glowfic | One Curious Kobold

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One Curious Kobold

It's winter, and all is well with the tribe. Their new magic, an ability to make portals from one place to another, which was found by one of their members during the early-summer trip to meet with the other tribes in the area, let them both build up a decadent food stockpile and move to a much deeper part of the cave system without the worry of being unable to find their way back out. No-one has had to go hungry, and even the fiercest ice storm doesn't reach them; they are as content as kobolds can be.

Well, aside from their new mage, that is. She's bored, and curious. Making portals to known places is straightforward enough, with the magic she found, but that's far from the limit of what it can do... so one day, she slips away, portals off to a different cave system - one can't be too careful, after all - and experiments.

Temperature roughly the same... gravity roughly the same... air the same, not into stone or underwater or in a volcano or on top of a mountain... but, instead of patterning it after a place she knows, what happens if she only specifies those things, and lets the innate patterns of the spot she's casting on do the rest? Particularly this one part, which seems to specify the world...

She finishes the spell, and hesitates for just a moment before activating it.

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Nod, smile. Good enough.

Pleased grin.

She pushes the pile of enspelled twine loops over to him, peering demonstratively through one first - does he see anything interesting in the collection so far?

He begins looking through them one by one, contemplating their various apparent properties.

A tentative voice calls out from the mouth of the cave.

That's alarming. The kobold is alarmed.

She moves next to the Endarkened, close enough to touch him in case she needs to teleport them away.

The Endarkened is not alarmed; he's curious.

He gets even more curious as the voice says more things.

("Um, hello. My name is Tenathayan. If there's anyone in there, I'm supposed to ask you to please not... leave... the world. And - oh - I'm supposed to tell you that all of the Endarkened died, and so did nearly all of the dragons. But I suppose if there is no one in there then I am standing here yelling into this cave for nothing. I'm sorry.")

The Endarkened not being alarmed is slightly reassuring, but only slightly; the kobold stays alert and waits to see how he's going to respond to this.

"And, I, um—" (here the voice briefly drops below audible volume before resuming) "—if there is someone in the cave who would like to talk to me, I am going to be in a tent on the southwestern beach." (Pause.) "I brought tea." (Mutter, mutter. Possibly another voice is involved in the muttering.) "And a unicorn. I am supposed to not surprise you with the unicorn." (Mutter.) "It's very good tea. Um. Anyway. Goodbye."

Well. The Endarkened is moderately confused, and very curious.

The kobold is alarmed at the prospect of there being a unicorn here, but she doesn't seem inclined to stop him from going and checking the situation out. It's not clear whether she'll follow or not, if he goes; she doesn't appear to have decided that yet herself.

Edited 2015-10-16 16:42 (UTC)

Before he decides anything, he has a go at translating some of the things the stranger said.

First he enlarges the tiny island a bit, and puts himself and the kobold in the cave, and an unshaped rock outside it that he hesitantly shapes into something vaguely elflike - he thinks the speaker is an elf, but isn't sure. He labels the questionable rock 'Tenathayan' and '...elf?', uncertainly.

Then, "Tenathayan says all the Endarkened died." This illustrated by indicating the questionable rock, touching it while he repeats 'all the Endarkened died', and then going over to all the Endarkened figurines and having them inexplicably fall over dead.

"Tenathayan says almost all the dragons died." Touch questionable rock, go over to the dragon figurines, all but two of them inexplicably fall over dead.

"Tenathayan says he brought a unicorn." A unicorn figurine joins the questionable rock. "Tenathayan says he will go to the southwestern beach." There go the questionable rock and his unicorn companion.

She considers this.

Then she examines the dragon figurines, and the endarkened figurines, and considers the layout of the cave to this point, and seems concerned.

Well, she can do what she can do, anyway: she ties a few pieces of twine together to make a longer string, attaches it to the cave wall a above her own head height with some sticky goop she was carrying in a tiny waterskin in her belt pouch, then puts an Endarkened-sized portal into the wall of the cave behind the string leading to a different cave. She carefully touches the string, and mimes pulling it away from the wall, and the portal subsequently closing. There's enough slack in the string that the Endarkened should be able to get all the way through the portal before it detaches, if he walks or runs through, and then if the portal closes as described, nobody will be able to follow him.

Edited 2015-10-16 17:35 (UTC)

He nods.

And, after some thought, he says: "I will go to the southwestern beach to talk to Tenathayan." There goes his figurine.

More consideration, and she moves her figurine to the beach too.

Nod nod.

And he goes out of the cave, and has to take a moment to adjust to the brightness of being outdoors, and sets off toward the beach.

She follows watchfully.

On the beach there is a lovely elven tent, and sitting just next to it, with a little awning extended over him to give him shade, there is a miserable-looking unicorn.

When the Endarkened emerges from the forest, the unicorn squeaks with surprise. "Tenathayan!" he says, and then some more things in a language the Endarkened does not speak.

Tenathayan - who is indeed an elf - emerges slowly and nervously from the tent. When he sees the Endarkened, he blushes and averts his eyes.

"I, ah, I See you," he says. "Um. This is Liselen. He says - well, he says you are not evil. But he is also very seasick, and you are - he said that you are not, um, comfortable for unicorns to be near, anyway, and so if you would like to take tea with me I should bring the tea and things out to you, instead of you coming into my tent. But, um, you are welcome here! It's just, seasick unicorn."

"I... see," says the Endarkened, regarding the pair of them with amusment. "I think it would be very interesting to take tea with you. I mean you no harm, and it seems that you do not mean me any harm either."

"We certainly don't!" says Tenathayan. "We came all this way even though Liselen gets miserably seasick just so that we could give you a message from the Wild Magic, and the message is that the - well, the other Endarkened, I suppose - are all dead, and so are most of the dragons, and if you please, it would be very helpful of you not to leave this world." He fidgets for a moment, then adds, "I did not know it was possible to leave this world. Today has been a very confusing day."

The Endarkened laughs. Tenathayan smiles, somewhat nervously.

The kobold considers. That is certainly a unicorn, but not a threatening one; the elf doesn't seem to be a threat either. The Endarkened seems to be okay with them, not wary or defensive; not in a state where he'd mind the distraction of her coming out of hiding. And the elf might benefit from a demonstration of the Endarkened's harmlessness, if she's reading the situation properly.

Well, she can do that. She steps out of the underbrush and approaches her friend, making a quiet noise of greeting and nudging his hand for scritches when she gets close enough.

Aww. He smiles down at her and provides friendly scritches.

...Tenathayan... just sort of blinks at them.

"This is a friend I made recently," the Endarkened explains. "I do not know her name, or whether she has one, but she calls her species 'kobold'."

"Um. I See you, kobold," says Tenathayan uncertainly in a koboldward direction.

Yup, right choice, excellent.

She grins up at the Endarkened, then nods politely to Tenathayan.

Tenathayan seems to be getting slightly less awkward about the whole thing, but is still a bit nervous when he continues: "I... will bring out the tea things, and some chairs. And, er. I have extra clothes. If you would like something to wear." This while still not quite looking at the Endarkened.

The Endarkened snorts softly with amusement. "I would not mind, and it seems you would be more comfortable that way. I will wear something."

"Right. Tea, chairs, clothing," says Tenathayan, and he ducks back into the tent and then comes out hauling a succession of objects. There is a small table to hold tea things, and there are tea things, and there is a small plate of little cakes which he leaves beside Liselen, and a somewhat larger tray of little cakes which he sets on the table next to the tea things, and there are three very elegant and comfortable folding stools, although their sizes do not vary much and so the Endarkened perches on a stool somewhat too small for him and the kobold, if she chooses to sit on one, might find hers a bit big. There is also a sort of kilt for the Endarkened, which he puts on.

Tenathayan pours tea for everyone (including Liselen, who gets a cup sized to be drunk from by unicorns, and who seems tentatively pleased about this), and then sits down and sips his tea and seems very cheered by some combination of the tea and the Endarkened's newly clothed state.

The Endarkened sits on his stool and picks up his tea and sips it and smiles.

The kobold sits, and sniffs cautiously at the tea before tasting it. It's quite good; she nods approvingly.

"The tea is good," says the Endarkened agreeably.

Tenathayan brightens. "This is one of my favourites. I did not know what the weather would be on this island, so I brought several blends. I am glad you like it."

"The weather?"

Tenathayan winces very slightly, but recovers almost immediately and nods. "Yes. Many things affect when it is most appropriate to drink a particular tea. Some flavours suit the rain best, while others are best on a warm clear day."

"I do not drink very much tea," says the Endarkened, "so I am not very familiar with the subtleties."

Tenathayan takes this as a cue to start explaining the intricacies of tea. He finds this subject very relaxing, and the Endarkened is amused and reasonably interested.

The kobold sips her tea while she listens. After a little while, she considers the cakes, but decides against trying them; instead, she quietly enspells another piece of twine and retrieves a pear to munch on.

The Endarkened nibbles on some cakes eventually. He approves, but decides not to interrupt Tenathayan's fascinating discourse on tea in order to tell him so.

Tenathayan has many things to say about tea - its various plants, their flavours, the many combinations thereof, and the association of these things to assorted seasons and hours of the day and weather conditions - and seems to be well on his way to forgetting that he is saying them to the ancient enemy of all that is good in the world.

The kobold doesn't interrupt either, not when things are going so well. She finishes her pear, and puts the core on her tribe's compost heap with another portal, and quietly moves next to the Endarkened for more scritches.

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endragoned - 2015-10-17 02:02 (UTC) - Expand

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lurkingkobold - 2015-10-17 02:12 (UTC) - Expand

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