Sometimes the Wheel is cruel:

  • Royal Decree: No apology shall be considered valid unless accompanied by a suitable remedy, by lemon law.
  • Princess’s curse: You are followed by a flock of birds determined to befriend you. Refuse their friendship, and you’ll be whacked with a sword. If the sword hurts, you must loudly announce your injury before speaking to anyone else.
  • Words: Recorder, Exploring, Chainmail
  • Potion of: Chaos = Several manageable problems occur at once, interacting with each other and resulting in a situation that is no longer manageable.
  • Tarot: Queen of Cups: compassion, emotional intelligence, intuition, nurturing, calm, empathy—someone who can remain emotionally perceptive while other people are losing their minds.

Here is what I wrote:

I reminded myself this was all my fault and dug deep into my reserves for my last bit of patience. "Okay. One at a time please. Torin, you were here first. What is the problem?"

"The pull on the system is exceeding capacity. Until we solve the problem, we need you to put everyone on a rota," he said to groans and mumbled complaints. I filed away a new orc curse word though. "The aether conduits were not intended to support magical usage of this magnitude." He shifted his judgmental gaze to the group at large.

My house was full of Wardens who had no place to live or work because I had tried to help, which blew up in my face, as usual. Now I was the Prison Guard of the Gen Pop Yard and I wanted to run away.

I looked over at Taviran lounging in a big comfy armchair casually reading a yonaka. A little too casually, in my opinion. I was sorely tempted to tell him to get his people under control. He was the Captain after all. Then I noticed the smirk and refused to give him the satisfaction.

"Right. I think next is Kaze."

The Tengu-Raven stepped forward, holding out a yonaka in his clawed hand. "I received this email from a group of Tengu-Sparrowhawks requesting friendship. I do not know them. It further says if I reject this offer of friendship, they will..." He glanced at the yonaka and read, " ' whack me with their swords.' In your opinion, how should I respond without offending them outright? If they attacked, I'd be forced to defend myself and I have no wish for that many unnecessary deaths on my katra." He shrugged a winged arm.

"Right. Let me think about that. And, a group? Not a flock? Never mind. Next up was Faren."

The young Varastaa stayed where he was and gave Torin side-eye. "I need to get these reports in and the ostaze is running too slow. I believe that is already being addressed." The last bit trailed off.

"Okey doke. Anyone else?" I looked around at the last few and got a few head shakes. "Great. I hear all of you–"

"Actually."

Oh good lord, no. It was Damaris, the Wardens' in-house artifacts expert. Except he was always bringing things to me and that was precisely how I'd ended up with a house full of Wardens.

"Yes," I said begrudgingly.

"Some dwarves were exploring in the underground tunnels," he said while pushing his way to the front.

"Oh. The Metro? I mean, I guess they are tunnels now that the trains don't run anymore." I shook my head. "Sorry. What?"

"Well, they found this and brought it to me because it's got a hum of magic, clearly spelled, but it is some sort of human material because, well, it's not natural." He shook the object back and forth in front of my face.

I recoiled as childhood flashbacks of "Hot Cross Buns" and "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" hit me hard. "It's a recorder."

"Recorder. It looks like a musical instrument. Can you tell what spell is on it?" He held it out for me.

"Fine. And then you'll all go away and let me get back to my own work?" I didn't care that I sounded snotty. I was seconds away from running away. I needed quiet time to recharge my batteries, which would conversely refill my patience.

They all nodded. Faren took two steps back towards the door. I took the recorder and pushed a bit of magic into it to see if I could tell what the spell was intended to do.

Everything happened at once.

Loud notes screeched out of the recorder. Every yonaka started repeatedly pinging. The house literally groaned, then began playing a discordant version of the "someone is here" announcement melody.

I was bent over with my hands over my ears attempting, unsuccessfully, to block out the cacophony.

"Hedy, cut the aether!"

"What?!" I screamed without looking to see who was yelling at me.

Oh. Cut the aether. Ha. I had been practicing manipulating the element that made magic possible. So far, a novice had more control than I did.

The notes changed. No. There were more and whatever was coming from the recorder was louder. I did my best to block it all out and focus on getting the aether to stop feeding every spell, device, and mechanism going haywire.

Eventually, I got it off. The yelling and complaining started before I'd fully regained my hearing.

"Enough." Taviran had finally decided to step in. "Hedy, what is the material of that thing?"

"Plastic."

He looked at Damaris. "Take that thing to the incinerator."

He turned to Torin. "Tell Hedy when we can restore the aether conduit." Torin nodded and headed back to the basement to assess the damage.

He turned to Kaze. "Go and talk to your Kai-Ren." He sighed.

"Captain?" Kaze asked.

"Please explain to him that you received a letter from an unknown gang of Sparrowhawks threatening violence and due to"–he glanced at me–"unforeseen circumstances, that letter was sent to everyone on the ostaze-earth network. Chain mails are illegal. I would prefer to avoid..." He stalled, looking for the right word. "Just. Talk to your Kai-Ren about a diplomatic solution. The paperwork, Kaze. Let's avoid that, please."

Everyone dispersed and it was blessedly quiet, finally. Taviran was back in his armchair engrossed in his yonaka.

"Uh. Thanks for taking care of everything." I did not want to apologize. It wasn't entirely my fault. "I'm sorry about the recorder thing. I don't know how it always goes so wrong. I was just checking to see what the spell was supposed to do."

He smiled, ever so sweetly, and said, "Well, per Ms. Lemón Law, 'no apology is considered valid without being accompanied by a suitable remedy.' So, I'm afraid I can't accept yours. Yet."