Chapter 8: Wondrous Stew, Dimension Spanning Inspiration

Standing at the lip of Calleydron, Eadam was a horse transformed. He wore a black hood bound with belts to prevent his terrible dandruff problem from committing a horrific act upon the stew that would be made inside the cauldron.

The gnargs stared with reverence at Eadam, as now he seemed less like some adventurer of insignificant power and more like a mighty mage! At first Eadam had stared listlessly at the inside of Calleydron and the mess of ingredients that the gnargs had brought back. However, as if he had seen something in the abyss of the insides, he seemed taken by wild inspiration.

He began to laugh madly and without aid of boilstone or flame, hot air began to arise from Calleydron! You see, the summoned cauldron was best used with a fire, but it could still be used without! It was self-heating!

*neiiiiiiiigh*

With a spin of his head, he commanded the gnargs

“TOSS THE MEAT, CHOP THE VEGETABLES, CHOP EVERYTHING! TOSS THAT, THAT AND THAT, THAT TOO”

Pointing out several things the gnargs converged, ruthlessly dicing them up with a fervour neither the Firelord nor Duppy could ever inspire in them. While gnargs are afflicted with minionism an innate tendency to serve ‘bad dudes’, there are few masters more persuasive than hunger!

Hunger can make beasts of people! Hunger can push people to greatness! When a stomach is full, who isn’t content to just laze about? It is when food is scarce that people will fight tooth and nail for abundance, then when they have abundance, they’ll let it all slip away!

As the gnargs formed lines to toss the ingredients into Calleydron, the smells of frying food almost formed visible shapes of the creatures and objects they were from!

“A SPOON A MIGHTY SPOON OF STONE, I NEED IT, GO MY MINIONS STRIKE THE EARTH AND PRODUCE FOR ME A SPOON!”

*NEEEEEEEIIIIIIIIGGGGHHHHH*

The gnargs shivered in awe and dug where they stood they cleaved apart rock, carved it and washed it with snow, all within mere moments.

Ulex, Kepo, Waufronk, Gheel, Spongy and Duppy stared in slack-jawed amazement.

Hefting the massive spoon the gnargs lowered it into Calleydron. Eadam tried to move it, but even with his mystic state, he could not.

“MUSCLES, I NEED MUSCLES!”

Eyes wild, he stared at Ulex.

“TAKE THE SPOON IN HAND BRO, BECOME PART OF DELICIOUS GREATNESS!”

Ulex felt extremely uncomfortable.

“Ok, ok, just don’t chop me up for the stew” he warned, not liking the look in Eadam’s eyes.

*NEEEEEIIIIIIIGGGGGHHHH*

“MY MINIONS WE FRY THE MEAT AND OTHER STUFF, NOW MAKE FOR ME WATER FROM THE SNOW FOR THE ENDTIME OF FRYING WILL SOON BE UPON US!”

Eadam cast seasoning into the frying foods to the accompaniment of Ulex’s grunts. At this point, nobody was sure where Eadam was getting the seasoning from, it was if he was summoning it from the air, as if he was tapping into the very dimension of food itself!

Though he may not have been a good cook himself, Ulex knew that you had to flip a lot of things you fry, but before he could do any of this, Eadam had appeared behind him. Ulex was so surprised that he almost fell into Calleydron, Eadam took no notice of this.

“That one first” he muttered.

Then, Ulex could neither laugh nor cry as Eadam continually whispered to him and Ulex found his mind consumed as he turned over each thing according to Eadam’s will. The gnargs finally collected together enough water, even then they resorted to mining rock again to make buckets. The gnargs even resorted to press ganging Duppy, Waufronk, Spongy Snaps, Gheel and even Kepo into mining and making the buckets.

As Eadam continued dancing about the lip of Calleydron trailing not dandruff but seasoning in his wake, the water was added in and a glassy eyed Ulex mechanically stirred the stew. Now by this point the steam of the stew had formed that wondrous phenomenon of cooking, a steam forest.

A vision of a cornucopia, for that is what a living breathing forest is! In this forest of steam, predator hunted prey! Creatures ate plants! Plants ate creatures! Not only plants and so on, but minerals and living minerals too! The smell was not the smell of the forest, but of a forest cooked, a forest made solely for eating! Inspiring wet mouths, gulps and stomach rumbles!

Now, the stew just needed time to… well, stew.

“Mr. Horse made good food before, but… nothing like this” Gheel mused.

“Eadam good horse” Spongy Snaps remarked.

“He could match up to some of the cook-barons of the Attic” Waufronk mused.

“Uauuuuaaaauuuhhhhh” Ulex moaned.

“did he always have this in him?” Kepo wondered.

“I really should capture him” Duppy whispered to himself.

This time, when Duppy revealed his character, someone noticed. Waufronk’s ears twitched and he glanced at Duppy, but he didn’t say anything. He was not long with Ulex and his gang, but Waufronk Heer was no traitor, no fair weather friend! He would remember the intentions Duppy had, and he would warn the others. However, from his days in the attic practising the dark art known as ‘politics’ he knew that the moment had not yet come. There was a glint in Waufronks eyes, but he quickly pocketed it before Duppy could notice. Only when the gnargs were glut, stuffed fit to burst with stew could they escape!

Waufronk also wanted to sneak a taste of the stew and if they scampered off, then that wouldn’t happen.

-This stew will remind me of my days in the Attic, no… it might be better than that- he thought.

The stew however did indeed have some time to stew. Not everything was in the stew yet, indeed the three prize finds had not yet entered. Actually if anyone had not gotten caught up in the moment, they would have noticed that the prize finds had not even been fried! Even if they had, they would have likely not objected for fear of Eadam tossing them into the stew.

It was never a good idea to cross somebody in the throes of what was possibly dimension-spanning inspiration.

Gradually even Eadam calmed down, and everyone waited while being consumed by a gnawing hunger that grew with each sniff of the stew, the steam forest of which had spread out far and wide above them. At this time, Waufronk decided it was better to inform his comrades sooner rather than later. He did however warn them not to take action. As Ulex was indisposed, this idea was not easily challenged.

That and everyone else wanted to taste stew too.

Waufronk however was not the only one having thoughts.

The Cinders captain was having idle movements in his mind too.

“Hey, just what are you lot doing out here anyway” he asked.

-Since I’m going to catch that cook-horse, I should find out what these adventurers are doing, too many adventures causing trouble for the Firelord, and that makes him more violent. If they just gave up, things would be better. Once the last fire goes out, the Firelord’s rage will die too… won’t it?- he thought.

Gheel’s face scrunched up, he just bred chompers, but he was sure that telling the captain that they were taking a really valuable looking thing to the market circle wouldn’t end well. He did not however know what he should say.

Spongy Snaps was in an even worse position, he was about to blurt it out. Kepo however solved that by putting the power of her mind over his mouth. In times like these Kepo was usually the one to spout some nonsense. This time, there was someone they did not have before.

“You are aware that we are adventurers right Captain?”

Duppy frowned. Of course he was aware. He was wondering what the crazy looking bat’s angle was.

“You are, aye.”

“Well, adventurers adventure, they quest!”

“They do, but what has this got to do with…”

“Well, we happen to be mostly questless, so we are heading to the market circle of course”

Having the feeling that something had slipped passed him, and passing it off as hunger pangs, Captain Duppy scratched his jowls.

“Well, that seems fairly reasonable”

“I suppose you are out on patrol Captain?” Waufronk asked.

Duppy gave a heavy sigh.

“Yeah, we are. Yeah… patrol”

“My condolences Captain”

“Well, it isn’t all bad, gets us away from that dratted gloomy temple of his and besides…”

“PULVERIZE!!!!!” Eadam screamed.

There are few beings that can produce as worrying a scream as a horse, be it a debatably intelligent one, a horseman or a plain regular horse. While a few gnargs managed to faint from sheer shock (Ulex also narrowly avoided falling into the stew again) the rest scrambled to obey the will of the dark cook-horse.

Apart from the three prize finds, everything was pulverized and tossed into the stew. Everyone thought that the stew would again need time to stew but instead their thoughts of peace were shattered as glass does by the mad laughter of Eadam.

“A BOILSTONE BRING ME A BOILSTONE!”

The gnargs almost forced Gheel’s mouth open before he could get it out himself. The boilstone was reverently carried to Eadam, who brought it to his mouth and whispered to it.

“it finally happened, all that moping broke him” Kepo wailed.

“No, Spongy not want great cook broken!”

“Indeed, this is troubling” Gheel said.

Waufronk, being a learned bat like all good dukes, had already taken cover.

Everything shuddered first, cracks came across the stone and Eadam tossed it into the steam forest.

The stone began to shine, and the steam grew heavier, hotter, thicker from insubstantial grey to a dark almost black grey that could not be seen. The beasts roared, the trees sang, the rocks grumbled!

The heat was so intense that Ulex feared he would become a cooked carrot, however by some quirk, while the steam forest was above them, it did not spill out the sides of Calleydron. Everyone else wasn’t so lucky the gnargs scrambled to avoid getting cooked by the heat.

It rose up, like the trunk of a tree, and the forest its branches and leaves. The shining boilstone did not fall into the stew, it hung in the middle of the steam forest.

“QUICK, TOSS THE PRISOMS INTO THE STEAM FOREST!” Eadam commanded.

The gnargs hastily did so, unfortunately some of them were so dull of mind that they licked their claws with their mouthparts afterwards. These unfortunate gnargs quite quickly became crystal.

When the prisoms entered the steam forest, the forest shrank suddenly and not long after, there was a plopping noise. The number of plops were greater than the number of prisoms that went in.

“NOW THE MOSS!” Eadam cried.

As soon as this was tossed in, the steam shrank once more, and turned blue to boot. Yet again, the number of plops were far greater than the quantity of what was thrown in.

“THE CAULDRON ONION NOW!”

As soon as the cauldron-like onion was tossed in, the steam-forest swirled, slowly transforming. It changed from a forest of steam to a cauldron!

“BEHOLD, FINALLY THE SHINING CRESCENT! NEEEEEEEEEIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGGGGGHH!!”

The corpse of the bird spun without grace as it entered the steam-forest. It vanished into the cauldron. What issued forth from the steam-cauldron was a noble cry and a mighty and vaguely ludicrous looking shining crescent of steam rose up from the steam-cauldron. It then broke into many smaller ones and the cauldron broke into many smaller cauldrons. The steam-birds entered these and then the cauldrons descended into the stew inside Calleydron.

“More water” Eadam said, returning somewhat to what was mostly normal to him.

While Eadam might have been returning to lesser but more manageable awareness, the gnargs were still at fevered pitch. Still, the water was added and all that was left was to stew the stew for a while.

All returned to peace.

Well, all except for the gnargs who were on lookout duty.

They were screaming something about an army of rhagulars.