About three hours after the first child was born, both women were done, and I busied myself with preparing to make the Spirit Body Seal pill - surprisingly enough, the palace storehouses, which I had access to thanks to Xena giving me a temporary pass, were only missing one of the materials, and it was one I knew the Alchemist Association always stocks, since it’s used in one of their staple products.
“Now the question is, how do I buy materials directly from the association?”
“Aren’t you a member? You have the robes, after all”
“Oh, Xena. I was once a member, but... I got caught up in some political issues a while back and had to fake my death. Not exactly sure how to convince them that I’m the same person after all this time, nor that it’s safe to use that old identity, for all I know there’s still an old bounty on my head”
“If you’re talking about the one Jcerniv put out, I got rid of that one as soon as I took the throne. Also, you wouldn’t happen to have a pill to make me produce more milk, right? I feel like I’m about to run out and I’m only done feeding half the kids”
All fifteen of us - two mothers, one father, one midwife, and eleven newborns - had moved back to the underground infirmary, which was set up to handle a baker’s dozen people who needed care, infants or not. It also had protections in place to make sure no hazardous things, be it poison or disease, could get in or out, so the young girl wouldn’t poison anyone else for the time being.
“Yes, your majesty. I always carry some with me, just due to the nature of my job. Just... give me a moment... to find the right - ah, here we go. I could really use a better spatial ring, the ones I have are all either too small or don’t let you easily find the item you’re looking for”
“I’ll see to it you get the best we can give you - oh holy shit, that’s so fucking bitter”
Tilly was looking like she wanted to throw up while holding a cup still half full of the medicine, and Yuri was looking at the rest of us with an expression of horror and dread, since she knew she’d have to drink the same thing pretty soon.
“Sorry, I should’ve warned you. For the future, you c-”
“The future? I have to drink this shit again?”
“Every day, your majesty. And as they get bigger, you may have to drink it twice per day, or more. But, as I was going to say, for the future, it works significantly better and doesn’t taste particularly bad if it is mixed with breast milk, three parts milk to one part medicine for best results, but only use your own if you don’t want to have... issues”
Yuri raised her hand after setting down one satiated baby before picking up the next, a hesitant quiver to her voice.
“Can I just, uh, do that now?”
“Lady Yuri, do you have the milk to spare right now?”
“Uhh... probably not...”
“If you did, you wouldn’t need this. It takes about an hour to kick in, and should last for a day and a half or so, leaving you enough time to squeeze yourself a pint to mix the next dose with. For the first few weeks, you’re likely to have a fair bit of excess milk... no, perhaps not. You have far more children to feed than any human mothers I’ve helped before... no, not really. It’s five and a half children per person, and I’ve dealt with a woman with quintuplets”
“Pardon me, is my assistance going to be needed or can I leave to go obtain the last ingredient for the pill Snow needs?”
Snow, by the way, was the name Yuri decided on for the girl with the poison spirit body. She also happened to be the only one of her four kids - or even all eleven children - who had anything other than primarily black fur, hers being fully white, hence the name.
“Oh, sir... I never got your name”
“And you won’t be getting it, sorry”
“Very well. Sir, I should be able to handle things here, as long as you’ll be back before we run out of the antidotes”
“The stockpile I gave you should last for a day, just give one dose every three hours to each person. If that’s all, I’ll be off. Hopefully I will be back before sunset”
I left the underground chamber, not through Tilly’s room, but through the path that led to a secret entrance in the medical hall’s storeroom, the path that Xena came from. Once I rounded a corner, I shifted into cat form, moved Leon one slot to the left, and sprinted to the end of the tunnel. I pushed open the trapdoor with my nose, saw that nobody was around, and left the medical hall by the side entrance. From there, I ran to the western wall, climbed a tree, and leapt out of the palace grounds into the middle ring, before making my way to the association.
It took a few tries to get back to the form I’d used as Tama a decade prior, since I’d almost never used it since then, preferring the slightly older-looking, more androgynous form with a few feline traits I used as Glatisant. But, once in that form, I donned my red robes, strapped Fives to my forearms under my sleeves like before (nowadays I usually had them miniaturized and shaped into thumb rings when not in use), and walked in the front gate.
An orange robed alchemist, wearing the grey over-robes of the Association guards, stopped me before I got too far, having not seen me before.
“Pardon me, Master. But as I don’t know your identity, I must ask that you tell me who you are and why you have come here”
“Ah, sorry. I’m an alchemist who is no longer affiliated with any particular branch of the Association, and I found myself in need of a specific ingredient. I was hoping to buy it here, and also see if I could catch up with some old friends. Do you think you could bring Master White here?”
“Do you mean... Grandmaster White?”
“Oh, he’s a Grandmaster now? Good on him, I knew he had the potential”
Yes, I did decide to pass myself off as older than I was - or perhaps younger, but as an alchemist that’d been one for longer than I. Why ruin the surprise by giving him my name?
“Uhh... yeah, I’ll see if I can get him. Do you know anyone else here?”
“I’m not sure... it’s been a while, let me think if there’re any names I can remember for the youngsters. Ah, is there a man by the name of Bai Chen?”
“I don’t know about his surname, but we do have a Grandmaster Chen here”
“He should be about 45 or 50 years old now? Black hair and eyes, burn scar on the left side of his neck?”
“That sounds like him, yes. I know where he’d be at this time, who should I tell him is here to see him?”
“Tell him one of his teachers wants to see him, I don’t want to ruin the surprise. Don’t tell him what I look like, either, okay? Still, Grandmaster? I didn’t expect him to reach that rank too. Maybe when he was closer to a century old, but not this fast”
The young man grinned and raced off, leaving me under the supervision of another guard. A few minutes later, I heard the voice of Master - sorry, Grandmaster - Chen approaching, and soon began to make out most of what was being said.
“... crotchety old... but he’s still quite nice... get to know him. Master Lyle never raised his voice at me, even when I made a mistake. He would sigh, but he... still gave exactly the advice I needed to understand and correct my problems. I think you’ll like him”
Who could he be talking to? Or about, for that matter. Regardless, his voice stopped just on the other side of the door, and then, after an audible deep breath, he pulled it open.
“Hello, Ma- WHAT THE FUCK?!?!”
“TAMA!!!!”
The second voice was Master Mia’s, as she came hurtling towards me at breakneck speeds, leaping over the desk to give me a flying hug with a fair bit more weight behind it than I was expecting - and speaking of expecting, at a second glance, the reason for that weight was because she looked to be expecting.
“Mia, I appreciate the eagerness, but can you maybe stop trying to crush my ribs?”
“Oops, sorry. But, uh... now that I think about it... you haven’t changed a bit. Like, eerily so. You should be, what, 23 now?”
“Nope, still 13, almost 14 now. But you’ve changed quite a bit, who’s the unlucky fellow?”
“That’d be me, you rascal”
“It took another six years of me pestering this dolt before he finally realized what I was telling him. I almost gave up. Almost. But I’m glad I didn’t”
“I’m also quite glad you didn’t”
Mia looked up at Grandmaster Chen, now sporting a set of black robes, with an expression I could only describe as entranced. Not something I hadn’t seen before, but I’d never seen it reciprocated, until now.
“But enough about us, why are you here - or rather, why are you only here now? Where’ve you been for the last decade, and what have you been doing?”
“Uh... it’s kinda awkward to say this... I’ve been here. In the capital. Just... unsure if there was still a bounty on my head, so I’ve been using another identity. It was only today that I learned the bounty got removed like eight years ago. As for why I’m here, I have a kinda urgent need for ghostwillow sap”
“That’s an unusual request. I mean, it’s not unusual to need it, but urgently? I’ve got some in my spatial ring, if you need it right now, but I’d love to catch up more if you’ve got time”
“I’ll come back tomorrow, for now I need to refine something to treat my... my daughter”
Grandmaster Chen froze in the middle of handing me a small bottle of pearly white sap, and Master Mia froze as well, her jaw dropping open so far I was worried it might break.
“DAUGHTER? You... you’re a father? Since when?”
“Uh, since like three or four hours ago? I know it’s a bit of a shock, but can we please talk tomorrow? Time is of the essence”
“Damn, you beat me by just a few weeks. Just one last question before you go, okay?”
I stopped on my way out the door, leaning back to look at them around the corner.
“Yeah, sure, if it’s quick”
“How did nobody notice you? You’re kinda easy to spot, you know, with the hair and the... like...”
“I know, gimme a second”
I pulled my head back out of view, shifted to cat form, and then shifted into the slightly feminine, not fully human form I used as Glatisant - still wearing my alchemist’s robes, not what I would usually wear as Glatisant - before walking back around the corner.
“Does this answer your question?”
“I... I’m assuming that’s actually shapeshifting. If you can do that... is that why you look the same as you did when you were 13? Is that another fake face?”
“As I said, I am still 13. But yes, both are fake forms. You’ve met me in my real form, Tama the alchemist never existed...”
[It was all a fabrication by his self-proclaimed pet cat. Now, I’ll see you tomorrow]
That last part was said as I jumped onto the back of a chair while shifting into cat form. I then raised a paw as if saluting, and raced out without letting them say another word.
[That was sssuper mean, you know]
[You come in, surprise the crap out of them, then do it three more times in the span of half a page before leaving without letting them process what they just saw and heard]
[We’re not sure how you’re going to explain what you’ve been doing these past few years. Are you going to tell them you’ve been an assassin? Will you even say who your kids’ mothers are?]
[Probably not, and yes, respectively. But for now, I’d like some silence, it’s been a while since I refined something this complex and I need to make sure I remember every step of the formula]
My spirit companions and daggers shut up, and I raced across the rooftops towards the palace in a rare moment of actual silence.
Yes, my spirit companions were pretty much always talking, what I tell you is an infinitesimal fraction of what they said. Even to this day, tens of thousands of years later, they’re still chattering away - and it’s worse, I have more than just the first two now. The fried chicken in particular WON’T FUCKING SHUT UP when I’m trying to tell someone my life story.
I love it, good news from the others he knows. Plus them getting a lovely shock at possibly quite a few revelations. The amount of people in his brain must cause some chaos especially if they are always talking. Are we going to get to see them catching up after this? I’d love to listen in! Cookie
!
Yeah, plenty of shocks will be had over the next few chapters. I had a plan for how one of the reveals would go, then had another idea a few hours ago and now I'm debating which one I should go with...
And yeah we'll get to see them catching up I think (I'm not making any guarantees, if I can't write it well it's possible I'd cut that scene). Still need to have him meet up with Grandmaster White too
One side note, since I kinda wanna tell someone, but... the "fried chicken" is the next spirit companion we'll meet, but not the next one Tama will take - not even close, actually.
Will be number 6 or 8, depending on how you count things.
Until then, feel free to speculate as to why they're called fried chicken. There's two reasons, one's a lot easier to guess than the other one, but it's that other one that's the main reason.
Meow