“He wants… you’re sure he said a red rimmed black?” Gwen asked as Jed joined her at the table.
“That’s what he said.”
“That doesn’t… either he really wants us on board, or these tokens are worth even more than I realized,” Gwen said, reaching into her pouch and laying out more than ten of the red rimmed black tokens. “These are the spare change from buying our gear. This…” Gwen pulled out a green-rimmed token. “Is easily worth twenty times one of those.”
“Maybe we can book ten hexes worth of travel at once,” Jed said with a chuckle.
“You realize we probably won’t be able to stay on it long, right? Not with our stalkers,” Gwen said, putting most of the tokens away into miscellaneous pockets, only leaving out two reds.
Jed nodded, some of his mirth dissipating, though not all. “I do. But I also figured that it’d be best if anyone who asks thinks we’re running as far and as fast as we can.”
“Pleasure wheelers aren’t that fast,” Gwen said with a chuckle of her own. “Not with them stopping at every major port of call for at least two nights.”
“Fast as we can, in style,” Jed corrected himself, leaning back with his hands woven together. “Think if we book it tonight, we can sleep on board? Hate to have to find rooms only to get up for whenever they’re leaving.”
“Seems like the sort of question you should’ve asked, right partner?” Gwen asked, sliding the tokens over. “Why don’t you go book our passage and find out.”
“Won’t hear any complaints from me,” Jed said, accepting the tokens and making his way back up the dock towards Jate and the gangplank.
While Jate was busy engaging another customer in conversation, a large man in a fur-lined jacket - who seemed dismissive of the smaller gentleman - Jed ended up talking to one of the scantily clad men running a fruit tossing contest that gave out something like jam as a reward. He found out that once they booked passage, they could indeed rest onboard.
The attendant only smiled when Jed asked if the fruit used in the contest went into the prize.
Soon, the man in the fur jacket made his way aboard the pleasure wheeler. Not wasting a moment, Jed took his place.
“Ah, you return, my good fellow. Allow me to hazard a guess. You have more questions to take back to the one holding the purse strings,” Jate said, mustache bouncing as he smiled.
“Nah, we’re gonna book our passage. And Alto there said we can sleep here tonight, which is the only other question I had at the moment,” Jed said, thumbing over his shoulder at the stall.
“My good fellow, while you are certainly welcome to spend the night aboard, I feel I should warn you that it will be a rather loud evening. We find our more sensitive passengers preferring to book passage at local establishments during dock nights,” Jate said, smile slipping slightly as his gaze moved to the man with the fur-lined jacked who’d just passed. “And while we do keep warp wrought individuals on staff, the quality of our guests can be somewhat rougher on such nights as well.”
“Worried that a pair of hunters can’t handle ourselves?”
“Worried that if you do so, we might well need to make an earlier departure than planned, my good fellow,” Jate said, tapping his cane against the dock for emphasis. “However, if you believe yourself capable of restraint, you and your partner are more than welcome to board.”
“Good,” Jed said, retrieving the tokens and handing them over. “One hex, paid now. More to come later, if we enjoy the ride.”
Jate raised an eyebrow as he accepted the tokens, pressing them against a black pad at his waist. When the pad beeped red, Jate nodded, slipping the tokens into a pocket inside his suit jacket. “And that is that. You just bring your partner by so I can meet her, and you’re good to board.”
“Still got some stuff to take care of, but we’ll see you soon,” Jed said, nodding to the man.
“So you will,” Jate agreed, spinning his cane with a flourish that had the golden head shining in the evening torchlight, not unlike the giant paddle wheel that gave the pleasure wheeler half its name.
This time when he returned to Gwen, informing her he’d booked passage, she just nodded before going back to talking to the air. Her and Mythlyn’s conversation seemed to have landed on the prettiest fish scales to use as a garnish, though it sounded more like Gwen was questioning how that was even a thing while Mythlyn was more focused on which ones tasted the best.
Jed let the banter wash over him as the time they had to wait for their dusters to air drifted by. In truth, they probably waited longer than necessary before they made their way over to the end of the dock.
“Oh my,” Jate said when they approached, smoothing out the end of his long mustache. “I had thought… well, even better, even better, my good fellow, my good lady.”
“You wanted to meet me, right?” Gwen said, hand resting on her handgun. “Well, here I am.”
“Yes, you most certainly are. A most fearsome woman, if I may say so,” Jate said, bowing slightly.
“You may,” Gwen said, a giant smile spreading across her face for a fraction of a second before she schooled it into a scowl. It might’ve been fast enough to fool Jate, but Jed had every intention of teasing her about it later.
“This…” Jate said, pausing to ensure he had their attention as he stood straighter, producing a thick iron key. “Is the sole key to your room. Should you lose it, another will need to be fashioned. Which, considering they are attuned using the warp, is not cheap. I advise whoever is less likely to-”
Gwen plucked the key out of Jate’s hand, turning it over and squinting at it for a second before handing it to Jed. “Pretty sure that’s going to be impossible for you to lose, wouldn’t you agree.”
As Jed ran his warp senses over the key, he found himself nodding as he slipped it into one of the pockets inside his coat. With a bit of practice, he might not even need the key, since it lacked any sort of physical mechanism. He doubted Mythlyn would even need that much time.
The Queen’s Gambit’s locks might not stand up to an archangel. Shocking.
“As you prefer,” Jate said, eyes shifting between them so quickly as to be almost unnoticeable. “Your room number, as you may have noticed, is on the key, though if you did not, it was room jaguar-ten.”
Jed had noticed, even though he’d been more interested in the twisted shape of the warp energies.
“Yeah, caught that. Hope you don’t mind, but we’ve had a long day. Could definitely stand to get off our feet. Right partner?” Gwen said, turning towards him, winking.
“That does sound good,” Jed said, unsure of what the wink had been about, but figuring Gwen would fill him in on it later.
“Of course, of course. I hope you both have a good night,” Jate said, bowing towards them, cane hooked over his arm.
“Thank you, Jate,” Jed said, returning the bow with one of his own as Gwen stomped up the deck. “And… uh, sorry about her lack of manners.”
“It is all within expectations, my good fellow,” Jate said, his smile returning in full. “Hunters are known to be somewhat abrasive, which, when one deals with the worst has to offer on a regular basis… well, I deem it a small price to endure their rougher natures.”
“Awful understanding of you. You’re a good man,” Jed said, having to slouch slightly to pat Jate on the shoulder before starting up the ramp. “Good luck.”
“To you as well, good fellow. To you as well!”
Jed ascended the ramp to find Gwen waiting, hand on her gun, as if ready to shoot the first person to talk to her funny.
“He was nice,” Gwen said as she scanned the deck.
At first Jed thought she was looking for threats, then he realized her eyes were lingering on the decorations as much as the people, just… sweeping the room.
“I did not get the impression you liked him,” Jed said as he also took in the deck of the Queen’s gambit.
“Just wanted to get aboard, to see what we were missing,” she said, nodding forward.
The deck had a few small clusters of people standing about, with a live band playing music he’d been hearing all night but hadn’t been to able to source. In front of them, several people were dancing, though he didn’t recognize the steps. Not that he would’ve been any better back on Earth. The only thing he knew about dance was that people sometimes held hands and shoulders and shuffled back and forth. Jed’s high school dance performances hadn’t been particularly impressive, though he did manage to avoid crushing his girlfriend’s feet, which he’d taken as a win.
“What do you say, partner, up to a dance?” Gwen asked, tilting her head in the direction of the dance floor.
“Don’t know a single step,” Jed said, happy to have a very good reason to say so.
“Hmm, Lyn and I’ll have to fix that,” Gwen said, a small frown drawing across her lips as she watched the other dancers. “Not with that dross though. Hunter dances.”
“Hunter dances, huh?” Jed asked as they started circling the ship. The front area near the band was more open than Jed had thought from the outside, with the center having a large hole that led directly to the sky, a wide boardwalk surrounding it.
“Yep. Grams taught me years ago. Pretty sure Metsa was saving them for the end,” Gwen said, slowing and pointing at a pair of dancers who were…
Well, Jed wasn’t sure what to call it. When she’d first pointed them out, a squat man was holding his hand up, his partner, a lithe man doing a twirl. He’d seen that sort of thing at his high school dance.
It quickly elevated, somehow, despite the relatively slow song. Without any interruption, the lithe man swung upwards out of the twirl, the motion somehow matching the beat. He seemed to be supported by the squat man’s single hand. He too was turning in place, the hand not holding up his partner stretched out.
“The black orchid spiral,” Gwen said, nodding. “They’re good. Hard to hold it so slow.”
“That seems challenging,” Jed said, glancing down at his feet. At least if he hoisted Gwen above him, he wouldn’t have to worry about stepping on hers.
“It is. Even going normal speeds, Grams wouldn’t let me try it for the first year o’ lessons,” Gwen said as she started walking around the edge again. “Course, hadn’t killed my first demon yet, so I only had what the Empress gave me. Makes sense now but wasn’t tickled at the time.”
Jed chuckled, nodding. With increased coordination and strength, a move like that would be a lot easier to pull off.
“The tricky part is timing the shots so you’re both bleeding off recoil without falling over each other,” Gwen said as they found a pair of steps leading up.
“Wait, shots?”
“Course, partner,” Gwen said, taking Jed’s shoulder and turning him back to the couple. “Picture them with a pair of revolvers, pushing them along.”
It was, Jed realized, surprisingly easy to picture them with revolvers, spinning in place as they rained death around them. “That… is ridiculously impractical.”
“Course it is,” Gwen said, laughing as she clapped him on the shoulder. “But fun, right?”
“Yeah. Yeah, that would definitely be fun,” Jed said, nodding in agreement.
“Good. Added to our training regimen,” Gwen said as they came out on the upper deck. Instead of dancers, the upper deck had been set aside for tables. The tables had a mix of activities, from card games like the one Metsa and Sotas had taught him, to dinner, to…
“I’m surprised there isn’t a curtain for privacy,” Jed said, blushing as he looked away from the nearly naked woman ‘dancing’ on the table.
Gwen stopped to raise an eyebrow at him. “With the way your friend is all over you, never would’ve thought something like that’d make you blush.”
“It’s different,” Jed said, though even he didn’t believe it.
“If you say so, partner,” Gwen said, shaking her head as they walked passed the table with the woman and the very attentive young man watching her every move.
“I think it was as much that I wasn’t expecting it as anything,” Jed said as they walked, his embarrassment fading as quickly as it’d come. “The deck’s open to the air. The people down there, the children down there, could see her, if they happened to look up.”
“Ah, right. Revisionist upbringing,” Gwen said, nodding.
“You know that’s not the case,” Jed said, shaking his head.
“She isn’t entirely wrong. Several facets of your youth do share revisionist values. That said, they are hardly the only culture on the ring to prefer restricting blatant sexual activities around children. It does not surprise me that such values are not as strong, here on the river. Most often, it is places that are isolated that push for such.”
“Told ya,” Gwen said, latching onto the one part of Mythlyn’s comment that supported her point.
Jed shoved her shoulder, rolling his eyes.
She shoved back, arching her eyebrows as a smile tugged at her lips. “You gonna prove me wrong? Maybe go back there and let her know you’ve got a token of your own for her?”
“You’ve got a dirty mind,” Jed said, shaking his head.
“Might be I do,” Gwen said with a shrug. “Might be yours is too used to having to go without, so its compensating.”
“Nope. Like I said before. Just never liked casual sex,” Jed said, shaking his head. “Unsatisfying.”
“Huh,” Gwen said, looking him up and down, much as she had the first time he’d said it, though it felt as though she’d heard something different with the way her eyes lingered on his, smile slowly twisting upward.
“What?” Jed asked as Gwen diverted towards what seemed to be a mini-bar on a cart.
“Do you have Lover’s Embrace?” Gwen asked the man standing at the cart, who Jed noted wasn’t wearing that much more clothing than the woman dancing on the table had been.
“We can mix it, yeah,” the man said, looking between Gwen and Jed. “Though it takes a few days. Not something we can offer to stayovers.”
“Oh. We’re going to be here longterm, right partner?” Gwen said, bumping Jed’s hip, their revolvers making a slight clacking sound as she did so.
“All the way into the next hex, at least,” Jed said, fishing the key from his duster pocket as proof.
“Ah, well, in that case, I’d be delighted to arrange a dose of Lover’s Embrace. I must ask, you are aware of the effects?”
“Yep.” “No.” Gwen and Jed said at the same time.
The man looked at Jed, nodding. “It’s warp alchemy. Not every pleasure wheeler will offer it, though most have a brewer who can fix it up, since its so popular. And our Brewer is a bit better than most.” Seeing that Jed was listening, the man continued with only a slight pause. “He’ll take your essences and mingle them, along with a couple other ingredients I don’t know the official name for. Once it’s all mixed up, you both eat it, then kiss for five minutes. Some people think the kissing isn’t mandatory, and for a very rare few people, they’re right. But for nine out of ten, no kiss, no stopping the babies.”
“Stopping the babies,” Jed repeated, looking towards Gwen with a raised eyebrow.
She just crossed her arms and smirked back.
“That’s what it does. Prevents pregnancies between partners who drink it,” the man said, holding up a hand. “I should note, because people always seem to forget this part, it only works with the partners who’ve drank it. And it only works with one partner. Try to drink a new one and it’ll fail to stick or have some sort of awful side effect. You do not want those side effects.”
“Avoid mixing potions.” Jed nodded, though he felt a small twitch as he fought to keep a smile off his face. Based on her expression, Gwen had likely asked about the Lover’s Embrace specifically to embarrass him. And he knew exactly how to reverse that.
“You can purge the effects with a Ready For Life, also something we can mix. Those don’t need two people, though they tend to be three times as expensive, depending on the local hunter’s market,” the man said, shrugging. “Not as much demand for them, but we do like to keep supplies for both in stock.”
“How much?” Jed asked, not quite able to keep the smile off his face as Gwen’s eyes widened.
His smile faded slightly as her wide eyes turned into a mischievous smirk and she linked her arm with his. “Yes, and how long until we could… enjoy the benefits?”
“Three days is typical, though you’ll have to wait till morning to talk to our brewer. He’s not a night person,” the man said. “And for Lover’s Embrace, depends on local currency, but you two look like hunters so… usually about a tenth of a red-rimmed black.”
“And how long do they last?” Jed asked, folding his hand over Gwen’s, smirking at the shock he saw there. “We’re hoping to be together for a long time.”
“Until you take the Ready For Life potion. People really don’t seem to get that. It will not wear off if you don’t take the Ready For Life potion,” the man said, crossing his arms.
“Right. Don’t suppose you have anything for tonight?” Gwen asked, leaning forward over the cart. “Afraid we left our usual candy back home.”
“Got a few, though we don’t guarantee their efficacy,” the man said, looking between them. “And if you’re hunters, good chance the stuff we’ve got’ll be useless.”
“Guess we’re going to have to wait for Lover’s Embrace for the boring stuff,” Gwen said, patting Jed’s arm hiding her wink from the bartender.
“Pretty sure you’re the one concerned with the boring stuff, sweetie,” Jed said, winking right back, though he didn’t bother trying to hide it.
To his satisfaction, Gwen blushed as she glanced at the man behind the mini-bar-cart. Then with an apparent force of will, she pushed the blush off her face.
It was honestly the most shocking thing Jed had seen the whole night. So shocking he simply stared at her as she pulled him away from the man at the mini-bar-cart.
“Okay, now I really do want to… you know,” Gwen said, clutching his arm tighter. “Especially some of that other stuff.”
“You sure you could handle it?” Jed asked, only for her grip to grow tighter on his arm. “I’ll admit, it’s been a while. I might have a fair bit of extra… aggression, stored up.”
“Fuuuuuck,” Gwen said, face wrinkling up adorably. “Nope. I’d be too tempted to… if we’re gonna do this, we need to do it properly.”
“Huh. Guess I was closer to the mark with that comment about it being important to you than I realized, huh?” Jed said, though he was quickly realizing he was going to be sore the next day, and not just because of the elkback riding and the trip down the rapids.
“Or maybe I just like to let myself loose, and don’t want to be thinking about consequences while doing it,” Gwen said, smacking his arm before tugging him forward. “Now come on. Let’s see what this boat has left to distract us. ‘Cause I could really use a distraction right now.”
Jed nodded, conflicted as to whether he wanted her to let go of his arm. As nice as it was to have her close, he wasn’t sure any distraction would get through to him until she let go.
That thought held all the way until they stumbled into a room at the back of the ship where the two hunters from earlier were brutally beating each other.