The Workhorse (Open)

[Gardens of Babylon]

When she opened her eyes, she immediately regretted it. There was a pressure against the sides of her temples and the sunlight streaming in through her watery gaze only made it worse. A wave of nausea washed over her, starting from her stomach and flowing to her throat. Bridget gasped, taking a deep and ragged breath. After a few minutes, when she hadn’t thrown up and the nausea started to subside, she finally tried to open her eyes again, squinting against the light that fought to burst her brain into a million pieces. The last thing she remembered was running, and perhaps vaguely stopping by the old willow on Ash Street. It got fuzzy from there, and her head spun trying to remember. Instead, she gingerly began to push herself upright.

As far as she could see, she was surrounded by fields. The field of grass and clover she laid in was on top of a hill, beyond the edge of which she could make out the quilt-like swatch of farmlands. Grazing cattle and sheep dotted the landscape in the distance, while dirt roads twisted lines through the patchwork of deep browns, green and gold. There was a chill in the air, the first hint of autumn and in the copses of trees she saw leaves tinged with blushing reds and brilliant orange.

“Hey!” she heard a voice ring through the peace of rustling leaves and grass, of birds chirping and the faint murmuring bleat of livestock. Jerking her head to the side, she saw a small cart pulled by a pair of dappled workhorses. Hand-bound bales of hay were stacked in the cart, towering over the couple in the cart. The man raised a deeply tanned arm and waved to her. “Looking for a ride into town?” he asked.

Town? Again, Bridget took a hard look around. She knew she was far from home, but how far? Nodding, at a loss for anything else, she stood up, brushing dirt from her back and legs. Once she was nestled comfortably in the back of the cart, the sun-warmed hay pressing against her back, she searched her pockets. Everything was there, from the small blade she kept on her to her iPod. I should have listened to Mom… she thought bitterly, reminiscing on the lectures about not taking her cell phone with her on evening runs that she’d heard and ignored hundreds of times before. Maybe if she’d listened, she’d have some idea what happened, or could just talk to her parents. As much as she hated to admit it, she was scared and alone.

Wiping tears from her eyes and fishing out her iPod, she brought the touch screen to life and scrolled to the side to get away from the run information it had been recording when she passed out. Numbers whirred by until she was back to the main menu and could use her thumb to jerk the options to the side until the radio came to a halt before her. When she clicked it, static poured from the headphones in her lap, the familiar frequency of her favorite station set. How far was she from home if she wasn’t getting reception?

After a few minutes she gave up trying to find a station and scrolled back to the fitness tab. She should at least end her run. Anxiety about uploading the short run information and messing up her averages lurched on her back and in the midst of an ethical struggle on whether to just scrap the night’s numbers altogether, she came to the pedometer screen. Every option was maxed out , from time spent running, distance gone, calories burned. As Bee stared in disbelief, the cart lurched as the road turned from dirt to sparse cobbles. Looking up from the screen, she began to see fencing along the road, the occasional cottage style house breaking up the monotony of forest and field.

Convinced her iPod just shorted out, Bee switched off and pocketed the device, holding tightly to the twine that bound the hay into sheaves. She used it to pull herself up and not fall off the back of the cart as she peered in an opening between two bales. Ahead, she saw a city unlike any she’d ever seen. Figures darted out of the way of the horses, women in full skirts and men in cotton and leather .She saw a vendor selling meat pies on the side of the road, and a blacksmith to the other side, sharpening a sword on a grindstone as a man stood patiently and waited.

“I thought you were taking me to town,” Bee called to the driver of the cart, her voice quivering.

“This is Radasanth!” he called. “We’re coming in from the south.”

That was funny, Bee thought as her trembling knees forced her to sit once again at the back of the cart. She didn’t remember any Renaissance Fairs coming through during August. It was the only explanation she could think of. But then… where were the turkey legs, the jousters, the housewives in inaccurate period costumes, the goth kids in trip pants? Where was she?

[Gardens of Babylon]

The buildings of the city passed them by, stretching far too long to be the typically throw up and take down tents of the Fair. The stone buildings, some reinforced with wrought iron and some with wooden Tudor elements, were too established. Moss and vine grew in cracks and up the sides of walls. Grapes sagged full and ripe on a trellis here while a sign on a baker’s storefront claimed a dozen rolls for two copper. The chimney from the ovens wafted fragrant smoke, and the stone was streaked with black from years of bread ash that had been washed downward with the rain.

For a moment, she thought she might have been kidnapped. But then, she reasoned, where were her kidnappers? Sure they would have kept her in one place while they waited a ransom. Who would they ransom her to? Her parents were far from rich, nor well known in the community. Kidnapping didn’t happen to families like hers, she thought. Then, as the cart trundled to a stop and she hopped off the back, she saw the most amazing building ahead. Her feet began to move on their own as she halfheartedly thanked the couple for the ride. Towering against the skyline of the city was a ziggurat, like those she’d seen in history class when they studied the pyramids of the Aztecs. Was she in South America, and was that where those pyramids were? She wished she’d paid more attention in class instead of spending her afternoons with her eyes focused on the clouds outside.

Soon she found herself at the steps. They were solid under her feet, almost as if she were being uplifted as she went closer. As she came to the middle of the path, a shadow overtook hers on the slate steps. She barely was able to turn before she beheld a terrible visage. She was staring somewhere near the belly of a giant creature. She would have said it was a man, clad in a dark matte armor, but no man had such lizard-like features. From his scaly face to otherworldly yellow eyes, it was as if someone had taken an iguana and pumped him so full of steroids, that he no longer had blood. She held her breath, her eyes slowly moving up an expanse of muscular chest to meet an angry, taunting gaze. Finally his lipless mouth cracked a smile, razor sharp and yellowing teeth flashing at her as he spoke.

“What have we here? A little mage dressed in strange robes? Little mage, you should run along if you haven’t even the backbone to stare at me. Nothing but death awaits you inside.” Her heart fluttered in terror, frantically trying to beat its way free from her chest. As the draconic beast moved away, the claws on his feet scraping against the stone steps as he moved, she found she could not move. Bee was stricken with a chill, sweat beading on her forehead. No, this was not South America, or a traveling Fair. She was caught in a nightmare. A small shriek escaped her throat when she felt a warm, gentle hand on her shoulder.

The man behind her was a kind looking sort. He was balding and elderly, with the cracked hands and wise eyes of a man who had experienced life to the fullest and had never spent a day without work. He was wrapped in the orange robes, draped around his shoulders and secured at the waist with a sash. As his hand rubbed her shoulder consolingly she found herself willingly led down the stairs and back onto the street. Her curiosity was dead, killed by the knowledge that the ziggurat held creatures like that.

“We are not all cut out for war,” the old monk finally said. “But that does not mean a life is unremarkable.” When they were in the street once again, she listened carefully and silently as he gave her directions, telling her it was a place where she could find work best suited for her talents. Talents? Bee couldn’t think of what he might think those were. Still, she felt comforted and the monk had a point. She was going to need work if she wanted to be able to take care of herself here. Her stomach growled ominously, and she didn’t have any money. If she did, she doubted there would be a currency transfer somewhere. Hell, she’d never even left her state before, much less gone to…wherever this place could be.

Carefully following the directions she’d been given, she crossed away from the ziggurat and smiths. Shops gave way to neighborhoods, tenement squares and finally a street where the homes had yards, filled with gardens. They were small, much smaller than the yards she was used to in her subdivision, but quaint. It was the perfect picture of what she imagined Britain to be like, whenever she thought of far off places. The destination she’d been given was a small home crafted of log, with the chimney merrily smoking. The fragrance of spice hung in the air and as she found the gate in the short stone wall, and the path leading to the door, she passed a sign.

Simon Rennell
Apothecary and Spells
No Love Charms

[Sentinel]

An intoxicating menagerie of sights and sounds surrounded Sentinel, assaulting the clay golem from every stall and corner that flanked Radasanth’s southern thoroughfare. In one stall a swarthy Fallien hawked a dozen spices which Sentinel had never heard of but which smelled alternately sweet and spicy, with a hint of perfumed desert wind. Two blocks down there was a booth filled with crested singing birds imported from the depths of some Dheathainian jungle, their voices filling the streets with the sound of crystal chimes. Around a corner there was a gathering of children watching a puppet show which purported to have come from the courts of the Scarabrian nobles, the laughing youngsters begging their parents for coins to toss in the puppet master’s box so that the rabbit would continue to do magic tricks for them. Everywhere the golem looked there were a hundred things that filled his curious mind with wonder. But the most wonderful thing of all was that a seven foot tall creature made of mud could walk down the streets in broad daylight without worrying for his safety.

As a golem, Sentinel had spent all of his time since leaving Adolphus’ tower watching his back. The kindly old mage who had created him had tried to teach him about the ills of the world and what it could to do the unprepared, but even so there was much about life that could only be learned through firsthand experience. Sentinel had learned much from the first small village that had run him out of town thinking him a sign of ill omen. And he had learned even more from the brigands whom had stabbed him in the back in the back of a lumber warehouse in Underwood. He understood the harsh realities that Adolphus had tried to teach him in a way that no schooling could possibly convey.

But that wasn’t to say that all of his lessons had been bad. A human child of no more than five ran up to him and waved, giving Sentinel an enthusiastic, toothy grin. The golem returned the gesture as best he could without any actual teeth before the boy’s mother showed up to hurry him along with a scolding about how he had been told not to bother strangers in the market. Yes, Sentinel thought, there certainly were a very many good things about the world. This, all things told, made his mission that much more important.

Elisdrasil, the Raiaeran whom Sentinel had met in that same lumber warehouse in Underwood, had received a vision of an impending storm cloud hovering over Corone’s capitol and had sent the golem out to investigate. Formally he was here as an agent of Phoenix Ascendant, seeking whatever it was that had clouded his high elf leader’s divinations. Informally Sentinel had another mission, one which would have a much more direct impact on Phoenix Ascendant as a whole.

Sentinel sought out a passing group of men whose uniform identified the four of them as members of the city guard. “Excuse me,” he asked, trying to be as polite as possible to the sentries. Dutifully, the guards stopped at Sentinel’s request, though the look on their faces gave the golem the distinct impression that they weren’t pleased about it.

“What do you want?” the lead guard asked, spitting a glob of dark fluid in the dirt at Sentinel’s feet.

“Oh, uh,” Sentinel stammered, put off-guard by the terse behavior, “I was hoping that you might be able to direct me to an apothecary who specializes in liquor enhancers.”

A chorus of laughter answered Sentinel’s question. “Do I look like a street map, freak?” the guard replied and then gestured for the others to follow him, leaving the embarrassed golem standing alone in the center of the street.

“Pardon the intrusion,” a voice from behind Sentinel caught the golem’s attention. He turned to see an elderly human watching him with a sympathetic look on his face.

“Sorry,” Sentinel said, stepping back. “Am I in your way?” He nervously shuffled his large, flat clay feet in the dust. “I tend to forget how big I am sometimes.”

“What? No,” the man held his hands up apologetically. “I just overheard your conversation with those jerks and thought I might be able to help you out.”

“You can?” Sentinel brightened.

“Yes, I know of a wonderful apothecary by the name of Simon Rennell who can help you.”

“And he has experience with liquor enhancers? The brothers Tickers and Boom Boom were very specific on what I needed to have shipped to them.”

The elderly gentleman chuckled. “I’m sure he can help you. Just follow this road through the Sandpoint District and you’ll find Simon’s shop on the right.”

“Thank you so very much,” Sentinel offered the man his hand, keeping aware to not be too vigorous.

The old man took the golem’s hand without hesitation. “I’m glad I could help,” he said. “Us freaks have to stick together.” With that, the old man’s eyes began to shine a multi-hued rainbow of colors, and the air around him was suddenly filled with the scent of roses.

“Wait,” Sentinel called out, but the old man moved quickly away to lose himself in the crowded streets. Knowing that it would be useless to follow the strange man, Sentinel instead turned and followed his directions to Simon Rennell’s shop.

[Gardens of Babylon]

Simon Rennell was mostly a pair of gigantic, blinking eyeballs at the moment. Bee stood in his study, while the alchemist slowly funneled a thick emerald gel into a vial, watching his works through a large lens that magnified his gaze to a strange and wonderful degree. His old hands shook a little, but his steady pace and devout watchfulness made sure that not a single drop was spilled from fingers swollen with arthritis. The study itself had the feel of the man, slow yet busy, warm but with purpose. The furniture from the desk to the stools were hard wood, and both the desk now and the shelves were covered in jars filled with materials and sheaves of paper with notes and diagrams scribbled upon them. While she was at a loss as she looked from jar full of bundled herbs to a golden box mysteriously labeled “king’s heart”, the large bay windows let in shifting lights from waves of clouds moving over the sunny sky. Around the window, exotic plants leaned from their planters towards the glass, the fragrant aroma of their blossoms light in the air.

The room was cool for such an old building, and she knew it was owed to the contraption in the corner of the room. An antique fan of brass whirred away, the click and lurch of its mechanism bare to see. Not quite clockwork, but cogs and leather belts moved a turbine so that the blades could spin. Bee could see a crank on the bottom that got the machine started, as perpetual motion and kinetic energy kept it running. Behind it, in a large dish, a large chunk of ice sat in a thin layer of water. Along the brass legs of the fan, and on a paper label that seemed hand-printed, a swirling alien script danced. The more she tried to read it, the less she found herself understanding the strange symbols.

“Amazing things, you find in Alerar,” Remmell finally said. He looked up from his magnifying glass, tousled salt and pepper hair waving in the breeze from the fan. His eyes were still large behind his thin-framed round glasses, but not nearly as much. Now she could see once again his hooked nose and toothless mouth. He kept his lips pursed, his sharp jaw jutting forward. He slid from the stool, carrying the vial with him, clutched carefully in his hands. At another dresser near where she stood, he pulled out a drawer that contained small paper boxes. Another drawer, smaller and to the side held soft dried grasses. Stuffing the box with grasses, he laid the vial inside, with a layer of grass on top. He finally slid open a third drawer, pulling out two sprigs of dried herbs. “Ah,” he said again, “lavender for luck, rosemary for remembrance. These are two gifts I always give with my services, and unfortunately the two gifts whose greatness are always lost on the give-ees.” He snorted for a moment before closing up the box.

“Now, you’re looking for work are you? I must say I haven’t had an apprentice in many years.” He inhaled sharply, nostrils flaring. “If you can take direction, I say you can stay. How about we test your mind, child?” He paused for a moment and began to head for the door of the room. Bee followed dutifully, confused until she heard another sharp breath from the alchemist, his kind and wavering voice too low for her to hear what he said. Then, from across the house came an unmistakable and solid knock at the door.

[Sentinel]

Sentinel knocked at the alchemist’s door a second time, and then leaned over to check the sign again.

Simon Rennell
Apothecary and Spells
No Love Charms

Love charms? Sentinel remembered what Adolphus had explained to him about that emotion that living creatures called love and wondered, curiously, if there were those who had to resort to potions to achieve that. Was love so wonderful? Was it so hard to find? Would he be able to learn to love? There were so many questions about life that the golem had yet to learn. But there were other things that he had to attend to before he could answer the many mysteries of life.

“We’re open,” a low voice echoed from inside called out to the clay golem, drawing his attention.

“Hello. I’m looking for …,” Sentinel called back, only to realize that it would be far more efficient to actually enter the shop before trying to speak to Mr. Simon Rennell. Glad that clay couldn’t blush, Sentinel entered stooped to squeeze his massive frame through the polished wooden door frame.

“Sorry about that,” he mumbled, turning around to make sure that his robe didn’t catch in the door, knocking over an intricately carved pedestal in the process. Fortunately the brass orb atop the pedestal bounced rather than broke as it hit the floor, coming to a stop at the foot of the human female at the other end of the shop. The thick glasses amplified the annoyed look on the face of the man whom Sentinel could only assume was the apothecary.

“Yes, hrmm,” Simon spoke, his nostrils flaring as he pushed his spectacles back onto his nose. “Imported Scarabrian clay with a mixture of Giselan field mud. Powedered wyrm bone and myrrh. And,” he sniffed heavily, “infused with a thistlewood tincture.”

Sentinel looked from Simon to the woman behind him and then back again, obviously uncomfortable but unsure exactly what he should do.

“How can I help you Mr. Golem?” Simon continued, either unnoticing Sentinel’s discomfort or uncaring of the effects of his words.

“Well, I …,” Sentinel shuffled back and forth, his large flat feet slapping lightly on the shop’s wooden floor. He fixed his eyes behind the aged apothecary, steeling himself by staring at a lightly bubbling silver liquid in a filigreed brass alembic. “I’m looking for some alchemical liquor enhancers for Tickers and Boom Boom.” Realizing that Simon probably didn’t know who the twin gnomes were, he added, “They run the Boomtown bar in Vorsport. It’s in Southern Corone.”

The request genuinely seemed to shock the apothecary. “Liquor enhancers? I’ve heard of alcoholic potions before but I’ve never had an actual bar purchase my wares. Tell me, what exactly do these owners intend to do with my reagents.”

Sentinel reached into one of the pockets sewn inside his robes and produced the list that Tickers and Boom Boom had given him. “They’re going to use them to make a new house specialty, the powder keg.” He handed the list to Simon, who studied it for a second.

“Half the things on this are explosive if mixed,” he said, even more startled than before. “And you intend to mix these into a drink?”

“Well not me …” Sentinel trailed off.

Simon sighed and shook his head, “well, it’s not a powerful explosion and I doubt it would do much damage so it’s no matter of mine what they do with it. Stand over there and wait a while, I’ll need to check my supply stock.”

[Silence Sei]

The streets of Radasanth had been alive today, of that there was no doubt. People rushed by in a hurry to make it to their favorite shop before closing time, children were ogling the toys hung in the windows of stores, and merchants moved products into certain angles to hide any discrepancies that lie within. Of course, all of these people seemed to move to the side when they noticed that Sei Orlouge was making his way through the populated area.

The mute sighed and tried to ignore the hushed whispers of the people, avoid eye contact with all those that found it befitting to stare. Was he really that much of a spectacle here, now that he was the leader of his own private military? Sei had never asked to become a celebrity, but the status was thrust upon him by fate itself. He was fated to save Corone from some unknown threat, and after two or so years of doing his best to make sure the country was protected, everyone started taking notice.

This really annoyed him.

After all, he was just doing what any other decent person would do. Why was it so shocking that he stood up to titans, fought against legends, and even fortified unprotected cities, when it was the right thing to do? He slowly walked his way past the people, each of them stepping aside as if they owed him the courtesy. The mute released another exasperated sigh as he made his way towards his destination. Apparently, very few apothecaries were as good as Simon Rennell, and Aislinn Orlouge, Sei's niece, had demanded of the telepath that he pay Simon a visit for several supplies. If given the choice between being the leader of a well-known organization, and a running boy for his kin, Sei would have much preferred to be the latter.

As he climbed up the three steps to the store, the mute could not help but notice that the door had been left wide open. Blinking with a profound curiosity, Sei stepped into the shop, only to be stopped by a wall of what appeared to be clay. Peeking out to the side of this wall, Sei noticed a girl, his eyebrows raised in true interest now. What kind of heartless parents would name their daughter 'Simon'? Perhaps it was short for 'Simone', or maybe even 'Symphony' (though the last one was a bit of a stretch). Regardless, the mute could not see any other person in the shop, mostly because of the strange wall of clay before him, so this had to be Simon Rennell.

"Ah yes, excuse me," Sei's voice would speak into the minds of all present, though he was still unaware that there was more than him and the girl currently, "I was wondering if you could help me procure some supplies for my niece, Aislinn Orlouge? She said that she sent a messenger earlier to tell you what I would need. I believe one of the primary ingredients on her list had something to do with grounded up berries? I'm sorry, I just know it was supposed to act as some sort of fast-acting burn salve."