Spring 1016
Some Other Wanderlust
Peach and Ixtalan
Some-Other-Peach
On a day like this, the Wanderlust was constantly in motion - the entire building seeming to shift with the ebb and flow of people coming in through the swinging saloon style doors, flooding the dining room with roaring laughter and eddys of fresh salt-sea air. This was when the Wanderlust was at its best, Peach thought, when it swayed and danced and if Peach could catch the rhythm of it just right, she could sing along.
Peach sang along today - a nothing song - the sort of thing her mother would call a kitchen song. Lyrics improvised about the things and people in the tavern, with plenty of half-rhymes and “da dum de dums” to fill in the gaps.
Peach happily adapted her song as she went - it had started as a trick to remember customers and orders and so as Peach brought a fresh pot of hot water to the priestess and her acolyte sitting quietly in the corner the kitchen song was a gentle tune about tea. And as she served another round of ale and hot pies to a crew of rowdy sailors - recently returned to shore and flush with gold and fresh adventure, Peach’s song became about the sea.
“I had a man come in who smelled like the sea, with salt on his lips says he’s been dreamin’ of me—” as she sang, Peach fell into a dance that was half-flirtation and half artful dodge - slapping away hands pawing at her skirt while still smiling, laughing, always staying a half-step ahead.
“—I say the sea can be nice but life’s nothing without spice and salt alone won’t put a sway in these hips—” here Peach popped her hip dramatically, dropping a wink to no one in particular, and the table of sailors hooted appreciatively. Peach turned away from the table - already thinking of the next table, the next song, when suddenly, startlingly, she feels a hand grab her wrist.
Peach turns back, eyes wide, smile automatic. The man who grabbed her isn’t big, but he’s bigger than she is, and as Peach tries to pull her hand away, his grip tightens. “Oh no, don’t go,” he says, “come on, forget the rest of them, we haven’t seen something sweet as you in weeks.”
“I’m flattered,” says Peach, “I can be right back with—”
The man stands - the sudden movement sending a small wave of complaints and spilled drinks down the length of the table - and pulls Peach toward him, hard. Peach loses her balance - missing her step just slightly, and the man catches her with a chuckle. “See?” he says, “You don’t really wanna go. Tell you what, give me some sugar and I’ll let you go clock out…”
Ixtalan
Suddenly the man shouts, hand flying to the back of his head. Something small and hard clatters to the ground at his feet - a pit of some fruit, still wet with saliva and bits of yellow-orange flesh. He spins, eyes darting around the common room, but the people in the path the pit had come flying from either haven’t noticed or are looking around, just as baffled.
Another pit comes arrowing in from the opposite direction, striking him in the head again. A pair of stroppy teens in the corner snigger between themselves.
The sailor’s eyes narrow, and, releasing Peach, he stomps over to the table. “And what are you laughing about, eh? Think this is funn—ow!” This, as another pit strikes him directly on the cheekbone, leaving a wet trail down his cheek as it sticks momentarily and slides down his face.
“Peaches aren’t in season yet, dickshit,” a voice calls. A third stroppy teen suddenly materializes at the empty spot on a bench at a table of stolid farmers, who shift uncomfortably at the attention suddenly being pulled toward them. “Really sour. Not sweet at all. Do not recommend. Ask me how I know.” Ixtalan spits out a fourth peach pit and grimaces at the stone.
“Dickshit” eyes her, then bursts into loud, overdone laughter. “A joke! I see! Very funny, in’t she?” He looks over at his table, the sailors there watching the goings-on with a mix of amusement, boredom, and exasperation. “A wannabe minstrel here. Go on, tell us another one.”
Ixtalan grins, eyes sparking, and unfolds to her feet, taking a few steps away from the nervous table of farmers. She’s tall, already, overtopping the sailor by a few inches, but lean as a rail. “Do you want me to start with you or your mum?”
The two teens at the table in the corner exchange glances and stand. The sailors at Dickshit’s table, seeing this, rise as well. Silence falls, tense, until the halfling throws a couple of coppers on the table and jerks her head toward the door. “Good luck, Ish.”
“What?! Come on, you guys—”
“We didn’t tell you to pick a fight with a table full of sailors, idiot,” the dragonborn says. Said table full of sailors relaxes as they see their friend has only one lanky adolescent to deal with, returning to their seats amidst chortling and suggestions on how best to teach the snake a lesson. “See you at the doc’s,” he finishes, clapping her on the shoulder as they squeeze past.
She scowls after them, then turns around to see Dickshit right in her face. She has only an instant to gulp before he sends her flying into the freshly-abandoned table.
It makes an impressive clatter, but quick as a (sorry-not-sorry) serpent, she rolls to the side and pops up to her feet, lashing out with a foot at Dickshit’s ankles. He staggers and flails but doesn’t fall, regaining his balance as she dances back, out of his reach. Growling, he closes in on her, to be met with a face full of chicken bones and pewter as Ixtalan catches up the abandoned plate and hurls it at his face. He powers through both that and the dregs of ale from a tankard flung his way, reaching for her. The first grab misses as she dodges one way, but the weave puts her right into the path of the second grab, his fist closing on the collar of her coat. She half-eels out of it, but one arm remains trapped, pinning her in place as he winds up a punch that lands solidly on her fists held protectively before her face, smashing them back into her own nose. A second glances off her forearms, and more rain around her shoulders and chest as she rears back as far as she can, trying to shelter her head.
With a spasm of effort, she wheels them both around a quarter-circle, giving her space to wriggle out of the rest of the jacket and his reach. Panting, she backpedals, half-falling, half-sliding over a table to shouts of indignation and sprays of spilled ale, at this point just looking to run away.
Peach
There is a sharp blast, and a shower of sparks rains down on the common room. Miranda Pine stands in the kitchen doorway, thrown into silhouette by the light from her prestidigitation.
The crowd - which had started to form a rough circle around the fighting pair of Ixtalan and the man she had dubbed “Dickshit” - falls quiet at the sudden noise and the presence of the Wanderlust’s proprietor.
“Peach, where are you at, girl?” Miranda’s voice rings out clear over the silent bar.
Peach pulls herself from the well-meaning entrapment of the arms of the Priestess and her Acolyte. “I’m fine,” she says, half to the pair, and half to her mother. She takes a few unsteady steps before regaining her rhythm and finding her footing again, “I’m over here!”
Miranda nods, sharply, and turns her attention to Dickshit.
“You!” she barks - Miranda has a small frame, but she is bright with rage and prestidigitated sparks, and her voice makes Dickshit jump. “You’re picking a fight with a kid?”
The sailor wipes the back of his hand across his mouth leaving a smear of blood and chicken grease. Ixtalan had gotten a few hits in, and he is bleeding from a deep cut along his jaw. He looks toward where Ixtalan is - shaken, but steady on her feet - and then back at Miranda. “She—”
“She what?” Miranda interrupts, “Ixtalan, there, is fifteen. The same age as my daughter, I’ll have you note.”
At this, a wave of laughter ripples through the table of sailors. From somewhere in the crowd, a voice cracks a joke about ‘unripe fruit’ and Dickshit’s face reddens, a fresh stream of blood now dripping down to the corner of his mouth. He wipes his face again.
Peach sees her moment, and so she moves quickly, careful to avoid the debris from the fight - stepping deftly around broken pottery and an overturned chair until she is in front of the injured sailor. She smiles, and pulls a folded paper napkin from her apron pocket, offering it to Dickshit.
“You know,” says Peach, voice dripping with artificial sweetness, “you’ve got a little something, right there.” She gestures to the corner of her own mouth and watches as Dickshit apes the motion, wincing at his own touch. “You should go see the Doc and get stitched up!” Peach smiles and snaps her fingers, as if remembering something, “You know she’s also a friend of mine? Small towns, right? Too funny. Tell her I say hey?”
Another ripple of laughter passes through the room, and this time it’s as if a spell is broken. The crowd breaks up into its constituent groups - tables resume their conversations and it’s only a few moments before the sailors have been cleared out entirely; Miranda chivvying out the entire crew despite their pleas and apologies and promises of future gold.
The Wanderlust starts to move again, ticking away like a well-wound clock, and as Peach makes her way to where Ixtalan is standing she finds herself humming a new song. On her way she sweeps up Ixtalan’s jacket discarded in the fight. There is a tear along the collar but thankfully no worse damage. As Peach nears Ixtalan herself, though, her kitchen song catches in her throat. Ixtalan is hurt. Not badly, but hurt while trying to protect her and Peach suddenly feels as if she is at the verge of tears.
“Oh!” says Peach, softly, “Oh, Ixtalan you didn’t need to…I mean…can you…” Peach stops stumbling and her words instead spill out quickly, “Do you want to come on back to the kitchen with me? I’ll get you cleaned up and we can see if we need to call Doc, okay?”
Ixtalan
Having frozen in her tracks with Miranda’s dramatic entrance, much like everyone else in the room, leaves Ixtalan seated on the other side of the table she’d just slid-fallen over, carrying a decent portion of the table’s contents splattered liberally up her back. Which is nice, as it allows her to make herself comfortable to enjoy the sight of the formidable-when-she-wants-to-be elf shaming the sailors and restoring order. Ixtalan even gets to grin cheekily and wink at Dickshit as he’s chivvied out, which makes the man’s face darken.
As talk starts up again, she takes stock, scraping excess food off herself with an abandoned fork and testing the various bruised and battered portions of her body. Peach approaches as she’s occupied with tilting her head back and gingerly attempting to staunch the trickle of blood dripping from it, leaving Ixtalan in a position to look straight at her—they’re nearly eye-to-eye, despite her being seated. The white of one eye is starting to redden, burst capillaries vivid against the gold of her irises and the black of the scaled portion of her face. “Souds good,” she says, nasally, the back of her sleeve stuffed beneath her nose. “Thik my dose might be broked though. Maybe just sprai’ed.” She rises to follow Peach, wending around the tables to head back toward the kitchen of the tavern, still dripping a little from the spilled ale her shirt and pants had absorbed. “What a chode, huh? Do you haf to deal with a lot of that?”
Peach
Peach looks back at Ixtalan, smiling but then biting it back - she doesn’t want Ixtalan to think Peach thinks her injuries are funny.
“Yeah, but it’s okay,” she says in answer to Ixtalan, eyes firmly forward as she steers them toward the kitchen. The swinging doors close softly behind the two girls, muffling the sound of the dining room beyond and providing some level of privacy.
Peach seats Ixtalan on a low stool and then busies herself with the sort of thing she’s seen Doc do, the odd time Peach had needed to act as nursemaid. Some bandages, yes, that made sense. And a flat of ice-packed vegetables - near rotting and thus magically frozen to later be used for stew (Peach wraps this in a clean linen towel, just in case the vegetables start to thaw, or smell).
What else…Peach hesitates, chewing her lip, her feet moving to the anxious beat of this new kitchen song…water. For some reason Doc always had a bowl of hot water…
“It’s okay though…” Peach continues to answer Ixtalan’s question, but then laughs at her own awkwardness. There had been silence for minutes by now, and Peach’s laugh echoes back at her from inside the cabinet - her head and shoulders briefly buried, looking for a bowl as an excuse to compose herself. “Not that it’s okay, because it’s not, it’s annoying, that sort of customer but - ah!” Peach rises from the depths of the cabinetry, bowl triumphantly in hand, and continues to talk - the pleasant chatter flowing automatically, as she fills the bowl with water, seemingly from nowhere. “It’s something that comes with the territory, and my mom’s got a no tolerance policy, which you’ve seen.”
Peach sets the bowl of water on the counter next to Ixtalan’s stool with a small flourish and a waitress’ practiced grace. “I don’t usually have someone pullin’ big damn hero moves and defending my honor though.”
Peach starts to dip a clean kitchen cloth in the bowl of hot water and looks up at Ixtalan - even seated Ixtalan is slightly taller. She continues to talk as she blots Ixtalan’s bloodied nose with the cloth. “You know I’m pretendin’ like I know what I’m doing here but I’ve got you a cold pack and some hot cloths and I don’t even…”
Peach’s smile falters and she falls quiet as she tries to assess the level of damage Ixtalan has taken on her behalf. Suddenly the cloth feels too hot - the heat spreading from Peach’s hand into her cheeks, and she pulls it back - “I should probably just walk you to the Doc, really…”
Ixtalan
“I don’t usually have someone pullin’ big damn hero moves and defending my honor though.”
“Well thad’s dumb,” is Ixtalan’s blunt assessment. “A pretty girl like you should be gedding more prodection from bullies ady time ode pops up.” Unwillingly, her thoughts flick to the temple priestess and her tagalong acolyte, and she flushes in embarrassment. She covers it over by taking the warm damp cloth and wiping down her hands and face, taking more care to avoid her nose than her heretofore stoic bearing of Peach’s administrations might have indicated it needed. “Zero tolera’ce does dot mea’ much if do ode dows it isid tolerated udtil someode tries, ad thed it just keeps repeati’g.”
She sets the cloth down, prods her nose - hardly more than a brush of a finger - and winces. “I thi’k you are right though. I should go to the physicker for this.” She rises, setting the dirtied cloth down next to the bowl, and smiles at Peach. The effect is somewhat marred by the swelling nose and reddened eye, but her attempt is game. “Still, tha’ks for the effort. The pretedse was cute.”
Peach
Peach steps back as Ixtalan stands, and when Ixtalan catches Peach’s eye and smiles, Peach is stunned, for just a moment, by the color of Ixtalan’s eyes. Rich gold and green and deep as the sea. Peach can feel her new kitchen song thrumming, the tempo rising in her chest and sending a blush blooming across her face.
“Pretense?” Peach laughs, “I was genuinely concerned!”
Peach’s blush deepens, reddening not just the apples of her cheeks but the tips of her ears.
“I mean—” Peach trails off and looks away, casting her eyes toward the ground, looking for a distraction. Ixtalan’s sheepskin jacket is crumpled on the floor, and Peach takes her time retrieving it. The jacket is still in perfectly good shape, save a small tear in the sheepskin lining. Peach pokes her finger through the hole, worrying the edge of the torn seam, giving herself a moment to recompose herself before turning back to Ixtalan.
“I can go with you to the Doc’s,” Peach offers, holding out the jacket, “you know, if you like. Make sure you get there safe and all?”
Ixtalan
“Your dight’s bee’ messed up edough already, I god a ha’dle of where the physicker is.” She blinks at the sight of her jacket and smiles. “Tha’ks for grabbi’g that, but—” she ponders the state of her clothes for a moment and shakes her head. “Dah, you keep it, with all the stuff od me I would odly make it gross. Adyway you’ll look better id it thad I do.”
She winks, and a few steps takes her out the back door and into the night.
EPILOGUE
There wasn’t anything so obvious as a sign, nor shadowy figures stepping up to drop an ominous warning, but word filtered around to the travelers who frequented the Wanderlust: don’t touch the curly-haired serving girl. Her mother was bad enough, but even whenever she was in the back or away, whoever put a hand wrong on the girl always seemed to end up falling into the donkey trough outside, or stepping into the spit bucket, or tripping over their own tied shoelaces. One sailor swore that the evening after she copped a feel and got kicked out, someone used the cranes to drop a crate on her hand, crushing it. Nobody really believed her—it was likelier she’d stumbled into an unsteadily-stacked pile of shipping crates and toppled it on herself, given the drunken state she was in when her howls summoned help. Still, regulations on the docks were tightened to ensure nobody else was hurt, and stories spread.
And as stories do, they seeped and twisted and expanded, and the clientele shifted and behaved a little more nicely, just in case, and other clients breathed a little more easily and drank a little more freely in their stead.
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