Quest SMASH

by Joseph Lallo

  A young man stood on the ledge, struggling with a sack of mail. His arms were full of envelopes, some of which threatened to spill over and sail away to the floor far below. She stepped forward, extending her arms.

  'I'm so sorry. Let me take those.'

  The boy looked harassed. He muttered a thanks as she relieved him of his burden, then glanced around nervously.

  'I wouldn't hang about, miss. Get back inside, quick.'

  She lifted her brows. 'Why?'

  'Um, because-'

  'Miss Sanfaer!' A woman's voice broke in as a slight figure swooped down from the skies, landing so swiftly that she almost knocked the mail boy off the ledge. She held up an image-capture and light flashed in Llandry's astonished face. 'Miss Sanfaer, I'm from the Herald here in Waeverleyne. Our readers are anxious to hear more about your remarkable jewellery. What can you tell us about the istore?'

  Llandry was too amazed to speak. She stared as more figures appeared behind the reporter, many carrying image-captures and notepads. They hovered in the air around Llandry's front door, and more flashes of light assaulted her eyes. More figures appeared on the staircase below, wingless men and women from the other Dayland realms and even one brave (or desperate) man from Glour, his nocturnal eyes completely enclosed inside black-lensed goggles.

  Stunned, Llandry felt panic racing through her as this swarm of people converged upon her. The mail boy saved her, shoving her gracelessly back into her house and slamming the door behind her. The stacks of mail fell from Llandry's numb arms as she fumbled with the key.

  A knocking sounded at one of the windows. She darted through her house, breathless and shaking, slamming each window shut and barring the shutters. Only when each possible entry into her house was firmly closed did she slow down. She slumped to the floor, fighting with herself for every breath of air. She felt ready to asphyxiate. Stumbling through to her kitchen, she found her cordial and took a long swallow, her hands trembling so badly she almost dropped the bottle.

  It took her an hour to calm down, an hour that she spent curled up on her kitchen floor with Sigwide in her arms. The orting was alarmed, too; her latent summoner senses caught his fear, but she was too thoroughly disturbed herself to do more than hold him close and wait until they both felt soothed. At length her breathing eased and she felt stable enough to brew tea without shattering her teapot and cups. She rose to her feet a little shakily, tucking Sigwide into the carry sling she always wore around her waist. He would be happier kept close.

  The letters were more of the same. She perused a selection of them as she sipped her tea, choosing several at random. There were forty letters today, half of them containing orders for jewellery together with money in several currencies. Many of them had vastly overpaid her, even though her prices were already (so it seemed to her) extremely high. She laid a cool hand against her hot forehead, her thoughts buzzing. She had fifteen orders already outstanding, so that made thirty-five, and she had only enough istore left to fill approximately ten of them. But with that swarm of bodies outside her house, how could she possibly reach her cave without being accosted, questioned, petitioned, detained, or possibly worse?

  She thought briefly about giving the whole thing up. It was a tempting thought, but would it bring the desired results? Would the letters stop coming? Would the pushy petitioners stop crowding her doorway? Doubtful. It was too late for that.

  Besides, if she was honest with herself, the prospect of giving up her istore was painful. No matter how much trouble it brought her, she still felt soothed when she held a nugget of that stone in her hands. Wearing it made her feel stronger in some way, calmer, more in control of herself. She lost some of that feeling of dislocation, that sense she always carried of being out of place and out of sync with the rest of the world. Spending her days working with it, running it through her fingers, polishing its beauty and setting it into a succession of equally beauteous items made her satisfied, proud, happy. She couldn't imagine just abandoning it.

  ***

  Her supply of raw gems ran out three days later, but the crush of bodies outside her house had not diminished. She'd stopped going anywhere near the door, not even to collect the mail that continued to pour through her letterbox. Every time she approached the front of her house she could hear them talking, sometimes shouting, banging on her door. She stayed near the back of the house.

  But now she had ten completed items to mail, twenty-five more to make (not counting those orders that were probably lying, unopened, in her hallway) and no more istore. She would have to find a way to leave her house undetected.

  She waited until the late hours of the Eventide, a time when most people across the city of Waeverleyne were asleep (usually including herself). Creeping to the front of her house, she found that everything was blissfully quiet. She packed her tools and her packages in a pack slung low on her back beneath her wings. Then, eschewing her front door, she slipped out of her kitchen window and climbed onto the roof.

  Waeverleyne lay in the soft, low eventide light that was artificially created by Glinnery's sorcerers. That meant it was night time beyond the Dayland enchantments, a time when Daylanders were not usually roaming abroad. On the other hand, the muted light was more favourable for the Darklanders. She would still have to be careful. She took to the skies, angling up and up until she was flying just beneath the vast, spreading caps of Glinnery's signature glissenwol trees. She reached the nearest mail station without encountering anybody, and slid her collection of small packages into the secure box one by one. Then she was away once more, aiming this time for the outskirts of Glinnery and her cave in the ground. Nothing reached her eyes or ears save the usual soft sounds of eventide, and she finally began to relax.

  Then three figures appeared in the air before her, cutting her off. She stopped, startled. Her wings beat slowly, holding her aloft as she studied the three. Two men and a woman, all clearly citizens of Glinnery, though the features and clothing of one suggested some Nimdren blood. They smiled pleasantly enough at her, but their intention to detain her was clear. She said nothing, waiting. The woman spoke first.

  'I sent you a letter.'

  'So did I.' That was the Nimdren.

  'You never answered.'

  'So we thought we'd ask you in person.'

  The third man approached, looking her over. His eyes lingered on the belt at her waist, the bag hanging from her shoulders. 'On your way there now, are you? They said you only come out of your house for more istore. That's true, isn't it? We've been waiting for days.' He spoke lightly, trying to smile, but there was an intensity about him that unnerved Llandry. She shook her head, mute.

  'We're going with you. That's probably easier for everyone, isn't it? No doubt you're too busy to write letters.'

  Llandry shook her head again, searching futilely for her voice. The man frowned, and all three fluttered closer to her.

  'We understand you want to keep it for yourself. Who wouldn't? But don't you think that's selfish? We do.'

  She angled her wings, retreating a little further backwards with each slow beat. They followed her, inexorable.

  'All right, you're not going there now. That's fine. Why don't you just tell us where to find it?'

  Llandry blinked, one word circling around her mind. 'Selfish?'

  'That's right. Don't you want anyone else to benefit from it?'

  Guilt worked at her, eroding her certainty. Maybe they were right. Should she have ignored the letters? Was she behaving like a good businesswoman, or was she being greedy?

  She opened her mouth, intending to tell them everything. Perhaps they sensed her weakening, for all three of them descended on her, circling her eagerly. Their proximity, their urgency, silenced her again and all she could think about was escape.

  She dropped, flying hard. She heard them behind her, calling out to her as she wove through the tree trunks, trying futilely to lose them. They dogged her all the way to the balcony
of her home. The doors were locked and barred from the inside, she remembered with chagrin. She darted around the building, threw herself back through her kitchen window and slammed it closed. Knocking came from different parts of her house in succession, signalling that her pursuers were seeking a way in. She stood frozen, gasping for breath, terrified. What did they mean to do if they did get in? There had been an air of desperation about them, as though they strove to act rationally but something spurred them relentlessly on. What was it about her pretty istore stone that created such fervour?

  ***

  Exhausted from her eventide activities, Llandry slept late the next morning. She rose to find her parents seated in her living room, though the atmosphere was strained. Her mother looked up as Llandry entered. She was unusually pale, her face drawn and her eyes hard.

  'Ma, Pa...' Llandry stopped in the doorway, unwilling to approach her livid parents. 'How did you get in?'

  'You mean past the hordes of intruders swarming around your house?' said Ynara icily. 'I sent them away, of course. I could have done so earlier, had it occurred to you to contact us.'

  Llandry winced. Her mother only spoke so formally when she was truly angry. 'I'm sorry, Ma. I didn't want to worry you.' She felt suddenly silly. It certainly hadn't occurred to her that her mother might be able to get rid of them.

  Ynara snorted. 'Did it occur to you that you might be in danger of worse than having your picture taken?'

  'They were just reporters, Ma.' Llandry risked a glance at her father. His face was closed, unreadable.

  'You're sure of that, are you?' Ynara slammed her book down onto the table and stood, advancing on Llandry. 'Yesterday I received a note from Eva Glostrum. You remember her from the Market, I'm sure. She tells me her istore ring was stolen. It was sent to a jeweller's, apparently, for some small adjustment, and lifted overnight. Just that ring.' Ynara lifted her brows and gave Llandry that stare, the one that expressed her extreme disappointment. It never failed to reduce Llandry to a miserable bundle of apologies.

  'Furthermore,' continued Ynara, 'My jewel box is missing. Naturally my beautiful istore bracelet is missing with it. What that means, I'm sure you'll gather, is that somebody has entered our house in the last couple of days and walked off with my jewellery. Nothing else, you understand. Only the jewellery. The implications of that are obvious enough. We came at once.' Llandry squirmed under her relentless stare. 'I don't know how you've avoided a break-in here, Llan, but remarkably you seem to be in one piece.'

  The use of her nickname suggested her mother was beginning to relent. Llandry drew in a breath, her eyes blurring. Ynara was rarely angry, but she was truly terrifying when her ire was properly aroused.

  'I'm sorry, Mamma,' she managed around the lump in her throat. 'I'm okay, really.'

  'Nice job with the barricades,' Aysun put in. She smiled lopsidedly, glancing at the furniture she'd piled against the large window when she'd returned last eve.

  'Thanks, Pa.'

  Ynara sighed and embraced her. Llandry clung to her, weak with relief.

  'Nobody's hurt you, have they?' her mother asked, fiercely. Llandry shook her head.

  'Fine, well. Your “friends” are in custody overnight. They'll be released tomorrow. They'll be facing prosecution if they bother you again. Meanwhile, Llan, I want you to come home for a while. We need you under our eye, where we can keep an eye on you.'

  Llandry stiffened. 'But, Ma, my house. I'm happy here. I can manage.'

  Ynara cast a meaningful glance at the shuttered window and its leaning barricade of furniture. 'I'm sure you can.'

  'It worked, didn't it?'

  'Please, Llan. If anything happens to you...' Ynara didn't need to finish the sentence. Llandry knew that her parents wouldn't sleep unless they knew she was well. Sometimes the intense love they had for her could be stifling. She suppressed a sigh and nodded her head.

  'All right, Ma. I need today to clear up a few things, then I'll come home tomorrow.'

  Ynara hesitated, then nodded. 'Then I'm requesting a guard for you for tonight. Just to make sure.' Ynara steered Llandry to a seat and pressed a cup of tea into her hands, stroking her hair.

  'Llan, you have to give this up.' Her father, hitherto uninvolved, now fixed her with a stern stare. 'This is out of control. Your safety is more important than your career.'

  Llandry winced inwardly. He was right, too much so for her to argue with him. Truthfully she'd begun to drown under the weight of her sudden success; she wouldn't much regret being freed of the burden.

  Except in one particular. Her istore was gone, entirely so. She'd used up the last pieces, fully expecting that she would soon be retrieving more. Not a single stone was left for her to keep. That part was intolerable.

  'I agree, Pa,' she said aloud. 'I'll make an announcement - no doubt there's a reporter or two still milling around somewhere - and the boards can pick it up. I suppose all those letters can simply be returned.'

  Ynara narrowed her eyes, suspicious. Llandry kept her face carefully blank. If she could satisfy her mother and father with her easy capitulation on this point, perhaps they wouldn't think to extract any inconvenient promises from her. Such as a ban on visiting her precious cave.

  'All right, love. Thank you,' Ynara said at last. 'I'll take the message for you later.'

  Llandry thought fast. Her parents would certainly stay until the guards were in place around her house. Nothing less would satisfy them. Nor would she have any opportunity to slip out to her cave after her return to her mother's house. It would have to be this eventide: now that the swarm of reporters was gone, she would only have to evade the guards. She knew her house better than they would: slipping out would be easy. It would be a quick journey, straight to the cave and straight back, collecting a mere few small stones. As long as she had one of her precious gems to hold and carry about with her, that would be enough.

  Chapter Six

  Eva stood in the conservatory of her home on Glour's prestigious Fifth Circle, carefully dripping nara-fruit juice onto a bed of parchment strips. From beneath a neat nest of twigs emerged a questing nose, tiny, black and twitching with eager interest. She opened her thoughts to the creature, showing it images of food, and juice, and warmth. Parchment rustled as the mouse emerged, promptly sinking its small, sharp teeth into her finger. She allowed it to draw her blood along with the juice, smiling at its enthusiasm. This one would make a fine culinary assistant to an artisan chef.

  She nudged the mouse back into its parchment nest and withdrew her hand. It had built itself a home in the corner of her conservatory, settling close to the glass where the silver moonlight came through particularly strongly. The mouse seemed happy, but it would be time to move it soon.

  First, though, she had a bird ready to depart the nest. Just now it was hanging upside down from the roof of the conservatory; a curious posture for a bird, but then, it was called a bird only because nobody knew how else to categorise it. She coaxed it down, drawing it to her with a mixture of command and entreaty. She took the role of its mother in the bird's mind, a being to be both trusted and obeyed. The bird soared gracefully downwards, settling on Eva's shoulder, gripping her with talons that clenched and unclenched restlessly. Eva winced as those surprisingly sharp claws pierced her skin. She objected still more when it began to peck at her ear, insistent and wholly oblivious to her pain.

  'I suppose that is a mark of affection, is it?' She stroked the bird's soft feathers, careful to avoid the webby membrane of its wings. She slipped her hand into a thick leather glove and held up her hand. The bird walked obligingly onto the glove, smoothing its indigo feathers nonchalantly.

  She'd taken to calling the little dringle-bird Skritch, a charitable interpretation of the effect its pacing had on the flesh of her shoulders. She was rather glad he was now ready to be delivered to his new companion-master, a herbalist living a few circles away.

  She had spent the day inspecting the va
st kennels the summoners kept outside the city. It was a ritual she observed every moon, even though it was years since she'd found anything to object to in the kennel masters' handling of the animals. Breeding season was approaching, and this year there was a good chance of a few new shortig pups. The species was notoriously hard to breed, and almost equally hard to track down in their native habitats in the Lower Realms. Their impressive tracking abilities made them in high demand with Vale's men, however, and he'd begged her to up the numbers available this year. Tricky, but she was certainly up to the challenge.

  She was still attired in her kennel clothes, plain cottons layered against the chill in the air. She wrapped a heavy wool cloak around herself, allowing Rikbeek, her gwaystrel, to tuck himself into the folds. He availed himself of an opportunity to bite her en route, which she ignored. It was an old custom. She left the house, keeping her thoughts bent on the dringle-bird pacing up and down her glove.

  It maintained its station obediently as she made her way through the streets beyond her house. Glour City was built in a series of rings, widening steadily from the nucleus of the city out to the broadest streets on the outermost edges. The innermost circles were the most prestigious: the first through to the fourth were reserved for city government offices and the manor homes - palaces, really - of its richest and most prominent inhabitants. Eva's position on the Fifth placed her among the second rank of citizens. She could have moved into the third or fourth circle years ago, taking her place among the other peers and government officials of the realm, but she liked the house she'd inherited. It made her feel a little bit closer to the father she'd lost, and the mother she'd barely known at all.

  Her destination was the house of her friend Meesa's husband, Numinar Wrobsley. A prominent and skilled herbalist, he lived on Circle Twelve in the heart of the trades quarter. Instead of situating his dwelling on the edges of the forest, as any reasonable potion maker might do, he had brought the forest to his home. The building was stacked atop tall stilts, which wasn't that unusual in Glour; many citizens liked to raise their houses a little closer to the firmament. Wrobsley's house was easily twice the height of even the tallest of the residential buildings elsewhere in the city. He had a garden spread atop the roof and he spent hours and hours up there, carefully tending the rare plants he'd had imported from the Lower Realms. He swore that the proximity to the pale moonlight kept his plants stronger and healthier than their sicklier cousins elsewhere in the city. It was as reasonable an explanation as any for his particularly potent concoctions.