Lisaykos, Healing Shrine of Mugash

"This is fish? This is good," Foyuna enthused. The girl had been raised with the best of the best, being the king's cousin on his paternal side. Most nobles preferred livestock and poultry. They disdained fish and rabbits as the food of poor people and Coyn. At the shrine, we had fresh fish often because it was tasty and inexpensive. As someone who had a busy shrine that took a lot of money to run, I was fond of inexpensive, especially when it tasted good.

"It's not often you get fish cooked this well," Senlyosart remarked. Her fish was almost gone but I already knew she liked most fish. "I wouldn't mind the recipe," she hinted. Her shrine was on the river like mine.

"Would it be possible?" Senlyosart looked at me in hope.

"It's Emily's recipe. It's simple to make once you have the sauce in hand. The sauce itself is a bit of a challenge," I replied in a helpful, informative voice. "Assuming you already have the sauce, you coat the fish with it, add a little seasoning, and bake it in the bread oven until it flakes easily with the prong."

"You cooked fish like bread?" Moxsef was surprised. Meats and fish were traditionally either roasted over a spit or boiled. Emily's method of baking meats and fish was truly novel.

"We had dishes made so we could cook inside the bread oven," I was enjoying this, "made of kiln-fired white clay which was then glazed and fired a second time."

"Why?" asked the ever-practical and inquisitive Raoleer of Giltak.

"The glaze keeps the meat juices with the meat instead of sinking into the clay," I explained.

I hadn't done any cooking myself. To be honest, I don't know how to cook since I have never had to make a meal for anyone, including myself. Despite this, I have spent more time in the shrine's kitchens in the last several rotations than I have in my entire life. I was quite willing to do so if it would get the picky Emily to eat more.

"What's so special about the sauce?" Senlyosart asked. I could tell she was taking notes in her head.

I took a moment to find someone in the basement near the kitchen and mindcasted to have a crock of the sauce brought up to my dining room from the cold room in the basement. Apologizing for the slight delay, I began to explain. "The sauce is made from perry vinegar, egg yolk, and light olive oil." Then I waited for someone who understood food to make the connection.

Of course, it was the maniac mekaner Raoleer who understood instantly. "Wait," she protested. "If you mix those, will you not get a horrible mess? The vinegar and the oil will separate and the egg yolk will make the mess worse."

Note that I didn't even know this myself until only a few rotations ago, but I wasn't going to tell anyone here that.

"Yes, that is what will happen if you don't mix them correctly." I deliberately did not add anything more, hoping the crock of sauce would arrive soon. On cue, we could hear the sound of feet running up the stairs echoing down the corridor through the open door of my dining room. The young man who Emily taught to make her sauces appeared, breathing hard.

He made a bowing obeisance, and said apologetically, "Great One, I have brought the requested olive oil-and-egg sauce.

"Krusk, would you please put a spoonful on every plate?"

He fetched a spoon from the sideboard and circled the table.

"So this the sauce?" asked Foyuna, who was seated exactly opposite of me. She put some on her spoon and tasted it. "Interesting. Somewhat tart and sweet at the same time."

"The trick, as I understand it," I explained, "is the speed of the mixing. You start with the vinegar and the yolk. There's a kind of liquid fat in the egg yolk. Brisk mixing breaks up the yolk and the vinegar into small droplets. Then you add in the oil very slowly at first. Due to the vigorous mixing, it too forms tiny droplets. The fat from the egg yolk coats the droplets and keeps the drops of the oil and vinegar separated. There's a point at which the liquid ingredients will thicken into the sauce after enough droplets are coated with the yolk. The Blessed Emily calls this an emulsion. We'll be having a variation of this emulsion sauce for morn repast tomorrow, where the oil will be replaced by butter."

We should have dinners more often at the Shrine of Mugash," Kamagishi said teasingly. "The culinary output of the entire shrine system would improve." Even dour Irralray of the Peaceful Shrine of Erhonsay laughed.

"Yes, but how about a new way to do mutton?" Senlyosart leaned back and grinned. It was a common belief that there was nothing new anyone could do with mutton.

I sat back and glanced at Krusk. He looked back at me and smiled knowingly. I smiled at Senlyosart, well aware of what my kitchen was plotting for tomorrow's dinner for our current guests.

"There's a new way to serve mutton?" she asked, happy to be surprised.

"Oh, please stop smiling, Lisaykos," Kamagishi chortled, "you're scaring me."

"If the food here gets any better, I just might move in," Fassex remarked to everyone's amusement.

---

Aylem, Healing Shrine of Mugash

I wasn't ready. I just wasn't ready. I passed the overspent Emily to Priestess Healer Thuorfosi and saw Asgotl try to push his way through the people crowding the atrium as the bells started peeling. I immediately cast the charm of shadows on myself followed by the charm of nothingness. Once I had those two charms of deception to fade the memory of me out of the minds of others, I cast the charm of circular light around myself.

It's always better to use circular light with either shadows or nothingness. Circular light by itself can sometime throw a light-based artifact that can disclose that magic is in use. It's rare but sometimes there will be a red flash or a linear red haze. If you remember to cast shadows or nothingness, the confusion sewn by either of those two will mask the observation of any light defects associated with circular light.

I wasn't ready to see or talk to anyone quite yet, not even Asgotl who looked like he had a big heap of grievances all piled up. I don't know if I could handle that today. I would be in better shape for his anger tomorrow. All I wanted to do right now was to go and sit in a quiet place and just think. The thought of seeing my daughter left me cold and frightened. I may not be the best mother but I deeply love my two children. The realization that my daughter was afraid of me gutted me and left a hole inside me that I did not know how to fill. My Opo'aba, my wonderful lovely daughter was scared of me and I gave her good reason to be that way. And if she felt frightened, then Heldfirk probably felt the same way.

I took the steps down to the basement and found an empty storeroom to sit in and just think. My magic reappeared when Emily released me as if it had never been missing. I couldn't feel it at all in one breath and in the next, it was just there, as if it had always been there. And since my magic was back in all its power, I knew I could even take a nap and the charms would still function in my sleep.

Most mages find they must train themselves to have charms persist in their sleep. Not me: I've never had to do that. The charms I cast can last weeks at a time if I want them to. The charms of other people usually last a day at most. I did not worry, therefore, when I nodded off and woke up in the middle of the night. I got up and decided to take a walk along the river and decide what to do next.

If only Opo'aba were not here. I think I could face Imstay right now, if he wasn't too judgmental. I am hoping Lisaykos doesn't take too big a gouge out of me, because I know she will, but then she'll be done. That's one of the good things about her: she doesn't nurse grudges or grievances. I don't know if I can face Fassex right now. Maybe tomorrow, when I've had a little more time.

---

Emily, North Marketplace, Aybhas

The meatball place was a kitchen built into a wagon and set-up as a street stand with street-side seating. It was popular. We had to stand in line. That was so cool. I haven't had to wait for anything in an age. Thourfosi had me sitting on her arm. We were all wearing lined shrine mantles with the hoods up. The hoods were gray, of course, and lined with with black flannel. The sigil of the shrine was embroidered in gold. Wolkayrs told me that's reserved for the High Priestess' deputies and staff. That left me wondering just how incognito that could be.

I found the foot traffic around us was interesting. All the Coyn I spotted looked like they were running errands. They tended to stick to the uphill side of streets. No one looked abused. Most were well clothed for the cold snap that arrived this rotation.

The line moved fast. When it was our turn in line, the lady at the counter looked at me, blinked, and looked at Thuorfosi. "My lady priestess, is this...?" She asked in an urgent whisper.

Thuofosi raised her eyebrows and tugged on the front of her own hood, the universal signal for "incognito."

"Right, and how many skewers?"

"Three."

"Pitchers?"

"Just one."

"Any nips?"

"I'm good for some nips," Wolkayrs said. "You, Thu?" Thuorfosi nodded. "Em?"

"W...w...what's a nip?" I asked. I had no idea what a nip was.

"You've not had nips?" Thuorfosi's eyes popped. "Well, we must fix this. Two nips. please."

"That''ll be one silver, two bronze," she held her hand out and Wolkayrs counted out the coins. "Eddo, table!" She shouted. A small disturbance, or maybe a small knot of turbulance, forced its way through knees in pants and skirts to erupt next to the counter lady. It was a Coyn teenager, somewhere between 16 and 18, brown hair, nice hazel eyes. He had a happy, devil-may-care smile.

"Put them at twenty-seven," the counter lady told him. He blinked with an inquiring face and looked up at us. His mouth formed an oh. Thuorfosi tugged on her hood briefly and gave him a warning glance.

He bowed with a flourish, "if you good folks would follow me." He was a showman with a bounce in his step as he showed us to our spot, under a large open air roof on one side of the street and up against a stone wall looking down the pedestrian way into the north market. I could see the roof of Wolkayrs' family's woodshop. The young Coyn inspected the table top and then the seats to make sure they were clean and dry, and then turned to us smiling, "this is your table. Your food will be out in just a moment." He bowed and then ran back to the counter lady taking orders at the food stand.

"I saw that," Thuorfosi tapped the end of my nose. "You really looked that young man up and down, didn't you?"

"What?" I rolled my eyes. "I've b...been a prisoner of the fourth floor for ages and d...d...do you know know how many Coyn I've met? Zero! Of course I g...got eye tracks all over him. I haven't m...met anyone my height ever since I met the Queen's Coyn at the palace. I have v...very little idea of how Coyn live on this side of the Great Cracks."

"The Coyn working in the kitchen are peeking at us," Wolkayrs smiled in amusement.

"I had noticed," Thuorfosi smiled back and then smiled at me.

"I w...was working on not noticing," I grumped. "It's a b...bit off-putting."

"You can't stop people from looking," Thuorfosi sympathized. "People will always look but as long as your hood is up, no one will bother you."

Eddo the Coyn had not lied about the speed of our order. The food came out just then, along with three plates, a pitcher of something showing a wiff of steam, and beakers, including a coyn-sized one. Wolkayrs poured spiced warm cider for everyone, explaining for me that it was warm spiced cider in cold weather and cold tea in hot weather.

"So these are nips," Thuorfosi explained. They were cone-shaped tubers cooked on a grill. Each one was on a beaver reed skewer, not too big for my hands and not too small for Wolkayrs and Thuorfosi. "Try one. They're best hot." She held the platter so I could reach.

I picked up a nip on a stick, blew on it to cool it, and bit off the tip. The wonderful taste of buttery potatoes spread across my tongue like a balm. The taste was of pure nostalgia. Conical spuds! I should have taken a smaller bite because the nip was very hot. I must have made a face.

What's wrong, Emily?" Wolkayrs' expression was as full of worry as was Thuorfosi's.

I swallowed in a hurry, "it's good...really really good, b...but hot! I w...was trying n...not to burn my tongue." I looked at the nip, "d...do they come out of the ground like this or w...were they cut this w...w...way?"

"That's their normal shape," Wolkayrs said, popping an entire nip in his mouth. A second followed it. I was still less than half way through mine. Damn Cosm.

"Why haven't we had these at the shrine?"

I thought Wolkayrs and Thuorfosi were going to choke from keeping themselves from laughing. "Are you serious?" Thuorfosi looked at me with amazement.

"W...w...would I ask if I w...wasn't serious?"

"Ouch! Struck down by the Emily glare of death!" She giggled. "Emily, this is street food. The High Priestess Lisaykos haup Foskos was palace raised and she would never serve street food at her table. Nips are, well, you know..."

"Poor people food?" I filled in.

"Exactly," she nodded. Please don't tell the Blessed Lisaykos that..."

"I heard nothing. Did you hear anything, Wolkayrs?"

"Not a thing."

---

Aylem, over Aybhas

From several thousand hands in the air, I watched with my clairvoyance as the three of them enjoyed eating street food. Healer Thuorfosi was quite the mage. She had Emily wrapped in a subtle charm of warmth so she didn't notice the chill inside a low-grade barrier so the breeze wouldn't touch her. It was very skillful and considerate magic. Emily did not realize how hard her three attendant healers worked to keep her comfortable. She would probably be disturbed if she knew.

Did she still think of Thuorfosi, Twessera, and Kayseo as the "gang of three?" She probably did not since Emily originally applied it as a slight. In her mind, there was a gang of four who were some corrupt Asian politicians who were framed by other corrupt Asian politicians some three decades after I died.

Along with High Priestess Lisaykos and Scholar Attendant Wolkayrs, the five of them were the people Emily knew the best. They provided all the work and the care to heal her and help her and make her more comfortable in a world she disliked. I had done none of those things for her yet had once expected her to give me her friendship and sympathy, simply on the basis that I was me and she should feel privileged to gain my patronage.

I was unliked and friendless growing up in Coventry, especially after my brothers fled my dog's end of a family. My life here was a bit better but I think that's because of my position as Queen. I was still just as unliked and friendless here as I was there. Only here, people put up with me in ways that wouldn't anger me because they were afraid of what I might do to them.

The envy I felt just then for Thuorfosi, Wolkayrs, and Emily in their friendly sharing of nips and spit-turned-basted meatballs made me wish I could join them. It would be so nice just to talk to someone over some street food, share some gossip, tease one another over making eyes at some attractive passer-by.

I used to think that becoming the Queen was recompense for all the pain of my previous life. What a fool I was. What good is power in a life without love?