Chapter 3 - Toscamo

News From Around Your World:

Investors of Nuts and Bolts woke to a shock this morning, as the Normalized Chest Value (NCV) of the upper-quarter-trending treasure plummeted overnight. The 10-era Starharbor yield fell 17 basis points, to 1.18%. Strategists at court predict an even greater drop in the coming days, as the industry moves to fasteners with a lower production cost. Most enchantments performed with Nuts or Bolts have been rendered ineffective.

Yesterday, the king condemned bean factory ‘protestors’, who used inflammatory language to describe the bouncer response amid increasing damaging protest events, according to a source present at his last council. “There is no room in this monarchy for naysayers to the brave men and women who bounce our streets. Those champions of law and reason deserve only our utmost respect,” admonished the king. The line received blank stares from the council, the source said.

Residents of Smithersfield and Briar Chafing have been soiled by more than three days of torrential jelly rain, as communities begin to survey the wreckage of devastating jelly flooding that has left the districts preserved and suspended. The ground and basement levels of over 1,700 homes and businesses have been completely submerged. Starharbor officials could not be reached for an estimated drainage time.

The grey eyes turned away from the personalized text. The grey hands folded up the newsparchment; grainier in texture than the stock used in a Region Justice Center word machine. The grey head looked up.

Mr. Grey stood on the curb of a broad street. If you could call it that… the ground showed not one puddle of jelly over its surface, not a jiggly drop in sight. Instead, people hustled back and forth over an easy thoroughfare of motley material. Some people crunched across gravel. Some kicked up little clouds from the packed dirt. A few tapped out a rhythm on scattered, mossy paving stones. Sometimes the road became indistinguishable from a field left to fallow, with tall grass growing in rampant profusion, heedless of the feet and wheels which daily trampled it. The travelers - decked verdantly like chives and emeralds and lush limes - adjusted their step to the terrain. And to their business. Some carried woven baskets of speckled candy, either in their arms, on their backs, or balanced atop beehives of hair. Others led wide, flat cows, parting the crowds of people before them like ships cutting the water.

Despite this busy and diverse traffic, and the odd cadence of the accented babel, Toscamo rush had a softer flavor than Starharbor’s. Children, many children, rushed hither and thither with broad smiles. They played all manner of local games: chasing feral, rolling tumblecats down alleys, dueling with rubber toy mallets, competing to see who could chug the most water in the shortest time. Pedestrians parted for these games and for each other, without grumbles or shaking fists. Travel seemed free of cares in Toscamo.

On either side of the traffic, houses and shops rested their foundations on square platforms of reedy wood. Every building had walls of thin, stretched leather, which slid on tracks for doors and windows. Their roofs were thatch. Mr. Grey had asked Tom several times if he was sure that Toscamo was the capital of Wine Medo, and inwardly doubted after each affirmation. Where were the towering skyscrapers and stilt houses, or the enormous workers’ prison complexes? He’d seen no stone bridges of stupendous archness spanning any canals. Instead, long, rickety, narrow bridges swayed over the rivers veining down the great hillslope on which Toscamo lay. These waterways filled the town with ambient, giddy trickling, and made mists of wine which condensed on any stone. Two-man gondolas poled the rivers, or let the current carry them where all streams joined a pale lake. The city even loosened its belt and let itself sprawl into this body of wine. Long dock and fisheries stretched far into the fermentation.

Mr. Grey turned away from the busy street and faced Tom. As they’d walked into town the two of them had gained many moments of daylight. The sun must have felt sluggish, for he moved across the sky at his leisure. It was now bright, hot noon again, on the same day. Tom dabbed at his face with the soiled handkerchief while haggling with a pawnbroker. He wanted to make a few pebbles from the leather whip he’d taken off one of the bandits.

“Do you think we might…” Mr. Grey began. Tom silenced him with a flat palm. The big man kept his eyes on the pawnbroker. He and the surly man stared at each other. Neither one blinked. Neither one spoke. Mr. Grey thought it an odd form of barter.

Mr. Grey glanced at the adjacent shops. Another odd thing about Toscamo was; he saw no enchanting services. There were, however, many other kinds of shops. There were newsparchment vendors. There were bookstores brimming with foreign magazines and art prints. There were rows upon rows of flower shops - full of rows upon rows of flowers - which filled the air with a local perfume Mr. Grey called ‘Dangerous’. Nor did the shops sell the flowers solely for decoration. They offered flower poultices, flower medicine, flower pills, everything that could be distilled from the petals of a plant, these shops kept in stock.

And there were the candy shops. It seemed to Mr. Grey that candy took the place of beans in Starharbor. Most of it came in the shape of shells or coral patterns. Most of it, like the flowers, had a distinct, concerning aroma.

Mr. Grey looked back at Tom. The warrior still had his eyes attached to the vendor’s. Mr. Grey looked down at the manilla rectangle in his dry hand, a remaining bit of mail after disposing of the newsparchment. It was an envelope addressed to him. The senders were a firm that sounded familiar: ‘Blackjaw and Slake: Finders for Hire’. Mr. Grey threw that into a nearby wastebin as well. He took it for spam.

Mr. Grey sent his eyes once more roving the crowd, then back to the shops, then to the distant lake. All the while the crowd loomed nearer to his spot on the curb. The sun seemed positively crawling to Mr. Grey. Perhaps it was slow; he had no way of telling with his broken ticker.

After unknown eons of passing time, Mr. Grey turned firmly on Tom. He said, “Can we find Honeydew now?”

Tom waved dismissively at the surly pawnbroker and turned away from the stall. He raised a thick hand to shade his eyes and looked along the road for potential buyers. To Mr. Grey he said, “Why are you always rushing?”

“I have to locate her, sir.”

“Is she not able?”

“Oh she’s marvelously talented. Believe me. But I’m the one with all of our visa documentation.”

Tom rubbed at his bristles while searching the crowd. He thought for a long moment. “The road bandits took your things.”

Mr. Grey suddenly realized that Tom was completely right. Mr. Grey had no visa.

“Oh dear Mr. Tom. I just don’t know what to do. This is all so strange,” Mr. Grey, though downcast, was beginning to pick up on the local accent. He unconsciously formed his words into the vernacular patterns, rather than stumbling onto comprehensible sentences by accident.

“You should relax then. We sell the lash, make treasure. Then we buy candy. I’m thinking bon bons.”

“Is the king even known here? Is there government?”

Tom mused. “The Starharbor Embassy. You could seek help there.”

Mr. Grey had been despondently watching the passing crowd. At Tom’s suggestion, he looked sharply at the big man. His face wore its stony facade, not the mix of hope and exasperation he felt. Tom, who had been examining the same crowd for a whip buyer, looked back at Mr. Grey.

“Tom. Why didn’t you mention a Starharbor Embassy to start with?” asked Mr. Grey, forgetting to form his words neatly. “That’s exactly the thing I need… Not that I blame you, of course. I suppose I should have known…”

Tom said, ”…So is there a plan?”

“We’ll go to the embassy. If you’re still coming?”

Tom sighed. He wrapped the whip around his shoulder and nodded. Together they entered the traffic of the street.

---

“The thing is, I’m looking for someone in particular.”

Mr. Grey clasped his hands stiffly on the counter of the Starharbor Regional Embassy. If you could call it that… the building’s construction made it almost indistinguishable from the canvas-roofed shops on either side. It had a single long counter in front and a cramped storage room behind. A king’s pennant twitched noisily from the roof crossbeam. It bore an exceptionally unexceptional likeness of his grace; the king’s face was a faded pearl disc in the center of the sirah-stained cloth, with two fraying eye holes and a flat mouth-line making up all the features.

At Mr. Grey’s back, the industrious traffic bustled on, hither and thither, thither and hither. Before him, a clerk drummed her fingers against the wooden countertop. First the little finger, then the ring, then the middle, and finally the index. Then she lifted them slowly, one at a time, and started from the beginning.

“Well?” asked the Starharbor Region Embassy Clerk. Her half-shut eyes, and half-open mouth, and half-hollow cheeks, gave her a stultified look. It conveniently marked her as Starharbor bred and Starharbor fed.

“Well, she’s about average height and average build. She has long hair. And she wears her robe in the Starharbor fashion. Not the local one, with all the folds and the shorter hem.”

“Uh huh.”

“Now that I think of it, she might have changed clothes. In which case you wouldn’t be able to identify her by dress. Pardon me, don’t you need to take this down?”

“Got it all up here,” the clerk lifted her hand just before the tapping index finger in the drumming cycle, and tapped her temple instead. She brought the hand back to the counter and restarted. “Anything else?”

“Not to speak ill of her; I have noticed a tendency to aggression. I’m not saying she’s ever attacked anyone,” Mr. Grey added quickly, unfolding his clasped fingers and waving off the notion. “She strikes me as one of those ‘act without mentally listing out every potential consequence which might result’ types of person.”

“This lady have a name?”

“Of course! My mistake. Her name’s Jodee Coats.”

“Will you be much longer?” asked Honeydew from Mr. Grey’s right.

Mr. Grey and Tom had found Honeydew on their way to the Embassy. Tom had trod over the sunflowers of her long robe. When she’d turned and berated the big man for his footing, Mr. Grey had interceded. Thus had the three met.

Now Honeydew stood at his side. Her sunflower robe looked smart as ever, somehow unwetted from any wine lake cannonball. One of her hands slumbered inside a pocket of her robe, atop her own treasure purse. She’d become wary after hearing Mr. Grey’s troubles. Her other hand drummed at her side, more rapidly than the clerk’s but in unconscious sympathy. She appraised the pedestrian traffic as it passed. She missed the nitty and the gritty of Mr. Grey’s conversation.

The Clerk answered Honeydew’s question. “That depends on,” she paused until Mr. Grey looked up from her fingers, “what you need?”

“If you could give me a current address,” Mr. Grey began, “that would be an excellent starting point. And I’d be delighted to look over any documentation she might have forwarded to this building. To tell you the truth though, I suspect she didn’t send any parchmentwork. If you’ve got an empty change of address form, even that would help. Otherwise I’ll have to draft one, you understand, and I’m not sure where I’d find a Word Machine here in…”

“No,” interrupted the Clerk.

“No?”

“I can’t give a resident’s address without a permit,” said the Clerk. “Sorry,” she added, in a tone that wasn’t.

“Just come back later,” suggested Honeydew. She tugged Mr. Grey’s stained sleeve.

Mr. Grey turned to Honeydew. “I’ve actually got other questions too, while we’re at the embassy.” He glanced with doubt back at the unobliging clerk, tapping all four fingers up and down in rhythmic impatience.

“But I don’t want to bore you,” he added to Honeydew. “We could meet somewhere. Perhaps Tom knows a good place?” He turned to the man named.

Tom had been leaning against a groaning wooden post of the Embassy, eyes closed. He opened them and blinked slowly at Mr. Grey and Honeydew. He said, “We should go to lunch.”

“We should get our luggage,” Honeydew insisted. But she motioned Mr. Grey to continue.

Mr. Grey turned back to the clerk. Each tap of the woman’s skinny fingers accompanied one of her sharp syllables. “How about giving the summarized version?”

“I’ve lost my antiodor cologne. The local scents have been very aromatic. I do feel fine right now, but… Well I’ve heard Odormoat plague attacks can be subtle.”

The clerk sighed and reached beneath the counter with her free hand. She came back up with a fresh bottle of emergency cologne. She pushed it across to Mr. Grey. Mr. Grey immediately unscrewed the lid and dabbed his neck with the wick. In his nose the Wine Medo candy and flower scents gave way to caustic, sterile cologne.

“That it?” asked the clerk.

“Not quite,” said Mr. Grey. The clerk dropped her sharp chin into her pale palm, and her skinny fingers drummed their pattern against her sallow cheek. Mr. Grey went on, “I’ve also had my vacation funds taken by road bandits. I was rescued by this man, Tom. But the bandits escaped with my treasure purse.”

“Bummer.”

“Is there a way to have some of my hoard balance back at Starharbor forwarded? Or loaned?”

“No.”

Honeydew had been splitting her eyes between the hand mirror and the bright sun. At the clerk’s last word, she turned the bright eyes to Mr. Grey. “I’ll pay for us both for now. Let’s just get rolling.”

“Yes, food should come first,” added Tom.

“Our luggage should come first,” said Honeydew. She clicked snappishly. Tom only looked at her blankly.

The Clerk had lolled her attention - or lack of it - to the passing crowd. Mr. Grey hooked her with an up-pointed, ‘just-a-moment-please’, grey finger. “Are you sure there’s no way to get treasure forwarded?”

“I’m sure,” said the clerk.

Mr. Grey showed no distress in his posture or expression, but let out a breath through his nose. “That’s a bit alarming.”

“The trip to Starharbor’s free.”

“We’ve just got here!” interrupted Honeydew. Mr. Grey gave her a placating nod.

“The other thing is,” Mr. Grey continued, addressing the clerk, “that I don’t have our visa documents anymore. Those bandits took almost everything.”

“You should keep better hold of your stuff,” said the unhelpful woman. “It’s against King’s Law to travel without a visa.”

“I understand. I’m sorry to be a bother. But I don’t have much control in this scenario. Isn’t there a replacement form I can fill out?” Honeydew groaned, joined a few tocks later by Tom.

The clerk sighed dramatically. “What did you say your name was?” she asked.

“Mr. Grey.”

The clerk pushed herself off the counter. She moved into the Embassy’s back room with a vacant, wandering amble.

“This is about as fun as teeth bleaching,” said Honeydew. She pointed distantly to where the city spread along root-like docks into the pale wine of the lake. “I chatted up a dancer before we met. She said chances were we’d find lodgings in the theater district. Which isn’t supposed to be far from where they fished our luggage.”

Mr. Grey held a thoughtful silence. Tom opened one frosty eye and rolled it between Mr. Grey and Honeydew. After a moment he said, “And we could get fresh candy.”

“I don’t think we can,” said Mr. Grey. “Without our visas, I fear we might be detained.”

Honeydew and Tom groaned in sync. Tom shifted to a more comfortable position against the Embassy post, which also groaned. Honeydew shifted her weight to the other foot, and the reedy wooden floorboards made the same sound as everybody else.

They waited for the clerk’s return. The traffic chattered noisily in its passage, but the silence among the three made greater clamor in Mr. Grey’s ears. Honeydew broke it. “So Tom,” she said, turning to him. “Sounds like you showed up almost in time.”

Tom opened his eyes and stared at Honeydew while deciphering her accent. He said, “They weren’t fierce fighters; Mr. Grey isn’t either. I came where needed.”

“A shame you came late. Might have spared him a lost fortune.”

”…We’ll see how it all ages.”

The two of them introduced themselves to each other - with pauses for dialectic difficulties - and related how they’d come to know Mr. Grey. Mr. Grey wanted to join at several points. First, to assure Honeydew that he felt full gratitude for the aid Tom had already given. Then, to assure Tom that Honeydew was his true and steadfast companion on this vacation. In the end, he thought it improper butting into their talk, even though they spoke of him, and even though he stood between them.

After many moments had slipped by the clerk returned. She brought no parchmentwork, filled or otherwise. Instead she slid a square napkin over to Mr. Grey. She then resumed a leaning posture on the counter, and the methodical finger tapping.

Mr. Grey looked down at the napkin. He looked between the scanty stitched words on its surface, and the bored-faced clerk. “I think there’s a misunderstanding,” he said. “This cloth just has my name and description. Actually, I do see Honeydew’s name on the other side… But there’s nothing else.”

“Right. That’s your visa,” said the clerk.

“Where are the terms? The Conditions? The medical sheet? The job history? Where’s the definitions page, or the restricted activities?”

“You don’t need that here. Local tradition crops the visas. Just the important stuff. You’re welcome.”

“But…” Mr. Grey began. The idea of walking around, with only this diminutive patch of fabric to cover his identification, stupefied him. He felt naked.

Tom shoved himself from the post, and asked if they could eat now. Honeydew clicked twice, as though to a horse, and asked if they could get their luggage.

---

The long, narrow, wooden suspension bridge creaked. Above, The Wind that Smelled like Rain carelessly tugged her clouds across the sky, sending shadows crawling on the bridge’s boards. A foamy river of wine running below threw vintage droplets up as it tumbled over the rocks, soaking the swaying ropes. Across the bridge, three laden pedestrians made their way with care.

“They… call this… the Blanch,” said Tom from the back of the trio. He carried both of Honeydew’s luggage boxes in his thick arms. He huffed under their weight. “The longest river… in town.”

“It feels like the longest,” said Honeydew. She led the trio by a few impatient paces. “Feels like we’ll never settle lodgings. We’re missing out on the Wine Medo scene!”

“Do you think there’s any local pencil pushing contract work?” asked Mr. Grey of both. He walked between the two, stepping deliberately from plank to plank. He held his own suitcase and violin coffin stiffly at his sides.

“This town has… the most rivers. More than anywhere,” said Tom. He might have been replying to Honeydew, or merely musing.

“But aside from rivers, what moves in Toscamo?” Honeydew asked eagerly. “What’s exotic? What’s sightworthy?”

“Any parchmentwork?” Mr. Grey put in. “For making treasure?”

“Yeesh, slow down a bit…” said Tom with another huff of effort. “We have beautiful carvings… And performances. Fiddle contests too… Held by Blushing-in-the-Snow.”

Tom had pointed his last remark at Mr. Grey. Mr. Grey - busy keeping his footing during a violent wine spray - hadn’t heard.

Honeydew turned and looked past Mr. Grey at Tom. “We will absolutely watch a fiddle contest,” she said. She clicked several times with enthusiasm for the idea. “I bet it’s an absolute spectacle. Lights. Music. Flash and fanfare!”

Mr. Grey muttered, mostly to himself. “I wonder… If I mention I’ll be finalizing documents for Jodee Coats and those other Odormoat-breakers, perhaps that Embassy clerk might give a commission.”

“What about Tom’s idea, Mr. Grey?” asked Honeydew. She stopped at the bridge’s halfway point. The other two came to a halt, and Mr. Grey turned his attention to her. With the three standing in the bottom of its arch, the suspension bridge swayed wide and close over the frothing wine.

“Sorry, which idea?” asked Mr. Grey.

“Attending the show. What’s the host’s name again, Tom?”

“Blushing-in-the-Snow,” answered Tom. He set the boxes down while they stopped.

“Right. How about seeing Blushing-in-the-Snow’s fiddle gala?” She nodded at the violin coffin in his hand. “Seems up your canal.”

“That could be one idea,” said Mr. Grey. He looked at Tom. “Would there be a fee?”

“For the audience. But not for participants. Players get in free.” Tom wiped his brow with his handkerchief. Mr. Grey missed the sweaty man’s sly expression behind the wiping cloth.

Mr. Grey said, “We’ll have to earn our entrance treasure then. I still say local work’s the way. Maybe someone has notary needs? I have a little background in that occupation.”

Honeydew said, “If you just enroll we’ll get in free. Right?” She looked at Tom. Before he’d deciphered her words, she went on, “Who knows, there’s a chance you’d win the prize… The winner gets treasure, Tom?” Tom nodded.

“I certainly won’t,” said Mr. Grey in an iron tone. Then, more placidly, “I only mean, I haven’t played violin in…”

“They call it a fiddle here,” interrupted Tom.

“So a fiddle then. Fiddle or violin, I’ve forgotten how to play.”

Honeydew said, “You’d need a brush-up. To remind you of the notes,” It may be recalled that Honeydew had no knowledge of enchanting.

“I know someone who could teach,” suggested Tom.

“No. I’m sorry, but I have to decline. We’ll have a much easier time recouping the loss with regular parchmentwork. I have a good feeling we’ll find something not so fantastical.”

Mr. Grey stepped deliberately to the next plank in the swaying bridge. Honeydew frowned, but she turned and strode onward. Tom picked up the boxes with a reluctant grunt, and followed. They crossed the rest of the bridge to the tune of the spraying water, and of Mr. Grey’s assurances. He said they’d find work soon, and make some treasure, and find Jodee Coats, and that everything would work out neat and orderly.

Much later that same day - when the sun had finally waddled across the sky and begun to set again - the three pedestrians found themselves crossing the same creaky wooden bridge. In the opposite direction. They’d left behind their luggage in the cheap lodgings paid for by Honeydew. The only burdens of this return trip were small bags of conical shell candy.

Mr. Grey said, “I’m still surprised. You’d think, in a town this size, somebody would have registration or insurance needing filed.”

No one responded immediately. Tom eventually said, “Less parchmentwork here.” Then, after feigning consideration for a moment, he added, “There’s still that fiddle contest.”

Honeydew added, “Enter it Mr. Grey. Where’s the risk?”

Mr. Grey shrugged, his dry hands clutching fast to damp rope rails. “I’m sure I’ve forgotten everything I ever knew. I’d ruin the event,” He sighed through his nose. “And look like a fool.”

Tom said, “Perhaps you wouldn’t. You’ve got some time for lessons. I do know someone,” The other two stopped. Tom dropped to a crouch. He let some of the wine spraying up around their feet collect in the hollows of the coneshell candy. He brought the candy to his mouth and crunched vigorously.

After a moment of satisfied chewing, Tom realized they waited for his elaboration. “An ancient Well Witch,” he resumed. “She lives beneath the topsoil; out beyond the town. Not hard to get to. With good weather, a few days. Scenic country views.” It sounded like something Tom had read in an advertising brochure.

“I don’t know,” said Mr. Grey. He watched the misting wine. “I wouldn’t want to impose on a stranger.”

“Give it a chance Mr. Grey - click,” said Honeydew with an encouraging smile-of-pearl. “Worst case, she says no. You’ll have got one of your walks out of it. As for me,” she went on with a stretch, “I’d be treasureless-stakes on that trip. I’d scout out the town while you’re away.”

“I… Well yes, I suppose. You shouldn’t spend your vacation sitting around while I take lessons.” Honeydew patted his hand in appreciation. “I might get attacked again.” Mr. Grey pinched his chin at the concern.

Tom said, “You’d be well guarded. I’m attack-proof company.”

“Tom, I can’t accept. You’ve assisted so much now; a perfect stranger.”

“You don’t know the way,” Tom pointed out. “And I should visit the witch; it’s been ages now. We’ll go together.”

The rocks below threw up another translucent spray of wine. Aerating it; if you could put it that way…