First: Running in the Bear Empire
Previous: Buttons
Next:34: What’s Your Name?
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Author’s Note: This chapter is as the title says, literally.
That is, they have sex. There is no conversation and no plot in this chapter, so if you’re not interested in the sex, you can safely skip this week and go to 34: What’s Your Name?
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First: Running in the Bear Empire
Previous: Imperial Bed
Next: 33: Consummation
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For a moment, Deline thought that Carrone was simply stuck on a never ending circle. Then she realized that he was smiling.
She smiled back at him. “Well.” She raised her eyebrows. “I’d say ‘wouldn’t you like to know,” but I think we already established that you have an interest and an opportunity. But if we’re talking about the furniture… you could go upstairs and take a look yourself. It’s not quite as modern as the one back in the Capitol, but it’s an Imperial Bed.”
First: Running in the Bear Empire
Previous: Job Description
Next: 32: Buttons
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Deline looked Carrone up and down, in part because she needed to buy herself a moment to think.
“You’re attractive.”
That hadn’t really been what she’d meant to say.
“You’re strong, clever, and good-looking.”
First: Running in the Bear Empire
Previous: Third
Next:31: Imperial Bed
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Deline found that she was staring at Carrone; rather, she realized that she was staring at him when he shifted uncomfortably.
“So,” she spoke carefully. “You want a life, a life that isn’t being a bounty hunter any more. You want someone to go home to at night, or someones, a marriage or a joining. You want people you can look at as partners, as equals; you don’t mind being the junior in a marriage, though, as long as you have a place. But you were planning on settling down and then you went after the wrong rabbit. Am I close?”
“That’s – that’s it, yeah.” He huffed and lay down on the floor, staring through the glass at the fire. “That’s it. So you see why you – you being the wife of the Emperor, that means that you’re in line for the throne when he dies, doesn’t it?”
“Don’t – you probably shouldn’t make it sound like it’s an imminent thing,” she protested. Continue reading
Originally posted on Patreon in January 2019 and part of the Great Patreon Crossposting to WordPress.
In the Prompt Call, I mentioned that:
Fic starring characters who’ll later be in the novel currently titled Found Down Below is available http://www.lynthornealder.com/2018/08/02/thimbleful-thursday-parts-and-points/ and http://www.lynthornealder.com/2018/08/27/what-the-spell/ .
This is the third character in that novel.
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He didn’t turn around.
Part of him was screaming to. Huge parts of him ached with it, whispered to him, reminded him that Dyevo had found all his jobs, had paid his rent, had bought his food…
…had taken 90% of all his fees, leaving him with enough to cover a couple entertainments and the options Dyevo didn’t deign to provide.
Mostly potions, because Dyevo ran this part of town, and if Dyevo didn’t think his Parts should have something, they were gonna make said Parts pay out the nose.
That, of course, was another problem. Dyevo ran this part of town. He ran Tayevyi Industries, he ran the BelowSpace entries, he ran the Parts that did the running and the entertainment and the black market shipping. Continue reading
First: Running in the Bear Empire
Previous: Blood
Next: 30: Job Description
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By the time they reached the cabin, Deline was thinking that maybe she should have let Carrone carry her after all – except he was not in any better shape than she was.
She stopped him when they could see the stone roof of the building and walked widdershins twice around the place until she could find the wards and their key, and then used her personal token as Claw to unlock those wards – in this case by taking her necklace and, with a quiet incantation in a language that had been, if her sources were correct, already old when the bear made this land, sticking the necklace into the hollow of an ancient tree.
“Now we can go in.” She gestured him forward.
“What would have happened if you hadn’t done that little dance?”
“The house might have eaten us in our sleep – or possibly, nothing at all might have happened. This way, it will keep other people a decent distance away.”
“Your magery is a strange, strange thing.” He shuddered. “I don’t know how it isn’t sorcery.” Continue reading
First: Running in the Bear Empire
Previous: Climbing
Next: 29: Third
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One drop of blood slid down Carrone’s neck. Deline watched it. He hardly breathed.
He could stop her. He didn’t have – she didn’t think he had orders against stopping her. Perhaps she should have written down everything she’d ordered him to do.
“Why?” she asked. She was proud of herself that her voice sounded mostly casual. She didn’t feel in the least bit calm, casual, or laid-back about the matter. She was actually a little bit fond of him. “Why would you want that?” Continue reading
First: Running in the Bear Empire
Previous: A Place
Next: 28: Blood
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The question hung in the air between them.
Deline had started it because he wouldn’t stop about the “wife of the emperor” business, no more than some courtier trying to curry favor or some spy trying to dig up information. She’d finished the question because she found herself curious, even though she was aware it wasn’t exactly a nice question.
Carrone cleared his throat. He looked at the next hill before them, looked back at her, and started walking.
Deline followed, setting a pace that wouldn’t leave her looking at the back of him the entire trip.
At a very narrow flat spot, just barely big enough for the two of them, he paused. “Obviously you think I’m good enough for that,” he pointed out, his eyebrows raised as if challenging her to deny it. “How many nights have we spent together already? Continue reading
Time for verbs!
Or just a single verb…
We’re going to start with the concept of to count, to sum up.
This is a very old word, first recorded as someone counting their sheep.
fuap is the root word.
fuaplu began as “one who counts.” Now it means, well, “computer.” That is, a machine.
BUT from there we go in two directions.
boe (bowie) comes from an ancient word meaning small and now means tiny. That would be boefu – a microcomputer.
On the other hand, you have the really big, massive things used to grind huge amounts of information. We have noen (No-en, like noel), from an ancient word meaning great. So a Noenfu is a megacomputer.
Bonus: noenbeajue, megacorp.
oh, and “tek”, technology, which comes from gaoz, “craft,” and –mɛdio, the study of. and now is back to Gaoz meaning “technology, things someone can technomance, things that use electricity.”
Speaking of, I have enough words left on this monster to contemplate electricity.
We start with the ancient word – a loan-word at that, peumbas, -as being the ending for “forces that are not quite known.”
This word originally meant bright light, as far as we know. It is now the root word for all things electrical.