Iris and Victoria spent their first evening in Fale Nalore browsing some of the many markets across the city. They weren't distinct districts, as most cities might have, but were instead long streets lined almost exclusively with shops, diners and taverns. The streets themselves wound through the entirety of the city and were open only to foot traffic. They included no small amount of greenery, each having a broad median of seemingly wild growth down its center. Interestingly, there were periodic bridges that rose up from the sidewalk and arched over strips of greenery that connected the median to the swamp at large. Victoria explained this was a core tenet of Elven cities, nature should be connected to itself -- never isolated.
Their goal for the evening was to gather a long list of adventuring supplies written up by Eli. It seemed to include everything the man could think of that they might need for an extended trek through the wilderness, even many supplies they could gather along the way.
"We don't actually need this much firewood, right?" Iris asked as she reviewed the list, "what is he thinking?"
"He's thinking you have a bottomless bag, so he might as well try to fill it," Victoria answered, "this is exactly how he acted when we left Tintin for Giantrock City, except that time he was at least limited by the fact that we had to carry everything back then."
This time, however, the limiter would be coin. Even pooling their resources together, the party still had a rather tight budget. Thanks to the thriving bartering culture of Fale Nalore this was alleviated somewhat by the array of esoteric items Iris had collected in her bag, but the pair still found it necessary to revise the list as they went to ensure they could acquire the necessities and have enough left for Autumn's shopping list tomorrow.
One issue they ran into was that goods in Fale Nalore were, on average, of very high quality. This seemed to have little effect on the price of abundant commodities, but any tools crafted by artisans were significantly more expensive than their lower quality counterparts that could be found in a city like Giantrock. On the bright side, Fale Nalore's status as an airship hub meant that there was no shortage of imported goods from across the continent, and though most shared the same problem of being only the highest quality, they were eventually able to find cheaper but serviceable options for most supplies.
Throughout their evening, a tentacle would occasionally reach out of the bag and tap Iris on the arm, reminding her to purchase a compass as she had asked. It took three different shops, each with a failed attempt at bartering, to finally acquire one for a reasonable price. It was of Orcish make with a body of a dark green metal and markings inlayed with silver, and the shopkeeper who sold it to her claimed it was from an Orcish city to the far north with a name she couldn't pronounce. Despite it's affordable price, the piece seemed to have been made from quite high quality materials. Iris guessed that, much like in Gellorn and Fale Nalore, the Orcish city enjoyed a surplus of silver that made it a commodity, and further assumed that the green metal was abundant to the orcs as well.
When the sky began to darken, chunks of glow stone chiseled into fine gem-like shapes and cradled by tarnished silver street lamps flickered to life. Though the light of glow stone was dim and didn't reach far, the generous number of lamps combined with the oversized stones created a warm, well lit atmosphere to the market streets.
When the lights came on, so did the music. They had passed a few street musicians during the day, but now it seemed that someone was setting up to sing or play an instrument on every block and at every corner. Many were stringed instruments such as lutes and violins, but there was no shortage of drums, flutes and horns either. Some of the taverns and cafes even housed large pianos that spilled out onto the street through the open windows and doors.
One might expect it to be a cacophony of songs competing to drown each other out, but what happened instead surprised them both. The scattered musicians joined with the others they could hear, playing together in improvised songs as they followed each other's leads. Though the musicians at one end of a street couldn't hear those at the other end, walking between them created no lapse in the melody. One could draw a circle around any particular musician in the city, equal to the distance of the furthest music he could hear, and all within that circle would be playing in symphony.
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A perpetual smile rested on Iris's face as she walked with eyes full of wonder, "does Everveil have music like this too?"
"No," Victoria said with wonder of her own, "this is something special."
They spent that night in a cozy inn above a lively tavern with a window overlooking the bustling market street below, finding that as the hours went on the music slowed into gentle melodies that almost begged for them to drift off to sleep. When they awoke the next morning the music was gone, replaced instead with the songs of conversation and laughter from early risers outside.
"I love this city," Iris remarked wistfully from her bed.
"Well it's our last day here," Victoria replied as she slipped on her boots, "let's get out there and enjoy it."
Iris nodded, but closed her eyes to enjoy the gentle morning for a little while longer.
With only a short list of errands remaining and ample time to spare before the daring escape planned for the next morning, the pair elected to enjoy a sit-down breakfast in a cutesy diner built into the hollow of a huge old log. After breakfast they set aside time to visit the more food-oriented market streets where they could complete Autumn's shopping list. It wasn't really as much of a list as a vague guideline to acquire any and all spices, sauces, fruits and vegetables -- the only qualifier being that each ingredient was something neither of them had ever heard of. Autumn's idea being that if she couldn't personally tour the city for new ingredients and flavors, then Iris and Victoria could at least bring back what was new and strange to them in the hopes that most of it would be new and strange to her as well.
They spent much of the afternoon touring the city for interesting sights, visiting a few museums with plaques in the language they didn't know, marveling at the architecture of ancient structures with origins unknown to them, and even finding time to take a boat ride through the canals. One of their favorite places was a massive garden with ornate silver archways at each of its entrances. A local explained that every plant in the garden, from the smallest shrub to the trailing vines and the trees overhead, was edible down to the roots, bark and leaves. It was a carefully curated collection of every fully edible plant native to the region, cultivated over generations to create the best tasting varieties of each species.
Visitors were welcome to sample anything from the garden, so long as they never took more than five percent of a plant and only picked as much as they would eat on the spot. They were lucky enough to visit at a time of year when there were many berries, nuts and even full sized fruits ripe and ready to eat -- though that didn't stop Iris from occasionally sampling leaves, stems and flowers out of curiosity. To her surprise, most of them actually tasted quite good.
"It's a shame Autumn isn't here," Iris said around a mouthful of mixed berries and sweet tasting leaves.
"I think she'd hate it," Victoria countered.
Iris gave her a confused look as she continued chewing.
"She'd be mad that she can't take any of it home to cook with," Victoria elaborated before taking a casual bite of what looked like a long, woody stem but was in fact a thin and crispy skin wrapped around a soft and juicy interior.
"Mhm," Iris nodded as she agreed.
______
The winds had shifted, the captain was certain of it. For all his love of violence and recklessness, he was still a sailor with lifetimes of experience -- if there was one detail he always noticed, it was the wind. When the Gaping Maw had arrived in Fale Nalore twisting and dancing currents had collided and swirled around the city, fluttering leaves and shivering branches in all directions. Now, as he stood at the stern of his ship and stared out over the city, early autumn leaves shed from the tower-trees and blew only to the southwest -- even the leaves from other enormous trees in the far distance followed the same pattern. This wind was cooler, humid, and carried the telltale hints of a distant but approaching storm.
The first mate stood beside him, inspecting his stoic expression with a curious look that slowly grew concerned.
"Petresca knows we're here," he said flatly, absent his usual energy, "the spiral brews."
"We anticipated this might happen, it changes nothing."
"Yet, it changes everything."
Even as they spoke pallets of crates, sacks and barrels were hauled onboard by pulleys while hammers and handsaws could be heard all across the ship. The crew's desperate repairs were well underway, poorly patching holes with mismatched wood and shoring up cracked or splintered beams and masts while torn sails were pulled down and replaced with off-color canvas. The repairs weren't pretty, but they would suffice -- and most importantly, they would be complete by sunrise.
"The winds will be too strong to fly far," Meredith said, "but we expected that. The Shining Blue will greet us with spite and fury, but we expected that too. We will endure, and we will succeed. You will succeed."
The captain lowered his head and sighed as Meredith placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. After a moment, he looked up again with a stern expression and spoke in a confident tone, "I've read the texts a thousand times, the hydra needs only to touch the open sea and my quest will be finished, and my grasp on godhood will clench tight. Whatever price the spiral claims will have been worth it."
"There is no loss a god cannot recoup," she agreed.