I considered keeping up my surveillance of Yaavtey's home and ignoring the warning, but I thought better of it almost immediately. Yaavtey was clearly well known in the area and I risked tipping him off if I stayed. I already might have tipped him off, depending on what that guard tells him, I thought. I went back up to the roof to check and see if Koyl had returned, saw that he hadn't, and headed back to the inn. I hope he picked up the crossbow at least, I sighed as I pushed my way past a man in rags.
Back at the inn, I found Koyl sitting at a table with Yehpweyl. Activity inside the dining room was relatively low for it being so early in the night, with only a few other tables having any men or women sitting at them. Koyl didn't notice me because he was too enthralled with his conversation, but Yehpweyl glanced at me just before I sat down. Her clothing is even tighter than usual, I thought.
“...so then the merchant shoots the crossbow by accident and nearly takes his assistant's head off with it!” Koyl joked. Yehpweyl giggled, covering her mouth demurely and slightly squeezing her breasts inward with her forearm. Finally, Koyl noticed me, and he looked nervous. “Oh, hey Yuwniht,” he stuttered.
“I hope you're keeping anything private out of this conversation,” I said.
“Yeah I'm just chatting about what I was off doing this afternoon,” Koyl said quickly, “I got that crossbow for you just like you asked.” Yehpweyl looked displeased when Koyl stopped paying attention to her, and when he spoke to me she showed... disgust? I don't understand this woman at all, I thought.
“Did you manage to find the other things you were looking for?” I asked. “It took you a lot longer than I expected.”
“I hope you didn't end up waiting for me,” Koyl said sheepishly.
“I didn't,” I said. There was silence for a moment, then Yehpweyl stood up.
“Would you like some food, Yuwniht?” she asked. The way she said my name made it clear that she was irritated by my interruption of her conversation. She could also work for the Hatchet Crew, I thought, maybe that's how she can afford to rent out rooms so cheaply.
“Just whatever is filling,” I replied, “no need to make anything specific.” Yehpweyl pursed her lips, then turned around and walked away to go fetch some food. Koyl watched her all the way until she walked behind the bar, then sighed and turned back to me.
“Sorry, it took a while,” he apologized, “it was already sundown once I-”
“Doesn't matter,” I replied, “what did you buy?” Koyl pulled out a dagger from a holster below the table, then a sword from a sheath on his right hip that I didn't notice as I approached. He set both on the table and let me examine them. The dagger was just a standard straight blade, around twelve centimeters long, with a small crossguard. The sword on the other hand was a cutlass-style blade. It resembled my own, except it wasn't nearly as thick or heavy and looked to be a bit longer.
“Crossbow is upstairs,” Koyl said, “I made sure to get broadhead bolts as well since our friend seems to wear little armor.”
“How many?” I asked. Koyl put away the dagger and the sword to clear the table.
“Five,” Koyl replied, “but I don't think we would have time to use them all. The thing takes at least a minute or two to crank up. What did you even want it for anyway?”
The food was delivered as I explained what I had seen to Koyl. I also went over what I had seen when we were on the roof together because I wasn't sure he was paying attention when he was with me. Koyl looked especially interested when I told him about the man who spoke to me outside Yaavtey's house, grunting and rubbing his chin in some kind of gesture of acknowledgment.
“So we're screwed,” he said when I finished, “he's got people all over so we're going to be spotted no matter what, and the outside of his house has guards that you didn't spot. How is the crossbow supposed to help us?”
“It's a backup plan,” I explained, “if the main plan fails, you shoot him in the head with it and we run.” Koyl scoffed, then sighed loudly.
“If that's the backup plan I certainly hope the main plan is better,” Koyl said. I don't even really have a main plan yet, I wanted to admit, if I was doing this alone shooting him would be the main plan. We made small talk while I ate and racked my brain for some kind of idea. I considered asking Koyl for his input, but I wanted to be able to make a plan for myself so that I could do it again in the future if needed. If only I had a metamorphic face and shiftable pigmentation, I sighed. Eventually, I finished the food, and Koyl asked the question I wasn't ready for: “So what's the plan?”
“Do you know somewhere we can get disguises?” I asked back. Koyl laughed bitterly at my question.
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“Oh I hope you aren't serious,” he sighed. “Gods, you're serious, what did I do to deserve this?” The latter part of his reply seemed directed towards himself.
“Is it that difficult?” I asked.
“You're seriously thinking of just wearing a disguise and, what, stabbing him to death?” Koyl snapped. “Are you st- bad question, of course you are. That's not going to work because you're a giant and any disguise that would hide your face would be more suspicious than just going undisguised.”
“Why don't you do it then?” I suggested. “I could stay hidden and you could go. All you'd need to do is stab him in a fatal area with that knife, then twist it around until he bled out. Half a minute maximum if you do it correctly.”
“Because he's a trained fighter and he's twice my weight,” Koyl said, “Yaavtey could break my neck with one hand.” Yet, you still attacked me when we met, I mused, I must really look less threatening than I actually am. Still, Koyl had a point. The healing ability that was ubiquitous in these humans made it difficult for a smaller opponent to inflict a fatal blow.
“What about the blue leaf?” I asked. “Can we get some of that? We could knock him out with a blowdart and-”
“One of the things I did today was ask around about that, because that's what I thought you wanted the crossbow for,” Koyl interjected. “Unless you want to go out of the city and pick it yourself, it's not happening.”
“So let's do that,” I said.
“In the middle of bear season?” Koyl scoffed. “Do you have a death wish? You do know a bear is, right? They can eat blue leaf, so you can’t even use it to keep them away.” Right, I remembered, that one vagrant mentioned bear season when I was on my way to Vehrehr. Still, the bears can eat that poison? Does that mean they're poisonous? How does it keep them away then?
“How long is bear season?” I asked.
“Another fifty days at least,” Koyl replied, “it varies by year. You're not thinking of actually waiting that long right?” I wasn't, and I also wasn't thinking of going to pick the herb myself. My encounter with a bear was memorable enough that I had no desire to do it again. Wait, it was probably using force magic to keep its momentum like that, I realized as I recalled how the bear moved.
“You're sure there's no way to get any?” I asked.
“Not through anyone I know of,” Koyl replied. “It's rare enough already in the city, but right now we're well into the time of year that it can't even be gathered.”
“Then we need disguises,” I said flatly, “at least one, but ideally two.”
“I already told you it won't work for you,” Koyl countered, “you'd need to change your whole face. If you wear a mask you'll just attract even more attention.” And I don't have a metamorphic face, I thought, it's not like I can just- I stopped my train of thought as I came to an epiphany. Doing that would cause a huge amount of scarring that gives it away though, I thought as a series of ideas came to mind, I would need to get knives that were razor sharp. I'd also need some way to disable the healing ability for a time. Maybe I can... No, disabling it for that area would require damaging the brain stem at a minimum.
“How sharp of a knife can you get?” I asked. Koyl looked at me doubtfully.
“Why?” he asked.
“Can you get a knife sharp enough that a cut with it doesn't leave a scar?” I asked. “A small, faint scar is also acceptable.” Koyl kept his doubtful look, but was now intrigued.
“I've never heard of a knife sharp enough to not leave any scar, but I think a chef's knife might be close. It would have to be one of the fancy west-end ones though,” he said, “why?”
“Can you get some ivory as well?” I asked. “And some-” I stopped as I realized I didn't know the word for a screw. I had been mentally changing the word ngerljh to “screwed” because it had a similar contextual meaning, but if there was an Uwrish word for a fastening screw I didn't know it. “Do your people have... nails with a sort of spiral pattern on the shaft that are used for binding things together?” I asked.
“Why would a nail have a spiral pattern on it?” Koyl asked, looking confused.
“So you can twist it in instead of hammering it,” I explained.
“Is that some kind of specialty good?” Koyl asked with a raised eyebrow. “I'm not a carpenter, I don't really know anything about that sort of thing, but I haven't ever heard of a nail like that.” Shit, I thought, Would glue work? I don't want to have to rely on nails to keep this together.
“Nevermind,” I said quickly, “how about glue made for binding bone or ivory, can you get that? It needs to set quickly as well.”
“How quickly?” Koyl asked.
“Minutes?” I suggested, which made him laugh. “Okay, nails it is then, some short nails or nails and a tool that can be used to shorten them. Also, a small drill. Actually the glue as well, I can think of a use for it.” No need to make the hammering job more difficult, I thought, I might have to shape the nail points into fishhook shapes as well to keep them from coming out due to the rapid healing. “Actually, definitely a tool to cut nails down to an appropriate size,” I said.
“All of this stuff is going to be expensive,” Koyl said. In response, I took the pouch of money I had gotten from Dawpvaol and put it in front of him. “Okay, but how does this help us anyway?”
“Tell me, do you know a way to make a person heal slower?” I asked. I already knew of one way, but if there was one that was easier than the one I knew of I would definitely prefer to use it for the plan. Koyl grunted and thought about it for a moment.
“I guess if someone is just less healthy they heal slower,” he said. “Also old people heal slower, ones that are around eighty I mean. Other than that I'm not sure.” Damn, I swore internally.
“Get a hammer too,” I said, “and a brick or a rock or something heavy and similarly sized, and a mirror. The last one is optional if you're willing to help me out on this.” I'm going to have to do this the hard way, I thought.
“You haven't even explained anything about what you want to do,” Koyl complained. “Obviously I'll help, but I don't know what you need me to do.”
“Just get the stuff tomorrow,” I said, “I'm going to bed.” I stood up and left Koyl at the table, wondering if he would tell Yehpweyl about what I had just asked him for. Somehow I wouldn't put it past humans to have come up with something like this independently, I thought, but I doubt they would do it as brutally as I'm going to have to. They're far too averse to pain, even when they can heal near-instantly. Yaavtey will never suspect what I'm about to do.