Chapter: 592 – Honored Acquaintances

Tala held back for just a moment as Rane stepped forward to open one of the doors into the Caravaners’ Guildhall for his wife and daughter, allowing Tala to stride into what felt like a memory.

She’d come through here quite a few times while going back and forth between Bandfast and Marliweather, as well as before that. It had been a blissful, more carefree time… before Be-thric.

Yet we’ve taken back ourselves and risen higher than ever before, despite him and that time.

-Arguably because of, as we rose to the occasion of opposing and escaping. A powerful challenge often leads to the greatest growth.-

The doors were simple, if wide, and they had stood open when last she was here, allowing for easy foot-traffic in and out. This time, they had been closed, but obviously not locked. The arch which held the doors was easily wide enough for four people—five of Tala’s size—to come through shoulder to shoulder, with a bit of room to spare.

The room they entered was a wide receiving hall, with clerks working in alcoves around the outside, as well as some more senior workers moving through the shifting groups of their prospective clients.

Here, almost every business was represented, and it was a flourishing hub of activity.

Restaurants negotiated food shipments, either for more specialized crops not grown within this city, or working to establish contracts for when the city’s farming phase ended. Artisans, craftsmen, and tradesmen similarly negotiated for materials, or to ship their goods to other cities, and countless others sought or negotiated similar services.

As the Caravaners also carried mail from city to city, along with the other goods, there were quite a few people with letters, parcels, or packages moving about or waiting in one of the lines for that service.

Tala shook off the memory of her first time here as she walked in, beside her daughter, right in front of her husband. As they stepped inside, a voice called from a nearby counter, “Mistress, Master, miss, welcome. How can we assist you, today?”

Tala turned toward the Caravan Guild receptionist who’d called out to them, intending on asking after Mistress Kannis, but the woman, herself, seemed almost magically to appear, even if Tala had seen her coming from a cleverly disguised sideroom. “Mistress Tala, Master Rane, miss Lea, welcome and be welcome.” She turned to smile at the receptionist. “Thank you for greeting them, miss Turry. I’ll take it from here.”

Turry gave a bow toward Mistress Kannis. “As you wish, Mistress Kannis.” She then smiled toward the guests. “I hope that you are successful in whatever brings you here, today.”

Rane and Tala gave nods in return, Rane speaking for them. “Thank you. Have a good day.”

Lea gave a bow after her parents, seeming to try to key off of them. “Good day.”

Mistress Kannis led them off to the side, toward the restaurant attached to the Caravan Guild. “To what do we owe the pleasure of the Sappherrous clan’s visit?”

Rane chuckled, and Tala shook her head slightly. “No need for the formality, Mistress Kannis. We’re leaving Bandfast, and wanted to come by to say goodbye, and for Lea to be able to see Fannas again and say goodbye to him.”

“Oh! Well, that is very kind of you. Let me call him.” They stopped their progress as a group, and she closed her eyes momentarily, before opening them once more and smiling. “He’s on his way.” She turned to Lea. “Fannas enjoyed talking with you quite a bit. I know he’ll be glad for another chance. He bought a couple of decks of cards and some other things, in order to be better able to teach you the games he was telling you about.”

Lea gave a little bow. “Thank you for your kind words, Mistress Kannis. I am rather excited to spend some time with him as well. He is an enjoyable companion.”

“I find him so.” Mistress Kannis smiled in return before turning to Tala. “Your daughter is wonderfully polite. You must be proud that she is learning so much, so quickly.”

Tala and Rane both gave small, pleased nods.

“I know I wasn’t so well mannered at her age.” There was an obvious twinkle in the Mage’s eyes along with the playful words, and the three others each smiled at the rejoinder for their own reasons.

A minute later, Fannas walked out of a back room, drawing a few glances and greetings—which he returned as appropriate to each—but not too much more than that. It was obvious that he was a well known and accepted feature of this guildhall.

Lea hopped in place and waved, then scampered over to Fannas’s side, barely containing herself enough to arrive next to him before bubbling over with chatter.

Tala decided not to listen in on Lea’s socializing, instead joining in on Rane and Mistress Kannis’s conversation.

The young Mage had taken to her master’s old position in truth, and she was well and truly accepted as the head clerk of this local branch.

Lyn had dropped through a few times already in recent days to say hi to old colleagues, as well as to check in on Mistress Kannis, and the younger woman had been delighted to see her.

Things were going smoothly, and while caravans were still being attacked as they forged through the wilds—even occasionally lost—there hadn’t been any concentrated areas of such losses of late, meaning that the cycling cities seemed to be enjoying a time of relative safety and ease of travel.

That caught Tala’s attention. “Oh? Do we know why things are a bit safer of late?”

Mistress Kannis shrugged. “Well, honestly, it’s a lack of things more than anything else. There are no prominently rising Magical beasts, and those that were known have wide ranges.” She hesitated then, and winced. “I apologize. I know that your sister… I meant that there were no new rising magical beasts along our trade routes, I know that you yourself just encountered one near a city and—”

Tala gave a sad smile while shaking her head and speaking to end the building awkwardness. “I know you didn’t mean that badly, Mistress Kannis. My sister passed in the line of duty, protecting those under her care. No more needs be said.”

Mistress Kannis hesitated briefly, and then nodded. “Very well. Thank you.”

Tala gave a tight, but understanding, smile.

The Mage cleared her throat and moved on, clearly falling back into a more familiar topic. “So, with such wide ranges for the known beasts, it’s always a bit of a coin toss whether or not they’ll be encountered. Caravans have been missing most such potential encounters, and those that do cross paths have been well prepared for the specific beast in question.” She shrugged again. “We’re not doing anything differently, not really, but it’s bearing fruit for the moment.”

Rane grunted at that. “Like the harvest from a crop. Some years it’s not great, and some years it’s fantastic, not really from the farmer doing different things, but because the environment and weather are more or less favorable.”

“Exactly.” She nodded. “The farmer can’t know the exact weather or other factors that will come into play through the year ahead. So he just does the best he can, and in retrospect it is more or less successful in a given year.”

Tala ‘hmmed’, nodding slowly. “I think I can see that, yeah. Well, I’m glad that caravans are safer for the moment. I hope that such doesn’t lead to laxness or a change in expectations.”

Mistress Kannis sighed, a bit of sadness creeping into her eyes. “That is a danger, yes. We don’t advertise to the citizenry that things are safer now, because that’s looking back and holds no promise for what the next years will look like, or even just the next trip, but those with more influence have access to the information, and some of them lack the understanding of statistics and the various other concepts in play. We’ve had two non-guild caravans depart from Bandfast in the last year, both toward Marliweather. One got through with a few scuffles. They lost half their guards to things that wouldn’t have even required Mage Protectors for us. The other? Gone entirely.”

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Tala frowned. “We allow that? The traveling of non-guild caravans?”

Mistress Kannis arched an eyebrow. Though there was still mischief in her eyes. “Allow? People aren’t prisoners in our cities, and it’s rather funny that you ask, given you, by yourself, would qualify as a non-guild caravan.”

“I know all that.” Tala sighed before huffing a laugh. “But we still keep citizens from doing especially stupid things.”

“You’d think so, right? But no. We prevent them from doing especially dangerous things, if that danger is posed to others. That’s it. You know this Mistress Tala. Rust, that overarching policy is how you’ve been able to do half of what you have done.”

Rane huffed a laugh and nudged his wife with his shoulder. “She has a fair point.” He flexed their aura briefly, trapping all sound within as he said the next sentence. “Even with Lea, the issue was only whether or not she would be a danger to others, once that was shown to be unlikely…” He shrugged, releasing the lock. “We were left to our own devices.”

Tala grunted, but Mistress Kannis glanced around, frowning. “This isn’t the most private of places, Master Rane.”

Rane shook his head, smiling. “I secured us for that moment. We’re fine.”

Lea let out a giggling laugh that actually had notes and tonal similarities with Terry’s laughing trill, now that Tala considered it. That’s interesting.

-Lea doesn’t really have vocal cords as you do. So, between non-human sound generators, and the fact that children often tend to take on similar sound characteristics to those around them, this is just a bit more extreme of a case due to her capacities and Terry’s close integration with our family.-

I can see that. I don’t want to control her, nor remove what makes her unique, but should we consider trying to curb some of that?

-At the moment? No. Her laugh is more musical and melodic than most other people’s laughs, but it’s not really so far outside of the range of human sounds as to be noted as such. Unusual? Yes. Notably lovely? Yes. Inhuman? No.-

Understood. Thank you.