Page 14 of Geoffrey the Very Strange
"Shut up, Brightwings," Katya snarled. "Stop picking on Aspic, and stop hogging all the breakfast."
Cormac shrugged. "I can't help it if I have a high metabolism. Unlike some people who are built like cider barrels. Shortest fucking dragonborn I've ever seen. I bet your dad was one of those lizards that hide under rocks that your mom let crawl into her—"
The door to the kitchen slammed open to reveal Mrs. Pickle with a towering stack of pancakes and an ominous prickle glower. "Cormac Brightwings. You are on notice. Leave off tormenting the other lodgers this instant. Continue, and out on your ear you go."
"I was just having fun, Mrs. Pickle," Cormac wheedled in his sweetest tone. "It's not my fault if they can't take a joke. Right?" He elbowed Ishi in the ribs. "I was just joking."
Mrs. Pickle put the stack between Aspic and Katya, pointedly out of Cormac's reach. "Children say this when they know they are wrong." She knocked on the table twice before turning back to the kitchen. "You are not a child."
Cormac waited, frozen, until Mrs. Pickle had left the room again. "Oh, whatever. Old spiky battle-ax. I have to get to work."
He stomped out of the room, even though pixies didn't carry enough weight for effective stomping, and slammed the front door on the way out.
"Always such a pleasant fellow," Ishi murmured into his tea.
"I hope he does get kicked out. So tired of him." Timms slumped in his chair. "Aspic?"
"Hmm?"
"Areyou seeing Mage Very Strange?"
Aspic pulled out his best comforting smile for Timms, who just looked so miserable. "Ihaveseen him. But Iwastalking to his grandmother the other day, and she clearly was worried."
"She's a good old girl, Grandma Tutti." Katya gave him a sharp nod and scratched at her head scales. "Cured my spring cough last year. Nice of you to check on her grandson for her."
It wasn't… Partly… but not entirely…Aspic kept that to himself, though. They all had places to be that morning, and he didn't have a good handle on his thoughts about Geoffrey. Not a conversation any of them had time for.
The day had turned overcast with a damp wind picking up, so Aspic hurried to the shop that morning. Spring up in the hills played games like that, bordering on summer weather one day, then raw and wet the next.
Even hurrying didn't loosen his mind's grip on thoughts that had been spinning since the night before.And it doesn't make any sense. As ridiculous astypeswere, Aspic had always had one. Large beings. Gentle giants. Soft, squishy souls wrapped in hard muscle, in any gender. Granted, he'd never been able to keep a relationship for long, but attraction? He'd never wavered from type. Not once.
Why then did his brain insist on being stuck on the same cart track, going round and round? Geoffrey startling at Mr. Talondon's bellow. Geoffrey blinking distractedly at him with those long-lashed, heterochromatic eyes. Geoffrey's peaceful face, beautiful as he slept. Geoffrey, both powerful and confused when he'd called the lightning. On and on in circles over a grumpy little snip of a man who believed spider imps lived in doorways and a beetle hat could ward his head against… who even knew?
No sense. None at all.
Aspic reached work as the clouds opened and managed to arrive only slightly soaked. Sundrop had fled to his pocket at the first drop. She arrived dry. Inside the shop, someone had lit the iron stove in the corner and the winter lanterns to create a cozy haven against weather. The front room was nearly unoccupied—only Heliotrope at the counter, busy fingers flying over bundles and piles.
"Morning." Aspic climbed onto the stool beside her. "What… ah, what are you doing?"
"There's no stocking to do. No inventory. No customers." Heliotrope's eyes had that focused, manic gleam that often meant trouble. It played into gnome stereotypes, yes, but for Heliotrope, it was true. Ayla called itHeli getting a leafhopper in her brain.
"Mm-hm. So, what are you doing?"
With a tiny needle, Heli sewed bunches of sage together. She tied these around a bundle of rosemary twigs and attached a milk thistle on top. "Making kitchen guardians to sell. Dire said I could."
When she attached a lavender sprig on each side, Aspic finally saw it. "Oh. The sage is a skirt and the thistle's the head. That's wonderful. Do you want help?"
"No!" She smacked his hand away from the sage leaves. "Sorry. No. It'll take me more time to explain how than me actually doing it."
Aspic put his hands in his lap, self-preservation winning out over his need to be useful.
They sat in relative silence for the time it took to make three kitchen guardians, or about ten minutes, while Heliotrope hummed to herself, Aspic sat mired in thought circles, and the rain drummed outside.
"Aspic? What's wrong?"
Startled, Aspic jerked around to face her. "What do you mean?"
"I've never seen you so still." She waved at the shop. "I know there's nothing to do right now, but I've seen you sweep imaginary dust to keep yourself busy more than once."
