Chapter 8 Ren #4
“Of course I end up living with the only halfling who enjoys moss,” Ren said with a sigh, their shoulders slumping a little in defeat.
“Are you sure you wouldn’t prefer a goblin cave, too?
” As inconvenient as it was to see their plan so thoroughly foiled, they couldn’t deny that the eccentricities that made Pansy a “poor example of a halfling”, as she’d put it, were actually rather sweet.
Hence why they found themself smiling despite it all – though only a little.
Pansy shrugged. “I’ve already embraced goblin ingredients, so why not goblin houseware, too? Speaking of, is that a real mushroom?” She pointed at it, positioned so that it could serve as an ottoman.
“No, it’s dark goblin magic,” Ren said, utterly deadpan.
Pansy paused for a moment, her eyes blowing wide. Then her expression collapsed, features flattening into an unhappy scowl. “You’re making fun of me.”
“Yes,” Ren agreed. “It’s obviously a real mushroom.”
“Maybe to you. But I’ve never seen one that large. I— Eek!” Pansy scrambled out of the chair with a high-pitched squeal, nearly sending the log table spiraling onto the floor in her haste to escape… a trio of mice.
The snort that left Ren quickly devolved into a full-on laugh, the kind that left them folded in two, with their arms clutching their sides.
Pansy, meanwhile, was not nearly so amused, given the sharp look she shot them.
However, she didn’t bother chastising Ren for it; no doubt she thought that a lost cause.
She gestured towards Mushroom, who’d finally reappeared, settling atop the mushroom ottoman in a fitting display of his name.
“Don’t just go to sleep!” she cried. “Get them! You’re a cat, aren’t you? ”
By the time Mushroom managed to open one sleepy eye, the mice were long gone, having vanished into the bowels of the cottage via some dark crevice. Not that it really mattered. Mushroom only got up long enough to turn around and resettle – this time, with his butt facing Pansy.
“Ugh. You’re really useless, aren’t you? Cute, but ultimately useless.” She sighed, shaking her head. “I guess I’ll need to chase them out myself…”
“It’s their home, you know,” Ren said, having finally managed to snatch some semblance of composure amid their aching sides. “But you’re right. They deserve better than an ugly old chair.”
“It’s not ugly,” Pansy protested, seemingly offended on the chair’s behalf. “Just because you hate color—”
“I don’t actually.”
“Any color other than brown, green or gray,” Pansy amended with a pointed look in their direction.
“I like red too,” Ren said before they could think better of it, their gaze drifting over to the curls framing either side of Pansy’s face.
By some miracle, she didn’t seem to make the connection. “Wow. Four entire colors,” she scoffed. “What a feat.”
Willing the heat to drain from their face, lest it ruin an otherwise clean getaway, Ren said, “But the chair is old. You have to admit that much.”
“So, what did you have in mind then?”
“A new home,” they replied. “Made of wood.”
Pansy’s brow furrowed. “Like a dollhouse for rats?”
“They’re mice,” Ren corrected. “And, I guess?” Honestly, they weren’t quite sure what a doll would need a house for, but they certainly weren’t about to ask Pansy for an explanation.
“Okay,” she said with a nod. “Lead on, then – to wherever you, uh, keep your wood.” A strange look came over her face as soon as the words left her mouth, pinching her features together beneath a pink haze.
“My wood,” Ren repeated, eyebrows arching.
“Yes. For the, um, house,” Pansy murmured, her face now the color of an overripe cherry. “The mouse house.”
“Uh-huh.”
“You know what?” Pansy declared, straightening up even though her cheeks were doubtless radiating enough heat to rival the sun.
“I’m going to go get my knitting supplies from the kitchen.
They’ll need blankets and such, won’t they?
Something soft to sleep on. Yes.” She nodded to herself once, then hurried out of the room, her breakneck pace no doubt meant to preclude any sort of response from Ren.
Still, they managed to call out after her, “I’ll be out in the garden when you’re ready.
” They could’ve pointed out that mice generally made their nests from shredded bits of whatever they could find, whether it be paper, fabric or straw, but that seemed unnecessary enough to verge upon cruel, and they’d already visited quite enough of that on Pansy for one day.
Once in the garden, Ren approached the small wooden shed that had likely been erected as a place to store firewood but now served as a repository for whatever useful bits of scrap they’d come across.
Crouching down, they began rummaging through the jumble of planks, sticks and iron sheets.
It took a bit of time, but eventually they found some suitable pieces of wood, long and flat and seemingly structurally sound.
They hauled them out, then went to retrieve their tools.
Sharp though a goblin’s claws could be, Ren had no desire to spend half the day scratching at the same seam again and again.
Far easier to use a saw and get the job done in a single pass.
They’d managed to cut the wood into the requisite number of pieces and were in the process of arranging them into a house-like shape via carefully applied lines of stonesap, when Pansy finally reappeared.
“Oh!” she said, seemingly surprised by Ren’s level of craftsmanship. “It looks just like our cottage, doesn’t it? You just need to add a bit of moss across the top – to match the roof. Then cut a couple of windows; maybe paint them blue. I think that would look very nice!”
Ren’s attention, however, had already hit a snag.
Our cottage? they wanted to say, a strange prickle skimming across their warming skin.
Too bad that voicing the question meant acknowledging the sensation that had accompanied it, and Ren, for some reason or another, suspected they wouldn’t like that part very much.
So, they held their tongue, focusing instead on adding the finishing touches to the mouse house – including two windows, just like Pansy had suggested.
“Here,” Pansy said once Ren had set their saw back down, thrusting a slightly misshapen square of orange and yellow yarn towards them. “A blanket.”
Ren blinked. “It’s small.” And ugly, they thought, looking down at the strange snags and bulges that riddled the blanket’s surface, courtesy of far too many uneven stitches to count. Evidently, Pansy’s knifework wasn’t the only thing that proved lacking.
“Well, it’s for a family of mice. How big does it need to be?” As soon as the words left her lips, Pansy’s expression shifted, worry dragging across her brow like a plowshare. “Wait. Should I have made it bigger? I can make another one. It shouldn’t take me that long. I’m a really fast knitter!”
That’s precisely the problem, Ren thought, impatience ever the enemy of a job well done. Still, they bit their tongue once more, murmuring a soft, “It’s fine”, as they pushed the blanket through the perfectly circular opening they’d carved into one side of the house. “See? It fits.”
Pansy’s shoulders dropped, her relief palpable. “Oh, good. I was worried for a second there. Admittedly, I got a little distracted…”
“Distracted?” Ren jerked their head towards her.
Her smile, which had already been rather sheepish, turned all the more so. “It’s probably easier if I show you. Pig!” she called, turning towards the front door, which she’d left ajar. “Come out here and show Ren your new outfit!”
Outfit? Ren’s brow barely had enough time to furrow before Pig was trotting over to them, pink snout raised high as she showed off the mess of color that had exploded over her body – more eye-searing than even the cabinet downstairs.
How was it that Pig was strangely absent when Ren needed her, but the moment Pansy required a model for her latest knitting nightmare, Pig was right there, available and ready?
“What is that?” Ren asked, nose wrinkling as Pig gave an altogether unnecessary twirl, noticeably less graceful than usual, the clumsily woven knit straining and pulling as much as it slumped and dragged. Land almighty. Did she even use a pattern?
“A sweater!” Pansy chirped in response, her expression all brightness and light. “Doesn’t it suit her? At first, I was only going to use blue and green yarn, but I figured a bit of orange would really make the whole thing pop!”
If by “pop”, she meant visit serious harm upon Ren’s eyeballs, then yes, it absolutely did that.
The yarn was too bright, too pigmented, too – halfling.
Not to mention it was all but certain to snag on every little thing when they went out foraging.
As such, the sweater needed to go – ideally, straight into the bin.
Truly, there was no salvaging this mess of errors.
And yet, when they came to deliver the news, Ren’s tongue dropped against the bottom of their jaw like a stone.
They stared at Pansy, enraptured by the sheer radiance of her joy.
It had taken a hold of them, pinning them in place, as the sun did to the moon.
Worse, the strange prickle from before was back – now with an added shot of heat, rendering it all the more potent as it swarmed across their nerves.
Ren swallowed, the words they’d wanted to say piling up in the back of their throat. “I-I suppose one sweater is fine,” they murmured, ducking their head in shame at their own uselessness.
“Oh, I think it’ll be a lot more than just one,” Pansy said with a grin, already twining a bit of yellow thread around one needle.
And Ren, unfortunately, couldn’t bring themself to say no.