Confined With a Goddess

Jake fantasised about how much easier this morning would be if he had a box of nails. If he did, then he could just drive them into the wood and secure the two pieces together. That wasn't an option this time. He had to auger out the holes and then dowel in sticks that were made sticky with sap. Then move on to the next one.

By this point, he was glad that Celestia had made him split the planks, because having a flat surface, or at least, mostly flat, made it easier to stand everything on end. That, and a bit of hard work, made for an easier time than trying to hold everything up on a live edge.

Celestia was out collecting more trees. She'd said that the ones she'd cut yesterday were for framing, and today, she was going to make the façade. Jake wasn't sure what she meant by that, but he wasn't going to question it. He also wasn't going to question why she wanted him to only make four of the eight walls, and why they were walls that didn't connect to each other. He thought that corners would strengthen the structure, but he was told no, that the intersections needed extra planning, and who was he to argue with somepony who knew better?

He was improving, though. He was exhausted by the afternoon, but not nearly as exhausted as he would have been when he'd just started. He was able to make it to the afternoon, and while his arms and shoulders were sore, they weren't as sore as when he was putting down the floor. He knew he would acclimate to it if given enough time, and having been working on it, as well as all of the extra walking he was doing, was starting to pay off. Maybe a better diet, too, barring last night's cheeseburgers, but at least he'd had a vegetable with it.

His inability to tell the difference between a fruit and a vegetable aside, he made good progress, finishing the four walls he was assigned today. He even tried to stand one up, but he accidentally dropped it off the edge. That was just as Celestia was coming back for the day.

"That usually takes two," she said, dropping two tree trunks in their working area. "Here, let me help you."

She helped him pull the wall back on top of the floor and held it down while he secured it with more dowels. As promised, she even helped with the other three before going to collect the rest of the trunks while Jake split one.

"Those cheeseburgers were really good," she breathed as she came back for the last time. "You sure those aren't actually plants?"

"They're made of meat," Jake answered. "And cheese, which I'm told comes from milk. Somehow."

"Somehow?"

He shrugged. "I don't know how to make cheese."

"But you know how to make meat?"

He shrugged again. "It's animal parts. Like fish."

Celestia nodded. "Fish is a staple, here."

Jake lowered his head. "So, um... I've told you that I came out here on a fishing trip, right?"

"But you don't know how to fish," she confirmed. "I remember."

He was silent for a moment, then took a deep breath. "Can you teach me?"

Celestia raised her eyebrow. "You want to learn how to fish?"

He nodded. "I only know in theory. I've never actually caught anything."

She thought about it for a moment. "Tell me, what do you know of fishing?"

"Well, you need a rod with a string on the end, and on the other end of that string is a hook. You lower the hook into the water, and wait for a fish to bite it. Then you pull it up."

Celestia shook her head. "You are missing so many pieces of information, there. That's the most basic understanding of fishing I've ever heard. No wonder you never caught anything; you never baited your hook!"

Jake's face turned red with embarrassment. He knew about bait; he'd had some on the boat. He'd even had a conversation about buying worms, and had been told that he'd have better luck with chicken liver. He wasn't sure about that, but he'd bought some, anyway. It was in the grocery section, oddly enough. Who was eating chicken liver?

"You're also discounting the role of the reel, the bobber, the sinker, the different varieties of hooks, flies, lures, the net, and my personal favourite method, the fishing spear."

Jake nodded. "I don't know what any of that is for."

Celestia nodded. "I'm going to show you some fishing spears."

She walked into her hut and came back with a handful of spears. They looked to be fairly deadly if mishandled, and he didn't want to risk that. "Which one's the safest?"

Celestia dumped the spears on the floor and held up a crude-looking stick with four points, each about three centimetres apart in a square. "You stand about knee deep in the water, with the tip just below the surface, then stab straight down onto the fish. This requires that the fish swim up to your legs, so it's not all that effective. The one I use," she used her magic to summon it from where the raft was sitting, "Is far superior. Hold it?"

Jake took the spear. It felt very heavy and was made of some kind of metal. It had a gnarly tip at the end that barbed backwards to make sure that whatever was caught would have to be cut in half to remove, which explained why she would fillet the fish right there on the spear rather than removing them first. At the other end, there was some kind of band, like elastic or rubber.

"It weighs about the same as water, and as a result, is neither going to float nor sink very much," she explained. "It would more likely float, though. Would you be so kind as to grab an aubergine and place it on top of that stack of lumber?"

Jake did as he was told, placing an eggplant on top of the pile of half-planks he'd been pulling from all day. When he was clear, Celestia placed the band in the crease between her thumb and index finger, then started sliding that same hand along the shaft of the spear until it was sitting just below the head.

"This spear is now incredibly dangerous. As long as I keep a tight grip on it, everything is fine, but I have to be careful where I aim it right now." She aligned the shaft with the eggplant. "Because if I were to let go, or my hand were to slip, or if something should shock me, or anything else caused me to loosen my grip..."

She let go, and the elastic snapped closed, pulling her hand and the butt of the spear closer together in a straight line. As it slid through her hand, the spear flew forward faster than Jake's eyes could track, and before he knew it, the eggplant had been skewered onto the spear, which was still locked to Celestia's hand by the elastic band, which she reeled in.

"...It's as dangerous as a loaded crossbow."