The following day, Caruso entered the kitchen to find Orange and Miranda chatting at the table.

‘Ah, here he is,’ Orange said.

‘Orange! You’re back!’

‘Your observational skills have been honed to a deadly point. I was just regaling Miranda with my misadventures. Come and join the fun.’

Caruso sat down and poured himself a cup of parasol tea.

‘But surely,’ Miranda said to Orange, ‘she must’ve realised who threw the fish at her.’

‘All too likely. That’s the problem with these stuffy galas. You start lobbing a couple of fish about the place, and you stick out like a shaved cat in a bowl of hot porridge.’

‘A shaved cat?’ Miranda said.

Orange waved it away, ‘An old saying.’

Caruso helped himself to a slice of the breakfast tart. ‘A new recipe?’

Miranda beamed, ‘It’s a popular street food dish I remembered from Pali.’

‘It is exquisite,’ Orange said. ‘I can barely remember the last time you tried something new. Feeling a bit adventurous then?’

‘I’ve been spending a lot of time learning all about shrooms and cultivation with Caruso. And I don’t know…I guess it has rekindled my passion.’

‘Nothing like a good ol’ rekindling. How's it all going then? I take it we don’t need to rush out and sabotage Kactus’s garden before he returns?’

‘It’s still early days, but I'm confident,’ Caruso said. ‘And by the way, thanks for everything in the carriage. It was all perfect. Miranda almost lost it when she saw the quality of those shrooms you bought.’

‘It wounds me that you assume I must’ve bought them. But alas, you’re right. Ferris would have me publicly executed if he found out how much I paid for them.’

‘How much were they?’ Caruso asked.

‘Did your mother not teach you that it’s improper to query the price of a gift?’

‘Oh, come on.’ Miranda said. ‘It’s hardly your own money.’

‘Very well. Very well. For all six mushrooms…I paid about eight thousand gil.’

‘Fuck off,’ Miranda said before quickly covering her mouth in shock. ‘Sorry! Excuse my language. But surely you’re joking.’

‘Am I?’ Orange challenged her with a grin.

‘It’s impossible…’ Caruso said. ‘Eight thousand?’

‘Perhaps a touch closer to eight and a half.’

‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’ Miranda said, horrified.

Orange gave a hapless shrug.

‘But how?’ Caruso said. ‘At any decent stall, you could buy all six of those shrooms for thirty gil…Even at expensive luxury stalls, top quality shrooms rarely sell for more than a hundred each.’

‘But these shrooms were on another level,’ Miranda said.

‘What stall did you get them from?’ Caruso asked.

‘The realm of the super rich is mostly hidden from the public,’ Orange said. ‘Could you imagine displaying a mushroom worth two thousand gil in the common market? People would die. No, I purchased from a private vendor who sells these as luxury gifts—something you would bring to a fancy dinner party to dazzle your friends. I find wealthy people are always on the cutting edge of inventing innovative new avenues through which to spend their money.’

‘Just how rich are the Foresters?’ Caruso asked.

Orange replied: ‘Having a monopoly on all drugshrooms for hundreds of years? The Great Mushroom Road is basically an artery that pumps gil straight into our overflowing pockets. The same thing happens on every world. The Foresters are a dab hand at making money.’

‘I took a bite out of three of those shrooms,’ Miranda said, clearly still in shock.

‘Edible mushrooms do lend themselves to being bitten.’

‘You can eat the rest if you like,’ Caruso said to her. ‘I only needed them for stage one.’

Miranda’s eyes widened greedily at the prospect.

‘So, where is this operation of yours taking place?’ Orange said.

‘You want to come and see?’ Caruso asked.

‘Lead the way.’

Caruso led them into the larder and lowered the wall to the outside.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

‘Ah, been doing some remodelling I see.’ Orange poked his nose outside.

Like a child showing off his new toys, Caruso showed Orange everything they had been working on, starting with the five bowls of bittergill on the table. Caruso pointed out how mycelium had now fully spread throughout one of the bittergill dishes and was ready for stage two. The other four weren’t far behind, except for one which had been infected by a circle of green mold and had to be discarded.

Next they looked at the horse grain jars on the back counter; all were in various stages of growth. The firetongue jar had only a few points of white blotchy growth throughout the grain. With the silverstem, just over half the jar had been colonised by mycelium. It formed a satisfying, uniform line through the grain.

In the berry shroom jar, however, none of the grain was visible. It was all one solid white mass. Caruso proudly handed it to Orange who examined it closely.

‘Spectacular,’ Orange whispered, spinning the jar in his hands.

‘Is that one ready for stage three then?’ Miranda asked.

Caruso answered: ‘This is what perfect grain-spawn looks like. If we left it any longer, stunted mushrooms would start to grow inside. Let’s begin stage three.’

Miranda excitedly grabbed her pen and paper—which was now almost entirely covered with notes on one side. Caruso walked outside to where the elm log lay and tried to hide his grin when he saw both Miranda and Orange looking at him expectantly.

‘So,’ Caruso began. ‘The point of stage three is to plant the mycelium into its final home. It will do a little more growing into the medium we provide. Then, as long as it has all the nutrients it requires, and the perfect growing conditions, it will fruit into perfect healthy mushrooms.’

‘How long does that take?’ Miranda asked.

‘These are fast growing shrooms, so we can expect to see results in a day or two. The key to stage three is perfectly replicating the growing medium, sunlight and moisture levels from its natural environment. Berryshrooms are straightforward. They grow vertically on elm trunks, where it’s dry and shady.’ Caruso heaved one of the elm logs up and rested it against a wall. ‘We will make little holes in this log, and plug each one with the grain-spawn. Orange, can you please secure this log to the wall?’

‘Only because you asked nicely.’

A couple of threads formed out of the mycelium wall to hug the log in place.

‘Ummm,’ Caruso just realised what was missing. ‘I was going to get Ku—I mean, Green to help us poke holes through the log.’

‘Need a blinker?’ Orange asked.

‘It would help.’

‘I believe I saw Serene going about her morning sprints. I’ll go and request her services.’

While waiting for Orange, Caruso and Miranda used the time to prepare the bittergill for stage two. Miranda scooped a half jars worth of horse grain while Caruso scraped off some of the termites’ nest and the bark from the ash wood, then together with the bittergill mycelium, placed it all in the jar with a small splash of water. Miranda screwed on the lid and began shaking vigorously as Orange arrived with Serene.

‘Hi Serene,’ Caruso said. ‘Thanks for helping.’

The woman nodded and wiped sweat from her flushed face, ‘This won’t take too long, will it? I’m in the middle of my routine.’

‘It’ll just take a minute. I need a dozen thumb sized holes in this log. Each about a hands width apart. Is that okay?’

‘And then you’re going to stuff the holes with that mycelium grain?’ Orange asked.

‘Yes.’

‘Why not just blink the mycelium straight into the log?’ Orange asked.

‘Umm… I didn’t think of that… But, yeah, if we could blink the right amount in, and give the mushrooms space to escape the log, then that would work perfectly. How would we do that?’

Serene let out a huff of frustration. ‘Should I come back?’

‘We’ll figure it out quickly,’ Orange said. ‘Do some push ups.’

‘How about putting some on the end of a spoon, and blinking that in?’ Miranda suggested.

‘The spoon will get stuck,’ Serene said.

‘What if I made some mycelium cloth?’ Orange said. ‘We scoop the mycelium onto that, roll it up into a cigar, then Serene blinks that in.’

‘Brilliant idea,’ Caruso said.

‘Fine with me,’ Serene said.

‘It doesn’t matter if the mycelium is surrounded in Orange’s threads?’ Miranda asked.

‘Not at all,’ Caruso said. ‘His threads are just inert mycelium. The Berryshroom mycelium will repurpose it for itself. It should actually speed up the whole process.’

Similar to when Ferris made his mycelium blindfold, Orange summoned a couple of fine threads which began weaving back and forth in a frightening display of speed and precision. In the time it took Serene to complete ten push ups, Orange had produced a long scarf of thread.

They each played a role: Miranda grabbed a knife and began sectioning it into ten rough squares, Caruso scooped some grain spawn onto each square, and Orange tightly rolled them into cigars, finishing each one off with a final securing thread. Then, one by one, Serene blinked them into the log, leaving a little bit hanging out the edge. Caruso was thrilled at their handiwork. It was an eloquent bit of ingenuity, one he was certain Duskydale himself would be impressed by.

Not long after, Serene left to go for a run, and Orange said something about needing to climb some trees, leaving Caruso and Miranda standing in their garden, alone. Caruso felt her eyes on him.

‘So, I’ll guess we should start setting up the growing areas for the other mushrooms,’ Caruso said.

‘The others don’t require mycelium cigars to be blinked into logs?’

Caruso laughed, ‘No, the others mainly just grow on the ground.’

‘I’m curious about firetongues. The last guy, Daniel, he actually managed to grow them. They looked normal but they never…you’re smiling…you know something, Caruso?’

‘Maybe…Let me guess. They looked normal, but lacked any spiciness?’

‘Spot on. How could you know that?’

‘Well it’s just the nature of those shrooms. A lot of sellers at the market tried to swindle customers with spiceless firetongues. See, they produce their spiciness as a defense mechanism against shroommoths. There’s an acid found on the moth’s feet that causes this reaction. Although if you start inviting shroommoths into your garden, they will soon eat everything, so it gets rather tricky.’

Miranda shook her head, ‘How do you know everything? It’s insane. Daniel never worked that out, and he seemed like a smart enough guy, if you ignore his weird obsession with frogs.’

‘Well I didn’t exactly work it out by myself either. I learned it from a book. When you return to Jamala, remember to give Duskydale’s book a read.’

‘You know I’m getting a little sad that we are already into stage three. I’ve been enjoying our time together a lot, I don’t want it to end.’

Once more Caruso felt that nervous feeling in his gut. He knew what he wanted to say but the words seemed to lie beyond a wall of fear and doubt. The panic grew and for a second he felt an icy prickle on his back and he worried he might actually box himself in. He controlled himself. He couldn’t afford to sabotage another moment like this, he wasn’t sure how many more he would get.

Caruso exhaled, ‘Once we finish with the challenge, what if we kept practising and growing shrooms here, together?’

Miranda’s face flushed red and she gave a smile so deep and genuine Caruso felt it in his chest.

‘But,’ Caruso continued, feeling bolder, ‘if you want to retain my services, it will cost you.’

Miranda smirked, ‘Name your price.’

‘Since I’ve been teaching you about shrooms, I figured you could teach me about cooking. I don’t know anything—’

He must’ve said the right thing because Miranda beamed widely, grabbed Caruso by the hand and immediately led him into the kitchens.