Asheron's Fall: The Power of Ten, Book Six

Ebook the Power of Ten 6: The First Month Part 2, is finally released on Amazon!

EBOOK SIX IS NOW OUT ON AMAZON! The First Month, Part Two!

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The garrison in Eastham was now full of groaning archers. There was a lot of stretching and use of minor Healing magic being used on backs and arms, and exhausted men and women of three races catching up on sleep.

Three days in total it took to clear the island of Wisps. However, it was enough Karma for at least seven more days of advances, which was more Karma than any of the soldiers under forty years old had accrued in their whole lives.

I’d outkilled any single archer out there with Dartrays, being able to harvest more at one time than anyone else, with occasional bursts of Shardrays to obliterate an acre or two of the things at one time, as needed.

We’d finished up at Asheron’s Castle, sweeping the last of them off the spiral ramp around the mountain. There’d been some inside the Castle itself, but not many, given how fast the fighting wound down once the Rift had been closed, and the way those at the summit had been annihilated by the Harbinger dying and Rift closing.

Asheron’s Castle itself had yielded up nothing much to study, having been completely taken apart by the infuriated Harbinger or by Gaerlan’s investigations, if not destroyed when the Harbinger lit off, or whatever happened when the Rift there had opened.

Master Oswald had already flitted off, gone to check and see if Martine was letting the undead know whose fortress they had seen fit to take over, among other things.

The rest of the soldiers were totally envious of the missile tossers, words of cross-training getting around eagerly as soldiers looked ahead to the time they might become adventurers and wouldn’t have devoted specialists around themselves.

On the other hand, they had their own devoted Dungeons around to test themselves in against foes constantly, and if their foes weren’t glass cannons worth easy Karma like the Wisps, archers had problems in tight corridors and the like, and a good team of melee fighters could chew through their opponents fairly quickly, if they were smart. Having to be careful of point-blank War magic was the biggest concern, of course, but the additional threat meant they also earned more Karma in melee combat than archers did in ranged combat…

Such fatigue wasn’t allowed to slow down elite members, of course, and so the Roaches were immediately off to the olthoi Dungeons to work on their bug-killing tactics.

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“Time to sweep the desert?” I asked rhetorically, seeing the Holo from Kris’ bracer over the table as Briggs looked over the whole thing. Current dispersion of forces friendly and hostile played out over the map where more officers could study it, including King Borelean and his daughter and mother.

The air was a little uncomfortable, as the king was always affected by Briggs’ looming presence and the Source air about him.

Small wonder. A king of men and a King Among Men were very different animals, and his position was threatened by the latter, even more than it had been by Kris when she sat down with him all those months ago…

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Six months previously…

I didn’t want to be there, really, but Kris wanted some help with the cooking, and nobody around knew all the dishes she was making like I did.

Also, Phantasmal Servant Horde for all the magical help that was required.

King Borelean and the Queen Mother had stressed that they wanted to meet us both, so we’d invited them over. Given how busy Kris was dashing all over the place, she’d set a date to go to Freehold, rented out a private hall, and was fixing up a dinner for them… rather the opposite of what the royals expected.

Rather bemused, they did show up on time, a couple of knights going through the place to make sure there weren’t any surprises, scanning for poison and the like.

Borelean, Elysa, and Fan showed up in carefully casual attire, still finely made, but not showing off excess wealth or a fashionable edge. I noted that none of the accenting jewelry was tied to a mana pool, which made sense given that the King had lost his arm and wife to such things, and Princess Fan her mother. They’d likely not trust such magic until the day they died.

We did say to bring their weapons, just so they’d feel more at ease. Word of Kris’ ability with a blade had spread, and neither of us doubted the king would want at least a bout with her, to see if the tales of her bladesmanship were true.

Lord Mick had upsold us pretty well, and the tales coming out hadn’t gotten any lighter. That was especially true in regards to the magic I was starting to make known, which had upended a lot of the standard Isparian magic and was starting a revolution among the younger generation of mages, along with causing consternation among the older paramounts who had long maxed out their magical skills.

The chicken nuggets were totally new and novel, and the dipping sauces had them calling out in delight at the variety. The onion soup went down so smoothly it had them all shouting excitedly and clamoring for more broth. The shrimp appetizers were perfectly cooled and crunchy, a delight to a place that ate a lot of seafood, and the sauce was exquisite, a QL 32 mix that simply shouted for attention on the tongue.

The salad was a gorgeous melange of six different varieties of lettuce, five cheeses, olives, ham bits, bacon, almost transparent pear and apple slices, crumbled boiled eggs, and a ranch sauce that they’d never had anything like. They raved about it and devoured the entire batch of it, totally able to make a meal of just that.

The inch-thick auroch steaks that came out for the main course had them almost drooling just from the smell, sizzling and fatty and rubbed and spiced and with three more sauces for them to dip and test out as they cut in and their knives almost glided through the fresh pinkness within. The potatoes were whipped into cream, dripping with butter and garnishes of onion and finest garlic and pepper. I saw Princess Fan’s eyes roll up and she almost fell over when she had a taste of them.

Sama had always been obsessed about great mashed potatoes, and Kris was continuing the tradition. You could pour them down your throat.

Dessert was a tapioca pudding in a style none of them had had before, going down despite their overstuffed protestations as they couldn’t help themselves.

When the gentle candies came out in the mignardise, along with a hickory and chocolate coffee blend that had them slurping at it much too loudly, they were about as relaxed and cordial as they could be.

So were their guards, served at their posts by Phantasmal Servants in ghostly formal attire, meals on Disks and helplessly eating everything with at least as much gusto as the Royals were.

The four different wines selected over the course of the meal went with everything perfectly, and if there was some alchemical fine-tuning to that effect, well, master chef with enhanced taste buds will do what they want to do.

The table was cleared away by Phantasmal hands, Kris and I made our appearances to applause and compliments for the meal, and our Disks came out, molded into floating chairs to match the force Disks that they were all sitting comfortably in, while yet another Disk materialized between us all into a perfectly situated table for us to sit around.

“Are you absolutely sure you’re a spellcaster and a sword master?” the Queen Mother asked with a sigh of regret. “I definitely would hire you to work in my kitchen in a heartbeat!”

Kris just beamed a bit. “The chefs at the Imperial Palace thank you for the compliment. They were great teachers, and we were demanding students as well as beneficiaries of their skills.

“I will also note that I know how to poison each and every dish I indulged with you. The chefs in our kitchens are trained in how to protect against such poisons, and naturally know how to apply them if needed.”

All the royals stared at her in disbelief, and she just sipped her coffee, as did I.

“Well, it seems your training is a… bit broader than I insisted on my daughter learning,” King Borelean finally spoke up, also taking another sip of the exquisite coffee… and then setting it down to pick up one of the delicate, melt-in-your-mouth pastries that went with it. He sighed in wonder. “Is this how they eat in Roulea back on Ispar?” he had to ask. “I am impressed despite myself, Princess.”

“Dad isn’t so fussy, but Mother can go on huge bitchfests if her food isn’t up to snuff. It both terrifies and delights the servants, because she won’t accept them getting crappy food, either, and she regularly sends them out to teach people new dishes and how to eat and prepare them. The Imperial Culinary School gets a lot of applicants from all over,” Kris replied warmly. “As far as Roulean cuisine goes… they know how to go truly overboard and waste a LOT of food on utterly magnificent feasts. That, I’d say, is the high point of their cuisine.”

“Oh? And Aluvian cuisine?” Queen Mother Elysa asked, curious now.

“Fills you up the best of all of them. Dad’s favorite, always will be. Sho cuisine has the widest variety of spices and sauces, while Gharu’ndim cuisine has the most overall variety and exotic elements to it. I admit I’m not impressed by frozen monkey brains, but there you have it.”

I had to roll my eyes. “They actually served a course of the Nineteen and Nine Great Exotic Dishes to you?” I huffed. “Nobody eats those things in real life, Your Highness.”

“You are absolutely correct. The Gharu’n chefs were dying to try them, however, so Mom and Dad let them, but the only ones who ate were the family and the kitchen staff, who had to critique each and every dish. Of the Nineteen and Nine, I think six ended up with excellent grades, twelve were meh but too bloody pricey for what you got, and ten of them were basically either eye candy or disgusting and tasted like crap. Whoever wrote down the recipes was an imbecile or a fraud.

“The Gharu’n chefs were mortified at the results and were immediately tasked with setting forth a new Nineteen and Nine. I think they were up to Twelve and Four last I heard, every dish a Gharu’n classic and awesome to both look at and taste.”

“Only four main dishes?” I had to ask her, thinking about that.

“There were debates on four others, including two from the original list, but they hadn’t been finalized, not the least because you just don’t get Ancient Sand Worm meat fresh enough to experiment with very often.”

“Ah.” I flipped up an image of the massive deep desert predators for the local Royals to enjoy the camel-swallowing size of. “Can’t imagine why. Kill one of them, feed a whole village for weeks.”

“I don’t recall steaks being cooked quite like that in the past,” the Queen Mother pointed out.

“Dad does love his steaks from the grill,” Kris shrugged, then smiled, all eight canines on display. “It also puts Mom in the mood for midnight shenanigans, so there’s a lot of experimenting with beef in the Palace!”

That earned some coughing laughter out of everyone there, especially the sole male at the table.