~ CHAPTER 24 ~
THE MAGIC OF WONDER AND REVELATION, PART 2
After our trip to the guard house was done, it was time to stop putting off something else that was rather important: getting healed up. There was both a healer and a spirit doctor with offices right next to where we were, so we took ourselves and our brand new hard-earned Gemdust to go see them. I did have to spend one more Mana first, though: it was an emergency.
<“Demi, no! Don’t buy the potions!”>
She gave me a startled look, almost answering out loud before thinking better of it. <“Why not?”>
<“We’re right next to the main gate right now. If you buy them here, they’ll gouge you like crazy! Here, I’ll take you to Hazeroot Row later. I bet we can find an Alchemist there who can sell us some for a much better price.”>
Or, it occured to me, I could take her to a [Witch]. Did I owe that Ratman the business? He probably wasn’t even high enough level to make potions worth buying yet anyway, right? I wondered if one of them would know who the Witch of Midnight was. I realized I wasn’t planning to find out.
So, that was the story of how I parted with four of the eight spills of Silver Gemdust I’d just earned. I spent the other four at Hazeroot Row ten minutes later buying a mix of potions, salves, brews, food, and water. That was common sense: the best way to regenerate anything was always to eat and drink.
Demi was as impressed with the cool ambiance of that place as I had been earlier, but apparently it wasn’t her first time being there: she just hadn’t made the connection between ‘players are learning alchemy here’ and ‘you can buy potions here’.
I could sort of understand, though: it was easy to forget things when you were having fun, and the place was nothing if not interesting. We spent a good five minutes trying on funny masks being sold a player who claimed to be a [Masked Man], whatever that was, and another five sampling various different [Mysterious Brew]s for review for a [Bondless Shaman].
Before we left again, I considered going up to see Inkitina, but when I pictured introducing her to Demi, I suddenly got an uncomfortable feeling in my stomach. What if she and Demi didn’t like each other? Or, worse, what if they did, and Demi wound up liking her more than me? I knew it was a bad thing to think, but, well, I could always introduce them later, right? Instead, after we got stocked up, we just left again quietly. We were both in agreement: it was time to get questing! Again.
Demi had a quest called [Asyr Hospitality (Part 4)] which she wanted help with, so we started with that. Because it was part of her personal story, she couldn’t share it, but I could still help by equipping some kind of ceremonial dress and a pair of bouquets with poison darts inside, and then empowering my Sign on her as she went through a particular doorway. The gigantic tattooed woman who lunged at her with a pair of drawn short-swords was surprised when, moments before she was about to murder Demi in cold blood, she bounced off instead, I immediately shot her with a dart, and Demi kept walking as if nothing had happened.
Then I had to endure sitting cross-legged on a mat, while being repeatedly slapped on the back hard enough to knock the wind from my lungs, as that same woman laughed the whole thing off like it was all some big joke. After she’d cut open her own arm to bleed out the poison and then wrapped it with some kind of herbal concoction, that was. She wasn’t even the quest giver, so part of the quest was just sitting there drinking sweet green tea and laughing at her endless stream of jokes while waiting for her husband to get back. Err, well, one of her husbands, it seemed. Anyway, the reward was good: Demi got some [Basic Antivenom Salve]s and an IOU to train the [Stoneblood (Passive)] Skill, which would eventually increase her poison resistance. All around, it was pretty fun.
That all took a while, but we were still ready for more, so we decided the next one would be a quest Demi had evidently picked up while I wasn’t looking, called [Mila’s Stolen Treasure]. It involved beating up a group of [Thug]s and then returning a necklace they’d stolen to a timid looking Chakrit girl. Mostly I was the one doing the beating up; apparently that was something I was capable of doing. Meanwhile, Demi scrambled around trying to block all six enemies at once and mostly failing to block any of them… not that it really mattered, with her Health and armour.
The combination of the little girl’s snake-like features, big round spectacles, and even bigger even rounder eyes as she thanked us was simultaneously kind of freaky, and unbearably cute. She kept bobbing up and down for a good minute while saying thank you over and over again. The moment we got out of sight, Demi grinned gave me a high five, so I knew we shared the same opinion.
That quest was sharable, so we both almost got two spills of Silver Gemdust each for it, until Demi’s conscience got the better of her. Instead we got Karmic Flow: one for me, three for her. At least I didn’t have to worry about her getting struck with bad luck anymore.
With two quests down, we decided it was time to do one of mine. I still wasn’t sure where to go next for [The Eyes of Twilight], but I wasn’t too worried. Somehow, I had a feeling that I’d figure it out. For [The Keeper’s Garden (part 1)], though, my choice was simple. I didn’t even have the vaguest of ideas where to start for [Saproot Seed], since the list just said it was the product of a [Saproot Tree], but I thought [Dried Black Pepper] would probably be easy to find even without Demi’s help, so that just left [Brightsage Leaf]. I knew just where to look: the terrace gardens.
Wandering the terraces wasn’t really something Demi could help with, though, so we decided we could save time by having me go there by myself while Demi went to get my [Refined Copper Cloud Salt]… complete with a look of resigned disappointment. Apparently she’d been hoping I’d get up the nerve to go there myself while we did the other quests, but she didn’t fight me about it. She just made me feel guilty.
Hey, it was scary, ok? Anyway, Tate and Byron had probably stopped waiting for me hours ago, they weren’t crazy! If they’d even been waiting at all… Rather than keeping on that track, I forced my thoughts back to the topic at hand.
That was: [Brightsage Leaf]. I went over it again in [The Keeper’s List], checking to make sure I hadn’t missed anything. The main property listed was that it had a strong minty flavour, but why that classified it as a green-coloured magical item, I had no idea. The description of it was that it had a fan of long, flat, slightly serrated leaves arcing from a central bulb in an upside-down bell shape that was about twenty centimetres tall and half that wide. Also the central bulb was supposed to glow a soft yellow-green colour.
Anyway, that all would have meant nothing to me, other than that I should have asked that cook when I was there, except that I could remember seeing something with a similar description when I’d been walking around the terraces earlier. So, basically, all I had to do was go back up there and explore until I found it again, and then… knock on the owner’s door? I guess?
Demi walked with me to the spot where I’d climbed up last time, and we parted with a series of mindless jokes about running away together and becoming cloud pirate princesses, as well as a whole lot of wildly excessive waving.
That was immediately followed by an endless running commentary in party chat, as we both kept each other up to date on the newest weird things we saw. That turned out to be a little unfair, though: Demi only had a maximum of ten Mana, so any system functions she used cost her a fraction of what they cost me, yet she still regenerated the same amount from items. Effectively that made things like telepathic messaging almost free for her, especially by comparison to me. Well, for me, I just didn’t really care-I could always buy more water again later to regenerate any Mana I spent.
While we kept up the chatter, I got to work searching the terrace. Immediately I noticed that, once again, the sight of the terraces at night was both majestic and serene, but this time I was mostly too focussed on examining the plants to appreciate it. With my perception-enhanced eyes and my focus-deprived mind, the list of plants, now I cared to look, was just as good.
There were tall ones that grew in a half-arch up to my waist and ended in hanging bells glowing in various colours. There were straight ones that looked vaguely like the pictures I’d seen of palm trees, except miniature and mostly pink. There were flat ones that looked like lotuses in various shades from obnoxious purple to light-consuming black, and, occasionally, transparent pale blue. There were thick tangled bushes with white and orange balls of cotton growing on them like berries. Not to mention the things that looked like how pineapples used to look in the history movies, except with the obligatory added glowy bits, of course.
Then there were patches of foul-smelling green strawberry-like-things, sweet smelling white blueberry-like-things, and spicy smelling red banana-like-things. I didn’t see any sunfruit, but I did see fruit in the shape of stars, others that looked like upside down horse-shoes, as well as ones that looked like mangled octopi. In fact, there were so many things I quickly lost track of them all. There were, however, no things that smelled like mint.
And then finally, mostly by process of elimination, I found what I was looking for tucked away in an obscure corner I couldn’t even imagine why I would have visited earlier… except that its bulb was glowing purple, and it smelled more like pizza sauce than mint.
Well… I decided to knock anyway.
And then I waited.
This particular garden was situated a few minutes trek sort of south-east-ish of the Keeper’s terrace, and was surrounded on three sides by the walls of rooms that should be the fourth stories of their respective buildings. I could peek between the buildings down into the streets below, but mostly the place had a nice, quiet, cozy feeling. There was a path of thin flat stones going to the door I’d knocked on, but the garden itself was filled with a rich brown dirt that smelled somehow warm. The other two buildings had doors that opened onto a wooden landing that was raised about half a meter up on the western side of the space.
Eventually I decided I’d waited long enough, and knocked again. This time I heard a few creaking sounds and a woman’s voice from below saying something that was probably “Coming!”
And then I waited some more.
<“Hey River you wouldn’t believe what I just found!”> Demi’s telepathic message cut me off just as the door opened, causing me to miss whatever the woman said. I was left a little bewildered and gawking like an idiot.
The stranger in front of me took precedence, though. She was… well, she looked a bit like a fantasy version of my mom actually, except a lot younger. Also her eyes were a bit softer, and she was blue. Like, really blue. Obviously she was a Mistborn.
The most immediately apparent feature of Mistborn was always their crazy coloured hair, but describing hers as being like radioactive bubblegum wouldn’t have done it justice; it was more like a patch of mid-afternoon sky had ripped a hole in the fabric of reality just so it could form a vaguely pixie-cut-shaped halo around her head. The fact that her whole head practically shone with the ripples from my [Eyes of Wonder] Skill only made the image even more startling. Her eyes were also blue, like I was looking through a pair of misty portals into an alternate dimension filled with swirling tropical seas.
Finally I tore my eyes away from her head, and saw she was wearing a brown and blue patterned blouse with way too much lace around the shoulders, as well as a poofy beige mini skirt, making her look like she was trying a little too hard to look like a little kid. Either that or she’d just gotten dressed in a hurry. Her skin was pale white, but the patterning was darker than mine and tinged, in a definitely completely unpredictable twist of fate, obviously blue.
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Seeing me staring, she raised an eyebrow at me and repeated her question. “Hi, how can I help you?”
“Oh, um, sorry. I was just looking at your garden and I noticed you, um, had a plant that looked like Brightsage in it? I was looking for some and I… um, I sortof wondered if you could help me.” Yeah, it was not my worst opening line ever.
She blinked at me for a good ten seconds before replying. “Hi. I’m Lindy. That’s not Brightsage. What’s your name?”
Eeh? I was immediately thrown off yet again. Well, I might as well go at her pace. “Oh, um. Hi Lindy. I’m River. If that’s not Brightsage, would you mind telling me where I can find some that is?”
The woman, Lindy, frowned, making it look a bit like a tropical storm cloud had just descended between her eyebrows. I expected to see flashes of lightning any moment. Did I make her angry? Had I asked for too much?
“Brightsage… Brightsage, Brightsage. Hmm. I know I’ve seen some inside the city. Now where would I have seen it? It’s kind of nasty stuff, isn’t it? Likes the dark… Hmm? I wonder why a lovely girl like you would be looking for something like that anyway? Reuben down the way has a nice crop of Winterthistle this month. It’s much nicer, and easier to work with too. Why don’t you… ah, he’s probably asleep though…”
“Ahh,” I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. “It’s actually not for me, it’s for someone I know who I think used it to make ink? I don’t think something else will work, unfortunately.”
“Someone you know- won’t work- make ink… wait!” Her eyes went wide, “You’re River!”
“Yeah, I- I said that, right?”
“You did, I just didn’t… well anyway, of course I can help you! Yes. Or, well, that’s what I’d like to say. But, actually, I don’t know where you can find it. I know it grows in dark damp places, maybe in the sewers under the city? But, barring that… Mmm, we used to have a depressing amount of the stuff where I used to live, but it would take weeks to walk there now.”
“Hmm… wait,” I realised the implication of what she’d just said, “to walk there? Didn’t you come here from the Empire? I thought everyone did.”
“Eeeh?” She looked even more surprised than I was, “Oh, I forgot, you came here through the waygate didn’t you? So you wouldn’t know. I guess you can always ask that person about it, but, no, some of us are able to sneak in.” She smiled slightly sadly. “Sneak in, blend in, make lives here. The Children really look a lot like them, so that helps. I mean, it’s all in the flows of the Mist, of course. I mean, I’m sure she would say something else, but… I, hehe. Don’t tell her I said this, but I guess it’s hard to see the Mist when you walk so deeply within it, you know?”
I didn’t, but my whole body was screaming at me to ask about something else. “By her, you mean the K-”
Her hand shot out faster than I would have thought possible. “Careful! Who could be listening? Right? You never know.”
My mouth hung open in stunned silence until my brain caught up to what had just happened. “Uh, well, what I was going to say was ‘the kind old lady I met this morning’.”
She grinned at that. “Oh, yeah, her. Um. Oh wow, I’m so jealous of you. You’re like… what is it the imperials call it? Like royalty. Princess River. Haha, has a nice ring, doesn’t it? Not that you’d want to go around saying that to anyone. Sorry, I got a bit off topic, didn’t I? Your highness.”
She had, but I didn’t care. My thoughts were already racing. It was my first real conversation with another Mistborn besides the Keeper, yet she’d already revealed so much to me. How much could I have learned if I’d just asked Tejana when I had the chance? Except he had been a player, so nevermind. I had another question that needed asking, though. “Do you know who the Witch of Midnight is?”
She pondered for a while. “Nope. Don’t. Um. Sorry about that.”
Well, it had been worth a try. It was a bit too obvious for me to have missed the connection between the names of Midnight and Twilight, but fact that she didn’t know anything was also telling in itself. Should I bother asking if there was a Witch of Dawn and a Witch of Noon as well?
Before I could formulate another question, the woman spoke again. “I don’t, but thinking about it, it almost sounds a bit sinister to me. Witch. Witches are an imperial thing, and if you’re talking about imperials… ah, I guess to anyone who isn’t born of the Mist… what kind of energy does midnight represent? Right? It’s like fear of the unknown. They can’t see, they can hide things, or they think they can. Well, anyway, sorry, it was just a thought. What is this person trying to hide?”
I stared at her, my thoughts racing. If I thought of it as a normal conversation, her musing seemed innocent, but if I thought about it in terms of gaming, the question had to be asked: what was the game trying to tell me by having her say that? When I did meet this so-called Witch of Midnight, assuming I hadn’t done so already, would I be able to look at her without wondering?
After a brief silence, the woman continued. “But… um. Ah, well, you know, it’s getting pretty close to midnight now, isn’t it? My husband, you know I probably shouldn’t stay up here too much longer, or he’ll start to get worried.”
“Right!” I nodded, pulling myself from my reverie. “Thank you, you’ve given me a whole lot of things to think about. I guess… it was the sewers you said I needed to go to, right?”
“Ah, yeah. Sorry I couldn’t think of any place better. I’m sure the locals can probably help you get in and out a bit quicker, though. Well, anyway, you’ll get used to that kind of place eventually I’m sure, what with what you do. The Mist doesn’t much discriminate, does it?”
That sounded very unfortunate, but I was already forming a plan. I smiled at the woman and was about to say goodbye before I realised I couldn’t remember her name, what had it been? Lacy? Lucy? Lara? No… It had reminded me of clouds, because of her hair. Windy. Lindy. Yes.
“Yeah. Um. Thanks again Lindy. I hope your husband didn’t get too worried. I guess, that’s goodnight then?”
<“Hey River? Something happened? Talk to me!”>
“Yeah, good night. Well, I guess you’re probably planning to stay up, but I’ll see you around. Come ask me for help any time. I mean, it’s like an honour to be able to help you, isn’t it? Your highness.” She laughed.
I laughed with her. “Alright, I will. Thanks Lindy. Goodnight. I’ll see you around."
I waited until we’d both turned, then switched to telepathy as fast as I could. <“Sorry. I, um, just got a lot of new information all at once.”>
<“Oh, whew. Thank God. I was so worried. I kept messaging you, but you didn’t reply. I thought maybe…”>
<“Nah, it was ok. I… sorry I didn’t reply.”>
Somehow, though, that didn’t feel quite enough. I… needed to think about that.
~ ~ 26/1/2/00:15 ~ ~
Status: [River]
Class: [Novice Mistborn Runemaster]
Location: [Cowl's Landing - The Rooftop Paths]
Health 38/38 ~ Mana 31/41 ~ Stamina 37/41 ~ Runes 1/1
[Eyes of Wonder]
Equipped Skills (8/8):
[Force Infused Palm]
[Myriad Fists]
[Imbued Defence]
[Unarmed Discipline (Passive)]
[Body Conditioning (Passive)]
[Inscribe: Rune of the Creator Flame (1/1)]
[Sign of Inverse Devouring]
[Eyes of Wonder] Statistics:
Defence +8
Resistance +5
Constitution +4
Willpower +4
Endurance +4
Spirit +1
Perception +1 (+5%)
Focus (-5%) Equipped Items (3/8):
[New Arrival’s Simple Dress]
[New Arrival’s Simple Shoes]
[Valesilver Pin]
[Silversilk Bracelet] Other Skills:
[Elementary Ingredient Preparation (Passive)]
[Runic Plea] Other Items:
[Special Edition Founder’s Token]
[Small Pouch]
[Small Iron Key]
[Sugary Biscuit]x2
[The Keeper's List]
[Amarh Elbow Gristle]x18
[Thoril's Needle]x15
[Myrl Rose]x6
[Crushed Red Longshore Prawn's Shell]x3
[Thwart Grass]x4
[Neit Flour (Male)]x13
[Neit Flour (Female)]x13
[Telemetric Null-phase Spirit Transponder]
[Basic Healing Potion]
[Basic Mana Potion]
[Basic Healing Salve]
[Basic Mana Salve]
[Dry Trail Mix]
[Waterskin (4)]
Active Quests:
[Cryptic Flows of the Mist (Part 1)]
[Path of the Runemaster (Part 3)]
[The Keeper’s Garden (Part 1)]
[The Ancient Keeper of Runic Magic (Part 4)]
[Things Worth Finding in the Mist]
[The Eyes of Twilight]
Status: [Demi]
Class: [Novice Freechild Guardian]
Location: [Cowl's Landing - The Salt Refinery]
Health 44/60 ~ Mana 10/10 ~ Stamina 39/40
Equipped Skills (8/8):
[Guarded Strike]
[Standfast]
[Shield Block]
[Greatshield Discipline (Passive)]
[Mocking Shout]
[Strength of Eternity (Passive)]
[Downed Brawler (Passive)]
[Resolute Defence (Active/Passive)]
Statistics:
Defence +19
Resistance +1
Damage +2
Strength +8
Willpower +5
Equipped Items (5/8):
[New Arrival's Basic Short Sword]
[New Arrival's Basic Shield]
[Tarnished Iron Breastplate]
[New Arrival’s Simple Undershirt]
[New Arrival's Basic Chain Tasset]
[New Arrival’s Simple Pants]
[New Arrival's Basic Leather Boots] Other Skills:
Other Items:
[Special Edition Founder’s Token]
[Novice Stamina Potion]
[Novice Rejuvenating Salve]x5
[Guldrin’s Checklist]
[Saproot Seed]x14
[Mordalk Stew (cold)]
[Luma Feather]
[Garden Pebble]
[New Arrival’s Basic Chain Armour]
[Palt Lure]
[Greatshield of Dauntless Hope (Shattered)]
[Starfire Wasp Wing]x52
[Starfire Wasp Eye]
[Spider Monkey Chelicera]
[Kvaltyr Antler Fragment]
[Vial of Silver Gemdust (10)]x2
[Vial of Silver Gemdust (7)]
[Basic Antivenom Salve]x3
[Silver Tea Bell]
[Basic Healing Potion]x2
[Basic Healing Salve]x2
[Rogu Jerky]
[Veilberry Waterskin (6)]
[Cloudweight]
Active Quests:
[Guldrin’s Experiment]
[Wanted: Dead Jungle Palts]
[Finding Vinot]
[Ooh, What's This?]
[Asyr Hospitality (Part 5)]
[Strength of Eternity (Part 4)]