Chapter 50: Chapter 50: There are many wishes in Hineni’s nest. All of them are for fewer frogs and more owls

Hineni smiles, lowering his head in a moment of familiar comfort to smell her hair, which smells distinctly of owl. Obscura lifts her gaze, looking at him with wide, curious, yellow eyes. “Sorry,” says Hineni as they move to the right again. “I was just being weird.”

 

The owl-god blinks, tilting her head at a sharp angle to examine him carefully. A moment later she stands up tall, sniffing the base of his neck, apparently satisfied with whatever result she finds, as they then keep on moving afterwards.

 

It is the middle of the night, so essentially the early morning by their standards and Hineni and Obscura are alone downstairs in the restaurant, dancing. Or, well, ‘dancing’. They’re really just holding hands and each other while swaying around, trying to figure out the steps. It’s a lot of fumbling and it’s really awkward, physically, at least. It turns out that in real life, he himself is not exactly a coordinated creature outside of the forge and Obscura, with her bird-like legs, isn’t really apt at these sorts of synchronized movements either.

 

Still though, he finds himself having a lot of fun. The two of them aren’t really talking or laughing. They’re just standing downstairs in the darkness of a moonlit night like a couple of weirdos, holding on to each other and moving from side to side.

 

Honestly, despite their unpracticed incoordination, this might be the best night he’s had in a while. Hineni thinks that this is great. He closes his eyes, squeezing her fingers tighter as they continue.

 

The two of them open their eyes again to look at each other at the same time, sniffing the other in the same instant, so that it only counts as doing it once. That way, three sniffs will have been had, as is perfectly reasonable, socially acceptable and expected of any healthy relationship.

 

---

 

Papers flap as a slender hand whips through the pages of the book. “I’m telling you!” says Sockel. “This is crazy!” She picks up the ancient ledger from his childhood, flipping it around to show him.

 

Hineni leans in, looking at it. He had been walking past her, sweeping the hallway, when Sockel, with her door open, called him into her room excitedly to show him something.

 

The man stares, trying to decipher what he’s looking at.

 

“This just looks like an old shopping list, Sockel,” says Hineni, letting a finger run over the items written on the paper in a nostalgic hand-writing. “Tubers. Milk. Slime drops,” he reads. “This is just stuff.”

 

Sockel rolls her eyes. “You’re not getting it, look!” she emphasizes, pushing it closer, her finger tapping against the column next to the names of the items to be purchased. The pricing.

 

“Yeah,” says Hineni. “Tubers were cheaper back then,” he says. “But what wasn’t?”

 

Sockel lets out an audible groan, her head falling back as she lowers the book in annoyance. “You damn spoiled city folk,” says the elf. She sets the book down, pulling out another one of the old books, one equally as uninteresting looking as the prior. She flips it open, showing him something. Hineni squints, reading the handwriting. It looks like the old librarian’s. He recognizes it, because she always did really swoopy letters.

 

“A ledger on borrowed books from the library?” asks Hineni, not sure if he’s supposed to be feeling something. “Sockel. I don’t understand what you’re trying to show me,” he says.

 

She tsks, pointing at the list of late fees paid and those owed by people. “The numbers!” she says. “Look at this,” explains the elf, turning the shopping list back around to look at it herself. “Isn’t it the best?” she asks.

 

“Sockel, I really don’t understand what you think is so great about these old things,” says Hineni. “But I guess it’s nice that you enjoy them.”

 

“Honestly,” sighs Sockel. “How you managed to get this far in life, let alone engaged, is beyond me,” says the elf, rolling her eyes. “You’re as blind as a bat. Look.” She lays the two books side by side, pointing at the shopping list. “See?” she asks. “In the middle of the shopping list here,” she says, tapping against the word ‘tubers’, which is in the very middle of the list. “It has a different hand-writing than the other stuff on the shopping list!”

 

“…So?”

 

“So why?” asks Sockel, looking at the book. “That means that someone started writing the shopping list, didn’t know how to spell ‘tubers’ and then asked someone else to write it for them!” explains the elf, her ears twitching in excitement. “That person then started writing the price too, but then got stopped and the other person took over writing the shopping list again!”

 

Hineni stares at her. This is an interesting theory, though not in and of itself. The theory itself is kind of mundane and unexciting. But Sockel’s clear excitement for such a plain thing, such a simple story of life that she has read out of this book, perhaps even imagined, seems to be very important to her.

 

He doesn’t really understand it, personally. But maybe it just isn’t his to understand?

 

Hineni nods, scratching his chin. “You’re right, Sockel,” he says. “Pretty neat,” lies the man. He thinks it’s boring and not that interesting. But he wants to be nice. He doesn’t want to be a person who says bad things about the things others enjoy.

 

“Right?!” she asks excitedly, looking back at the book and flipping a page. “I’ll let you know if I find anything else,” she says, digging back into it.

 

Hineni nods, returning to his sweeping. “Looking forward to it.”

 

Perhaps books and mundane things really are very interesting for her. It sounds like the south was a boring place to grow up. So boring, that things like old shopping lists and ledgers really are an exotic oddity for her to this day.

 

---

 

Rhine is laying on the floor, his hands crossed in front of his chest, a pained expression on his sweaty face, as he holds his upper body upright in a frozen sit-up position.

 

“He wants, yes?” hoots Obscura, waving around an owl-shaped cookie.

 

Rhine’s face trembles and he lowers himself back down to the floor, exhaling. “No, thank you,” says the boy, before repeating another sit-up.

 

The owl, who was just standing on the back of the chair before him, is now to his right, hovering upside down.

 

“Just a nibble, yes?” she asks, waving the cookie. “The river-boy is hungry, yes?” asks Obscura. “He likes owls, yes?”

 

Rhine closes his eyes, lowering himself back down. “No, thank you,” says the blue-haired boy, exhaling again. He takes a breath, pushing himself up into a third sit-up. He looks around the room, searching for Obscura with wary eyes, but he only sees Hineni standing in the doorway. “I mean, I do!” he adds. “- Like owls. But I don’t want a cookie.”

 

Exhaling, he lowers himself back down. A voice creeps out from beneath the bed, next to where his head rests. “Cookie, yes~?” croons the voice.

 

Rhine yelps, rolling to the side. An amused hissing and clicking comes from beneath the bed.

 

“Why are you bullying Rhine?” asks Hineni.

 

“Who~!” A feathered head pops out from beneath the bed. “Mysterious!” She vanishes back into the darkness. Rhine looks at him, before staring into the corners of the room. “Secretive…” hisses her voice from around the space, coming from no discernibly distinct location. “Ob~ scu~ ra~!” she finishes, whispering into Hineni’s ear from behind him.

 

By the time he turns around, she’s gone.

 

The man rubs his head, turning to look back at Rhine. “What’s that about?”

 

“Is the owl-god going to eat me?” asks Rhine.

 

A couple of customers walk past him, looking at them with somewhat worried expressions, as they head towards the staircase.

 

Hineni tilts his head, raising his voice as they walk away so that they hear. “We’ve been over this, Rhine,” he says. “Nobody is getting eaten here,” he says very plainly and loudly, waiting for the door to the stairwell to shut again, before looking back at him. “Why would you think that?” he asks.

 

“Because lately she’s been bringing me snacks and food and stuff,” explains Rhine. “At first it was really nice,” he says. “But now I think she’s trying to fatten me up,” he says, looking somewhat worried.

 

“Rhine.”

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“Yes?”

 

“You’re a drop in the bucket. If anyone is going to get eaten here, it’s me,” says Hineni.

 

Rhine shrugs. “You probably don’t taste good.”

 

“Boy.” He lifts his arm, flexing it. “This here is high-quality meat.”

 

Rhine scratches his cheek. “When I was in school, they told us that people from down in this part of the city were more like monsters from the dungeon than humans and since we can’t eat those…”

 

Hineni rolls his eyes. Rich people sure are an odd bunch. Apparently having money and no problems causes you to invent new ones. That’s what happens to people with no real challenges in life, he supposes. “First of all, we can eat monsters from the dungeon just fine,” says Hineni. “That’s some rich-folk talk there, Rhine,” he explains. Rhine nods, rubbing his lip with the back of his thumb as he thinks. “Second of all, the owl-god isn’t going to eat anyone.”

 

Rhine thinks for a moment. “And?”

 

“And what?” asks Hineni.

 

“And thirdly?” asks Rhine.

 

Hineni blinks, staring at him for a moment. Damn. The boy is right. He needs a third point. Crossing his arms, Hineni stands there for a moment, needing something to get out of this. “Thirdly, you’re getting too muscley to eat,” he says, pointing at him. “Frogs are squishy and soft, you know?” asks the man, grabbing Rhine’s arm and squeezing it. “Like a rock.”

 

“Ow…” says Rhine, looking at his arm. Hineni has to laugh at this, but then Rhine catches on as well.

 

---

 

Hineni shivers, climbing down the ladder to the ice-cellar.

 

“Go away!” says an annoyed voice. Eilig pops her head out of her ice-house, staring for a moment. “Oh, it’s just you. What do you want?”

 

“Who else were you expecting?” asks Hineni, walking up towards the creature. “I’m just checking in on everyone,” says the man.

 

Eilig stares at him quietly for a while, before vanishing back inside of her ice-crystal without a word. Hineni looks around the room. The ice is growing well. It’s been a challenge to keep the meat from freezing over directly, because Eilig’s ice seems to grow on its own, when not kept in check. But that’s nothing that some hooks and some crates and some creativity couldn’t fix.

 

“I want this,” says a voice from next to him.

 

“What?” asks Hineni, looking back towards the fairy, just in time to see a sheet of old paper being shoved into his face.

 

“You people have been sleazing around, stealing my ice and bothering me day in and day out, so I want something in return,” demands the fairy. “Especially if you’re all going to keep coming into my cellar!”

 

Hineni rolls his eyes, grabbing the piece of paper. He’ll just let the cellar comment slide this time. It’s not worth arguing over. He tilts his head, turning the paper around, trying to look at it better. “Eilig,” says the man.

 

“What?!”

 

“I can’t read this,” he explains, looking at the fairy-script, scribbled onto the old parchment, which looks like it was taken out of some old, frozen crate.

 

“Huh?!” asks the fairy, flying up to him. Something flicks his head. “You idiot!” she barks. “It’s one thing, how can you not be able to read it?!” she snaps. “I can’t believe I have to deal with this. Being dead was more peaceful!”

 

“Eilig,” warns Hineni.

 

“What?!” she asks. “I bet you can’t even spell my name!” she fusses. “If your mother could see you now, she’d be so let dow -IAH!” The fairy looks up at him, grasping onto the sides of his hand to pull herself free. “Don’t you da-!”

 

Hineni licks the fairy a third time. It was unavoidable, really. Honestly, it’s been bugging him for a while now and in a way, this moment has come at an opportune time for him to clear his mind of it. Besides, the fairy had it coming. She was being a real jerk again.

 

He lowers his hand, having achieved a rare state of spiritual fulfillment, found only by the fewest on this mortal coil.

 

- However, there is a problem.

 

“Oh! Great!” she yells. A pair of small fists strike against his nose. “This is the worst! You’re all the worst!”

 

Hineni rolls his eyes, feeling her striking against his face. The thing is, it’s gotten so cold down here, that she’s now stuck, frozen to his tongue.

 

It takes a few minutes, a very awkward climb back up the ladder and a glass of warm water, but eventually, the problem is resolved.

 

“Can’t we get along, Eilig?” asks Hineni, pressing his tongue against his teeth to try and get some feeling back into the tip of it. “I’m trying, you know?”

 

“You can try to brush your teeth more often!” says the fairy. He can hear her wings buzzing as she shakes herself off. “We’re never going to talk about what just happened to anyone,” she says. “- To the grave.”

 

“Agreed,” promises Hineni. “I’m sorry,” he apologizes. “But you went too far.”

 

He can hear the fairy sighing, muttering to herself. “It’s fine. Just buy the thing, okay?”

 

He looks back at the sheet of paper, trying to decipher the meaning of the symbol there.

 

Something mutters quietly. “It’s a- o- …se…”

 

“What?” he asks. “I didn’t catch that.”

 

“A doll-house!” snaps the sharp voice next to him. “Sheesh.”

 

Hineni stares at the blob for a moment and then nods. “I’ll see what I can do.”

 

“Good,” says the fairy. “And tell your stupid wife to stay out of my cellar!” snaps Eilig, shaking herself off one more time, before heading back downstairs.

 

 

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