Commander Teasdale In the Dragonlands, page 7
"This isn't a matter of money but of ship safety." James Cresswell insisted. "I will go to the captain if I must."
"It is both." Tensy said. "But my restrictions on my water's use are—and will continue to be—based on the best good of the ship.
"Think Mister Cresswell, think. The plants in my garden provide food for the crew, or will as they mature, they also pull dirty water out of the tanks and release clean water vapor into the air of the garden. That is the nature of plants. That water vapor is then pulled from the air like rain from the sky and goes into the white water tank. The water in my system already has water added that way from the last thirty-five days. It's as pure as rain water and will remain so. Any corruption has already happened.
“Pulling more than we need to put in moldy barrels would be a waste. It would keep the plants from growing and ultimately provide the ship with no more water than it would get a hogshead at a time as needed." She looked at him and smiled. "As to the cost. Well in spite of what you quite correctly said about it being more expensive at sea than in port. I will simply charge you what you charged me."
Cresswell sputtered but there was little he could do. He might take it to the captain but that was unlikely. First the issue was that he had failed to properly manage the movement and storage of the barrels. He could probably blame Kevin Kilpatrick the bosun for that. Kilpatrick or one of his bosun's mates would have been in charge of the crew moving the barrel. Unless the problem was with the barrels.
None of which changed the fact that the water in Tensy's Townhouse was secure and safe from additional accidents. It could be moved from the town house to the rest of the ship gradually as needed. One hogshead at a time. Tensy could make a solid argument that the water was actually safer in her Townhouse. It was also fresher. Water stored in oak barrels developed algae over time. The water in Tensy's Townhouse was filtered and exposed to ultraviolet light to kill the bugs.
All that might be overridden by the fact that the Captain didn't like her, or the notion that it was recycled pee. But Cresswell was aware that the Captain hadn't interfered with Tensy's Townhouse and now that Gregory Plimpton was on board and clearly on good terms with Tensy. It was, or at least looked, unlikely, that the Captain would try to force her to turn the water over to Cresswell. He certainly wouldn't insist that she do so without compensation. Which Tensy thought was the largest part of the Pursers concern. Pursers didn't get paid, they made their money by buying and selling goods and a Purser had to buy his position and put up a surety with navy-house. It was a system that, as Peter said, "begged for corruption and got it."
She saw Cresswell out and went back to the computer. She called Miss Midshipman Katlin Walker and had her arrange a work party to drop buckets over the side and collect three more hogsheads of sea water to go into the seawater tank of the townhouse.
✽✽✽
The Duke Aragorn was a much larger ship than the Sir Lionel Allen. The extra weight of the water and foods in Tensy's townhouse didn't have the same effect on the Duke Aragorn that they had on the smaller ship. The weight of the food and water carried on board had an effect on how deep in the water the Duke sailed but so did the ballistas, the sails, the rigging, the crew, all the other goods on board and the weight of the ship itself. Finally that was all adjusted by the ballast, which was rocks, sand, lead ingots, and iron ingots, that were loaded onto the ship by hand.
When Tensy had bought the water and brought her other supplies on board to go into her townhouse. Cresswell had not taken that water from the main water stores of the ship. Instead, he had several tons of ballast unloaded and left in port at Londinium. To balance the extra weight.
That reminded Tensy of one of Peter's innovations on RONS Lenny. He and Chips had built a sealed wooden ballast tank into the Lenny, that could be filled or emptied at need, this made loading and unloading ballast easier, and it made it into something they could do at sea. The same innovation had been introduced to the other ships of the Royal Orclands Navy. but she didn't think that it had made it over to the Kingdom Navy. She was sure that it wasn't on the Duke Aragorn. Neither were the Banyan Boxes, that kept the rain out even while letting the air flow.
There were a number of purely mechanical innovations that she had access to that would help the ship. If she could get them past Barnes.
She called up the ship's stores file for the entire ship. This had been copied from Cresswell's books. She had gotten the captain to get her access to the books so that he would have a copy of the books available on the console in his cabin. Then the servant "Peter" had copied the books into the computer system.
The servant "Peter" was a copy of Peter with his skills but not his personality. That actually made it better at certain things than Peter was; it didn't get bored with data entry. So copies of all the ship's books were now maintained in the "computer system" that was built into the Townhouse. The captain liked it that way, and though he was loath to admit it, so did Lieutenant Barnes.
The Duke Aragorn had set sail with sixty, one ton barrels of fresh water. A bit over fifteen thousand gallons. Enough to provide a crew of three hundred, a gallon of water a day for fifty days. About half of that was delivered in a twice daily ration of grog. The rest in various soups and stews that were the crew's daily meals. There was some moisture in some of the foods like the sauerkraut, but there was more lost in removing the excess salt from salted meats. All in all it wasn't a lot of water per man per day and the purser should have made sure they had more water than they did. Tensy wondered what he was shipping instead.
They were twenty-five days into what was supposed to be a forty-four day trip and six days extra wasn't enough. Even if you didn't count the loss from the accident. They were a bit south and east of where they should be on a direct course to Goodlanding but close enough. There should have been enough water even with the loss of the four one ton barrels. But they had been becalmed for the last five days and had had little wind for the five days before that. Without Tensy's water they would run out four or five days short of Goodlanding. On the other hand they might make Research Island. Using the water in the townhouse they would make Research Island easily unless they spent even more time becalmed.
Tensy used the interface to call the sick bay and get a report on the status of the injured crew. They were port watch personnel and all were expected to recover. Barbara Monte the new ship's surgeon was a barber surgeon who was nominally an intercessor of Prima but didn't get spells. All doctors and surgeons gave respect to Prima.
Having been told, politely, by the surgeon to mind her own business. Tensy focused on the recommendations that she was going to be making to the captain. After discussing them with Barnes.
Up to now she had been focusing on her personal responsibilities, learning her job and staying out of the other departments. She had let Mister Brown use the shop for cutting and shaping wood and iron because the shop did have iron working equipment including a "magical steam hammer" and magical hotspot that would heat metal white hot. Without the danger of having a hot fire loose on a wooden ship. But aside from buying the water and some stores from Cresswell and having the Peter based servant input the ships books. Tensy had stayed scrupulously out of ship's business.
She hadn't suggested the Banyan Boxes, that let the crew breathe even in a severe storm. She hadn't suggested the harnesses and carabiners that Peter had introduced to RONS Lenny, and that the Lenny had introduced to the Royal Orclands Navy. She hadn't brought up the electric winches, batteries, or auxiliary steam engines. Partly that was because she had no means of providing a steam engine or an electric winch. They were making both on Research Island and in Goodlanding and there were steam engines starting to be used to pump out the tin mines in the Kingdom Isles. Some of the ships of the Kingdom Navy had them too. If the Duke Aragorn had had one they could have steamed through the doldrums and been at least five hundred nautical miles closer to Goodlanding than they were.
However the best person to convince Captain Tucker and Lieutenant Barnes of the need to modernize the ship was just about anyone but Tensy Teasdale. That of course was the other reason she wasn't pushing Peter's innovations. Anything she suggested was sure to get Barnes' back up, and almost as likely to annoy Captain Tucker. Though Captain Tucker would be more subtle in his response.
What they needed was some way to modernize the ship that wouldn't come from Tensy. She thought about Gregory Plimpton but Captain Tucker would just assume that Lord Gregory was passing on her suggestions. No, the best option was to get them to Research Island and let the RON convince them. There would be one of the RON ships there. By now they all had steam engines, Banyan Boxes and at least some of Peter's other innovations. Let Captain Tucker and Lieutenant Barnes see RONS Lenny, RONS Bastard, RONS Georgie, or RONS Chérie, so that it wouldn't be Tensy forcing the innovations on them. Let them envy and lust after the new stuff and resent the fact that RON had them while a Kingdom Navy ship didn't.
Chapter 5: A Drop to Drink
Location: Tensy's Townhouse, The Duke Aragorn
Time: 11:55, 5 Estormany, 1272
Captain Nathan Tucker stepped into Tensy's Townhouse and looked around. The main table of the great hall of the townhouse was missing; instead there was a small room near the kitchen and the garden. It was walled off with panels like those used on the gun decks. He walked across the great hall to the temporary room and went in. The table was round and would seat eight. There were six chairs. Lord Gregory was already seated talking to George Brisbane like old friends. Which they were.
Nathan had decided to use Tensy's Townhouse for the meeting because it was comfortable. More comfortable than his cabin. Also because he wanted Lord Gregory's input. Over the last month Lord Gregory had spent quite a lot of his time in Tensy's garden and had praised it highly. So if Tucker ordered the water removed from it he had better have a very good reason. Tensy was speaking to one of the Townhouse servants, the one that looked like an orc woman.
She stopped her conversation as soon as Nathan entered and came over to greet him and show him to a chair. "Lunch will be arriving soon sir. Would you like something to drink?"
The table being round had no head. It was also a subtle reminder that his ship's second officer was married to a knight of the Table Round. Nathan honestly wasn't sure whether that was intentional or it was just that the table was convenient. If Lord Gregory had suggested it, it was intentional. Not Teasdale though. While she was capable of that sort of subtlety, she had gone to some trouble not to trade on her husband's rank. Which reminded Nathan that Peter Banyan felt no such reticence.
James Cresswell arrived while Nathan was being served a sherry.
Tensy pointed him to a chair rather than seating him. Then Barnes came in and sat next to Nathan.
Teasdale took her seat and the servants brought in the food. There was a baked ham with an orcberry glaze. Sliced radishes sauteed in a garlic butter sauce and served on a bed of leaf lettuce. And fresh bread. Along with the food were glasses of water. Not mugs, clear glasses. The water too was clear. A servant brought in a barrel, it was opened and water was poured into other glasses. It had a noticeable greenish tinge from the algae.
"That's the water from the barrels." Tensy said.
"We are all familiar with what happens to water on a long sea voyage." Captain Tucker said.
"You may be, Nathan." Said Lord Plimpton, "But I certainly wasn't. Do your crews actually drink that?"
"Yes Lord Plimpton." Lieutenant Barnes said. "The Navy life is not an easy life."
Gregory Plimpton picked up the glass of greenish water in front of him, sniffed delicately and put it back down. Then he took a glass of clear ice water from Tensy's Townhouse and drank.
Tensy suppressed her smile. Then took a breath and tried to explain what made her townhouse different. "Up until now I have been willing enough to leave the Wizard's Townhouse spell as unexplained magic. But the loss of the large water barrels require a fuller explanation of what's actually happening."
Tensy didn't want to explain it all. Partly because the Wizard's Townhouse on the Duke Aragorn wasn't the same as the one that Grandmaster Corninth installed on the Lenny. The basic spell was the same or at least similar, but the shape and structure of the townhouse was quite different. In part the change was done in order to let Tensy cast the spell. Because she wasn't the wizard that Master Corninth was.
At its most basic a townhouse is simply an interdimensional space, no different really than the one created by the Wizard's Shack spell. It is larger but the base spell is the same. Ethereal Mansion was different; it was an amazingly complex spell that required a grandmaster to craft and cast.
Tensy couldn't craft an Ethereal Mansion spell if her life depended on it. Which was why the Wizard's Townhouse spell existed. What the Wizard's Townhouse did was separate the spell into two parts. The interdimensional space was created by the spell that was cast on the doorframe. This was a basically simple spell but required a certain amount of magical strength. Since the interdimensional space is magical it can be shaped in any way that the caster wills. If the caster has a clear and precise image of exactly what they want. In Ethereal Mansion that's done by crafting other spells into the original spell. Servant spells, fresh air spells, light spells, shaping spells to make the beds, tables, and so on. What Grandmaster Corninth did was come up with the model townhouse to hold all those details then magically instruct the space to match the model.
Everything that was built into the Townhouse was determined by the model townhouse in the alcove by the door. Grandmaster Corninth's models were basic. They were just guides for the magic to make it easier for him to form the townhouse. The model townhouse that instructed Tensy's version of the townhouse spell was an actual magical item. It had been made, had spells crafted into it one at a time over weeks, then aged magically for over a decade. That meant Tensy didn't have to be able to hold the kind of complexity and detail in her head that Grandmaster Corninth did in his crafting of the Wizards Townhouse.
It also meant that Tensy's Townhouse was actually more complex and detailed in structure than Grandmaster Corninth's. That was why the servants were more individualistic than in Grandmaster Corninth's townhouse.
Almost Simulacrum.
It also allowed the non-computers in the townhouse to take on the character and much of the functionality of computers, with screens, harddrives, RAM and ROM, or at least their magical equivalents. It allowed the townhouse to have magical heat exchangers, that heated the ovens by cooling the refrigerator and freezer, and by moving heat from the air of the garden and the hydroponics to the kitchen and the forge in the shop. All designed to use less magical energy than Grandmaster Corninth would use to produce the same results. If Tensy tried to do it the way Grandmaster Corninth did it she'd be recrafting and recharging the townhouse twice a day rather than once every three days.
But her guests didn't need to know the private minutia of her magic. Instead she explained about "Maxwell's Gates" avoiding the term demon, lest it be misunderstood. "The Maxwell's Gates let heat through in one direction and cold through in the other, so that the heat collects in the oven and the cold collects in the freezers. The computer system makes adjustments by turning the gates off and on and storing heat and cold in different containers to be moved as needed. The condenser in the garden is kept just above freezing so that the air that flows over it loses most of its water. The same way water is condensing on the outsides of your glasses."
It wasn't a closed system otherwise the fresh air spell that was in all of the townhouses wouldn't work. But it was a semi-closed system and it used the magic of the basic spell to power the other parts. Moving heat from the fridge to the ovens in the townhouse ate a bit of the magic that maintained the interdimensional space. But less than it would take to just magically heat the ovens. The more of that she did the faster the townhouse spell would run out and the more often it would need to be recast. But she didn't want to explain all that.
"Pulling the water out all at once now will be little different than pulling it a little at a time, except that it will turn green from the algae in the barrels. What will make a difference is having the crew use the toilets in the Townhouse in preference to dumping it over the side. The radishes in today's lunch are from the townhouse garden. There will be more fruits and vegetables as they mature, as long as the garden has water. With all respect sir I think our best course is to use the water in the barrels first and save the water in the townhouse in case of need."
George Brisbane gave her a sharp look but didn't comment. Tensy wasn't sure what that was about.
"At the same time sir I think we should make for the east coast of the Orclands. There are several islands including Research Island where we can get water. If we go to Research Island we may be able to get a steam engine to allow us to use steam power to move even when the wind is not blowing.
"And if we remain becalmed?" Lieutenant Barnes asked.
"We can boil water." George Brisbane said.
"What?" Tensy asked.
"The condensers that suck the water out of the air of the townhouse can pull more water out of the air if there is more water in it. You have a kitchen Tensy. It heats water to make stews and porridge. If you boil water, sea water, the condensers will pull that steam out of the air and we'll have more fresh water."
Tensy felt like an idiot. Why hadn't she thought of that?
"Can you do that?" Captain Tucker asked.
"Yes sir, but there is a drawback. Using the ovens to heat water takes some magical energy and that will mean that I will need to recraft and recharge the Wizard's Townhouse spell more often. I can certainly make some water that way but I don't know if I can make enough."
