The Continuing Saga of Eaner Pantalon (Saga III)

Apologies for the delay in getting this out. It almost didn’t happen…for some reason, my computer apparently decided to move my saved games from one area to another. Luckily I found the damn things and moved them BACK to where they needed to be.

“Father Eaner?” Waryn asked again, standing before the priest who was himself slumped at his desk in the writing room.

“I thought that dude was girl…I…what?” Eaner blurted as he suddenly returned to a state of awakening from that awful nightmare, “Waryn…what’s going on?”

“Father, you…well, you missed your sermon.”

“I missed…CURSES! It was a good one, too!” Eaner truly was fuming. It was a rare opportunity to speak, for Father Bernard usually insisted on having the spotlight cast down upon him and his overly pink face at all times. This was Eaner’s chance to step in and shine in a colourful manner…the comparisons he’d written between The Duchess and the Whore of Babylon were fantastic! These backwoods country mongrels would have loved it…well, they would have loved anything not delivered to them by the Count of Somnolence himself, really. And now he had slept through his chance, having stayed up late in to the night making his final preparations. All of that good gambling time spent writing sermons, and it was completely and utterly wasted.

“My apologies, Father. We tried to find you in time, but you weren’t in your usual places.” Waryn explained. It was his polite way of saying ‘You weren’t passed out and covered in your own grape-stained drool somewhere in the rectory.’

“Well, isn’t that wonderful for me.” Eaner muttered with sufficient acidity to melt through the writing table in front of him. He stood and stretched, then quickly realized he was assigning the blame for this predicament to the wrong person. It was all the fault of that damned Bryan Roopers! He had been a thorn in Eaner’s side (one time quite literally, as he had attached a thorny branch directly to Eaner’s side while he was sleeping off a ‘stressful day’ in the calm refuge of a bustling street) since he had arrived in this filthy mongrel village , and last night was no different. Eaner had been trying to write his masterpiece in the tavern when Roopers had walked in, strutting about his increasing importance in the face of society, whatever the Hell that even meant. The man was a bloody restaurant owner! He told cooks how to boil water while Eaner communed with God…well, intimated that he did, anyway. Blithering idiot. Anyway, all of his blathering on had forced Eaner to relocate to the Scriptorium, where he had fallen asleep. Perhaps a few accusations of practicing witchcraft would suffice to knock the bastard down a few pegs before some moron on the town council decided to hand him an office based on a fine fish stew. Eaner made a quick note on the now useless sheaf of paper before him…

“Father Eaner! Where have you BEEN?!” the horrible roar of Father Bernard demanded. Sadly, the voice was soon followed by the man himself. If ever someone had cried out for representation by a disembodied voice, it was the increasingly corpulence of Father Bernard. Not even his priestly robes could mask the rolls of flab adorning him like some sort of blubbery tapestries.

“My apologies, Father Bernard. I was attending to work here in the Scriptorium and must have dozed off.”

“Well, I demand to know what it was that kept you so busy! I was forced to stand in for you at the last moment. Were it not for my intimate knowledge of the texts of The Bible, disaster would not have been averted!”

“Well Father, I have looked over the accounting sheets again and found the money for a replacement Confessional.” Eaner started. There had been an unfortunate…’incident’…with the previous one. Apparently alcohol and candles were an efficient combination for rendering something unto cinders…who knew? Luckily, Eaner had been able to pass the blame to the semi-retarded stable boy, knowing that he would receive no punishment beyond some hen-like clucking from the other town members who had the good humour to refer to themselves as ‘intelligent’.

“Well…I…I suppose I should thank you for that, Eaner.” Bernard mumbled, the wind having been removed from his sails…one could only pray that said wind did not make another horrifying re-appearance within the man’s robes. Let’s just say that lentils and Father Bernard were a ghastly combination for anyone else unfortunate enough to be in the room!

“You’re welcome, sir.” He damn well BETTER be thankful! It had cost Eaner 750 gold to purchase the blasted thing! “One more thing, sir. I’ve looked in to our staffing situation and believe that it is time to promote Waryn to Journeyman status. He’s been here for a long enough period of time and his work has been good.” In truth, Waryn’s work was a trying exercise in what passed for usage of the English language. His loyalty to Eaner deserved reward, though.

“Hmmm…yes, well, if you deem him ready for such a status, Eaner, I concur.” Bernard stammered, then found another excuse to leave the room, quite possibly proving the existence of a God after all.

“Thank you, sir!” Waryn shouted, and it was all Eaner could do to prevent his being hugged by the dolt.

“Yes yes…well, you and Cornelius get back to work, Waryn.” The bearded idiot nodded enthusiastically and sat down to begin ‘writing’, as he dared to call it.

No matter, for Eaner had other things to deal with for the moment. He had received notice that the Town Council was finally ready to bestow Civic Rights upon him, and now that they were open again this morning, he fully intended to attain what should have been his LONG ago!

“Good morning, Father. How may I help you?” The Registrar, by some miracle actually WORKING in his office today, asked as Eaner strode in.

“I’ve received notice that I am eligible to be given Civic Rights, sir. So I’m here to get them.”

“Aaaah, I see Father. And you have the necessary gold to cover administrative costs?” the Registrar asked. It took Eaner a few moments to collect himself to reply.

“Administrative costs? I’m afraid I wasn’t aware of that. How much is it?” The Registrar told him the figure “Are you daft, sir?! What costs do you have that require that amount of gold…the construction of a new Registration office to deal with the paperwork?!” Eaner blustered for awhile, but it scarcely mattered. The corrupt jackass would not so much as budge. Eaner stormed from the office in a fit of rage, stomping in to the tavern and ordering several rounds to calm himself. Once he had relaxed a bit, he noticed that the mood was definitely sombre.

“What’s going on?” he asked the barmaid, who looked at him in shock.

“Father, we assumed that you had heard…the Pope has died.” she mumbled, then walked away in a cloud of depression. Eaner ran back to the church and discovered that it was true.

“Well…isn’t that quite a thing.” he remarked, then headed back to finish his ale. Luckily, the slow pace of the day meant that his half full tankard was still on the table where he had left it.

Time passed. Eaner spent more time with Denys, showering her with…err…unique gifts to win her favour. First was an item that had caught his eye as he strolled through the market, preparing to threaten his paper supplier if he continued to charge outrageous rates. Though Eaner had had Cornelius produce a few volumes of work, the illegality of books had rather destroyed their market value, leaving them reliant on Waryn’s emotionless mush poetry to rake in the cash. This had a rather drastic effect on their bottom line. He had convinced the man to drop the prices a bit at the cost of obtaining this quality item as a gift :

Yes indeed, a skull candleholder. Denys had been so thrilled that she was rendered speechless…well, for a very brief moment anyway. Soon she was back to hurling insults at random townsfolk in that way Eaner found so enchanting. Towards the end of her diatribe, she even had the skull ‘speaking’ some of the brainless prattle of the people she was mocking in an amusing impression! Clearly the sort of gift that impressed a woman more than the usual nonsense.

Next up had been even better :

Eaner could scarcely afford a vacation, and giving a treasure map seemed a bit insulting…why not just ‘gift’ her a peg leg and damned parrot and come right out and declare her a pirate?! However, a heat-able rock was practical…nothing like a gift to keep someone from freezing to death to show one’s appreciation after all! She was absolutely stunned as he handed her the stone, eyes wide in disbelief. Perfect!

Everything was going swimmingly until the incident happened. Eaner was never completely clear on what precisely transpired. All he knew was that Waryn and Cornelius had been working diligently on pretending to have a clue as to what they were doing. Waryn had gone for some fresh air and Cornelius decided it made for a perfect opportunity to sweep out the church. So he did. The man was diligent in his cleaning, so much so that he tended not to notice when anyone else came near. Earner still had a bruise on his left side resulting from a painful jab to the rib cage from the end of the broom stick the last time Cornelius had been fervently dealing with a dirty floor. This time, it was Waryn’s turn to face the wrath of hygiene, quite likely the first time that the two had ever been acquainted. As he made for the stairs down to the Scriptorium, having finally though to something to rhyme with ‘gargantuan’, Cornelius made a last sweep across the top of the steps, tripping Waryn most effectively. The result was a bloodied and broken Waryn, something Cornelius noted in about an hour, once he was finished dusting the pews.

Wonderful. Now it was just Eaner and Cornelius, a man whose every word made Waryn sound increasingly like a learned sort. Ugh.

Incidentally, I did up a quick review of the game for Reclaim Your Game that you can read here if you’re interested. I really can’t recommend the game enough, especially for $9.99.