Lotsorn surpassed Jace’s imagination. He had seen almost nothing of the cities of this world. He thought he had an idea based on the fort and keep on that island, only to learn, looking at Lotsorn how badly he was mistaken. The city had walls stretching hundreds of feet into the sky and hundreds of feet wide. There were towers stretching even higher. The city probably could have held millions. The stone was all black, and looked just like obsidian, and the pale sunlight seemed to give the whole city an almost ghostly shine. The harbor was a legitimate harbor as well, with a break water, the ships were strange. If he were to name them, they looked like something akin to what a Viking longboat might look like. He wasn’t sure how oceangoing they were. Though considering the Vikings were able to sail across some of the most inhospitable oceans in the world, perhaps he shouldn’t be too harsh about it.

He knew his little yacht received a lot of attention. He didn’t see a single triangular sail anywhere, furthermore everything had oars, and from the looks of it, were manned by crews of slaves. Meanwhile his boat sailed in quietly, under the power of nothing but the wind, with just one man in control of it. Its size wasn’t particularly small either. Though he considered the yacht far too small for safe ocean travel, it was almost 2/3 the length of the longboats.

From what Verna told him about it, the city apparently was one of the few fully human run cities on the continent, with slavery, piracy and trading being the main sources of income. He could tell humans were in charge, as from what he could see of it, though the city probably could house millions, most of the city appeared to be in disrepair, or abandoned. The number of human slaves was stunning. It was hard to find clothing humans. The opulence of the clothed humans, and the despair of the nude ones left a deep impression on his mind. After dealing with the harbormaster, and leaving the port district, he took a room in one of the few clean looking inns he could find on the main street.

The prices of everything were outrageous. He had developed an idea for the price of items over the past 8 months living on this world. Almost everything could be had for less than a silver tal. So a room with a single meal, for one night, one bed costing 3 silver tal struck him as outrageous. Not that he couldn’t afford it but he couldn’t help feeling like he was being ripped off badly. The staff at the inn were all enslaved female fairies and humans, all young and pretty, and surprisingly clean, which only raised Jace’s suspicions about the cost of the room.

Suspicions which were confirmed when dinner came with several girls to “serve” him as he wished. The heartbreak at seeing these young women prostituted for his apparent enjoyment, made him deeply disturbed. The more he thought about it the more irritated he became and was about to say something when Verna stood up and walked over to the girls. He was nervous about what she might do, but ultimately decided to leave it to her, figuring the ‘worldly,’ and ‘knowledgeable’ kindred woman would be able to delicately resolve the situation.

Verna calmly looked over each of the girls then frowned. “Is this the best this place has to offer? A group of scrawny ill fed used old whores who smell of semen? Are you insulting us? 3 silver tal for this? Get out and tell the owner to come himself with his own virgin daughter or his best girls if they’re better, or I’ll burn this place down and take our 3 tal back from his corpse.” Jace froze at the words coming from her mouth. It had been a long time since he had heard that imperious and overbearing tone.

‘Fucking Kindred’ he groaned to himself. He had completely forgot how these idiot dragon people acted to outsiders.

The girls all paled under her withering yellow eyed glare, and quickly fled the room. Jace, pondered a long moment and ultimately decided getting mad with Verna was counterproductive as it was his own idiot fault for letting her handle anything. He picked up his knife and fork and started to carve into the meat. Verna looked at him and then casually said, “I wouldn’t eat that meat.”

He paused with the fork an inch from his mouth, his mouth watering at the idea of any meat after the weeks of vegetable mush. He placed the fork down reluctantly and said with a great deal more patience then he felt, “Why?” He had long harbored fears about the meat he had eaten in the past, Verna’s urgent warning set off those long suppressed fears and alarm at those questions left unasked.

“When in a human city, or when your food is being prepared by free humans with ingredients they procured, assume nothing of the source of the meat unless you watch them butcher it yourself. It might be some form of animal raised in a pen. Or it might be something hunted. Just as likely as those sources is it was a slave butchered to put meat on your table. Human slaves being cheaper then real meat of course. Granted, killing humans is a great crime. But let’s be serious and honest here. The only humans with any worth among your people are women who are able to bare children. The male slaves are nowhere near as valuable, and no one really looks into what happens to them. Did no one tell you these things?”

Jace felt his hunger wither. Looking at the plate he saw nothing on it that wasn’t soaking in the juices of the meat. He closed his eyes and pushed the plate away from himself. Suddenly he realized that he didn’t think that Verna was too harsh on those girls.

Jace started to speak, unable to look at the food anymore “Tell me Ver…”

She cut him off, “Nana, if you’re going to shorten my name, Nana, not Ver. I hate it when people shorten my already short name with ‘Ver’.”

Starting again he said slowly, “Tell me Nana… ugh… I’m not sure I like saying that. You don’t look like a Nana. Seriously? Nana?” His train of thought was completely derailed.

She nodded like it was a serious matter. “Nana”

He looked at her curiously, nothing fit her less than a cute name like ‘Nana.’ She was beautiful, imperious, sexy. What she almost never was, was cute and childish. Trying to start again he said, “Tell me Verna. Is there anything else I need to know about the people here that will be this horrifying, which I might not have been told yet?”

She looked like she was disappointed he didn’t call her Nana, then she thought a long moment then spoke, “perhaps you never heard about the Fighting arenas…” Jace cut her off.

“I think I can guess. You do not need to say more.”

At this time a large woman, the first fat human he had seen in all the time he had been on this world, came to the room. Behind her was 4 new girls, one of them was perhaps 10 or 11 and looked like she had been woken up from bed, obviously the woman’s ‘virgin’ daughter. The other three were indisputably prettier and younger than the last batch.

Verna rounded on the 5 people who entered, her head held high, as she spoke in that imperious tone. “Stop! I do not recall giving anyone leave to enter the Great Lord my Master’s room.”

Jace felt indescribably embarrassed by what just came from her mouth. ‘That fucking kindred!’ He screamed in his heart. He was about to stand and put an end to this nonsense when she suddenly started speaking sense, “First you’ll replace this dish. My Great Lord and Master does not eat the flesh of beasts. So you will replace this food with something fresh, and all vegetable.” So he tentatively, and against his better judgement let her continue.

“Next, put your girl to bed. My Great Lord and Master does not harm children. What type of animal do you take him for?” For once he agreed with her tone, and actually forgave the nonsensical title she was calling him, because she said exactly what alarmed him most of what the innkeeper brought him. Seeing that poor child dragged into his room made him ill.

Once the young girl was shoved out of the room and the food taken away by the other three girls, Jace sighed with relief. It seemed letting Verna handle it ended up working out alright. He could deal with a little embarrassment. It’s what he deserved for letting her take the lead in this issue.

Once the room was empty Verna sat down on his lap, looking undeservedly proud of herself. Then she said “Which of those three girls should we keep for the night? I recommend the one in blue, she looked like she’d be fun. You’ve never had a Fairy girl right? So it will be the one in blue right? Or do you desire all 3?”

He was wrong. He should never let Verna handle anything.