The Quantum Wanderer

We jump through the portal to our living room. Rudolph is passing a white gloved hand over a book case, when he jumps back because of the golden light we are emitting. He then turns around.

“MY LORDS! Welcome home!” He bows to us, hand over his heard.

“Hi Rudolph, I am glad to be back.” I will the golden light I am emanating to disappear, then I turn tor the girls.

“Girls, please dim out the shine.”

They nod, and the light goes back to normal. Rudolph is staring at us. Tammy is looking all around, watching every little detail. Then she turns to him, and inspects him up and down.

“My lord, may I ask who is the lady?”

She glimpses a very quick prankster smile, and answers, bowing down.

“I am lady Tamamo no Mae. You can call me lady Tammy. I am the lords’… new toy.”

I hold the bridge of my nose to calm down. I clear my throat.

“She is going to be a companion to us. Please prepare a room for her, close to ours.”

“Of course, my lords. Any specific instructions?”

She smiles again, and whispers on my ear.

“Ties? Whips? Chains? What are master’ tastes?”

I sigh, then I answer Rudolph.

“Nothing in particular. Something akin to what we have for my wives.”

“Of course, my lord.” Rudolph answers. He turns around, and speeds into the kitchen.

Tammy opens a large smile.

“Something akin to your wives, master? I am honored.”

Opal approaches, her most regal walk.

“You do realize this is figure of speech, right, fox? We don’t really use those rooms. Anything without our lord is… Beneath.” The word fox sounded like something she would scrape from the soles of her shoes.

“Yes, yes, I want to be beneath. Beneath him, even beneath y-o-u.” Tammy says, while putting her index finger underneath Opal’s chin.

Cecilia and get alert, I start trying to figure out what story I am going to tell Edward, something like “Opal sneezed”.

But Opal covers her mouth with her hand… and laughs. This is definitely not what I expected.

“Told you master. I am that good…” Tammy whispers in my ear. Actually, in my mind. I look at her, and she answers the question my face is showing, again in my mind.

“I am not invading your mind, master. I am just… praying, really hard.”

That makes sense. And this makes me feel a little assured.

Suddenly,  there is a lot of talk and noise in the kitchen. Maids come out, and start moving up and down the stairs, probably arranging Tammy’s room.

The voices in the kitchen are really excited.

Rudolph comes back from the kitchen. He knocks on the open living room’s door.

“Excuse me, my lord.”

“Yes, Rudolph?”

“We have been receiving several inquiries from lord Edward about your presence.  We have been asked to notify him upon your immediate arrival. Now that my lord is here, what do you want answered?”

“Oh, he can know that we are back. No problem.”

“Of course, my lord, I will be sending a message out immediately.”

Rudolph leaves the room. I look around. Ruby extended her arm in front of her self, she is looking at her nails.

The nails change color to red, but it is not the exact effect one gets from the laquer. It is a little bit off. She seems disappointed with the results. She turns to me.

“My lord, these past couple of weeks have been rough on my nails… Sisters, what about having them done again?”

All of them check their nails. I nod.

I would get a little worried about the girls in their original shape, but Tammy’s shape is not that unusual, in the sense that, although I haven’t seen fox beast kins around, beast kins are not so rare. They are not common, but they were as common as dwarves. Before they left, of course.

I also stand up.

“Well, a visit to the baroness of Meerwasser would also be in order.”

All the magic got a lot easier. I feel like someone prepared to run a marathon jogging around weekend unprepared runners. It is just… Effortless now.

We jump through the portal, it takes us to a back alley in Shoria. The girls move along, Cecilia pulling Tammy with them.  Muninn and Huginn stay on each of my shoulders. I walk the short distance to Hikari’s manor.

I approach the guards.  The one on the left recognizes me.

“Good afternoon, sir! You are the honored guest, right?”

“Yes.”

“Are you here to visit lady Akiko or the baroness?”

“Both? Either?”

“Of course, sir. Please follow me.”

One of the guards stay on the gate, while I follow the other one through the path. We reach the door. He knocks on the door. The customary butler hurries in. He opens the door and sees us.

“Good afternoon, my lord. Please come on in. Is the lady aware of your visit?”

“Hi. Not really.”

“I will let her know. Please follow me.”

He leads me to a living room.

“Just a moment, please, lord.”

He gives a bow and gets out of the room. I am looking out the window, into the garden. At the sky, this one with clouds.

There is a knock on the door, and then it opens. A maid walks two steps in, then bows.

“Does my lord have any drinking preferences?”

I turn to face her.

“Some juice will do fine, thank you.”

She nods, bows and leaves the room. I walk over and sit on a couch. Shortly, another knock. The door opens, the maid with at tray and glass with juice. She brings in the tray, place it on a table.

I take a sip. It feels like the fruit used was still a little green. I smile to myself. I twirl the cup, smiling at the new cheat. I taste it again. Now it is sweet enough. I smile to myself. This whole thing is going to spoil me.

Drink a little more. Another knock on the door.

This time, Hikari enters the room. Another maid, behind her, carries the baby that has grown a lot after last time I saw it. The tail is outside the diaper, in full display. That is actually unexpected.

“Honored guest! How are you? How are your wives?” Hikari asks, while walking towards the couch. She sits down, and the maid hands her the baby. She nods to the maid. The maid bows, turn around and leave the room.

Hikari is rocking the baby on her lap. She turns her head to the baby.

“Look, little Toshi, this is your godfather.”

The baby laughs and wags its tail. I smile at the scene. Then I remember that she is not hiding the baby’s tail anymore.

“Hi. I noticed that you are not hiding the tail anymore… Is this safe?”

Hikari laughs.

“My mother was worried about the goddess. No goddess, no worries. The risk now would be some lesser nobles. Our surgeon announced that I am partly beast kin. It is generally frowned upon, but since I married Julian and he knew it, I have legitimacy. And against the emperor, dwarves, and the Breaker of Chains, no one really dares to challenge. Heh. If they piss us off, their guards might have to go back to throwing rocks.

“That said, how are you feeling? Are you alright now that you’re awake?”

“Yes. I am feeling  well.”

“I would even say divine…” Muninn asks, and giggles at his dad joke.

We all look at him. He moves to the table.

“Tough crowd!” He says.

Hikari rocks the baby another couple of times.

“You know, I have been looking for ways to thank you for what you did. I can’t come up with anything that will do justice. I cannot express how much I appreciate what you have done.”

Muninn was going to say something, but Huginn was faster, and pinned his head to the table, by the neck. I ignore this.

“Sure, no problem. My wives and I gained a lot from it, particularly. And these two too. And everything is well when it ends well.”

“And what are your plans now, honored guest?”

I scratch the back of my head.

“I never create too many plans. You would be amazed of how many times I get this kind of question, as if I planned the things to this point. But most of it just… Happened.” While I gesture with my hands.

Hikari laughs.

“I am sorry, honored guest. But I saw, well, I didn’t actually see it, but I was there, when you killed a goddess. I can’t think of anything that can top that.”

I laughed as well. After it died down, Hikari continued.

“What about the wives?”

“Oh, they decided to have their nails done…”

Hikari supports the baby on one hand, and takes a look at the nails in another.

“Humm… Perhaps I should have gone with them…”

I giggle once.

“What about your mothers?”

Hikari sighs and rolls her eyes.

“She is in an apparently much deserved honeymoon. My suggestion. The cries, in the middle of the night, make it hard to sleep. You know, we have a baby in the house!”

“Is Toshiro still crying in the night?”

“Toshiro? NO! My mom is. Crying out some nasty moans… I am pretty sure the whole help heard her. Every night. The whole night. I don’t like using silence spells because they can hinder a real emergency, you know…

“A couple of maids complimented her skin, mentioning that she rejuvenated… So I suggested her to go on a honeymoon. She is sounding like a teenager. And Kage… Father… It still feels so weird to call him that, he looks younger than Julian was, apparently is spoiling her.”

Muninn and I are both laughing hard. Huginn and Hikari roll their eyes.

We talk about the local politics, and how the local nobles have been reacting to all the news. Her temporary “seclusion”, and some other topics.

A portal opens, and the girls come out. Cecilia greets us.

“Hi Hikari. We sensed that hubby was here, so we just jumped… Do you mind?”

Hikari smiles.

“Of course not. But if you use this too much, people are going to know you can do special stuff. I don’t mind at all, though.”

Tammy squats in front of Hikari and Toshiro. She looks at the baby, then at the mother.

“How is my grandnephew doing?”

“See for yourself.”

Tammy extends a finger to the baby, the baby grabs it.

“Sorry, little one, I won’t give you my finger to be bitten, we just had the nails painted.”

I look at Ruby, she shows me her nails. I smile. She blushes. I am happy that we can still have these little couple games.

Tammy sits beside Hikari, and Hikari hands her the baby. She keeps rocking it a bit. The talk ends up going towards baby bedroom talks between Cecilia, Tammy and Hikari. Huginn offers an opinion here and there. The rest of us are not really paying attention.

At some point, I slap my leg.

“Well, if you forgive me, but we have to go home. We can visit some more at a later date.”

Tammy hands the baby back to Hikari. We say our farewells. The girls go home through a portal opened there. I wait till all of them are gone, excuse myself again. Hikari rings a little bell on a side table, and a maid enters the room shortly after. I follow the maid outside the manor, and then go home from an empty alley.

I arrive at the living room. Tammy is filling the girls with questions about the ocean. Actually, she is filling Cecilia with questions, the dragonesses kind of ignore her.

I scrub my chin. I might as well create a beach and sea in the pocket dimension. I am going to do that when we plan next party.

We all go up to wash. Tammy is looking at every piece and cranny in the manor. Her reaction is one of observation rather than overwhelm. Considering her point of comparison is the place where things are created according to one’s absolute will, it is understandable.

We undress in the bedroom, Tammy does the same. We get underneath the showers. I notice that Shandon nods to Ruby, and Ruby stays behind us, on the way out.

Tammy is looking up.

“What are these?”

Shandon turns the water on. She sees water is coming out, and tries to escape. Her speed is amazing, but still slower than Ruby, that blocks the passage.

I laugh a little. Cecilia laughs as well.

“In this land, we have dust and sweat. I mean, we used to have sweat. So we washup before supper.”

Tammy relaxes, but her head is down. We start getting wet, and the hair on our heads stick to our skin. Cecilia looks at her, and notices the reason. The tails loose their fluffiness. The girls laugh a little bit. Tammy brings one of them in front of her.

“My pretty tails…” She is sad.

It makes me pitty her a little bit. I hold her face in my hands.

“Your tails are still pretty. Once we dry them up, they are going to get back to what they were.”

“Really?” She asks, with puppy eyes.

“Really.”

She hugs me. A short hug, she gets pulled back by the other girls. I end up hugging each of the girls, kissing them all. At the end, I end up kissing Tammy as well.

Cecilia goes on to explain to Tammy the products we use. As of right now, our washing products are primarily produced by the elves. In particular, the dryads provide us with some stuff that is kind of unique.

We have a shampoo and a conditioner that we use. The results are, well, magical. Although this is not unexpected given the situation.

The girls dry their hair with heat and wind magic, Tammy follows them easily. When her tail assumes the usual fluffiness, Tammy gets really happy. She smells them, one tail after the other. She turns to the girls, directing it mostly at Opal.

“Thank you! My tail has never smelled this good! And this fluffy.”

I get curious. I start to move my hand, and then I look at Opal and the others. Tammy notices the micromovements.

“My ladies, our lord is right now unsure of what… Our situation is. You know how men can be.” She positions herself behind me, and pushes me towards the girls. “I think it might be best if you could explain to him exactly what the deal is.”

I look back at her. I have to admit, she is good.

Cecilia sighs. She looks at Opal.

“Very well. My lord, we recognize that the fox contributed to the family. She demonstrated cooperation before conquered. As we mentioned before, we also checked her loyalty towards the family.

“As of right now, we can consider this a… “ Opal looks at Aquamarine.

“Engagement?” Aquamarine suggests.

“Yes, we can consider this an engagement.”

I smile. If I can guess correctly, engagement is a concept that doesn’t really translate in dragon’s language, and Opal sometimes has an issue on those. How cute.

On the other hand, this information tells me two things. The first one is that they are treating Tammy almost as an equal. This is interesting. The second one is that I apparently do not decide who I marry anymore. But in this particular case, things are not too bad.

The girls pick up some clothing the closet. The dragonesses don’t care about whose clothes are whose. Only Cecilia has a different set of clothing, because she is a little smaller than the dragonesses.

Tammy is looking at her kimono, on the floor in the bedroom. I gesture her towards the closet.

“You can have something from the closet. That is going to make people question your origins a little less.”

She ends up dressing normal casual clothes, with pants and t-shirt, rather like the other girls. We go down for supper.

At the table, we meet Charles and Lucille.

“Good evening!”

“Hi Charles, Lucille… Good evening.”

“How are you? I heard that you were back today a little after noon.”

“We are great! By the way, this is Tammy. Tammy, these are Charles and Lucille, Cecilia’s parents.”

“Nice to meet you.” Tammy says, lowering her head slightly.

“Nice to meet you too.” Charles answers.

Tammy starts sniffing the air. Then her sniffs grow deeper.

“What is this?!? The smell…”

The girls laugh.

“You are about to learn why Roberta is Opal’s second favorite human.” I laugh.

The food starts to come from the kitchen. Once it is all on the table, we start serving ourselves.

In my case, as always, Opal serves me.

Lucille is serving herself, when she clears her throat.

“So, Tammy, where are you from?”

“I am from the south, my lady.”

“Really? What country?”

“Just a distant one. You would not have heard about it, don’t worry.”

“Cool, cool. Are you also marrying Marcelo?”

Cecilia chokes on a piece of steak and coughs it out.

“MOM!”

“What? This is an honest question.”

Cecilia covers her face. Tammy laughs lightly. It undoes the tension.

“I don’t know if I can hope for that yet, my lady. Being here is already a great honor.”

We start eating.

It is a very weird thing, eating for pure pleasure. I am keeping my avatar grounded, in spite of not having to. The whole thing feels a little… weird. But Roberta’s cooking is still wonderful.

Tammy’s tails start wagging around when she chews kraken steak for the first time. It looks like I installed a fan in the room.

“Humm… “ She swallows. “What! Is! This! What is this, master?”

I smile. Ruby answers.

“Oh, that is kraken meat. Our lord hunted one down. It is the tastiest steak we have ever tasted.”

“What is a kraken?” Tammy asks.

“One of the very few monsters a dragon would not risk hunting. The bullmoose another one, but the kraken is tastier.” Ruby answers, a lot of pride in her voice.

Charles lowers his head and tilts it a little bit towards Ruby. He didn’t know about those details. He looks back at his plate, the small portion of kraken in there. But basically the amount he was able to consume.

He sticks a piece with the fork, and cut it off. He looks at the bite sized piece of steak. He then looks at Ruby, that has been very talkative.

“What kind of *thing* would a dragon not risk hunting, if you don’t mind me asking?”

I smile. Cecilia massages the bridge of her nose. Ruby ignores it. Aquamarine realizes that Ruby is revealing a little too much, while Shandon and Opal are just nodding, proud of the accomplishment.

“Not at all. It looks like an octopus, but way larger than a dragon. And it lives in the deeps of the sea. A dragon could be dragged down by it, and then it would be the end.”

Charles’ head was almost coming out of his body.

“The dragon would drown?”

Ruby smiles.

“No, silly, but fighting underwater with an underwater, bigger enemy could not work well, right? Dragons don’t need that much air. Otherwise, flying at high altitudes would be a problem.” Aquamarine answers.

The other dragonesses laugh a little, as if any of this would be obvious. Charles is too overwhelmed by this kind of information to even realize they laughed. Tammy just paid attention to the whole exchange.

We all get back to eating. As always, we finish before the dragonesses do. Tammy drinks a little bit of wine ale.

“By the gods! This was one of the best meals I have ever had! Is this normal?”

Cecilia nods.

“Yes. Opal says that Roberta, our chef, is her second favorite human.”

Opal, before putting another fork of steak in her mouth, complements.

“Now she is first.”

Tammy was about to ask why, but I shake my head at her, so very slightly that Charles and Lucille do not notice. Tammy then turns to Lucille.

“On a very important matter, I had a lot of talking with Cecilia and the girls this past week. They told me how important you were towards my grandnephew’s birth. Thank you very much!”

“Oh, dear, don’t mention it. I myself popped 8 children. And I am not even counting the several dozen births in the farm. That was nothing. And the baby, so cute.”

I snorted. All babies look like an unbent knee to me.

“What?”

All of a sudden, I had the very serious attention of all females on the table. I look at Charles for support, he smiles and shakes his head. Traitor.

“I am sorry… All babies just look the same, right? Like an unbent knee?”

“You monster!” Cecilia cries out.

All of sudden I am attacked by several napkins hitting me. Even the dragonesses join in the fray. After the napkins, the girls are all avoiding my look. I raise my hands.

“Ok, ok… I am sorry. Truth be told, though, our godson is one of the cutest knees around…”

The girls let some hums out. It gets drowned by Muninn’s laughter. That dies out shortly after a stare from Huginn. I look at him, and we realize our situation.

Lucille is the one that comes to our rescue.

“Now now… Did you mention that Toshiro is your grandnephew?” Lucille asks Tammy.

“Yes, my lady.  I am Kage’s sister.”