“Oh, no, that’s just good sense,” said Iridia, and Viv was pretty sure she was joking. Maybe. The tapenti continued, “I told you I’d take Varine seriously, and I have. But maybe not seriously enough, because I realized I haven’t spoken to the one person who has recent information.”
Iridia actually reminded Viv a little of Madger fromTen Links in the Chain, but without Legann’s balancing influence. Grudgingly, she admitted to herself that she might not actually dislike the tapenti.
But to be clear, that doesn’t mean I likeyou,either, she thought, echoing the Gatewarden’s own words.
“Brand,” called Iridia, catching the tavernkeep’s attention. “Her drinks are on me.”
She rested an arm on the counter. “So, I’m here to rectify that. I want to know everything you know. Are you willing to talk?”
Viv drained her mug and set it back on the bar. “I won’t even make you buy me dinner.”
25
The sign hanging from the handle of Thistleburr’s red door readCLOSED. Viv couldn’t remember ever seeing it before. She tried to peer through the glare on the windows, but the curtains were drawn. She knocked and called out, “Fern? Are you in there?”
Potroast’s answering bark came first. The curtains twitched aside, and then Viv heard the latch being thrown. The door opened inward, and Fern appeared in the gap, clad in a filthy smock, her fur haloed in dust.
“What in the—” began Viv, but Fern ushered her in with an impatient paw.
The shop looked like the victim of a very localized, very selective earthquake.
Most of the shelves were bare, although a few lonely volumes still leaned against one another on some of them, like drunks past midnight. The rest tottered in stacks and small mountains everywhere else.
Satchel stood amongst the wreckage, a tuft of fluff clinging to one horn, the flames of his eyes swirling blue. He clutched a large sheet of brown paper, torn along one edge. A spool oftwine sat tilted in his pelvis, the location of which made Viv strangely uncomfortable.
Potroast trotted anxiously between the stacks, sniffing and whimpering, and spared Viv a distracted hoot of indignation.
From a small pile near the door, Fern seized a book-sized parcel wrapped in twine. Scrawled across the front in dark ink were the wordsTRAVEL,ROMANCE, andHEARTBREAK. “We’re going to make some gods-damnedroom,” she said fiercely.
“You can’t be doing that withallof them, though,” said Viv, staring around the shop in bewilderment.
“No, but this is the perfect time to reorganize. When the shipment arrives, we’ll be ready.”
Viv looked doubtful. “I think it’s a great idea and all, but how many of these do you actually think you can sell?” She picked up another parcel from the stack, this one markedADVENTURE,BOUNTIES, andBLOODSHED. Actually, that sounded pretty good. She was seized by an impulse to open it.Thatwas promising, anyway.
“Well, Satchel and I were talking,” said Fern, hustling back to sort through some of the piles. She checked the titles, sometimes opening them to flick through the first few pages, and then arranged them using an incomprehensible system known only to her.
“You were?”
“Indeed, m’lady,” replied Satchel.
Fern handed him three volumes, and the homunculus bent over the side table, which had been requisitioned as a workstation. With deft folds, he wrapped the stack, withdrew a length of twine, and snapped it with his bony fingertips. Then he swiftly tied the package with a tidy bow.
Fern’s eyes sparkled with more energy than Viv recalled everseeing. “A boardwalk sale. Right outside. There’s another passenger vessel due in two days. We’ll lay out tables, spread these across them, and see how many we can get into willing hands. And what we don’t?” She shrugged. “I guess we’ll pile them out of the way, like you said.”
Viv thought Fern might be overestimating how many she’d be able to offload, but the rattkin’s mood was so high, her expression sohopeful, that she didn’t have the heart to dampen her spirits.
“So,” she said at last, feeling like a giant towering over tiny buildings of words, fearful of where to tread. “What can I do to help?”
Fern held up an inkwell and pen. “How’s your handwriting?”
They worked together companionably for most of the day. Fern fretted over what to package up and began the process of reshelving volumes that were to remain in the shop. Satchel tirelessly wrapped the books she passed his way, and at Fern’s direction, Viv inked the paper with two or three words evoking the stories bound within.
“So, Satchel,” said Viv, squinting as she blocked in another letter, fingertips black with ink. “How long, exactly, have you been, uh…” She deliberated over the right word. “Alive?”
The homunculus gently detached Potroast, who was attempting to remove one of his fibulae. “I couldn’t say, m’lady. I have—”
“ ‘Viv’ is fine, Satchel.”
