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January 2 - January 6, 2024
I supposed that Anglish people must simply own more things.
“Be safe, and be good, and come home when you can. We’ll keep the fire burning for you.” It was the same thing she said to Father before he left on whaling trips, and I felt my eyes sting a little at having it said to me.
“The only source I have for it right now is almost prohibitively expensive, but I’ve read that it can be made by dragons in a thaumaturgical process.” “A what now? And what’s strahlendstone?” I asked. “The Anglish don’t call it thaumaturgy, I don’t think,” Niquiat said. “They call it witskraft. Anyway, it’s the thing you do to shape a dragon’s breath and make things out of other things, you know?”
“It’s rude to eat in front of someone else who’s hungry,” I said, “and I expect they’ll call me a savage no matter what I do.”
“My grandmother didn’t think that there was anything worth knowing that I could learn by coming here, and I’m beginning to wonder if she wasn’t right.”
“We don’t hoard things, if that’s what you mean,” I said, keeping my voice studiously even. “Those of us who have give to those of us who don’t, because we care for one another. We do own things. My books and clothes and tools and things are my personal property, until I give them away because they’ll be of more use to someone else. As for passing things down to heirs…In the general course of things, a mother passes her homestead to her eldest daughter, or whichever of her daughters seems most suited if the eldest isn’t.”
It is only right and just that the enlightened and advanced species of mankind should supplant those that are backward and primitive.
“I’m sorry, I’m not very well versed in the subtle intricacies of Anglish conversation, so I’ve probably misunderstood you entirely,” I said, trying very hard to keep my voice clear and even. “Did you intend to imply that I’m incapable of reading?”
I’m a hopeless and incurable fidget. If I don’t have something to occupy my hands, I can’t even begin to think. I become useless, prone to fits and rages. So I carry things to touch, to occupy my hands. “Well, that seems to be a tidy solution, then,”
“Erelore is the study of eretide: all things that have happened in foregone times and why they happened in that way. I hope, in this study, to bring you to a basic common knowledge of erelore as befits a new secondary school student.
“I’m afraid that I’ve been unfair to you,” he said, looking over the field. “Well,” I said, bending down to pick up Kasaqua because she’d started pawing at the hem of my skirt, “it’s not too late to start being fairer.”
And do read that book on comportment, dear. You need to know the rules of engagement before you can formulate an effective battle strategy.”
Altogether, I’d like to have a life of good health and good comfort, for myself and my loved ones.
“Do you have any idea how people will talk?” “They’ll talk regardless, Theod. Let’s give them something to say.”
“I would be most honored, Miss Anequs,” Theod said, smiling with his mouth but looking as if he wanted to murder me with his eyes. I smiled back at him and turned with enough swiftness that my skirt swished in my wake.
There wasn’t any corn, which seemed practically blasphemous for any kind of celebration in October, but the Anglish could be very strange.
But a whaler married to two wives who are in love with each other is very common, because then the wives aren’t as terribly lonesome when the whaler is away. Come to that, a good number of whalers have husbands who go to sea with them, for the same reason.”
I drew in close, pulling Hekua’s face near mine, and whispered, “I kissed a girl at school. We can’t formally court, for lots of reasons, but I think that she fancies me, too.”
you’re kind and you’re clever and you’re diligent.
On the day after the whalers’ returning dance, it was traditional that the children of whalers employ themselves in something useful or entertain themselves in some way that kept them far from the house until sunset, so that whalers’ wives could welcome whalers home in their own way.
