Commander Teasdale In the Dragonlands, page 15
All three dragons nodded agreement with that.
It was still hard for Tensy to get her head around.
Dragons didn't care for their young, they didn't even care for their eggs beyond burying them. No dragon had any instinct for herd or pack behaviors from which human culture had evolved. Dragons cared only for themselves.
All of dragon culture was transactional. They negotiated agreements between themselves because it was safer and sometimes easier than fighting for everything. It was hard for Tensy to get her head around but it was her only way in. "The advantages of having us here should be obvious to you all. Certainly to you Gregory, you know how much Peter's innovations have changed things in the Kingdom Isles, and here we all sit in comfort, in an area that dragons normally avoid like it was made of poison ivy. Who knows what other useful things we'll come up with in the next few years?"
"Parise has wizards too, book wizards and amulet wizards. In fact one of them is here in the townhouse, Joëlle Monet is an excellent amulet wizard, were her amulets to be returned to her." Señor Desilva said. "Don't limit yourself to the Kingdom Isles."
"That's an excellent point." Gregory Plimpton said.
"Lord Gregory," Tensy complained.
"I was on your side Tensy, when I was being Gregory Plimpton. It was part of the bet. But I am myself again with no reason to be biased in favor of one human tribe over another. The Pariseians have almost as much to offer as the Kingdomers. I'll probably get more out of you for less if you have to compete with each other."
"In that case why didn't you stay in the Kingdom Isles?" Tensy asked.
"And maintain the form of a human," Gregory shuddered. "don't be ridiculous."
"How do you make these spaces?" Glorious Golden Sunrise of the East asked.
"It's a careful time consuming process," Tensy said. "George Brisbane has made one using the instructions provided by Grandmaster Elbert John Corninth.
And they were off.
Señor Desilva pointed out that Joëlle Monet, his amulet wizard also knew how to make the doorway into the magical space. Gregory suggested that Señor Desilva and his officers and crew might like to set up an ownership marker.
"We would indeed if we had such a marker."
"I could provide one." Offered Blackheart.
Tensy realized that she wouldn't be in a position to prevent Desilva and his officers plus a fair chunk of his crew from setting up a base. Not unless she wanted to keep them under guard or locked in her Townhouse for however long it took to get in touch with the Kingdom and get some more people out here. The dragons wouldn't let her stop them.
She turned to Desilva, "Alfons, unless you want your crew to become dragon snacks you will need to make it illegal to eat people in your lands."
"Was it absolutely necessary to point that out to him?" Gregory asked. "If you had just kept your mouth shut the dragons might well have solved your whole problem."
"The thought did occur to me Gregory, but we're humans not dragons. Even if our countries are at war. Besides, better a somewhat cooperative neighbor than one who is out for revenge, because of the people he could have saved if I had just told him."
There was some more discussion but the black dragon agreed to provide one of the claiming stones, mostly to annoy Gregory.
At least that was Tensy's impression. She and Beau Stanchion, the new head of the mission, agreed to release officers in exchange for their parole not to make war on any kingdom territories or properties in the Dragonlands including a promise not to make any attempt to retake the HMS Pierre Dupree.
Akik Ukas, the HMS Pierre Dupree's carpenter, and Lance Brown set to work repairing both the HMS Duke Aragorn and HMS Pierre Dupree, a project which was much easier to do when they were in a port surrounded by trees. Tensy had them focus on HMS Pierre Dupree because she planned to send it back to the Kingdom Isles to let them know what had happened.
She wished she had the ability to teleport but that was a grandmaster spell. There were perhaps thirty wizards in the Kingdom Isles who could craft that spell and probably less than two hundred in the world. She needed some way of getting in touch with the Kingdom Isles. There were scrying spells but those had limits. They weren't range limits per se, but the target of a scry spell had to be well defined. One of the best defining characteristics was a general location. "Within ten miles of me," was much easier than "Somewhere in the world." even if you were scrying for a person. At least all the spells that Tensy knew for scrying had that limitation. Also the "Mysterious Dragonlands" were called that for a reason. The whole of the Dragonlands were difficult to scry. Dragons were jealous of their hordes and went to some trouble to make sure that they couldn't be scried. This included dropping Prevent Scrying spells in random locations, so that you couldn't use the fact that you couldn't scry a place, to determine that there was something there. That was one of the functions of the Claiming Stones.
So she couldn't contact Peter or let the king know that his ambassador to the Dragonlands was a dragon and no longer felt restricted by any oaths he swore while pretending to be human.
In the meantime the duck-billed-monkeys were as uncomfortable as the dragons if they weren't protected by Kaggluk's spells. The dragons had left until there was someplace comfortable for them to visit.
George confirmed that yes he could load magical items in the Townhouse just as he always had. George had built a door to a Wizard's Townhouse but it was only completed weeks ago. It needed aging before it could be used.
For right now the only Wizards townhouse they could use was Tensy's Townhouse.
Chapter 11: Port Drakar
Location: HMS Duke Aragorn, Drakar Bay
Time: 06:23, 16 Cogani, 1272
"Be careful with that." Lieutenant Barrak de Fran shouted and two sailors almost tipped a long wooden pot over. He could walk on the artificial leg now but there was still considerable pain. It made him irritable. Besides, the hydroponic tank that now held some of the Darvamelons was valuable.
Transferring the goods that were stored in Tensy's Townhouse to shore so the townhouse could be taken out of the Duke Aragorn and established in the Kingdom Enclave was proving to be a lot of work. The two sailors didn't drop the wooden tank filled with water and darvamelon plants. But it was four more hours, of a full forty people transferring food, plants and goods and still they missed things. When Tensy released the spell, clothing, and nicknacks that people had forgotten were forced out of the collapsing space.
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"There you crazy creature." Ginny said, as Tensy cast the spell that established the townhouse against the stone outcropping, next to the claiming stone. The two flying monkeys darted into the Townhouse.
"They were miserable out of the Townhouse" George Brisbane apologized for Wings and Green Eyes.
"What about the babies?" asked Andrew Johnson. By now the joeys eyes were open and they had the same green fur that orcs and their parents had. Their wings were still nothing more than little bumps on their backs.
"They were mostly comfortable as long as they stayed in their parent's pouches." Ginny said.
Tensy, ignoring the conversation, placed the model in the newly positioned townhouse's alcove and they started loading the plants into the hydroponics section, the chilled foods back into the refrigerators and the frozen goods back into the freezers. It was a very quick way of setting up a starting point for a colony. Also an example of the efficacy of a college of wizardry for the dragons, even if dragons were more naturally magical than elves.
Location: HMS Duke Aragorn, Drakar Bay
Time: 10:42, 19 Cogani, 1272
George Brisbane had been discussing things with Tensy and with Gwyneth Padmore. There was concern about the introduction of nonnative species of plants and animals. That concern had originated with Sir Peter Banyan but Gwyn Padmore had agreed that it was a possibility.
Ginny had been telling him about Rover, Kaggluk's mount, who found Kaggluk's place in the celestial realms boring because it lacked fields. He knew that Ginny was confused about why Kaggluk didn't just expand her place and add fields and forests full of animals for Rover to hunt. It occurred to George that maybe she didn't because she couldn't. He had never been to Kaggluk's place in the celestial realms, but Tensy had when she was with the Rifles, and they had discussed it some since they had met Kaggluk on their visit to Research Island.
Kaggluk's place in the celestial realms was a copy of Grandmaster Corninth's wizard's Townhouse, with the addition of a temple to Justain which had shrines to the other gods. It had not always been that way. It wasn't till Peter Banyan suggested that Kaggluk use the Grandmasters model Townhouse as a focus that Kaggluk's place had become liveable. Talking with Kaggluk he'd learned that now her place had a copy of Tensy's Townhouse. So perhaps for whatever reason she needed a model to add something to her place. Well they needed a place to introduce plants and animals and see their effects. Anyway what about a doorway and townhouse model that was open fields or forests.
He couldn't make such a model. He was a competent woodworker but not good enough for something like this. He did know the principles of magic. Like to like and part to whole, and there was the shop.
The copies of Efwert dac Olteran Sofeidras y Wesgutosen and Sir Peter Banyan, lacked Chip's magic and Peter's imagination, but they were very good copies and fully possessed of the skills and equipment of those two artisans.
It was, George decided, worth a try. In part that was because they needed a place to try out invasive species, but more than that, he was very grateful to Kaggluk for what she had done for Ginny and wanted to help her if he could.
The first thing to do was to find examples of the plants and animals needed. He didn't need the whole animal: fish scales, a giant rat's hair, a bit of hoof from a pig, or a cow, a twig or bit of bark, seeds, blood, that sort of thing, but also descriptions as complete as he could make them. Quite a bit of it, he had in his supplies and books. It would make a huge dent in his supplies but he still felt it was worth it.
It took a while to put together then he instructed the Simulacrums of Peter and Chips in what he wanted. "I need three tiles; a field, a forest and a pond. They have to fit together but more than that. Two copies of the field need to fit together to make a bigger field. Two copies of the pond need to fit together to make a lake. Two copies of the forest must fit together to make a larger forest. You should be able to fit as many copies together as you want, in whatever order you want, to make as large a space as you want." George also asked for another copy of Tensy's Townhouse model but changed so that it would fit with the others. George liked Tensy's Townhouse. He found the servants and the computers useful and it was a pleasant place.
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While George was working all that out Tensy had sent Ronald Foster off in HMS Pierre Dupree, with orders to return to Londinium with Tensy's complete report. The trip would take at least two months even though HMS Pierre Dupree was faster than HMS Duke Aragorn
Barrak de Fran, went with him to act as his first mate and to get a new magically enhanced leg when they got to Londinium. Joëlle Monet, the amulet wizard from HMS Pierre Dupree had learned that she couldn't load amulets in the local magical ambiance, She had made arrangements to load her Amulets in Tensy's Townhouse as part of an agreement to get the Pariseians help in building the Kingdom Settlement. Another of the officers from HMS Pierre Dupree would go with it on its trip back to the Kingdom Isles.
Location: Tensy's Townhouse, Drakar Bay
Time: 12:00, 2 Justain, 1273
George took the door frame and the models that he'd had built to Tensy. Tensy was impressed with the models and let George and Wings borrow her spell books to load the instructions into the models. The way the Wizard's Townhouses worked was that the door defined the size of the space and the length of time it would last before needing to be recharged. But the models defined how the magic worked within the space. Grandmaster Corninth had simply used a lot of servant spells to do almost everything. Peter and Chips had used engineering and specialized servant spells to recycle water, and waste, to provide heating and cooling, computers and communications links that linked into the magical items on the HMS Duke Aragorn. Those links still worked even with the Townhouse now more than a mile from HMS Duke Aragorn.
She let George use her spells to load the models with the servants and equipment that would let the models link together and have water flow from one module to the next. That water like the water in Tensy's Townhouse would have to be added from outside but also like Tensy's Townhouse it would convert seawater to fresh over time. It wasn't necessary here because there were freshwater sources available.
It was the next day before he, with Wings' help, had all the spells crafted into the models. Once everything was loaded into each of the models he took them to the small temple in Tensy's Townhouse.
Location: Kaggluk's Place
Time: Not Applicable
Kaggluk felt the items placed in her temple and was irritated. She got asked to age things on a regular basis and the requests were starting to bother her. It was George so she was probably going to do it, but she now understood much better why the gods insisted on payment of some sort for aging magical items. If they didn't they would be constantly deluged with requests.
Then she looked at the models that were with the door frame. Since George was in her temple and asking her to age the items she could examine him to determine the use he intended to put them too. That was one of the rules. She knew that, though she didn't know how she knew it.
So she looked and in looking realized that the door frame and the models were more a gift to her than a request. She also realized that Rover would love the forest glade.
George was a better wizard than she was, but he wasn't a real wizard like Grandmaster Corninth or Tensy. She got Justain's permission then asked Zagrod how she might reward George for the present.
In her place she could communicate with the gods more readily than in the mortal realm but it still wasn't easy.
All she got from Zagrod was that she should age the door frame a long time.
A moment—and a hundred years—later she made the door frame and the four models in Tensy's Townhouse match the ones in her place. By that time the four models were living habitats. The difference in the door frame was less obvious but quite real. It wouldn't need a wizard to craft the Townhouse spell into it, it had the spell in it permanently.
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Having made the ones in Tensy's Townhouse match these. Kaggluk had the servants move the door frame to the room that she still thought of as Grandmaster Corneth's wizard's library. She had the servants install the door frame and placed the forest model. Then she walked over to the side of the little forest glade. She wished it were a bit larger and saw the place to put the next model. She looked at the servants carrying the models and there were still four of them: forest, plains, pond and George's Townhouse. She placed another forest model and there was another forest glade, it melded with the first into a larger forest area. She did the same thing again and again till she had a forested area almost a thousand yards across. Then she used the pond model and put a lake as big as the forest, then on the other side of the lake she put the open plains.
She looked around and she liked the place. All it needed was orc caves. With a half sigh she went back to the wizard's townhouse part of her place in the celestial realms then realized that she hadn't used the townhouse model.
Almost she didn't bother; she already had a perfectly acceptable Wizard's Townhouse. But George had made it so she placed that model right at the entrance. And there was another townhouse much like the one Chips and Peter had made for Tensy. It was a little different in that it was designed to be open to the other modules. When she looked in the temple she was surprised and gratified that it had a very realistic statue of her next to the statue of Justain. She touched it and her hand sank into it. She turned and sank into the statue and looked out its eyes. It was comfortable. Then she got up leaving a tiny part of herself in the statue.
Then she went back to work with the Chosen Orcs. No time at all having passed in the mortal world.
Location: HMS Duke Aragorn, Drakar Bay
Time: 6:07, 3 Justain, 1273
George placed the doorframe and models on the floor next to Justain, in front of Kaggluk's mural and they changed. In the blink of an eye they were old. He could see it. The wood had darkened with age, the inlays of amber, jet and magic moss had a luster with the amber almost seeming to glow. The magic moss had grown subsidiary patterns through the wood of the doorframe. The models too were much older than the model used for Tensy's townhouse. The images of trees, fields and ponds looked real.
A magical item should be aged. The doorframes could be used without much aging but they worked poorly and would cause the spell to wear out faster. Aging one for a year was mostly enough so that it would work fairly well. Aging one for ten years or so made a door that would accept the activation spell readily and wouldn't waste the magic much if at all. Tensy's door frame had been aged for fourteen years as had the model that defined her townhouse. George had asked Kaggluk about her aging of Tensy's door frame when they were at Research Island. You could tell the difference in the flow of magic around the doorframe. They started out rough and scratchy and smoothed over time.
This was different.
George knew about permanent magical items. He owned a grand total of one. His spectacles of See Magic. The See Magic spell was among the weakest spells there were. So weak that a novice wizard could craft and cast it. George hadn't made his spectacles of See Magic. They had been made by a professor and aged for fifteen years. For a spell as weak as that one the glasses can be aged as little as three months and be relatively easy to load. His door frame had that same feel of permanence as his spectacles of See Magic. So did the four models.
