Pilgrim 3, p.17
Pilgrim 3, page 17
“The best room you have,” Jelmay told an older man standing behind the counter at the inn, the man’s eyebrows bushy, his mustache thick and neatly trimmed.
“We only have three rooms,” he said carefully as he took the four of them in, “and only two of them are connected.”
“Then we will take the connected ones.” Jelmay produced some kip. He began counting it out an exaggerated way, showing off his wealth. This didn’t seem to faze the older man, who simply told him the price, took the money, and then handed Jelmay a pair of keys.
“My wife, Oiwa, will be by later with fresh linens, and something to eat. My name is Yudono, and if you need anything, please let me know.” He motioned them down a hallway lit by candlelight, Kudzu leaning on Danzen for support as they walked.
The first room was larger than the second and featured two beds as well as a seating area. The second room had a nicer view of the street outside the window, yet it only had one bed, and nowhere to sit aside from a single chair parked in front of a table in the corner. Danzen led Kudzu to this bed and helped her get in. He crouched before her, ignoring Jelmay and Yato’s chatter from the larger room.
“We will just be here a day,” Danzen told Kudzu. “You should rest, and I will see about bringing a healer by. I will let you know when I do, and you can change into whatever form you would like.”
“I’m feeling better,” she said, her voice just a little shaky.
“You are looking better as well, but it is best for you to rest. One of us will always be here, either Jelmay, Yato, or me. Just call.”
Kudzu nodded. “Thank you, Pilgrim.”
Danzen made his way through the door that connected the two rooms to find Jelmay drumming his hands on his belly. “It’s about time you got her all tucked in. Here’s what we need to do tonight. One, I want some real food, some meat, like I promised Lady Pilgrim.”
A quick glance to Yato told Danzen that she wasn’t as interested in food as Jelmay assumed she would be.
“So food, and we need to get a healer, or veterinarian, someone to take a look at our little fox friend. Also, there is a popular dice game they play in this region…”
“More gambling?” Yato asked.
“Of course, more gambling. How am I supposed to fund this trip without gambling? Perhaps you would like to join me and see how it’s done. After all, you aren’t going to be an assassin forever, are you? Maybe there’s a future in which you become a remarkable gambler, and if this is the case, you need someone like me to train you. If you didn’t know, I get these visions of the future from time to time, and it’s why I joined Pilgrim over here in the first place. To be honest, I haven’t had any visions lately, but I did have them before. Maybe it has to do with resting easily with good protection nearby. It’s not like I don’t have a care in the world, I just compartmentalize things.” Jelmay stepped to the door and looked back at the two of them. “Well, is one of you coming with me?”
“I’ll go,” Yato said, once Danzen didn’t respond.
Once they left the room, Danzen sat on the bed, figuring he would rest a little himself considering he had been up for the last thirty-six hours. But he didn’t feel right with Kudzu injured in the next room, so he eventually moved to the chair near her bedside, his arms crossed over his chest, his Blade of Darkness leaning against the wall, gauntlets on the desk, and his sword sheathed at his waist.
Always ready.
****
Danzen was disturbed about twenty minutes later by a knock at the door. He stood, his hand naturally finding its way to the hilt of his famed boomerang blade. The doors weren’t very thick; if he had wanted to, he could have loosed his blade in the direction of the door and reached the person on the other side.
“Hello? Is anyone in there? I’m here with linens.”
Danzen relaxed his guard once he realized that it was the wife of the man at the front desk, a woman named Oiwa. “Kudzu, we have company.” She was still in her human form, yet she had taken on a few of her fox features, including a longer snout and pointed ears. When she didn’t stir, Danzen simply made sure the blanket mostly covered her body before he went to the door.
“Your linens,” Oiwa said, the woman sniffing, her eyes bloodshot, nose and cheeks a pinkish red.
Danzen took them from her, and when he returned to the door she handed him a basket with a few slices of bread in it as well as jam in a small glass jar.
“We make, or should I say, I make now considering…” The woman stifled a sob. “I’m sorry, it’s been a rough day for me.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“As I was saying, this jam is made from a local berry that only grows in this region and only between spring and summer. You’re in luck. I just wish that…” She wiped her face with her arm after Danzen took the basket from her. “Again, my apologies.”
“Is there anything I can do?” he asked.
It was then that Oiwa finally looked up at him.
She was somewhere around sixty years of age, her long strands of gray hair combed back and tucked behind her ears, which had a way of showcasing her jewelry. It wasn’t gaudy or anything, but it was indicative of some of the jewelry Danzen had seen people wearing in the north with its small polished sandstones, many similar in color of the hills outside of the village, toward the Outer Regions.
As if she sensed that he was observing her jewelry, Oiwa lifted a hand to her ear and touched her earring, the woman slowly starting to turn away from him. “I’m sorry, my lord, I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“It’s fine.”
Oiwa was just stepping away when she stopped. “If you don’t mind me saying, you sure seem to have a lot of weapons,” she said, with her back to Danzen. For some reason, this caused him to tense up.
“Just two.”
“I saw more in the room. My husband said you had a large sword.”
“We will be on our way tomorrow, I assure you.”
“No, it’s nothing like that. I’m not judging you, I’m just…” Oiwa wiped her face with her arm. “It doesn’t really seem fair to ask you for any favors considering you don’t know me, but perhaps there is something I can help you with.”
“What’s that?”
“Yudono told me that one of your companions seems to be injured. You may not believe it looking at me, but I spent my youth working in the infirmary of the nunnery outside of the village. I went back and forth in my twenties as well, before I met my husband.”
“My mother is from that nunnery.”
“Is she now?”
“Shodren Ravja.”
“You… you are related to Shodren?” The woman turned to him, her eyes filling with wonder. “Why she’s quite the remarkable woman. To have suffered through the hardships she suffered through when she was younger…”
“You know about that?” Danzen asked.
“Everyone knows,” she said, not elaborating. There was a very real chance that she was referring to something else, but Danzen didn’t push her on it, or if she knew about his demon father. It was better not to.
“I did not know that.”
“Shodren rebuilt the nunnery after it was attacked by bandits trying to get to its remnant. She was tortured as well, at least that’s what people say, but she never let it distract her from her overall mission of helping people better understand their echoes. She used to come to town every two weeks or so and hold lessons for those interested in bending their echoes. She was always on call to perform rites and anything else villagers needed. I was unaware that you were her son.”
“I am.”
“Then what I was going to say earlier…” Oiwa shook her head. “It no longer applies. I will help you without an exchange.”
“I don’t mind helping, if it’s something I’m able to do.”
“You might not like what I would ask you to do,” she said carefully. Oiwa’s eyes dropped from his face to the weapons sheathed at Danzen’s waist. “I don’t want you to hurt him or anything, I just want answers.”
“Answers?”
She wiped her nose again. “About a week ago, my son, Shimaru, disappeared. There’s a local boy—I guess he’s no longer a boy anymore considering he’s the same age as my son, twenty, but I’ve always seen him as such. Anyway, if anyone in the village knows where my son is, it’s him, it’s Toku. Toku has struggled, you see. He wasn’t always this way, but he lost his father at an early age and spent a lot of time with his brother, who was part of a militia, a particularly nasty one. Your mother would know about them; it was never proven, but the people that attacked her nunnery were said to be a combination of bandits and militiamen. But, those are just rumors.”
“And you think Toku would know where your son is?” Danzen asked, trying to better understand what she was hinting at. Oiwa seemed to speak in a stream-of-consciousness type of way.
“Yes, according to a few others I talked to, Shimaru was last with him. I tried to ask, and Yudono has as well, but Toku won’t even give us the time of day. He is so rude! I’ve known him his entire life, and he won’t even see me? It’s not like this village is that large, yet he acts like he runs the place. And maybe…” She nodded bitterly. “Maybe Toku does. There’s a lot you don’t know about Odval, and if you want to get into it, we can, but we don’t have to. But you should know that the village is very kip-driven, a place where bribery goes a long way, from the elders to the group of men tasked with local law enforcement. I know they say everyone in the kingdom has a price, but whatever that price is, it’s lower here in Odval. And Toku, he understands this.”
“But why wouldn’t he tell you where your son is? It seems like a rather innocent question.”
“That’s what’s bothering me about the whole affair,” Oiwa said. “Why won’t he tell us? What does he know? Is my son dead? Did Toku do something to him? I really hope Shimaru hasn’t gotten involved with any local gambling or anything like that.”
“Is he the type who would do that?”
She shook her head. “Not really, but he has been a bit unsure of himself in the past. Very timid, you might say. My son went off to Sainshand to a governmental academy there and returned for the Floating Candle Festival.”
“Was there something different about him?”
“Nothing, just that Shimaru seemed even more willing to prove that…” She shook her head. “I want to say his masculinity, but it’s not quite that. I think he just wants to prove himself to others, so he is not viewed as a weak man by those who grew up with him. And he isn’t, he truly isn’t. Shimaru is brave, stupidly so. Don’t you for a minute think I’m saying my son is weak. He’s quite strong and very intelligent.”
“If I wanted to ask Toku about your son, where would I find him? For that matter…” Something Jelmay had mentioned came to Danzen. “Is Toku the type that would have something to do with the gambling around here?”
The woman bit her lip. “He certainly is.”
“In that case, if I were someone new to town, someone who wanted to just gamble for a night, where would I go?”
Something akin to a snarl appeared on Oiwa’s face. “There’s a tavern on the other side of the village, one of those places that caters to the lumber yards between here and Bahlingar. Anyway, look for a tavern called the Golden Knuckle. There’s nothing out of the ordinary about the place upon first glance, but once you enter, it’s pretty clear that there’s a gambling ring going on in the vicinity. You won’t be able to see it, but you’ll be able to hear it. From what others have told me, there is an exclusive entrance through a door next to the bar, but only if the bartender approves of your passage. So I would start there, I mean, if I was… new to town.”
“And you think this is where Toku would be?”
“That, I don’t know,” she said, “but I’m sure it’s a good place to start. You would think with a village of this size that I would instantly know where he is. Odval may look small, but it really has grown over the last fifty years, and part of the village was built over a cave system, so there are always things happening underground, if that makes sense to you. Passageways, smuggling, that sort of thing. I try to look the other way, but sometimes sin has a way of seeping through the cracks. I just hope…” Her voice cracked. “I just hope that Shimaru is doing well, wherever he is, and I pray that he’s alive.”
“Let me check on my friend, and tell her you’ll be looking after her,” Danzen said.
“May I come in?”
Danzen hesitated. “Just give me a minute.”
He closed the door behind him and approached Kudzu’s bed. She blinked her eyes open, sensing his presence.
“I have someone here to look after you,” Danzen said. “I will be gone for just a little while.”
“What were you talking about?” Kudzu asked softly.
“A number of things, but…” Danzen offered her one of his rare grins. “I need to find somebody, you just focus on resting.”
“You need to find someone?”
“Yes, for the owners of the inn. Their son has gone missing.”
Kudzu smiled. “You can’t help but try to be the hero, can you?”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” he said as he gently placed his hand on her shoulder. “You are half-transformed right now, so just be wary of that,” he told her.
Her snout began to soften as it morphed back to the face of a human, her ears doing the same. “I’ll remember.”
“I’m going to leave this here,” Danzen said as he withdrew Nomin’s blade. He placed it under her blanket.
“I don’t think I’ll need that…”
“Just in case. I’ll be back shortly. Either way, I will stop by to make sure you’re fine.”
“Thank you, Pilgrim, Danzen. And whatever you are about to do, be careful. We have to leave tomorrow, you know.”
“I know.”
“Once I’m better, we should bend our echoes together. I feel like I haven’t practiced in a while.”
“Sure,” he told her. “I would like that. Together.”
Kudzu stared into his eyes for a moment. “Good luck.”
****
The streets of Odval were barely lit, Danzen keeping to the shadows, starting to feel a hint of exhaustion from being awake for so long. It wasn’t anything he couldn’t handle, but he was going to be glad when the time came for him to finally put the night behind him and sleep for a few hours. It wouldn’t be much of a stretch for him to get information from the local ruffian named Toku once he found him. Hopefully, he would be able to wrap this up quickly.
Heading toward the other side of the village, Danzen’s eyes shifted to where the most light was coming from, a commotion that he hadn’t noticed during his last trip through Odval. He knew of the area with taverns, gambling dens, and pleasure houses; he had even gone after a mark or two there in the past, but he never really paid much attention to this particular area of the village, nor had he thought much about who Odval catered to, or why it had continued to grow.
Now it made sense.
With the lumber yards slowly stripping away the forests, and people settling down, those coming from Bahlingar or perhaps some of the even smaller villages in the Outer Regions, Odval was becoming a regional hub. As it stood, Odval was about as big as the First District of Suja Village, but it was clear in the construction already taking place that it would continue to grow into something much larger, something that would require several administrative districts. What would it look like a few decades from now? Would there be any of the forest left around it?
He knew the answer to this question, that it was inevitable. Change was as destructive as it was transformative.
The Golden Knuckle stood out mainly due to the honey-colored lanterns that hung from posts around the establishment, people outside conversing and drinking, a few arguing, barmaids coming in and out of a screen door to deliver drinks to those huddled around standing tables. It was lively, but not as crazy as it must have been a couple weeks back during the festival. There were still signs of the Floating Candle Festival, from discarded paper lanterns on the ground that had been trampled over to banners and paintings on some of the buildings, symbols of fortune, prayers for health and happiness. As Danzen approached the Golden Knuckle, a man grabbed his arm and looked him over.
“Do I know you?” he asked, squinting at Danzen, his words slightly slurred together.
“No.”
The man squeezed his arm; Danzen gave him a look that would have split a mountain in two. Even in his drunken state, the man sensed that he was looking death in the eyes. He quickly backed down.
Danzen entered the tavern and walked straight up to the bar, where the bartender, a thin man with a lump in his throat, studied him for a moment.
“What will it be?”
Danzen spotted the door that he knew led to the gamblers’ room and nodded to it. He thought he may have to use his Demon Speak ability, but the bartender simply motioned for him to head in.
Danzen passed under the stuffed head of a boar, its fangs easily six inches long, and from there into a rather large space bustling with activity, the room with high ceilings and seating on the second floor. There was another bar on the side of the establishment, a few patrons huddled near it, women serving them drinks. The left-hand side of the room featured card tables, a light haze in the air from hookahs smoked by men seated on cushions above, a few with their legs dangling through the railing of the second floor. Situated on the right side of the room were tables dedicated to various dice games, which was where Danzen found Jelmay, Yato standing near him.
“Something has come up,” Danzen said as he stepped up to the two of them, startling the young assassin. For his part, Jelmay paid little attention to Danzen, his eyes watching the dice that the dealer had just thrown. The three dice each landed on the number four, Jelmay gritting his teeth. “Not again,” he growled, tapping his finger on the table, the bakeneko currently in the form of the nondescript man he normally took, his hair slicked back for once, agitation in his eyes.
