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Post by enchilada on May 1, 2019 18:13:00 GMT
“Ohhh.....” Enchee looked at the flower, neatly in the spectral hand, and the knife on the floor, which she pocketed. She cleared her throat, then she did it again.
“It was Queso’s idea!” She protested, folding her arms over herself, then looking away, over her shoulder. She glanced round, view of only one eye allowing sight of that side. She offered the flower to Thea; Enchee was very good at taking advice off of people, and pretty bad at coming up with excuses by herself. It was hard to explain that sometimes... she just had to take stuff.
Sometimes, she didn’t even want it, she just wanted to take it. The feeling wasn’t fun, but Enchee basically couldn’t feel guilt, and if she ever had felt guilt, it was fleeting. Once the feeling that she needed to have the pretty shiny big thing, she felt pretty good! And she felt pretty good now that she’d held, if only with her mage hand, the flower.
“Uh huh.”
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Post by moralhazard on May 1, 2019 18:26:22 GMT
Thea raised an accusing eyebrow at Crucible – he was not helping! – then turned to Enchee, accepting the flower without the slightest sign of softening.
“Enchee,” Thea said, kneeling down to look at her smaller friend. “I’m not mad,” she wasn’t, not really, “but if you cut the flower down, then other people can’t enjoy it. You understand, don’t you? It’s nice to leave it for everyone to see.”
Thea glanced down at the flower in her hands, then back at the goblin. What was done was done; she would pay for it if the restaurant needed her too. “You know, I bet this would look very nice in your hair,” Thea grinned at Enchee. “It’s just the right color. I could fix it for you, once we’re at our table.”
Thea carefully tucked the flower away in her satchel as they made their way down the little hallway. It ended in a massive pit, covered with branches and leaves, which seemed to be the source of (some of) the smells.
A slender fire genasi stood next to it. He had ash-gray skin and hair that was the bright red of fire, which moved as if about to burst into flames at any moment.
“Thea!” He approached, hands outstretched.
“Kalino,” Thea clasped his too-warm hands in hers, smiling. “It’s a pleasure to see you, as ever.”
“And you,” Kalino beamed at her. “Our food didn’t scare you off last time, I take it.”
“No,” Thea laughed. “I’ve even brought new friends,” she smiled back at Crucible and Enchee.
“Right this way, my dear,” Kalino tucked Thea’s arm under his, and led her, Crucible and Enchee deeper into the restaurant. The foliage gave way to surprisingly comfortable looking sets of chairs and tables, all made of an exotic-looking wood. The edges of the room were studded with more greenery and flowers – not just the red ones, but all sorts – but it was far enough back from the tables not to be too claustrophobic.
Kalino led them to a table settled towards the back, and pulled out chairs for Enchee and Thea, promising to bring them some starters and their choice of drinks soon. Thea let Enchee get settled, gave Crucible a stern look as if admonishing him to make Enchee behave, and followed Kalino back towards the front of the restaurant, setting a hand on his arm and speaking quietly.
There was a sharp raised voice from Kalino, no words that Enchee or Crucible could make out, and his hair flamed sharply, but Thea smiled at him and said something else, and then he laughed and shook his head.
Thea made her way back to the table, and winked at Enchee. “All sorted, this time.” She brought the flower out again. “Shall I put it in your hair?” She asked.
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Post by 3personal5me on May 1, 2019 18:45:48 GMT
Crucible took his seat at the table, the chair protesting as he gently eased his weight onto it. He wasn't surprosedeby Theas reaction. He supposed he could be doing more to help. He could also be doing less.
He watched Thea walk off, wondering what she was up to. He surmised that she was explaining what happened with the flower. His suspicion was all but confirmed when she returned.
"She's right, Enchee. That flower matches your hair perfectly. Like a little princess".
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Post by enchilada on May 1, 2019 19:06:34 GMT
Enchee leaned forward, hopping up towards Kalino. She was transfixed by his hair. In a rather rude, childish way, she was just staring. And staring. And staring, even as she turned her body away from him, she kept staring. Her eyes were already big, but her eyes got even bigger. Her pupils were barely even slits anymore, making them look even... even bigger. Her eyebrows probably shouldn’t go that high? How were they so high? So high.
She took a few seconds to scramble onto the seat, which was quite unlike her. She sat on her legs, trying to give her a little more height. Just a little... a little more... why was she so small!
The goblin nodded eagerly at the promise of the flower in her hair. She smiled her big yellow smile. “Yes please, Thea!” Enchee giggled. At least she knew her pleases and thank yous.
And then Enchee nodded at crucible. “I am a princess, but I was already a princess soooooo........”
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Post by moralhazard on May 1, 2019 19:29:17 GMT
Thea laughed. She leaned forward, and carefully tucked the flower behind Enchee’s ear, deftly manipulating the girl’s oddly textured hair to coax it to stay. Enchee’s hair was unusual, but Thea had been fighting the wind in her hair for two decades, and she felt herself more than equal to any hair-related challenge. Carefully, she secured the flower, and pulled back.
“Hm…” Thea squinted at Enchee, considering her very, very seriously. After a moment, she nodded. “Absolutely like a princess,” she agreed, grinning at Enchee.
Kalino reappeared a few moments later. Whatever anger they had seen was gone, and he smiled approvingly down at Enchee. “Lovely, little darling,” he said, cheerfully.
Thea smiled gratefully up at him, and watched as he set down little bowls on the table.
“Now!” Kalino said, dramatically. “Thea, have you told your friends about the majesty of what they’re about to witness?”
Thea giggled. “No, Kalino, I thought I’d leave that for you.”
Kalino bowed. “We have a rare and exceptional treat for you today,” he explained. “Here, we serve a cuisine found nowhere else in Waterdeep – found nowhere on the material plane except for a small island in the distant seas. And, of course, here. We start with fried taro root,” he gestured to one of the bowls, “and small fish,” he gestured to another. “And a little dish of seaweed, and another of raw fish, perfectly safe, for those brave enough to try it!”
The last little thing he set down was two pitchers. “Here we have some sauces,” Kalino explained. “This one is sweet,” he pointed to a sticky, dark-looking liquid, “and this is spicy. Be careful! It’s quite difficult for many to eat this one,” he grinned. “And what would you like to drink?”
“Two of the coconut drinks, please,” Thea said, cheerfully. “Unless – “ she turned to Crucible.
Either way, once the orders were taken, Kalino would leave them to their little pre-feast treats.
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Post by 3personal5me on May 1, 2019 19:42:44 GMT
Crucible shook his head. He didn't eat or drink. He was capable of doing so, and could taste and smell the food. Some warforged ate and drank to feel closer to the biological races. Others genuinely enjoyed it. Crucible avoided it. Not that there was anything wrong with eating or drinking. He enjoyed food and drink, but found it to be a distraction. He waited until it was just the three of them again, then turned to Thea. "So how did you meet? It can't be worse than her robbing you". He shot a fake accusatory glance at Enchee.
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Post by enchilada on May 1, 2019 20:05:08 GMT
Enchee was too transfixed to really react, or even to exactly take on what the man was saying. Her eyes just followed him, and she remained silent.
When he left, she gasped, and shook her head at Crucible. “I told you! I don’t do stealing. I only do good things! Like... uh... I have a job, I deliver newsletters to some of the houses in, uh, the city. And I uh, I do it real fast! Zoom~!”
Enchee played with her hair, on the opposite side to the flower. “I met Thea at, um, her shop. I was actually going to buy something maybe but I didn’t because there were too many adults and they really pressured me. I wasn’t planning anything. I just... but it was better that way anyway. I don’t think my magic would work as good. Thea’s really good at making things! But me n my ball got somethin’ speshal!”
She eyed the food cautiously. She watched Thea for kind of... what to do? She wanted to copy her, because... well... at least where she lived, goblins didn’t quite eat the same as everyone else. Plus, she only ever ate beef stew anymore.
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Post by moralhazard on May 1, 2019 20:13:21 GMT
“Thank you, Enchee,” Thea said, cheerfully, smiling down at Enchee. She didn’t add anything to the story; there didn’t seem to be much point, and what Enchee had said was – technically – all true, at least as far as Thea knew.
"And then we met again yesterday," Thea explained. "I found Enchee helping the - goblin scouts? - sell some cookies. The apprentices all liked the cookies very much, Enchee! They told me to tell you thanks," she grinned at her.
“Here we go,” Thea said, cheerfully. “I bet you’ll like these!” She served Enchee a little ball of crunchy fried taro root; it didn’t have much taste, just a lot of crunch. Next to it, she put a little fried fish. “This sauce is very nice, it’s sweet,” she put a spoonful of it on Enchee’s plate next to the fish and taro root.
For herself, Thea took one of each, plus a little slice of raw fish and seaweed. She grinned at Enchee. “These are a little slimy, but they’re very tasty. Would you like to try it?” If Enchee did, Thea would carefully serve her a slice of each. “You can have more of whichever you like,” Thea promised.
She took her own fork, stuck it into the taro root, and dipped it in a little of the sweet sauce on her own plate, and took a bite of it.
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Post by 3personal5me on May 1, 2019 20:31:27 GMT
The warforged watched Enchee and Thea. They seemed to click, somehow. His fingers quietly drummed on the table as his mind wandered. He wondered why Thea was so good with Enchee. He wondered what happened to the little girls family. He was glad to know that she atleast had someone else to look out for her if he wasn't able to. He snapped back to reality, watching Enchee. He was curious to see if she even ate anything that wasn't beef stew. If he had a breath he would have held it.
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Post by enchilada on May 1, 2019 20:52:55 GMT
“Good! They can buy more in a few weeks! I’ll take a flyer!” Enchee delivered those, too. Handmade, each unique. Painstakingly drawn. By five year old goblins.
Enchee told herself she was going to try a bit of everything. She had to. For Thea. She didn’t want to disappoint her. It looked... different, that was for sure. She tilted her head at it, almost as it it would change. It didn’t.
The ball looked okay. She could almost definitely manage that, and, since it didn’t really taste like much at all... it was fine! Her confused, maybe slightly apprehensive face turned to one of delight as she ate that! It was actually really fun! Crunch... she hadn’t put the sauce on it. She wanted to try it alone, first. One step at a time.
Enchee nodded! “That one’s good.”
The fish was... fishy. Enchee wrinkled her nose as she brought it the fork her mouth. Two things were new here: the fork, the speed. Enchee was going extra slow to try to match Thea. She wasn’t used to it. It made it worse. This new experience that she was absolutely not very happy about forcing herself through was made painstakingly slow. You had to be slow with stew. It was full of watery stuff.
Fishy. It took the whole time she was chewing to decide if she liked it. She didn’t want to, but, she did. Fish were something her parents had actually prepared for her in the past, so at least it wasn’t entirely new. But she wasn’t going to stop there.
Slimy stuff. Right. Okay. She couldn’t imagine it being much different to the slimy texture on the outside of the dumplings in beef stew. She always left her vegetables, and one of the things looked quite a lot like cabbage, she thought, but she wasn’t entirely sure, because she never ate it. Only the suet dumplings and the beef. Occasionally an onion or two slipped through her razor sharp gaze. So she did try it.
Both of them were sort of fishy, but in different ways. Very different ways. Again, she wasn’t so sure.
But she liked the taro root.
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Post by moralhazard on May 1, 2019 21:04:21 GMT
“Oh, yes, please do!” Thea said, cheerfully. “I’m sure they’d be happy to buy more cookies.” It was true, too; the apprentices were always hungry. Thea didn’t really remember that from her own apprentice days, but, then, she’d lived at home rather than in the shop, or, rather, the workshop where she’d apprenticed had been part of her home. That had meant, in fact, much more time spent at meals that the air genasi might have wished.
Thea split her attention between nibbling slowly and carefully at her food and watching Enchee. She liked the taro root; that was good! She could see Enchee wrinkle her nose at the fish, but the little goblin tried it anyway. Thea couldn’t tell what she decided in the end, either about that or the sea weed and sliver of raw fish. Still, Enchee had tried everything, and that earned her a proud smile from Thea.
The raw fish was Thea’s favorite; she liked the seaweed as well. Such things weren’t popular in Waterdeep, but she’d had both before on the eastern edges of the Sea of Fallen Stars, as a little girl. She hadn’t been a picky eater; she’d wanted too badly to impress her mother with how grown she was, at the great age of thirteen. She ate her single piece of everything, and didn’t take more for herself.
“Would you like some more taro root?” Thea asked, smiling. “It’s even better with the sauce.” If Enchee agreed, Thea would serve her another ball.
It wasn’t Kalino this time, but someone else who returned with what looked like coconuts, with the tops chopped off and a long straw inserted. The juice inside was cold and sweet and flavorful; Thea didn’t hesitate to grasp the coconut with both hands and take a little sip from the straw, smiling at Enchee in the hope that she’d do the same.
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Post by 3personal5me on May 1, 2019 22:29:41 GMT
Crucible smiled, glad to see Enchee enjoying herself. Maybe one day he could even convince her to take a bath.
"Se Thea, how do you know this place? They clearly know you".
He was never good at small talk.
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Post by enchilada on May 2, 2019 17:54:03 GMT
“Yes please!”
Enchee stared at the new ball for a second, before, very carefully, dipping it in the sauce. Again, she stared at it, before resolving to put it in her mouth. She smiled, almost as appeased as before, but Enchee discovered she really rather liked plain food. It wasn’t a bad flavour, she’d definitely eaten some pretty awful things trying to keep alive, but she’d never really had so much choice.
And her choice just so happened to be beef stew.
Another thing, Enchee had literally no concept of any divide between adults and children. She had no idea what such a divide could be, or why it was there. All she knew was that she liked both of her friends.
“Yeah!” Enchee agreed with Cruciblem and then whispered, “What’s that man’s deal? With the fire?”
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Post by moralhazard on May 2, 2019 18:54:20 GMT
Thea smiled at Crucible. “Oh, well,” she paused, trying to think how to explain.
Enchee’s question interrupted her thoughts, but – in truth, it actually fit the overall explanation pretty well.
Thea grinned down at the goblin. “You know, that’s almost the same question! Enchee, do you remember what I told you about – what I am?”
Whether Enchee did or not, Thea would give a little explanation. “An air genasi – that means my father was a djinni. Like Calim,” Thea explained. “Now, when I told you about djinni, I told you about other elemental beings as well, remember? About genies, who are earth elementals, and marid, who are water elementals, and efreeti, who are fire elementals. Kalino, who owns this restaurant, is a fire genasi. That means that one of his parents was an efreeti, or at least descended from one. That’s why his hair is like that.”
Thea smiled at Crucible. “It’s also – how I know him, I suppose. Waterdeep may have more genasi than anywhere else in Faerun, but we're still not so many, in truth. I think Kalino makes a point to seek each of us out. He found me not long after I arrived at the city, and invited me here for a meal.”
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Post by 3personal5me on May 2, 2019 19:50:19 GMT
Crucible nodded along as he listened. He knew that Waterdeep was home to exotic races- he was one, after all- but he didn't realize that the others could share the comradery that warforged did. It seemed natural that the warforged be close knit. They were all, in a sense, siblings. Siblings from the same home, who fought in the same wars, and died in the same deserts and marshes and jungles.
But warforged were a dime a dozen. At least, they were, before they spread out through the world. They were built and sold for war, en masse, and grew up with legions of their own kind around them. He never considered what it would be like to live the opposite. For meeting your own kind to be a rarity.
He smiled.
"Well, anybody can benefit from a comrade, regardless of their association. To have met another of your kind is yet another blessing".
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