2nd Life Chapter 36 Clever Crafting, an elder scroll series fanfic

Chapter 36: Clever Crafting

He was showing them how to make honey meringue cookies. The Guillard Brother, the newest Breton restaurant in Windhelm, had purchased several kitchen tools being made in Winterhold. When they'd discovered the inventor, Curtis, was dining in their restaurant, they'd comped his meal, the meal of his guests, and invited him to inspect their kitchen. Curtis was no blue-ribbon chef, but he'd watched enough cooking shows like Masterchef and BBQ Pitmasters to pick up some techniques and ideas. Engineering was engineering.

They knew what a basic meringue was, and making meringues was a pretty intense exercise with a wire whip, which was itself a new device. But before even that, they'd used a fork with long, thin tines. One of the types of Winterhold devices they'd bought was a manual rotary eggbeater, both the delicate wire-whisk type and the sturdier flat-blade type. Next, literally scraping the bottom of a wine barrel for white crystals of potassium bitartrate or cream of tartar. As they were grinding the stuff into powder, he told them how this stabilized the batter to better contain the air bubbles so meringues and cakes would be light and fluffy. It also added a slightly vinegary flavor, so only use as much as needed. Also, this world had not yet discovered the evil that was industrialized processed cane sugar, and he was not about to use moon sugar in this recipe. So he was using heated honey.

While the meringues baked, they talked about attracting Dunmer customers. Well, they had to start using Morrowind ingredients, didn't they? The Dunmer were big on bugs, which could be nutritious, and packed a lot of protein with little fat. They should patronize some of the many Dunmer food stalls, get a taste of dark elf cuisine, then try to apply their Breton cooking techniques. It's not like bug mash, and lizard meat wasn't any more disgusting than brains, tripe, kidneys, and other offal used in Breton cooking. It was all in the celebrated Breton technique, no? *Breton fingertip air kiss*

He returned to Sadri's bearing a tray of meringue treats for Lady Helsette. Yesterday, she'd had false labor pains that caught her by surprise, and she'd shouted. A minor earth tremor startling everyone in the city and had the Dunmer swearing that they had nothing to do with it. Lord Revyn, too, although he was flat-out lying.

Probably why Akatosh never had any daughters. On the other hand, do lizards have birth pains laying eggs, or is it more like blissful relief after an extended period of intensifying bloating and constipation?

Now that that scare was temporarily over, he had another schmooze session. This time it was a party being thrown by Jarl Korir. He was attending as Winterhold's celebrated clever crafter, and Edd Theman was also there in his role as the College's Mouth or public affairs representative. This was the jarl's important "remind everyone that Winterhold is still an importhant power" event. An event, starting mid-afternoon, a lavish dinner, then an evening of some hired entertainment, a ball, and so on.

Curtis managed to keep a cheerful smile up. Edd Theman could be excused from having to pretend anything other than mild amusement. The two token dark elves and wizards in a crowd of, um, noble sons and daughters of Skyrim. The jarl required some public ass-kissing. So, as he talked about all the major projects in the hold, the schools for non-magical clever crafters, the inventions, Curtis made sure to praise the jarl's determination to reforge a broken Winterhold stronger than ever. Edd Theman thanked the jarl for allowing the College to redeem its reputation and a chance to prove that mages had a place in civic endeavors, such as the shoreline reclamation project. The jarl was beaming proudly at the end of it. Both Dunmer downed their own small barrels of sujamma when it was all over.

"As a Mouth, I've never been so ill-used," sighed Edd. "Well, except for when Severus disappeared without telling me and left me to deal with that fallout."

"I hear ya. But you're good at your job, Edd. That's why the other Mouths as Sadrith Mora all recommended you."

"Thank you, truest of the False Incarnates."

Edd, by now, knew all about Curtis's otherworld origins and the video game of Morrowind. The video game plotline had fascinated him and answered so many questions. It had also helped him to finally forgive Severus, which was good. He was also contemplating joining House Mora with his granddaughter. And, if Severus was going to be the housefather, there had to be peace between them.

Restoring harmony between the Nerevarine and his Mouth had put Curtis in the odd position of therapist's assistant. Both those men had trouble expressing their feelings. Brother Salindil had been counseling them. But sitting in a nondescript room didn't inspire them to talk, so he'd moved the session to the archimage's rooftop gazebo. A map of Morrowind had been tacked to a wall laid out, and the plume of Red Mounting was visible on the horizon. He also had asked Curtis to attend two sessions. The idea was simple - he would ask Curtis many questions about this Morrowind game and how he went about playing the game. Severus and Edd were tasked with listening, no commentary. It had been a weird feeling of both those men staring intently at him as he describes the game setup and the decision trees he had to navigate as the Nerevarine. Brother Salindil had been amused. Why did a confessed tank player decide to join House Telvanni when he had minimal magic talent? And how had he won his way to mage-lord level in the most unmagical way possible?

Weird, but Salindil had made it work, and the two men had reconciled.

This little party also worked for Curtis and Edd because they got many inquiries about the schooling for clever crafters, magical and non-magical. People had bright children they were thinking of sponsoring, and they wanted to know how long training would be, meaning how soon they'd get a return on their investment. There were promises of visitors to look over the schools and the project, which would be happy news for the Frozen Hearth and the other two newly-built inns.

He should return to Winterhold and get things prepared for visitors. The work he and Irdal had come here for was done days ago, and they should have left. But she'd really gotten into teaching vocal mechanics and techniques to the Dragonborn and the Greybeard, and he'd gotten dragged into doing these public relations stuff for House Mora and Winterhold.

The next day was a breakfast meeting with Harold Felix and four more family members. The first pair were Angela Felix and her husband, Ambrose Cornelius. Angela was with port authority at Anvil, and Ambrose ran a cargo ship. Ambrose would be captaining the boat that would be taking Curtis and his people to the other side of Skyrim. The other two, whom he hadn't known were Felix kin, were Etrude Aquila and her husband. Alessandro Roberto. He'd met them earlier in Winterhold doing interviews for a Colovia journal called The Gold Coast Watch. Etrude was a reporter, and Alessandro was an editor. That answered some questions he'd had because their subscription base was Colovia. They had been doing a lot of pieces the past two months on the inventions coming out of Winterhold. He now learned they had Thalmor subscribers, so their real intent was to create distracting stories and false leads for the Thalmor to chase. The Thalmor knew they were Felix kin, so why not use that to their advantage?

Ambrose wanted to talk about the invisibility cloak Curtis had invented. He'd heard a summary of the story from Revyn about how Curtis had been kidnapped and taken to Japhet's Folly, which had inspired him to create the cloaking device. Meris and her ship, the South Seas Pearl, had been the ship that had picked them up and while dropping off the commandos tasked with crippling the Dominion marines stationed on that island. It had also later towed the underwater pod the commandos would live and operate from. The SS Pearl was also originally going to be the ship taking Curtis and his people through the stormy, icy northern seas to an obscure landing near the border of High Rock. But the Felix's South Seas Pearl was a slow cargo ship when it came down to it, so Sadri had commandeered Justiciar Ancarion's fast and sleek schooner. The SS Pearl, with a temporary crew, because some of the regulars "got sick" while partying in Windhelm, would chug its merry way to Winterhold, Dawnstar, and Solitude. This was an unusual activity for the Felixes and was sure to draw attention and suspicion from the right people.

So, it was happening. Ambrose would be taking command of the ship and spend a couple weeks with the cargo crew in drills to familiarize themselves with this new ship. If they were seen by other Dominion ships patrolling those waters, they would have a better chance of outrunning than a cargo ship would. An invisibility cloak would significantly improve the chances of this being an uneventful trip.

It was going to happen within the next two or three months while all Dominion attention was on Windhelm and all the friendlies that showed up to witness Ulfric's coronation.

Curtis felt sick. He'd had many talks with Gelebor about the Forgotten Vale, had poured over a dozen times the route from the Northpoint landing to Darkfall Cave where the Skyrim gate to the Vale was hidden. It was planned that Gelebor and Lady Serana would precede them to make sure the Dark Passage was cleared of Falmer/the Betrayed. A lot of talking. But it was starting now. Was he really ready for it? Were they ready to leave the cold but familiar comfort of their ruined Dwemer research station for the ruins of a forgotten valley and a ruined temple? The college's restorations department would be losing Salindil's and Meren's contributions of knowledge and skills. Curtis knew the college's advances in industrial chemistry would suffer without Brother Tellion. But the reason the Altmer priests of Auri-El had come to the college at Colette's invitation in the first place was to get them beyond the reach of the Dominion. He should send them a message immediately to tell them to get the other priests who followed Aldarch Salindil to Winterhold.

Lady Serana had told him about her journey with Lady Helsette through the Forgotten Vale. He wondered if Lady Helsette would be in the mood to tell him the story from her point of view. However, she was asleep when he checked in. Irdal was also napping on her sleeping pad, but she woke up, sensing movement in the room. She'd kind of made herself another attendant to the lady. Between teaching breathing and vocal control and discussing pertinent tonal concepts, she'd been asking her a lot of questions about her explorations in Dwemer ruins.

"You are agitated, my lord, is something wrong?" she asked.

"Yeah. I just met the captain of the boat taking us to the Snowmer sanctuary," he said.

"Ah," she said and drew him to a far corner of the room. "Try to keep your voice down so her ladyship can sleep."

Curtis nodded. "Yeah, yeah. I just came from meeting some more Felix family members. You know how I told you I'd been captured by the Dominion and taken to a small island. Well, Sadri and the Felixes managed to claim one of the smaller, faster Dominion ships. They've got the captain and crew here that will be training to sail that ship instead of the cargo ship they'd originally sailed here with. They plan to move us within the next two or three months. A lot depends on how well we can cover our tracks here. A lot of spies watching Sadri and the Felixes. Can you get word back to Winterhold? Gelebor and Lady Serana need to head to Darkfall, and Brother Salindil will need to contact the rest of his priests to come out of hiding and get to Winterhold."

"I understand. Do you have any further commands?"

"No. I still need to meet with Lord Sadri and the other Felix elders to see what they're planning. Oh, and have Drilira report on her progress to improve the cloaking device, and Jalen, on his active sonar system. It would be nice to have a working system for them to practice with, especially since they're using a stolen Dominion ship. They'll start training to use it soon, and that will probably take them a couple of weeks. It might help them if they can train without worrying about being seen by the enemy."

"Yes, my lord. I'll begin at once. In fact, Drilira usually meditates and has her tea at this time of day; she should hear me. Or Agrund, though he takes ale instead of tea and prefers a light nap instead of meditation."

Curtis left her to it. No preset contact schedule had been arranged, so Irdal was going to have to catch anyone in a receptive state. He didn't really think it would take her too long; the Dwemer were quite familiar with each other's habits.

He intended to go back to the inn to see if he could hook up with Ambrose or even Alessandro again. But as he was leaving, he saw Angela and Etrude approaching, clearly coming to visit Lady Helsette.

"Felix kin," he told the guards at the door.

"Which ones?" asked the guard, pulling out a scroll from the drawer of the new standing desk beside the door.

"They just came in last night. I doubt they're on that list yet." He intercepted the ladies and asked Elden to escort them next door to the Cornerclub to wait as he went to fetch Dana, who had the authority to admit them.

Two weeks ago, the government staff and public records had been temporarily relocated to the nearby home of Lady Belyn Hlaalu. She moved out to her second home in Aldmora rather than put up with annoying acquaintances not seen in decades. And, besides, it was more profitable to charge a premium rental price to the Windhelm government to use her home. She rented the upper floors to Kinlord Ra'athim Taredase Davrian, his servants, and his guards, who'd immediately moved out of Sadri's to there. The Gray Quarters public affairs rented the lower floors.

That freed up room for Curtis and Manolas to roll out separate bedrolls in Ser Dana's office. They were getting increasingly nervous sleeping in the same room as a pregnant Dragonborn about to pop at any moment. Not that they had exclusive use of the new space, they were now sharing it with some of the servants who had been cluttering up the halls at night.

Now that the inconvenience of running a public office from his home was removed, Sadri had slammed his door shut. Guests and servants staying at his house had to sign in and out. Visitors were turned away unless they were on the admittance list. Of course, Sadri couldn't exactly boot out his Redoran guest, Varvur Sarethi, the Archmaster of House Redoran, the first Great House to approve the recreation of House Mora. Yeah, that Varvur Sarethi from the Morrowind game, the teen accused of murder and who had to be rescued by the Nerevarine as one of the Get Approval of House Redoran quest lines.

Curtis notified Dana that two Felix ladies not on today's scheduled visitor list or the family list had recently come to town and were waiting to visit Lady Helsette. While she dealt with that, he checked back with Irdal. Irdal had managed to catch Drilira and had conveyed Curtis's instructions. Drilira reported that she had a working prototype, but would need the approximate dimensions of the craft it would have to cover. She would prioritize detection trials over her current work plans. She would have Jalen report his progress on their next scheduled contact window.

"What's the schedule?" asked Curtis.

"Mid-morning and 12 hours later, mid-evening. Drilira has suggested that a physical token from the Dominion craft be sent to Sidabor. An excellent idea as he has the visual talent of hex detection. He can see if any spells were cast upon the ship or imbued into any part of it during its creation, like spells to enhance performance or allow tracking by Dominion naval command."

"Damn. Good idea. Let's see if we can get a few minutes with Miz Angela, the captain's wife. Any questions you got for the captain, we can tell her. I'll bet tomorrow he'll be over here with his own questions.

"Ah, sounds like they're coming up."

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