The venerable Rutherford Dibble, salesman extraordinaire, was the owner of The Astounding Cabinet of Unbelievable Rarities, situated in a rundown part of southern New Town, close to the checkpoint known as Hole in the Wall dividing Wallsen and New Town.

New Town was several city wards away from Old Town, being surrounded by Wallsen to the west, Urod Circle to the south, and Draggok Hill to the east. The area wasn’t exactly extravagant, but it was far from the squalor and lack of attention to details which Wallsen embodied full force. The houses here were mostly built of stone or brick, not wood, timber-frame, or mud. The streets were considerably cleaner and the stores around this part of town sold goods of a much higher quality, comparatively. ‘What a difference a wall makes’ was a Sonderport proverb.

The building itself was an ordinary-looking, two-storey tenement house of whitewashed brick, and the windows into the shop on the ground floor looked greyish and rain-spattered. The sign hanging above the door, however, was wildly colourful, which made it seem quite loud in the slightly dreary street.

It was comparatively much more expensive to live in New Town, but the Sonderportians living here happily paid the extra money to at least half the chance of getting mugged or murdered.

Naia gave a low whistle when they neared the curio shop and she spotted a small cart in the street, where a young man was selling flowers. “Imagine how quickly he’d be mugged, raped, and murdered just a few minutes’ walk in that direction…” She pointed a thumb over her shoulder in the direction they had come from.

“It makes quite a difference,” Shale agreed. “Wallsen has gotten better though, just in my lifetime.”

“Better? Are you serious?” Aran asked.

“Statistically, there’s been a four percent drop in conviction rates of Wallsen citizens in the last twelve years,” Ailmon supplied.

“I thought you’d been here for a long time,” Shale said, looking curiously at Aran.

“Long enough to know some people. Not long enough to recognise improvements, it seems.”

“The analysis of conviction rates isn’t complete without mentioning that the slums outside the walls,” Ailmon nodded in a northerly direction, “has seen a rise in crime, which with a quick estimate equals every single person living outside the walls of Sonderport committing roughly nine separate crimes a day. So, let’s not get our hopes up.”

“Absolutely! Let’s stay depressed!” Naia commented.

“Well, I’m sure there was a time when… I don’t know, Spire Ward was on the outskirts of the city and full of crime,” Shale said. “It seems the less fortunate are just pushed north as the city expands over the centuries.”

“Quite so,” Ailmon confirmed. He pushed the door to the curio shop open and a wealth of small bells chimed. The bells were hanging intermittently on a long string that was pulled when the door opened, winding across the ceiling into the murky back of the shop.

Inside, the oblong room stretched to either side of the door, with shelves lining every wall from floor to ceiling. Ordered lines of shelves marched down the middle to form aisles down both sides. Every spot on every shelf was full of goods of all kinds. Small statuettes and figurines of every description, books, bags, pouches, jars or strange things, boxes, dried herbs, weapons and every other kind of item imaginable. A full suit of armour stood menacingly on a stand right before the door and behind it was a long wooden counter, brightly lit by a large lamp, with a doorway behind it, shrouded by a dark blue velvet curtain.

The man behind the counter looked up from a large book he’d been writing in when they entered. He was a lanky, thin human, looking to be about fifty years of age, weathered and a bit dusty, with short, wispy grey hair and lively grey eyes. He was dressed in a colourful, well-worn assortment of a tunic and vest with several pockets and a short, green cape draped over.

“Marvellous!” the man exclaimed, suddenly animated and lively to fit his colourful clothes. “Come in, come in! What can I do for you this fine afternoon?”

“Hello, master Dibble,” Shale said and approached the counter. “My friends and I are here because we need information on a product you’ve sold.”

Dibble looked at her intently while she spoke. Then he looked some more, narrowing his eyes a bit. “I’m very happy to help you, young lady, but you look familiar! Have we met before? And do forgive me if I don’t remember it.”

Shale looked over her shoulders where the others had gathered and then back at the shopkeeper. “Well, I was here as a child, but I haven’t really been back here since.”

Dibble suddenly clapped his hands sharply, grinning. “Of course! You are Narga’s daughter, aren’t you! …Shale?”

“Yes…” Shale said, dumbfounded. “You remember my mother?”

“Of course, of course. Lovely woman, I do hope she’s doing well?” Dibble said energetically.

“Yes, very well. Thank you. I’ll tell her to come by.”

“How wonderful. And look at you; sweet, tiny, shy Shale, all grown up.”

Aran took a step to stand next to Shale at the counter. “Please tell us more about sweet, tiny, shy Shale,” he requested wholeheartedly.

The half-orc woman looked down on him with a stern stare.

“Alright, maybe later.” Aran shrugged and sidestepped so Ailmon could approach and put the pouch of herbs from Corwin’s room on the counter.

“We found this,” Ailmon said, nodding at the bag of herbs. “We were wondering if you remembered selling it?”

“How very intriguing!” Dibble exclaimed, taking the pouch and looking at the note attached before he turned his gaze to Ailmon. “What a truly astounding day! It began so very drearily, but here you all are on a mysterious errand, doubtlessly to do good. I’m happy to see that young Shale is in fine and lawful company, my good man,” he said in an earnest tone. “Not that I’m surprised at that, but I must assume that your present quest has a tinge of something legal, since an official of the courts is involved.”

“I’m here in a private capacity,” Ailmon just said. “You have an impressive memory for faces.”

“Why, yes. Yes, I do.” Dibble smiled broadly and sincerely. “It’s rather a fine quality when running an emporium of the strange such as I do. And indeed, good luck for you, since I do remember the gentleman in question. He came in here…” Dibble turned a few pages in the large book on the counter, “nine days ago. He looked quite frightful, poor fellow. I trust my amazing fever cure worked like a charm?”

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“Well…” Shale said. “It probably did. However… he’s not exactly on his feet these days.”

“Oh, dear. I’m sorry to hear that! He was such a polite man, even in the state he was in.”

“What state was that?” Aran asked.

“Well, he was rather on the pale side, poor fellow. And he looked to be sweating a bit and I do remember his hand was shaking when he paid. We talked a bit, so I could figure out what remedy to mix for the poor man, and he said he could hear whispering in his ears. Quite disturbing!”

“Whispering in his ears?” Aran asked.

“Told you the shicks sucked,” Naia called out from somewhere in the store where she’d apparently wandered off to. Aran pressed his lips together to not give a sharp reply under the shopkeeper’s watchful, enthusiastic stare.

“Yes, quite. Like someone was talking to him just on the cusp of hearing, as he described it. Now,” Dibble leaned over the counter slightly, eyes almost glowing with excitement, “what manner of thing might a shick be?”

“Oh, it’s…” Aran faltered, looking quickly at Ailmon and Shale, searching for agreement as to the wisdom of revealing that information.

“A magical rock,” Naia called out from wherever she was browsing, ruining any kind of strategy, and though he couldn’t see her, Aran was sure she had rolled her eyes when she emphasised the word ‘magical’.

Aran closed his eyes for a second as he sighed inwardly.

“A magical rock? How absolutely, horrifically delightful!” Dibble exclaimed enthusiastically. “Do you happen to have this amazing thing in your possession, by some wonderful stroke of luck?”

Shale, Aran, and Ailmon shared a look between them. Then Ailmon gave a little nod, and Shale found the shicks in her belt pouch, handing them to the shopkeeper.

“Oh, my word, how very unusual…” Dibble held the small, flat disks, turned them over, and held them up to the light from the lamp on the counter. “I’ve never seen anything like these in real life. Quite a find, I must say. Would you be interested in–”

“No,” Aran quickly said. “We’re not selling them. We need them. For now, anyway. Until we find out what the Hells they are.”

“Intriguing, my fine fellow,” Dibble commented. “You don’t know what these are?”

“Do you?” Shale asked.

“Oh,” Dibble gave a laugh. “Half the astounding things in here,” he gestured grandly at the hodgepodge of items surrounding them, “escapes even my astute eye. They do look somewhat familiar, however…” He gestured with the stones. “What with the positively delightful lines on them. There’s a bit of a memory stirring at the back of my mind, though it might be entirely too fantastical for you and your lovely friends, to say nothing of your mysterious purpose.”

“Honestly,” Shale said, “any help you could give us would be appreciated.”

“I’m only too happy to help, my dear, but perhaps you’d be interested in a trade? It would be a pity to see such lovely items thrown to the winds when you no longer need them, and I’m sure I could display these in my cabinet of the astounding to delight both young and old and everyone in between!”

“After we are done with them?” Shale asked.

“Quite naturally, I wouldn’t want to interfere with your wonderful quest on that poor man’s behalf, far from it,” Dibble confirmed.

Aran shrugged. “We can’t really give you any guarantees… Since we don’t know what they are–“

“Magical, I told you!” Naia said, approaching the counter, holding a small mask in her hands.

“Since we don’t know what sort of magical they are or what they are used for, we can’t say what might be the end of this,” Aran finished tersely.

“Understandable, of course,” Dibble nodded. “But in case it turns out you are in a position to part with them afterwards, I should be very happy to give them a good home here.” He put the shicks on the counter. “Now, let me just see if I can find a certain book I seem to remember, do give me a moment.”

Dibble disappeared behind the velvet curtain into the murky, unknowable back of the shop and they heard a door open and close from back there.

Aran turned to Naia. “Seriously?” he said in a low tone of voice, so Dibble wouldn’t hear from wherever he was.

“Is that guy helping us? Why, yes, he is!” Naia stated, waving the small mask at the curtain to the back rooms. “Because he saw a chance to sell the shicks, or exhibit them or whatever? Also yes. Yes, he is!”

“Are you really, seriously saying this was a calculated move on your part?” Aran asked.

“Of course. We can walk around and not tell anyone anything, but look.” She held the mask up in Aran’s face. It looked like a hideous, deformed baby’s face and was fashioned in some sort of dark metal he didn’t recognise. “This was just sitting on a shelf. It reeks of magic. Reeks! Most of the things in here are just bollocks, but some of them are legitimately powerful. I’m guessing he doesn’t know which is which, but I wouldn’t bet on it.”

“That’s exactly why we shouldn’t go around tel–” Aran hissed, but the sound of the door behind the curtain made him stop and settle for giving Naia a sour look.

She shrugged and rolled her eyes as the shopkeeper came back, carrying a very large, yellowed book which he put down on the counter.

“Here we are,” Dibble exclaimed happily.

“The Amazing Impossibilities of Bestial Life as Recorded by a Scholar of the Fantastic,” Naia read the title on the cover aloud. “Interesting. If I had to be a scholar, it would be of the fantastic!” she said with emphasis.

“I feel exactly the same, young lady!” Dibble exclaimed. “I believe the writer in question has been dead for quite a few decades, though, and the title is currently free.” He gave Naia a roguish wink and she laughed.

“I’ll give that some thought!” she said as Dibble began leafing through the enormous work. Several of the pages were closely written, but some featured whole-page illustrations of strange beasts and phenomena, one more unlikely than the next.

“Let’s see… I believe it was…” Dibble mumbled, then commented without looking up from the pages, “If you do take up the work of a scholar of the fantastic, young lady, do make sure to put an index in your works; that would be most appreciated. Ah! Here we are!” he exclaimed happily and quickly ran his finger down the heavily written page as if reading at breakneck speed.

Dibble then turned the cumbersome tome on the counter so the group could see the illustration. The picture filled the whole page. A towering, bipedal, and monstrous thing, covered in what was either round scales or some sort of tumours plodded across a landscape of what appeared to be a forest of thick, winding growths. The beast had no visible face or means of seeing or hearing, only a broad, tapering head atop lumbering shoulders.

“Hm, looks rather nightmarish,” Ailmon said evenly.

“What’s it supposed to be?” Shale asked.

“Ah, I’m glad you asked,” Dibble rubbed his hands joyfully. “This rather horrific thing is called a spirit-snare. They are supposed to be living on different islands in the southern Life Sea. Our good scholar of the fantastic is reluctant to share their specific home address, however. But the book details how they communicate using their minds and will attack passing ships, driving the sailors quite mad. Terrifying, isn’t it?” he asked exuberantly.

“And you think the… shicks are their scales?” Aran asked sceptically, eyebrow raised.

“With no sort of certainty, but it could be.” Dibble found the shicks from under the tome and put them on top of the drawing, so they lay on the page like the creature’s scales.

“Right…” Aran said. “So, does your scholar of the fantastic say how big these things are supposed to be?”

“Sadly, that detail is omitted in specific terms, but from the illustration, I surmise it might be human-ish in stature, though I cannot be certain.”

“So what are these supposed to be?” Shale tapped one of the disks on the page. “Those things covering it?”

“Why, I believe they are its seeds,” Dibble said. “Like a tree would scatter its fruits to seed new of its kind, the spirit-snare would drop its seeds where it went.”

Shale picked a shick up. “Feels a bit more personal, now. Like I’m groping someone…”

Naia giggled. “You’re being handsy with its reproductive organs. Sadly, we can’t just give it a kick in the shicks.”

“Let’s not be too hasty in accepting this theory,” Ailmon interjected and then nodded at Dibble. “Thank you for your assistance. It’s an interesting theory and we’ll take it into account.”

“Oh, my absolute pleasure! Do come again if I can be of service. And please remember me when your grand quest is at an end.” Dibble smiled broadly.

“Don’t worry, we will!” Naia said, holding up the small, hideous mask. “Now, all that business aside, how much is this? And how does one make money on being a scholar of the fantastic?”

Dibble put a hand over his heart. “Ahh, a discerning woman with her priorities in order if ever I met one!” he exclaimed joyfully.