Chapter 31.
Four shillings, five pence. The coins were shiny in my hand as I clinked them together before finally slipping them into my pocket. It wasn’t much, but it was still a humble start.
I followed Galine into the back, past several tables and an honest-to-God quest board. Sometimes things felt a little on the nose, but honestly, I appreciated anything familiar enough to recognize.
“Are you in an ale mood? Or wine? We might have some cider too,” she hummed, ducking through a doorway.
“Uhh… wine,” I decided, following her into the office space. There were two large desks on either side of the room, with a shelf of what I assumed was ledgers between them. It was a simple functional space, a private space.
Galine smiled at me and plucked an unopened bottle of wine from where it had been tucked away on the shelf. She plucked two mugs from one of the desks and pulled the cork from the bottle.
“What are we celebrating?” I asked as she filled both cups.
She glanced over at me. “I thought we were bemoaning where life has taken us while getting hammered.”
I nodded, accepting the cup from her. “Yeah, that works for me,” I smiled.
I took a sip of wine and promptly gagged in surprise as I forced the liquid down. “Holy shit, that’s… got a fucking kick,” I muttered. It was bad wine, it was… funky. Weirdly sour yet also sweet, and definitely spiced with… I had no idea. I took another sip.
Galine laughed at me, pouring herself a healthy glass. “Don’t tell me your tastes are too noble for affordable wine.”
“No, not at all,” I chuckled, clearing the film from my throat. “On Earth, it’s all made with fancy equipment. I mean, yes, there’s cheap wine, but it’s still better than this,” I grimace apologetically. “Though… not much better, it’s just a bit softer.”
Galine nodded, though I suspected I was being humoured rather than anything else.
“Anyway,” I shrugged, sitting in one of the free chairs. “Bemoan away.”
She smiled and took a big gulp of wine, once again making herself comfortable on the floor. Or as comfortable as lying on hardwood could be, surely she could use a rug or something; it had to hurt the joints.
Galine was still tall enough to set the mug on the desk as if she were simply sitting across from me. Hell, I absolutely assumed it was totally inappropriate to say, but I could have ridden on her back, and I was a tad curious to do so.
“I am a coward,” Galine sighed dramatically.
I blinked. That was not how I was expecting this to go. “The fact you went up the stairs despite your fears rather suggests otherwise,” I replied, taking another gulp of wine. I needed to be less sober for tonight.
“Blah,” she shrugged it off, leaning back and propping herself up on her horseback with her hands as she stretched. “It’s mostly just humiliating,” she sighed. “I feel like it’s every week that I’m finally sure I’ll get it all together. It never is.”
“On Earth, there were a lot of ramps, at least where I was, and elevators…” I pointed out. “They’re like… little closets that move up and down between floors. Like dumbwaiters but for people.”
“I know what an elevator is,” she snorted. “The guild headquarters has one. It was the only reason I could get upstairs at all.”
I nodded. “I just mean it sucks you don’t live somewhere accommodating. I had a sociology professor tell me once that it is not people’s unique circumstances which are inherently debilitating, it is society's refusal to accommodate and support them.”
Galine sat back up, reaching for her cup.
“Though,” I sighed, waving my nub and the sleeve which had come undone to hang loosely, “this does feel pretty inherently limiting.”
“I see the point, though,” she replied with a shrug. “I remember a mercenary who passed through once with a metal leg. The magic was far beyond me, but he could walk just fine with it and do whatever needed to be done in combat. He seemed to manage just fine.”
I nodded. “Obviously, having one hand makes things difficult, but also, everything is designed for those with two hands in mind. Things could be designed differently. Or chronic pain wouldn’t be debilitating the same way if medicine were better prepared to treat it. But… at the same time, I feel far worse off with just one arm,” I muttered, trying to keep the bitterness from my voice.
“Don’t blame yourself for being angry,” Galine sighed gently. “You’re still grieving.”
That caught me off guard. “What would I be grieving?” I frowned.
She blew out a breath. “I…. The life you might have lived otherwise?”
That hit me like a punch to the gut. I rolled my neck uncomfortably. “Yeah, maybe.”
“I like that professor thing,” she continued. “My equine half is only a barrier because the city is built for bipedals,” Galine sighed, sipping more wine. “And yet for some stupid reason I always stay.”
“Why do you really stay?” I asked over the rim of my mug. “I’m sure there’s plenty of work to be done on flat steady ground.”
Galine absently tried to tame her long hair in thought. “Are you really not fucking with me about being an outworlder?”
I nodded. “Cross my heart, I promise.”
She just squinted at me suspiciously.
I couldn’t help but chuckle. “Or at least for the sake of the argument, pretend I am,” I offered.
Galine rolled her eyes. “Look, bipedals don’t really get along with centaurs and vice versa. The clan I’m from is entirely nomadic. We don’t feud over land, we don’t have lords or kings, we just… live very differently. Some say that makes us savages, I’d say we all have the freedom of a king and don’t have to spend every waking moment plowing the fields just to avoid starving through the winter.”
That made me laugh. “Here, here, I don’t really fuck with the monarchy either,” I grinned. “We mostly got rid of them on Earth by the time I kicked the bucket… well… we were beginning to backtrack into a sort of techno-feudalism, but… anyway, never mind,” I smiled, “Ignore me.”
“Were you some kind of scholar on… Earth?” Galine asked.
I shrugged. “I tried to be. In hindsight, I should have tried harder.”
She simply nodded, seeming to consider that.
“So…” I cleared my throat, “you can’t find a party because bipedals are dicks?”
She smiled. “Honestly, most people have bigger issues to care about, but there’s the occasional dick, sure.”
“So what really keeps you here then?” I asked, downing the last of my wine. I was already getting tipsy, and it made my words flow like honey.
“I’m just used to it,” she sighed. “The pay’s not bad, the people are alright. As I said, I’m just a coward. I meet all sorts that work for Wolfbit, they’ve all got a… something I just don’t. And it would be that much harder for me. Sure, I’m faster than a bipedal on foot, but they can just ride an actual horse to make up for it and then just dismount when it doesn’t suit them.”
I nodded. It made sense. She lacked a certain flexibility you probably wanted from hired thugs.
“And the people sometimes suck,” she added begrudgingly. “I really try not to let it get to me, but… It’s weirdly lonely. Bipedals are all so individualistic. We’re much more… communal, we’re herd animals as much as I hate the comparison.”
“I get it,” I offered. “I’ve experienced similar. For everyone’s sake, I hope y'all don’t get an industrial revolution the way we did.”
“Why?” she asked.
“Uhh,” I blew out a breath, trying to figure out the simplest way to put it, “it made things even less communal in some ways. Began separating the people doing work from the tools required to do it, and also the products they created. Everything became… alienated through money.”
“That sounds… bad,” she offered, refilling her mug.
“Yeah, it wasn’t great,” I hummed.
“What was I saying?” she hummed. “Oh, right. Bipedals are just fucking weird about the equine thing,” she huffed.
I blinked, her sudden frustration catching me off guard.
“I hate being stared at,” she sighed. “I mean, here at least, people are used to me more or less. But if I were travelling with bipedals… I’d be stuck with them, what they want to do, where they want to go. And at every fucking village, people would point and stare.”
“I’m sorry, that sounds horrible,” I offered gently.
“It’s not,” she groaned. “They don’t mean any harm. I just… hate it. Part of the reason I stay is just hoping my clan passes by again so I can go back to my family,” she admitted. “Gods, that's pathetic.”
I put my hand on hers kindly. “There's nothing pathetic about wanting to be around people who understand you. It’s deeply human–oid,” I quickly rephrased. “Sorry… do you count as humanoid, is it number of limbs based?”
Galine chuckled. “If you asked my people, they’d say we're closer to fae, but sure. Yeah, we generally count.”
“Interesting,” I nodded. I’d have to ask about the fae at some point. And dragons. And… everything. Fuck I had so many questions.
A ding, followed by a few more dings, broke our tipsy chatting.
Galine sighed. “That's the reception bell, give me a sec.”
“Of course,” I smiled, trying to smother my disappointment. I was really enjoying her company.