Maikana
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Chapter 46 – To spice things up
🕑 Added 2025-04-03 01:29:55 +0000 UTCThe feast laid out before them disappeared faster than the young group had expected it to. None of them held themselves back from devouring the soft, moist flesh that had been revealed once the shell had been cracked. While they found themselves satisfied with their meal, none were sated. They knew full well that other delicacies like the one they had just partaken of had been prepared in the many other halls.
Losq was well prepared, he’d scoped out many of the best places and foods while distributing the breweries wares over the past few days and chatting with the recipients. The great hall would have the most variety, but would also have the most kobolds packed into the space and be the hardest to navigate. So rather than spend their whole night waiting in lines, he guided them through the passages and tunnels, skirting the edge of the great hall if they needed to traverse it, checking off many of the items on his mental list of tasty treats.
Their next stop took them out near where Beys worked her days, though none of them had any interest in whatever interesting preparation of moss the farmers produced. It was still moss after all. No, they were after something else that was farmed in those caves. Beetles. Unlike the little crunchy beetles that the hatchlings enjoyed making sport of, they were after their larger kin. These ones were the size of a kobolds fist and while they still had the satisfying crunch of the smaller ones, these were much better after they had been cooked.
Tonight on offer was something else none of them had tried before, honey glazed grilled beetles. They were being served skewered three to a stick and were coated in a sticky sweet glaze that they were all excited for. When they arrived, the crowds had already settled in to their meals. The buzz of conversation loud in the hall and several kobolds sitting on the stage eating their food; soon to take up their instruments to begin the next stage of the evening’s entertainment.
It didn’t take long for them to obtain their own skewered beetles, though they only asked for 3 servings for them to split. There were many more treats for them to chase down so no point in filling up in one place. The crunch and pop of the beetles as they bit in releasing the juices to dribble down their chins competed with their sighs of satisfaction and sounds of pleasure as they tasted the sweet glaze and perfectly grilled beetle. They sat for a time, enjoying their snack and chatting about random things before heading to their next stop.
This time they did linger in the great hall, not for the food but for a bit of a show. With dinnertime winding down, it was time for the entertainment to begin. Unlike the loud music and dancing that would take place in the various halls, there were other events to be enjoyed in the central chamber of the clan’s caverns. What caught the youngling’s eyes was a tale being told by one of the matrons, a large white cloth hung from a wall and shadows moved about depicting the story as she spoke.
“And so, the Matriarch,” The shadow of a large draconic form appearing alongside her words, “Did call forth her most loyal servants from the lesser races.” Various small shadows that looked like ants before the dragon marched in from the side. “And she bade them to change so that they might serve her to their fullest.” The smaller shapes bent double and appeared to be prostrating themselves before her. “That she would gift them the barest morsel of her essence so that they might be elevated. A gift they proudly accepted.” One by one, each of the little shapes stood and grew slightly, little wings sprouting until they rose up from the shadowed ground they had rested upon.
As the familiar story continued, Kori caught sight through the crowd of what was being done. A mage sat in the front with a strange cone in front of him. The tiniest trace of mana hinting at the lantern spell being used to shine a light through it onto several carved figures that other matrons manipulated to make the shadows dance across the white sheet of rough canvas cloth.
They stayed and watched the performance with rapt attention as they told the tale of the creation of the kobolds by the matriarch of dragons. It reminded Kori of the first time she’d heard the story told by Elder Kles; the rambunctious little hatchlings attention captured in the telling in the brood chamber. When the display ended, they clapped along with the sizable crowd that had gathered alongside them. There would be another story to follow, after a break to prepare, but the younglings had food still left to find and dashed away, hoping that their delay would not cause them to miss out on anything.
Several halls, and several treats later, the younglings crossed back through the great hall, heading to one of their final destinations. They had heard a rumor that Blonc’s warriors had raided a den of badgers and were serving something special in the training grounds. Not many ventured that way so they had some hope that there would still be some left, but if there was it wouldn’t last long.
Cutting through the great hall they ventured closer to the Elder’s table set up in front of the entrance to the chapel. A disturbance among the Elders catching Kori’s attention as she had apparently captured one of its occupants.
“There shesh is…” A loud and slurred voice called out. “The litthle walshking disaster hershelfs…”
Kori turned to see what was going on, horrified to realize that the attention of every eye in the vicinity had been split between the source of the loud garbled yelling and herself. Bolst stood upon the table, with several of the other Elders were trying to get him down, swaying on his feet with a tankard in one hand and the other pointing at Kori.
“Ish jusf want my lab back…” He bemoaned, trying to take another swig of his empty drink. “But noooo…” He cried, nearly stumbling off the table as Ylst tried desperately to hold him upright. “You made that… thath… Thing… and nowsh I’m mixshing in… In… A closet… And… And… He.” Waving the tankard back to point in Ortik’s direction. “Magde me get rid of my spichders…” He exclaimed sadly. He continued whining about his lab, his spiders, and the unfairness of everything for several minutes, Kori wanting nothing more than to slink away into the crowd but feeling compelled to remain. Eventually Aldr and Blonc intervened and each took hold of an arm before carrying the man away.
Kori tried not to let the drunken trapcrafter’s antics bother her, but they did. She respected the man and to see him like that was upsetting. She still had difficulty in not blaming herself for the incident and this certainly wasn’t going to help the matter any.
Before they could depart, Ylst waved Kori over to them for a moment, attempting to apologize for her peer’s actions. “Don’t take what he said too hard Kori. He’s had too much to drink and let his ongoing argument with Ortik spill out.” She shook her head, clearly thinking that the matter should have remained a private discussion. “He doesn’t really blame you for any of it.” She attempted to reassure Kori. “Though we’re all a bit surprised how hard he’s been taking the loss of those redbacks…” A shiver ran down Ylst’s spine all the way to the end of her tail as she spoke of the little spiders, a gesture shared by several other nearby Elders.
“I won’t Elder. Thank you.” Kori replied, not really meaning it but trying to be polite.
As she turned to leave, she heard Ortik call out to her, “Youngling, come to the Elder’s chamber near the end of the meeting tomorrow. There’s the matter of your apprenticeship to discuss.”
Returning a quick “Yes, Spiritcaller Ortik.” Kori departed quickly to avoid getting drawn into anything else.
After they left the great hall heading to the training yard, a quick trip with few others in the tunnel, the group began to bombard Kori with questions. They’d all heard what happened, Kori told them all the same night, but they still pestered her about Bolst and especially about the spiders.
“What’s a redback?” Losq asked, not really understanding what the big deal had been.
“It’s a tiny spider, smaller than my littlest claw. Their bite can kill a kobold in minutes and it’s a bad way to go apparently. Not as bad as that rock fish thing, but still bad.” She explained as they continued onwards. This of course opened questions about the stonefish, which led to her explaining about the centipede and everything else that he’d kept. To say that the other younglings were all now terrified of Bolst and his creepy pets once the conversation ended would be putting things nicely.
Once they reached the training grounds the conversation quickly shifted away from the past and onto the present. Mostly to do with whatever that tantalizing smell that permeated the air was. They found themselves drawn to a station set up with several fire runes heating large pots of water and plumes of steam rising into the air. Each pot was covered with a wooden circle over ten centimeters thick, its purpose unknown to any of them.
Watching them approach was a grizzled older warrior who stood behind the pots, a shock since they had expected a cook to be making the food like it had been in all of the other halls.
“Welcome, welcome! Come to have a taste of something a little different have we, younglings?” He called to them, waving the five forward. “I bet you haven’t tried anything like this in all the caverns this evening.” He said with a broad smile as he reached over and lifted the top of the wooden disk off of one of the nearby pots. Inside he revealed a hollowed interior with several plump white pieces of food, nearly the size of the beetles earlier. At first Kori thought them to be larvae of some type, steamed within the wooded container but that guess didn’t seem right, as Kori recalled the rumour had said they were serving badger and she was pretty sure that badgers didn’t have larvae.
“What are they, Shieldmaster?” Beys asked, having recognized the man preparing the food.
Hearing his class being named, he cocked his head and gave Beys a good long look before his eyes lit up with recognition. “The little arm-breaker, yes?” She winced as he brought up one of her worst days. “Sorry. Come, come, try some badger dumplings.” Motioning them forward as he spoke before beginning to pile the so-called dumplings onto a slate for them. “And here, for bringing up a sore topic, a little something extra.” He lowered his voice as he set a little pot of something with a small wooden spoon on the side of the slate. “Careful with this, it’s got a bite.”
They thanked the warrior, darting off to the edge of one of the sparring rings to sit and dig in. When they checked on the contents of the little pot, they found a reddish oily substance within with a strong and pungent aroma unfamiliar to any of them. With a shrug that it must be good if he gave it to them as an apology, Kori ladled a spoonful over the top of the round white dumpling that looked as though it were twisted closed at the top and proceeded to take a big bite out of the side.
The first thing she noticed was the soft not quite gooey but also not firm texture of the outside before the rich, fatty meat gave way on the inside, its juices dribbling down her scales as it overflowed within her mouth. The second thing she noticed was an intense burning sensation. Her mouth was on fire. Tears began to well up in her eyes as she just barely avoided dropping the dumpling in the sand below, managing to just keep it on the edge of the slate.
In a panic she looked about the chamber that she’d spent six months of her life practicing to be a mage until she spotted one of the basins near the edge of the room. Dashing away from her siblings to their panicked squawks, she drove her head beneath the water rune praying it was well maintained as she activated it. She spent a full minute drinking from the stream of water produced, it spilling over her face and drenching her clothes as she tried to wash away the aggressive flavour.
Her mad dash had been apparent to all nearby, the grizzled old warrior laughing himself senseless and others joining him in a good chuckle. The lack of worry eased the fears of her siblings for her safety, all of them now suspiciously eying the little pot of what Kori could only imagine what tasting her flame flask might be like. After she finally returned to the group, panting slightly and her scales flush, her siblings pester her with questions. The only answer she would give them however was simply, “Try it for yourself.”
So, they did. In much smaller quantities than Kori had mistakenly used. A little dab being more than enough to create a pleasant burning sensation that accompanied the fatty badger meat quite well. Kori even ate the remainder of her first dumpling, in small bites, so it wouldn’t go to waste. She wouldn’t admit it quite yet, but once she was used to the taste and wasn’t drowning the dumpling in the oil, they may have been her favorite of the evenings treats.
Returning the still mostly full pot of spicy oil to where they’d gotten it, Kori asked the warrior what it was. Apparently, it was called ‘chili oil’ and was a product of the surface. The merchants traded the pelts from the badgers and materials from any other creatures the warriors slew for it, amongst other things.
As the night was winding down and the halls devolved into loud music and drunken dancing, or drunken music and loud dancing depending on who did the most of the drinking, there was one more surprise in store for the evening. This time it wasn’t Losq who had made plans, he had no where else to lead them, it was Qot. Kori thought that they had avoided the traditional sneaking of the booze that many younglings participated in, but apparently Qot had done so pre-emptively. She’d stashed a small cask of mead aside where no one should notice it when helping with deliveries. No one really questioned why an apprentice brewer was walking around carrying such a thing and that was all it took to secret it away for later.
Losq gave his sister a shocked look when she explained what she had stashed away, while Plk and Beys grinned eagerly. “What if we get caught? You know what Aldr will do to us.” He cautioned.
“So? We’ll just get cleaning duty for a few weeks. Not like we don’t do that anyway.” She rebutted, waving off his concerns. “We just need to go someplace nobody will notice us.”
They spent several minutes discussing the matter, Losq and Kori reluctant while the other three were all for it. Eventually they gave in and went along with Qot’s plan. Though Kori gave the suggestion of where to go to enjoy their ill-gotten beverage. There was that little alcove overlooking the lake that Kori went to when she wanted to be alone. The others knew of it of course, they’d all heard how Korse had checked there when they were looking for her after the end of her apprenticeship with Ortik, between the area being relatively private and the lake being deserted for the festival, they thought it was perfect.
It took some doing to navigate the less used tunnels and deserted places while they lugged around a cask with a few litres of mead in it, but they managed to make it to their destination and found it to be nearly as deserted as they hoped. A few fishers were sitting around one of the work areas, passing about tankards from their own keg, one much larger than what the younglings had absconded with, while they mended a net. If they noticed the new arrivals they gave no sign of it, letting them be about their business. As they moved away from the group they heard complaints of too many torn nets lately, mostly blaming their apprentices.
The younglings made their way around to the unused side of the cavern, overlooking the expanse of the lake that was webbed with ropeways and lines above the water that the fishers used to traverse the space. The little hollow that Kori led them to was not what the others had expected. The ground had been cleared of jagged rocks and there were leather mats rolled in a corner. A few slates sat on top of a pair of larger relatively square stones that looked tall enough to make a short table from. The space seemed well used and much more comfortable than anyone expected.
When they shot their little sister questioning looks, she just shrugged, “What? I like it here.” As if that explained everything.
Once they had the place set up and they gathered around the cask, sitting beside the slightly unstable little stone table, they ran into a slight problem. You were supposed to use some type of tool to open a cask and none of them had such a thing. Instead, they relied on brute strength. Losq managed to pry the top ring off and pop out the lid for them to dip their pilfered tankard in to fill it.
The five remained there, the cask set out on their little table, passing around a dented metal tankard and drinking their fill. All except Kori who had no interest in partaking and was mostly just craving a nice cup of tea. They talked about their apprenticeships, and the food they’d had, and how they were hoping they’d get good classes. Beys even admitted, once she was well and truly drunk, that leaving the warriors was the best thing that could have happened. That Blonc had talked with her about her anger and cautioned that if she didn’t work on it, she was looking at a berserker class that no one wanted for her.
They stayed there for hours, at some point even the fishers had left, drinking and talking, staring out over the waters. Plk was probably the drunkest of them all, as aside from Kori he was the only one who never really did much physical labour and his vitality was even lower than hers. At one point he stumbled back from the waters edge, where he’d gone to relieve himself, claiming he’d seen a shape bulge up on the surface of the water. None of the others spotted such a thing and told him he’d clearly drank too much, having a good laugh at his expense. By the time they left for their dens, the caverns of Clan Emberscale were quiet as a grave, aside from the odd snores coming from those who never made it back to their own.
