by T J Marquis
Jon looked horrified, covered in slime and bile, and his aura of light dissolved. Bahabe, too, looked disgusted, but she ran to him and knelt to make sure he was okay. He gasped a breath and nodded that he was. Dahm left his blade embedded in the serpent’s eye socket and moved to help Jon up from the ground. He wasn’t hurt, just shocked.
They all went down to the water, somewhat warily, and helped Jon to rinse off in the salty brine.
Afterward, they returned to their little pile of travel bags and Dahm encouraged Jon to sit and recover.
“These kind of creatures are always interested in our type,” Dahm remarked. He scanned the serpent’s corpse. “Might have some decent meat though - they’re not all bitter.”
Bahabe screwed up her nose in disgust, but Dahm just chuckled. Jon thought he might eat the thing simply out of poetic justice, bitter or sweet.
“He’s thinking about eating it either way,” Dahm stage-whispered to Bahabe. Jon scowled, then shrugged.
“Well! If that’s your first outing with me,” Dahm said, “imagine what comes next, ha ha!”
“The blade?” Bahabe just had to know. “Where on earth?”
“Just that,” Dahm exclaimed. “Such is my gift, or the wages of my life’s work. On Zhamann, the spirits of stone are visible and present, and every man learns to some degree how to shape this element to his needs. Once,” he indicated the blade, still stuck in the serpent’s eye, “that little trick would have taken me months to complete, garbage though it is. After these many decades, however…” he shrugged as if the act of fusing the sand together had been trivial.
“That’s amazing,” Bahabe said. Dahm mocked a bow before he sat.
“Thank you. Maybe I’ll have time to do better for the next monster.”
“So you can pretty much make whatever you need for the journey. Is that why you brought no provisions?” Jon asked.
Bahabe added, “Or is it because you can’t take things through the portal?”
“Oh, no,” said Dahm. “It’s a religious observance. Whenever one of my order goes on a journey, we put ourselves at the mercy of those we meet.”
“Ah,” Jon understood. “So that’s why you adopted us so swiftly.” Dahm grinned. “Well,” Jon continued, “let’s be on our way then, before something else tries to eat me.”
They all prepared to head north, taking the time to cut some meat from the serpent’s ribs. “It may even fetch a price at market,” Dahm posited, severing some scales and a meter-long whisker for proof of the meat’s source. He hastily crafted a bag to carry the meat in, using a yard or so of the serpent’s flesh and riveting the edges together with interlocking bits of stone he fused and shaped from the beach sand. Jon and Bahabe were impressed.
They struck out for what proved to be a reasonably short hike, moving inland to skirt the edge of the scrubby grasses, where walking would be easier.
Dahm led the way, scanning the horizon with discerning eyes. He seemed completely at home in this land, with an easy confidence that made Jon envious. Jon marveled at how amicable the man was, how disarming. He wondered off and on about placing their trust in someone they’d only met minutes hence, but within that small span, Dahm had already revealed his own power and saved Jon’s life. He seemed completely unconcerned with convincing anyone to believe his story thus far, and Jon found himself wanting to trust the man. Nevertheless, he would keep his eyes wide open, for clearly Dahm was a formidable warrior, and Jon was as yet untested in that area.
Bahabe wondered what kind of man they’d met. She too noticed how natural it felt to have Dahm along on their journey, and tried vaguely to use her empathy to sense the presence of any kind of spell or glamour he might be using. She sensed nothing. In fact - and this itself did give her some pause concerning the man - she had no sense of his emotions whatsoever. Since she’d first begun to feel the empathy, years ago, she’d never encountered anyone who read as blank to her. Of course, he had clearly mastered his stonecraft, and maybe other forms of power, so perhaps his experience with the worlds of magic held some secret resistance to her senses.
“I can’t believe how lucky this was,” Dahm said to Jon as they walked. “Two mages for companions, within feet of my entry! You’re perfect.”
“Thanks?” Jon said.
“Don’t let it alarm you, Jon,” Dahm said. “It’s just people like you tend to stumble into trouble easily, and it’s become clear to me that a place of trouble is where I’ll find my son.”
“Just maybe no more trouble today?” Jon said. He was desperate to shower after being drenched in serpent bile. Dahm laughed.
“You never know,” Dahm said. “Until then, we just enjoy the journey.”
It wasn’t long before they crested a long rise in the land, and the coastal city appeared ahead. It had a name, but Bahabe and Jon hadn’t been able to read Nak-sak’s sloppy label on the map. The city reached far inland and was mostly of squat, flat-roofed wooden buildings. Even from here it was evident that most were not painted. The map indicated a wide bay, and from here they could see the southern arm that encircled that bay and the many docks and ships it held. All along this arc of land, the warehouses and industries of the city had grown. That was where the city’s haze emanated from.
There were no roads or paths on the southern approach to the city, but Jon thought he saw the dust of movement a ways northeast. To the west, the surface of the sea was dotted with fishing boats and buoys. He had no idea what to expect here, and he hoped they would be able to simply lose themselves in the crush of people until they got their bearings. If anyone sought to question them, or if this city’s culture was rigid and exclusive, being complete strangers with a wild backstory could prove troublesome.
The little party circled around to the eastern approach, so as to at least join the flow and not enter the city proper through some back alley. Jon and Dahm noted that the city looked very contained and orderly as if built in a small span of time, with comprehensive plans. Thus there were no outlying neighborhoods - the city had a very defined limit and just started.
A merchant’s carriage pulled past them on the road, with the steady clomping of horse’s hooves, and Jon breathed a sigh of relief when the driver waved a greeting at the three travelers on foot. Several more carts and wagons passed them up, and though not all waved, nobody accosted the little party.
Coming nearer, the three could see that the wood of the city’s structures was fairly fresh, planks and beams not yet greyed with rot or bleached by sun. Here and there, one might see a building or two in the process of being painted. It all gave the impression that the city had literally been plopped down all at once and activated with the flick of a switch.
There were no gates or guards, and nobody’s ingress was impeded. Stretched between a pair of buildings that flanked the road, just inside the city’s limits, was a banner with a single word painted across it.
“Bayport,” Dahm said. “Clever,” he chuckled. “We always translate the local language before traveling,” he explained.
Jon wondered how Dahm’s people could study a realm before actually setting foot in it. Then he imagined if they could make doors, they could also build windows into a world.
With no clue where to go, the three agreed to follow the merchants to market. Bayport was laid out in a nearly unbroken grid, the only anomalies being certain larger buildings whose owners must have paid twice or thrice as much as others to secure multiple lots, or even whole blocks, on which to build. Gardens and parks were nestled in each district at regular intervals, once again reinforcing the sense of deliberate city planning.
Fountains graced nearly every garden and there were pumps for collecting water spaced no more than a few blocks apart. Some of the larger buildings may have had electricity - lights from within shone bright in places, not flickering - but Jon couldn’t quite tell.
The people of Bayport displayed great sense of purpose, an energy just short of urgency. Everywhere there were people tra
nsporting goods or marching by in their work attire. Jon better understood the mission of the Anekites who’d visited Sem-bado - these people were eager to expand and grow. Bahabe might have been expected to scowl at them for having thought to exploit her island home, but she was fully occupied by her sense of awe, having never seen a city before.
Bayport’s market was a district unto itself, consisting of many cells where the storefronts of the wealthier merchants formed a perimeter around inner yards packed with tents or mobile stalls. For the most part, the tents and stalls were segregated by the types of goods being sold. Jon and his companions found themselves immediately drawn by the smells of food.
As they made their way to where their noses led, the three took note of the wide variety of people milling about in the marketplace. They themselves were not much out of place, for the population here consisted of many different skin tones, statures, hair colors, and styles of clothing.
Here was a dark man in thick, utilitarian cotton trousers and blouse, with leather boots and rough hands, buying fish. There was a small group of light-skinned men and women draped in layers of colored cloth that covered all but their faces. They seemed to be advertising to others concerning their religion. An olive-skinned blacksmith and her male apprentice were both dressed for the summer heat, wearing little but their leather aprons for protection. Jon was interested to see the homes of the various cultures meeting at this crossroads.
The three soon spotted a row of butchers working out of their wooden carts and moved in that direction. Dahm picked the one with the kindest face and greeted him cheerfully, casually making note of the posted prices of various meats. He hefted the sack of serpent skin with its many pounds of rib meat and smiled.
“We’ve got some meat to trade,” he said, “a little rich for our tastes.
The butcher’s eyes widened at the large, thick scales of the serpent. “Whose meat this is?” he asked, bending near to sniff it out.
“Forty-yard sea serpent! Tender stuff, if a little salty,” Dahm answered. “We got a whisker too,” Dahm grinned, pulling a tip of the whisker out to wiggle it before the butcher’s eyes.
The butcher stood back and eyed the little party, “You kill this? They eating ships all day in spring…” Some of the other meat merchants were beginning to show interest. Dahm raised his eyebrows. Jon smirked.
The butcher held his hands out, palms up in acceptance, “Okay, okay. Either way, is good stuff.” He thought a moment. “I give you thirty per pound for meat.” Jon noted that was six times the price of what appeared to be a standard fish. He watched Bahabe for her sense of the man’s intentions.
“And one hundred for scale and skin,” the butcher continued. “Whisker is not good for eating, but I give you twenty-five. We deal?” Before he had finished a woman from across the way stomped over.
“I cannot take this today! Karon wants the good meat and tries to rob you. Well not while I’m around!” she bellowed.
Karon scowled at her, growled, “My own wife tries to put me out of business! Maybe, Aria, strangers don’t know meat is good?” He hissed lowly.
“You are the one who did not want to share a stall,” Aria retorted, huffing. She addressed Dahm, “I will give you an additional five for the meat, add thirty for the skin, and you deal with selling the whisker to the apothecaries,” she gestured to where the apothecaries must have been, out of sight.
Jon scanned the other butchers to see whether they thought to compete, but they were just chuckling at this marital spat, otherwise appearing to respect the fact that Jon’s party had chosen Karon’s stall first.
Karon growled long, “Okay. Forty for pound of meat, one hundred fifty for skin, three hundred for whisker,” he said it grudgingly, then looked at his wife, “and we split in half.” He questioned her with a hard look.
Jon sensed that Aria was more pleased at the thought of sharing the transaction with Karon than winning a portion of the goods. She beamed at her husband and nodded once.
Karon sighed, “Deal?”
Dahm consulted Jon and Bahabe with a look. They nodded. “Deal,” he smiled. The butcher looked relieved.
The meat was weighed, and their goods were exchanged for coins in various denominations, whose recently minted surfaces bore the likeness of eight prim men and women sitting together at a heavy table. Karon called the coins zans. He even provided a purse with which to carry them, after commenting on Dahm’s lack of such an accessory.
Jon, Dahm, and Bahabe made their way to an open area between some stalls, where they could stand out of the way of traffic and discuss their next move.
“What now friends?” asked Dahm. “You were gracious enough to let me make the first move,” he chuckled, “so now one of you gets a turn.”
“Well that deal had to be yours right?” Jon said. “Since you killed the serpent. I assume we did pretty well?”
Dahm nodded, “I reckon we just earned around a week’s wages, but it’s hard to be sure without looking around a little more. Either way, the likes of us have no need for lodging, and clearly we have a knack for serpent-slaying, and the bait,” he teased Jon, winking. “I’d say we’re in great shape so far!”
“We should look for armor and weapons then,” Bahabe said. “Bayport seems safe, but we don’t know what else is out there, what might attack one of us next. We should be prepared.”
“I agree,” said Jon. “But I was gonna ask Dahm to teach me his fusing ability, and he can already make his own sword. Surely we can’t afford to buy more than one good weapon and some armor?”
Dahm demured only slightly, “I am not stingy with my knowledge, but there are only so many hours in the day. I did indeed plan to craft my own weapon, so perhaps you can sit in on that, Jon. We’ll have to be careful how we spend our time though. I don’t think remaining sedentary will accomplish any of our quests, do you agree?”
They did. After some more conferencing, they agreed to search out some protective gear for Bahabe at least, since Jon had his Light, and Dahm desired no armor. If they could afford it, Jon would armor up too. Dahm agreed also to craft a weapon for Bahabe.
Diving back into the market, they followed various paths through the bustle past clothiers, tanners, and blacksmiths, to the arms dealers themselves. Jon had been wondering since the encounter with the serpent what kinds of arms the Anekites might use. The presence of pollution’s haze over the city indicated their industry was burning something for fuel, so Jon had begun to expect to see firearms, though his secret heart desired a sword.
In this district, men and women both in and out of uniform or armor wore their weapons freely as they went about their business. Some were clearly military, but others might have been mercenaries, and nearly everyone bore swords, with a smattering of maces or axes. As it turned out, one shady looking merchant was selling what looked to be parts of guns that had been scrapped. The styling reminded Jon of the relics he’d seen from the American Civil War, in museums or movies - long rifles, and a few revolvers, with wood stocks and handles. No one seemed to be offering new, assembled guns. The other weapon shops boasted a wide array of broad, short and longswords, spears, quarterstaves, maces, axes, crossbows, and various other arms. Armor was plentiful, and came almost exclusively in leather, which Jon thought made sense - even if guns were rare, there would be little sense in someone wearing plate or mail with firearms around. Leather was a better compromise. Jon wondered what threats lurked in the wild, to warrant such a well-armed populace. And who had all the guns?
After seeing the utilitarian pieces of leather armor that were available, Bahabe gained better insight into what she would actually be willing to wear. Many of the offerings were too bulky or ugly for her tastes, and she refused to travel looking like a pillar of hardened leather. She managed to find some bracers, light boots, and a minimalist cuirass for herself, and durable, hooded traveling cloaks for all three of them.
Feeling famished, the little party made their way back to the market
’s culinary sector. There they visited a charming stall selling chunks of meat wrapped in something like pita bread. Dahm bought himself three portions, and his new friends each wolfed down two. They discussed what would come next over mouthfuls of the savory wraps.
“Much of the day remains,” Dahm said as he chewed, “and we’ve found your city. I sense this isn’t your final destination, is that right?” Jon and Bahabe glanced at each other and nodded. “So do we stay or move right along?”
With every passing hour Jon’s trust in this man had continued to mount. He decided to take the risk, and proceeded to tell Dahm everything, albeit via the short version.
“So Bahabe needs to head east, and I’ve just got my eyes peeled for a tower or a bloody shadow,” Jon finished the story.
“Well that sounds gruesome,” Dahm mused.
“Do you have any idea where your son might be?” asked Bahabe.
“Ah, well that’s something of a story,” Dahm said. Thinking of it dimmed the light in his eyes ever so slightly. “Better saved for the campfire, I think. Suffice it to say, it doesn’t really matter which direction I go, except to not shy away from trouble. I’ll ‘have to keep my eyes peeled’, as Jon put it.”
“So how about a vote then,” Jon said. “Who wants to stay indoors tonight and set out tomorrow?” The other two said nothing. “So we sleep under the stars and start, uh, looking for trouble?”
Dahm and Bahabe grinned and nodded.
They spent another portion of their zans to replenish their food supplies, buy a map and small tent, and a travel bag for Dahm. They were able to obtain water from a hand pump on a street corner.
As they made their way through the busy streets and back toward the eastward road, they encountered another group of the colorfully-dressed religious zealots Jon had noticed earlier. A woman among them seemed to home in on Jon and approached him with searching eyes. She came uncomfortably close and studied him intensely for several moments. Jon was taken aback but didn’t want to be rude, so he held his ground. He could smell her breath, see every pore on her face. He almost began to back away at last, but then she spoke.
