Don’t Take Life Too Seriously; You Might Lose to a 10-Year-Old

Having survived the ordeal, I wondered if it might have been better if I had died with my kin back at the Two Trees. Well, perhaps that is irreverent. We survivors are subject to morose humor. At any rate, When I finally escaped the washroom, I couldn't put distance between me and Mimka fast enough. That lady was crazy!

Luckily, I had an escort to assist in this. Upon exiting, a young woman—perhaps early 20s—with dark brown hair pulled back and clipped into a messy knot greeted me. She must have been wearing a corset because, while plain, her yellow dress hugged her waist and enhanced certain aspects of her female anatomy. Most of the staff prefer more practical garb. From what I could tell a formal dress code existed, but not an official uniform.

My appearance caught her off guard, and she brought a hand to her chest, taking a half step back, but I wouldn't hold that against her. Her initial shock abated, replaced with a demure blush, and she apologized, asking me to follow her to Lady Amillia. I still didn't care much for Amillia, but after what I had just undergone, she would be a breath of fresh air.

As I had assumed, the march stretched on, much to the detriment of my bound feet having never before suffered such confines. The rear lip cut into the back of my ankle and it wouldn't be long before blisters started forming on my heels. Yutsuukitsuu only occasionally put weight on their heels—when standing in place for a long duration—and so weren't calloused for walking. I tried shifting back into a more comfortable foot strike pattern—which the shoes made difficult—but whoever made these shoes clearly had form in mind with no regard for function, the footwear didn't even provide much in the way of toe room. Granted, by the nature of yutsuukitsuu foot structure—that is slightly longer and narrower—this wouldn't seem to be an issue. But if you tried to walk with a ball of the foot strike, you would find they wore at the big toe as well as the pinky side of the foot. What we had here was your classic dilemma: walk the human way and get blisters on your heel, or walk the yutsuukitsuu way and get blisters on your upper foot. I suppose you could split the difference and have fewer foot sores in both areas, which knowing me, I would probably opt for.

The only consolation as we made our way through the unjustifiable labyrinthine halls was the plethora of ornamentation and displays to draw attention away from the inhuman foot bindings. Red rugs lined nearly every corridor leaving polish marble about a meter to breathe on either side, which might seem like a lot until you realized you would be hard-pressed to find any hallway spanning less than 4 meters across. Walls ranged from rich mahogany to wallpaper with strange patterns. And this was only a backdrop for any number of paintings hanging from every decameter of wall—yes, I did just use one of the red-headed stepchildren of the metric system; truly an unappreciated unit. Honestly, the paintings were pretty generic, landscapes and uninspired portraits mostly, though I think I saw a dog in there somewhere. Aside from the portraits—most likely of family members—I suspected they had foisted the task of lining the halls on some poor functionary.

Other curios hung about as well, but following my escort through numerous twists, turns, and several staircases—both up and down, must have been a government contract—no opportunity presented itself to peruse these curiosities. A real shame, but I suppose I would have plenty of chances in the future unless I escaped quickly, but I should have such problems.

At any rate, we reached our destination on the... third floor? I think? Hard to tell. She led me into a room with towering white paneled walls and regal windows, that would have lit the entire room if not for the hour—the sun had gone down at some point during my torment. Instead, several artificial light sources lit the room, casting their glow over a few stylish sofas, artfully placed with accompanying tables and rugs.

After scanning the room, my eyes fell on a table in the far corner, flanked by two of those grand windows, one ajar. Amillia sat at the table, arms crossed with an impatient slant to her mouth.

"What took you so long, Tissa?" Amillia said, frowning.

"Sorry Amillia." Tissa bowed. "I brought him as soon as his bath ended."

"But I finished my bath ages ago!"

"Yes, well... I think his bath might have been more..." She cast me a ponderous glance. "involved?"

Amillia shot out her lower lip. I thought she would double down on her grievance, but instead drooped in resignation and said, "I was hoping we could have tea with the sun setting, but I guess the twilight will be okay." Well go figure, I had expected less maturity.

"Do you need anything else, Amillia?"

"No, I'm fine."

"Then I will just be over her then. Give me a call if you need anything." With that, Tissa whisked herself away to a sofa in another corner and plopped down.

"Alright, Sir Ola..." Amillia paused mid-word, open-mouthed. "Oh, right. Father said I shouldn't use Sir..." She rubbed a finger across her lip. "How about... Mr. Olavir!"

I stifled a sharp remark. But I would be damned if I would let her patronize me with a meaningless formality, like addressing a primary school teacher or latter 20th-century public television icon. "Just Olavir is fine."

"I can't just call you Olavir." She pushed her index fingers together. "Not until we are better acquainted."

"I don't know about that..." I crossed my arms, looking off into the corner of the room where Tissa now sat, reading a book. "I feel we got pretty 'acquainted' on the ride over here. Besides, didn't you already say we were 'best friends?'"

"Are we best friends??" Her eyes light up, growing wide.

"No!" I spat out before I could stop myself from verbally slapping Amillia across the face. Regaining my neutral bearing, I gave a polite cough into my hand. "I’m sure you are aware that I am your slave. I don't think friendship can exist between us."

She scowled, almost a pout. "Fine then..." Her lips formed an assortment of shapes, a growing look of consternation spanning her features as she thought up a retort. Her face came full circle as she finished, "Olavir. Then I order you to sit in that chair." She gestured to the chair right next to where I stood.

I cast a baleful glance at the ornate chair, a chair with comfort as a far distant second priority. A twisted knot of metal, better suited to a decorative bird cage, but at least it had a seat cushion. I contemplated spurning her command, setting the tone that this wouldn't be a functional relationship.

However, one has to ask what this would accomplish? I still had this shock collar on and my situation could only get worse. I needed to show prudence in choosing my battles, and making a scene here would accomplish nothing besides puffing up my ego. And so I sat.

Amillia sat down across from me, scowl softening. A teapot, along with several cups, occupied the center of the circular table, along with some kind of biscuit. I had laid eyes upon the assembled items before, failing to recognize her intention until now. She poured out two cups of brown liquid.

"Do you like a lot of milk with your tea?" She asked, reaching for a spiral-necked carafe I assumed held the bovine lactate.

"Umm, no," I said, but thinking I should be more specific added, "No milk." It seemed strange to add milk to tea, although I had never been much of a tea drinker, outside of the Elder's place, and we didn't have milk. Speaking of which, were yutsuukitsuu lactose intolerant? If milk had never been a part of our diet, it seemed likely. That would be a bummer...

"...Olavir?" Amillia repeated. She had been talking to me, but only just broke through my ponderings. I may have flushed with embarrassment.

"Achem, excuse me. What were you asking?"

"How much sugar do you like?" A heaping mound of sugar hung at the end of her spoon, so I guess she assumed at least one.

"I'll just take the opposite of whatever you're having," I said as politely as I could muster.

"Oka—" Perhaps it's unbecoming to mess with a child. Still, I banished a devious grin to the corner of my mouth, when she realized she had no idea what that meant, but still thought it was a legitimate answer. "Wait, Thesro just cover this..." She mumbled to herself. "The opposite of a 5 is... Negative 5!" Her voice rang with the unmistakable air of triumph. "Okay, so that means instead of adding 5 spoons of sugar I should remove..." It dawned on her. "Hey! You can't remove sugar from tea!" Her face reddened, but whether from embarrassment or irritation I couldn't say.

"Hmm, well that is a problem then, isn't it?" I rubbed my chin as I pretended to contemplate a solution. "Maybe if you took zero spoonfuls of sugar instead of... FIVE." And these were five heaping spoonfuls too. Though, in all fairness, that would still be less than your average soda, but soft drinks make for a poor standard.

Amillia continued waiting for an explanation. I guess I needed to spell it out for her. "The negative of zero... is zero." More blank staring. "You wouldn't need to remove any sugar from the tea."

"Oh!" All the tumblers fell into place and opened the door to the second realization. "But wait. That means I couldn't have any sugar in my tea either!"

I shrugged. "That would be the implication."

"Im...plia...cation? Why do you use such fancy words? I don't know what it means!"

"Really? Seems like a pretty normal word to me."

"Alright Nelithandar. What does im...plia..ation mean then?"

"...Who?"

"Nelithandar?" Amillia looked surprised by my blank stare. "The god of Knowledge and Education?"

"Ohhh, another one of those guys." My theology studies were a bit behind the rest. I could only say I knew of a handful of the pantheon.

"Pfff," she laughed with a cartoonish smugness. "You don't even know who Nelithandar is. Guess you aren't so smart after all."

Well, I couldn't let this stand. "How do I know you didn't just make him up? To make me look bad?"

"What!? He's not made up!"

"Can you prove it?" I pulled over a cup of tea and sipped it. It had a soothing mellow taste, not bad.

"Prove it! How am I supposed to prove it?!" She smacked the pot as she threw up her arms, but managed to grab it before it fell off the table.

"Surely you can offer something? Perhaps you could tell me about him?"

"Umm..." Once again she dropped down into a thoughtful pose. "Well, he is the god of knowledge and... I think there is a temple to him in..." The hamster spun the wheel double time up there in her head. I thought she might actually pull a muscle.

"Well, maybe you aren't making him up, since I imagine you could make something up faster than you can recall it from memory." I took another sip, delightful.

"Yeah…" Again it took her a moment to realize. "Wait, are you making fun of me again?"

"Noooo, Noooo, not at all." The scowl returned. I guess the sarcasm wasn't lost on her.

"Okay then, If you are so smart. What does Im...la...tion mean then?"

"Implication," I said, enunciating every syllable. "means that..." I waved my hand in circles as I summoned it from my brain. "It means that... that..." The smugness began slipping off my face as I realized that I didn't actually know how to define this word succinctly. "It means when something means something else. And that it is implied..." Oh no, using the word in the definition is a critical failure when defining words.

As I struggled to assemble a fitting definition. Amilia sat with her head aloft, propped up by two arms resting on the table, her impish grin once again gaining territory.

"You wipe that smug off your face," I said, pointing a stiff finger at her. A miscalculation on my part because she nearly fell back in her chair, overcome with a fit of the giggles. My turn to marshal an unamused scowl.

After several more moments of laughter, she wiped the tears from her eyes. Despite my best, or perhaps worst intentions, Amilia now basked in high spirits. Well, whatever. It didn't matter to me. It would have no bearing on any escape attempts. Still, it irked me. I frowned off to the corner again. Tissa still read her book, only now she reclined, horizontal, with her leg kicking carelessly over the side.

"I guess I win," Amilia said, adding sugar to her tea, despite her previous quandary.

"You win?" I replied, offended.

"Yeap! You didn't know who Nelithander was, and you don't know what im...plo..."

"IMPLICATION!" I interrupted.

"And you don't know what im...pli...cation means." I facepalmed as she once again struggled through the word—at least she pronounced it correctly this time. She, however, couldn't have looked more proud of herself.

"I do too know what 'implication' means! It's just hard to explain so that a child would understand! And as for Nelithander..." Wait, was I really arguing with a 10-year-old? With great frustration, I dropped back down in my seat.

"Don't be upset," she said, switching to a more amiable smile, pushing over a tray of those biscuits. "Here, have a hiscup."

I glowered at them. Spite half tempted me to reject the peace offering, but refusing out of spite would be childish and accomplish nothing. With a resigned sigh, I took one and bit into it. I hadn’t eaten since Finfare and saliva began to fill my mouth like a sinking ship. My teeth cut through the thick wafer with the brittle morsels dissolving just before chewing became bothersome. The faint sweetness teased the tongue after the mild bitterness of the tea. Quite good, but then again, would you expect any less from a noble house?

So I munched away at the hiscup and sipped my tea... in silence. Though I had accepted her peace offering, I had no inclination to humor her. Amillia felt the awkwardness fall between us, judging by her fidgeting. I could feel it too, but this was where I lived.

The discomfort lingered until a voice broke the silence. "Amilia, it is nearing time for bed," Tissa called out from her plush sofa. It looked like she had tucked the book away and straightened out her dress.

"It's not that late already?" Amilia said, face halfway to a pout.

"I'm afraid so."

"Mmmm, Okay..." But she perked back up as she reached for a small sealed box on the table that had as of yet been undisturbed. I hadn't thought much of the box of simple design. But now that she had called attention to it, I stared, curious. She removed the lid and pulled out a brown square. It was embossed with a design on one side and had a faint sheen, but not until she bit into it and the smell wafted over, did I know… chocolate.

I had never been much of a sweets guy, but I always harbored a fancy for chocolate. Couldn't exactly say why, but as far as candy went, chocolate reigned supreme. A true connoisseur could appreciate it with only the smallest addition of sugar. To think I had gone ten years without so much as catching a whiff.

I stared at her; I couldn't help it. We briefly made eye contact, but then she just went back to savoring her chocolate without saying a word. That punk! Did she want me to ask? Was she trying to get back at me for maintaining the awkward silence? Well... I suppose I could meet her halfway if it meant getting some chocolate.

"What is that you are eating? It has an interesting aroma," I asked, maintaining a detached air.

"It's chocolate." (Translation note: I didn't know the caster word for chocolate, so asking served as a perfect entry point.)

"Chocolate is it? With that scent, I wonder what it tastes like..."

"It tastes great!" she said, but didn't offer any. Well, she couldn't be that dense. Apparently, halfway wasn't enough for her. I glared, and it must have made her uncomfortable, as she continued, "Oh… you were not expecting any, were you?" She brought her hand to her mouth. "Chocolate is a rare delicacy. I don't believe it would be suited for a..." She shot me a deliberate look. "Slave," she finished with extra emphasis. My frown hit the ground as the word left her mouth.

She finished the last bit and drank the rest of her tea, while I just stared like a post-apocalypse statue. I thought she had forgotten about that comment, but it appeared she intended to hold a grudge. She did look a little guilty afterward, though. In any case, two things were certain this night: I had a new nemesis and a new side quest, acquire chocolate.