Seventeen

"I am not," Weft said tightly, "a gentleman." And I'm never relieved of my duties, he added silently and with a trace of resentment which shocked him.

He turned rather disgustedly on his heel.

"The best ones do," Suitov was saying. "I'm surprised you remember that," he added, though he wasn't unduly. Little investments of that nature sometimes paid dividends.

Agueda mentally pulled a face at Weft's retreating back and returned to rubbing Baskerville's tummy.

"We don't care what the nasty man says, do we puppy?"

She hoped he wouldn't rip her innards out.

"Personally I find it easiest to ignore him," Baskerville said. "He sulks, then he shows up again as though nothing's happened. Though it's also funny when he throws a hissy fit."

He sighed in happiness.

The fact that this hellish creature still sounded like Baskerville was surprisingly comforting. But she found she still had to ask.

"Baskerville... darling. You wouldn't hurt me, would you?"

It was accompanied by a vigorous tickle just under his rib cage.

"Are you worried about what the kittycat said?" Baskerville asked as a prelude to saying something more.

She hesitated.

"No."

Jaina blushed still more and chuckled at Suitov's insistent compliments. "I'm hardly among the best. Uh, today I'm with the best, but I don't think I fit the label myself. I'm just a little scruffy." She downed her remaining Dew, which was shockingly tasty.

Baskerville said, "Hurting you hadn't occurred to me. Why would I? I don't have that many nice friends," he added, leaving the reasons up to the imagination.

Suitov grinned, shook his head and left a few seconds' pause. "So, what's been important to you lately?" he asked.

Because What have you been doing lately was too prescriptive. For all he knew she might not want to talk shop.

Suitov's question caught his target off-guard, as usual. Jaina had to think for a minute before answering.

"Djew?" she suggested sheepishly, then shrugged it off. "Heh. No, I have a real one too."

Jaina's eyes lost focus as she said, "Just being, I think. Living, enjoying what's enjoyable, avoiding the insidious self-inflicted guilt trip." Even as she mentioned it, the incessant voice in her head grew louder. You think you make a difference? You're ignoring your duty every second you sit here making googly eyes at Dark Bad and Handsome! People are dying because you think you deserve some time off, you wretched little...

She shook her head and forced herself to ignore the mental taunts. "You know, basic hedonism," she said with a mirthless smile.

Suitov nodded gravely. "Yes, I just about remember."

The substance known as Bede murred to himself and slid languorously¹ down the trunk of the birch. There was no bamboo, though had he but known it (and perhaps he did), budding rose bushes² were already on order.

The gardeners were not scheduled to arrive until after the builders had finished, though. That's the sensible way to do these things.

Light was loitering around the horizon as though cooking up some half-baked plan. Bede glossed over the untamed grass, set foot upon the back verandah and was lost from view for a while. He turned up a short twinkling later upon the shoulders of an elf. The dice box wasn't even knocked.

Blink, blink.

Ow.

"Where does it say flammable?" Sebastian asked when he came to again, plus one aching jaw. He made a mental note to never even jestingly point something burning at the winged specimen.

"Nowhere," Serp grumbled and crushed a can of caffeine he had consumed. Then he blinked and turned a very, very slow look toward his shoulder. There was a kind of wild panic to his expression - just when had this happened?

Sebastian also blinked at the sight. "Find a new pet, eh?"

"You shut up," Serp growled at the swashbuckler. "You shut up now." It had to be the caffeine. Yes, it had to... stupid kid.

So Sebbie did, all the while staring at the little critter.

"Surprisingly enough, I'm inclined to believe you." Agueda replied, not taking her hands off Basky's tummy.

"At least you seem to be much safer than Kerak right now."

Kerak was currently recieving a poke in the eye from round-tipped squidgy appendages. It's possible Bowman was enjoying it much more than Kerak was.

"Guys like him are all about repressing the beast within," Baskerville sighed. "The posing angstbunnies. Ultimately more danger than it's worth. If there's something that you're scared to let out, scared to look at even..."

He stretched and yawned, still lying on his side.

"Well, you just end up obsessing over it. Gives it more potency than if you'd faced up to it in the first place."

Propping himself partly up, he scratched his chin.


Forty metres away as the crow flew, except it'd have to be a ghost crow to fly through the two walls in the way, Bede settled more comfortably. Serp's shoulders were an interesting perch, for obvious reasons.

He let a little hind leg dangle and watched the gaming paraphernalia. Pirate hats!

"The beast within..."

Something about Baskerville's words took her back to the Molvidr school. She shook her head as if to shake off the memories, her hair flicking across her back as she did so.

"What would mine be, do you think?"

Was she after serious psychoanalysis? Baskerville hadn't met many serious psychos, apart from Weft of course, since leaving ho-- well, leaving the place he'd been born in and had considered home only because he had nothing to compare it with.

It was easier to tell a psycho back Home. They were the ones with red eyes.

"It can be anything, I guess," Baskerville thought aloud. "Anything you're scared of. Even love."

Actually, she was putting on a playful front and had hoped for an answer that wasn't quite so, well, accurate. She felt her guts twist slightly and flinched, pulling her hand off Baskerville's belly.

It was all a bit too much really; turning up in this bar, getting friendly with a guy who turns out to be some Freudian hell-puppy that fights werewolves.

With her mind on that topic, and to change the subject, she nodded over towards Kerak.

"Since his inner beast hasn't emerged in a while, shall we check if the man himself is ok?"

Baskerville swung to his four feet. "Course it hasn't. I beat it thoroughly, weren't you watching? Oh, I was magnificent. Keep away from my Aggywaggy, I says, then I got it by the throat and grrrrrrf!" He got a bit carried away shaking his head from side to side as though stunning a salmon and growling.

"It won't be back for a looong while," he concluded, staggering a bit.

Jaina eyed her magically-cleaned (but Jaina-drained) glass for a moment. Should I ask? I really ought to, but will he take it... well.

She opened her mouth, backpedaled, tossed the remainder of her poured Djew into her slack maw instead. Then she swallowed hard, nervously wiggled her toes inside her boots, and asked. "Do you ever get, uh, dead things here? Of the sorts that shamble or nip necks?"

"Since I got here? No. However, given the state of the boundary wards at the moment anything, however intentioned, can walk in. I will be taking a look at that later on."

Someone had moved his copy of Heigh's Boundary Mechanics for Geniuses. There was a conspicuous empty rectangular space on the bartop. Oh well - he'd only brought it as a reference, and since it had been enfolded in a gaming sourcebook he suspected it hadn't moved far.

She had a good point, though. They'd have to fit some heavy-duty blinds.