After what felt like much too short of a stay within a mile radius of a bed, Root didn’t feel excited to be stuffing her belongings back into her bag.
“I hate packing,” said Beel from the floor where he sat with all three things that went in his bag: a small money pouch for pocket change (Root carried the bulk of Beel’s money), a bundle of trail snacks (Root carried most of his rations), and, currently, the amulet. He stared at them as if waiting and hoping they’d jump up into the empty bag he held in his hands.
“Make sure you don’t forget anything,” said Root flatly as she folded up Beel’s blanket and added it to her bag.
“I know, I’m always worried about that.”
The door opened as Azriah returned from an errand. Root paused Beel’s packing as he handed a map to Vit. She leaned over to look.
“We’re going here,” he said, pointing to some mountains.
“That’s a decent walk,” said Vit.
“I found a portaller that goes to a town here.” He tapped the map again. “No portals into Urk, but a few networks have permission for outgoing trips. Something about ‘not having to go outside the walls’ or whatever.”
“Okay. Well, that’s good. That covers most of the distance.”
“And you confirmed that’s where the king is?” asked Root.
“According to the most recent word, yes.”
“And how recent is that?”
Azriah scratched his head. “Uh… eighty years, give or take.”
“Ah, good,” said Beel.
“Eighty?”
Azriah shrugged. “If he’s been there that long, what difference does eighty years make? Best we’ve got.”
“Eighty years is pretty good,” agreed Beel. “I remember it like it was yesterday…”
“Well, fine,” said Root. She jabbed a finger at Beel. “You’re paying my portal fare then, in case this isn’t the right spot. It’ll make my pack lighter, too.”
“It’s the right spot,” said Azriah. He seemed confident, which Root couldn’t discount.
They wrapped up their packing—not that they had much to do. Everything they owned, they carried on their backs—or in Beel’s case, everyone else’s backs—and that made it easy to get moving in a pinch. They’d copied down any notes they needed out of the various books and other records they’d borrowed from the city and wrapped them in waterproof skins—plus an additional material they’d purchased during their crypt quest that promised to be “Atnaterra-proof,” which apparently included protection against water, fire, insects, a type of blighted mineral, blood, grease, spirit-goo, acid saliva, and splum. It had kept their maps in perfect condition, and so it seemed a shame not to recycle it for whatever else needed protecting. Usually that meant they wrapped up the old book they’d stolen from Ajis or, during the occasional overnight or when he got particularly anxious about factors real or imagined, Beel. The bits of smooth cloth were just big enough to serve as a tiny blanket for him.
They left the room, settled their bill with the innkeeper, and followed Azriah to the portaller.
He was a squat little spirit with a big head and bigger horns, giving him a look that made Root certain he’d tip over if looked at wrong and end up stuck on his back like a beetle with all its legs waving in the air. He manned a desk in a small but ornate single-room shop and looked up when they entered.
“Hey there, forks, welcome to Podo’s Pordals, where can I getcha today?”
Root exchanged a look with Beel. She mouthed the word “forks?”
Beel gave her a look. She knew what it meant: “Don’t be rude.” He gave her that one often.
She crossed her arms and sighed.
Azriah approached Podo with his map. “We’re headed here. I was told you work in this area?”
Podo used a little looking glass to assess the map. “Hm. Yeah, but I don’t do wilderness. Closest I can get you is here—Sewch.”
“There’s another village here. Looks like…” Azriah leaned closer to read. “G… Corrivack?”
“Don’t go to Corrivack.”
“Why not?”
Podo drummed a stumpy, scary-looking finger. “Don’t know it.”
Azriah hesitated. “The reason, or…?”
“The village.”
“Okay. Well, it’s a bit closer. Is there anyone who does go there?”
“Gimme that.” Podo took the map from Azriah’s hands and looked it over again. He consulted a large book on his desk that looked about as heavy as he was. After several minutes of rifling and muttering, he looked up. “Can’t get you to Corrivack directly. But I can instead send you to Zafell, and I know a portaller there who goes to Corrivack. He’s got waits, though. Probably about a nine-hour layover, I’d say.”
“Nine hours? To get another portal?” said Azriah.
“Or I can get you to Sewch.”
Azriah looked to the others.
“Sewch seems to be less than nine hours from Corrivack, no?” said Vit, tracing a finger across the map.
“Depends on how fast Beel is walking,” said Azriah.
“Hey!”
Vit shrugged. “And Corrivack—how close is that to… where we’re headed?”
“Not entirely sure. Best I could find is that it’s out past Corrivack. I figured the locals could point us the rest of the way once we get there.”
“Hm. All right, let’s just do Sewch, then.”
“Four for Sewch?” said Podo. He wrote something on a notepad. “And I’ll give you a group rate. Sixteen mantles.”
“Damn.” Root handed over half the total, cut from Beel’s account. “Why’s it matter how many are going through? Like, if you’re opening a portal, what’s the difference if one person goes through or ten?”
“Thirty-six mantles,” said Podo, either not understanding the question or ignoring it. “Off you go, then.” He unfolded a pair of sunglasses and put them on, then reached up with one hand and stretched it from thumb to pinky between his horns. They began to glow. He was probably the only owner of a pair of sunglasses in all of Atnaterra.
Podo swept out and down with his hand. From his horns, a rim of the same shape descended and landed vertically on the floor between them and the desk. He waved. “Best of luck! And don’t forget, this is a one-way trip—no portals into Urk, Grand Priest’s orders!”
They filed through the portal and it snapped shut behind them.
On the other side, they found themselves in an open pavilion in a town that apparently hadn’t heard the news about walls. All around, roofs hung overhead on pillars or narrow wooden stilts, but Root could see all the way out past the town’s outermost buildings and into the woods beyond. In the space in between, Root caught glimpses of many, many other things she’d rather not have spotted.
It could not have been in starker contrast to the architectural proclivities of Urk.
They’d left the dry heat behind as well. As soon as they stepped through the portal, Root got hit with a feeling she hadn’t felt in over a week: a chill. She dropped her pack to switch out her top for something with a little more coverage.
“Hey—excuse me, miss!”
Root paused. A gooey spirit was looking right at her. “Uh, yeah?”
“What do you think you’re doing? Changing in the middle of the street like that? Get some decency!”
Root looked around at—and through—all of the surrounding buildings. “Where would you like me to go, then?”
“There’s a bathroom right here,” said the spirit, and pointed to a drain in the floor under a nearby roof.
“I think it’s occupied,” said Root, averting her eyes.
Embarrassed as she wasn’t, Root didn’t have to worry about it for long. They had no business in Sewch, and they were soon off, making their way left-east toward Corrivack, though not without accidentally passing through no fewer than three spirits’ homes and getting shouted and threatened out of each one.
It was odd to be relieved by the normalcy of the Atnaterran wilderness, but Root found herself thinking it on occasion, and this was one of those times. That was, notably, despite the anemones. (At least, that was their best approximation of what the new features were even after some discussion.)
Vit led the way, using Azriah’s general guidance from the map and the faintest hints of a road not often traveled. They brushed aside fronds of the anemone-things as they went, ignoring the occasional zap of protest to the disruptions.
“Those mountains are fucking huge,” said Root, who felt the expletive was the only way to capture what she was seeing. They towered ahead of them, up and up and up, with slopes nearly vertical and peaks that looked high enough to stop Enyn in its tracks. She’d seen the Rimnangs back home in Zhaen-or-Daijia—snowcapped and so enormous they made her dizzy just trying to wrap her mind around their height, places where monks went specifically for the religious experience of insignificance (though her theory was that it all boiled down to lack of air up there). These mountains looked impossible.
“The Eddrealms,” said Vit.
“No…” Root paused, looked up at Enyn, spun in a circle. “I thought we were in the far left-east of Atnaterra.”
“We are.”
“But we saw the Eddrealms—when we first crossed over after leaving Unn. That was thousands of miles east of here!”
“They go all around Atnaterra,” said Vit, drawing a circle in the air with their finger. “Go any direction, you’ll hit the Eddrealms eventually. I thought I mentioned that…?”
“There was a lot going on. Lot to take in.” Root looked up at the wall of cliffs again. “They didn’t look this big last time.”
“There are some high points and low points. Well, there are some high points and really high points.”
“And that’s just listing the foothills,” added Beel.
Vit nodded. “We were also farther away.”
Azriah walked with his neck craned back, looking up at the mountains as well. He stumbled and got zapped by the foliage. They all took it as their cue to spare at least occasional glances for the road.
(The Eddrealms held the all-time lead for cause of tripping in Atnaterra and hadn’t budged in their rank since the dawn of the worlds. Tree roots and uneven pavement and unexpectedly-tall stairs had been trying to get together and get the mountains disqualified ever since, but the best they ever managed was the establishment of a subset of the league which amended the title to “things that are tripped on,” thus requiring that the thing in question be making some contact with the foot or other lower appendage in order to qualify. They took it as a win and grumbled in silence.
Bandits also loved the Eddrealms. The average population density of bandits increased nearly threefold near Atnaterra’s perimeter due to the good-old-fashioned principle of cheap labor. No need to split the profits with your buddy who played the role of “guy lying in the road pretending to have a broken leg” (or as it was often referred to in the trade, “lying lying guy”) when a bunch of mountains would do the trick. And they didn’t even need to be paid—but they sure might’ve appreciated it.)
“And what did you say the region beyond the Eddrealms is called?” asked Azriah. “The Want?”
“The Want,” said Vit with a nod. “Endless nothing.”
“Well, as long as that’s not where we’re headed,” said Root.
“Grii,” came a sound like metal lips smacking with tired boredom. “Worse,” said Orne Tyn.
“How can anywhere be worse?”
“You’ll see. Rib.”
“Lost them?” sputtered Ajis. He paced along the crest of a dune that looked out towards Urk. It had become their designated meeting place. “How could you be so careless—?”
“They took a portal,” said Loope defiantly. “And the portaller wasn’t as receptive to the old ‘I’ll-have-what-they-had’ trick. We got lucky last time, but the people of Urk are so—”
“Paranoid,” finished Ophylla. She didn’t have to visit the city to know it; she knew what was in play.
“Yes.”
“And you couldn’t just sneak through the one they used?”
“They gave us the slip. They’re getting better at masking their steps and keeping their cards close—even if the reason is concern about that Ooze guy, Syrus. We—”
Ajis slammed a fist into his other hand. “You should be keeping them in your sights at all times!”
“Let them finish,” said Ophylla with the patient tone used to parent a toddler. She waved her hand to the twin tumbleweed spirits to elicit the rest of the report.
“There are two of us, but four of them,” grumbled Loope, flicking his tongue at Ajis. “And as convenient as it would be, they don’t always stick together you know. Anyhow, we reached the portaller late. Missed their exchange. We didn’t know where the portal ended. We couldn’t risk getting cut off from our mistress.”
Ajis rubbed his fingers. “And me. You report to me.”
“As a regrettable condition of proximity, generally.”
Ajis seethed. A sizzle escaped his parted lips. “Well, since you’ve failed, I will have to go speak with Uvuh. We need people in the field—we’ll need to comb every mid to major hub in a thousand-mile radius…”
Ophylla fanned herself with a paper fan. This desert heat was terrible for her skin and hair—she’d need a long soak when she got back. Her tumbleweed spirits didn’t look like they were faring any better, hot and breathing heavy, their skin starting to shrivel. They looked at her, paying little attention to Ajis’s ramblings or the stomping path of his boots.
“Any clues on where they might be headed—just to shrink the range?” she asked.
“Well, yes, actually,” said Loope with a nod. Ajis stopped.
“And when were you going to mention this?”
“When the mistress asked.”
“I—”
“What did you find?” asked Ophylla, waving her hand to smack away the end of Ajis’s outburst.
“One of them—Azriah, the swordsman—was out this morning seeking answers. Asking for the whereabouts of Ago Sog.”
“What?!”
Ophylla knew the name, but either she was missing a linking piece of information, or Ajis was overreacting. She never ruled out the latter.
Ajis knelt by Loope now, planting both clawed hands on the ground. Emotions warred on his face: fury and fear.
“You’re wrong,” he said, his eyes sharp as they scanned Loope’s serpentine face. It wasn’t a statement as it so often was with him—it was a request, a hopeful bid to be proven wrong. “They’re not… they can’t be seeking him out.”
“They are.”
“But they have had him ever since his downfall. They’ll never—” His eyes widened. “Their mote periapts,” he said, a burning whisper. He looked up—at Urk, at Ophylla. Ophylla’s throat constricted. She didn’t like the look on Ajis’s face. She never did, but this one was worse somehow.
“Ajis—” she started. Whoever they were, he seemed more worried about them than he was about the Children. Maybe more.
“We need to go—now.”