Chapter 49: Religious dilemma

Tom apparently didn’t realize what the result of rewarding Jackalope for stealing his gun was likely to be, Nunuk and Apuma had just looked at each other and sighed when they found out. Apuma had actually come to have a go on the bike. The result was the slowest moving dragonette Sapphire had seen since Fengi was put on pen cleaning duty for losing her knife that one time. Still, it was an amusing sight.

Following recent events, Nunuk had called another little meeting this time with Tom attending and with far less secrecy. First on the docket was convincing Jackalope that being allowed to ride the quad bike didn’t mean she was pardoned from her theft.

Dakota had just shrugged, she was more than used to dealing with Jackalope, and in the end, they all knew she could be depended upon, not to mention she would always give things back once she had gotten to play with them, assuming she didn’t break it of course. The usual fix of just letting her try out the thing she was eyeing, wouldn't work here though.

As such Rachuck and Nunuk decided to let Jackalope know that if she stole something from Tom again, they would be forced to make her pay reparation. Tom looked a little worried at this notion.

After having confirmed she had no chance of actually paying for most of the things Tom owned. She slackearedly agreed to keep her fingers to herself. Sapphire just hoped the notion of being forever in Tom’s dept would do the trick. Tom seemed happy with the arrangement, not to mention he had a locked room to put things in now.

“Tom, what was the revolver she stole worth back where you are from?” Esmeralda had asked.

“I paid 7000 danish crowns for it. I have no clue what that is in your currency.” right that was a bit of a problem she could see that. Nunuk seemed to take an interest in this though.

“What would a gold coin be worth?”

“We don’t have those, I’ll check if I have value of gold somewhere, I can't remember. A kilo of gold is worth a lot though, like three to four hundred thousand” yikes, those were some big numbers “I weighed your coins, there’s 150 coins in a kilo, so...” Tom pulled out the little thing he had used to take her picture in the forest and tapped on it a bit “The revolver would be around three gold”

“Oh.” was all Nunuk could say at that. Three gold, seriously! A weapon that could lay low a black knight and cut through darklings with contemptuous ease and it cost just three gold coins.

“Gold is very valuable to my people” Tom tried. He could say that twice. What Sapphire wouldn’t give for a shopping trip in one of their big cities if gold was worth this much. She might even sell her necklace to them and buy a whole armory.

“a Loaf of bread worth around 20 crowns for reference so around 100 loaves of bread for one gold” She remembered paying around 5 copper for a loaf of bread in the capitol. right then time for some math. 100 copper in a gold coin so that was 20 loaves for one gold that made it 5 times cheaper, She was getting better at this. She still wanted to go shopping there. She wouldn’t just be buying bread though that was for sure, she wondered what kind of clothes they could make?

“While the lesson on economics is very fascinating we do have other matters to attend to. Besides, I highly doubt you would take 3 gold for your revolver now would you?” Nunuk questioned

“Nope,” Tom just answered bluntly, which was understandable.

“Very well then, it has reached my ear you meet Kalestine. I hope your encounter was pleasant?” Sapphire knew Nunuk was perfectly aware of exactly how it had gone already. Wounded and weak as she was, there was no way she had let this slide during dinner or breakfast.

Sapphire answered. “She wasn’t too pleased with the noise we were making, the large amount of deer we killed, the fact there might be a dragon on the way, or the fact there had been darklings on the island…” That was a bit of a list of grievances come to think of it. “But she was very pleased that we managed to repel the darklings, not to mention kill a dark knight. So she conceded we had done our duty as best we could. She even gave her blessing for Tom to traverse her woods.” Sapphire did her best to try and sound optimistic on the last parts. Even if the list of good was a bit shorter she did feel it more than made up for being a little noise to kill a dark knight.

“That’s good, though I must admit I had hoped for a bit of praise following those battles. However, she was never one for showing gratitude I guess.” Tom put his hand in the air like one of the kids in class. scoring a few headshakes around the room.

“Yes, Tom” Nunuk went in her best mom voice.

“They can teleport and read minds right?”

“Yes Tom, they can”

“Is it also true, unicorn blood can cure death? Oh and what about the horns?”

There was complete silence broken only by Herron dropping a knife he was playing with. Tom visibly recoiled clearly figuring out that hadn’t been the smartest thing to ask. How could he even ask that? They weren’t just some prey!

“Didn’t mean kill, just like I did with Nunuk only blood and going out instead of in”

Nunuk leaned forward in her chair, eyes narrowed “You better.”

“There is no higher crime in our book of laws than to harm a unicorn. They are the embodiment of a pure soul, the noblest creatures this world has ever spawned. Not to mention our deal with them has stood for centuries if not millennia. To threaten them is to threaten our entire people.” Apuma joined in.

“Understood, didn't want to kill” Tom tired before being cut off by Nunuk

“Nor will you attempt to steal its blood to satisfy your curiosity” A clear point in her voice.

“Not that he could if he wanted to” Dakota joined in sounding a bit more reasonable“It’s not like she would just give you some, so you would have to hurt her to get it. That will not be allowed to happen.”

By now Tom had his arms up in the air “No didn’t mean to hurt her, just curious that’s all” Sapphire was beginning to wonder just how like Jackalope Tom was turning out to be. She had seen that particular maneuver more than once before. Still, she prayed this was a promise he was going to keep. There was nothing worse than having to hunt down a friend, she did like him after all.

The hall settled after a bit, at least Kullinger hadn’t been here Sapphire thought. That would have a real shit show.

“Sorry, didn't mean to kill you know.” He did look genuinely sorry to Sapphire. It was clear to her he had more questions, it wasn’t likely he was going to ask them now though.

Nunuk seemed satisfied her point had been made as she leaned back in her chair with a bit of a wince.

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That had been a fairly extreme reaction, he had suspected they really liked the unicorns, but still. He hadn’t witnessed such hostility from them directed at him, that was a bit of a wake-up call. Don’t go around asking someone if the blood of their holy creature would cure death. It was a bit like the most extreme version of asking an Indian if they served beef he guessed. It didn’t matter though it wasn’t like he could get a hold of any.

The conversation had continued on the point of what preparations needed to be done to make ready for Jarix’s possible arrival, as well as how Tom’s projects were coming along. In the end, the plan was for them to start work on the distillery right away. Meanwhile, he got to work on what parts of the lathe he could. For starters, he would be focusing on the motor to drive it. If he couldn’t get that to work he would need to start over anyway.

They would hold off on making more bows for now, at least until the distillery was completed. That suited Tom just fine, he was kinda hoping Sapphire could use the time to work out if there was any way to improve the bow to better suit their needs.

Shiva seemed a bit perturbed by the amount of work in her immediate future. She had just gotten started on recycling the armor and weapons of the darklings that were too badly damaged or poorly maintained to warrant restoring. She had been soothed a bit by learning Tom needed time to work out designs for everything first before she was expected to start hammering out the large amount of plate needed.

All in all, the meeting had been a rather unpleasant experience. He would have to be a bit more careful in the future. He was starting to get to terms with their rather different take on religion. It was clear that just because they didn’t sing songs or do much praying, didn’t mean they weren’t religious.

With the rather unpleasant experience dealt with, things had carried on as before. Tom was back to working his duties, the kids of course had a lot of questions concerning Kalestine. They had clearly all heard stories before so Tom wasn’t entirely sure what to say. He described her for them and tried to liven up the story a bit for their sake. He didn’t want to add besmudging the name of a god or holy creature to the list. He did give in to the demand to try and draw her, he just hoped the typical Danish luck when it came to drawing religious figures didn’t bite him in the ass on this one.

He had started with the distillery, that was something they could likely figure out by themselves once he got them going. Luckily for him, he had brought some designs that he had obtained totally legally before departing. It wasn’t like copyrights or patents were a concern here anyway. He had brought both digital and analog thermometers as well, so he didn’t need to worry about that particular bit of mental gymnastics for the time being.

Still, he needed to figure out a way of heating very smoothly and accurately if he wanted something more than just high proof spirits. He went for a water bath with a stirrer in it. That way you could pour in a bit of cold or hot water if to adjust the temperature with a fire providing most of the heating. He did also consider trying to make methanol from some of the wood they had chopped down. The challenge of making an engine run on that stuff was just not worth it in his book though.

As for all the deer, the huntresses were hard at work salting and drying the meat for long term storage. Tom had no clue how they made salt this easily with the ocean being a fair ways down, but it was apparently cheap. Their supplies of salt had also recently been refiled following Vulzan’s visit as part of the supplies they had wanted. They also smoked a substantial amount of meat. Mostly turning it into little snacks or thin strips.

The skins were set to cure in vats in the tanning hut, being the building furthest away from the keep. Tom had never tried curing leather before, but he had heard it would stink. He was not disappointed. He had gone down to ask Esmeralda if she knew where Holdey’s toy wooden dragon had gone. As soon as he had made sure she didn’t know he had bolted for the door. Good god, that stank.

In other news, his joint design/storytime class was now consisting of just as many adults as children. In the end, he made a deal with Apuma to start holding science classes every other day for the adults. That way he could actually take care of the kids and manage a bit of design work.

Raulf in particular had enjoyed when he set about explaining the distillery he was planning. It was clear the farmer was a bit of a beer enthusiast, but the thought of being able to make this whiskey clearly intrigued him.

Tom had settled on making a reflux still. Shiva had managed to convince him she could make the tanks and pipes out of steel. She was an armorsmith, after all, so he believed her. He just hoped the thing wouldn’t rust on them. He didn’t have what was needed for stainless steel and copper was also limited. Shiva had questioned him extensively on what stainless steel was. So he went about another round of explaining.

The notion of steel which didn’t rust resulted in a fresh round of accusations of Tom not admitting to knowing magic. since that apparently sounded like Mithril to her. He had convinced her in the end that it was just a matter of alloying in a lot of chrome. She had of course immediately demanded to know what chrome was. That one stumped him for a bit before he tried to explain it was another kind of metal. The fact they didn’t have any and that he didn’t really have any idea where to get some was a bit of a bummer.

That had inevitably evolved into her demanding to know how many metals Tom knew about. The amount of joy and sadness the old smith went through was almost heartbreaking. The notion of there being so many metals she never even knew about and having her hopes smashed by Tom admitting he had no real way of making any of it locally, was almost too much to bear.

In the end, he resorted to making the next science class about metallurgy. Hopefully, they could figure out something useful for her after that particular disappointment.

The still had been a rather simple task to design since he was basically stealing the whole thing. His new workshop proved the perfect place to get out the laptop for the first time with the door locked, of course. He didn’t need to explain this one yet. He got out the files and started copying them down by hand for Shiva to start work. There were naturally also other things on the laptop, it had been a while after all.

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It had only taken Tom a few days to produce a set of plans for the distillery. An impressive feat she thought judging by the detail of them. She knew he didn’t sleep as much as them, but she was starting to worry if he was getting what he needed. If he was tired she couldn’t tell though, so it was probably nothing to worry about.

He had explained it on the blackboard during science class. It was actually a rather simple device for once. Even if the fact alcohol boiled at a lower temperature than water was news to her. The notion things could get colder than freezing and not freeze was a bit of a brain turner too. As with so many other things she just accepted it as the truth and worried about what she needed to understand. She had long since given up trying to understand everything.

Shiva seemed to be of the same mindset, only worrying about what she needed to know to make all the metal components. Raulf and Apuma though kept on trying to understand what Tom was on about, leading to a lot of sidetracking. More than once the girls had to put a stop to them, so they could get back on topic. It didn’t help Tom was more than willing to just keep talking. Still, it was easier to stay awake for this than his classes on math.

Dakota and Apuma had taken her place on that front. She instead spent that time either working around the keep or covering for Tom as a nanny. From what she figured out, they were making a lot of progress rather swiftly, she hadn’t seen Apuma this stressed in years. In fact, she even caught him looking through papers at dinner once.

It would seem Dakota was cheering up a bit too, even if she did complain a bit about Tom being too good at math for it to be natural, not to mention the odd rant about things not making sense. when she had shown Sapphire the problem she couldn’t understand Sapphire had just chuckled nervously. She had no clue what she was looking at apart from the symbols being English that was. It would appear Tom won the argument over what to use then.

Unlike with the bow, there wasn’t much for Sapphire to do when it came to making the distillery, it was mostly metalwork. So she elected to sharpen up her skills a bit instead. It was only another week before Nunuk had promised her she would be allowed to use her wings again after all. Besides she wanted to get in a few more shots with her new bow. Tom had given it to her after all and didn’t seem too concerned with who used it, so she might as well claim the privilege.

She had spent an afternoon on the range with the guards as they were doing their training. She could of course outshoot them all even with her regular bow but with this, it was child’s play. They had of course all been allowed to have a go, all being astonished by how easy it was to shoot, even if some of them struggled to draw it. Unkai in particular didn’t have the draw length to get to the easy part, which was a little sad.

The funny thing though was that once it was drawn out it was easy, so she would just help them with the hard part and then they could get to shoot a much heavier bow than they had any chance of on their own. She did promise to ask Tom to design a more man-friendly version in the future with a bit of a snicker. Needing help to draw your bow was not a brilliant way of going about it in combat after all.

The only bummer was that her old bow made of its finely bleached and dyed wood was a lot prettier than this weird contraption. Perhaps she should be the one to receive the first proper one as well. Tom had called this one a prototype, after all, it apparently meant not quite finished but good enough. There was something cool about having the first one ever made of something though, perhaps she could get this one spruced up instead.