After the woman left I followed the road in the direction that she had indicated, counting three alleys on my left as I bumped and passed between pedestrians. When the fourth came around I had to do a double-take to ensure that what I was seeing was actually an alley. In between two buildings which had begun to lean into each other after construction there was a path that had been dug down below the road level with rough stone stairs leading into it. At first I thought it was some kind of sewage drain, or perhaps just a tunnel, but when I looked inside I could see that there were lights further in and it went on for a while.
The alley was barely twice the width of my shoulders across, though thankfully it had very few people in it and most were just standing still against the walls. Once I passed the initial two buildings which leaned together the path ramped back up to street level and I could see the sky above me again. Of the people in the alley, none looked to be a fighting match for me in any way with most appearing either drugged or starved or some combination of the two. Is there really an inn here? I wondered as I started to suspect I was being led into a trap. Just then, on my right, I saw a wooden door coming up with a sign pressed above it.
The door was between two windows, both shuttered closed but leaking light from inside, and appeared to swing inwards judging by the lack of visible exterior hinges. Before entering I took a look at the sign, which was a simple wooden board that had characters burned into it followed by a pictogram of an animal. It looks like a fox of some kind, I thought, or it would if its snout wasn't so wide. The name of the inn that had been given to me, Zvaonaosawtz, contained a word in it that was very similar to the Uwrish word for sleep. Sleepy fox inn? I thought with a hint of apprehension, I just realized that I've never actually been inside an inn before. While I knew of the concept, warbreed had no need for inns since their settlements were always militarized.
I pushed the door inwards gently in case a human was standing nearby, swinging it open just enough to let myself in before closing it behind me. The interior of the inn was very plain and also not exactly what I was expecting. The entire bottom floor of the building save for the back right corner was open, roof supports notwithstanding. Beside the back right corner was a staircase that lined the back wall and lead up to the next floor, but the rest of the floor was covered in tables and chairs. Along the left side of the building was a long bar, behind which were many stacked barrels. In the back left corner, still behind the bar, was a stove and grill.
The room was filled to around a third of its maximum occupancy, thirty people give or take a few, with the patrons inside being distributed unevenly across two-thirds of the tables. My entry caused some heads to turn but none of them lingered for very long. The low background drone of the combined conversations was enough to hide the specifics of anything they were saying from me. All the humans were drinking from mugs except for the ones behind the bar, and some of the tables had food. The smell of cooked meat wafted into my nose and stimulated my stomach once again, reminding me that I needed to eat. A large blonde woman behind the bar looked over at me with a disgruntled expression, then gestured for me to approach her. I definitely can't fight everyone here, I thought as I counted out humans, I guess I'll just play along and see where this goes, and leave if it starts to go badly.
I approached the bar and stood across from the woman, who appeared to size me up. Likewise, I did the same, trying to figure out exactly what had caused her bizarre appearance. Her face was much rounder than most humans, with less defined features, and the shape of her body indicated that her abdomen was also much more round than normal. Even her arms were thick, holding tight against the fabric of her blouse-like upper wear. It's subcutaneous fat deposits, I realized, she has a large amount of fat under her skin. As I wondered silently about the caloric density of creator human fat, the woman finished examining me and frowned, huffing out her nose.
“What do you want? A drink?” she grunted. Her voice was on the deeper side of the female average, but still higher than most men. Having enough excess food to become this fat could be an indicator of wealth, right? I figured, Or maybe she has a genetic disorder that prevents her body from prioritizing muscle growth or something. With that much caloric intake, she should be as muscular as I am. Perhaps she is, and it's just hidden. That would make more sense.
“I'm looking for a map,” I replied.
“What?” she barked, cupping her ear at me.
“A map,” I repeated, loud enough that nearby patrons could hear me. One man to my left chuckled.
“Where're you looking to go?” she asked. The woman folded her arms in front of her and I could see the fat under her skin shift around with them.
“I need to get to Vehrehr,” I replied, “but I also need information on the mainland.” The woman squinted at me for a moment, then sighed and blinked rapidly while looking away.
“Oh!” she blurted. “Sorry there, had to take a moment to understand you. We don't have anything like that in here, this is an inn.” I found it odd that she felt the need to tell me that I was inside an inn. My stomach growled, loudly, and the woman looked down at it. “You hungry?” she asked.
“I am,” I replied with a nod. “I also need a place to sleep tonight, I assume the streets are unsafe or that sleeping outdoors is illegal?” Again the woman took a moment before responding.
“Ah yeah, those npoyt guards'll beat your ass if they catch you,” she snarked. “You got some money? You can stay here, but you need to pay.” I reached down and pulled up my money pouch, once again jingling it for effect to show that there were coins inside. “Alright then, we've got two rooms still open tonight, one on the second floor and one on the third,” she said with a toothy smile. “Same price for either, one ngoywngeyt for the key, and if you want some food delivered up to you it's another four ngeyt for that.” While I wondered exactly what amount of money those words indicated, she also added “If you want some company I know a few girls too.”
Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.
“I have this much,” I replied, carefully pouring out the coins onto the bar in front of me and stacking them up neatly. The woman's face took a serious expression the instant the money hit the bar, and she put her arms up on both sides of the coins to block people from seeing them.
“Are you a moron or something?” she hissed at me. Her breath smelled sweet, but not like any fruit I could recall. “What kind of country are you from you poymawpjh?” she continued, berating me in whispers through her gritted teeth, “Are you trying to start a fight in my inn?”
“No,” I replied, “is displaying money like this really that offensive?” The woman, like several others I had seen hours earlier, looked at me with her mouth partially agape.
“Someone's going to steal it from you, poymawpjh,” she scoffed.
“Who?” I asked. The woman looked as though she was at a loss for words. The money was well within my reach and if anyone tried to swipe it I was confident that I could catch them before they escaped me.
“Just put it away,” she sighed, “I don't need this place getting smashed up again because some jhawptztoyl idiot like you doesn't understand subtlety.”
“How much money do I owe you?” I asked.
“I told you-” she began to reply. I was really hoping she would take the hint, I thought. My gamble was that the woman would either try to demand an outrageous amount of money, in which case I could simply leave, or she would take the amount she required thus informing me of the values of the coins.
“I am not familiar with this money,” I said slowly and deliberately. “If you could take the required amount for a room and a meal from the coins on the counter I will put the rest away.” The woman narrowed her eyes and stared into mine, then raised an eyebrow. Even her forehead has some fat, I noticed. She then reached over and took a single one of the twenty-four sided coins without a hole in it, and one of the eight-sided coins. She stowed them under the bar, then pulled out a square coin and added it to my total.
“Now put the seytoydh coins away,” she demanded quietly. I swept the coins off of the counter, dumping them back into my money pouch. “Second or third floor?” she asked. I took a moment to consider whether I had enough faith in the construction of the building to want to risk the third floor.
“Second floor,” I replied. The woman pulled up a large metal key with a wooden handle and placed it in my hand. On the handle were two characters, one which looked like two crossed lines and one which looked like a vertical line with two horizontal lines crossing it, and a third small diagonal line sticking out from the left below the others.
“Room five,” she said. After a moment of thought, she added “can you read?”
“Not this language,” I answered simply. The woman sighed and pulled the key out of my hand, pointing to the characters.
“See these?” she asked. I nodded in reply. “Look for a room that has them on the door. Make sure they match before you try to go in,” she instructed, “Five's door is nice and loose, so you shouldn't have any problem once you got it unlocked. You know how to use a key, right?” I nodded again. “Good,” she grunted as she placed the key back in my hand.
“The meal?” I asked. Never hurts to be thorough, I thought.
“Fried jheyt and eylgeyl is what we're cooking tonight, so that's what you're getting,” she answered. “Go on up and we'll have it to you shortly. If you need anything else just go ask Zhihl over by the stove and she'll get it for you, alright?”
“Alright,” I echoed. I left the bar and walked across the room, ignoring a few light verbal jeers from patrons. I noticed that one table of men, at which four men were seated, was playing some sort of dice game. Money was out in the open and when my eyes crossed it the men all stared back at me aggressively. Is theft really such an issue here? I wondered. I was no stranger to stealing provisions for myself, but generally warbreed didn't steal except as a consequence of battle. The people of Suwlahtk didn't steal either, at least not in amounts that I would have heard about while I was there. Higher population density means a lesser chance of being caught, and a lesser chance of committing a crime against someone in their social circle, I reasoned, ergo, higher crime rate, I suppose.
----------------------------------------
It only took me a few moments to find my room upstairs, and I made a discovery on the way. The cross character is a two, I concluded after seeing more of the doors, and the other one is obviously a five. Counting the “branches” sticking out from the main vertical line made the numbering system obvious. I walked around and looked at the other doors, seeing that the numbers went up to eight at the least, but since there were only eight rooms I had no way of knowing if they went higher. I went back to my door and slid the key into the keyhole. One twist later and I was inside.
The room was small, containing just a single bed with a fur blanket, a small table and stool, a lit lantern for illumination, and a window at the back. The wooden floor creaked when I walked across it but showed no signs of cracking or breaking. I took off my spear and crossbow, set them down by the bed, then laid on the mattress and heard the wooden bed-frame creak even louder than the floor did. If this bed breaks I'm going to just have to jump out the window, I thought to myself, there's no way I'm paying for it. Someone in the room above me was moving around, and I could hear it, but otherwise the room was much quieter than I had thought it would be.
A while later a skinnier woman, who I assumed to be Zhihl, came and knocked on my door. She had brought me a wooden platter of meat and chopped vegetables as well as a bucket of water and a mug. I accepted them and thanked her, then went back into the room to eat. The food was very greasy but more delicious than anything I could remember tasting, so much so that I was left hungry after I finished it. Later again I went down and purchased another platter of food, using up the square coin I had been given as change. The sides must indicate the value, I thought, that just leaves the question of how much the coins with the square hole are worth.
Eventually I drifted off into sleep, more comfortable than I had been since leaving Suwlahtk, and slipped into a dream about chasing a thief through an endless crowded street.