ashkevarna

Diversity is a flower that blooms with greater beauty and greater strength each time it is cross-pollinated.

— K. Ancrum, The Weight of the Stars

"I know just the thing."

Ash was having lunch with Jek, an affable young gnome who had responded to her request for help with learning Gnomish. Like her, he hadn't settled on a specialty yet, and didn't seem in any particular hurry to do so. Unlike her, he seemed to make friends easily, smiling and waving at nearly everyone they passed on their way to the food trucks.

"You're part Kenku, right?"

Ash blinked, and nodded. "Yes. Half by blood, and raised in a Kenku village."

He nodded along. "My point exactly."

"Your... point?" Ash tilted her head in confusion.

"Well, it's obvious, isn't it?" Jek gestured vaguely in her direction. "Mimicry. That's their whole gig."

Ash cleared her throat. "Well... maybe not the 'whole gig' per se, but it is one of our inborn abilities."

"See, you've been going about this all wrong!"

Ash couldn't hide her bafflement. "What in the world do you mean?"

"You're not going to learn written Gnomish by translating it into a language you already know. You're going to learn spoken Gnomish, and then associate it with the various runes."

"I... guess that makes sense." She thought back. "When I was first learning Elvish, it started with hearing it spoken by my dad." She smiled wryly. "Of course, I was much younger then."

"Which brings me back to my original point. I know just the thing." He finished his meal and stood up. "I don't have one with me, but give me a day or two and I'll whip one up for you."

"One... what?"

Jek grinned. "You'll see!"

Ash scrutinized the device that Jek had presented to her. It looked sort of like a magnifying glass, but there was a button on the handle. "What is this?"

"It's a verbalizer! Where I come from, every kid in school uses one of these to learn how to read." He gestured at the button. "Whatever runes you can see through the lens, will be spoken aloud when you press the button. Of course, I've tweaked this one a bit."

"Of course," Ash echoed. She was studying the device intently, trying to divine how it worked. Then she glanced up at Jek. "Wait, what? Tweaked how?"

"Well, see, a standard verbalizer would just repeat the words in Gnomish, but this one will also repeat them in Elvish. And it works on Elvish runes as well as Gnomish ones. It's bilingual!"

"Oh! That's handy. But... why Elvish?"

"Because you're not the only one trying to pick up another language, Ash. I had made one of these for myself as well, but now we can help each other, don't you see?"

Ash slowly smiled. "Well, okay, sure! ... Is there any particular reason you want to learn Elvish?"

Jek flushed a bit. "Let's just say I might want to impress someone." He shrugged. "Besides, you never know when a bit of knowledge might come in handy."

"True, that. Well, I still have some of the Elvish histories I read as a child, if you need some study material."

"Great! And I have some Gnomish stories as well." Jek chuckled. "You can hardly learn the entire range of Gnomish grammar just from studying diagrams."

"Gnomes actually do write about things other than engineering? I wasn't sure."

Jek laughed. "Just wait. You've not experienced Gimble until you have read him in the original Gnomish."

"Who's Gimble?"

"Who's...? Ash, I had no idea you were so sheltered as a child. You're in for a treat."