Dragon Queen (Avery Rome Book 3) Read online

  When he spoke his words were on topic, if a little late.

  “The same is true for Georgia. I don’t really know the rules here that way?”

  That, it turned out, depended on where you were. Will, having heard the whole thing, jogged over.

  Then he spoke in English, tossing off words occasionally for the Prince.

  “When here, away from the villages, you can do what you want, as long as both, or all, parties agree and are over fourteen. The same is true of the larger cities. The smaller, more rural places require marriage first and frown on same sex pairings. Here though, that kind of thing is fine enough.” There was a partial bow then, toward where Kait was in the distance, touching the arm of a short, stocky man. “Technically, as foreign dignitaries, it would be legal in the village as well. The commoners would be troubled though, so polite people try not to push them that way.”

  The man was trying to lead them, using his words, but Avery didn't see that much of a problem with the whole thing. She had a boyfriend around, somewhere. Looking, she noticed that Phillip was busily collecting wood, near the end of the line, standing next to a rather cool looking blonde woman. They weren’t speaking however, because Phil was probably meditating as he worked.

  He was certainly collecting more wood than she was at the moment.

  Still, Will needed to know that they’d behave and follow the rules of the place. Even if fourteen sounded a bit too young for people to be having sex. At least if they weren’t getting married first. That was due to being raised in a cult though, she knew. Her people had often married just after their first change, which normally happened at about twelve or thirteen.

  “That won’t be a problem. If it is, then I’ll take care of it. Brian will help.” She didn't know if that was true at all, but the words got a nod, which seemed to mean the same thing for his people as hers.

  “That’s true. On both sides. It won’t be an issue. I’ll put the word around though, just in case. Now, I think we’re about to have enough wood for three or four days… let me… Mark! Denis!”

  Brian Yi moved over to where the wood was being piled, and set his own armload down. Avery did the same, though they needed a better place for the fire pit. Some rock that wasn’t river stone as well. That could break open and explode in a fire, thanks to steam being generated inside of it. That wasn’t a big issue for her, but some people complained if they were left blind by burning hot rocks for some reason. Even Shifters didn’t like that kind of thing very much.

  The two men who came over were both fit, good looking and very different from one another. One had a snubbed nose and dimpled chin, showing that he was probably a Raccoon Shifter, as well as one of The Gray. Denald, to be exact. A man who, if she recalled correctly, had been half eaten by her years before, if in a different reality. The other gentleman had a long nose and peaceful expression on his face. He was also, clearly, her friend Mark, if older by several years. Both were a bit intimidating. They were men after all. Even if they were probably nice enough people, it was hard to start out assuming that kind of thing.

  “You need something, Brian?” That came from the slightly shorter one, who had wavy brown hair and a slight sneer on his face. That did turn to a smile when he realized Avery was there. Leaning in, a hand came out to shake. “Denis. Call me Den, if you want?”

  That was very close to what she knew him as, so it made sense on a level that was probably wrong.

  “Avery. Pleased to meet you.” It wasn’t that strange for her to shake hands with people, so she didn’t mess it up or anything. Thankfully.

  Then she did the whole thing with the other man, Mark.

  Brian patted her on the back.

  “Avery is one of the line walkers. She’s also an actress, doing fiction shows in her own world. On top of that, she knows how to cook over an open fire. I don’t know much more than that, but I figured that it might-”

  The peaceful looking one lit up. It seemed a bit forced, but no worse than what Eve did most days.

  “That could work for me, actually! I don’t really know how to do it at all, but we wanted to see if we could put together a bit of a mini-show, for the network. It will probably just go up online. It depends on what we actually can put together here. We need it to be professional, regardless, so if we do a good enough job, it might actually air? We have a show on the Food Network.” The man didn’t actually seem proud of what he was saying. It was more in the sense of being just a simple explanation as to why they wanted to try cooking over an open fire on camera. It was their job to think of things like that. Apparently.

  Which was, of course, nearly brilliant. They were on vacation, along with their friends and the strangers that Will had brought them, with a handy fire right there. At least there would be one.

  Avery didn’t know what to say for a moment, feeling shy around the strange men and women, but Tarsus put forth some ideas for her. They were, of course, all well thought out things. The first was that she use her acting skills to make it seem like she wasn’t feeling negatively about the new people’s special project. Especially given that it was, in potential, a pretty good idea. One that she needed to get a copy of herself, just in case the new show took off back home.

  If nothing else, having proof that the other worlds weren’t all horribly evil or dangerous places might be of interest to someone or other.

  “That sounds fun! We should collect some rocks and make a fire pit. We need to get things that don’t come from the creek.” She made herself smile, letting it touch her eyes, so she wouldn’t seem like it was fake. “Unless we want minor explosions for your show? Here, I can draw a circle for that on the ground. I have a shovel with me, in my gear. An entrenching tool, really.”

  She hurried to her tent, the food, supplies and clothing that she’d brought in all right there, outside of where she intended to sleep that night. There were several sets of things next to it, indicating that someone else was planning to be in with her, at the very least.

  Jogging back, she held the small folding shovel in her right hand. It was a basic green color, being American Army surplus. That wasn’t just the cheaper option, but had been nearly as high quality as she could find for that kind of thing. It still wasn’t up to heavy use at all. Then, by her standards, nothing ever really was.

  She kind of intended to do the digging herself, but Phillip, being into the idea that she was actually his girlfriend, put a hand out for the thing. It was sweet of him, even if it didn’t really make a lot of sense. Still, while he wasn’t as strong as she was, or even as much as a lot of the other people there with them, at a guess, he was fit for a Human man. Stronger than most would have guessed, with better endurance thanks to all his meditation and training. He’d been impressive to begin with that way, but after twenty or thirty years in the void had managed to nearly double that part of things. It showed as new muscle on his lean form. It was enough that no one thought that him doing the work was odd, at any rate.

  “How deep?”

  That was all he asked, his voice pleasantly subdued. There was a camera on him already, capturing the work portion of things, as if that might be interesting to the audience. Den, the curly haired man, working the thing himself. It had a special microphone on it to catch the sounds being made as well.

  Avery held her hands about a foot apart.

  “This deep, in the center? Like a bowl. We need to find rocks, at least for the ring around it. Normally we wouldn’t have to go that deep, but we’re cooking for nearly fifty people. We’re going to want a bigger fire so we can do several things at once.” She made a face then and tried not to seem mean about things. “Which… I didn’t really bring gear for that many, so we’re going to have to be clever and stagger when people eat.”

  Standing a bit to the side, so he wasn’t interfering with the camera work, Will shook his head.

  “Really, we can use the food unit for that. We should get some shots of that being used? The things are… Well, mag
ic. That way we can make sure everyone gets enough to eat. I eat enough for two or three people myself.”

  Avery smiled and glanced over at the man, ignoring that Mark was pointing a rather high end camera at her.

  “I do that one, too. What would you like to prepare for the meal?” She was asking Mark, who had picked up on the idea that she understood him to be in charge. There was just something about him that led to that concept for her. Why, she didn’t really know, since no one had really deferred to him yet. Brian had mentioned something that made her think of the man as being the one in control of the cooking related matters.

  Then, it was also Brian who had seemed like he was in charge of everything else, for his people. No one had named him as their commander or anything, but they really had all acted a bit like he might be.

  The peaceful man with the camera spoke, not letting her relax by moving the recording device out of the way.

  “We could try something basic to start with? Roasted chicken, some kind of bread product and some potatoes? We’d need a bird for that.”

  Instead of looking around for such a beast, Willum simply moved off to one side, and pulled a small tile from his shirt pocket. When he tapped the thing, which glowed on one face of the white glass, it floated from his hand and then formed a pretty pink, black and blue box in front of him. That was about four feet long and three wide, with complicated sigils all over the outside of it. Those were all a standard blue color. Then, without waiting the man jogged over to Phillip and waved at the entrenching tool.

  “May I borrow that? Some of your freed-up dirt, as well?”

  Without blinking the green tool was handed over. It took eight trips, but after two or three minutes the purple haired young man stood in front of the device, touching a place in the center of the thing. It wasn’t instant, but shortly after that, a whole, raw chicken was pulled from a small hopper on the left-hand side.

  She’d seen a similar trick before. True that had been with prepared food dishes and inside the planet of Mars, but the idea was similar, if not identical.

  Of course, it meant starting with a bird that needed to be plucked and cleaned, but she could do that part. It had been one of her jobs as a child, when she’d been with The Gray. The men hunted, the women did the rest of the food preparation. So, without pausing she held out a hand for the bird and started right in on it. Describing what she was doing the whole time. That probably wouldn’t be needed for the video being captured, but several of the others were standing there, watching her like she was providing entertainment.

  That got her to grin.

  “We need rocks? Collected away from the water, if possible. Also a spit. I didn’t bring one with me, so we’ll have to make one. Use green wood for that?” Then, working the whole time to denude the bird, just kneeling on the ground and working efficiently, she explained the setup she wanted. It didn’t take nearly as long as it would have doing it all herself. They had nearly twenty helpers though. That meant they had things done in about fifteen minutes. She finished the basic preparation on the bird first, then had to go and make certain they could roast the thing.

  It took a bit of skill to set that kind of thing up, using low-tech things like rocks and a bit of dirt to hold the stone towers together.

  “We could also use sticks for this, but this way we shouldn’t have to replace them every other time we have a fire. Now, we need to get the blaze going. We don’t really want to roast things over the flames themselves. That will just burn it on the outside, leaving the middle raw. Which is fine, if you’re really hungry, but not that great if you want to make a decent presentation for things. Here, I can…”

  She had been about to make the fire, but Brian moved in and started to set that up. He didn’t even use a match to make it start. Instead he used a bow drill that he manufactured from a bit of tough string that was in his pocket. That had him being on camera instead of her, which was kind of a relief. Her nose had itched the whole time, after all.

  When the blaze was going, the man deferred to her as to how large they needed it to be.

  “Fill the ring there? We’ll need heat for at least two hours without rebuilding the whole thing, that means a lot of coals. Now, while we’re waiting for that, we need bread and some potatoes. I have some canned ones with me?” She looked at Mark, who made a devastated face at her. As if he couldn’t believe his ears.

  Right until Will jogged to the food production device and caused about ten pounds of small golden potatoes to appear. Those didn’t even have dirt on them, though they did need to be peeled. Interestingly, she didn't have to do that part herself. Bridget and the tiny version of The Mistress of Souls, Felicia, both came over and started on that. Along with her Mark.

  That part got a few eyes to go wide, as if they hadn’t noticed how similar the two were before. It wasn’t a perfect match, since the one with the camera was easily ten years older if not more than that, but they were clearly the same, otherwise.

  It was the man on the other camera that took the pictures of both of them, doing it fairly covertly. No one mentioned it however. Probably because it wasn’t that important. Not for the mission at hand, which was preparing food for a meal as well as making sure that people in a strange world not her own had the entertainment of seeing her make it.

  That part was different, since both Mark and Denis seemed to think that having her do it all was perfectly fine. In her world, the people that were to be working on the new show with her had all seemed very eager to have as much time with their faces on the screen as possible. These men didn’t really seem to care about that. Not yet. She didn’t either, so it worked out pretty well that way.

  A nice-looking woman who had a snubbed nose to match that of Denis came over about then.

  Avery hadn’t seen her before that, not that day, but did recall her.

  “Kerry! I didn’t know you were joining us.”

  In a rather polished fashion, the woman smiled and looked at the whole thing.

  “I’m here to help with the bread? We need some yeast. That or chemical leavening. I have to admit, I didn’t bring any with me. Which should be a lesson for everyone, unless someone else did that for us?” There was a searching look at the crowd, but no one put a hand up in the air.

  Which meant Will Baker had to save the day again. Instead of going off to the magical machine, he ran away, calling out as he did it.

  “I’ll be right back!”

  That was probably true, given he’d been moving at nearly a hundred miles per hour not long after that. It still took him about ten minutes, but the great looking boy came back, holding a wooden bowl with a damp towel over it. Inside, once he uncovered it for her and Kerry, was a mass of light tan, which bubbled and smelled of carbon dioxide.

  Kerry gave him a skeptical look.

  “I get the idea, but I can’t use this.”

  That got a chuckle from several people.

  Looking at it got Avery to think for a moment. They still needed some flour, after all.

  “I can. Phillip, would you get one of the bags of flour from the gear I brought in? It’s the tent on the far right of our section.” That wasn’t too far away. Inside of sight of where she was kneeling on the ground, in fact. That meant she could call out for more things, which would take some digging. Honestly, it would have been easier to do it all herself, but including people was important.

  “Also, the two Dutch ovens? The large metal bowl as well.”

  Almost everything she’d brought was made of metal. That was heavier, but didn’t break as easily as glass or ceramic.

  They worked on the ground, adding the yeast starter to the flour, salt and water mixture. There was a touch of oil as well, and some herbs, since Willum collected them for the bread himself. Directly from the forest around them. Some were a little odd, but they seemed safe enough as well as gentle, as far as flavors went. No one shouted at them to stop or dashed the things from their hands, so she rubbed them between her han
ds rapidly to bring out the scent and flavors. That meant one of the things got left out, since it reeked to her. No one mentioned her carefully dropping that bundle to the side.

  “Now we season this and let it rise a few times, before baking it. We have the time. The fire still needs to burn down a lot before we put the chicken up. We should find something to drink to go along with this. Tea, maybe?” That was what she’d had most of the time growing up.

  Every man woman and child of The Gray drank it. Straight, and without sugar. It hadn’t been something that she’d had a lot of in the last months, but there was a box of teabags in the food she’d brought, just in case anyone else wanted to try it.

  She also had instant drink mix. Phillip got that out as well, and brought her both, as well as two large thermos containers. They’d come in filled, but with various drink options, in dried form. That meant they had to be unpacked before they could be used.

  Mark, the peaceful cooking show man, moved over to look at what they had to select from. Then he shook his head for a bit.

  “Well, I can get the idea of needing to streamline things for camping. Still, instant cocoa? That stuff is hideous. We need to work out how to make the real thing. Do you have cows here, Will? For milk and cream?”

  “Oh, sure. We can probably trade for some in the village. In the morning though? We don’t do a lot with refrigeration in the woods yet, so we want to get it fresh.”

  They could, at a bet, also make it, using the magical food device. Going to get it would probably be more interesting, however. Doing things, the easiest way wasn’t going to be as interesting for the show they were doing.

  So, she smiled, meaning it.

  “That sounds like a good idea. We should be able to keep it cool for a while in the creek. We’ll want a metal container for that. One that can be sealed on the top, to keep the water out.” The plastic and glass vat cans they had would keep it at the temperature that things were put into it pretty well, but that didn’t cool the milk down in the first place.