3. Stone Rose

“Bam! Sword blade, right there - inches away from slicing my head off. “Enough.” You could hear a pin drop. Crowd on the edge of their seats.”

Grinning, Rose dropped his impression of Lux’s earlier battle stance, complete with imaginary sword held high. “So dramatic,” he said, with great satisfaction.

He sauntered through the streets of San Aria without a care in the world, weaving between traders and tourists as if they were circling partners in a constant dance. Lux and Caela followed closely in his wake, while a still-annoyed Valerios strode along behind them, daring all oncomers to move out of his juggernaut path.

Spinning on his heel to walk backwards with just as much ease, Rose turned to address Lux conspiratorially.

“You practise that line about the bar tab? Come on, nothing to be embarrassed about. I’m definitely stealing that one for the collection.”

The former fisherman laughed awkwardly, scratching at his stubbly chin. He’d already apologised for pulling a sword on his brand-new acquaintance, but Rose seemed completely unburdened by grudges. Instead, he seemed to consider it the start of a sterling friendship - and an excuse to launch into an excited blow-by-blow recap of the tussle, as if he was reviewing a particularly well-choreographed fight scene from a play.

“No, it just slipped out. Wasn’t really thinkin’ when I jumped in,” Lux admitted. “I tend to do that.” He exchanged a look with Caela, whose mouth twitched with amusement. “A lot.”

Valerios nodded sagely, twirling the tip of his voluminous moustache. “Battle instinct. Every warrior’s bread and butter.”

“But man cannot live on bread and butter alone,” Rose cried in mock despair. “If you want to add some real flavours,” he told Lux, tapping his head, “you need this. Psychology. Get in your opponent's head, then kick it in. Know his heart, and pierce it.”

He nodded at the shortsword hanging from Lux’s waist. “Where’d you learn to swing that thing, anyway?”

Lux rubbed the back of his neck, suddenly hesitant. At his shyness, Rose pressed on. “Come on, you can tell me.” He leaned in, dropping his voice to a stage whisper. “Was it moustache man over there? I can see why that would be embarrassing.”

Lux laughed, though it didn’t quite reach his downcast eyes. “It was my pa, back home. Before...” He trailed off.

Rose watched him for a moment. Then his smile softened, and his usual attitude slipped away, just a little. He continued in a quieter tone, meant for Lux alone, rather than his usual audience - which, as far as Lux could tell, was the whole world. “Tough, losing someone like that. Does things to people like us.” He swung his arms, thoughtfully. “I didn’t meet my dad ‘til I was your age, and that-” - he grimaced briefly - “-didn’t go well. So I found something better to do. Started fighting, and…” He shrugged. “I guess I never stopped.”

Lux tilted his head, curious. “Then, when you said you dance…”

“Yeah, my little joke.” Rose grinned, back to bravado in a flash. “I’m a prize fighter.”

He illustrated this claim by adopting a quick-stepping shuffle as their path turned through a busy street market. “It’s all a dance, if you think about it. Footwork, timing, situational awareness-“

Just at that moment, a young flower-seller turned from her stall and bounced off of Rose’s swaying body.

“Although, sometimes,” he continued, twirling round to catch the falling woman and dip her like a dance partner, “I do enjoy a traditional two-step.” He raised the flushed woman, tucked a red curl back into her bonnet, and released her, giggling, back into the market throng.

Lux looked up to Rose, wonderingly, as the party continued to push through the masses. “You must have fought so many bad guys…”

Rose nodded. “A few. There was this one fellow, The Flamingo, used to fight on one leg.” He laughed at the memory. “There were certainly some characters back in Pasat-”

Rose bit off the end of the sentence, cringing. “Forget you heard that. I’ve been out of that business for a while. New town, new name, know what I mean?”

Caela piped up. “Then my uncle-”

“Since I can’t fight, I’ve been doing odd jobs for the old man. He’s been keeping me fed and clothed since I got here. Mostly clothed, anyway,” Rose added with a cheeky grin.

As a tall white arch swept over their heads, the crowds of people suddenly gave way to a wide promenade - and beyond, the glistening blue sea. Locals strolled in twos and threes along the waterfront, the ocean breeze streaming through the fluttering folds of their pastel robes. Outside of the city’s tall, narrow passages, shade was sparse, and the white sun blazed down onto the stone. The heat of the day was already sweltering. Valerios wiped his brow, but did not remove his fur-lined cloak or back-mounted armoury.

Rose squinted along the blindingly pale promenade. “We’re looking for a ship called the Stone Rose. No relation, unfortunately.”

Caela scanned the horizon, more used to the gloom of the forest floor than this dazzling cityscape. She noticed the resemblance of the locals’ robes to the flags on the rooftops, and pointed it out to Rose, who shrugged. “Something political. The Council of Twenty are some bigwigs who get elected to run things, because of how much they’re involved in the businesses, and they’ve all got their colours. If you’re planning any colour-coded outfits, best check which neighbourhood you’re going into, lest you upset someone.”

Caela did a quick scan of her outfit, satisfying herself her forest tones wouldn’t be confused for any of the lime-green flags on display. Valerios, meanwhile, shook his head mournfully. “Terrible, terrible,” he muttered. “How do they agree on anything? A wonder this city hasn’t fallen to rubble.”

They strolled along the harbour, passing mighty, high-masted trading ships and tiny, battered fishing boats before they finally picked out the Stone Rose: an ancient-looking vessel, its boards green with algae.

Lux tugged the end of Rose’s shirt, looking doubtful. “What are we looking for, anyway?”

Rose closed his eyes with the effort of remembering.

“So this woman owes the old man a debt, right, and she’s to pay it back by buying something for him. We’re to pick up the payment, make the trade, and deliver the product to the old man.”

“What’s he buying? What’s the payment?”

“He said they’d know.”

Lux glanced a little suspiciously at Caela, still addressing Rose. “This sounds shadier than a hundred-year-old olive tree.”

Caela set her shoulders with determination. “I trust Uncle Mene,” she said, and took her first step onto the creaking gangplank.

Lux turned back to Rose, who, eyes on Caela’s wobbly progress, shrugged. “Old man’s dead on about most things, so it should be fine.”

Reaching the silent deck, Caela spotted a figure silhouetted against the sun. Unsure how to greet them, she raised her hand in an awkward wave that went unreturned. The stranger stayed motionless, unspeaking. Despite the heat, Caela felt a sudden chill.

“Hello?” she asked, inching forwards, to no response. Her gloved hand crept up towards the quiver on her shoulder. They weren’t expecting danger, but something about the way the figure stood, still as stone-

Oh. Caela came to a sudden stop, feeling her face flush with foolishness. She looked again at the stone statue, wondering why it had been placed here on the top deck. The pose and anatomy of the female figure were quite lifelike, and she felt vindicated in having been fooled by the decoy. But the existence of the statue - several statues, she now realised - presented its own mystery. Who would bring such heavy goods onto a boat, only to leave them standing on the deck?

“It’s safe!” She called back to the others, trying to sound more confident than she felt. Her three companions made their way up the gangplank, curiously inspecting the stone sculptures. Caela sized up the single door leading to the captain’s quarters, wishing she hadn’t taken the lead on this investigation, and pushed it open.

The old cabin door creaked as it swung, rough wood flexing under her touch.

“Hello?” She stepped into the cool darkness. The midday sun shining through the doorway illuminated a bright rectangle of floor, but it took a few seconds for Caela’s eyes to adapt to the room’s dark, cavernous interior. This, too, was full of lifelike statues, densely packed as if they were a cheap commodity. Blinking away sunspots, Caela thought she saw something shift amidst the stacked crates.

They’re hiding, she thought.

“Shut the door behind me,” she called back to the others, fruitlessly peering into the dusty gloom.

Rose swung the flimsy wood shut, sealing them into the twilight. “You sure? You won’t be able to-” he began, before catching Caela’s expression and falling silent. With the last of the light reflecting in her eyes, she suddenly looked like a nocturnal animal.

“I will,” she whispered.

Caela slipped between tall crates and under overhangs, unshouldering her longbow and nocking an arrow. Something was in here with them, moving slowly and surreptitiously.

Could they have found another aberration? So soon?

She hoped not. She could see in the dark better than the others - better than nothing - but the cluttered scene was beginning to blur together into a grey blob. She put her hand out to steady herself against a statue, this one of a tall woman wearing a blindfold and a terrible snarl. As her hand brushed against warm flesh rather than rough stone, she felt a jolt of dread.

The statue’s hand snapped closed, holding Caela in a grip that was both vice-like and terribly, obviously alive.

The statues. How could you have been so stupid, Caela?

The tall woman whipped off her blindfold with her free hand, her lank hair exploding into a hissing frenzy of action. Thinking quick, Caela squeezed her eyes shut. She strained against the grip on her hand, her bow tumbling out of her reach as she tripped.

Rose had seen Caela as a creature of the night, but right now she just felt like a mouse, frozen in terror as its serpentine hunter slithers closer. A touch of heady perfume cut through the dusty cabin smell, and Caela felt long nails dig into her hand as she was raised to her tiptoes, legs feeling like jelly.

“What’s this? More vermin in my home?” The woman’s voice, deep and husky, was cracked with emotion - not at all the playful predator that Caela had been expecting.

“W-we c-c-c…” Caela could hardly get the words out. Her tongue felt thick, her cheeks paralysed. Somewhere outside, she heard an almighty crash. She could barely spare a thought for her companions’ fate, however, while her own hung in the balance.

“Have you come to take my life? You’ve already taken the most important thing to me, and you thought you’d come back to take the second too?” The mournful voice tickled the ranger’s ear, close enough to raise goosebumps.

Caela flinched, biting down a scream as tiny snake-tongues flicked at her face. The perfumed smell grew stronger, and she felt the faint warmth of another face inches from her own. She desperately clamped her eyes shut, knowing that looking at her captor for even a moment would mean sharing the fate of the statues surrounding them.

Just as she thought all hope was lost, she heard a sudden inrush of breath, and was abruptly dropped to the floor.

“Your smell… You smell just like my little lynx.”

“Uncle Menelaus,” Caela gasped, covering her eyes. “He sent us here.” To meet you, apparently, she thought.

The hissing ceased, and Caela heard the swish of fabric before being gently raised to her feet by a strong, delicate arm. That grip, as firm as before but much gentler, pulled her hand from her eyes. Caela looked up into the face of the medusa. From behind her blindfold rolled a tear.

“I am sorry, child, for scaring you so. This is not my custom to greet guests. I… I have seen better days.”

Ten minutes later, the medusa’s four guests sat awkwardly around a warped captain’s table, sipping glasses of iced fruit juice. While Caela had been investigating, Valerios had finally succumbed to the heat of the day and collapsed in his half-ton of steel and animal pelts. Rose and Lux had revived him with judicious use of a passing fruit juice vendor, then gone in search of their missing ranger.

Vyne had assured them that most of the statues on the ship were hand-sculpted. The party, having inspected her mason’s tools, chose to trust her.

“Those days are long past me,” Vyne said, “I have not made a… ‘real statue’ in many years.” She sighed. “It’s my daughter, you see. She has not come home in many a week. This city… she has never been on her own. I am worried she has been taken.”

Rose nodded gravely. “I only wish we could help.”

Vyne shook her head, draining her glass. Her snakes lay limply around her shoulders, seeming to change hairstyle with her mood. “I know not where she could have gone.”

She forced a smile at Caela. “But this is a mother’s worry. I should not burden you with it. Why does my little lynx send word to me?”

Caela hesitated, not sure how to continue, and Vyne smiled, answering her own question. “Ah, it must be our debt, yes? He calls it at last.”

Caela nodded. “I don’t know why now. Just that he needs to buy something.”

Vyne slid to her feet and left the table. After a minute of unseen searching, she returned with an old, battered jewellery box. She opened it and proffered the contents, two glassy bars lying on velvet, to her guests. Rose examined the translucence of his piece, a deep red rectangle the size of his palm, before passing it to Valerios. The man frowned, tapped the bar on the table and scratched it with a fingernail. He then looked up at Vyne, his eyes bulging out of his head.

“Ruby? A bar of ruby?” he squeaked out. She nodded, taking back the bar and its blue companion. Lux seemed to need a second tug to release his piece.

“A king’s ransom, and simultaneously worthless. There aren’t many who’ll accept these as currency.” Vyne shook her serpentine hair in thought. “Little lynx, is it worth this much?” she mused.

As if remembering she had company, she stood up suddenly and began to clear the glasses from the table. “Your uncle and I, we were… companions. We travelled the land, along with Ren - maybe you met her in the Feisty Fish - and…”

Vyne stopped. “Caela. Of course.” She turned to examine Caela, the snakes fanning out around her. “You must be Cael’s granddaughter.”

At Caela’s nod, she knelt down to pat her hand. “He was a great hero, and a greater friend,” Vyne smiled. “None of our troupe would be alive without his sacrifice.”

She returned the ruby and sapphire bars to their box, and closed the lid with a determined click. “You must go to the Otherside,” she announced cryptically. “A den of delights, of a kind, north of here. They will know what you need.”

—

Freed from the surprising hospitality of the Stone Rose, the party scurried down the gangplank and made their way into the waterside alleys, buzzing with nervous energy.

Lux and Rose launched a two-pronged interrogation upon Caela, pressing her for details of the adventures hinted at by Vyne. Embarrassed, she did her best to deflect them, seeking shelter within the black curtains of her hair. She stalled long enough for her companions to realise that they had no idea where they were going, and ask a man sitting on a veranda for directions.

The ruddy stevedore peered suspiciously at them, wiping sweat from his thinning hairline with a rag. Finally, he cackled coarsely and jerked a thumb further into the rats’ nest. “Don't know about an 'Other Side', but if it’s cheap thrills you want, next canal to your right, under the bridges.”

As they continued on, Caela heard him mutter: “Didn’t take you for that kind. Pah! Tourists.”

The dockworker's directions led them along a precarious tow path, tiger-striped with the shade from bridges passing overhead. The sub-street-level road had an acrid sleaziness the scrubbed-clean main byways of San Aria lacked. Several doors advertised ‘entertainment and company’; in other cases, the ‘company’ advertised themselves, lounging around in grubby underwear. Each of the four visitors had to politely refuse the offer of a ‘good time’.

Finally, they found a tiny black door marked “Gateway To The Otherside” in slanting white calligraphy.

“This must be the place,” Caela murmured, half-hoping it wasn’t. Rose, looking at Valerios, gestured extravagantly for him to go first. When the big man didn't move, he cracked a grin. “Why not have a go, milord? I bet they've got people who can bring even someone like you out of your shell.” He rapped the large man's pauldron to illustrate, making a low clang.

“Be my guest, dancer, you'll be welcomed by your brethren,” Valerios replied, a glint of malice in his eyes.

Rose showed his palms as if to ward off the paladin's bad energy. “Woah. I like a party as much as the next handsome devil, but this isn't really my kind of joint. Never for money, always for love, that’s the Rose way, you feel me?”

He leaned towards Caela, speaking in a more serious whisper. “Look, these places... they don't treat their people right, you know?”

Caela wavered in her conviction for a moment, until she felt a calloused hand grip her own. Lux locked eyes with her, a nervous determination shining within him.

“We can do it,” he insisted, as much to himself as to her.

Caela nodded, feeling braced by the boy's confidence. She knocked on the door and put an ear to it, unwilling to face another unpleasant ambush today. She heard a shuffling approach, and suddenly the dwarf-sized door was unlocked by an appropriately dwarf-sized dwarf. Far from her imagination of a traditional miner, this man was weighed down by several pounds of velvet, with a moustache oiled into needle-points.

He eyed them without much interest, delivering only an unimpressed monotone.

“Whaddayawant?”

“We're looking for the Otherside. Is this it?”

“Closed.”

Verdict given, he attempted to slam the door, only to be stopped by Lux's steel boot. The boy slung his backpack down and quickly retrieved the jewellery case. Cupping it to hide it from any prying eyes, he cracked it open.

“We have payment,” he said, looking meaningfully at the impassive usher. The man's expression didn't change, but he stepped back from the door and gestured towards a black curtain.

“Inside.”

Caela and Lux gratefully dipped into the bordello, hearing the faint cry of “Make good choices!” from Rose as the door was locked shut behind them.

Beyond the curtain, the bordello extended into a series of low, domed ceilings, layered with purple tiles that made it feel like walking around the inside of a geode. Before they could ask any questions, Lux and Caela were shepherded through a series of rooms containing a handful of lethargic patrons and their companions for the hour. The dwarf’s hands firm on their backs, they were driven towards a lilac banquette and all but shoved into the squishy cushions.

As they looked up at their forceful host, the dwarf unhooked a little pouch from his belt. He extracted a pinch of glittering obsidian powder and, just as they began to protest, blew it right into their gaping mouths. The last thing Caela saw was Lux struggling with his scabbard before collapsing back into the velveteen abyss.

4. Otherside >>