Tor slowly got up and opened them, one by one. It seemed less off-putting than just turning on the magical lights on the ceiling. If the lady with him wasn't a bit scared, she was made of sterner stuff than he was. That or insane. Either way, being polite seemed to make sense.
“Hello.” He spoke softly, having learned that people that had been drinking normally felt sick the next day. That should be sign that it wasn't a good plan, but people did it anyway and always claimed they had a good time, no matter how bad things had gotten.
The woman looked at him and smiled, wincing as she did.
“Hey… Um, is there a restroom around here somewhere? Maybe a place to clean up too?” She didn't introduce herself, so Tor didn't either. He just pointed to the correct rooms and listed them off. He decided to make some copies of things, just in case they went over well enough, and was just finishing that when a knock came at his front door.
A soft knock that he almost didn't hear at first.
Tor made sure his shield was on, just in case it was the woman’s jealous boyfriend, but it turned out to be Petra, who'd brought him a tray of food, since everyone else was probably going to be sleeping late. She was obviously hung over too, but didn't whine about it like most people did. Tor set up the table with plates and gestured to the seat next to his then got a pitcher of water and chilled it in the freeze box for a minute, then had to break the ice on top up to drink it, the field working a little too well it seemed. When he came back out the woman who'd been taking a bath, from the sound of it, came padding out nude and sopping wet.
“Do you have a towel or something? I… Petra? How are you!” The woman ran across the room, leaving a trail of water and grabbed his friend, obviously her friend too, who still sat, hugging her tightly. And damply, Petra's clothing got soaked instantly.
“Martya? Oh!”
Hugs continued. After a bit, when she straightened up, showing off dark nipples and pubic hair openly, making Tor stiffen a little more than was probably polite. Then she was the one walking around nude. He explained the drying system and how if she held her hand or any other body part, on the sigil built into the wall, she'd be hit by warm air, which would let her dry quickly. It wasn't a towel, but it worked well enough and could be built in.
Petra and he ate in silence, but the girl kept smirking at him. Did she think he slept with Martya, who was obviously her old friend? Tor tried to look at the situation from her perspective. Naked girl running around his place, washing up and acting like she belonged there… Yep. That's what he would have thought first too. Tor wondered if he should ask to sleep with the woman now, just so when people talked about them it would be true.
When she came back out she bowed to Tor, a low humble thing that looked genuine and had to make her head hurt, at least she grabbed at it like it did. At least she'd put her clothes back on. The stuff was nearly see through in the bright morning light, but it wasn't nude, making it possible to look at her without splitting the front of his pants open.
“Oh, Pet. Last night was awful.” The woman started, her voice woeful. “Farrell and his friends caught me out drunk and alone, I mean really drunk, and were pulling me down, probably to have back-door sex, you know how they are, can't even be bothered to do it properly if your drunk enough? So I ran away and found this, door and then passed out. I don't know what happened after that, but my behind doesn't hurt and I haven't had sex at all that I can tell, so this fellow is obviously a better man than Farrell. Which isn't hard, but still… I… don't know where I am. One of the magic houses obviously…” She clumped into one of the chairs without waiting to be invited, since they were obviously all friends now. Tor smiled, wondering if things were really just that easy here, or if it was just Martya. She looked miserable, if clean enough, though in yesterdays clothing.
He really needed a way to quickly launder clothing built in to the structures. He had water, and could heat it. That didn't give him soap, but he could make the water swirl or go back and forth rapidly to do the scrubbing for him, right? Then use the clothing dryer field… He'd have to work on it. Really though, could he clean the clothing without water? Just organize a field that would carry all the dirt and oil away from it? That… seemed really doable. It was just a variation of the earth moving field. It would just have to recognize fabric.
Martya grabbed her head again and moaned softly. Petra didn't, but looked ready to throw up. Tor also needed to come up with a hangover cure. If he did he was going to charge a lot for it though, silly people should learn to just drink less, shouldn't they? He wondered for a second what would happen if the healing field was used. It should help with illness, was this like that, a sickness? Poisoning maybe.
Chuckling, he went to his trunk and pulled one out. Without saying anything he activated it and handed it to Martya, who took it with a hesitant look. If it really hurt, or made her sick, he'd rather not ambush Petra with it. After all, she might sleep with him again sometime if he was careful enough about the whole thing. Maybe when he wasn't even in a trance? That could be fun. The girl closed her eyes and gripped the stone hard, her breath coming fast, panting shallowly for about a minute, then she smiled and set down the stone.
“That… Petra, here, try it.”
The large woman didn't wait, she didn't pant either. When she opened her eyes she looked… better, no dark circles, no hangover left. Grinning she kissed Tor and didn't stop for a long time.
“I could feel the pain drain away, the headache and sick feeling. I feel good. Rested. We need to get some of these to the King’s palace and, um, some other places. Like inside the big house today. Normally I'd let them all suffer, especially Maria, but she went out of her way to apologize to me pretty sweetly, so I guess I should attempt to be nice in return, at least until it proves to be a trick or something. It can wait a few minutes while we eat and catch up though.”
The two girls had a kind of short hand that he couldn't really follow, what he did get was that Martya was Petra's closest childhood friend, one of the reasons she always came to party with the Wards, it being old habit and her being popular. That, and it turning out that she'd gone into the family business after all, as everyone had always said she would, which meant that being a bit of a party girl didn't hurt in general. Tor didn't think anything of it, since where he was from most people simply did that. He'd have been a baker if he hadn't gotten a King’s scholarship, and even then, if he didn't have ten siblings, each vying for their own place in the world, he probably wouldn't have gone. Not if his family had needed him.
But Martya's family was in the prostitution trade. Apparently they didn't really need her for it at all either, and she wasn't wild about the work. Too many uncouth sailors that thought sticking it in and thrusting a few times should have her loving them abjectly. It was a silly idea, of course, but Tor could kind of credit it. After all, he'd liked Petra before, but didn't he feel a little more fond of her now? Like they were closer or something. Lovers. Did it count as that if they'd only done it one time? Probably not.
The girl continued on about how there wasn't much else for her to do, since she didn't want to fish or farm for a living either. Too much work she admitted, for too little pay.
“Um, Martya… Would you like a job?” Tor asked, feeling a little awkward about it.
“Sure… Since you could have had me last night for free anyway. What do you want, a blowjob? Regular sex? I'll blow you for free, just for the rescue and do the rest for that hangover remedy…” Laughing she started to shimmy out of her dress.
Petra crossed her arms and mock glared at her friend.
“Hey, get off my boyfriend you!”
Everyone laughed, even Tor, if not for the same reason.
“No, I meant selling ice. The price will probably go down, around a silver for ten pounds, I'd guess, given the market here, maybe less, but if you sell enough, that should work out. I don't know how much you make now, but… Well, let me show you.” His voice showed his excitement, earning a strange look from the other two. He grabbed the right pendants, there were three of them to make up one manufactory, and went outside to set things up.
He didn't whistle while he did it, but it took force of will not too. It was kind of exciting and happy all at once.
It took about five minutes, because he had to patch into a water feed, just using the one going into his house for now, explaining how it worked as he went. Then, after moving everyone else well out of the way, he tapped the main sigil, which made a white and red hut, about forty foot on a side with what looked like a red tile roof, so it kind of fit into the area, just appear in front of them. The sigil amulet slid into the wall and started glowing a soft pink. He just liked the color and though it worked with the white and red pretty well.
The water was going in not half a minute later. Then they had to wait. Not too long, but a good fifteen minutes.
