“Uh...” Jesstin forgot himself for a moment. “Buy.”
They shared a knowing look. “And may we escort you in the direction of your fantasy?”
“I don’t have a fantasy. I have a need.”
“Are they not the same?” sang the twins, who couldn’t possibly look more different. Beyond them, stall after stall after stall stretched down seven rows—no, nine. Eight. The count changed. There were more behind him. He shouldn’t be there. Leave while you can.
Not without what I came for. “I need to travel a great distance in as short of time as possible.”
They brightened. “You want an especular!” Then giggled. “Oh, this will cost you indeed.”
“A speck... what?”
“Come, come. We have but one Conductor in the Obscura, and they do not like to wait.”
“They don’t even know I’m coming,” Jesstin replied, but they’d already started down an aisle without him.
He looked behind again. However he’d entered the market, it wouldn’t be how he exited.
Each stall they passed was an assault to the senses. One was bedecked in vibrant silks with a line thirty deep, people waiting to be given the dubiously accurate predictions of when they’d find the person they most desired. There is a soul out there for all of us! Let us scry your happy acquaintance!
Another proprietor had rows of cloudy, tiny bottles, hundreds of them, and they all looked the same, but when each patron made their request, he knew precisely which five to pull down off his racks. From the signs, Jesstin gathered he was a dealer of illicit substances. If sleep cannot find you, you must find sleep! Wish to rid yourself of those horrid, vivid dreams? Now you can forget the past!
“Keep up,” sang the not-twins when he fell behind gawking.
A man and woman in another booth sat behind two lathes, carving and smoothing small wooden talismans in varying hues of umber and brown. The sign above the center read Carving season. Return in the next.
On and on they walked, the aisle without end. Shopkeepers promised all manner of bizarre outcomes and remedies, from family reunification to contact with earthly necromancers. The most menacing one claimed they could send a fiend after one’s enemy, to have their soul stolen. The sign above said Soul Collectors United.
Nowhere did he see prices, but a star system appeared on a long pole next to every stall, each marked with anywhere from one to five stars. The soul stealers had five stars. The apothecary had one.
The women stopped at the end of the aisle. The booth they approached closed off the path, like a king’s throne at the head of an incongruously long table. Mirrors hung around the booth in varying stages of decay and disrepair: hand mirrors, vanity mirrors, even toy ones given to children, any kind one could imagine.
The pole had five full stars, but also something no other stall had. A sixth was perched atop the pole like a cane adornment.
A tall man sprouted from the ground behind the counter, like a plant in spontaneous bloom. It was a startling move, but he’d seen his share of aberrations already.
“The Conductor,” said the sisters, each spreading an arm toward the spectacled beanpole waiting for Jesstin’s reverence. Upon closer inspection, the Conductor wasn’t a “he” at all but a sharp-eyed woman.
She must have caught Jesstin squinting. “I have many miens,” she said, her voice unexpectedly a silvery soprano. “But you did not come to marvel at me.” Her gaze drifted above Jesstin’s head, which was unusual. He was usually the tallest person in the room. “Sisters, you may return.”
The two women didn’t move.
The Conductor’s eyes slanted. “You will receive your fee when I receive mine and not a moment sooner.”
“Yes, Conductor,” they both said dejectedly.
“They get kickbacks?” Jesstin asked, thumbing toward the departing twins.
“Kickbacks?” The Conductor’s violet eyes turned upward. “Ah! You mean commissions. Yes, when they don’t squander my time with unserious patrons. Are you an unserious patron, Jesstin?”
He hadn’t given her his name, but being “surprised” at this point would be purely theatrical. “You’ll find I’m quite serious, madame.”
“Conductor will do.” She swept a low bow, bending at the waist like a hinge. “Will you come to the back den with me?”
“Where?” Jesstin could see nothing but the wall behind her.
She gave him a look. Are you sure you’re not unserious?
