tales of the mundane (archer)

8/9/2019 Tales of the Mundane (Archer)

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Tales of the Mundane (Archer)

Yanoro Nicolae

Opaque V i l l ager

10 Apr 2010, 6:40am

There were not enough hours in the day for someone for YanoroNicolae. Usually, when someone was their own boss, they wouldgive themselves a bit of a break. Nope. Yanoro was a slavedriver and often he would forget to sleep or eat because he waskeeping to many balls in the air. He never neglected whatdepended on him, however, such as his garden or his Mehdayri.It was only himself that was taken for granted, but the man wasfine with this reality. That was the way things had to be for thegood of everyone, and Yanoro was very happy with being theAtlas figure in the scheme of things.

It was spring time, which meant that his garden needed specialattention. The entire morning, he had spent with gloved handsin the dirt, tilling, pruning and harvesting. It seemed like anever ending job, but an important one, since it provided himwith ingredients. Still, it had it's own meditative element. To beso close to the earth, feeling the soil against the skin orbreathing in the perfume of fresh blooms, was something thatkept the hedge witch going. Everyone knew that he was not the

post positive creature in the Universe. Yanoro might have beenswallowed up in the mouth of depression had he not had thegarden sitting in the back, with its goals to be accomplished andpromise of spring. It was his little safe haven, where he couldjust be...until the winter of course, in which he would have touse potted plants as a supplement.

It was around lunch time that the man came in from his work.He only worked in his garden in the morning because it wouldjust get too hot otherwise. He grabbed a towel from the sidecloset and began to dab his face and neck with it. Yanoro,wrapped it around his shoulders as he moved into his kitchen toput together a meager meal of chicken and bread. As he set theingredients on the counter he wondered about his new culture.How could all these people live on such beige and tastelessthings? They watered down their tea. They snubbed theirvegetables. These people lacked a sense of taste, he decided.With a quick and decisive movement he grabbed for fivecanisters of spices, all of which he grew himself in anotherseason in that same garden. The fresh bits of this and uponbeing used in cooking or a potion added that extra bit ofsalvation to the mundane. He could taste that he was doing agood job and might not turn out to be a complete failure. Thusin the pan with the chicken went the cumin and the turmericand the chili powder. He would make his heaven, DAMNIT!

The man had a few minutes before he had to flip over the

chicken breast. A true workaholic, Yanoro decided that heshould move next door, into his living room and spruce upeverything a little bit. It doubled as his meeting room forpotential clients and he knew the appearance of said room had a
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great deal of influence whether that rich bitty would be buyinghis fountain of youth potion or sleepy time incense. A long dark

hand found a small feather duster and began probing andprodding every little nook and cranny in the little room. When it

came to things like this, he could get very very anal. Theproprietor of the shop had things he needed accomplished. He

had a stack of bills sitting on his kitchen table that needed to be

paid, and to Yanoro, that would not happen without a fittingsetting for a monetary exchange.

ArcherPo l i shed Regis trar

11 Apr 2010, 5:36am

There had to be better ways of going about this.

Archer tugged his hat brim low over his eyes. He didn't doubtthat the conversation he'd overheard was anything less thanperfectly planned, and it irritated him to no end. I'm doin' just

what she wants me to and no mistake.

There had been too many girls oozing about their newhandcreams lately, and when Liandra began moaning about her

horribly chapped skin, it'd dawned on him with horrible clarity --she was giving him an opening.

This had been a week ago.

"Don't want her none, don't need her none, but here I am," he

grumbled under his breath as he made his way down NeedleStreet. He'd been heading for the Dragon, as was his wont,

when rather suddenly he found his feet taking him in an entirelydifferent direction. It was the fourth or fifth time he'd started

down the Street in the past week, but never had he gotten asfar as this without turning back.

It's that damn winged idiot's fault, sure 'nough, puttin' thoughts

in my head what got no place to be there. And who gave himthe right t' show up like that anyway, bringin' her up just

t'flaunt itin my face? And at my own damn party, too. Sure,he's s'posed to... 'keep an eye on things', but I ain't asked fer

his help and I don't need it, either.

He was in an unfamiliar stretch of the Street now, but thecowboy knew what he was looking for. How many times had this

or that chambermaid blathered about their silky new skin,answering another girl's curious questions with a girlish sigh.

'House of Red Sand!' they'd gush, the words running togetherinto a breathless squeak. By now the exclamation was burnt into

his memory. He couldn't have forgotten it if he'd wanted to...and he rather did want to.

At last he saw the sign. It was large, almost unmissable, but the

house it stood before didn't look much like the other shops onthe Street. Then again, few of the shops on Needle Street

looked much like each other. Archer glanced around, hoping noeyes followed him up the walk to the front door. He was

reaching for the doorknob before he thought better of it, andrapped his knuckles loudly on the door instead.


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Wonder what kind o' creature runs this place, anyway, hemused idly, hooking his thumbs in his beltloops. The girls had

been full of talk about the person that sold them these miraclecreams, but strangely the only description they'd provided was

'witch'. Well, that meant female, at least. His mind supplied theimage of a mocha-skinned Creole voodoo queen and he couldn't

help but grin. Perhaps there was a bright side to everything.

Yanoro Nicolae

Opaque V i l l ager

11 Apr 2010, 6:22am

The knock stopped him in his tracks. He stood there immobile,

up on his tip toes leaning up towards the top of his bookcase.Someone was calling on him. Yes....Yanoro did not really have

office hours. Sure, when he was in his living room, reading or

what not, he would unlock his door but the hedge witch was sointent on making a sale, a customer could come in at three inthe morning and he wouldn't care. Money is money and Yanoro

had no qualms about how to get it. However, he was not quiteready for costumers at the moment. His forehead was a little

shiny from being in the sun, and he smelled a little bitoverworked. His clothes were his gardening clothes and at this

point, soil clung to them like the stereotypical damsel to strongarm. The man sighed. Oh dearr... He sighed, trying to thing

up a solution.

Ah hah! A solution popped into his head so brilliant that it madehis cheeks hurt. Setting down his feather duster on top of the

book case, he moved to his hall closet. His long hands felt forhis long cozy house coat. It was a very light brown color and

was made from some natural fibers. He draped it about hisshoulders and grabbed for his ceremonial red sash and wrapped

it around his waist. That towel about his neck, he used onemore time to try to rid himself of shimmer before throwing it at

the bottom of the closet. He needed it away and off of him. Onlythen did he let out a very collected, Juss a minude... The

man then moved to one of his cases of inventory. He grabbedwith two gentle fingers a vial full of one of his famous

concoctions. In a moment the cap was off and he was taking adrop down his throat. It was something that he sold for women

married to men with body odor. They would sneak it into theirhusbands' drinks and hooray. Their bodies would start producing

a musky yet pleasant scent. When the liquid would hit hisstomach, the entire room would flood with a very subtle ambery

scent and all would be well.

The man was quick to put everything back in it's proper placebefore moving towards the door. The doorknob turned and

there, before the Cowboy Don Juan was not a dark skinnedenchanting seductress. Nope. There was but a dark skinned

professional that was prepared to play the game of supply anddemand with him. cHullo... He muttered, an uncharacteristic

smile coming up to sting his somber cheeks. He opened the doorwide and gestured towards the interior, denoting that Archer

was to be invited into the inner sanctum.

Yanoro of all people did not want to be painted as a stereotypebut he quickly learned that people wanted to see the desert

when buying from a desert man. They wanted to have the


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foreign experience to they could tell their friends over drinksabout the authentic atmosphere of that little shop down the

road. Thus his living room was decorated as the cultural gem ina sea of normalcy. First of all, the walls were painted in a deep

shade of burgundy. A small painting of a black lotus with ayellow background hung in the corner, and it was probably the

only wall space in the room that wasn't covered by some

shelving. He had dark wood floors, in which half was covered ina red, purple and gold elephant covered tapestry. Arranged onthis carpet was a dark wicker woven table in the middle

surrounded by a mix of pillows and chairs. They were all brightjewel tones and in the most intricate and intriguing patterns.

Even a couch sat near by, which Yanoro used most of the timeon his own, but again, people knew that his people enjoyed

sitting on the floor instead of in chairs. Still, some old peoplecame by and couldn't sit in chairs, and thus the stools were

employed. Knickknacks were everywhere. In the center of thelittle dark table there lay a wooden painted Meydayri. In the

book or potion cases there was a painted clay bowel here, afestive fan there, a gold totem here, a glass lamp over there.

The smell of desert cooking wafted in from the kitchen. Yes. He

did paint a picture.

ArcherPo l i shed Regis trar

13 Apr 2010, 10:59am

He heard movement. Good, someone was at home. Or at shop,whichever. And he heard what was undoubtedly a voice,

although it was so muffled and strange that it was hard to tellwhat it said or what type of person was saying it. Archer shifted

anxiously as footsteps approached the door. Here goes.

To say that Yanoro was not as expected would've been amonstrous understatement. For a brief moment Archer

hesitated, giving the hedge-witch a baffled look that quiteclearly said 'I'm out of my element'. "Afternoon," came his

automatic response, and a friendly grin was quick to take itsplace on his face after that. Still, when he stepped past the

other man into the living room, it was largely obedient reflex.

And what a living room. Suddenly the whole 'House of Red Sand'bit made more sense. It took a moment to take the headily

stereotypical Orientalist atmosphere all in. The trappings of theroom were familiar to him in the same secondhand manner as

most things beyond his beloved Texan frontier: Poetry and arthad long discussed the exotic East. It was the idea of those

foreign places that he knew, not their reality, and it was theidea that Yanoro's careful decorating evoked. Here were the

incense and the gilded towers, the barbaric men and the sensualwomen. It His mind lingered long on that last point, his previous

vision of a Cajun Marie Laveau morphing into a gossamer-veiledfortune-teller of the dunes, bedecked with jangling jewelry and

swirling henna tattoos.

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan / A stately pleasure dome decree...he thought with a smirk. If she's one o' them harem types, bet

she knows a trick or two. Pleasure domes. Hell.

Yanoro, however, still wasn't fitting at all neatly into Archer's


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mental picture of things, although the robe and sash helped,with their vaguely exotic feel. It wasn't until he took another

deep breath, inhaling the spicy scent wafting in from thekitchen, that the pieces all fell into place. Missing woman.

Cooking smells.

Really, his chauvinism knew no limits.

"Right lovely place you've got here," he said at l ast, noddingto Yan polite ly. "Mind tellin' me if the mistress'll be 'round

soon? Although whatever she's cookin' sure smells nice."

Yanoro NicolaeOpaque V i l l ager

14 Apr 2010, 10:39pm

The witch moved in behind the cowboy and crossed left to oneof his many cabinets as Archer took a look around the place.Pleass sid down. He murmured in with a friendliness that

would have made his many enemies faint. His hands quicklyfound his matches his polished wooden incense holder and a

stick of turquoise ended incense to light. It was then he movedback to the coffee table, putting these three things in a very

straight line on its surface. Oh, Yanoro had his tricks andcharms. Upon lighting the stick, the subject would become much

more persuaded to buy what Yanoro had to offer, and closer tothe asking price. For now, he would wait though. He was not

sure why this stranger had come and he did not want to wastehis product on someone unwilling to buy anyway.

Yanoro stepped into his kitchenette for a moment to check on

his chicken. He turned it over with his fork, not wanting it toburn, but it still needed a little time. He took this opportunity to

take out his tea pot. A nice cup of tea would go very well withthe chicken and often made his customers feel more at ease in

such a foreign situation. Do hyou wan any dea, sir? Heasked, as it was custom to his people. In his homeland if one

would refuse tea or water it would be a huge insult as onewould not offer it unless they were very serious about giving it

away. Water was very scarce after all and offering tea was away of saying, 'My family is doing very well. Don't worry about

us.'Yanoro kept the tradition in his work as it kept him more intouch with his old life. It wasn't like he was entertaining anyone

personally nowadays.

The foreigner stepped back out into his living room to see ifArcher was comfortable and seated. It was then that those

funny little words fluttered so smoothly from Archer's mouth toYanoro's ears. "Dank hyou. He responded to the compliment.

The questions were a little more work to answer and were oddlypresumtive. Oh well, everyone had their ideas about the lives of

others. This one just seemed a bit more vocal about it. Thosegreen eyes peered at his new guest inquisitively. Der iss no

woman chere. I live chere alone. He said simply. An Iyamde cook....so danks? He tried to smile, but this man was a

little off, he decided.

Archer
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Po l i shed Regis trar

15 Apr 2010, 5:53am

Sit down... where?

Archer gave the cushions a puzzled glance. Eventually hesettled onto one of the chairs with only the briefest of cautiousonce-overs. It ain't gonna grow teeth and bite, he thought

sourly, but part of him wasn't entirely convinced. This housebelonged to a witch, and a good one, to boot. If she could

afford a servant by selling hand lotion...? The cowboy gave Yana newly appreciative look. Livin' with a beautiful witch, doin'

whatever she tells ya to, whenever she needs ya... He almostgrinned, but caught himself. Instead he picked up the carved

Mehdayri and turned it over in his hands, pretending to beengrossed in the designs while Yanoro ducked into the kitchen.

Lucky son of a bitch.

He almost didn't hear Yan's offer. His head jerked up as hetumbled out of his reverie. "Tea?" he echoed, unsure if he'd

interpreted the man's accent correctly. "Uh, sure," he heardhimself saying before he'd thought it through.Long as it ain't

that foul stuff Momma used t'get f rom back east. But anotherthought occurred to him. Wait, witch-tea? Like magic stuff?

Hell, I ain't gonna turn into a frog or nothin', am I?But thedamage was done, and Archer feared the consequences of

angering this mysterious witch or her servant more than hefeared any potentially dangerous brew. "Tea sounds great,"

he finished lamely. Liandra, yer welcome back best be worth it.If I ain't a frog by then.

The witch's servant returned to the main room not a moment

later. Archer hastily set the Mehdayri figurine down, pretendingto ignore the telltale way the wicker table creaked. The smile he

then turned on Yanoro faltered only a bit at the witch'srevelation. 'So... yer the witch, then. The one what makes

the lotions and such," he said slowly, as if daring Yan tocontradict him. "That's why I came. My... lady friend heard

y'all made some lovely creams..." His visions of a sexysorceress were dwindling every moment he continued to sit

there with a puzzled grin. Knew this was all too good t'be true--"Wait!" He interrupted his own thought with a new insight.

"How come they call you a witch, then? Witches iswomenfolk!" His tone was almost accusing. Yes, that's right,

Yanoro. How dare you not be a woman! D

tales of the mundane (archer)

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