Grandma's Attic

Chapter Two

Thredwyl's cousin Chrean was waiting for him. Lurking, it might be said with mischievous intent, out of sight along the passage to Grandma Nari's chamber. He slapped Thredwyl on his back and slung his arm around Thredwyl's shoulders. "So do tell us, how'd it go? And who are you to marry?"

"No one. Yet," Thredwyl answered him, his head reeling from a super abundance of an adults-only beverage. His belly was queasy too.

How much had he drunk, how long had he been with them, how had he accounted himself? Had he acted a total fool? He vaguely remembered dancing in some form of rigidly set...set. Had he danced with Grandma Nari? Nay, he couldn't have. Yet they were her slippers flipping and flopping as they passed each other, lightly stepping along the long form reel.

"I'm heading to my cubby," he excused himself, a sparkling white handcloth to his mouth.

"Hey, that's not like you."

"Nay, and neither was this Mother's Meeting. By the cringe, but I feel decidedly unlike myself." He swallowed down the rising vomit and would have hurried away, but his legs and his head wouldn't allow such haste.

Despite he'd rather huddle into a tight curl and never again move, he gathered together his determination and walked, painfully, in a straight line, head up. He knew Chrean was watching him, and he didn't want Chrean to tell their cousins of the wretched state he was in. Jolly grim around the edges? Aye, jolly grim.

Cubbies had changed a great deal since that long ago magician had discovered how to alter a rock's form. Though still called cubbies, they now were double, treble, ninety-nine-opals their former cramped quarters. Walls were water-smooth and glittered with jewels and mica. A drain, all private like, allowed for private defecation. Alcoves with doors provided hanging space for the ever-more fantastical form of their clothes.

But right now, it was the drain Thredwyl needed. He tugged off his full-skirted coat and the dazzling white neckcloth that seemed determined to strangle him. He yanked at the ties on his breeches until able to step out of them. Then he set himself down on the floor, head hanging over the gaping and - now he realised - smelly hole.

Did he sleep, or did he pass out?

He came to with a head that felt like an avalanche had crushed it, and a mouth that would have screamed for water if he'd been able to open it.

"Water," he managed to burble, and gingerly crept to the basin provided in every cubby, cleverly filled via channels from the cascades - at least, they were in the wet half of the year.

"Ah," he sighed. He did feel better. He supposed some food wouldn't go amiss, but that would mean venturing out, and venturing out would mean connecting with his cousins, and connecting with his cousins would mean questions he wasn't yet ready to answer.

Of what did the Mothers speak?

Marriage.

It was the male's duty to tie down the female else, left loose she might cause an avalanche.

Thredwyl would have waggled his head, but it would have hurt. Aye, he kind of understood it, but nay, he did not. Trouble was, he didn't really know much about the female of his species.

Species, aye: that had been the thrust of Jawman Arion's tale of creation. The Grandma-of-Creation had created three species. So fine, she'd created more than three but only three that concerned the Kupies. They were the water-formed Nixies, the fire-formed Fernamon, and the rock-formed Kupies, better known as the Stones. And as species, they could not interbreed.

Thredwyl remembered his guffaw at that. He had seen a Nixie once, naked in the water behind the cascade - they sometimes leaked through the caverns. A long sinuous thing that could have been a worm - worms were often found in the crevasses - except that she had a face much like the Kupies and arms and...things. Those things were also like worms. Long wormy hair. Long chesty-things. Long things the writhed around her bottom. Would a Kupie want to do that with her? He didn't know exactly the mechanics of that, but he and his cousins had often speculated and so had some idea. As for doing it with a Fernamon - that would hurt, it would burn. Just thinking about it, Thredwyl held his part. Oddly, now he thought about it, that part looked much like a worm. Had Grandma originally intended them to interbreed?

In considering who to marry, the Mothers had been quite stern that clan to clan must not wed. Which was all very well, but those clans that considered themselves the purest - the Sapphires, which was Thredwyl's, the Rubies, Emeralds, Topazes and Amethysts - were beholden to marry someone of equal class, not to muddy the line, despite there were loads of non-pure blue clans, and red clans, and green, and so forth. Which meant...? Thredwyl supposed he'd choose from the Ruby clan, red being the colour he favoured next to blue.

The trouble was, Thredwyl and his cousins seldom saw a female Kupy; they shunned the company and activities of the males. Instead, they hung around in groups, talking. Rumour had it they voluntarily spent much of their time in their mothers' chambers. Yet that seemed contrary to the saying that the females were wiser than the males. How wise when they could have been enjoying their freedom years?

And that thought brought him to the realisation he had only ten days of freedom - nay nine - left. So why was he wasting time thinking when he could be adventuring with his cousins?

He slammed a red beret upon his long blue-black hair and headed over to Gruff's Cavern, knowing - hoping - his cousins would be waiting for him there.