#50 - Wanna Bet?

“Heya, Teel!”  Dauf stuck his head into the office, leaning on the doorframe.  James looked up from where he was writing, carefully, with the new pen based on the ideas from the House of the Hand. He had a board balanced on his lap and his heels up on his desk, to get maximum light from the lamp behind him. The new pens tended to blot and often leak onto one’s fingers but this batch was an early attempt.  The innovators had a set now with much better seals.  It was astonishing just to have the ink flow for so long and as smoothly as it did.

The only problem was that he had the habit of licking his pencil so now he had a number of blue streaks on his tongue and the ink just tasted nasty.

“Yes, Dauf!”

“Just opened the courier bag from the Rigas…”

Teel rolled his eyes.  “And they found true sea monsters on one of their expeditions?”

“No!  It’s a couple of monster ambassadors from across the sea!” 

Teel’s heels hit the ground and a splash of ink sprayed across his page as he put his board down, thankfully not obscuring his story, or very little of it.  “From Riga-Dhaum?”  He asked.  “Large grey ambassadors with a hand in the middle of their faces?”

Dauf blinked, surprised.  “Yes!  How did you know?  That hand has two fingers…”

“Special edition!” Teel cried.  “These two are from a country we’ve never heard from before!  Aliens!  Monsters!  The edition will gain the offices triple credit from everyone!”  He stepped up and plucked the missive out of Dauf’s hands, eyes scanning down the page.  “You have enough for your story?  Good, I’m heading up to the House.”  He was shrugging into his great coat, settling his hat upon his head, seizing his cane, even as he spoke.  “Oh, Dauf?”

“Yes, Teel?”

“Wanna bet me a week’s credit at the public house that one of the ambassadors is named Jaugunjaugun?”

“No, James.  Not takin’ it.”

“Dang.”

“Maybe Mercedes will take you up on it.”

“We have elephants too, Dauf!  Wait till I tell Ahrimaz!”