Chapter Three
Miriam was really angry, frustrated and not a little afraid. Although she often accused Allun of being a useless hunk of meat, he actually had his uses. It was only now that she realised just how much she took him for granted. Not that she’d ever admit it. He looked after all the household administration; he paid the bills and made sure everything was fixed. She never worried about being alone, as he was always there.
Now she was alone in a foreign land. For the first time, she worried about what people thought of her. It dawned on her that perhaps she shouldn’t speak to everyone as she did, but she was so used to it, she couldn’t seem to change.
She left the security of her room, venturing as far as the dining room. There were only a few tables, and the room was empty apart from two couples sitting together at a table in the window. A pretty, dark haired girl showed her to a table laid for two at one side. The place settings reminding her that Allun was not here any more. For the first time, she rather hoped he’d come back. The girl smiled at her and removed the extra place setting without being asked.
The woman she’d seen earlier came over to her table.
“Hello, Mrs Tanner, I’m so sorry to hear about your husband. We’re all hoping and praying he’ll be found alive and well.”
Miriam couldn’t think of what to say, so she simply nodded.
“We have soup or a prawn cocktail to start, followed by some Sea Bass or duck. What can I tempt you with?”
“Do you do pizza?”
Mary blinked a couple of times, trying to think of something to say to this dreadful woman. While she did so, Miriam noticed the dark girl approach the table.
“If you’d like a pizza, I can pop out and get one,” she said, with a friendly smile.
“Yeah, I’m not into foreign food. A ham and pepperoni.”
That was it, no please or thank you; the woman had no grace at all. Mary felt the anger rise within her. She felt sorry for her, otherwise she would have said something. However, before she could think of a reply, the cheerful girl spoke for her.
“Okay. It may be a few minutes. Why not try the soup, it really is delicious?”
The girl was gone, so Miriam found herself ordering the soup.
Mary went out to the kitchen fuming.
“What’s up, love?” asked Dan, eating his supper at the kitchen table.
“That bloody woman, I mean, how bloody rude can you get?”
“What happened?”
Mary told him, but when she told him about Tamsyn’s quick thinking, he chuckled.
“She’s a bright one, ain’t she?”
“Very. I almost said something I’d regret. The poor woman’s husband may be missing, but that’s no reason to behave like an ignorant fool. I mean, we’ve had so many Americans come and stay, and they’ve all been lovely people. She really is a cow!”
“Perhaps she don’t know any other way to behave?”
“That’s what Tamsyn said. She thought that she should have been sorted out at school.”
“Reckon she’s right. This fish is good.”
“Thanks, try telling that to the bloody woman!”
So, thereafter Miriam was known as ‘the bloody woman’.
Tamsyn returned from the pizza shop with a large Pepperoni with extra ham. The ‘bloody woman’ ate it all, but complained it wasn’t quite hot enough.
However, she then ordered some apple pie and ate it without complaining at all. Tamsyn took the opportunity to sneak up to Miriam’s room and removed the laptop that Allun placed under the bed. Miriam would probably not even think about it first or last. However, if she told the police and they looked for it and found it in her room, it would be tricky.
Having secreted it in her room, she then returned downstairs and helped herself to a large slice of apple pie. It was one of the best pies she’d ever eaten, and Allun had eaten a fair few pies in his time!
Miriam took herself off to her room straight after supper. Tamsyn heard the TV on as she passed the door on her way to bed.
Alone and able to try to make sense of what had happened, Tamsyn stripped off and sat on her bed. She felt wonderfully complete as Tamsyn. Everything about Allun was wrong, so she had no desire or intention of ever taking the torque off again.
She liked being young again; she liked being female and having a body she felt at home in. All the RP games in the world couldn’t have prepared her for this experience, but she was under no illusions that it was going to be easy.
Half a century as a male was one thing, but to suddenly face being a female, regardless of how much she had always wanted to be one, was a daunting task. She didn’t have to worry about ‘passing’, so that had been one of Allun’s barriers to ever attempting a transition from male to female. She was strikingly attractive, but that brought its own complications, which she had yet to experience.
However, she was a realist and, as such, she knew that as a non-person, she would face many difficulties, regardless of gender. She was pleased to have ‘killed off’ Allun, but with no body, she wondered whether he would stay dead.
She listed her priorities:
To achieve some form of legitimate identity.
To understand the power (?) of the torque.
To understand how to be Tamsyn, and female.
To identify why she had been chosen (?) to undertake this profound change, and how it all happened.
To identify the price that would inevitably be demanded for this miracle.
Oh yes, and to locate and secure the sword to return it to the lake.
What lake?
She powered up the laptop, restraining herself from checking Allun’s Email account. There would be an investigation, so there was no point in doing anything that could cast doubt on his ‘suicide’. Using the mobile modem, she logged into her RP game as the Lady Tamsyn, yet again amazed by the coincidence of her choice of name.
The game had eight main players, most of whom had played together for some time. There were others who dipped in from time to time, but the core eight had been there since the start. All were only known to the others by their game name, so she had no idea as to their real identity, or even of their gender and nationality. She suspected the Sorceress Wanda was a female, but she thought all the others were male. One of the players, a warrior called Brutus, was a relative newcomer. Tamsyn wasn’t sure about him, as some of his moves and responses seemed contrived and vaguely sinister. She wondered if she was being silly, but no matter how innocuous the play, she always got a bad feeling about him
As the Lady Tamsyn, the others were aware of her speed and agility, and that she was excellent at solving riddles and puzzles. She had no special powers as yet, but as an all-rounder she was quite strong. Silvus the Mage was a thinker, who was less physically active, but because he managed to acquire knowledge, the other gamers would fulfil tasks for him in return for knowledge. Jude was a thief, capable of eluding capture and acquiring objects that were thought to be secure from prying fingers. Sir Hugo was a knight, strong and skilled with the sword and lance. His forte was honour, and Tamsyn felt she could trust him. Wanda was a sorceress, capable of great magic, but it had no lasting power, often waning within a few minutes.
Kori was a hunter, with a tame tiger that just happened to be a Siberian White. Together they could face down any foe, but the hunter’s agenda was still a mystery to the other players, as was his or her gender. Occasionally, he appeared as a male but later, would be female. Tamsyn suspected that in real life Kori was a male who yearned to be female but for some reason, enjoyed the mystery and thrill of others not knowing for sure.
Bertram was the merchant, who made no bones about his agenda: - the acquisition of wealth. He could supply anything for anyone, but at a price. Many of the gems and gold pieces that appeared from time to time ended up in his clutches in exchange for weapons, spells, charms or other vital piece of gamer equipment.