Chapter 2

She awoke with sunlight coming through the tiny window in along the narrow end of her room above the little, now-cold tin stove. The room was a little chilly, but had held the warmth of the stove overnight surprisingly well. Still, she got up and dressed quickly, pulling on her dress and tightening the bodice strings as she checked that her cloak was now dry, tugging that on, as well, as soon as the cursed bodice was properly snugged around her slender torso. She despised the Westron-style of bodice, for it did little but accentuate the fact she had virtually no breasts, at least by human standards.

She sighed as she tugged on her boots, not liking how they felt after drying without properly being soaped to prevent them going all stiff. It would take her days to walk the stiffness out of the leather. She vowed to herself to ward them against water – not for the first time.

She let the wards go on the door, but not the bed, and peered out into the hallway. Nembariel's door was closed and she could feel the energy of his wards on it. He was obviously in there. She would be exempted from any ward he wove, just as he was to hers, but she had no reason to disturb him, or his guest if he had taken one to his room with him.

Downstairs the common was empty, save a single rather fat man with a broom, patiently and far-too-slowly sweeping the floor. She saw when he looked up and gave her a happy, vacuous smile that he was what humans termed a half-wit. She smiled back, though, feeling naught but pity for the fellow and she would try to be pleasant to him, in any case. She viewed them as something akin to people who stopped growing older early in life, in their minds, and were forever children.

She knew he would get excited at her appearance, most of them did. "Oooh, pretty elf!" he crowed as he got a better look at her. She avoided cringing at the sheer volume of his voice as her ears tried to lay themselves flat against her skull. He came over, lumbering in that shuffle they seemed to share and reached out a hand as big as her entire skull to gently touch the tip of an ear, then giggled to himself before returning to his chores.

Kella appeared from a door behind the bar, still in her night-gown. Such a silly garment, thought the little elf. Clothing just for bed! She slept properly bare, as she understood all elves, or near enough, did. When she saw the big man's odd manner, sweeping a few strokes and then staring at Daenellis for a handful of heartbeats, she smiled. "He will try to touch your ears for luck, the men said there were elves about and he should," she told Daenellis. "He's harmless, though."

"I surmised and he has already enriched his fortune this morning, then," said the elf with a smile for the friendly barmaid – or was she the innkeeper's wife? She had certainly set him onto his heels with a few words the night before.

"The cook is finishing the bread up, and I imagine he could prepare you something if you wish, lass," said Kella. "Some oatmeal with apples cut up in?"

Daenellis thought that sounded quite good. "That would be most kind, yes," she said eagerly. The food last night had fed her up, but there was still plenty of room in her small body for a bit more, and oatmeal with fruit was actually something she regularly ate before this trip started, in her homeland. "Does he have any mint or heartspur leaves?"

"I imagine he has some mint about, you want that in your oatmeal?" asked Kella with a lifted brow.

The elf nodded eagerly, making her ears flap a little with the rapid motion. There was a reason elves often affect a languid air about their movements – ears flapping was not terribly dignified.

Kella giggled at the unique sight and shrugged. "Your meal, your taste," she said as she went back through the door.

She heard a floorboard creek and spun about, the big, slow-witted fellow jumping back in alarm at her quick movement – almost blinding fast. "Not this time. You only get a little luck from this elf," she teased and he looked frightened a moment, until he saw her smiling, then roared with laughter as he moved off to sweep again.

Kella emerged looking more than a little worried. "What are you doing to rile that boy up?" she demanded with surprise on her face.

"Just teasing a little," said Daenellis, not fully suppressing a smirk.

"One bless, well, you'll wake the inn with him braying like that," she said. "Not that any decent folk are abed this late anyway. Come on, you can eat with us in the kitchen, not in this empty cavern."

The kitchen, as Daenellis had found most human kitchens were, was warm and comfortable. The big oven kept it toasty and the smells of food and cooking was deeply imbedded into the walls, giving it an ambiance of comfort and plenty. In most homes, she knew it was the center of life, and it was in elven homes, too, though they often cooked outdoors on special patios for the purpose.

The cook was a fat man, which was reassuring, and he beamed as he slid a bowl of oatmeal to the girl, liberally sprinkled with crushed mint. She sniffed it and pronounced her opinion of the smell to his pleasure and started eating with a certain lack of elven dignity.

"Decker, I think that our guest wizard isn't feeding his apprentice," said Kella with amusement in her voice. "You best keep another bowl on standby, this one might start on the table next."

He chuckled as he glanced over to see the rapid shoveling motion the girl had adopted. Even her ears were laid flat as she ate, giving her the air of a canine hunched over his food, jealous of it and ready to snap at anyone coming too close.

"Growing lass is hungry is all," he said. "I seen it afore in my own boys when they was in their teens. Could eat their own weight in a tendae, I swear it."

After the first half of the bowl, her little belly starting to truly fill, she slowed to a more respectable pace and had time to look about the tidy, warm kitchen. "Thank you," she said, apparently having reached a fullness that allowed the re-engagement of courtesy.

"Most welcome, little bit," said the cook. "I can find some more oatmeal if you like, and maybe mint, but afraid apples are dear."

"This will be fine, sir," she said respectfully.

She offered to help clean up dishes, as he had already dirtied quite a few in making bread and other baked goods for the inn's day, not just her bowl for oatmeal. He glanced at Kella and she nodded. "Might you be able to spell them clean?" he asked, rather hopefully.

She smiled. "I can put a little ward on them that will help them stay clean later," she offered and he seemed well-pleased with that idea. Wards were much easier than gross effects. They relied on subtler application of magic and not quite so much on brute energy pushing things about. It was actually, unless one was a very, very skilled wizard, easier to just wash dishes than use magic to clean them.

She was provided a stool to get at the human-height counter. She was, after all, only a half a hand more than four feet tall. She would not reach her full height for ten or more years, and even then would 'fill out' for another ten or more after that. Elven adolescence was a very drawn-out affair, not for the faint of heart. He boosted her up to the top, her weight of just over three stone barely a load at all to a man used to chucking sacks of potatoes about.

He helped her wash, though, not leaving it all to her – partially to be sure the job was done right, this was his kitchen, after all. Then, once all washed and dried, she began going back through them, weaving a little warding on each item's working surfaces. The enchantment would not last forever – perhaps a half a year or so, but the items would simply not stick to things, as if greased. She did not ward his cast iron cookware, though, as it would prevent the proper sticking of oils to the iron that made cast iron such a prize in human kitchens, and they would likely rust.

He spent an idle few moments sliding a bit of soft cheese around on a platter, chuckling at how the thing just slid over the wood like it was polished steel.

"I think she's earned a tendae's meals out of you, at least," said Kella and he nodded, promising he would tell the 'boss' about it.

Daenellis was not going to comment, but she had spent deeply of her reserves of magical energy in those little wards – there had been dozens of them, small as they were. She would not be fit to use magic again until middle-day.

Dennel came in and Daenellis' suspicion they were a couple was confirmed as he kissed the woman as she tilted her head up for it. "Good morrow, my heart," she said and he smiled. At her, then at Daenellis.

"And to you, dear," he told her as he sat down at the little table. "Seems we'll get more work of the apprentice than the master with this hedge mage, though that's common enough in the sort," he said. Kella told him about her enchanting the kitchenware and he nodded. "Finely done, then, aye," he said cheerfully. He did speak fairly enough with her, and was kindly toward his wife, but Daenellis still felt there was something a little darker about the craggy-faced fellow than his jovial exterior let on – though he did not seem evil, itself.

Kella sighed and murmured that she had best go check the chickens and gather eggs for breakfasts, before leaving, taking a wickerwork basket with her.

Daenella, still at the table with the innkeeper finally gave in to her fey prodding her in the back of the mind. "What did you mean last night about coin, sir?" she asked softly, pitching her voice so that the cook would not easily hear.

He blinked, then smiled slightly. "Well, a few of the girls here. They tend men's needs in trade for coin," he said. "You know of the needs of men with women, aye?"

She nodded a little, thinking hard. "They share pleasure and the men give them money? Why?" she asked. This was an utterly alien thought to the girl. Elven women sought pleasure as much as the men, sometimes moreso, and the idea of trading it as a commodity was pretty odd.

"Well, it's just so," he said. "Men seek it and women provide. He seemed to be reconsidering the conversation in the apparent cluelessness of the young elf's eyes. "It's not a matter of import, I do think you may be too young."

She looked down at her hands. "I am of age, sir. Though I am small compared to a human girl."

"Perhaps, but – I wouldn't feel right saying more, perhaps if you linger a time and we become better friends." He smiled and tried to ruffle her hair, a singularly ineffective gesture on elven hair, his fingers slid through it like amid quicksilver, the hair settling again into place without muss. He blinked at that and stroked her hair. "Gods, that's soft," he said in a tone of mild awe.

She could not help a little giggle at his stunned reaction, it was utterly unfeigned, unguarded, and the best sort of flattery to an elven girl. "Thank you," she said warmly, her big silver eyes glinting.

He lowered his hand, much to her regret, she liked being petted like that, it was a common paternal gesture that most elven children never really get past, and carries on into adult flirtations, as well. The first man most elven girls flirt with is their father – innocent as it is, it is where they first practice the skills.

He saw her ears droop and noted it for later reference as his plate of flapjacks was delivered by the cook. "I'll ask you to go wake your master, if you might, so he and I may discuss your bill and further housing," he said. "I'll settle your tab separate, as you seem to work fine on your own."

She had another bit of the secret he had started to give her last night. Her fey wormed around it and rolled the pieces in her mind. Humans traded pleasure for money, an interesting but silly concept. Would not the pleasures match and make it where they both owed one another coin? He seemed to be both hesitant and worried about telling her more. She would reassure him that it was a secret she would and must keep, as she simply could not bear to part with good ones.

She nodded and got up, skipping off for the common and going to wake her mentor. The excitement of this fresh, shiny secret forming in her mind made her forget caution and she just went in – and froze.

Her mentor was not asleep, but was quite awake, as was his young serving-girl companion. She blinked at the sight of the human woman, every bit the size of her mentor, was astride him on the bed, her legs straddling his hips as she rode him with an eager, rapid grinding motion. He was growling in pleasure as she cried out in soft, rousing peals that even the young elf found quite spine-tingling. A green haze enveloped the woman, as well – he was using magic to tease and stimulate her whole body as she rode him, adding to the pleasures.

Only now was Nembariel noticing her entrance, his wards not having gone off and her mouth not yet having uttered a sound. The human woman chose that moment to climax, her body going rigid as she tensed her belly and spine at the same time, her form thrumming as her head flew back in ecstasy, her cry of plesaure a loud, drawn-out, "Yes!"

He seemed at a loss for what to say, and soon couldn't as he was covered by the collapsing serivng girl, covering his mouth with eager kisses, and murmuring happily to him. Daenellis used the distraction to slip back out and into the hall, closing the door behind her with a shiver.

She was no sheltered flower. She had seen her own parents make love, though not quite from so close. And even heard Nembariel in the next room doing likely just what he was there. But all together it had been a rather shocking scene to her, and worse for the tingle she felt behind her navel, and the warmth she felt lower down. She also, very badly, wanted to know what spell he had been using on the girl's body – she seemed to have been enjoying it quite a lot.

She went into her own room and sat quietly, worried Nembariel would chastise her for not at least knocking. But when he did open her door – without knocking – a short bit later, he said nothing of it. She walked with him toward the kitchen after relaying the innkeeper's message.

"I apologize for interrupting, master," she said as they walked.

He dismissed it with a gesture. "As you saw, you did not actually interrupt her at all," he said with good humor, that made Daenellis giggle. "I doubt a team of horses stomping through would have at that point." The little elf had to agree, the girl had seemed quite – enthusiastically determined.

She was silent a moment. "What – spell was that, master?" she asked.

He stopped, looking at her with his eyes now sapphire blue. "On Nalli, you mean?" he asked.

She nodded.

He sighed. "You're a mite young for learning that sort of magic, dearest, but it was a sort of static charge, like one gets from silk on glass," he said. "Hundreds of them, very small, not painful or shocking, but more a tickle."

She thought about it and quickly saw how it could be done, then imagined it over her entire torso, all over, and shivered to her toes. He chuckled. "You have too nimble a mind, dearest," he said, stroking her hair. "Do try to not hurt yourself." She blushed to her eartips as her intent to try it on herself was that evident.

The innkeeper had a litany of desires of the mage and his apprentice, but promised to fair-pay them separately, so he was not accused of double-dipping them for one fee. Most of them were small things – ward the inn against pests, some lightstones for the lamps, that would last at least a year, and two hotplates for the cook for starters. For her, he devised smaller jobs. Fox-ward the chicken coop and water proof the bathing room floor.

It was all straight-forward, simple stuff, but would take time, especially pest-warding the entire inn, even though it was not particularly large. He did even offer some coin in the deal to encourage full effort, for he knew wizards could easily skimp on power for spells that work a short while, then fail soon after they leave town. Such was bad for a mage's reputation, but there was little recourse to the purchaser, especially if he had been a skinflint and did not really have cause to complain.

Daenellis did the fox-proofing of the coop and the wire-mesh enclosure of the chickens' home. She was not overly fond of chickens, but even elves kept them, they were just to one-blessedly useful and stupid of livestock to have. Elves fancy they created civilization in Feldare and helped the other civilized races learn it, and perhaps they did at first, but chickens as fodder for farming were a human creation, as were dogs, bred by patient, careful culling over centuries and centuries. Both creatures were almost equally valued by elves. That did not mean Daenellis had to favor the idiot animals, but they did need protecting and she rarely turned her nose up to eggs. Foxes were inherently skittish creatures, so creating a ward that would thwart them was not difficult, nor required great power. However, on inspecting the fenceline of the enclosure, she suspected another agency at work. The hole was far larger than any fox needed for they were not much larger than a domestic cat – another animal everyone was pretty sure humans bred from some native feline, though the lineage was fuzzy at best.

This was a dog's work and she had the feeling that the local dogs, in time of famine, were going on short rations like everyone else. So she would need to weave the wards more strongly, with a stout shock to dissuade them. As she patiently worked her way around the fenceposts, forming the warding, she realized this was just a far more powerful application of the sort of energies and dispersals of the spell Nembariel had been using to tickle and titillate the serving girl who had been riding him. She was pretty sure she could duplicate the effect he had wrought, and realized the greenish mist about her had been simply illusion added to it for the girl to be able to see what was happening to her – showmanship was part of wizardry.

That task done, and the chickens duly protected in their ignorant security, she went inside to apply a seal to the wooden floor of the bathing room.

This time, the room was not empty. One of the serving girls was in there, though not the one Nembariel had been enjoying the company of this morning. This was something of a relief, as Daenellis did not really wish to blush the entire time she worked.

Elves are, by their nature, most often of a leaning to accept both males and females as possible lovers, if not mates. And while the elf-girl was generally more interested in the males about her, she was not totally immune to the charms of women and the barmaids Dennel employed were all attractive and young women, with a decidedly flirtatious nature. If they all did as the innkeeper had said, and traded in pleasure for coin, they would need to be skilled in piquing mens' interests.

This girl was no different. Tall, slim, with a generous curve of hip and swell of breast. As she bathed, Daenellis found herself glancing toward the pretty blonde from time to time, silvern eyes drawn to the play of water over the young woman's supple flesh. While the male form inspired a sort of shivering, frightened curiosity and tremulous arousal in her, the female made her feel quite differently, a subtle tugging on her belly to touch, caress and elicit the sounds she had heard coming from Nembariel's lover as she had climaxed. Even without having yet taken a lover, she knew men and women loved differently, and that she was one who would, ultimately, seek both sorts of pleasure.

"Come, wizardling, and take an eyeful, so you can focus," teased the serving girl. The blonde glanced over at her cutting her eyes in a most fetching manner. "You are not the first elven lass who has shown curiosity in me, and I know of your – tendencies."

Daenellis blushed clear past her long ears' points. Ducking her head in embarrassment. "I apologize," she murmured, speaking clumsily and furthering her pit of humiliation.

"I'll not hear that, come here, sweet child," said the barmaid again, beckoning this time with long, carefully-painted nails. "I would just as much like to look upon you. I saw you last night, looking like a soaked puppy, but see now you're a beauty."

Elven vanity made them sometimes easy prey to compliments, and Daenellis was no more resistant than any to its coy blandishments. She rose from the crouch she had been in to study the wood of the floor and padded nearer. She did not feel overly lovely, the dress she wore was not terribly well-fitted to her, being a teen's dress, cut down to her height and loose in all the wrong places and snug in equally unfortunate locations. And she had not properly groomed – as she would have liked – in some two months – an unforgivable oversight in any polite elven community.

She glanced at the woman in the water of the tub. She was slender, though by no means elven slim. But still close enough that Daenellis found her quite a stunning, feminine figure. Her eyes could not help being drawn to the blond woman's darker pubic hair, a curiosity to elves, that humans grew hair on their private places, sometimes quite dense thatches as if trying to hide their most intimate secrets – a thought that appealed to the secret-feyed little elf. The woman was bold in her flirtations, almost egregiously so by elven standards, as she parted her legs to allow Daenellis a better view of that most intimate of locations, exposing the delicately pink petals of her sex.