MagiStream

Summers at The Keep are a mix of uneventful and busy days. I can go weeks without a thing to do besides collect eggs and care for my creatures, not that such activities are boring. But if that’s all you do day in and day out, life can get a little dull. And then out of the blue you can have days where everything goes nuts; the aselis won’t stop braying because the heat has wilted most of the flowers and they’re “starving”, no one can convince their cats to come down from sunning themselves, the pegasi and enox troughs can’t be filled fast enough for the thirsty beasts, and you’ve got coati lying around everywhere because it’s so hot and you really aren’t sure what to do with them. But I live for days like this. Usually occurring on the hottest days, I slip on my summer robs and get ready to face the problems of The Keep.

The first thing to be dealt with are the aselis. Anyone with work to do can only get it accomplished with extreme silencing spells to mute the unbearable noise. Fortunately, with so many horticulturally inclined creatures at the keep, providing the aselis with flowers is easy but time consuming. You have to provide water to the virdis crabs, vasant beetles, and xand bears so they don’t exhaust themselves providing the various flowers needed to sate an aselis. And seeing as water is such a demanded resource in summer, it can also be a bit difficult to obtain. Yes, the koi in the koi pond are generous enough to allow buckets of water to be taken throughout the season, but there is a limit to how much can be removed; otherwise the poor fish would have nowhere to live. And while the Stream is a ready source of water, the amount of people and creatures there, not to mention the ever present eggs floating in it, make it hard to adequately collect the cool, refreshing liquid. We actually had to break into the water stores for the kitchen at one point. The cooks weren’t very pleased with us.

And then there’s the cats. And the manticores. And the chimeras. And any other creatures that hold a great affection for sunning themselves for extended periods of time. The roof of the castle can’t hold them all; sometimes you can’t even see the roof itself, just the animals sleeping on it. Others have taken to lounging on the stone pathways leading here and there from the main hall, which makes getting here and there somewhat of a challenge. Have you ever tried convincing over 20 full grown manticores to remove themselves from their favorite sunning spot? Well, don’t. It is not recommended by any stretch of the word. We have to call magi from all over the place to collect their creatures and convince them to sun themselves elsewhere, which gets many a magi rather cross because they were very very busy doing something very very important and is this really something that needed them to be dragged all the way from the highest room in the tallest tower for? Very exhausting work indeed.

I believe I’ve already explained the problem with the equine species at the Keep and the water, so I’ll get right to the coati. They’re everywhere when it’s hot; in the trees, in the grass, on the benches, on the walls, in the gardens. Everywhere. And it’s very difficult to relocate them because you know if you look at them the just won’t move, and when they do move it’s at such a pace that you aren’t really sure they’re moving or not. As such you see a great many of the stronger magi and creatures lumbering about carrying coati from all over the place to a more secluded yet still sunny spot of the grounds.
And all of this is just in the morning! Image the afternoons and evenings! Actually, don’t. You’ll be here for hours.

But, you know? These are the best days for me in summer. It’s certainly more entertaining than sitting in my room or the library, doing nothing but read and researching all the time. It wears you down after 3 whole days of it in a row. Thank the ancient magi for all the creatures they’ve provided to us. They may seem like a pain in situations like this, but life would certainly be less fulfilling without them. My hellhound sitting under the window with my winged cat perched above (because she finally decided to move from the roof) is a welcome sight after a long hard day of maintaining the peace at the Keep. Coming back to an empty room after such a day would just be too sad in my opinion.

Now if only we could convince all the yales to stop eating everyone’s work scrolls while they’re distracted by the other summer chaos…

I love this I snorted in a few places, you have a talent for painting a scene

MothballMilkshake wrote:I love this I snorted in a few places, you have a talent for painting a scene

wow thanks!