They land in a small forest of bushes this time; superbly camouflaged and surprisingly cushioned.
Áesta, Jarl finds out, is the reason for the latter half of this: as an evergreen tree, their truly green daemon can manipulate flora at a moment’s notice—even vegetation that’s no longer alive.
Just like the wooden spare bedroom’s door in Jarl’s cabin home.
(Bestow an unholy amount of superpowers, indeed…)
~
“Nice catch!”
Manus grins at Áesta as he flourishes from the foliage. The low white heels of his getup gouge into the earth, turning up sod and snow alike. The soil and wildflowers both threaten to stain his clothing, but he ignores it; probably having a whole slew of spells up his sleeves that can clean and repair them.
Come to think of it: Jarl never has seen Manus actually do laundry.
Shaking himself from these thoughts, Jarl nods in agreement before absentmindedly drying his hand of gel (Oak’s) with a handkerchief. Meanwhile, his sky blue eyes cast about to take in more of their surroundings and figure out where they are; he finds that they’re by the water.
Again.
Frowning, the priest worries for a moment that his plan failed—that he’d somehow irritated the Oak tree instead of intrigued it. But this fear is quickly put away when Manus also glances around and then cheers, “We made it!”
“Ta hwere?” Áesta asks, dark brows furrowed: he didn’t have the route nearly memorized like they did (Which Jarl thinks is pretty understandable—he wasn’t there for the formation of it either, after all.).
“Bailenac’ringy!”
~
18 kilometers away from Father George and Sunder Inn’s inhabitants, Bailenac’ringy's nothing like Bailemore.
And yet it is. The same way that Shantown is. At the heart of the old Irish town is an equally old church (surprisingly plain in comparison to both Jarl’s and Father George’s, though) with a pub or two nearby and outskirts much farther full of sprawling green yards, golden fields of hay, and lovely antique houses.
Although, any of that is pretty hard to tell from where they are.
They only know these things because of the pamphlets.
~
The brochures and tourist guides Hagen had gotten at Manus’ behest were all—oddly enough—summer themed; as a result, none of them were able to prepare the Trio of Treaties for a wintery Bailenac’ringy.
The body of water they'd landed beside this time is not a real one. Rather, it’s made by man for transport. Stretching across the whole country/continent from Galway to Dublin, the Royal Canal is a shallow river sporting nearly 50 Locks with two lanes flanking both of its sides: one paved road and one pretty much dirt. Grass usually covers the latter heavily and swarms the former eagerly.
Now, however, it’s all covered in snow and ice.
The waterway itself is, too: where it’s normally a calm liquid surface—almost mirror like in quality—it’s now frozen (Much like Sunderlin.). Autumn leaves that never got cleaned up are now stuck in the still waters and frost makes the formerly reflective surface opaque and obtuse. It’s not completely solid, however, as most of the ice sheets are thin and fragile, appearing to be easily broken, melted, or even just whisked away.
Hopefully Áesta doesn’t try swimming in it again—or at least not yet.
Jarl turns to aforementioned daemon with some intent to warn him against this (it will, after all, be very hard to explain to any human who might pass them by just why their foreign companion in trying to freeze themselves) only to find that the creature is already watching them—Manus especially—both very closely, appearing to be very curious about who’ll cave to the cold first and how badly…
~
“We need to head west.”
“West?” Jarl frowns at this, eyebrow twitching slightly. He might not know much about where they’re going or how they’re getting there, but he definitely knows that the Devil’s Cavern is to the east, not the west. “Why?”
“‘Cause we’re ta t’e east o’ Bailenac’ringy, duh!”
A corner of Manus’ cape wacks Áesta in the back of the head, startling Jarl and causing the daemon to yelp. He pouts cutely up at the mage but only receives an eyeroll in response, “Jarl’s never left the parish, idiot.”
The contracted pair share a blink.
They then look at each other. “Huh…”
Beginning to feel the effects of the teleportation spell, Manus points to the roads flanking the waterway and explains to Jarl, not unlike an exhausted mother, “The dirt road is the northern bank and, if you look up ahead very closely, you’ll see Lock 35—also known as Bailenac’ringy’s Lock. The Bridge is even behind it.”
He then wobbles, knees going weak, and nearly drops his bag of Dory’s coffee.
~
Jarl ends up carrying Manus most of the way into town.
This isn’t as hard as he’d feared it would be. Manus isn’t all that heavy—rather the opposite, in fact; and, now that he knows about the witch’s wind powers, he wonders if they’re related—and Jarl has super strength, now, anyway; so bringing the smaller male into Bailenac’ringy’s really not that much trouble.
Convincing Áesta to at least take on the Sunderlin bags, however, was.
“‘Ow much longer? T’ese t’ings reek!”
Jarl rolls his eyes, wondering yet again just how old this daemon really is, before shushing the tiny creature. “You can see the bridge and lock mechanisms better than I can! You tell me!”
“You two are like an old married couple: one endlessly teasing and the other endlessly boiling over—and then you’re always switching,” Manus gripes, feet shuffling tiredly alongside Jarl’s sturdier stride.
The priest just groans, face red, and ignores Áesta’s obnoxiously affronted gasp (he’s clearly not offended), “We’re contracted, not mated!”
(Jarl doesn’t even want to know what that really means.)
~
They never actually make it to Bailenac’ringy’s Bridge—at least, not during their first day.
Hagen and Manus both planned for the group to set up and stay at the River Inn while the mage rested (and, apparently: Áesta hangs out with the drunkards and Jarl meets the local priest) which, according to the map, lies just north of the 35th Lock. So, once they hit this marker, they turn right and start heading up the bank, through a park, and away from the bridge they’d used as an initial landmark.
It takes them almost half an hour to realize they’d been wrong.
“Ah, fer Jives sak…” Áesta sighs through his nose as he sets down the bags from Sheryl and Dory. For once, Jarl has to fight the urge to curse along with him; instead, he just sighs, too.
Before them stands a large, gray-white building comprised of two stories, the width of at least three rooms, a big front door, a long cobblestoned entryway, and a wrought iron gate set into a thick gray concrete fence.
It’s the inn Manus and Hagen mathed out—but it’s also out of business.
(Where will they stay???)
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