Our group of fifteen headed for a huge table in the back of the tavern’s common room. More people were playing Vice inside the tavern, and a small crowd was watching and placing bets. Vice and betting went hand in hand, it seemed.

I eyed the game with jealousy but knew I didn’t have time for it.

I needed to bathe, and I needed to claim my bed vouchers. After that, I could relax a little with the others and finally get some food and drink in my belly.

I asked the tavern keeper if I could use their washroom and attacked the layers of filth on my body with soap. My clothing was too tarnished to save, but I could buy a new outfit later. For now, I gave it a worthy attempt with some soap and water and did my best to dry it before dressing again.

I couldn’t tell if she was only humoring my attention to hygiene, but Lyria followed my example and disappeared into the women’s washroom instead of joining the others, who were already ordering food and drinks as they settled into noisy conversation.

To my mild embarrassment, Lyria was already done cleaning up and waiting for me when I finally emerged. Her hair was still wet, and her face was clean. She had also removed her dented and scratched plate armor and wore only the simple, dark green tunic and long pants that were usually beneath it now. I guessed the armor was in her slip space.

“Feeling better, Princess Helmet?” she asked with a smirk.

“Please don’t start calling me that,” I said. “Hey… I think I want to go turn in my bed vouchers before I join the others to eat. It shouldn’t take too long, right?” I asked.

“Probably not,” she said with a shrug. “Want some company?”

“Are you coming because you don’t trust me not to get myself killed or because you just want to see the stats on my beds?”

“Both?”

We went to the table and made an excuse about me forgetting something at the alchemist’s shop. The others all said they weren’t going anywhere and said they’d see us when we were done.

Next, we went to the bar for directions.

“A furnisher?” the man repeated. He was burly and round at the waist with a thick, tangled gray beard. “Well… the closest one is Grimbo’s. It’s just across the street back toward the market district. Now, don’t go twisting my words here, but Grimbo is a grommet. Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” he added quickly.

“Is that a bad thing?” I asked.

“Oh, no, no,” the man said. “Grommets are great. I love ‘em.”

We waited for more explanation, but the man was just smiling awkwardly.

“If we had a problem with that, what would we do?” I asked carefully. I had no idea what had him acting so strange, but maybe it would be better not to risk this “grommet” thing if it could be avoided. After all, it could be another word for cursed tomte, and I would be happy if I never saw one of those again.

“That’s the thing,” he said, rubbing his hands together. “Folks who prefer—ah, well…” he sighed, setting his hands down and finally meeting our eyes. “Okay, look. Grimbo’s your only choice right now. There was another furnisher, but rumor is the grommets have been paying him to stay closed. They want all the voucher claims for themselves.”

“Should we be worried?” I asked.

“Worried? No, no. They’re quite harmless. They just… well, grommets like to watch. They really like it.”

With that slightly concerning introduction, I headed for the furnisher with Lyria.

“Why was he so weird about the grommet thing?” I asked once we were back outside in the noisy din of Thrask.

A group of Irons passed in front of us, each more battered, bruised, and bloody than the next. I stared after them, wondering what the hell they’d been through.

“Grommets are just unusual creatures. Harmless but strange as hell. I haven’t personally seen one, but I’ve heard stories.”

“You’ve never seen one?” I asked.

“Eros is a big place. Where I grew up, it was rare to see anybody who wasn’t human. It’s only so diverse here because Coil is only a few days ride by boat. There’s hardly any reason to venture out to frontier towns deeper in human territory, so more exotic races like grommets tend to gather in cities.”

“So this area is human territory?” I asked.

“Well, this area is tomte territory. But the rings are human territory. Fathom is at the center, and—”

“Fathom?” I asked as we waited to cut through foot traffic to cross the busy street. The tavern was against the tall rock ridge, but the buildings on the other side hung precariously over the edge. I’d seen them from up high and knew some hid long, winding staircases leading out their back down to the docks. I hoped the builders here had taken proper precautions to ensure none of their structures were about to tip over and fall hundreds of feet down to the docks below.

If the tomte engineers were anything like Bloody Steve, that was probably unlikely.

“Fathom is the capital city of humanity,” she explained. “It’s Ithariel’s home city. His influence keeps the corruption away, so there’s never any threat of infestations spilling over there or even rifts opening. Most of the other races originate from beyond his rings of influence.”

“You made it sound nearly impossible to survive outside the rings. Other races call it home out there?”

She nodded. “For people like us, sure. But Eros didn’t have rings of influence before Ithariel came along. The other races may not have a transcendent being like humanity, but they all find a way to get by out in the wilds. In some cases, Diamonds provide protection for entire cities. A few luckier races even claim to have a Mythril protecting them.” She grinned as if showing me what she thought of such things. “All I know is the other races think Ithariel could do more to shield their territory as well. Some of them think he keeps his influence limited to only protect human territory on purpose. It’s a bit of a contentious topic.”

“Yeah,” I said. “I’m not surprised.”

Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

“I think this is it,” Lyria said, looking up at a shop. It was a wooden building standing at a diagonal, almost leaning on the more sturdy-looking stone building to its side.

“Well,” I said, swallowing hard. “Time to find out what a grommet is, I guess?” And hope their buildings are sturdier than they look.

We stepped inside to the sound of a light bell jingling overhead. The thick wooden door swung closed behind us, almost completely muffling the sounds of the noisy city outside.

The shop was cramped, musty, and filled with earthy scents. I supposed I needed to get used to thinking of that smell as Erosian, rather than earthy.

It looked like an office, but it was an absolute mess—like a hoarder with a fondness for rocks, clumps of grass, and dirty roots had been busy stuffing the place to the brim. Most of the roots and some of the grass clumps had semicircular bite marks missing. Bitter-smelling, twisted roots that ended in onion-like bulbs hung from the rafters, bonking into our heads as we moved into the room.

Lovely.

Something was moving around deeper in the shop. There was a back room shielded by strings of dangling vegetables.

“Enjoy a moment,” a deep, scratchy voice called from deeper in the shop. “This one is coming!”

It sounded like somebody was shuffling things, dropping them, and bumping into walls back there. There was an occasional exclamation of “ooh,” or “ahh.”

Then, it emerged. The creature was about four feet tall and covered in thick, wavy brown hair originating from the top of its head.

Two disproportionately large eyes were mostly visible, peeking out from behind thin gaps in the flowing, brown hair. It watched us with an unblinking and slightly eerie gaze.

I flinched when a thin, hairless pink arm popped out from the side of its mane. The creature waved, showing two fingers and one thumb.

“Hey ho,” he said again in his scratchy voice as he walked to the desk with the sound of bare feet slapping the wood flooring. “This one is Grimbo. Welcome to Grimbo’s Fine Furnishings, Rocks, Roots, and Grass.” It paused, blinking slowly like a happy cat. “Your helmet is causing… satisfaction.”

“Oh,” I said. “Thank you, Grimbo.”

“Would you be purchasing rocks or roots, perhaps? The quality is causing… delicious feelings. This one can confirm.”

I saw something move below his eyes and realized he was smiling beneath all that hair. His teeth were flat, wide, and all the same size.

“No, thank you,” I said, inspecting the creature.

[Grommet, Level 1 (Wood)] “The grommets' home region is known for its long, grassy plains. Most of the year, the grass is a deep brown, providing the perfect place for grommets to blend in. When the grass blooms and turns green in the deep summer, the grommets chew off each other's hairy manes down to the nib. Their pink skin works almost as well as their brown hair for camouflage among the flowers native to their home pastures. In the wild, grommets form tight-knit communities called ‘Gromvilles.’ A Gromville can sometimes boast miles of underground tunnels.

“Many cities have strict regulations on grommet immigrants. Grommets are known to tunnel for leisure, fun, and as a social activity among friends. Their digging habits can open up cities to dangerous dungeons, expose hidden rifts, and even threaten the stability of structures above ground. While it is not polite to say openly, many view them as troublesome pests.”

Eros is a weird ass place.

The oddity of the grommet made me wonder about all the races here and where they came from. Humans looked exactly like humans from Earth. I was transported here from my world at some point in the past. Did that mean things like grommets were, too? Did this little guy’s long-lost ancestor wake up in a field and nearly get mugged by a tomte, too?

It seemed like a reasonably rational assumption, at least. Maybe Eros was like a multidimensional dumping ground, slowly accumulating all kinds of strange, alien races.

I put the thoughts from my mind, focusing back on Grimbo’s unblinking attention. “I’ve got some bed vouchers to turn in.”

“Vouchers?” Grimbo asked. He didn’t have eyebrows, but the area above his eyes twitched upward. “More than one? Hm? This one is feeling… curiosity.”

I looked Lyria’s way, hoping she could figure out what I was wondering through my helmet. She just leaned closer, voice low. “Grommets really are harmless. I’ve never heard a single thing about them cheating somebody.”

I nodded, then turned my focus back to Grimbo. “I’ve got one epic, one legendary, and one–”

Grimbo’s eyes closed slowly, and a deep, womp womp womp sound started to come from somewhere in his… chest? The sound shook through me like a subwoofer cranked to maximum. He was smiling beneath his fur.

The noise stopped after a few moments, and he gradually opened his eyes. “Excitement… This one feels excitement. Legendary bed voucher…” He moved to a string dangling from the wall and started to tug it. I thought I could hear a bell ringing somewhere deeper in his shop.

“What the hell is going on?” I whispered to Lyria.

“I think he’s probably calling his friends so they can watch, too.”

After ringing the bell a few more times, Grimbo waved for us to follow him into the back of his shop. We entered a larger room. I recognized one of the dimensional boxes like I’d seen in Riverwell, but Grimbo was walking past it.

“Isn’t that—”

Grimbo turned, flashing his teeth again. “You will keep the secret, yes?”

“We actually just wanted to claim our vouchers and go,” I said. “Our friends are kind of waiting on us.”

The area I assumed would be his shoulders lifted slightly. The large, white eyes narrowed. “Grommets are told not to dig. But… Grimbo digs. We all do,” he added with another hair-covered smile.

Alright. Apparently, we were doing secrets anyway.

He pulled back another curtain of beads, leading us to a bedroom. Grimbo pulled his bed—a mat of what I assumed was his own shed hair clumped up in a nest—aside.

There was a hole in the ground.

We stared. A ladder led down a few feet, and then the tunnel looked like it cut straight under the street outside.

“Where does this lead?” I asked. I don’t know why that was the question I asked. I could’ve probably asked a hundred questions, though. Why are you so strange? What do you look like when you’re hairless and trying to blend in with pink flowers? Why are we walking past the big-ass box that we’re supposed to use to claim my bed vouchers?

“This goes,” Grimbo replied.

“Does it go somewhere we can claim my bed vouchers?” I asked.

Grimbo made a creaking noise like an old chair moving back and forth. Was that laughter?

“Yes, yes,” Grimbo said, descending the ladder. “A grommet will never cause you harm. Of course not.” He looked up at us from down in the tunnel, raising one pink finger to point at his oversized eye. “But we like to watch.”

I looked at Lyria, who leaned closer, lowering her voice. “Let’s just get this over with.”

We followed him down the ladder and into the tunnel.

Strange, yellow glowing stones were occasionally pushed into the soft dirt walls to provide light. I saw shadows cast over endless grooves as if Grimbo had dug this all by hand.

“This is some great digging,” I said to make conversation as we crouched low, following Grimbo.

“Gratitude,” he said.

“How much farther is it, exactly?” I asked.

He turned toward me, then reached to part his hair—fur? I flinched back in amused horror when I realized he was pulling his hair aside so I could see he was smiling with those big, flat teeth of his.

As if that was all the answer I should need, he turned and started walking again, leading us deeper.

“If he tries anything, I’m punting him,” Lyria whispered.

“I try many things,” he said matter-of-factly, showing no hint of being bothered by her threat.

“Is it much farther?” I asked. My resolve to keep following this thing was thinning by the minute. I’d seen the furniture claiming thing back in his shop. I was halfway tempted to rush back there and stick the vouchers in myself. But I guessed I wouldn’t know how to get the bed to my personal space without help. I also imagined that would be horribly rude.

I let out a deep breath. The things I’ll do for loot.