//------------------------------// // And a Nova Griffonian Reply. // Story: So the Frost Melts // by Count Talon of Ransom //------------------------------// New Liverpool Dock. Not a second later. French's face goes dark as he sighs, realizing he can't understand the gryphon. Sue rubs his eyes in annoyance only to stop. "You said... What... right?" Sue hesitantly asked, his speaking of the word barely understandable, yet he still gets a confused, but understanding look from the gryphon "What?" French said, somewhat amused to hear the word come out of Sue's mouth, "You telling me you can understand what's coming out of his... beak?" "I think... I think he's speaking that Jew language the uh.... Hebrew something or what," French raises an eyebrow at the strange gryphon, who's just kinda standing there unsure what to do as the ship behind him just now finally docks as another gryphon, this one a little slimmer with black and white fur, jumps off the ship, as Sue explains, "We used to have a Jewish family for neighbours during the start of the famines". "So he's speaking this... Hebrew..." French looked back to the opposing gryphon... he wasn't really all that dressed, he had a coat on sure, but it was kinda thin for the winter... then again... French took a deep breath... it wasn't really that cold out at all honestly... odd. "You know the language then?" He says as he turns to Sue, only to get a deadpan from the small foreman. Apparently not. Captain Straus is deeply confused. First, his ship... or this island, gets teleported, then he finds griffons on this island, only to find out they speak some kind of... Equestrian, and doesn't speak his language, Nova Griffonine, well. By the Gods, knowing his luck they might not know any griffish language actually! He turns when he finally hears his ship gently knocking against the sturdy dock and sees Sanne start tying a securing line to one of the, clearly hastily made, moors. "Thanks for helping cap," she mutters as she finishes before walking up to flank him. "So, you know where we are?" She says as she breathes in the air, "Seems way too cold to be Southern or Central Griffonia," she rubs the back of her neck as she gazes at the two griffons, "though... we've never actually been that down south." "No idea," Straus says, pausing just long enough for Sanne to think that was all he was going to say until "They don't speak Griffish". "Griffish? I didn't know you believed in Pan-Griffonianism," Sanne said as she raised an eyebrow. "No, I mean, they aren't speaking any griffon language, period," Straus sighs, "They greeted me with some kind of... really butchered Equestrian..." The two English gryphons just kind of stood there in silence as the counterposing griffs talked amongst themselves. "You understand what they're saying, Sue?" French whispered to the Foreman, who just shrugged. "They're saying something about... language? Or something? Probably about what our language is supposed to be. I suppose that makes sense..." French chuckles nervously, "You really don't sound sure don't you, aren-" Suddenly the sound of shouting erupts behind them. The two of them turn around as the two other gryphon's head snaps to the stairway. The shouting was happening behind it, and since there was a little hill leading up to the stairway, they couldn't actually see who was shouting. "HEY! STOP! By ord-" the shouting stops for a moment before picking up, "No way in hell, did Lord Hilton tell you and your little altar boys to bring out all this food for some-" the shouting stops again for a long, awkward minute before a cry is given out overtop the stairs, "Yes, Earl Hilton!" "Well..." Sue muttered, "I think the Earl is here with his... feast... do we even have any food other then old canned beans and raw potatoes?" "You can still make a feast out of little... if anything those Catholics would probably keep it that way and give a sermon about humility and temperance and living poor like Christ and whatnot". Sue said nothing except silently made the sign of the cross as Earl Hilton appeared over the stairs and looked down at the four gryphons. "Sue! French! Good to see you two haven't been murdered by our visitors! Which means I don't need to use this!" With that, the Earl draws a, kinda old looking, sabre of all things! With a smile on his beak, he turns his head behind him and says, "Give them a good feast, my good lads!" And that is when the tall wide silhouette of a Mitre creeps up to the top of the stairway. Straus' heart skips a beat as he saw the new gryphon, dressed in a thick brown coat, with a cap of pelt looking more like a militia captain's hat from back home in Nova Griffonia then anything else, draw a sword! Was he some kind of noble? Military officer? Though, thankfully, the sight of a Mitre, slightly calmed him, after all, if this community has some kind of church, it means they aren't completely savage... right? The gryphon attached to that ragged Mitre appears somewhat young for someone who likely held a, likely, important spot in the local church. But Straus' eyes quickly turned from the priest to another priest behind him... a deacon perhaps? And he was carrying a... table? He was carrying a table, with help from another priest, at least he assumed the gryphon was one, and they just followed the... bishop, for lack of a better word until he knows what the holy griff calls himself. As they were halfway down the stairs, two more griffs, these ones looking more like the black-coated gryphon down here, a uniform perhaps, appeared at the top of the stairs carrying... a serving platter? It was made of wood and looked more like a bowl with a wooden covering but he could smell the food coming from it, no meat sadly but he could smell earthy foods... well at least his crew could eat some food that wasn't that oversalted... if not for the fact that he has no idea whether or not it's poisoned. The first duo of griffs brush past the black-coated and grey-coated griffs before setting the table in front of them and heading back. The second duo followed quickly behind, setting the... platters on the table, opening the tops and quickly departed back to the base of the stairs along with the first group. Straus honestly didn't want to eat it because... well would you eat some random food a bunch of people you just met on a mysterious island gave you? Of course, Sanne, didn't think twice about it and quickly hopped/flew over to the table and as the, most likely, bishop raised his front paws to the sky and started talking about... something, language barrier and all. Sanne just dipped her claw into one of the... wooden bowls that were meant to be platters and brought a... raw potato out? Straus was about to say something to Sanne before she bit down on the potato, causing the bishop to snap his attention to her. The bishop blinked at the gryphoness before looking up to Straus and, calmly, waved him over, before picking up another potato and taking a bite out of it. Straus sighed, fine, he'll eat the bloody potato. He walked over, grabbed the potato out of the bishop's claw, much to the amusement of said bishop, and took a bite out of it. "Well... It's fine, I guessed... bit too cold though," he muttered, just loud enough for the bishop to hear and raise an eyebrow. There was an awkward moment of silence as Sue and French just stood there and watched, that was until the bishop quietly spoke, "Come, eat, this is a feast for you as well," his voice was kind and light, not in the way that someone had intentionally made it that way but it was just simply how he spoke. Sue give the slightest of bows before slowly walking up the the "feast" it really was just potatoes, grain, and canned food. Sue knew they had better food in the cookhouse, actual bread with only slight amounts of sawdust, cooked potatoes that may or may not be a little rotten, and warm canned beans that'll probably put him on a toilet, but he certainly wasn't the kind of man to disrespect a priest, especially not the bishop, after all, Sue went to church. French thanked the priest before going over, taking one look at the food before picking up a potato and muttered low enough for Sue, and the two Nova Griffonians but they didn't understand him, to hear, "I think this might be frozen shit, Sue". Sue only laughed before taking the "frozen shit" and biting into it, "Naw, not frozen shit, just frozen potatoes," Sue chuckled more, only to stop as he noticed a third gryphon, along with two others but they weren't getting off board, climb off the ship and walk over to them. His feathers were greyish, though some looked more from age than natural born, and he was... well slightly larger than all of them. Not stupidly large, just like an inch or so above them all. He crept, because there's no way in hell that is how he normally walks, up to two eating gryphons, before slapping his... wing? His wing onto the male's back, spooking him. "You know," Tovi says, a tiny frown on his face, "I didn't think you were..." Tovi pauses, seemingly thinking on the best word to say, "Foolish... enough to just eat food given to you by strangers, hm?" Straus swallows down his piece of potato, it was bloody freezing beyond belief for some reason, before speaking, "Well Sanne, here," the both of them look over to Sanne, now having moved on from her potato to... a bowl of grain, "She started eating long before me, and their uh... bishop," he nods his head to the bishop standing on the other side of the table, noticing him talking to that noble griffon, who had just walked down the stairs, "Their bishop took a bite out of one, so I took his potato," Tovi says nothing for a moment, before taking Straus's potato for himself. Of course, because of karma's sake, before Tovi could actually bite it, that noble walks up to the table... with the bishop by his side. The two shipmates, Sanne was too busy eating to really notice, heard said noble and bishop mutter to each other, only for the bishop to look up to the shipmates, and spoke in a slow, slightly slurred way, "You are... Hebrew?" Straus' eyes widen as the bishop, mutters to himself, repeating Nova Griffonine in a rather poor manner. Clearly, he knew a bit of the language but not a lot. "Are we... Hebrew?" Bishop slowly nodded his head and Straus only got more confused, "Uh... no, we're Nova Griffonian... you know... from the old colony?" The bishop frowns and turns to Hilton, "They say they are... Nova Griffonian... from a colony. The earl nods, "Ask them about where this colony is and who founded them," before turning to Sue and French, "You two, stop eating and start acting like guards, we have a," the earl glances back at the bishop, seeing him mutter broken Hebrew to himself, decent translater," the two gryphons salute the earl before, after taking a few more bites out of their food, taking position behind the earl, trying their best to look like guards. The moment the bishop asks them, Straus' confusion only grew; they don't know about the empire? "Well..." before Straus said anything, Tovi replied, "Nova Griffonia is southwest from here, completely sure on that," As the bishop turns to relay it to the noble, Straus whispered to Tovi, "You... you do know we have no idea where we are right?" "Well the water's been the same since we say this island come, plus the fish are the same we catch any other day, we're probably still in the Frozen North," Before Straus could say anything in response, the bishop turned back to them and asked, "We know you... not... diplomats... we wish to speak to... diplomats... from your colonial... command." Straus looked to Tovi and got nothing but a raised eyebrow, before turning back to the bishop, "I mean... we can take a letter to our government". The bishop gave a smile before turning to the noble and translated the sentence to him. The noble smiled as well before turning to the griffons behind him, "Sue, French. Bring me pen and paper".