Chicken Stroll
Part Nine
A day dawned cold and clear. The sort of day where there should be frost, even if it is a little too warm for ice to form. The sky lightened into a delicate peachy pink, and mists slowly formed in the valleys around tiny streamlets. Birds started to call, their songs sounding almost surreally clear in the still air. Andorel stirred with a muffled squawk in the coop. It was dark in there, but the birdsong had aroused him from a sound sleep. It had taken him a while to get to sleep, since it had been difficult to figure out how to get comfy, but he thought back to the chickens of Candlekeep, and remembered how they tucked their heads back, keeping their beaks warm in the fluff between their wings, and he'd found that it was a very nice and cosy way to sleep, especially with his left leg tucked up into his feathers. Now, however, he was wide awake, and a strange feeling was creeping over him. An urge to do...something. He couldn't figure out what, though. He roused his feathers and settled them. The feeling was getting stronger constantly. He fidgeted slightly on his perch, and Dekaras stirred slightly, making a half-asleep whistling noise. Cracks of sunlight poked through the gaps in the wooden coop, slicing the dark air into segments. Gah...I have to move. Gotta get some fresh air. What in the Abyss is wrong with me?
He jumped down onto the straw covered floor, and squeezed his way of the small door into the bright morning. As the sun hit him, though, the feeling got even more intense. He staggered to one side, and then shook himself, trying to clear his head. He flapped in agitation, fluttering up to the top of the ridged coop. Sunlight hit his green comb. Sweet Tyr...I'm gonna burst. I'm gonna burst! I can't stop myself! He stretched out his neck and breathed in deeply, his chest expanding, then the feeling grew to a sharp point as he threw his head back and yelled at the top of his voice.
“Cock-a-doodle-doo!” Oh yeah. Guess that was what I wanted to do. Makes sense. He chuckled to himself, making quiet squawking noises.
“Cock-a-doodle-doo!” Came a loud answering voice from another rooftop. Andorel looked around to see Edwin, tail plumes sparkling, looking at him smugly.
The scruffy rooster puffed up in annoyance, all humanity (well, half-orcity) forgotten. How dare he challenge me? I'm the biggest rooster, I'll show him! “COCK-A-DOODLE-DOO!”
The answering scream had an edge of hoarseness about it, but was still very loud. “COCK-A-DOODLE-DOO!”
“COCK-A-DOODLE-DOO!!” By now, Andorel was angry, and determined to beat this interloper.
“COCK-A-DOODLE-DOO!!” Came the answering reply.
A new voice suddenly joined in the dawn chorus and both Andorel's and Edwin's heads snapped round. Though the rhythm was right, this one chose to use different words, and was louder than both of them put together:
“SHUT-UP-BOTH OF-YOU!!” Dekaras screamed at the top of his voice, glaring angrily at the pair of competing roosters with red eyes. Edwin slicked his feathers down in sudden embarassment, while Andorel looked wonderingly at the black rooster.
“Wow, Vaddy, you've got a lotta bottled up anger, ain't ya?”
Dekaras didn't dignify that with an answer. Instead, he carefully shook out his tail feathers, long black plumes giving off little glints of deep green and purple in the morning sunlight. “If the pair of you are quite finished with your vocal exercises in being territorial, perhaps we could do something constructive with our time? Such as making an actual attempt to get out of here?”
“We have tried,” Edwin hurriedly said. “Nalia and I, that is. And I...” Nalia chose that exact moment to hop through the entrance hole to the chicken coop, clucking with annoyance as one of her white feathers caught on a rough board. “What are you all being so loud for?” she complained, looking up at the three roosters. “I was sleeping in there, you know.”
“He started it!” Edwin immediately said, and his comb rose angrily into the air as he glared at Andorel.
“You went on with it,” Andorel retorted, and his mottled feathers were already stirring in response to the challenge. “Couldn't beat this rooster though, not wit' that scrawny chest o'yours!”
“Yes I could! I, for one, am a real rooster, not something that looks like a cross between a goose and a diseased donkey that has fallen down a cliff! (I'm amazed his fat carcass can even get airborne.)”
“Oh yeah? 'Least I'm not a selfish prat who makes messes an' then lets his teacher put his ass on the line for him all the time.”
“I don't ask him to do that!” By now Edwin was nearly screaming, and his comb looked about ready to explode with the sudden influx of blood. “I would NEVER!”
“But you still expect it, don't ya? Aint' that typical...always just takin', never givin' anything back...”
“I...you...he...” Edwin was nearly speechless with fury by now, opening and closing his beak as he vainly tried to get the words out. There was only one thing to say, really. “COCK-A-DOODLE-DOOOOOOO!”
“Yeah? Well, COCK-A-DOODLE DOO to you too, ya great big...”
“Oh, stop it!” Nalia huffed. She rolled her eyes at the two roosters. “Men...hopeless, all of them.”
“I'm only trying to put this insufferable mutated chicken in his proper place, on somebody's dinner table!” Edwin protested. “And I'm sure Teacher Dekaras would agree with me that only a very low and common person would want to eat his stinking carcass in the first place.” He turned his head. “Teacher Dekaras?”
But the black rooster wasn't there any longer. “Where'd he go?” Andorel asked curiously, his crest flopping this way and that as he looked around.
“Maybe he got fed up with the noise you two were making.” Nalia replied waspishly.
“Blame your familiar, he started it.” Andorel sniggered.
“As if I would choose to pick an argument with an imbecilic, mutated...”
“Shut UP!” Nalia squawked. “I really don't care who started it. What's got into you both? trying to sort out the pecking order or something?”
The two roosters looked down in embarassment, their combs going red and dark green respectively with shame.
“I suppose,” Andorel said quietly, “We'd better find him.”
“Yes.” Edwin replied grudgingly, then his eyes widened in fear. “Could he be in trouble?”
“Don't be silly.” Nalia snapped, more impatiently than she meant to. “But we should keep an eye on each other's whereabouts, I think.”
“We should divide up. That way, we can search as much space as possible in the smallest amount of time.” Edwin replied, gnawing a claw anxiously.
“Nothing's happened to him, 'Dwin.” Nalia said softly, looking directly at the red rooster. “So stop worrying.” She bent her neck slightly and preened one of his neck feathers soothingly. Edwin closed his eyes tiredly.
“So, let's go and find Vaddy then, eh?” Andorel said loudly. Edwin started and opened his eyes again. “No time to lose!”
“Will you stop calling him that?” Edwin asked, but without the vitriol he had shown earlier.
“Well, you could call him that if ya wanted. Or summat that rhymed with it.” Clucking with some private amusement, Andorel waddled off.
What do you suppose that meant?
No idea. Edwin replied. But then, I am quite proud of the fact I don't understand that half-orc's jokes.
First time I've heard you admit you don't understand something.
Don't start. Edwin sent tiredly. Let's just find Teacher Dekaras, yes?
With a mental affirmative, Nalia moved off and started exploring the chicken coops to find the missing assassin. Surely a black cockerel couldn't be that hard to find?
However, she searched round and round the coops, but couldn't find him anywhere. She paused for a moment, flicking a tickling feather out of her eye, and tried to think where he could have got to. Nothing bad could have happened to him...the other chickens would be in an uproar if there had been an invading human or fox. Argh, that feather really tickled! She flicked her head again, and a flash of black made her realise it wasn't one of her white feathers, but a long black plume. Of course! She had been thinking like a human again. She'd looked left, right, behind and in front, but hadn't thought of looking up. Dekaras was perched on the top of one of the chicken coops, looking down at her soberly.
“Oh!” Nalia said, taking an involuntary step back. “There you are...are you all right?” The black rooster cocked his head to one side, considering this. “Of course I am,” he eventually said. “Why wouldn't I be?”
He sounded calm enough, Nalia thought. Then again, that didn't mean very much, did it? From what she'd gathered from Edwin, he almost always did, no matter what. This was all so...so awkward! She'd shared enough of Edwin's memories of his teacher, dreams even, so many that she felt she practically knew him already, but they'd still never actually met before. It would be extremely rude to act too familiar. Not to mention that she hadn't exactly planned for their first meeting to happen with them both turned into chickens. She had no idea what the proper protocol was for such a situation. She didn't think even Aunt Delcia would have known that. Nalia thought for a moment, then flapped onto the chicken coop herself, settling down next to him.
“Well,” she said, “Edwin and Andorel were being really obnoxious right now, weren't they? I wouldn't blame you for getting fed up with them acting like that - gods know I did.” She paused, waiting for a reaction, but the assassin simply tapped a very sharp claw absently against the roof, looking deep in thought. “They both got really worried about you leaving though,” she added.
The tapping stopped. “Did they indeed?” Dekaras asked, not sounding particularly cheerful about it. “Strange. I would have thought they would be preoccupied with this ridiculous little game they're playing for a good while longer. Possibly long enough for all of us to be turned into feather pillows, or somebody's holiday dinner.”
“Well...”
“They don't even try, do they?” By now, the claw was digging a deep furrow in the roof, and the scratching sound belied the superficially calm voice that accompanied it. “Oh, I knew they had some bad blood between them,” the assassin went on. “I didn't think it would be easy. But I would have thought that they would at least be willing to make a tiny effort not to be as nasty as possible to each other. More the fool, I.”
Nalia's feathers stirred uneasily. She was out on deep water here, and she had a feeling it would be far too easy to say the wrong thing. “I think...” she said. “I think, that if they knew you were upset, they'd both feel really bad about it.”
“I'm not upset.” The way that the black tailfeathers were rising into an indignant plume told a different story, but Nalia thought it best not to comment on that.
“Right. No. Of course not. Sorry. Anyway...they both care about you, even if they're acting like idiots at the moment. And you care about both of them. But you can't make them get along, and I can't either. Only they can, and only if they want to.” She chuckled a little, and it came out as a soft cluck. “At least now I think they'll keep from trying to shout the sky down at dawn, so thanks for that one.”
Dekaras took a moment to mull this over. “You are welcome,” he said, and now Nalia got the sense that the calmness wasn't just a carefully applied mask. “My sleep is restless enough anyway without those two shrieking themselves hoarse right on top of me.” He spread his wings a little. “I suppose we had better go find them before they start again.”
“Good idea.” Then Nalia thought of something else. “Oh, by the way...what would you prefer me to call you?” Noticing the bemused look that the black rooster was giving her, she hurriedly went on. “I don't know if it's proper protocol to actually come right out and ask, but I can't very well call you 'Teacher Dekaras' can I? And 'Vaddy' is definitely out of the question.”
“Thank you,” the assassin dryly said. “I would like to keep the use of that one to a minimum, if possible.” He shook himself a little. “Our current circumstances aren't exactly formal, are they? And besides, you are Edwin's familiar and close companion. So, why don't you simply call me by my first name?”
“What, 'Vadrak'?”
“Why, yes. It is my name, after all. And if you don't mind, I think I will call you 'Nalia', seeing how that is your name. Convenient, isn't it?”
“I suppose so,” Nalia agreed, now trying to imagine introducing her Aunt Delcia to the assassin. Her mind screeched to a halt at the thought.
“Good. And, Nalia?”
“Yes?”
“Thank you.”
