A Dream of Empire Ch. 014

"Nice to meet you, Mattias. Sir Varian of Havelthorn," Talos introduced himself with his pseudonym, "and my two women, the Lady Tacita and the Lady Alessia."

"Ach, Imperials, so far from home! What a surprise, what a surprise! But, where are me manners? Come inside, come inside. Can't have a sir and two ladies standin' on the porch, can I?" The trio accepted the half-man's invitation, and followed him into the house.

"You know we're Imperials?" Alanna mused with a smile.

"Educated guess, lass. Quite rare to see mages in Solais, not to mention two o' them at once," Mattias smartly deduced. "Nope, nope, yer definitely Imperials."

"Our occupations are that obvious to you?" Alanna warmly asked of the half-man, who laughed.

"Of course! It's the hair, ye see, and there's far too much life in yer eyes for ye to be night walkers. Sit, sit, let me get ye some tea. Kuna! We've guests!" Mattias shouted towards the back of the townhouse, where the stairs were.

"Gratitude," Alanna giggled, flipping her side ponytail behind her shoulder. She took the offered seat that Mattias pulled out for her, as did Tatiana when he pulled out another and motioned for her to sit. Talos remained standing.

"Oh, and ye trying to read me mind makes it a tad bit obvious as well," Mattias added with a coy grin. Alanna shook her head, wanting to apologize, but the half-man predicted that as well. "Don't ye fret, don't ye fret! I've nothin' to hide from ye. And, er, sorry for the mess, err... we're not too used to guests here, ye see."

"It's no matter at all," Alanna warmly reassured him.

"So," Mattias said, placing his hands on the table when the two sorceresses were settled. "What need brings ye three to my home today?"

Talos wordlessly told Alanna to take the lead, which she took up without skipping a beat.

"We're looking to review your maps of the easterlands, good sir. We came across a merchant in Solais by the name of Ecbert, or, um, perhaps Eggbert, who swore up and down that if anyone was in possession of a detailed map of the easterlands it'd be you. He told us you were hired by the King just recently to survey the region."

"Indeed I was, and I'd say yer dear Ecbert or perhaps Eggbert is in the right! Gimme a moment to grab it," Mattias replied with a thumb over his shoulder.

"Of course," Alanna smiled.

Mattias pushed himself from the table and sauntered off to the back of the house. Talos noted some unexpectedly-loud footsteps from the stairwell a moment later, far louder than a man of Mattias' stature could have produced. He then overheard the cheerful half-man speaking to someone in the back room of the house.

"Ah, there ye are sweet-cheeks. Get our three guests some tea, if ye would."

Talos didn't hear her reply, though he did hear her peculiar footsteps as she tromped around the back of the house. He couldn't quite put a finger on what made her steps so strange... until she trudged into the main hall with the tea a couple minutes later. It was then, as Kuna silently served the trio some piping-hot tea from a well-used kettle, that Talos understood. Kuna, you see, was neither man nor mer.

She stood near six-and-a-half-feet tall by Talos' estimate - a veritable giant compared to Mattias - and had what appeared to be hooves instead of feet at the end of her legs, legs which were covered with dark brown fur from the calf down. The only clothing she wore to cover her tanned skin - if one could even call it clothing - was a bolt of red cloth wrapped around her waist, obviously intended to be a skirt, and another around her bosom. Her loose, jet-black hair was punctured by two small horns, horns which could have been called cute had they been found on a goat rather than a human. It took Talos two jaw-dropping moments to also note that she had a tail, which flicked around behind her as if swatting flies when it wasn't wrapped around her leg. If Kuna didn't possess these features, one could call her fair.

The trio remained absolutely silent as she worked; at least, until she gave Talos his cup of tea. She smirked at him as she offered him the drink, and playfully flicked a forked tongue from between her lips.

"Uh... thanks," Talos spoke. "Kuna, I presume?"

"Mmh... that's right dear," the goat-woman husked. "And what do your women call you?"

"Varian," Talos coughed. "Sir Varian of Havelthorn. That is, when they're not calling me a god between the sheets."

Talos!

Kuna laughed at his jest, but Talos didn't feel that same sense of satisfaction that he normally did when making a woman laugh. It was more of a low chuckle, emanating from her chest rather than her throat. Kuna brushed a hand against his arm, then turned away to strut off once more, which was likely the only way she could comfortably walk with those unnatural hooves. Talos spied a small slit in the fabric of her red skirt to allow her tail to reign free, which danced about behind her as she strut.

All-in-all, he was positively baffled that such a creature existed. His first thought was to reach out to Tatiana for clarification; but, that would be rude, so he went with his second option.

What the fuck? Talos smirked at Alanna.

I've no idea, she shrugged.

Talos finally took a seat at the low table as he waited for his tea to cool, and Mattias soon stumbled back into the room. The scroll he now held was massive, far larger than any other map Talos had seen before.

"Quite the piece, this one. 'fraid I don't have an extra to sell ye... haven't yet seen the calligrapher, ye see," Mattias sympathetically explained, rolling the papyrus out on the table. It covered the entirety of the surface when it was all laid out, and the level of detail on the map was clearly obvious even at a distance.

"Why so quiet, hm? Looks like ye've seen a ghost," Mattias asked of them, though he was looking at Alanna specifically. She felt compelled to speak.

"Um... your Kuna. She's... nice?"

"And hooved," Talos said through a cough. Mattias groaned a half-man's worth of displeasure, and sullenly let his gaze fall to the map.

"Ah. Sorry about that, er, folks," Mattias said dejectedly before raising his voice, obviously with the intention of chiding Kuna. "Usually she casts a spell to mask herself in front of company!"

"It was only a surprise, is all," Alanna assured with a pout. "We're not ones to judge oddities, I assure you."

"Certainly not," Talos shook his head. He leaned in to study the map before him.

"Indeed. Of course not. Where does she hail from, Sir Mattias?" Tatiana thinly asked, perhaps the first time she'd spoken at all to him.

"Ah, met her on an expedition to the Dreamward Isles, ye see. She's the last of her tribe, or so she tells me. Brought her back after a... well, after one ridiculous night under the stars. I'd say more in less-fair company, o'course."

"Of course," Tatiana blushed.

"Hm... this can't be right," Talos said to no one in particular. He pointed at a thick, circular line drawn on the papyrus, which signified the south-eastern coastline of Solais. "This should be straight. It's a straightened shore, not rounded like you have it here, Mattias."

Mattias laughed, and patted him on the back. "And it was straight, for a thousand thousand years before I discovered the truth. Followed the sun, ye see."

Talos grinned over his shoulder at him and replied, "I'm afraid I'm not following."

Mattias cleared his throat before returning his attention to the map, while each pair of eyes in the room followed along. He pointed at the rounded shoreline.

"Ye see Sir Varian, it's all a matter of perspective. Ye go to the shore yerself and it'll be straight, sure. It'll be straight for a thousand miles, as far as yer eyes can see, and as far as yer legs can walk. Yet... it ain't. It's round, like this. Ye stand here," he explained, pointing near the top of the circle, "and the sun is at yer side. Ye stand here," he pointed at the edge, "and the sun is in yer face. No, my lord Varian, it isn't straight no more. It's a circle, and not only that; a perfect one."

"A perfect circle. Really?"

Mattias returned Talos' grin, waving a hand through the air. "Perfect as can be," he affirmed as whimsically as his nasally voice would allow.

Talos found the fact most interesting, even if he weren't a surveyor or geographer. Mattias may have stumbled upon one of the world's greatest mysteries, and Talos was one of the first to hear of it. Yet, it troubled him. Did this fact mean he was traveling in the wrong direction? The Oracle had mentioned a shore straightened by design, not-

"And you said it appears straight when you stand beside it, yes?" he hastily asked. Mattias nodded.

Alright. So he was still on the right track. "Thanks, Mattias. My, uh, woman Tacita can make a perfect copy of the map, albeit hopefully a tad smaller..." Talos said, glancing towards Tatiana. She nodded. "Right. She can make a perfect copy. Would you mind if she did so?"

Mattias' eyes lit up as he looked across the table towards her. "Truly? Why... not at all! Not at all indeed! Of course, if she had the ability for more than, er, one copy..."

"I could conjure half-a-dozen within the hour, if that suffices for ye - er, you, Sir Mattias," Tatiana replied with a wince.

"Provided we don't have to pay for the pleasure, naturally," Talos added, pursing his lips. Mattias patted him once more on the back.

"Of course not, of course not! Why, this is perfect! Now I don't have to pay that slimy, coin-grubbin', two-timin' calligrapher for his 'court-trained skills'," Mattias guffawed, air-quoting the theoretical calligrapher. "What do ye need, Lady Tacita, what do ye need to conjure 'em?"

"Blank parchment, of whatever sizes you would wish them," she answered succinctly before glancing at Talos and Alanna. "And I'll need quiet. Noise considerably disrupts the Evocation of Facsimile."

Mattias lept from the table, and practically danced his way to the back of the house. "Of course, of course! Quiet! Come, Varian and Alessia! Let me show ye the sun room while the conjurer works her magics! Quiet in the house, Kuna! Better yet, join our guests in the sun room! To the parchment!"

Talos and Alanna shared a quick grin before leaving the table to follow the exuberant Mattias to the back of the house. They took their tea with them.

-=-=-

And so the foursome retired to the sun room - an enclosed space with windows along three of it's walls - for chat and tea while Tatiana worked her magics in the main hall. Talos and Alanna were, at first, quite careful with what they said around both the half-man and his goat-woman. Who knew what toes - or hooves - they would step on with their normal speech? They soon learned that Kuna was just as easy-going as her smaller half was, however, and eventually warmed up to them.

In fact, sharing an hour with the wildly-dissimilar couple was quite the pleasant experience. Sure, Talos didn't need to know that Mattias' manhood was not at all proportional to the rest of him, but it was still humorous when Kuna nonchalantly shared the information. He also didn't need to know that Kuna was capable of bouncing for hours on end due to her unnatural appendages, but he hoped it at least gave Alanna something to aspire towards.

In the end, Talos realized he appreciated abnormality. When the world around you is filled with wage-slavery, sickness, death, or worse, it's wondrous to share stories where the protagonists get their way. Not to mention that Mattias may have been the only man that Talos had ever met who had visited not only Hesperia, but Masakrai at the far end of the world as well. In fact, Tatiana could have taken all evening with her conjurations and he wouldn't have minded at all. He had a thousand thousand questions to ask Mattias of Hesperia, and a thousand thousand more of Masakrai.

Unfortunately, Tatiana was entirely too proficient with her magics. She found the foursome in the sun room less than an hour later, citing that her will was now completely spent, but that she had successfully conjured eight additional full-sized maps for the joyous Mattias and one smaller one for an approving Talos.

Talos offhandedly asked Mattias where the best inn in Sarum was located as they made their way to the front door. The little half-man clasped him on the back one last time, and motioned for Talos to lean in. He went to one knee and let Mattias whisper to him, even if Alanna would hear everything anyway.

"Ye don't look like a man who needs an inn, Varian. Tell ye what; just travel two miles out the east gate, turn south off the road when ye come across the burnt-out farmhouse, find the hill with a granite facade just a mile beyond that, and delve on in behind it. I promise ye won't regret it."

Talos nodded, and rose to his feet. "Alright. Thank you, Mattias. If you're home, we'll stop by when we head back west."

"That'd be swell, Varian," he replied. Mattias stepped backwards into the long arms of his giantess, then raised his voice to address the trio.

"Good luck to ye all out east. Be good to one another and everythin' will turn out just fine. It always does, with a friend at yer back."

-=-=-

Talos followed Mattias' instructions to the letter. He led the trio through the eastern gate of Sarum after checking the western gate once more, and found that the army of knights had, once again, ridden off to save the Kingdom from an apparently ever-present Orc threat.

He traveled the two miles to the burnt-out husk of a farmhouse in silence, allowing the sorceresses behind him to talk to one another without his interference. He knew trust amongst the fellowship was important when you're on the road, if not the most preeminent of requirements. After all, when you're in foreign and potentially-hostile territory, you can only truly trust those you travel with for help. Expecting help from the locals is a recipe for disaster; the same disaster Talos had saved Alanna from when the couple first met in a forgotten tavern in the Borderlands last year.

He met back up with them when they turned south off the dirt road, towards the hillocks and valleys on the near horizon. He'd forgotten to ask Tatiana something very important; at least, important to him.

"Hey, Tatiana, that goat-woman back there. What in all the hells was she? Do you know?" he asked her as he turned his chestnut stallion about to canter beside her.

"Indeed I do. She's a succubus, Talos; a rare creature that I'd no idea existed in our world. I've seen them before off-world, but... well, that's why I asked Mattias of where she hailed from. I suspect his answer of finding her on the Dreamwards was a lie," Tatiana intelligently answered. Her knowledge of literally everything continued to astound him.

"I didn't sense deceit," Alanna added with a shrug. "Though, I may not have been focused on him at that moment."

"Mm," Talos acknowledged. "But Tatiana, I thought you said before that off-worlders couldn't live here. They have to return to... er, wherever they're from, right?"

"Under most circumstances, but there are exceptions to every rule. There's an extensive list of examples in Planeswalker if you're interested."

He wasn't. At least, he wasn't interested enough to pry open that massive green tome of hers. He returned his gaze to the hillocks ahead of them, but Tatiana continued a moment later when he didn't reply.

"For example, Dusk wasn't born here either," Tatiana smugly declared. The kitty poked his head out of Tatiana's pack at the mention of his name, but soon retreated when he wasn't offered any snacks.

Talos caught a glimpse of him. "He wasn't?"

She giggled. "Nope! Found him on a bizarre world where everyone had metallic horseless carriages, and they were always traveling some place else in a hurry. I brought him back with me using the Law of Absolute Consent. Dusk didn't like his owner there."

"Horseless? But how did they travel?" Talos smirked.

She shrugged. "Some sort of internal device that generated a lot of noise, I believe. Honestly, I wasn't very interested. I despised that world."

"Ah." More nonsense he would never understand, then.

The trio soon came across the hill with a granite face that Mattias had directed them towards. It didn't appear anything special from afar, but he had mentioned to camp behind it. Following Talos' lead, they checked it out.

Behind the granite hill laid another not twenty yards away, forming a small, isolated valley between them. Nestled within that valley was a pool, with pristine waters so clear it reminded Alanna of the bathhouses of Imperia. But the true treasure of that valley laid just beside that; another pool, smaller, with waters bluer than a cloudless daytime sky. Steam rose from that pool, causing Talos and Alanna to grin simultaneously.

In his defense, Talos was at least diligent enough to set up the tent and collect fuel for a fire before he would allow his clothes to be shed. Alanna, however, had her clothes removed as soon as she'd reached the pool. Tatiana naturally avoided doing any such thing, and settled the horses instead. The sun soon fell behind the hill of granite, shading the world once more under a cool, star-filled night.

Talos felt more than a little disappointed when Alanna returned to him before he had a chance to join her in the spring. She inaudibly explained her reasoning to him, citing her exhaustion from the day; no doubt exacerbated from her lack of sleep the night before. He kissed her, and he told her how much he loved her, then led her to the tent for sleep. Talos got the fire going to ensure a warm sleep before he enjoyed the hot spring himself.

It was perfect; after a near month on the seas, and days traveling overland through the bleak and tiring landscape of inner Solais, he needed that spot of relaxation in those steaming waters more than anything in the world. He thanked Sir Mattias for the advice, and prayed to a nameless god for a safe journey ahead.

Twenty minutes later, he found himself curious that Alanna was still, in fact, awake. He noted that the two sorceresses were huddled close together near the tent, speaking to one another in hushed tones. He could have pierced that conversation in an instant, but something stopped him from doing so. Talos, in the end, simply found himself uncaring that the girls were likely conspiring against him, and relaxed in the burbling waters of the hot spring. Alanna shook him from his meditation not two minutes later.

I'm going to bed, Talos. I love you, I love you, I love you, and nothing you do here tonight will ever change that.

"Talos," Tatiana happily sighed, kneeling beside the man lazily relaxing in the spring, who had his arms outstretched and his eyes shut. "You promised to... show me your scars? Remember?"

Talos smirked, now in full understanding of Alanna's warning and encouragement. He opened his eyes to meet Tatiana's.

"I do," he curtly replied. He knew what Alanna would say at this point, of course. She would have said: "Are you going to join me in the water? It's pleasant."

And, oddly enough, he said the very same. Tatiana blushed to his ask but quickly accepted. "Y-yes! Just... promise me you won't peek."

Talos shut his eyes. "Won't." He heard faint giggles, then, and heard the unmistakable sounds of clothes being unlaced, unbuttoned, and dropped to the floor. He heard one lithe, beautiful girl step into the water with him, and heard her sigh with pleasure when she felt just how hot that spring was.

"Ahh... um. You can open your eyes, Talos," she softly said. He did, and what he found terrified him.