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Spirit Folk tents are amazing.
When the threatening storm arrived at last, the Fire Folk were preparing to unearth some sort of buried barbecue, the kind where you cook your food in a covered hole, like at a clambake or a luau. They downed tools, secured the scene and hustled into the tents, whisking their guests along without letting a single drop touch us.
The tent walls were hidden behind tapestries, but we could see the wind battering the ceiling mercilessly, making me worry that the structure might collapse. No gust ever blew strong enough to overwhelm it though, no matter how much it looked like it would.
I knew not to wonder why Curator let this storm interrupt the celebration. She was always careful to stay true to the main scenario. If one can draw out the ‘Dragon’s Challenge’ long enough, the threatening storm cuts loose in the middle of the fight, and you end up with an almost Wagnerian scene of literal Sturm und Drang , battling a dragon amid thunder and lighting, which you can use to your advantage of you have the right skills. She had to keep the storm to fit the script.
I have no [Fairy Sight] in Lydia’s body, but I have rudimentary [Spirit Sense]. The magic in the tent poles and fabric explained this feat, but I still had to marvel at the engineering required to deal with this merciless thunderstorm.
Our maids were already here when we arrived, already clad in tribal attire, merrily blending in with the young women of the Spirit Folk tribe. They fully expected the rest of us to follow suit.
When the tribal girls rushed us out of the imminent storm, they separated us from the men, plunging us into an all-female world where nobody hesitated to strip, or to strip the guests. While the winds roared, I found my hips wrapped with a garment like the ones they were donning, that looked from the outside like a pareo held together with a brass ring at the hip, but had a sort of integrated bikini bottom sewn into it. It was the same garment the tribal girls wore during the day, but with a fancy print.
Once everyone was so garbed, they decorated one another and the guests with body paint. Everyone acquired stripes, swirls and spirals on faces, necks, arms, backs, tummies and even bosoms.
The girl painting me was a dark-haired beauty with glittering red eyes, and she seemed quite excited with her canvas. It seems my Lydia form was quite to her liking. She also teased that I needed piercings so I could wear jewelry like hers…
She wasn’t looking at my ears. While eyeing the rings in question, I meekly replied, “No, thank you,” then added, “That looks… really painful.”
And she’d done each one twice… It hurts just to think about it!
The girls quickly dried everyone using big palm-leaf fans, then put on highly decorative and somewhat thinner silk bibs which exposed entirely too much from the side for my comfort. I looked down at my own bib and told myself, I must make sure not to lean forward too far in this thing!
I could also still see my friendly helper’s rings glittering through the fabric of her own bib. Okay, I’ve got to just stop thinking about the rings. My Lydia side is just too freaked out over them.
More jewelry came out, chains to decorate their bare backs and waists, along with necklaces, armlets, bracelets, anklets and whatever you call an armlet for the thigh on the side that their pareo-like skirts exposed. As my enthusiastic maids joined in to decorate me, I noticed that this tribe owns a stunning amount of gold and silver. I wondered how people who live by herding animals could possibly accumulate so much.
At last, the rain and howling winds subsided. The senior tribal woman in the tent decided we could safely go out, and we emerged to an already busy scene of resumed preparations.
The one pit exposed before the storm came upon us was partly ruined, because the wind blew away their hasty attempt to cover it. The pots that had been in the pit survived but the roast goat in the pit was a muddy mess. Fortunately, they were cooking four goats and had planned for extra (because leftovers), so we still had plenty of meat.
Just like Elven society, the Spirit Folk had no gender division of labor. Those that went around armed, those who did the domestic chores, or those who did any other task, such as the group who now worked to secure things around the camp that the storm had disturbed, were evenly divided between men and women.
Evenly didn’t mean half-and-half, though. Unlike elves, dwarves and humans with a 1:1 ratio, these Spirit Folk had an uneven gender split. Two girls for every guy, just like the Jan and Dean song, or slightly more than that, if I recall correctly. Many of the early artificial species during this period skewed toward having more women, almost certainly because they observed that the Elders were a nearly all female species. That fact had a significant impact on human cultures of that era, one which I doubt the Immortals meant to cause.
Our escort and the senior matron led us at last to the massive tent for the feast. A fire pit in the center should have been filling it with smoke, but again, magic enchantments on the fabric dealt with it just as they dealt with the storm.
My male incarnations and Oberon arrived before us, so I knew immediately, based on where the hosts seated them, that we would not be sitting in our own group. They had spaced the men evenly around the broad ring of places. They seated Oberon and Ceria beside a woman who was practically draping herself on the chief who greeted us earlier, and Rugau, Daq and Kwelabi at spots essentially at the other three compass points around the circle. The girls sat us each on our own cushions, also spreading us out, although mine turned out to be on the opposite side of my beryl-eyed beauty from the chief. She gave him a kiss on the cheek as she took the cushion directly next to him. He stroked her thigh as he returned the kiss, immediately killing my short-lived theory she might be his daughter. Age gap much?
“So this is the lord’s mother?” he asked her, glancing past her to me. He turned to Oberon. “I did not expect such a young beauty, Lord!”
My son chuckled. “Consider her one of the Dawn Kind.”
His eyes widened and he straightened slightly, as if to correct his behavior after realizing something. Meanwhile, my hazy memory failed to provide the meaning of the term Oberon used, so Fan Li served it up in the back of my mind.
<Elder Age mortals used that term for non-mortals. They see Elementals, Dragon Kindred, Phoenix Kindred and other magic non-mortal races, including the Elders, as beings from what they call the ‘Dawn Era’.>
In other words, the Primordial Age, before the Great Freeze. I recalled that many mortals of this era mistakenly believed that humans began in the underworlds like Ilim Below during the Freeze and didn’t exist in the times before that, despite Elder efforts to educate them otherwise.
“Ah… I see,” the chief said with a sheepish look. “I understand now. I did not realize the lord’s actual mother would join us.”
The beautiful girl listened to this with interest, although she didn’t comment. She gave him a narrow-eyed stare though.
Translation: The spirit beast employee running the ‘chief’ character had momentarily broken character to admit he only just realized who I actually was. He probably expected the ‘mother’ to be another NPC. My pretty escort had long since recognized me, and broke character slightly to give him an admonishing look.
“I do come here from time to time,” I noted with a smile.
By this time, many tribesmen and tribeswomen were taking their own places in the circle.
<Aren’t you busy in the outside world?> I asked Fan Li as I accepted a goblet from my pretty companion. She seemed to be dividing her attention equally between me and the chief. Her hands were all over him, and her eyes were all over me.
<Unlike the rest of you, this small one has no trouble existing as more than one awareness, and has been here for a while.>
I realized she meant that literally while a pre-teen server was pouring a beverage into the goblet that turned out to be fermented goat’s milk. Looking around, I spotted a Chinese girl in tribal attire seated near Kwelabi. She waved back.
<They think this humble scholar is an ‘Elderling’, it seems, due to the eyes.>
<I wonder how this fellow would feel if he knew that Oberon’s mother was here not once but five times,> I mused.
Daq joined the chat to say, <I for one am happy to leave the role of ‘Oberon’s mother’ to you.>
The girl next to me began clapping with delight, as did several others, and then I saw that youngsters were bringing in food under the watchful eyes of the elders escorting them.
Several spoonfuls of a dish a bit like paella, except with delicious meatballs and dates instead of seafood, landed on my plate, along with juicy servings of roast goat, hunks torn from freshly-baked bread, and refills of the mildly alcoholic milk. The only utensils were those used for serving. Everything on my plate was to be eaten with fingers. The bread, I soon saw, was for sopping up the juices from the plate and fingers.
It was easy to carry on the physical conversation while our mental conversation between Incarnations continued. In person, I was mostly listening to others describe Ceria and Oberon’s exploits leading up to her triumph in the Challenge.
A third woman joined the chief after both girls seated beside him began concentrating more on Oberon and me. She squeezed in, between my companion and the chief, exchanging long kisses first with her and then with him before receiving his compliments on the feast, which she seemed to be the one in charge of preparing.
I inferred from their talk that all three girls were his wives, and this one was the senior wife, but that it in fact seemed to be the job of the other two to ‘entertain’ Oberon, Ceria and me. The Fire Tribe customarily permitted extramarital sex, within a strict set of conventions. Visitors were fair game as a matter of hospitality.
<You should be ready to deal with the situation now, Your Grace,> Fan Li noted. It took a moment for me to realize she meant the situation in Oseri, not my companion’s wandering hands.
Memories from her and the men already brought me up-to-date. Of course, I couldn’t nod without raising the curiosity of my companion.
Fan Li actually had a young man on one side and a young woman on the other, and appeared to not be discouraging their advances at all, to my surprise. She and the girl were actually feeding each other, and then Fan Li used her fingers to feed the guy too!
<It’s clear I can’t scold Diur for his actions, although I can’t agree with them either,> I admitted, trying to not pay too much attention to her very un-Fan-Li-like behavior as she let him to lick her fingers clean.
<Efficient solution,> Kwelabi’s basso thoughts rumbled, <But not good solution.>
A pair of cuties were enjoying Kwelabi’s shaggy body. I could feel some troubled thoughts in his mind as they hugged him like a big teddy bear. As a quasi-man, he had never found human girls physically attractive, but he had our aesthetics jumbled up with his own and at least understood their attentions. Fortunately, physical urges remained connected to his biology. Nothing weird was going to happen there.
<Perhaps ‘practical’ would be an appropriate analysis,> Daq suggested. <He had limited options, it seems.>
Daq was not discouraging his companions, but not taking particular advantage of the situation either. Those girls had a hard road ahead of them if they were hoping for anything.
<I understand your point, but I cannot disagree with Her Grace’s dissatisfaction,> Rugau stated. <The rightness of actions is not based upon their success or failure.>
In comparison, his companions had an impossible road. He had already made clear his religious vows forbade what they sought. They were being more polite with him as a result, respectfully giving him their offerings without too overt a come-on.
Does my soul have some sort of switch that shuts down my sensual side when I become male? My female lives seem to have no trouble enjoying themselves.
Well, perhaps these three in particular were not typical.
The festivities grew more overt for the rest of us though. The tribal girls danced, with Ceria joining them, and some lost their clothing in the process, including her. My companion’s fiery eyes even urged me up on my feet, although my clothing stayed on despite her best efforts and her own striptease.
Feasting, dancing and entertainment progressed into something more like a discreet orgy, with lights dimmed and cushions and blankets for bedding and nominal privacy. During that time, I was able in [Spirit Sense] to confirm that Ceria and Oberon were in fact now intimate. I stopped myself from observing any more than that.
In the morning, I shared a bowl of some sort of goat milk hot cereal concoction with the chief’s youngest wife with a shared blanket protecting our bare skin from the cold desert morning. Then the time came for me to stop delaying and exit the scenario.
