Root woke in an unfamiliar bed.
It took her a moment to get her bearings. It took longer thanks to the noncooperation of her eyes, which insisted it wasn’t yet time to wake, and their alliance with her muscles, which hung like weights on her weary, sore frame.
The bed smelled like Anjeanette. In a not so negligible quantity, it also smelled like her own sweat, among other things. Her nose, ever an ally, jogged her groggy mind while her eyes burrowed deeper into the lumpy pillows and stuck there like rocks in thick mud.
The force it took to pry her eyelids apart could’ve lifted the halo’s display case, ground it to dust, and scattered it to the far corners of the desert. The fact that she managed at all was a mi—
She caught her thoughts, barely, as they slugged along.
The energy spent opening her eyes was nothing compared to what she spent moving one arm and lifting her head an inch to look around.
Her head throbbed as stars whirled through the room and jabbed her in the eyes as they flew by. She placed a palm on her forehead and groaned.
“Mm?” she said aloud.
“Oh, good,” said Anjeanette, looking up as she pulled on a pair of pants. “It’s late. We’re gonna be late.”
“?”
“Noon.”
Root wiped her hand down over her eyes and put pressure there, staunching the flow of stars. She groaned again. Shit.
With a deep breath and another heave of her aching muscles, she sat up, pushing away the tangle of blankets.
Anjeanette’s eyes lingered for several seconds before they zipped away to hide behind the curtains. Her face went red.
Root didn’t have time for resobered church girl prudishness, so she extracted herself from the remainder of the blankets. She dressed in haste—and her clothes as well, just to maintain some modesty out on the streets. From the corner, she retrieved her bag and stuffed her few belongings back within, checking twice the security of the wrapped bundle at the bottom. Not that she suspected Anjeanette might try to rob her, but even a simple misplacement would only dump oil onto the fire she knew she’d already lit.
But what did it matter? She wasn’t going to be that late.
Since the circumstances called for a certain degree of decorum, Root paused at the bedroom door. “I’ll see you over there,” she said, slinging her bag over one shoulder.
“See you soon,” squeaked Anjeanette, cleaning her glasses—easy cover for avoiding eye contact. But a smile bled through nonetheless.
Out on the street, Root looked up into the pristine silver Enynlight. She had her gripes with Atnaterra, but if there was anywhere to have a hangover, she rationed, better it be in a world that kept the lights turned low. Now if only the inhabitants could pilot a worldwide cure for nausea.
Back in the basement of Herb and Apple, the world was decidedly less accommodating.
Everyone was there except for Anjeanette, Saly, and Brian. With Root, that made seven. The others crisscrossed the room in buzzing chatter: hunched over the table, talking through points of the plan, scribbling out notes, and in Cruncher’s case, pacing around the furniture, his heavy footfalls and constant motion making Root’s vision spin and turning any milk in the kitchen upstairs to butter.
When Root stepped inside, it sent a hitch through the hubbub as they all looked up. Azriah paused his conversation with Squeej and the king just long enough to cross his arms. Vit, Beel, and Azriah shared a weighty look.
“Beautiful day for some generosity,” said Root, breaking the moment’s silence like a stone through a windowpane. The shards of discomfort scattered the floor. In spite of the stone, the glass reformed in an instant.
Whatever—she was used to this sort of disapproving glare. The looks and words had slicked off her just fine when hucked her way by her parents or Eshra—or name-calling by the kids at school—and she was just as capable of wicking them away now. She stood a little straighter and, headache in tow, stomach lagging somewhere down the street, she jumped into the fray.
A newspaper lay on the table. The Urk Sentinel it read across the top in huge, encumbered lettering, and below it, the tag line: “Never wonder what you should worry about today!” It was open to the day’s weather forecast, an hour-by-hour breakdown next to a picture of a frazzled-looking old man with hair like a snowdrift that had been ravaged by a tornado. He pointed to a map. Clear and Enyny, clear and Enyny, clear and Enyny. The forecast stuck to the usual day’s script through the morning and afternoon.
(Some wondered why Urk even needed a full-time meteorologist. Most of the critics quite accurately pointed out that Urk hardly ever had to contend with meteors at all. The others had sounder arguments that held a bit more water. Or rather, they didn’t hold much water at all, and it made their arguments all the more convincing. The only issue, however, came about when looking at poor old Nort Blunder, as anyone who laid eyes on the man could tell you there was simply nothing else in the worlds that a man who looked like that should do.)
By the evening, the weather report deviated from the clunkiness of its usual script into something Root felt more sure was a real word. Rain.
So Nort had followed through, then. Not that they’d doubted it after Vit and Anjeanette bribed him. The king had asked for blackmail, but if he’d been adamant on that particular, sending Vit and Anjeanette had been the wrong move.
At the end of the table nearest Root, Beel scribbled out the last line of a letter on crisp church stationery, cream and gold. He folded it, slid it into an envelope, and addressed it: Hambie Surl, Save and a Haircut. He handed it up to Root.
“Here, go put this in the mail.”
“Why me? You’re in charge of dismissing the barber.”
Beel raised an eyebrow.
Without looking up, Azriah said, “Because we need all the hands we can get, Root.”
Root bit back another word of protest—multiple words, as they were shaping up to be. A groan slipped past unrestrained.
Vit looked at her—not with annoyance, but with concern. “We were worried about you.”
“You didn’t need to be. I said I’d be back.”
“You said—”
“Vit—” started Azriah.
“Where were you?”
“Anjeanette and I went out for a drink.”
“More than the one, by the looks of it,” added Beel.
“All night?”
“Vit…”
Root’s ears burned. “Well, you know.”
“I said we should go look around—check the local bars, but Azriah—”
“Vit.”
Squeej started to chuckle, clacking her glossy beak. She placed a tentacle on Vit’s shoulder. “Let her be; she expanded her evening’s itinerary a bit. Got to get a taste of the local alcohol, a taste of the local girls—”
A sizzle zipped down Root’s spine as a wisp of smoke curled out of her shirt.
Vit turned defensively. “We just didn’t know what happened, okay? What, did you… fall asleep at the bar?”
“Great Mother Matu alive,” said Cruncher suddenly, halting his pacing to stare incredulously at Vit. “My friend—they had sex.”
“…” said Vit as they ran back through their side of the conversation in a new light. “… Oh.”
Azriah sighed.
“Well that’s not a big deal at all,” said Vit, turning back to Azriah, then to Root again. “You should’ve just let us know. So we wouldn’t worry.”
“That’s not the point,” said Azriah. He turned to Root. “How much sleep did you get? How are you feeling?”
“Enough. And fine. Like a million raduals.”
“Well, you’d better be feeling like ten million. And a half. Because that’s what’s at stake here.”
“I’m ready to go.”
Azriah held her gaze for a tense moment. Then he shrugged. “Good.”
Beel flapped the letter under her nose. “Please. It’s a long way, and my legs are smaller.”
“What, than yesterday?”
“Than yours.”
“Fine,” Root grumbled as she took the envelope and headed back to the door. Anything to get her out of the middle of this mess.
When she returned to the basement, Vit and Squeej were just leaving.
“See you soon,” said Vit as they passed each other on the stairs.
“Good luck.”
“Eh, not much to do yet,” said Vit with an easy shrug. “Just bartending and such. And I’m a natural there.”
“Didn’t you get fired?”
“Bygones,” they said with a wave. Then with a grin, added, “And that was mostly your fault anyway.”
“Mostly Beel’s.”
Vit nodded to the door. “And, well. Good luck in there, too. Y’know.”
“I’ll get him to lighten up.”
“Start with Cruncher. He’s going to wear a trench.”
“Really? I didn’t know they worked as apparel.”
“What?”
“Never mind.”
The pair set off, the first to depart for the Eternal Palace.
Back inside, Root caught herself up to speed with their progressing checklist. As Azriah and the king rattled through what had happened, Azriah’s coldness seemed to thaw. Root kept her eyes open and her hand away from her throbbing temple in hopes of maintaining that momentum. Twenty minutes flew by, and then the king called to the two of them.
“Is everything packed?”
“Ready to go,” confirmed Azriah, patting a bag he’d checked and rechecked no fewer than eight times.
“Then we should go make the deposit. Check up on our accountant on the way.”
Azriah nodded, and Root fetched her things. They soon set out, leaving Beel and Cruncher to hold down the fort. Cruncher was still making extra sure it was settled in its foundation.
The two of them looked like overly sentimental backpackers as they traversed the streets. Azriah and Root each carried several bags as if unable to part with their ninth pair of socks, the antique cookware they’d been carrying for a few hundred miles, and every half-interesting rock they’d spotted throughout the journey. Root carried her own things as well as Vit’s, and Azriah toted his, Beel’s tiny bag, and the extra package they’d assembled. The king, for his part, was entirely unhelpful in this arm of the journey—arms being precisely where he lacked.
He’d once again made an offer to be more helpful if they freed him from the brick. They’d once again thanked him for the generosity, but declined. Root had been throwing heavy sacks of fertilizer since before she could walk, and sticky as Vit’s bag was from all the little holes they’d patched with spider silk, it had a significant leg up in a competition of smells.
Though they hoped to make one last stop by the basement hostel after all was said and done, they couldn’t bank on it. The narrowness of their escape would dictate the length of their goodbyes, but they had to be ready to take their things and skip town if the circumstances demanded it. And they couldn’t very well walk into a prestigious gala with all of their travel equipment in tow, muddy boots scuffing up the floors.
As they crossed through the final gate into the palace’s district, they turned aside and made their way to a pop-up market kiosk. A dense crowd surrounded it.
“Excuse us,” said Azriah a little too politely for someone trying to shimmy through a crowd with his arms full. Root’s method of relying on bodily contact with her sharpest bits served her better.
At the center of the crowd, Saly worked in a frenzy, pulling yellow raincoats from haphazard piles as haughty patrons called out their sizes in clipped demands. A box of black umbrellas hunched beside him, sagging with the memory of being kicked a few too many times. But the flow of coins into his hands—and the way he seemed to be sorting them between his fingers on instinct alone—was impressive.
“Ah—good to see you both,” he said with hardly a glance to spare. “Yes, I heard you, here’s a medium. And an umbrella. No, they don’t come in wairms.”
“Looks like business is good,” said Azriah with astute observational skills.
“Too good, if you ask me. I’ll be out soon. Already low on smalls.”
“Just sell until they’re gone. That should do it.”
Saly nodded, a bead of sweat dripping down his temple.
Azriah placed a hand on his shoulder. “Keep up the good work.”
With less difficulty, they extracted themselves from the crowd. The spaces they vacated collapsed in an instant, filled with the sounds of entitlement and measurements.
Root was relieved when they stopped in a corner between two towering walls of the palace’s enormous base. Her arms felt like jelly—more gelatinous than before, that is—and the paving stones looked remarkably soft and inviting.
“Wait until no one is looking,” said the king from his spot tucked into the front pocket of Azriah’s bag.
“Obviously,” said Root, rubbing her eyes as nonchalantly as she could manage.
When their opportunity came, Azriah prodded the two nearly-invisible crevices and sprung the hidden entrance. They shoved their bags inside and then slipped in behind them.
By candlelight, the king led them through several long passageways including a steep incline and a ladder, both of which were slow going with all of their supplies. At last, he had them halt on a narrow, dirty patch of ground covered with broken tiles that they’d excavated from beneath a thick layer of dust with their footsteps.
Azriah checked through the bag one last time. A grinding sound ahead caught their attention, and a moment later, Vit dropped into view.
“Hey!” A troubled look evaporated as their eyes fell on the three of them. They grinned.
“Going well up there?” asked Azriah.
“Well… Got in without a hitch. The forged work papers didn’t raise any eyebrows at all. Uh…”
“Good.” Azriah handed Vit the bag. “Everything’s here. Whisper stones, fata pomorgranate seeds… other contraband. Root?”
Root rummaged around in her bag and pulled out the third periapt bundle. Vit stowed it in the bag with the other two. A look passed between the three of them, unspoken words crossing over the king’s head. Er, rather, his brick.
“I won’t leave this unattended any longer than necessary,” said Vit. “And I’ll check on the stash if I can. But also—”
The king huffed. “No one’s finding these tunnels. You see all this dust in here? Ugh, needs a good clean.”
“And here.” Azriah removed Orne Tyn’s sheath from his belt and added the sword to the pile. The blade croaked a parting note. “Not likely to make it past their security with that either.”
“You remember how to get into the other tunnel? Where we need all this stowed?” asked the king.
“Yes. I already scoped it out. Beautiful beveling in that segment, by the way.”
“Thank you. You know, the spirit who built that bit actually—”
“But guys,” interrupted Vit. “Sorry, I’ve been trying to say… Some of the other cooks and caterers were talking. Part of the dinner order, I guess. Special fancy dog food. Uh. Apparently David has a scent hound. They said he doesn’t bring it out much, but—”
Root’s stomach dropped. All their planning, and they’d heard nothing about a dog; there was nothing accounting for it in their plans. “But they will if they need it,” she said. “And it probably—”
“Can track the halo. Yeah.”
Despite Vit’s hopes and wishes, Bradan didn’t seem to be getting any better. It’s a troubling experience, that first time a child faces the raw reality that the world doesn’t seem to bend around hopes and wishes as it so should. Why didn’t wanting something bad enough bring it into being?
Vit hopped up onto the deck, a basket in tow filled with the swamp’s foraged gifts. They peeked in through the cabin door, eyes sweeping an empty room, an equally empty deck.
If hopes and wishes held the weight they should, Bradan would’ve been home. He would’ve been home more often than not. Instead, Vit had become well acquainted with a new type of existence, one they’d never known for more than an afternoon spent out exploring alone: solitude. For the first twelve years of their life, Vit didn’t think they’d ever gone a day without a conversation, except during the there and back of those few solo supply runs. Now, entire days unfolded without a word—barring those spoken aloud to a different facet of the self, which seemed to slip past their lips more and more.
Vit set to work cleaning mushrooms.
They cast frequent glances around at the swamp as they worked. Only the chirping of insects, the calls of birds and flitting spirits stirred the air. Smaller things danced below the surface of the water. Vit watched them for a while.
When the cleaning was done, they moved to the kitchen and fixed a meal. They set an extra bowl near the fire and covered it with a plate.
When the eating was done, and the dishes, too, they sat and flipped through a book. It was a geological text exploring the different sediment layers near the southern Eddrealms, and was mind-numbingly boring. But they’d read through all the books on interesting subjects over the years, some of them several times over.
Sometime around midnight, a splash stirred the water outside. A moment later, a shape leaped up and through a small half-door newly installed in the corner. A salmon flopped onto Bradan’s cot, water and muck stowing away around the tail fins, and then morphed back into a very, very old man. He didn’t mind bringing a bit of the swamp into his bed, somehow—in fact, he said it made him feel quite at home.
Already, his eyes drifted closed.
“Bradan,” said Vit, clearing their throat as the name came out hoarse. “Here—I have some dinner for you.”
“Mm? Oh, thank you Vit, you’re very kind. But I’ve told you not to fuss over me. I already ate.”
Vit nodded and moved to clear the bowl. When they returned, Bradan greeted them with a snore.
Gingerly, Vit straightened the blankets nestled around Bradan. They were damp with swamp water. Vit pulled the blanket up and set a fresh glass of water by the man’s bedside.
“Goodnight,” they said, and then sat back down for a thrilling bedtime story about rock compaction.