Renfaire Fantasy: Weapons Check (Patreon)

    As Brian crossed through the park with everyone he couldn’t help but still feel like he was treading through a dream. Life had taken such a strange, idyllic turn that he still found himself in disbelief. Daily life with the girls was amazing so far above his baseline for normal that it flew into the stratosphere, rocketing on past what he’d previously considered the greatest moments of his life. This was to be his new normal, and some stubborn human part of him just wasn’t able to adapt or accept that this was reality.

    “Gawd, it’s so fucking nice out,” Emily complained. “What’s with this perfect weather?”

    “Kitten, I’ve got your phone tucked in here, right cheek,” Kelly said, patting her dark yoga pants. “Don’t let me forget. If we can’t find a good way to set it up, someone’s gonna have to sit out of practice so that we can record everything for Steph.”

    “I can do it,” Christine volunteered.

    “We’ll figure something out,” Emily said. “Did she ask about and see if there’s any LARP groups that practice over by her college?”

    “Not sure,” Kelly said. “I don’t think she really wants to, not without us.”

    “We need to get her transferred ASAP,” Emily groaned. “She can’t practice magic without having Brian on tap. Don’t want any of us falling behind. Rebecca, too. Y’all need to quit pussyfooting over whatever it is you’re doing and bring her into the fold, Brian.”

    “We’ll talk about it with her today,” Brian promised. “I think—yep, that’s her now, she’s done gone spotted us.”

    “Ohayooou—!” Emily yelled out, waving her arms. “Moshi moshi Mara-sama!”

    “Would you stop?” Kelly groaned. “You’re so fucking cringe.”

    “Do we, um,” Christine stopped. “Do we need to be in character for this whole time today, or…?”

    They watched as Rebecca descended the hill to greet them, because she did so as a wild beauty from a bygone age, a war-maiden, clad in linen and wool tunics of a viking style. Gone were the greens and blues she’d worn back at AnimeCon, because now she dressed in the russet raiments of autumn—reds and browns, with knotwork embroidery in orange. Weathered leather toggle boots led up to wrapped cloth puttees bound tight from ankle to knee, there at her knees rus pants blossomed out, baggy in contrast, and with her rust-colored tunic skirting falling past mid-thigh it almost evoked the look of puffy petticoat bloomers beneath a dress. The triangular gores sewn in created an A-shaped flare to her garb, the fluttering tunic tapered up until it was tight at the waist where she wore a simple belt, and likewise her short sleeves were narrow at the shoulder but wide at each decorated cuff to provide ample range of movement.

Whoa damn... Brian couldn't help but stare.

    Rebecca’s unruly mane of auburn hair was a deep, sultry brown in the shade of the trees but blazed into a coppery red whenever she stepped into the beams of sunlight dappling between. Just the same, hazel eyes shifted between amber green and browned gold in the alternating light—seeing again her in person made Brian feel that his past impressions of Rebecca were always stills, oversimplified and incomplete. This girl could only really be appreciated thoroughly in movement and motion, because any single look at her didn’t seem to capture the full essence of what made Rebecca, Rebecca.

    “Brian!” Rebecca greeted, sounding quite pleased. “You guys made it. It’s so good to see you!”

    “Hey,” Brian waved. “It’s—we were just saying, it’s been a while.”

    “It has,” Rebecca broke into a grin of amusement, ignoring his wave and stepping in close to embrace him. “You’ve been busy!”

    “Hah, yeah,” Brian wore a sheepish smile as he hugged her back. “Sorry for that. We—”

    “Don’t be sorry!” Rebecca shook her head. “You’re all in love, you’ve all found each other.  You triumphed over circumstance and difficulties and danger and you all came through together—you deserve plenty of time to celebrate all of that.”

    “Yeah, but,” Brian sighed. “We should have made you more a part of it. You were more of a part of it, I mean you are, what you did was just as—”

    “I will be!” Rebecca told him, finally stepping back to arms length. “As soon as you’re ready. My not jumping into bed with all of you was me stubbornly proving a point, remember? I’m the one in a position to do so, so—I will. I did. I am. As far as we’re able to tell, I’m free of magic, free of the whatever influence the charm may have had. And—I still find you so very handsome. Hi, Christine!”

    “Hi,” Christine gave a shy wave.

    “Kelly, Emily,” Rebecca greeted. “Glad you could make it! Or, should I call you Titania, now?”

    “Kelly is gonna be Tit-tania,” Emily said. “‘Cause of, you know. She’s nothing but tits. They’re the ones that’re really in charge and do all the thinking, her pretty little head bobbing around on top is basically just for show. I’m gonna—”

    “So, that’s why in your case there’s just nothing at all doing any thinking?” Kelly countered. “Listen, if we’re—”

    “I’m gonna go by ‘Blue,’” Emily insisted, shaking out her shaggy pixie-cut. “Going by just that as a name is hella cool. I kept saying we should all use—”

    “Actually—if you would do the honors?” Brian turned and quirked a small smile at Christine.

    “Allow me to introduce our party,” Christine announced in a voice devoid of emotion. “My name is Andree, a squire in service to—”

    “Miss Andree,” Emily interrupted with twinkling eyes. “Get it? Like the—”

    “—A squire in service to Ser Briar,” Christine ducked into a small bow towards Brian. “Then, with us is our traveling companion, Lady Killy, and then… Blue? A scout whose services we acquired. Are we not going by Titania, anymore?”

    “Nah, wanna have a fresh start with you guys,” Emily shrugged. “So, just Blue.”

    “Then as Mara Thorferra, I’m very pleased to welcome you all to Grand Scar,” Rebecca said, stepping forward and clasping forearms with each of them in a more formal greeting. “Ser Briar! Ooh, I love that. Lady Killy is so fitting, too! And Miss Andree, I love it. Blue is… well. You tried.”

    “Oi!” Emily squawked. “All the pox-face latrine-lickers here last time made fun of me when I went by Titania, okay?! So, I’m just gonna be Blue. Full name Blue Rivers, that’s classic like uh, classic orphan style naming scheme, right? I’m from the Riverside orphanage—starving kids that got gathered up from the roadsides and raised into thieves, cutpurses. Scouts. I’ve gotta whole full backstory and everything, so don’t give me that pitying look!”

    “Alright, alright,” Rebecca assured her with a teasing smile. “I’ll let them all know. You do have a bad habit of always starting up new characters though, so—”

    “But ah, before all that?” Kelly spoke up. “Ser Briar, do you want to spark Miss Mara here in and give her a kiss? Before whatever other people all show up?”

    “Oooh—yes, yes!” Emily agreed. “Tongue time, tongue time! Swap some spit, make out, get to frenching!”

    “I thought that maybe, well,” Brian sighed. “That we should talk it through one last time. So, maybe after practice? Want to be sure that there’s—”

    “I still want to be a part of it with you,” Rebecca’s voice was resolute. “I want to be with you.”

    “You were maybe being influenced back then, though,” Brian said with a wry smile. “Maybe we can really make sure. For all we know, there’s some lingering effect that—”

    “Oh, shush,” Rebecca swiped at him. “I’m not the best at reading people, okay, but even I can tell you’re just kidding, at this point. What happened that finally changed your mind on that? Was it—”

    “Wait, you’re not the best at reading people?” Emily refuted. “Since when? Girl, you’re actually legit kind of scary with how—”

    “Hm hm, I also always tell people that I’m terrible at poker!” Rebecca teased, sticking out her tongue. “Anyway, hmm! Do I see that you’ve made your own weapons?! Let’s walk the rest of the way up to camp, so that I can take a look!”

    They tromped along the weedy footpath the rest of the way up the hill after Rebecca, to find a large clearing with the familiar historical tent set off to the side. The banner swaying in the breeze from a long stick planted in the ground, and the blanket spread out around a short camp table made this whole practice thing appear much more official than Brian had imagined things would be. Together they gathered on their knees about the little table and surrendered all of their weapons for Rebecca to inspect one by one.

    First up were Emily’s old cutlasses from her prior times out here LARPing with Rebecca—they were taken in hand and gently prodded, tested, gently twisted to test for dead spots in the foam beneath which might make hitting people unsafe, or sections where the foam had unseated from the core. Both weapons passed as single-edged short ‘blue’ class swords, but both also failed to pass as stabbing weapons, because Emily had apparently left the swords standing up in her closet. The weight of the blades had squished the special softer stabbing-foam stuff made for the tips flat and useless over the months they’d been in there.

    “You can still use them!” Rebecca admonished the girl. “But. No stabbing with these, until we can take them apart and redo them. And, listen to me about storing them properly, next time! Now, what about your new one, here?”

    Emily’s new crafting project was a bit of a mess. It began with the intention of being a short sword, but as it came together with more and more foam layers into an ungainly monstrosity she decided it was a flanged mace instead, then partway through that she realized the construction was too wobbly, and instead wound up tearing a large section of it off and calling it a hammer. A very ugly, oblong ‘hammer.’ Because sewing a cloth cover for that more abstract-shaped one seemed too difficult and tedious, that night they had instead wrestled three layers of black pantyhose over it, until the blue foam was no longer visible.

    “It’s a mace,” Rebecca announced. “Blue class, mace.”

    “What? No—” Emily sputtered. “It’s a hammer! It—”

    “It’s not pretty, but you did a good job making the padding safe,” Rebecca said, turning the oblong thing about in her hands. “This is safe to strike with from all outer sides, not just the one ‘head.’ Hammers usually have only a single striking surface. So, regardless of what it looks like, it actually qualifies as a mace. That’s a good thing!”

    “But, but,” Emily said. “Well uh. Can I stab with it, then?”

    “No!” Rebecca bopped her with the hammer. “You need to use softer open-cell foam for stabby tips, like the chunks I cut out for you that last time. Whose is this next one? It looks nice!”

    Brian had opted for a very plain and simple LARP blade that resembled a big popsicle more than a cutting implement. The crossguard and pommel of his however did look kind of cool, because the latter half of their build session he’d spent trying to copy the specific look of a Roman gladius from reference pictures he’d pulled up. With the pillowy oversized blade, one could squint at it and at least imagine it was actually a sheathed blade… one in a rather thick sheath. The sword passed inspection with praise as a blue-class sword, two striking edges.

    Christine’s sword was an even more ordinary Daegonhir sword, exceptionally so—being just a straightforward 1:1 replication of the super simple short sword design demonstrated in the video tutorials they had been following. It passed muster as a blue class short sword with two striking surfaces, the same as Brian’s.

    Kelly’s sword stood out from the others only in that it was very, very long. While they’d bought a little batch of fiberglass driveway markers from the hardware store to use as the rigid cores of the padded swords, the tutorials all suggested the cores should be cut down to about thirty inches long so that the weapon didn’t become unwieldy. Kelly apparently didn’t mind unwieldy at all, however; she wanted a huge reach advantage so that she could hit others, while they weren’t able to strike her back in return.

    Her sword was thus built upon the entire uncut forty-eight inch length of the driveway marker. When the requisite amount of safety foam was cut out and contact-cemented into place, its slender length looked even more like a sword than the blocky, chunky looks of everyone else’s. It was, however… very, very awkward for her to actually hold or swing around. She remained stubborn about keeping it like that, though, and seemed vindicated when they held a quick test trial in the apartment’s parking lot.

    “This is… a strange one,” Rebecca mused, giving it a test swing and frowning. “It’s the length of a ‘red’ class weapon—our two-handers—longswords, greatswords, polearms which can break shields on second solid hit. ‘Blue’ weapons cannot break shields at all. But, this won’t qualify as a red, because it’s underweight. By quite a bit. And also, you only left enough grip room here for yourself for this to be a single-handed weapon, it’s not even a bastard sword. You’d have a hand-and-a-half grip there at least. Basically, no one in Daegonhir makes this kind of weapon? It’s a long sword, but not a longsword. But, weirdly enough… it does actually pass for safety as a blue class weapon?”

    “Yeah, it’s not gonna do shit against you like, seasoned players,” Emily groused. “I told her already. But, it is obnoxiously effective against us newbs. Literally death on legs. Is it great for blocking with? No, not really. Easy to hold, to maneuver, to hit with? Also no, it’s weird and wrong and super fucking unbalanced. Does it provide an absolutely ludicrous reach advantage—yes.”

    In their quick test session in the apartment parking lot the other night it was very, very easy for Kelly to hold the thing ready and then just swing it into one of her opponent’s unguarded leg whenever they tried to step in range close enough to swipe at her. Then, by the Daegonhir rules they were learning their leg was ‘disabled’ and they had to go down on one knee—at which point Kelly’s advantage became even more exaggerated, because they were no longer able to cross the distance fast enough to even advance on her.

    “None of you have shields, yeah,” Rebecca nodded. “So, in something like a duel? Where you’re facing off with just swords? She may have an advantage. On the other hand, I think she’ll be in a world of trouble trying to find an opening with that thing against any of our fighters who use a shield. It’s just too awkward to swing around and get it hitting where you intend it to.”

    “I’ll have a shield by next practice,” Brian said. “We bought enough foam to make a couple, actually. Just, we didn’t have time. Most of us are working now.”

    “I was just going to hang back behind Brian in a fight anyways,” Kelly shrugged. “Only ever step up and take a potshot at someone he’s already tangled with. Just get them in the leg.”

    “Opportunistic!” Rebecca giggled. “That will actually work, hah. People will hate you! Have you guys practiced fighting in formation at all?”

    “We did a couple quick uhh, two on twos?” Brian chuckled. “Everything turned into a mess real fast, and it’s like we all died right away. Killed each other all at once. Sometimes somebody survived?”

    “But, it’s fun,” Emily assured Rebecca. “Right, guys?”

    “I’m liking it,” Brian said.

    “I’m afraid of getting hit,” Christine admitted. “I um. I tend to flinch back when things come at me?”

    “Emily rushes in,” Kelly accused. “And just—flails her pirate sword things everywhere in your face.”

    “Well, it works, doesn’t it?!” Emily grinned. “I mean—”

    “I didn’t say that it didn’t,” Kelly said with a pout. “I just don’t like it!”

    “To be fair, you kind of have to try to rush in against you, Killy,” Brian admitted. “No other option but try to close. But, when it comes to us going to an actual event, we’ll all be the same little team. So, I’ll be in front of you with a shield. Christine too, maybe.”

    “Okay,” Christine agreed.

    Brian held no illusions towards their group beating actual experienced Daegonhir players, but that was fine. In all honesty, they didn’t intend to engage with others outside of their close-knit group that much—the upcoming Bear Valley Renfaire was intended to be a little vacation for them, tourism, not a lifelong commitment to a new hobby community. Their tension with the whole Masters situation had pulled them into a bit of a spiral where it was easy to start obsessing over magic and secrecy.

    They were making healthy progress with their charm magic stuff, but Brian also knew that right now they needed a distraction so as to not let magic conspiracies start to consume every other aspect of their lives. He wanted this whole LARP thing to be a lot like cosplay already was for him—something he enjoyed and spent a few focused weeks on each year, but not something that overwhelmed his normal daily life or became a part of his identity. He’d seen it happen with some of the convention-goers that attended AnimeCon throughout the years.

    Of course, them approaching this stuff casually didn’t mean they were doing it completely without care or planning to just coast into this without putting in any effort at all. Aside from Kelly, all of them were cosplayers and pretty experienced at sewing and crafting things. Their little group had made fairly competent Daegonhir weapons on their first try, with everything but Emily’s hammer having gray fabric blade covers cut out and sewn up so they looked more like swords, and less like lazy pool-noodle weapons.

    While outfitting them all properly with tunics was still a work in progress, they had swept through the secondhand shop in Seneca and bought up all the brown leather belts, half of which were then cut up and resewn into basic ‘sword frogs’ at Emily’s insistence. Sword frogs which turned out to be something like a holster loop which was hung from your belt that you could situate your foam sword into.

    The sword frogs had seemed overboard and unnecessary at first… that is, until they’d tried them on when standing around for their quick test with the outfits and weapons in the apartment’s parking lot late that night. Anyone who didn’t have a leather sword loop ready for their belt had to just carry their weapon at all times. Which, when everyone else standing there could ‘sheath’ their weapons, felt quite a bit like conspicuously standing around with your dick in your hand.

    “We can start with simple warm-ups?” Rebecca suggested. “A lot of people can’t make it because of finals, but there should be at least four more showing up a bit later. Miss Killy—I made sure to bring all of my loaner tunics, if you’d like to take a look? Some more weapons, too if you want to give anything else a try. I didn’t think you guys would already have so much done!”

    “Okay, thank you,” Kelly nodded. “That pile over there?”

    “Yep yep!”

    “Actually, can I swap this one out?” Emily tugged at neck of her overly ornate long tunic. “This one’s already yours, too. Wanted a fancy schmancy getup for back when I was Ebony Darkthirst. But, if I’m Blue a thief from the slums now…”

    “You can take a look, but I think the fancy schmancy one is the only thing I have that’s even close to being your size, sorry,” Rebecca said with a smile. “Please keep in mind, my loaner tunics are usually meant for um, well. Bigger guys? Historically, most of the new people that show up to practices are fairly large dudes coming over from the college. Around the middle, at least. Everything there’s going to be equivalent to a large at best or more likely an XL or even an XXL.”

    “S’gonna have to be at least that big for us to squeeze both of Kelly’s huge honkers into something,” Emily said with a solemn nod. “Cramming those ginormous sloppy milk jugs into normal-sized stuff every day already takes a couple of us working together and a fair bit o’ elbow grease, and if—hey! Ow! Bad form, bad form! Killy, you’re not supposed to hit peoples without tapping weapons and acknowledging each other first! Bad!”

    “Sorry, Blue,” Kelly said. “My hand slipped. Total accident—just like you, actually.”

    “Don’t get all pissy with me!” Emily huffed. “You want to wear this nice fancy one? Killy was, what—the amnesiac noble chick cliche? Backstory a blank slate, fertile soil for planting plot hooks later on? This’un might be tight on you, but it’ll work. I can wear one of the huge old ugly baggy tunics, that’s more in character for Blue, anyways. Since she’s one of the River Rats.”

    “Really?” Kelly blinked in surprise. “I can wear the nice one?”

    “Uh, yeah?” Emily made a face. “You’re my girlfriend, I actually do want you to look super cool, and impress people, and have a really good time. Duh? I just also get to poke fun at your bimbo bobblies all I please. ‘Cause you’re my girlfriend.”

    “Emily,” Kelly said.

    “Blue,” Emily corrected.

    “Why is it that with you,” Kelly sighed. “Tallymarks keep stacking up on both the goodwill and the grudges side of the board, for me? They don’t even cancel each other out, not really. They just all keep building up, towards something scary, on both sides. I’m gonna marry you and murder you on the same night. Stranglemarks and kisses, kitten.”

    “Baby,” Emily gasped in mock astonishment. “Don’t threaten me with a good time…”

    “Sorry about those two,” Brian apologized to Rebecca. “We haven’t taken to get them spayed, yet. Uhh, Miss Andree—can you keep an eye on them, today? If they start yowling, or one of them mounts the other? Don’t be afraid to thwap them, or spritz them with the spray bottle.”

    “Yes, Ser,” Christine bowed her head in acknowledgement, and then drew her short sword from the leather loop on her belt.

    “Mreow?” Kelly mouthed.

    “Nya nya nyah?” Emily made paws with her hands.

    “Behave!” Rebecca giggled. “Please. And—when everyone else gets here, please try to mind your language, too. Usually when someone lets a swear slip, we make them do pushups! So. Best behavior, please. I’m in charge of the local unit—Freysefni—and it reflects poorly on me if the guests I invite aren’t being appropriate! That goes double for you, Miss Blue!”

    “La la la, can’t hear you, looking through all the tunics with my wifey!”

    “If you change clothes, do it in the tent!” Rebecca ordered. “This park is public, so—”

    “Yes, mommy Mara!”

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/// This one was actually going to be a lot longer, but I think the other half works better in different POV so I'm going to readjust that one and post it as a separate chapter AFTER I make a quick trip back to RE:TT.