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Stories from the Verse
In Verse Proportion
Chapter 80: Kondor 199
Table of Contents
Previous chapter: Slade 194
“Zeke, could we talk for a minute?”
Before they had gotten back to their room Kondor and Leah had agreed that they would travel with Mohammed. After all, there would be people at the palace who had known Leah as a child, and they would perhaps be offended were she to ignore them when they wanted to congratulate her on her nuptials. Further, Kondor should at least see the place, and be seen by the people. He was part of their family now, at least as long as he remained in this world.
“Yeah, sure,” came the response from somewhere down the hall, and it sounded closer as it continued, “what’s up?”
“Mohammed is taking his entourage home to the Southwest Amirate, he says in three days. Leah and I have decided to go with him, see the place, meet the people, all that. You’re certainly invited, but no one will be offended if you decline.”
Zeke nodded with a thoughtful look. Kondor continued.
“Of course, I know you need to get back to the Southern River Bend Amirate; you are officially on leave from your job there.”
“That’s true,” he said, “but there are other concerns as well.”
“Such as?”
“Well, certainly wherever you go, we can use this telepathy thing to contact each other; but since you don’t do magic, you can’t come to me, and if I’m going to come to you I have to have a fairly good picture of the place so I can see it in my mind.”
Kondor hadn’t thought of that, but it was apparently the way it worked. In fact, his experience had been that it was difficult to use the remote sight skill to see a place you’d never been, unless you were very clear about how to get there.
“So then, that’s yes?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“Good. Start packing--I’m not sure whether three days means the day after tomorrow, or today plus three days and then leave on the fourth, but we should be ready either way. I’ll let Mohammed know we’re all coming.”
As Zeke departed, Kondor said to Leah, “I’m not actually sure where your brother’s rooms are.”
“That’s fine,” she said. “We will see him at breakfast, and we can tell him then.”
Internally he agreed that that was probably soon enough, and settled back to rest in the heat.
“Is it this hot where you live?” he asked.
She chuckled. “Worse,” she said. “We’re pretty far from the rivers, and get our water by aqueducts from the mountains. Ours is the hottest and driest of the demesnes.
Well, that was something to look forward to, he mused.
There is a behind-the-writings look at the thoughts, influences, and ideas of this chapter, along with twenty other sequential chapters of this novel, in mark Joseph "young" web log entry #443: Versers Acclimate. Given a moment, this link should take you directly to the section relevant to this chapter. It may contain spoilers of upcoming chapters.
As to the old stories that have long been here:
