Heart of Dorkness

Scourge Three - Splendor

Once Gloop carries the ship away and the fog clears up it becomes a lot easier to see Vizeda in all of its splendor.

Unfortunately, Vizeda doesn’t have much splendor to show off.

The city isn’t entirely uniform, rather it’s a half-circle shoved up against the banks of the Dark Gulf--which isn’t actually a gulf, in purely geological terms, but no one but Esme cares about my rants when it comes to the names of places. Anyway, the city is barely worth the name city. It’s more of a town with delusions of grandeur.

The buildings are built tall rather than wide, to squeeze into the walls that protect the city from roving monsters, and there seems to have been very little urban planning done before people started claiming whatever land they could.

The dock-side homes are built with wide balconies so that the smell of rotting fish can really get inside, and there are piles of trash by the roadsides to add to the bouquet of smells.

“I think I forgot what a city smells like,” I say as I scan the docks.

“This one smells different to Santafaria,” Felix says. “I can still remember the bog when the wind shifted and came in from the east. Smelled like a bathroom after Esme’s done with it.”

“Hey!”

Someone clears their throat, and I half-turn to find Bianca standing next to us. She probably thinks that we’re pretty weird. Which, to be fair, isn’t far from the mark. Felix, Esme and I have spent the better part of a year and a bit at home and in each other’s company. The castle is more than big enough for us to miss each other sometimes, and there must have been a day or two where I didn’t see one or the other, but those were the exception.

“Sorry,” I say. “You were leading us to the inn, right?”

“If you wish,” Bianca says. “There’s an inn for seafarers here, but the better establishment is by the entrance gate to the south.”

“Lead on,” I say.

With Bianca in the lead, we start our trek through Vizeda. This city is supposed to be a big supplier of fish for the cities more to the south, and I think there’s a decent pearl-fishing trade here too. There’s definitely some crab and lobster fishing as well, judging by the cages full of squirming red crustaceans we cross.

“I bet they have all sorts of interesting food here, right Felix?” I ask as we start to cross the city. Mostly we’re staying on the edge of the road, away from the cart and buggy traffic. For all that Vizada is a small city, it seems to be bustling with activity.

“Yeah. It’s going to be hard going back to normal food,” Felix says.

I notice Bianca glancing back for just a moment, and I can’t help but wonder what she thinks Felix means by that. She has to know that we’re just weird, not abnormal, right?

I’m a little worried that we haven’t made the best impression with Bianca, but that’s something that we’ll fix with time and friendship. If she even wants to be our friend.

“This is the inn,” Bianca says with a gesture ahead of her.

The inn is a tall building, right next to the outer walls of the city. There’s a small garden at the back, only big enough for a few flower banks and a bench that sits next to the entrance.

“Looks comfy enough,” I say. The inn looks well-maintained, which is better than what I can say about a lot of the buildings we’ve crossed already.

“It’s not much, but it is a place to rest, if you wish it. I’ve taken the liberty of renting the two topmost floors. Do with them as you please, courtesy of the Malicieux family, of course.”

“Ah, thank you,” I say. “But you didn’t need to do that, it’s not like I lack the gold to rent a place for a night or two.”

Felix sighs. “You should probably give me your purse, you’re just going to toss it around and run out of gold before the week is out.”

“I will not,” I say.

“Felix is right,” Esme says. “But I think we both have some coin, for when you spend all of yours.”

“I’m not bad with money,” I say. Felix and Esme both turn away, refusing to meet my eyes. “Right?” I ask Bianca.

She bows very slightly. “As you say.”

Not exactly a ringing endorsement there either. Pouting at the unfairness of the world--and also my friends--I step into the inn and glance around the main floor. It’s a very... inn-like design. A few tight corridors around a counter with some alcohol behind it, a hint of a kitchen behind a shuttered door, and the enticing smells of roasting vegetables and cooked fish. A menu behind the counter announces that today is lobster served with imported citrus, which does sound nice.

“This way, please,” Bianca says.

There’s a stairwell up to the second and third floors near the middle of the inn. We have to walk by a couple of clients sitting at tables or smoking in the corners to get there.

The second floor isn’t anything too impressive. A corridor with some rooms and a window at the end. The third floor has a nice sitting area with a wide window that’s set high enough that it gives me and my friends a spectacular view of the countryside past the walls.

Vizeda has cleared out a lot of the forest and underbrush nearby, and there are plenty of smaller farms dotting the hills, some even have cattle or grazing animals, but mostly it looks like they’re busy with wheat right now.

A small river meanders around the bigger hills, entering the city somewhere to the east of the inn. “This is a nice place,” I say as I set down my things. “There are rooms upstairs?”

“Three rooms above, six on the second floor,” Bianca says.

“Oh, nice, we can split things up, maybe use one or two of the extra rooms as offices and reading spaces,” I say.

“How long do you intend to stay here?” Esme asks.

“Two days? Maybe three. We need to start asking around, figure out where that cult is located, and then we need to find transport all the way there.”

“Cult?” Bianca asks. “Forgive me if I’m overstepping, but I’m quite curious. I wasn’t informed of your purpose in the Caselfella Republic.”

“That’s fine,” I say. “We actually have two purposes here. Well, I have one, and Esme has her own.”

“But they might be linked,” Esme says.

I nod. “They might be.”

Bianca folds her hands over her tummy and stares at me with a graceful poise that I’ll never manage to copy.

“R-right, so! Esme’s on a mission from Semper to find out who broke into one of Semper’s hidden book caches.”

“There’s supposed to be one to the east, not too far from the capital,” Esme says. “We’re going to investigate.”

“And I’m on a mission from Mom to find out who burned down one of Mom’s temples in the capital.”

“In Caselfella itself?” Bianca asks.

“Yeah, Mom only has a few little temples here and there. There’s one in the capital and another in Algecante. Both of them were destroyed,” I say. “We know that the one destroyed in the capital wasn’t destroyed by the Church of the Hero, and it’s possible that the temple that was burned down two years ago in Santafaria was also not destroyed by that church. Mom thinks that it’s some cult that really dislikes her.”

“I... forgive my impertinence, but I was under the impression that many people tended to dislike your... mother.”

I shrug. “They don’t know her like I do. Also, people really don’t like monsters, and Mom’s the Goddess of those, so it kind of goes hand in hand. Still, people that pray to Mom not to be eaten have a statistically higher chance of not being eaten! There are other perks to worshipping Mom too!” Mom has been getting better at hugging, so that’s a nice perk too.

“I see,” Bianca says. “In either case, I’m here to assist you. If that means discovering the whereabouts of a suspected cult, then I am certain that I can be of use. At the very least, I’m familiar with the region and the nobles that run it.”

“Oh, that might really be useful,” I say. ‘Thanks Bianca, I’m sure we’ll make a great team.”

Felix grins and then gestures back down the stairs. “Can we get something to eat then? And we can scout around the city at the same time.”

“I doubt we’ll find any clues here,” Esme says. “But... it can’t hurt to go looking.”

***