Completed Tea With Hesper

[Ornea]

...

Tea With Hesper
Timestamp: 7 Winter 515 AV
Location:Lhavit

TEA WITH HESPER - THE PURPOSE OF LIFE

Lhavit was just like she recalled it, with the buildings of skyglass on the high peaks above the coast, and her arrival there by eagle felt like a repeat of her arrival there last year. She went to Solar Wind Apartments and moved into the attic apartment again. Everything was just like it had been there too, the canopy bed, her things, the cupboard where she had found the incredible investigator from the Cosmos Center that day long ago, and shot at him with her bow. She had never seen the man again after this; perhaps he had left the city.

Ornea had mostly been focused on her work last time she was in the city. It had taken over and she had postponed her personal needs, like finding a meditation trainer. This so far neglected need of mediation had been accentuated during her visit in Wind Reach. She had not only returned to her ancestral city, but relapsed to disuse of magic. Her reactions to It had varied between dizziness and nausea after lighting up a dark tunnel to see better, to getting more or less knocked out when she had shot a fireball at a shadow she had imagined to be a zith.

She had decided to return to Lhavit again, for an uncertain period of time.
It knocked on the door. Hesper, the landlord, was outside, carrying a tray with a tea pot and couple of mugs. She let him in. It wouldn’t hurt to socialize with the proprietor a bit. She liked him.

“I brought some tea” he said politely. “To welcome you back”.

They sat down at the table. Ornea watched silently as Hesper poured the tea for them and when he seemed to wait she took her mug and sipped on the tea. “It’s the best tea I have tasted even in Lhavit” she said sincerely.

“Finest Lhavitian tea of exquisite quality, from Sharai Peak” said Hesper. His voice was calm and soft and somewhat thoughtful. “There’s a lot to say about tea. A whole philosophy of tea. It’s possible to spend a whole life speaking about nothing else than tea, some would say. But personally I’m not one of those who want to dedicate all their time to only this, no matter how nice it is to have a cup of tea once in a while.”

“We are of the same mind” Ornea agreed. “I like to have a nice cup of tea, but it’s not the main focus of my life. “

A silence followed after this, the two of them slowly drinking their tea. The Ethaefal studied her, his gaze as inscrutable as ever. “And what is it then, the main focus of your life?” he asked.

Ornea was a bit surprised by the question. “The main focus of my life ...” she repeated, searching for an answer while feeling an odd blankness spreading inside her. You could trust Hesper to send any light conversation into unexpected depths. What had been a light social conversation over a cup of tea had instantaneously plunged down into life’s serious purpose.

“I could ask you the same” she said. “What is the purpose of your life?”

A smile moved over Hespers face and disappeared again. “How could I know?”

He took the pot and poured more tea for them. The pleasant warm fragrance spread in the air. “Why am I here? Why are you here? I cannot know. We cannot know. Not really."

He made a short pause before he continued. "This is what I know. We are living in the Solar Wind. We go where it takes us. Nobody knows what their future will bring. And this is why we need more tea.”

...

[Ornea]

...

TEA WITH HESPER - THE OKOMO TREATH HYPOTHESIS

Ornea found it nice to socialize with Hesper. Such an intriguing personality ...

“This tea is good” she remarked when they had sat silent for a little while. “What is it?”

“Sharai White Okomo Tea. The foremost quality. Exquisite.” Hesper sipped on his tea with visible pleasure.

“Okomo? What's the goats got to do with it? ”

Hesper smiled. “Nothing. The plantation is named White Okomo Tea Plantation. There’s a lot of okomo walking around there, just like everywhere else in Lhavit. You know how they adore their holy goats.”

“Those goats are everywhere” she agreed. “Until you need them, that is. As soon as it’s time to find an okomo for a ride it’s like they all have been swept away by the wind or fallen off of the peaks.”

“Don’t call them goats when the Lhavitians can hear you. Just a tip. Say okomo.”

“I have already understood that they worship those horned beasts like they were gods” said Ornea drily. “And I can see that they are important for transportations, and they give milk and wool, but they are still goats. Or okomo, if you think that makes any difference. From a pedestrian point of view I can only say that there’s okomo manure everywhere and it’s not any better than other goat manure. It’s a clipped pest.”

“The Lhavitan’s are used to it. It’s part of the life here. I guess that’s why the Lhavitians never mention that side of the okomos’ walking around everywhere. But it happens that I hear foreigners remark on it. The sanitary consequences are somewhat inappropriate to speak about though.”

“It’s a constant issue for Lucis and Lucis. We are doing everything to keep the water clean. Can you imagine what would happen if goat ... sorry, I mean okomo ... manure would somehow get in contact with the city’s drinking water? It could happen pretty easily. I think Edward Lucis has tried to speak with the shinya about keeping the okomo away from the wellhead. They use to go there to drink from the fountain, you know. But he said the shinya refused to do anything to limit the okomos’ access to the place. They told him to not insult the holy goats ... the okomos that is ... so the risk for infected water remains. We at Lucis seem to be the only people in all Lhavit who are thinking of this kind of important things. Edward hasn’t given up though. He’s set on improving the situation.“

Hesper put his cup of tea on the table. Ornea though she had seen his hand shake a wee bit, and when he spoke he sounded shocked. “Edward Lucis tried to make the Shinya limit the okomos’ access to the fountain at Shinyama? This ... and what do you mean he hasn’t given up? There’s no such thing as limiting the okomos’ access to any place in Lhavit! Surely the man can’t believe...”

Ornea shook her head. “He’s going to try to make the Catholicon side with him. He says the healers ought to see that it makes sense to prevent a health disaster. And if they don’t, I guess Edward will come up with more ideas. He’s a very persistent personality you see. And ingenious.”

“Are you kidding me?” Hesper took his cup again, and looked at her over the rim.

“No. Not at all. Edward Lucis is going to try his best to limit the rights of the goats ... the okomos. He says “the okomo cult” has gone too far and it’s time to make people understand that although the okomo are very fine and valuable animals indeed, they are still animals and their dung can destroy the water of this city.”

“In theory.” Hesper sipped on his tea. “It has never happened. It’s a totally hypothetical risk.”

“Hypotethical? What does that mean?” Ornea could sometimes find Hesper’s way of speaking a bit abstract. “And just because it hasn’t happened so far it’s not impossible. It could happen.”

“Hypothetical means that it’s just an assumption that can be proven right or wrong by the outcome of an investigation or experiment. It’s philosophy. You set up an hypothesis that something exists or is in a certain way, and they you try it to see of you were right. Or wrong.”

“Philosophy. Oh. But in that case you could say that Lhavit has the hypothesis that it’s harmless to let the okomos walk around freely and drop dung everywhere, and even near the wellhead of this city’s water supply, and this will not lead to infected water, or spread diseases in other ways. If you think of this as a hypothesis, the whole city is one big experiment that can prove this hypothesis right. Or wrong.”

Hesper coughed like he had got his tea in his windpipe at hearing this attempt at philosophy. He put the cup down again. “Well ... in a way ... yes ... but considering that Lhavit have existed for hundreds of years and the okomos has been around from the start, and none of those risks you are worrying about has happened for five hundred years I don’t think it’s an hypothesis that the okomo will not infect and destroy the water. It has been proven long ago that it isn’t so. The city is perfectly healthy.”

“Edward says that just because it hasn’t happened yet it’s not like it can’t happen any chime.”

“But isn’t he from Lhavit? I’m surprised that a man like old Lucis, who has lived his whole life here, would question the standing of the okomos. Really.”

“He questions things all the time. He’s a critical thinker, he says, not a mindless follower of old traditions. The world isn’t static. According to Edward, it isn’t. Things can change, sometimes quicker than people would imagine. He says it’s important to question things. It’s the driving force of innovation and progress. Everything can be questioned he says, the okomo, the widespread drug addiction in this city and the even the tea.”

“What? Does he question the tea?”

“Not really. Edward drinks a lot of tea. I may have exaggerated that part of it a bit. But he sure is worried about the okomo threat to the sanitary situation in the city. And he has strong opinions about the widespread use of drugs. Not to mention the state of the politics. But for now the okomos are higher priority.”

“Eh ... Ornea, all this seems utterly unlikely and unreal. Wacky even. I have never heard anything at all about this before. To be honest it seems like you have allowed your imagination to take over”.

Ornea looked at Hesper as she sipped on her delicious Sharai White Okomo Tea. His words hit a sore spot, albeit she was sure he hadn’t intended it, as he didn’t know anything about her overgiving injuries and the effect they had on her. It was true that her mind could sometimes start to drift like in a dream, and she was always worried about finding herself out on a branch, not knowing how she had arrived there. She felt sure she recalled Edward speaking about those topics. But she didn’t feel sure of exactly when or where this had been. Hesper’s words made her start to feel nervous. Had it really happened or had it not? Was her memories nothing else than delusions created by her own mind?

“How could I know” she said finally. “We can all dream I suppose. And I guess dreams could sometimes seem so real that they could override reality, and seem to be the real truth. But what this means, I don't know”.

...

[Kaleidoscope]

 

Ornea

Skills

• Socialisation: +2
• Philosophy: +1

Lores

• Lhavit: As Seen From Above
• Sharai White Okomo Tea: A Good Brew
• Okomo: Call Them Okomo, Not 'Goats'
• Edward Lucis: A Scientific Thinker

Comments: A short thread, but an enjoyable one! I like Hesper's incredulity at Ornea's questioning of the okomo.

Enjoy your grade (and your finest Lhavitian tea), and please don't forget to delete/edit out your grade request. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to send me a PM.