10

Like many crafters, Jessie Condorphil sold her wares from her home. It just made sense; why pay rent on a store when you could sell your things for free? Not every crafter had that luxury, though. Some of them needed the passing traffic at places like Coiner’s Way, so were forced to spend out. As a notewright, Jessie’s skills were so specialized, so rare, that she didn’t need to go to markets, didn’t need to advertise. People came to her. Heck, they’d travel upwards of fifty miles to visit her studio.

Mick didn’t have to go that far. A ride on a commuter cart over the bumpy – they really ought to maintain these damn roads – Huckler’s Pass took him most of the way. After paying the driver for his trouble, he took a short walk east along a dirt track, finally seeing a thatched-roof cottage up ahead.

He already liked the look of the house. Quaint, and cozy-looking. The only problem was it was a little too isolated for him. He liked things quiet, sure enough, but there was quiet, and then there was silent. At least in Sunhampton, you wouldn’t struggle for friendly conversation should you wish to find it. Out here, you’d have to make an hour trip just to buy a loaf of bread. Still, he supposed Jessie Condorphil wouldn’t have moved out here unless she liked it.

When he knocked on her cottage door – making sure to use his casual knock and not his guard’s knock – nobody answered. He knocked again, and the living room curtain shifted. Jessie stood there behind the glass, pointing at a sign by the front door.

‘Customers, please proceed to the shed at the rear of the property.’

Mick reckoned that since Jessie had already seen him now, she could have just answered the front door. The horse had bolted from the stable, after all. Still, he supposed it was probably a work–life separation sort of thing. The front door was for guests, the rear for customers.

Her garden wasn’t especially well kept, but you couldn’t call it messy, either. Jessie did just enough to keep the grass looking tame and to stop weeds taking over the cracks between the paved walkway. At the far end of the lawn was what she’d called a shed, but was actually a crafting studio almost as big as her house, albeit with only one level.

Mick headed over to the studio door and waited. And waited. And waited. He checked his watch, which his Ma and Pa had given him for his twenty first birthday, and saw that it was nine forty-nine.

What’s taking her so long? She knows I’m here.

Then, Mick’s gaze happened upon yet another sign, this one written on a square of wood that sat atop a pole wedged into the dirt.

Hours of business, 10:00 – 14:00.

He couldn’t believe it. Was she really going to make him wait out here for eleven minutes until her business hours started? Him, a paying customer? He guessed he had showed up to her home unannounced. All the same, it was after nine in the morning now. On Coiner’s Way, every single store was already trading at this time, except on a Sunday.

When Jessie finally left the cottage and met him by her studio door, her hair was wet, and she was holding a half-eaten slice of toast.

“Sorry about that. But I found if I don’t defend my time, then I lose it. I know it seems harsh, leaving you here waiting. Let me get you a brew to make up for it.”

It was no way to run a business, Mick thought. Then again, his mercantile knowledge wouldn’t fill the corner of a napkin. What he did know was this: for some crafters, the whole ‘making gold’ side of their job was just an unavoidable obligation. If they didn’t need to actually spend time selling their things, people like Lewis Cooper, for instance, would probably have shut themselves in their workshop for a full year and just worked away without a break.

Jessie unlocked her studio door and walked inside, opening up all the windows as she toured the room. “Gets stuffy in here,” she said. “Not to mention all the glue I use. Now, what can I do for you?”

“Got a gift certificate,” said Mick, holding it up for her to see.

“Ah. You must be Alister Tillwright. Folks hardly ever send off for a gift cert, you know, so I was surprised you asked.”

“No, I did some work for Alister. Found his missing pig.”

“His missing…no, I won’t ask. Don’t have time. The gift cert gets you one of my medium tier notepads. Let me fetch them for you, and you can choose. Just don’t take all day about it.”

If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

Jessie grabbed a stack of notepads and spread them out on a table set against the far wall of the room. While Mick studied them she got to work, soon ignoring him completely.

Faced with a choice of notepads, Mick felt like a kid who’d been given all his Yulthor money to spend. Most people wouldn’t have thought this was a choice at all. They’d probably ask, who cares about a notepad?

But Jessie Condorphil’s jotters were special. She was a notewright, which meant she could do things with notepads that people wouldn’t believe. Artificers like Lewis Cooper could do fancy things like make notepads last longer, but Jessie made him look like an amateur, at least when it came to imbuing effects into stationery.

The notepads that his certificate let him choose from were all different sizes, different thicknesses, different colors. Attached to each was a little tag on the end of a piece of twine, explaining what they did.

Mick took his time making his choice. The first one was a transcribing pad, which would write down anything you said while it was open. The second was a notepad that had an encyclopedia enchanted into it. All you had to do was write down a question, and the notepad would try to supply you with the answer. A quick shake of the pad, and the question and answer vanished.

“These are amazing,” said Mick. “Mind if I try this one?”

“Which?”

“The encyclopedia.”

“Go ahead. Writing in it is fine, since it self-erases. But if you tear it, then you buy it.”

Mick tried to think of a way to trick the notepad. On the surface it seemed incredibly useful, but it was only a medium tier pad. Presumably, this meant Jessie herself didn’t rate it as one of her best works.

Let’s see. All this thing does, I’m guessin’, is to take your question, refer to the encyclopedia, then write an answer. It’s not actually doing any thinking by itself. I could get the same answers at the local library.

Using the special pen that came with the notepad, he wrote his question.

What’s the secret ingredient in Spruce Wilkinson’s chicken stew?

He waited for a moment, before a single word appeared on the notepad.

Unanswerable.

“Ha!”

Jessie left her desk and wandered over, standing to the right of him. “How do you expect it to know a thing like that? Is this Spruce guy famous? Would you reasonably expect to find him in an encyclopedia?”

“This thing doesn’t have any local knowledge, does it?”

“What do you expect? Does it make you feel clever, tricking a notepad like that?”

“I’m sorry. Didn’t mean to disparage anything.”

Jessie walked away muttering to herself and shaking her head. Suitably chastised, Mick decided to take this more seriously. If he was being fair about it, the encyclopedia notepad was still a wondrous thing. It’d save him trips to the library to look things up, that was for sure. A crafty person might even use it to win the King’s Head quiz.

Then again…as great as this notebook was, visiting the library was free. Should he use up a valuable gift voucher on something he could get for free, if he was only prepared to take just a little more time about it?

“What’s this pad do?” asked Mick, gesturing at the last one.

Jessie took off her goggles. “Huh?”

“There’s no tag.”

“Oh. That. Truth is, that’s not a medium-tier pad. It’s higher. Only, the client who ordered it didn’t pay the second half of her deposit and didn’t show up to collect.”

“So why not sell it for what it’s worth?”

“I got so mad I threw it in the sink. Half drenched it with muddy water. I came to my senses in time and got it out and dried it, and the enchantments still half work. Can’t justify selling it for higher tier prices, though. Go ahead, open it up.”

Mick did so, turning to the first blank page of the notepad. “What now?”

Jessie seemingly forgot that Mick’s presence here seemed to be a hindrance now. Like most crafters, she couldn’t resist an opportunity to show off her work.

“Put your finger on the bottom of the page, and look around. Don’t gawp at me like that. Just do it.”

Mick placed his index finger right at the bottom of the first blank page. Then after sweeping his gaze across the room, he glanced back down at the notepad.

Nothing happened for a moment, Then, words began to appear on the notepad.

A notewright’s workshop. Messy, but not through lack of care. This is the workshop of someone invested in their work – not the appearance of it. There’s a coatstand with three coats hanging on it. The air smells like glue.

Points of interest:

The windowsill is damp – the window was open until recently.

The notewright herself hasn’t slept much lately, bags under her eyes the size of burlap sacks. Short nails not clipped but chewed. Stressed?

“What am I looking at here?” said Mick. “It describes what I’m seeing?”

“The lady who commissioned it, she said she was a writer. Wanted a way to capture inspiration in the moment.”

“It’s incredible. But it seems to have insights. Points of interest. It sure ain’t just describing things.”

“Well, don’t trust them fully. Like I said, I half ruined the damned thing.”

Comparing the notepad’s description and insights, it seemed like everything it had written was accurate. Jessie really did seem to bite her nails – a detail he would have missed. The thing about the damp windowsill was true, as well. Any would-be sleuth knew that the smallest details could be important.

On a third re-read, a sentence stuck out to him. There’s a coatstand with three coats hanging on it. Unless Mick had forgotten how to count, there was only one coat on the stand.

If he used this notepad, he’d have to use it carefully. It could lie to him. Then again, it might show him details he would never have otherwise come close to noticing.

“I’ll take it,” he said.

“Sold and sold. Hand me your voucher, would you?” she said. Tearing off half the voucher, she handed part of it back. “There’s your receipt, though everything’s sold as seen. Go easy on that thing, now. It used to have two hundred pages, but I ruined a hundred and two of them.”