small excerpt from JTPYO - King of the Waste [4] / the blow (what in the world?)

2026 02 21 🪐 

Well, again there's a delay in publishing the part of #3 "the trap" that I wanted to put in a PDF viewer. Mostly because I'm lazy; the first couple of times I tried it, it didn't work.

I was just working on this part, it's from the above-referenced chapter of JTPYO King of the Waste, called "the blow." This part has been changed little from the original, although it will be edited before final publishing. It's copyrighted, too. 

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14 November 2017 / 18 February 2023 / 26 August 2025


JTPYO – King of the Waste [4] / the blow


Copyright © 2018 through 2026 by Kristi A. Wilson

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Which is me.

OUR STORY THUS FAR: There was a sandstorm and many Children of God in the assembly took shelter with Naxosos and his cohort in the "main dining tent." The storm increased to the point that the Goddess-on-Earth, the sorcerer Joliel, and the two priests Naimejo and Tolalo, have to invoke magic to keep the tent from being completely blown down. (Note: Everyone present is fairly drunk, as the severity of the storm won't allow anyone to sleep.) During dinner, the sorcerer mocks Naxosos, which in turn causes Naemas and Korsis to mock him back and things just sort of fall apart after that, including the tent, which nearly blows down, trapping most of the tribe - and the warriors' horses - underneath it. Fortunately that doesn't happen, but the large tent's main support is broken in half, which is very strange. Some other things happen including Naemas getting angry at Joliel for accusing his brother of starting the storm, and cold-cocking him - an angelic visit, desecration of the priests' complex (the Children of God's traveling temple), and Naxosos exiling Joliel from the tribe - for a couple of days, and against popular opinion. Naemas has a bizarre kind of fit but he finally snaps out of it when Naxosos forgives Nirith for lying to him and the Goddess. A miracle then occurs. 

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"What in the world?" Naxosos said, letting go of Thais's hand and wading into the pool to gaze down at the fragments, ignoring the water that threatened to soak his boots. He saw fine roots spreading from each piece of the fractured mast, little twigs growing with tiny leaves opening on them as he looked (and his own face gazing rather stupidly down, its hair a mess, its beard untrimmed, its mouth open).

The singing suddenly stopped. The Goddess-on-Earth called loudly, "Move the tents, move the casks and blankets, the water may not stop. Everyone help."

Now Naxosos saw Naemas's face reflected next to his. "We're gonna be floating away in a second."

"Naemas."

"Hm?"

"Why did you never strike Joliel before? You're always so angry about his constant innuendos and smirking about the women, but you never do anything."

Naemas laughed. "Oh, but I did do something."

"What about when he returns? What shall I do? What will we do? You have to tell me, obviously I'm ignorant on countless fronts."

"The water's coming in my boots, let's get to dry land before the ground turns to quicksand below us."

As they sloshed back to what had been the doorstep of the dining hall tent and was now a shore where water lapped, Naemas said, "He'll consider the score settled unless you do something else. If you show your teeth at him, he'll come at you again, though, harder. As you can see, he's easily offended. He does own a crap-ton of property in Cela and elsewhere. I suppose I thought you already knew."

"I've been curious about him for so long, but now I realize I'm quite loath, for some reason, to ask."

With a laugh: "He has so many places he can hide. I would say let's take his advice and go to Cela, but we would have to stay indoors the entire time we lived there. Who cares how nice the house is, or how many houses? If I can't go outside and do what I want I don't want to live there."

After a moment of consideration, Naxosos said, slowly, "Tolalo told me long ago that were I to live in Cela, even close to it, I would end up being kept in someone's menagerie. I had been asking Mother about it, you see. He was trying to scare me."

"Did it work?"

"Uhm, I'm not sure."

Some young women, all of them naked, congregated in the water around Nirith, screaming and splashing. "Naemas, Naemas, come bathe with us!" one called and they all laughed.

Naxosos said, "And we're not supposed to look at them."

"Sometimes you're supposed to and sometimes you're not supposed to," Naemas said, shrugging.

"And he has his own coinage? Joliel."

"Haha, yep. I have some in my scrip, it has a little animal like a salamander on it."

"The wonders of this day," Naxosos said, stroking his tangled beard.

"Indeed," Naemas said. Glancing sidewise at him: "I could probably use a shave, too."

"Now that I see myself in daylight, I note my clothes are much more full of sand than I realized. Every crease in my skin is full of sand."

Naemas gestured toward the water. "If this lasts, everyone can have a bath and a drink."

Naxosos looked around, marveling. People were now having to scramble to move the dining hall tent complex and all the junk it had contained out of the water's way. The canopy that had been set up for Tolalo was being broken down and moved. Things were proceeding much more slowly, however, with half the tribe, and all the animals, now sporting about in the pool, which continued to grow.

"I want to sleep more than anything else." Now Tolalo, three priests in tow, came hurrying toward them. "They want to know what the angel said to me, I suppose. Did it say something to you?"

"I heard singing, nothing else."

(21 February 2026)