Hungry Heart - Book 5 - Ch. 15 (Patreon)

Chapter One / Chapter Two / Chapter Three / Chapter Four / Chapter Five / Chapter Six / Chapter Seven / Chapter Eight / Chapter Nine / Chapter Ten / Chapter Eleven / Chapter Twelve / Chapter Thirteen / Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen – Glorious Ends

Varg had a mind to ask Vetor how long they were going to walk like this, but since he needed to keep the curator in his teeth, that was not an option. Just as he was about to start losing his patience, Vetor mumbled in his most morose voice, “Turn left here.”

At least that was a sign that they were moving toward a destination. Varg’s nose continued to sniff the air, and, as he began putting two and two together, he realized what Vetor was trying to do. He was quite unceremonious as he threw the ball of fur to the ground and stopped him from getting away by putting his paw on top of the curator fast.

“We’ve been walking in circles, haven’t we?” he asked in a low growl.

“How did you know? You’re a beast, you shouldn’t know such things,” Vetor protested and struggled to get away to no avail.

“I might be a beast, but I do have a head on my shoulders and I’m good at using it,” Varg replied. “Did you really think you could fool me like this? And what did you think would happen?”

“I hoped you’d grow tired and fall asleep. Then, I’d be free and you’d still be trapped down here.”

“Hmm,” Varg let out. “You could have done that already.”

“Done what?” Vetor asked suavely as if he couldn’t recall what he had just said.

“You’re the one who trapped me in this strange labyrinth from the beginning. Why do you keep coming back to me? You must want something.”

Vetor remained quiet for a bit and then exploded, “You’re not supposed to be here! What sort of forms should I use for you? I could go with CX-28, but you see, you’re a shapeshifter, and that doesn’t work. Or I could use 123-I, but that’s no good either, because you don’t admit to any greed! How am I supposed to work under these conditions? You’re… you’re… you’re an aberration!” the curator shouted as loudly as his tiny frame would allow.

“You seem to be a few bricks short of a load,” Varg commented. “Do you want me to give you the solution to your dilemma?”

“Yes!” Vetor exclaimed. “I would be in your debt if you helped me,” he added hurriedly.

“Take me out of here. Then you won’t have to fill out any form at all. It would be as if I never was here. Problem solved.”

“No, no,” Vetor complained in a pitiful voice, “I can’t do that. I am the curator of the Market of the Damned. I have never missed work a day in my life. I am a conscientious servant of Coinvale, and I would never neglect my duties. What you’re asking me to do is to commit fraud. Fraud!”

“Then how do you want to solve this problem? It looks to me like you can’t let it go.”

“Of course, I can’t let it go! What would the higher-ups think of me and my work etiquette? Soon enough, they’d find a replacement for me and then--”

The poor curator’s sides were heaving at the thought he might lose his job. Varg couldn’t figure out what could be so covetable about overseeing a bunch of tortured souls in the underground, but he didn’t need to understand the curator and his convoluted motives. What he needed was a way to get Vetor onboard with helping him so that he could return to his companions. If they were already near completing the shard by assembling all of the fragments and they were only waiting for him to make an appearance, they would surely be worried.

Varg had played along with the guardians and their wish to imprison him because he didn’t want to add any obstacles in Toru’s way when important things were at stake. However, it looked like his imprisonment had proven a lot more complicated than he had imagined. There were no judges to look over his case. There weren’t even jailers, if he didn’t count the wretched creature under his paw that agonized over the most mindboggling things.

“Stop,” he warned. “I think you know how to solve this situation, but you don’t want to solve it.”

“What a daring thing to say! I’ll have you know that I’ve been commended twice for my stellar performance, and I am looking forward to a third commendation from the rulers of the city.”

“And when did you receive those commendations?”

Vetor paused. “I can’t remember,” he whispered as if that realization surprised him as much as it did Varg.

“How is that possible? How long have you been here, Vetor?”

“I’ve been here… all my life.”

“You don’t sound too convinced to me.”

“I am… I must be. This is my job. I am the curator of the Market of the Damned and I was given this honor by the Council of Merchants.”

Varg was starting to understand that something was not quite right with the curator’s mind and the way he remembered things. That was a weakness, and he intended to exploit it to help accomplish his own goals.

“When were you convicted to serve here?” he asked, as an inkling began to take shape in his mind.

“Me? Convicted?” Vetor squealed. “I am not one of the convicts! You are! You should be registered under form number AS-45s! Yes, that’s it! That’s how I should categorize you!”

“No, that’s not true. That’s not the form you should use for me,” Varg contradicted the curator, as his thoughts solidified in a new realization.

“You’re right,” Vetor moaned in despair. “You have fur on you, so that form is no good. What should I do?”

“Admit it. There’s no form you can use for me.”

“No, no, that’s not true! There’s a form, but I only have to think of what it is. Yes, I need to think!”

“Think for as long as you want,” Varg suggested. “As you can see, I’m magnanimous. I promise not to squash you under my paw. Take your time, but I’m telling you the truth. You have no form for me, hence your unsolvable problem.”

“I can solve any problem!” Vetor protested in a high-pitched voice. “You can’t say something like that. It’s wrong and not true!”

“Then go ahead, what form do you use for shapeshifters usually?”

“I use… I use…”

Varg had to admit that he felt marginally bad about putting the poor curator on the spot like this, but he saw no other path forward but to force the other to see the error of his ways.

“You’re a shapeshifter,” he said in an accusing voice.

“What? I’m not!”

“Yes, you are. You turned into that tiny old man and played the judge only earlier. Something tells me that’s against the rules.”

“No, no…” Vetor began sobbing. “How did you know?”

“I’m a shapeshifter. I can tell other shapeshifters from a mile away,” Varg explained.

“But you didn’t know earlier… when we met… you had no idea…”

“No point in clutching at straws. You have to admit that the form you use for shapeshifters exists, but you can’t use it, because you have only used it once, when you admitted yourself in here.”

“That’s a lie! A horrible, disgusting lie!”

“What kind of shapeshifter are you?” Varg continued, completely ignoring Vetor’s wails.

“I’m not, you are!”

Varg knew he had to press the curator until he gave in. “Can it be that so much time has passed that you don’t remember who you are.”

Vetor only sobbed quietly.

“Did you lie on that form? Why?” Varg continued his interrogation.

“I didn’t… that’s why shapeshifters should never come here,” Vetor said in a small, pleading voice.

“Why? Why shouldn’t shapeshifters come here?”

“Because… I don’t have a form for them. I… lost it.” It seemed as if that admission took all of Vetor’s strength, dragging it out of him.

“You didn’t lose it. You hid it.” Varg hoped that he wasn’t handing Vetor just the right tool for imprisoning him here for all eternity.

“How did you know?” Vetor asked. He seemed bewildered and his voice was far from the accusing arrogance of before.

“I know because I’m a shapeshifter,” Varg said the most obvious lie that came to mind. There was something about Vetor and shapeshifters that he needed to shed a light on. So far, he had put two and two together and it looked like he’d been right, but he was still walking through quicksand and needed to nail the problem down if he had any hope of getting the curator on his side.

“Of course,” Vetor moaned again. “But I can’t use that form again. It’s beyond anyone’s reach. Maybe you could get it for me?” he asked hopefully.

As if such a cunning trick would be enough to catch a wolf with silver in his hair. Varg bared his teeth and hovered over Vetor. “No. You will have to free me.”

“But how? I’ll have to lead you straight to the secret.” Vetor’s voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper.

“And? If you must, you must. After all, I suppose that your workday must end soon.”

Vetor might not have set working hours; he might very well work around the clock without a moment of rest. That could very well be his punishment.

His greed.

“I still have time to solve this problem,” Vetor mumbled to himself. “There are still hours left.”

“You worked all of the time and because you were tired, you made a mess out of your work. Was that your crime?”

“That’s not true, who says so?” Vetor asked. Now, he sounded frightened.

“You just confirmed it to me. Then, since you made a mistake once, a second doesn’t matter.”

“No, no, no, that’s not true. I don’t make mistakes.”

“If you don’t make mistakes, why are you here?” Varg asked. “Why are you the curator of the Market of the Damned, a place that doesn’t need an overseer?”

“What are you talking about? This place can’t function without me.”

“Is that true? Then how come you’re wasting your precious time with me here, instead of doing your job?”

That appear to give Vetor pause. It seemed to be a dilemma he couldn’t resolve. His mumbling intensified, and Varg waited patiently.

“Fine! I will take you to see the secret,” Vetor agreed as if that was what Varg had been pressing him on.

“Will it tell me the way out? Will it show it to me?” Varg asked. “Because if it doesn’t, you’ll fail, too.”

“No,” Vetor replied. “It won’t show you the way out. It is the way out.”

That was an interesting detail. Varg decreased the pressure of his paw on Vetor’s small frame. “Very well, then. Show me the way. No tricks now. I’m getting hungrier by the moment.”

***

Duril wanted to see Toru’s face right now. Together with Sogou, he was taking an incredible risk. But the guardians had appeared everywhere, all over the city. Wherever they went, they found them stationed there, in front of the houses, waiting to catch anyone who tried to get inside and remove the shard fragments. Their loyalty to such a task seemed suspicious to Duril.

Since the same thing appeared to be happening everywhere, it meant that Toru must have halted his quest as well. Had he made the situation worse by agreeing with Sogou’s plan? His young companion began asking around and discovered that Claw and Toru must have been noticed in their efforts to get to the shard fragments, just as much as had a young merchant accompanied by the blacksmith with one arm.

The city was beginning to fret; he could tell from the murmurs exchanged between the people gathered in the streets, at the doors of their houses and businesses. Ever since the mock Heart of Tradeweaving had fallen from the sky, the inhabitants of Coinvale had become a lot more suspicious of strangers.

They didn’t treat Sogou any differently because of his merchant clothes, and the familiar sound of his jargon. He spoke their language, and therefore, they saw him as one of theirs. They couldn’t suspect for even a moment that Sogou was working hand in hand with an outsider. That was their saving grace, but the storyteller’s plan seemed more and more dangerous now.

“Sogou,” he said as they walked through the city, “do you think it was the Council of Merchants that ordered the city’s guardians to take action to address the strange disappearances of the shard fragments?”

“The merchants of Coinvale, even those as high up as the Council, do not have power over the guardians,” Sogou explained. “They might offer suggestions or make requests from time to time, but they do not give them orders directly. The guardians take care that the Rules of Harmony are obeyed, but that is all. No one wants to be part of that business.”

“Convenient,” Duril remarked. “And no one has ever thought that these guardians might abuse their power?”

“It hasn’t happened thus far.” Sogou then added quietly, “Not that we know of, at least.”

Could people be blamed for turning a blind eye because they chose to let themselves be fooled into believing that a force like that of the guardians – a numerous force – would keep to the letter of the law without deviating from it for a moment?

Duril wished he had a black-and-white answer to that question, but it didn’t help at all that he knew how much hung in the balance. On the one hand, Toru’s quest was noble and pure. On the other hand, condemning an entire city for a silent, collective choice such as this, seemed impossible.

In the end, they hadn’t been able to gather even one more of the shard fragments still doing their work in people’s homes, because the guardians seemed to be everywhere. Duril could tell that Sogou’s silences had begun to stretch, longer and longer, as if the young storyteller needed to take time to process the fact that there was something about his beloved city that he hadn’t been aware of so far.

“Sogou,” he began, “what are you thinking about? If you don’t think that we would risk anything by going to the Council of Merchants, know that I am on your side. I would do all that is in my power to help Toru, but I would never put someone else at risk. We’ll find another way to help him.”

“Forgive me for letting myself wander about in my own head. It happens to me all the time. No, there is no need for me to go back on my promise to help you.”

Duril knew that Sogou might take some liberties in how he understood their conversation, but he had no doubt that the young man was highly intelligent and therefore his plan could be just as good as any. He still had trouble accepting that the young lad would be at risk, too, by embarking on this dangerous endeavor, but at the same time, he understood Sogou’s need for adventure just as well. In case the guardians in charge of enforcing the Rules of Harmony were, in fact, a threat to the city through their sheer numbers and dubious nature – it had to be dubious, or else it wouldn’t make any sense why Varg had as good as disappeared from the face of the earth – the merchants that ruled Coinvale, along with the entire population, needed to learn about it. No good would ever come from nurturing evil and making use of it even without bad intentions.

“Have you ever met anyone from the Council?” Duril asked, as they moved swiftly through the winding streets of the city.

“No, I cannot say that I have. But my father is convinced that the merchants ruling our city are wise and patient. You might look around and see all the riches our city has to offer, but there’s more to our beloved Coinvale than wealth. This is a place where great ideas are born. We love our gold, yes, and we don’t play the hypocrite, but we use it to better ourselves and discover great things that can and will change the fate of the entirety of Eawirith.”

Duril could tell by simply looking at the young man’s face that Sogou was genuine in the praise he doled out for Coinvale, and proud as well. He could understand such a thing, and he hoped that all of the kindness in the storyteller’s soul wouldn’t vanish upon learning some dark truths about the city where he had been born and raised.

Sogou stopped abruptly and pointed at a tall building to their left. Duril didn’t need any explanation as to the nature of the place. The tall statues guarding its entrance with opened books in their hands indicated that they were in front of a beautiful library.

“Do you know if they have a shard fragment?” Duril asked.

“No,” Sogou said briskly. “We should move on.”

Duril looked back at the tall colonnades standing along the front wall of the large library and wondered why Sogou had manifested something akin to anger when they passed by it.

“A place as big as that, they might need a few useful machines for sorting books, and maybe even a printer--”

“They are against anything that counts as what they call modern ways of ruining learning. And I’m being nice. The greybeards of the famous Library of Coinvale prefer being an obstacle in the way of advancing our city and its importance in the world. Also, they are unpleasant to talk to.”

Duril had a mind to tell Sogou that maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing, given how the entire city ran on fragments of a shard born from pure evil. But there might be some bad blood between those greybeards and the young storyteller that he didn’t know about.

“Will it be long until we reach the Council?”

“No. We will keep to our plan. You come from the mines of Sheparon, bringing news of how the shard fragments must be collected for a thorough inspection. Don’t worry, you won’t have to do more than stand there and nod gravely at the information I will provide the merchants with. We only need to ensure that they believe us for a short while, a few days at best. Enough for them to make use of their position and call off the guardians--”

“If they can. You told me how the guardians are not the Council’s underlings. Who is paying them the coin they need for that shiny armor they wear?” Duril asked.

“The Council does, of course. And I know that the merchants have no power over the guardians. However, they have enough authority to intervene and demand at least an explanation from the guardians, which means that we will have the necessary time – and maybe even help – for removing all the fragments that are still lurking around.”

“I admire your confidence. I will keep your advice in mind. You will hear very few words from me when we’re in the merchants’ presence.”

***

He hadn’t had that sensation for nothing. The closer they got to the Aureate Sea, the sweeter the air he felt filling his lungs. Everything became easier. All that wasn’t lost on Claw, who looked at him from time to time. He hadn’t considered the bearshifter as being out of the ordinary tall for someone of his kind, albeit he was impressive; right now, however, as Claw held him in his arms, Toru experienced fear at looking down as he sensed that the ground was far enough away for him to hurt himself if he were to make the wrong move and fall from his friend’s hands.

“Are we near?” he asked and closed his eyes.

“Almost,” Claw replied. “How strange. I can tell that there’s a breeze, although the Aureate Sea is like no sea I’ve ever seen.”

“I feel it, too. It’s soft on my face, like a caress,” he whispered.

Claw laughed softly. “I didn’t know you were the poetic sort. Maybe I should call you a poet from now on.”

“It wouldn’t be right. I barely know how to write a few letters, and I can’t read all the signs,” Toru argued.

“True poetry exists in someone’s heart, and it doesn’t matter if the words it’s made of ever take the shape of ink on paper.”

“Do you think so? I will tell Duril you said that. I’m sure he will be surprised. He doesn’t see me as someone who thinks poetic things.”

“You’re growing up, kitty. Some things are bound to change.”

The bearshifter’s words touched his heart. Yes, he was growing, but would he be the same tiger if he transformed into someone else?

“We’re here,” Claw told him and set him down by the shore.

Toru could feel the sand under him and hear the crash of waves like myriad coins tumbling over each other. Although its power was faint, Toru could sense the warmth of the Aureate Sea. It was the same as the warmth of the sun that helped him thrive. It was only natural, he thought. The sun warmed the sands of the Aureate Sea, and they held on to the warmth, moving gently under its fiery gaze.

His throat was so parched. He had to drink something, and if he did he’d surely be revigorated enough to get back to his quest. Letting his friends down by being weak was impossible to think of.

If he could only get a little closer. Claw must have missed him rolling away toward the waves, because he shouted at him just as Toru was about to quench his thirst by taking a mouthful of the moving sands.

“What are you doing?” Claw scolded him. “I have a pouch of water. You could just ask.”

The bear pushed the leather pouch into his hand. Lying on his back still, Toru tipped it up, letting the water splash over his face and scorched tongue. He coughed and let the leather pouch drop by his side. Water only made him thirstier. He needed more… no, he needed something else. Without thinking twice, he crawled on his elbows and knees toward the Aureate Sea once more.

“Toru,” Claw shouted. He grabbed him by the back of his neck to stop him. “You can’t drink sand.”

“Yes, I can,” Toru said back. He didn’t sound like a petulant child, either. On the contrary, he knew what was right for him, and Claw simply had no clue, which, for a wise bear like he was, made little to no sense. “Claw, I need to drink.”

“That’s not water,” Claw insisted.

“I know, but I need it.”

“I can’t let you.” Claw continued to pull him back, while Toru did his best to reach the rolling waves of golden sand.

He didn’t understand. Inside Toru, nothing but an endless, bottomless thirst remained. He had to get there, he had to touch it. He had to drink from it until he was full.

The bearshifter growled in surprise when Toru threw a handful of sand at his face. The short reprieve from being held was all he needed and he plunged, face-first, into the Aureate Sea.

Warmth bathed his face, and he opened his mouth to let it have its fill. The golden sand was like ambrosia on his tongue and he put his head in deeper.

He was pulled out by a strong arm. But when he looked up, it wasn’t Claw holding him.

It was one of the boat pilots. A messenger.

“How do you dare to taint the Aureate Sea?” the boat rider asked him, his wizened face all a frown.

There was more than that on the messenger’s face. There was also surprise.

“I’m thirsty,” Toru said and felt the earlier surge of power leaving his body.

“Thoughtless tiger,” the messenger complained in a stern voice, “you have brought it upon yourself.”

TBC

Next chapter