Chapter Three: Yellowvine City

Lacy spent a month at the Onslapithuanegi farmstead. In that time Max, Miya and a few other family members taught her all they knew about their culture and world, though they didn’t have nearly long enough to impart their writing system. Her language boon only translated verbal and physical communication, so she understood speech and gestures, but couldn’t read or write, though she did pick up some of the numbering system. Base 10, thank the gods!

When she wasn’t being tutored Lacy had primarily spent her time with Max in the vegetable fields—not rice—and performing other chores. It hurt a little to see the young man so smitten with her but she didn’t feel comfortable outright rejecting him and breaking his heart. She also couldn’t spend her time helping other men because after the first week everyone kind of accepted her as being Max’s due to their close proximity. It was…scary, to say the least, but nothing bad came of it. The other young men interested in her just kept their distance, which benefited her because she wasn’t looking for romance.

Presently, after that month of chores and learning, Lacy sat beside Thenja atop a wagon being pulled by a donkey and guarded by Uru, one of the Pole village cultivators. Despite everyone’s warnings she’d still sought one of them out, but indirectly. Instead of asking for the cultivators themselves Lacy carefully asked about their partners before befriending one of them. All the guards were male, one was a single old man who slept around, one was gay with a male partner, and the last was Uru. She didn’t want to risk attracting bad attention from the old man and she didn’t want to look like she was trying to seduce the gay guard’s husband, so Thenja was the obvious choice.

Lacy had hung around where Thenja lived until they “coincidentally” bumped into each other. Thankfully, instead of being forced to manufacture a reason to meaningfully interact, the other woman recognized Lacy, initiated conversation, and asked to be friends. Just like with Max, Lacy enjoyed Thenja’s presence but felt bad about using her.

After getting to know Thenja, the woman naturally introduced Lacy to her husband, the esteemed and mysterious village guard, to whom Lacy expressed her interest in becoming a warrior herself. It was a week before the man would take her seriously but in the end Thenja helped convince him to do Lacy the favor of guiding her through Yellowvine and introducing her to the city guard recruitment center. As Max put it based on his father’s experiences, getting vouched for by an active-duty guard was paramount for a smoother admittance because there was less paperwork.

“I see the city!” Thenja cried with a smile as she shook Lacy’s shoulder. “Oh, you’ll make a wonderful warrior, Lacy!”

Lacy chuckled and patted Thenja’s hand affectionately.

“Thank you, I hope so, too.”

“It’s going to be difficult,” Uru added from beside the wagon, having been walking instead of riding the wagon for the entire day’s journey. He hadn’t even broken a sweat. “The regiment is…almost torturous, but don’t tell anyone you heard that. One guy described it like that and the instructors gave him hell.”

When Uru said “hell” Lacy understood that he’d actually said “the whip” but metaphorically in the same way she’d say “they gave him hell”. Metaphors and the like used to give her headaches with that strange feeling of knowledge being put into her mind, but she’d gotten used to it.

“I understand, I think,” Lacy said amicably. “I will take your advice and leave in a hurry if it becomes too much.”

“Good, good,” Uru sighed, obviously still against Lacy trying to become a cultivator. “Everyone is allowed to leave whenever they’d like, so please do so before my vacation is over so that you may join Thenja and I on the return trip,” he reminded Lacy for the third time.

“Yes, of course.”

Dusk was just around the corner but still far enough away that Lacy had no trouble making out the city’s details as they approached. Its walls stood only a few meters tall, allowing a decent view of the the closest buildings within, which matched the architecture of Pole but with more sophisticated details along the roofs. Straight ahead, the dirt road led to a large, open gate.

Only one building stood much taller than the rest—the recruitment center—but she could barely make it out in the distance. Lacy found her nerves tighten as she laid her eyes upon its vague outline. This was it. The beginning of her magical journey. It all started here in Yellowvine City.

After a few minutes the dirt road that connected Pole to Yellowvine widened as it was joined by the roads leading to some other farming communities—though there were many other farms for Yellowvine elsewhere—and Lacy’s eyes ate everything up. There were two other roads, one of which had no one on it while the other carried an entire caravan that stretched for miles. Dozens, potentially hundreds of pulled carts and wagons covered in and surrounded by young men and women, elderly, and even some children. The very front carts carried recently slain animals of worryingly large sizes, some of the carts were covered in wool and fiber products like rugs, but most seemed to be full of produce. Made sense for a farming community.

“Why are the roads so empty except for that one?” Lacy asked, mostly just to play dumb. Others could forget she was an amnesiac, but she couldn’t.

“In about nine days Pole will also be moving a lot of goods to Yellowvine, but today seems to be…oh, which village was in that direction again?” Thenja wondered aloud.

“Ohg, dear,” Uru answered, twirling his spear with one hand out of boredom like he’d done so many times already.

“Yes, Ohg! Thank you, dear. As I was saying, Lacy, today seems to be Ohg’s day for transporting goods. It is farming villages like ours that feed Yellowvine, though we’re just one of many.”

“Ohhh, that makes sense,” Lacy affirmed appreciatively, while thinking about how ironic it was that Thenja, who lived off her husband’s guard money, was proud of being part of a farming village.

As Uru’s rented donkey wagon neared the city Lacy pursed her lips, wondering if they’d have to wait for all of the hundreds of people in the caravan ahead in the line to be processed before they could enter.

Lacy asked for clarification.

“The big gate is for caravans of merchants just like these folks,” Uru drolled, still twirling his spear. “The little gate is for us. We’re just visiting.”

Sure enough, Thenja navigated the wagon through a gap in the caravan, Lacy and some of the caravaneers exchanged smiles and waves, and they approached a much smaller gate that was still roomy enough for the wagon to comfortably enter. Thenja stopped the donkey within the gate, and Lacy marveled at how thick the city’s stone wall was. It must have been over six meters.

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Then Lacy noticed that the wall wasn’t made of stone bricks. It looked like solid stone, as if it’d risen from the ground like that.

A door in the wall opened, revealing a lightly armored man who kept his left hand on the sword attached to the right side of his belt. His other held a thick book that Lacy knew from her month in the farming village was made of heavily processed animal skin called vellum. This area hadn’t yet seemed to invent paper, or they didn’t need to.

“Origins, names, business, affiliations?” the gate guard asked boredly.

“Pole, Juka Uru, leisure, and Yellowvine Seed,” Uru replied smoothly. Lacy looked over and found Uru smiling lightly with his back straightened as he pulled a badge out of his breast pocket.

Upon hearing Uru’s affiliation the gate guard’s expression focused, and he, too, straightened his back. His hand left the pommel of his blade, he opened the book, and took out a primitive pencil.

“Welcome, fellow Seed,” the guard said. “And the others?”

Lacy almost volunteered her information but realized the guard had asked Uru.

Uru gestured with his open hand as he said, “Pole, Juka Thenja, leisure, my wife.” When the guard finished writing down Thenja’s information, Uru said, “This lady here is a bit trickier. These travel records might be her first documentation, as far as I’m aware. A farmhand found her unconscious in a field some forty nights ago with only the robe she wears currently, knowing nothing but her name and rough age. She’s a complete mystery.”

The guard gave Lacy a raised eyebrow, and she waved with as innocent a smile she could manage in return.

“Tricky, indeed. I imagine you plan to take her to an official for identification and records?”

Uru shook his head helplessly.

“Not to the normal kind of official, I’m afraid. You see, this lady has it in her head that she’ll become a cultivator. Wants to take part in the Yellowvine guard exams tomorrow.”

The guard actually had the gall to scoff, but Lacy kept an inquisitive expression as though she were just a dainty little flower who knew nothing of the world…which was only partly true.

“Wants to train as we did, you say?” he chortled right in Lacy’s face. “Interesting, interesting! Well, what do you reckon I should write on her?”

Uru replied, “Amnesiac woman discovered in Pole, Mathews Lacy, city guard exams. She has no affiliation, yet.”

The guard began writing as he muttered, “Makes enough sense.” When he finished he asked Uru, “Just in case, do you know where everything you need is? Donkey stables? Inn?”

Uru nodded and the guard let the trio be on their way.

“Night approaches. We rest at Yobi’s Inn,” Uru summarized their plans as Thenja guided the donkey onto the city’s main street.

Despite much of the city closing for dusk it was still quite the sight to behold and Lacy couldn’t help but gawk at everything. Having seen modern marvels back on Earth meant nothing when she was taking in an entirely new culture and civilization.

The packed dirt streets were lined with gutters made of bricks. The buildings were rather uniform but all still beautiful in their own ways, because while they shared design philosophies—like having a lot of open walls that revealed some interiors—they weren’t direct copies. It seemed the city got its name from the distinct decoration choice of painting yellow vines along the buildings, which were all multi-story and rather wide. Lacy had expected smaller buildings than the ones back in the United States, but in fact these were broader.

Observing the city’s people revealed why the buildings were so big. While some were businesses most were residential, and playing children being watched by older children or adults were common. The houses seemed to be inhabited by more than just a single romantic couple and their children each, being multi-generational or even multi-family.

But those were just the people in and around the buildings. On the streets were still many more flavors of folks, some pushing or pulling carts carrying goods, some on donkey-pulled wagons like the one Uru rented, and many more simply walking to their destinations. Some people walked in gaggles of same-age and same-sex friends, happily chittering away at low enough volumes that they could hear each other without disturbing the peace.

Just about everyone wore the same style of clothing—robes made of a single piece of fabric shaped in such a way that it was easy to wrap around one’s body and even easier to fold and put away when it wasn’t needed. Most people wore robes of solid colors—brown, gray, white—with only slight variations in decorations, which were mostly just a bright stripe here and there. Only one couple wore robes covered in intricately sewn flowers as they entered what looked like a restaurant, followed by a personal guard.

“Careful not to ogle, Lacy,” Uru said softly after he caught her staring straight at the couple wearing beautiful robes. “I know it’s all new and interesting compared to Pole, but city people don’t appreciate strangers looking too closely. Take only glances.”

“Of course, yes, sorry,” Lacy hurriedly apologized as she remembered she wasn’t an American tourist who would probably be fine no matter what she did. This was an alien world full of people who didn’t care about her. If she angered someone who had power and a bit too much ego, they might not let her off with just a warning, if not cut her down on the spot.

Fun adventures and a Deity’s request weren’t the only reasons she was aiming to become a cultivator. The ability to protect herself in a world with potentially even fewer civil rights than some of Earth’s worst countries was paramount to her comfortable survival if she couldn’t accomplish what the Deity needed of her.

Eventually Thenja drove the wagon onto a few side streets that led to a large donkey stable. Lacy couldn’t read the sign but an assistant helpfully welcomed them to Yobi’s Inn and asked if they had a stable reservation or would like to book one inside the inn. Uru produced a document of vellum with a stamp at the bottom before flashing the same badge he’d shown the gate guard. The assistant thanked Uru and offered to stow the donkey and wagon for them, so Thenja and Lacy disembarked with their stuff—Thenja had a single piece of luggage while Lacy carried everything of hers in robe pockets—before the assistant took over the reins and bid them a good night.

“Come, this way,” Uru said, leading the women around the smelly stable to the attached complex. “Yobi’s Inn is a fine establishment that caters only to those with at least some status,” he said smugly. Lacy already knew this from when he’d bragged about it back at Pole, which had a franchise donkey-wagon-renting location for Pole residents to make stable reservations at different locations so that they weren’t left with nowhere to put their ride. Lacy wondered how it all worked without the internet or some other form of high-speed communication. It was probably a lot easier to commit fraud in this world, or to overbook stables.

Uru swaggered right through the inn’s main entrance with Thenja to his right, spear in his left hand. Lacy followed from behind. Both Thenja and Lacy kept their hands together in front of themselves, as was custom for women in polite company. The interior was lavish with polished wooden flooring and large beast skulls mounted between detailed murals on the walls. Instead of the usual candle lighting, Yobi’s Inn had magical light crystals that softly lit the entire room. She wasn’t surprised by the light crystals because Miya had explained them to her when she briefly visited Pole’s resident physician, whose office was lit by crystals to avoid exposing patients to smoke.

The lobby had a few people sitting around chatting softly but was otherwise quite empty. Uru walked up to the receptionist with his vellum document and badge ready.

“Welcome, honored guest. How many rooms, how many nights?” the man behind the counter greeted with a smile, though he didn’t seem particularly reverent of Uru’s status as a city cultivator. Uru seemed to realize the same, but instead of being irritated and getting uppity, his ego cooled.

“Yes, um…” That was the first time Lacy had heard Uru hesitate. “Two rooms for four nights, please.”

Uru exchanged payment for two keys and the receptionist described where to go. The trio exited the main building, entering a large garden with many long, two-story buildings making up its walls. They entered the building labeled “3” by a large sign. Inside was just a long hallway with rooms at either side. They didn’t go down the hallway, instead taking the stairs next to the entrance, which led to an identical second floor. At the end of that hall they found their two rooms.

Uru handed Lacy her key, saying, “Pleasant dreams, Lacy. I’m tired and will retire now with my Thenja.”

Lacy caught Thenja’s eyebrows furrow slightly from behind Uru, but she schooled her expression before the man turned around, opened the door, and led his wife inside.

“Good night, Lacy!” Thenja said, waving. “I’ll see you in the morning!”

Then the door shut and Lacy was alone in the hall. With a sigh, she entered her own room.