Gareth and th Lost Island (12 page)

Gareth chuckled again.  “Remember how I said we
kept getting beat up?” he asked.  Izzy nodded her head.
 “Tralnis worked part time at the clinic in the ghetto,
donating his time.  After patching me up for five years, he
said he might as well just get guardianship of me considering how
often we saw each other. Imagine my surprise when the orphanage
matron pulled me out of class the next day to tell me a Doctor
Tralnis Granitestaff had convinced the local magistrate to grant
him custody of me,” Gareth said with a fond smile.

Izzy found it impossible not to smile along with
Gareth when his violet eyes twinkled like that.  “Even though
Tralnis lived on the other side the city, I still managed to make
it to our park a few times a week to see Henry.  A couple of
years later, Henry’s parents died in an accident.  True to
form, Tralnis took in Henry as well.  He sponsored both of us
for the schools of our choice.  Henry went to the culinary
school, and I went to the University Arcanum.  I became the
youngest professor in the University’s history, and Henry became
the only Chim to not only be accepted to the school, but to be the
head of his class.  Henry could have worked at any restaurant
he wanted to.  Instead, he moved back home. Henry informed
Tralnis that he was going to be the Dwarf’s butler, whether he
wanted one or not,” he said, laughing at the memory.

“So the three of you aren’t just friends, you’re
more of a family,” Izzy paraphrased.

This caused Gareth to chuckle even more.  “I
guess so.  Well as much as a kinky Dwarf, a Chim with a
questionable sense of humor, and an orphaned muta… er, human could
be a family,” he said, catching himself near the end.  His
verbal slip made the smile Izzy was getting addicted to fade away.
 

In Izzy’s opinion, a change of topics was needed
once more.  “I recognize the white stripe of a doctor on
Tralnis’ jacket and the black vest of a butler for Henry. What do
the stripes on your jacket mean? What exactly does Professor Mintel
do at the University Arcanum” she asked in a teasing voice.

Gareth chuckled at her playful tone. He pointed to
each stripe on his jacket in turn. “The wide blue one means I’m a
professor for the School of Languages. The brown ones shows that
I’m an adjunct professor for the Archeology Department, and the
narrow green one indicates that I’m a researcher with the
Department of Applied Magics. Up until recently, I mostly taught
classes in the School of Languages, and a few in the Archeology
Department when they were short staffed due to other professors
being out on expeditions. All of my duties have been suspended
until I finish this expedition,” he replied.

Izzy nodded her head, impressed. “Applied Magics…
does that mean you’re a wizard?” she inquired. Wizards were an
insular lot, and she had always wanted to meet someone who didn’t
need runes to perform magic.

Gareth outright laughed this time at her question.
When he saw her hurt expression he quickly said, “I’m the farthest
thing from a Wizard you can find, literally. Have you heard of the
extremely rare wizards known as mages?” he asked.

“Those are the blokes who don’t even need a focus
object to perform magic, right?” she asked for clarification.

“Yes, and they’re extremely rare. At any one time,
there might only be 20 to 30 of them on Hadronus. People like me
are just as rare. I have no magic what so ever, not even the slight
glimmer that most of the population has,” he told her.

Izzy frowned in confusion. “What do you do for
Applied Magics if you don’t have any magic? I would think you would
need to be at least an Adept to be of any use,” she commented.

“Each of the major universities around Hadronus have
at least one person like me working in their Applied Magics
department. Since we don’t radiate any magic, we are able to
calibrate divining equipment to a much finer degree than anyone
else can. We are also the only ones who can sketch out experimental
runes without the danger of them getting energized before they’re
ready,” Gareth told her with a smile. He wanted to get to know Izzy
better before telling her about his more secretive work on
combining runes with mechanical objects.

“I never thought about that before. I can see why
they would want you to work with them. You said you’re primary job
was with the languages department. How many languages do you know?”
she inquired.

Gareth paused and looked slightly self-conscious.
 “18,” he answered.

Izzy stopped and stared at Gareth.  “You’re
kidding?!” she blurted out.  He shook his head no.
 “Wow!” was all she could say.  As they entered the
trading bazaar, the buzz of conversations being held in several
different languages filled her ears.  Not for the first time,
she wondered what they were all talking about.  Izzy grabbed
Gareth’s arm, and dragged him deeper into the bazaar.  She
stopped near a pair of blue skinned Gutree who hailed from the ice
cap at Hadronus’ North Pole. “What are they talking about?” she
whispered to Gareth.

Gareth closed his eyes so he could focus on his
hearing better.  After a minute, he opened them and looked at
Izzy.  “Nothing really exciting, the one closest to us was
telling the other about a new whale blubber restaurant he found,”
he relayed.

Like a kid with a new toy, Izzy spun around
gleefully, and pointed at a lone Roehus female who was pacing back
and forth talking to herself.  “How about her?” Izzy asked
pointing to the red skinned woman.

Gareth listened for a moment, and then blushed
slightly. “She’s… uh… she’s been gone from home for quite a while.
Currently, she is planning out in graphic detail what she and her
husbands are going to do once she gets all three of them in their
mating chamber,” he translated.

Izzy nodded her head in approval.  “Good for
her!” she stated.  A loud argument from behind them drew her
attention. Two slightly potbellied Centaurs were yelling at each
other using large, rapid hand motions.  “What’s up with those
two?  Are they fighting over a female or something?” she
wondered aloud.

Again Gareth closed his eyes, and focused on
listening.  As the Centaurs started to get louder, Gareth
laughed, and shouted something to them in their own language.
 Hearing this comment coming from a human stunned them for a
moment before they joined in on his laughter.  As the Centaurs
walked past, one of them reached over and ruffled Gareth’s hair.
 

Izzy put her hands on her hips impatiently waiting
for Gareth to let her in on the joke.  Gareth pointed towards
the Centaurs. “They were arguing over which deathball team they
supported would end up taking this year’s championship.  I
told them to ‘cheer up, at least they weren’t Houlton Tramplers
fans.’  The Tramplers are so bad, they’ve become something of
national joke,” he explained.  Izzy rolled her eyes, and
started to lead Gareth to the merchant she hoped to buy cargo from.
“Just out of curiosity, what kind of cargo are we looking to buy?”
he asked her.

“Well, since Consus is pretty far up north, I
thought we would try to get as many crates of pignuts as we can get
our hands on,” Izzy told him.

Gareth stopped walking as his brain tried to process
what she had said.  While he had never been to Consus before,
he had read travel guides about the city and the surrounding
countryside. None of the literature about the area mentioned the
population viewed pig testicles as a delicacy.  He also
wondered how the demand for them could outstrip the local supply.
 “Why don’t the local farmers just raise more pigs?  I
would think that would be a much more economical option than
importing them,” he observed.

It was Izzy’s turn to stop in her tracks, and try to
figure out what Gareth was talking about.  When she realized
he was taking her literally, she blushed and laughed at the same
time. “Sorry, I forget you’re from this island.  Just like the
names for your cities, you lot probably have a different name for
pignuts,” she apologized.   “What do you call those
small, brown fruits with the hairy outer rind?  You know, the
ones with the green insides that only grow here?” she asked for
clarification.

“You mean dragontears?” he asked for
clarification.

Izzy nodded her head yes. “You have to admit our
name for them makes more sense,” she pointed out. Gareth did agree
with her when he visualized the small fruit in his mind. Now that
he thought about it, the sign hanging outside of their local fruit
seller shop showing a banana hanging between two dragontears must
have been why Tralnis always insisted they get their fruit
there.

Elizabeth Morgana stood behind Pilot as he navigated
the magical currents along the Leyline they were flying above.
 The rest of the crew were at different parts of the ship
doing their duties, leaving Pilot and her alone above deck.
 She used this quiet time to think about the three people that
in the short span of one week had gone from passengers to crew
members themselves. While Henry and Tralnis had both agreed to be
crew members as part of their deal, Gareth was under no such
constraints. Despite this, the young professor had bounced from
area to area observing, and asking what he could do to help.
 

The only bad thing about Professor Mintel that
Elizabeth could think of was how he looked at her sister, and how
Izzy looked at him in return.  Even though Izzy was an adult
now, Elizabeth still thought of her as her baby sister.  From
experience, Elizabeth knew that the long distance romances their
lifestyle dictated very rarely worked out.  Her disastrous
relationship with her last girlfriend was proof enough of that.
 For her part, Izzy had her fair share of relationships that
hadn’t ended well.  Elizabeth assumed that a relationship
between Izzy and Professor Mintel would end up like all of the
others.

The Captain’s thoughts were sent off track as she
was thrown against the railing when the ship came to sudden stop.
 She cursed loudly as the door to the lower decks flew open.
Tralnis, Henry, and Gareth ran out to see what was going on.
 

“Captain, what’s happening?  Why did we stop so
suddenly?” Tralnis asked as he ran up to where she was. Ignoring
them, Elizabeth grabbed a spyglass hanging by a leather strap from
a hook on the railing.  She extended the brass tube and
scanned the sky around them. “Captain, what are you doing?” Tralnis
demanded.

Elizabeth swore again when she couldn’t find what
she was searching for, even when she knew they had to be there.
“Pirates!” she responded tersely.

“I’m not a student of airship tactics, but wouldn’t
it be better to me moving if we are being chased by pirates?”
Tralnis asked sarcastically.

“Yes, Doctor.  Moving would be a really good
idea right about now, but we can’t.  Somehow, the pirates
managed to slip a Leysapper under us without us seeing them,”
Elizabeth replied tersely.  

“What the hells is a Leysapper?” Tralnis demanded.
 Elizabeth ignored his question, and leaned over the side,
trying to find the ship that was keeping them from escaping.

Seeing his captain was busy, Pilot answered for her.
 “Short passenger who is also our doctor, a Leysapper is a
small dirigible pirates use when attacking Leyships.  They are
equipped with special divining rods that disrupt the magic flowing
from a Leyline.  Without the flow from the Leyline, a Leyship
has to rely on its magic batteries to stay aloft. The batteries
aren’t powerful enough to provide the magic needed to move forward
as well.  When the Leyship is fully disabled, the main pirate
ship moves in for the kill,” he explained.

“There!” Elizabeth yelled as she found what she was
looking for. “Bastards painted their gas sack and hull the same
blue as the sea!” she swore, pointing to an irregular blue patch a
couple hundred feet below them.

Tralnis pointed towards the lone cannon at the bow
of the Glorious Dawn. “What about that thing? Can’t we shoot the
sapper below us, or the main pirate ship when it gets here?” he
asked.

Pilot shook his head no, causing his head quills to
rattle. “The Leysapper is directly below us. There’s no way we can
depress the barrel of the canon low enough to get a shot. As for
the larger dirigible the pirates are most likely using, they will
send out a swarm of two man ‘minnows’ to take control and
neutralize any defenses before they risk their ship,” he explained.
Pilot gave a distasteful look at their single canon. “The only
thing our canon is actually good for is scaring away the occasional
dragon,” he added.

Elizabeth had the spyglass to her eye again and
scanned the clouds now that she knew the pirates used camouflage to
hide their ships. “There they are!” she announced and pointed with
her mechanical arm to starboard. “I count 12 minnows coming in
fast. They’ll be on us in less than ten minutes,” she estimated.
“Professor, go see if you can help Izzy eek out any more power from
the batteries. Doctor… Henry, we’ll need you on deck to help out
when we’re boarded,” she stated.

Tralnis turned to look at Henry. “You heard the
captain, go fetch my fighting gloves,” he ordered. Henry didn’t
bother to acknowledge Tralnis, and just ran to the crew quarters.
After a minute, Henry returned looking slightly ridiculous wearing
a pot on his head as a helmet. In one hand he held the large iron
frying pan he had dubbed “Mr. Smashy”, and in the other a pair of
boxing gloves. What didn’t look so ridiculous were the two single
shot pistols tucked into the waistband of Henry’s kilt.

Tralnis rubbed the bridge of his nose in
frustration. “No, not those gloves… the real fighting gloves!” he
complained. “Never mind, I’ll get them myself!” he snorted, and
stormed down the stairs to the crew quarters.

Precious minutes passed by while the minnows drew
ever closer. Henry first impression of the tiny two man airship was
that they must have been the result of a drunken one night stand
between a dirigible and a bicycle. The pilot who sat at the back of
the contraption not only steered, but powered the ship via pedals
linked by gears to a propeller at the back. What the passenger of
the minnow did in the fight shaped how the front end of the tiny
dirigibles looked. Seven of the minnows had low slung platforms
were pirates stood waiting until they got close enough to their
prey to jump onto the enemy deck. The remaining two minnows had the
front passenger strapped in tight to their seat. The straps were
necessary because they needed both hands free to operate the long
barreled rifles they were armed with.