The Blue Hyacinth Tea House

Although every valley with any size (and a few without) had at least one shrine, it was nearly a week since leaving the centipede's valley before we found another with signs of more corporeal habitation.

We were surprised to cross a dune and find a small building in the valley below us, but our surprise was lessened somewhat when we realized that it had clearly been abandoned for some time. The building's front wall was made of stone, but the roof and other walls were made of wood and had collapsed years ago. Trees had sprouted in the foundations. None of us were familiar with the species, but the largest ones must have been at least a decade old.

Still, it was a shady place to rest, so we pulled the wagons over and got out to explore. Mogen pulled a folding contraption - something like a cross between a wheelbarrow and a bathtub - out of the undercarriage of Chak's wagon, and he eeled his way into it so that she could wheel him over for a closer look.

Up close, the tiles on the one remaining wall turned out to be decorated with a pattern of blue hyacinth flowers. Two rusted hooks above the sagging doorway had once held a sign, but we could see no trace of it anywhere around the building. There was no risk of falling through the floor - the trees made it obvious that the building didn't have a cellar - so we stepped through the doorway into what had once been the interior.

Inside, standing on grass that showed occasional glimpses of a tiled floor beneath, was a statue.

It was the red-brown of terra cotta, speckled all over with lichen and moss. Its face was sculpted to resemble a round-cheeked dog - an akita or spitz of some kind, perhaps - with polished black eyes and a friendly smile. The rest of its body was much more minimal in detail, as if it had been intended to be covered by clothing. The collar of what I assumed had once been a uniform of some sort still hung around its neck. The rest of the garment had rotted away, and the collar, which looked to have once been a cheerful red, had faded to a pale and ragged pink. The statue's hands held a stack of paper menus, which were yellowed with age but surprisingly intact, considering that the rest of the statue had clearly been out in the elements for some time.

On its forehead was etched a single character. Chak later said that it meant "hospitality."

As soon as Karlishek stepped through the sagging doorway, the statue opened its mouth and spoke.

"Kirim," it said, which means "welcome" in Jingli. While we variously jumped, gasped, and (in Mogen's case) pulled out a crossbow, it repeated the greeting in several other languages. Chak was the first of us to recover his poise; he thanked the statue in Amrat, the one language all of us shared. The statue switched languages smoothly and continued in Amrat.

"Welcome to the Blue Hyacinth Tea House," said the statue - which, I assumed, was in fact some sort of golem. Though it was clearly made of hard-baked ceramic, its face moved as flexibly as if it were flesh and blood. Its voice was soft and androgynous. "Please allow me to apologize for the state of my uniform. Would you like a table for five?"

We held a brief, hushed discussion while the golem waited patiently. Mogen's single vote for caution was outweighed by four votes for curiosity, and we said yes.

A few small vines had grown partway up the golem's legs. The stems snapped when it moved its feet; it had clearly been standing in the same spot for some time. It led us to what had once been an elegant set of wrought-iron chairs and a table. Unfortunately, the seats had long since rotted through, the legs had rusted, and a large portion of the furniture was now rust stains on the overgrown floor. Unlike its uniform, the golem didn't seem to see this as a problem; it gathered the remains of a few more chairs, which shed flakes of rust and in one case an entire leg, and propped them up against the metal outer rim of the table. It carefully balanced five menus on the few scraps of wood that remained of the surface. Given the state of the furniture, we all elected to remain standing (or, in Chak's case, reclining).

"Please let me know when you have made your selection." The golem stepped back a polite distance and surveyed the other tables, which were - if possible - in even worse shape. Finding no other patrons to attend to, it simply stood and waited while we attempted to peruse the menus.

Further questions revealed that the golem had no name; that the proprietor of the tea house was currently on vacation; and that the golem could not presume to say when they would return.

In a set of shelves by the door, several additional menus,  plus an assortment of cracked china, were stacked on the one shelf still intact enough to provide some shelter from the rain. That explained how any of them were still intact.

If protected from the elements, good-quality paper can last for centuries. This, unfortunately, was middling quality at best, and it had been stored for some time in a building without a roof. When I attempted to gingerly pry the brittle, yellowed menu open, it cracked in half at the spine. I felt a somewhat irrational pang of guilt. Rather than try to open another, I simply handed my menu to Chak - the only one of us who could actually read the faded columns of Jingli script inside - and he translated it for us.

The selection seemed to be fairly standard tea house fare: an assortment of cakes, pastries, and biscuits, plus a selection of teas, only a few of which we'd heard of. Most of the teas had reptilian names of some sort: Black Crocodile, Sunlizard, Dragon's Gold.

We were curious as to how the golem planned to produce any of the items on the menu, given the building's apparent lack of a kitchen.When I attempted to order a caramel rice cake and a cup of the Sapphire Dragon tea, which was the variety I was most curious about, the golem's response came as a surprise to no one.

"I am sorry to report that we are missing an essential ingredient for this dish. In fact, we are missing every ingredient for this dish. Could I interest you in something else?"

Still curious, I asked about several other dishes on the menu. The golem informed me that they were also unavailable, as was the Sapphire Dragon tea and, for that matter, every other variety of tea. I probably would have run through the entire menu if Karlishek hadn't interrupted me.

"What exactly is available?" he asked. I had to admit that this was a more efficient approach.

The golem considered the question for a moment. It looked over at the stream running past the front door. "Water." It turned its head to survey a few nearby shrubs and trees. "And a selection of fresh fruit."

That was good enough for us. For the sake of hygiene, I requested that the golem at least boil the water first. Chak rolled his eyes. "Boiled water? For goodness' sake. Mogen, would you please fetch the tea case from my wagon?"

Mogen gave the golem a suspicious look, but hurried back to the wagons and returned a minute later with a watertight chest bound in leather. Inside was a small treasure trove of tea in assorted jars and wooden boxes. The labels were in a bewildering variety of languages. I recognized Amrat, Halsi, Hmakk, English, and even a few in Sikelak. The names were an even wider variety: Jade Serpent, Baconeg Breakfast, Gira Gira Captain's Black, Midnight Purple, Red Rose Lightning, Undertaker's Comfort, Wicked Wilma's Knuckleduster Chamomile.

Chak selected two jars and handed them to the golem with the solemnity of someone presenting a gift to royalty. "Please accept these as a small donation to your tea house."

The golem inclined its head with equal gravity. "The Blue Hyacinth Tea House appreciates your donation. I am pleased to inform you," it added to the table at large, reading the labels on the jars, "that Green Manatee and Baron Smackerly's Blackcurrant are now available."

Both of these are widely known teas, available cheaply in most countries. Chak later informed us that, given the circumstances, he had chosen them mainly for their ability to retain their flavor over long periods of time, and the fact that they were both stored in watertight jars. (And, of course, the fact that they paired well with the flavors of the brassberries and wild mint that he'd noticed the golem looking at, "because I'm not a complete barbarian.")

The golem declined our offers to donate food supplies other than tea to the tea house, citing archaic health codes that none of us had heard of. It was a pleasant meal all the same. The golem even managed to find enough cups and plates for all of us. Most of them were chipped, but they were all intact enough to hold our tea of choice. The china was decorated with a pattern of blue hyacinths.

The prices were quite reasonable - for all we knew, because they were from the previous century - and we paid the bill using little more than small change. The golem took the coins and dropped them with a splash into the rusted-open drawer of what had once been an ornate brass cash register. We also left a tip, of course. The golem attempted to slip the coins into a nonexistent pocket, looked puzzled for a moment, and then placed them on top of its head instead.

As we were leaving, I asked how often the tea house had customers.

"Business has been slow lately," the golem replied. "You are our first customers in twenty-three years, five months, and eight days. If you enjoyed your meal here, please recommend us to your friends," it added hopefully. "Desserts are half-price on Tuesdays if you wear an amusing hat."

We thanked the golem and said that we would certainly recommend the tea house to someone, whenever we reached a more populated area.

By the time we left the valley, the golem had washed the dishes, gathered the menus, and resumed its post by the empty doorway, waiting patiently for the tea house's next customers. I hope the tea is still good when they arrive.

Orlogrove

After leaving Nemigan's orchard, most of the valleys we passed through were uninhabited. They continued to be roughly similar to each other: long, narrow strips of green between the bare golden peaks of the dunes, where scatterings of grass, cacti, shrubs, and small trees had grabbed the endlessly flowing waves of sand and rooted them in place.

Most valleys had a small shrine somewhere, usually by the deepest pool in the stream. (There was always a stream.) Apparently, each valley had its own local spirit - perhaps many spirits, if what I saw in Nemigan's valley was any indication - and someone long ago had taken the trouble to travel between the valleys, building a shrine to each one.

Spirits like to have shrines. They are forgetful creatures themselves, or at least remember in very different ways than we do, and many of them find it reassuring to have a shrine reminding passersby that they exist. Also, like most people, they are fond of well-crafted presents.

These shrines were certainly well-crafted. I couldn't identify the speckled gray stone they were carved from, which was neither the typical Golden Desert sandstone nor the pink granite from the gargoyle village, but it was quite hard; the carvings were old, coated with moss and lichen, but they were hardly worn at all. The stone was clearly not from anywhere nearby either. It must have taken a lot of work to transport it across all these dunes.

After my travels in Mollogou, where there's a spirit and a shrine for every hill and hummock, this place seemed oddly familiar - in an upside-down sort of way.

Karlishek and Garnet steered us away from a handful of valleys that, as they put it, smelled wrong. Nothing appeared obviously different about them from the outside, but after the first three or four, I also began to notice myself feeling faintly uneasy around them - the sort of vague sensation that I might normally have dismissed, but which I should perhaps learn to pay more attention to here. Not every location's spirit is a friendly one, especially in the less populated regions of the world.

Other valleys we avoided for different reasons. One we passed by simply because of the cheeky smile on the stone rabbit that adorned its shrine, a hand of cards pressed close to its chest with one paw. None of us were so starved for excitement that we felt like dealing with a trickster. Another had what was clearly a stone grave marker - much more crudely carved than the modestly adorned stone block that served it as a shrine - placed in the ground under its only tree. Though it didn't feel uneasy or hostile, there was an inward-turned sadness about the valley that caused us to quietly pass by and leave it alone. Spirits don't age or die the way that faster-living mortals do, and their mourning periods can last for centuries.

For the most part, though, the valleys were quite pleasant to wander through. It was a relief to be able to rest in the shade of trees again, however stunted, and hear the trickle of water nearby. Though there were no more inhabited valleys for some time, we found plenty of food in the ones we passed through. There were more desert apples and puddens, the occasional cluster of gumdrop cacti, and even a few edible mushrooms. In the sheltered spaces between bushes, we found the occasional cluster of wormflowers - fat, succulent, pink blossoms with a surprisingly sweet flavor.

We were lucky to have Karlishek along; none of the rest of us were familiar enough with the flora of the Golden Desert to reliably know if most of it was edible. Although he couldn't identify every shrub, cactus, and tuber we encountered, he was, in most cases, able to separate the benign from the poisonous or the unhelpfully hallucinogenic.*

Garnet continued to wander off and bring back various fractions of edible animals, depending on how long it had been since we'd last eaten, and Mogen turned out to be surprisingly deadly with a miniature crossbow she pulled out of her pack on the second day. As a result, we had roasted sand quails or brush millipedes to eat on most nights. (brush millipedes, admittedly, are not exactly difficult to catch; they can approach the speed of flowing tar when they feel frisky.)

All of our encounters with rattlesnakes, scorpions, and crocodile centipedes remained happily brief and long-distance. In an encounter between a crocodile centipede and the wagon gafl, the gafl would probably have won - they are heavy, unappetizing, and not extremely sensitive to venom, even in large amounts - but we preferred to avoid finding out for certain. Whenever we saw the long hummock of sand that marked a buried centipede, we made sure to give it a wide berth.

The shrines were endlessly fascinating. There seemed to be little to no pattern to them. Some were representational, carved with people, animals, or beings somewhere in between, in styles ranging from elegant to comical. Some featured only geometric shapes, or abstract sculptures that seemed to hint indirectly at a subject or a personality. One appeared to be an entire geometric treatise in the form of carved pictographs - something relating to the intersections of circles - although none of us were mathematician enough to understand it.

The design of a shrine seemed to have little obvious correlation to the apparent benevolence of its valley. One of the valleys we avoided was as tidy as a well-tended garden and had quite a lovely shrine, an elegantly carved swan with very little moss or lichen covering its form. It was pretty enough, but we felt distinctly that untidy things such as visitors would not be welcome. The next valley we avoided was the opposite: its floor was choked with underbrush, and moss completely obscured the face of the seated stone woman that made up its shrine. None of us were willing to step over the ridge into that valley, though we couldn't have said precisely why. Perhaps Garnet and Karlishek put it best: it just didn't smell right.

In contrast, one of the valleys that felt the friendliest had a shrine decorated with a border of carved skulls. They were small enough that they weren't visible from the edge of the valley (which was why we entered it in the first place). The valley's trees were hung with vines full of plump, blue-black grapes - which smelled pleasantly sweet, although we didn't quite dare to sample them - and the dense foliage overhead provided deep, much-needed shade during the middle of the day (which was why we didn't leave immediately). Once our initial alarm at the shrine's macabre design had faded a little, it was difficult not to feel comfortable in the valley. We stayed until the worst of the midday heat had passed and left wary but unharmed. Perhaps the spirit's aesthetic sensibilities simply tended toward the funereal.

We stopped for the night in a valley with a stone fish half-buried in the middle. It was similar to the standing stones that we'd seen near the abandoned canyon town, including the slow trickle of water leaking from its mossy stone gills. Unlike the standing stones, this fish was neither facedown nor faceup; it was simply propped sideways against a larger stone, as if someone had set it down there absentmindedly and forgotten to come back for it. Several small trees had grown up around it, and the water from its gills had worn a groove in the valley floor, becoming a small tributary of the stream.

The sun was nearing the horizon by then, and our thoughts were starting to turn to where we were going to spend the night. Despite its forgotten appearance, the fish was the first sign of civilization - aside from the shrines - that we'd seen since leaving Nemigan's house. Taking it as a good sign, we set off into the valley, which was somewhat longer than average, to see if there were any current residents to meet.

We found no other buildings or obviously artificial structures, but Karlishek pointed out that many of the trees and other plants were arranged in small copses, overgrown but still distinct. In most cases, there were visible differences between one copse and the next: slightly larger apples, for example, or flowers of a more vivid pink. Though the valley was short on architecture, it seemed to have an abundance of horticulture.

Finally, at one end of the valley, we found a gap beneath an overhanging boulder - a natural shelf of sorts, sheltered from the infrequent Desert rain. It was stuffed with books. They were old and dusty, but still in good condition. Most had at least one or two pages marked with scraps of paper or dried leaves. Though there were no footprints in the patch of sand in front of the shelf - which was damp from the nearby stream and would certainly have shown them - the shelf immediately around the books was clear of sand, as if they'd been moved recently. We were careful not to disturb them.

The whole valley had a charmingly distracted feeling about it. The flowers were thicker than in most valleys, with the remnants of order about them, like a garden left to run wild. Many of the trees had a bonsai sort of elegance. Even the rocks were often arranged in ways that looked deliberate, though overgrown. It was like visiting the workshop of someone who's constantly excited about their newest skill or project, surrounded by work that's perpetually not quite finished, but lovingly crafted all the same.

By that point, we had explored the entire length of the valley, and we were fairly certain that it had no mortal inhabitants. The obvious next step was to introduce ourselves to the local spirit.

The valley's shrine looked like a trio of wooden cabinets, though they were all carved from a single block of moss-furred stone. The two taller cabinets leaned together conversationally over a smaller, wider one, leaving a sheltered triangular space in the middle for offerings. All three cabinets were pleasantly asymmetrical. Their mismatched drawers were open just enough to show tantalizing glimpses of the objects inside (also stone): a book, a branch, a stack of coins, a set of drafting tools.

Most of the drawers, by now, were lined with moss. Another layer of moss was beginning to grow over the few tarnished coins left on the middle surface. It looked as if the shrine hadn't seen any new offerings in some time.

If one is simply passing through a spirit's home, a respectful acknowledgement of their presence is usually sufficient courtesy. As we were hoping to stay the night, something a little more substantial was in order.

In Mollogou, the details of a shrine often hint at the sorts of gifts its spirit appreciates. Hoping that such was the case here as well, we went through our various supplies for any likely-looking books, tools, plants, or currency. Most of what we were willing to part with fell into the latter category. For once, my habit of collecting interesting coins, rather than more sensibly spending them, proved useful.

We dismissed the various coins from the Golden Desert as too mundane; likewise, the small sum of Lint that I keep due to its widespread acceptance in most countries. Spirits almost never need to purchase anything, and we assumed that this one would appreciate novelty over denomination.

In the end, we left an intricately carved ivory coin from the Blue Desert, a three-sided coin from Tetravania called an Oak's Head,** and a clockwork coin from Miggle-Meezel that plays a simple eight-note tune when one turns the gear in its center. (I was reluctant to part with the clockwork coin, but I do have three others like it.)

The offering seemed to be sufficient. We spent a pleasant, peaceful night beneath the valley's absentmindedly tended trees, unmolested by insects or kleptomaniac centipedes. When we woke in the morning, the flat rock in front of the shrine had been laid with breakfast for five: fried apples and sand quail eggs, still steaming on plate-sized pieces of slate. A small fire was just burning itself down to embers in a ring of stones nearby. Though we'd taken turns on watch through the night, due to the unfamiliar territory, the shrine was just far enough away from our wagons that none of us had seen or heard the food being prepared.

As if that wasn't enough, after we finished breakfast, we found that a few rips in the canopy of Chak's wagon had been neatly sewn up with green thread, and someone had braided flowers into the gafl's fur. A small heap of flowers lay nearby, as if the braider had gotten distracted by something else partway through. Both gafl were happily munching on them.

In short, although we never caught sight of our host, their hospitality was impeccable. We all stopped at the shrine to express our appreciation before leaving the valley. When we boarded the non-aquatic wagon and found a sealed letter sitting hopefully on the driver's seat, weighed down with a pebble painted to look like a lopsided frog, I don't think any of us even considered not delivering it.

According to Chak, who had the best command of Jingli among us, the letter was addressed - in archaic but readable script - to a Gingrin Hilljarvel in Pandagula. ("Gingrin" is an academic title, roughly equivalent to "Doctor.")

The sender was marked simply as "Orlogrove."

Whether that's the name of a person or a place, or whether there's any difference between the two when discussing spirits, none of us were certain. If we manage to locate Gingrin Hilljarvel, perhaps we'll find out.

---

* I asked, at one point, if there were any plants that were helpfully hallucinogenic. Karlishek smiled with his antennae. "None that you'd know how to use," he said.

** I asked several people during my time in Tetravania why it's called an Oak's Head, but - as this was Tetravania - I received a clear answer from precisely no one. The closest thing I ever got was "well, oak trees don't have heads, so something has to." After a few weeks in Tetravania, one gets used to this sort of thing. Far more confusing is the fact that the coin, which appears to be a typically coin-shaped flat disc of metal, somehow has three faces on its two sides; one has to flip it over not twice, but three times, to arrive back at the face one started with. The results of a coin toss are by no means to be trusted.

Canyon Town, part three

In total, I believe we spent a day or two in the canyons. Perhaps three. Surrounded by so many centuries, it was easy to lose track of a few days.

We had grown accustomed to the sunlight coming only from above, filtering down through the narrow tops of the canyons to glisten on leaks from the raised aqueduct and cast shadows from the plants sprouting along its walls. When we finally turned a corner and found sunlight spilling through a doorway, it took us a moment to realize what it was.

We had reached an exit. Instead of another empty house, the arch before us was full of sunlit desert.

We approached the narrow opening slowly, half-disbelieving, like sleepers waking from a dream. We found ourselves strangely reluctant to leave - and not just because of the contrast between the cool canyon streets and the dry, sun-blasted dunes outside. The town had been home to many people once. Perhaps it was only my imagination, but I thought I felt a hint of sadness from the abandoned walls around us. The town couldn't have gotten guests often, and now we were preparing to leave.

Does a town grow lonely when no one lives in it? I don't know. If we had had a longer supply of food, though, I wonder if this one would have let us go so soon.

At the top of the arch was another statue, its features worn away by weather long ago. It might have been a bird of some sort. The words carved below the statue had lasted better, sheltered by its feet or talons, and Mirenza was able to read them.

"Is old poem of goodbye," she said, tracing the faded characters with one claw. "May wind stay at your back, water rise where you step, and such. Every place in Desert has same poem, little different."

It made sense for such a poem to be carved at the door to the desert, but it still felt eerily as if the town was saying goodbye to us.

When we walked out into the sun, Garnet fell behind for a moment. The small woman had barely said a dozen words since we'd become separated from the caravan. It took me a moment to notice she was gone. I looked back, worrying that we had lost her as well, and saw her whispering something to the stones of the archway. Perhaps she had felt that same sense of loneliness I had, and was giving the town a few comforting words. I don't know. I couldn't hear her, even if I had been rude enough to listen.

Far above her head, a stray breeze plucked a single peach-colored flower from one of the aqueduct plants. It drifted slowly down to land in Garnet's hand. She gave the sandstone wall a kiss and turned to catch up with us.

None of us spoke for several hours. I was quite content to be left alone with my thoughts, and extended the same courtesy to the others. We didn't say a word until the sun set and we set up a rudimentary camp for the night. A rocky outcropping provided shelter, as well as some prehistoric graffiti for Mirenza to read, and Karlishek identified a nearby stand of fat cacti as edible. They were a little like cucumbers that had grown already pickled. I made myself useful by building a fire, a task with which I have some experience, though working with the handful of miserly twigs we were able to find took all of my skill and a good deal of luck. Garnet took out a knife that looked about large enough to peel carrots - potatoes might have been a stretch - and vanished into the darkness, returning a while later to surprise the rest of us with a stringy desert hare and some kind of edible lizard. We ate, for the most part, in silence.

The flower could, of course, have only been chance. 

Perhaps. 

In my dreams, I heard the whistling of wind through narrow windows and doors, the trickling of water, and the sound of laughter so faint it was only a dream of a memory. The stillness had a measure of sadness to it - but there was hope there, too. More than anything, there was patience. A town is meant for people. A town carved in stone can afford to wait until the day when they finally come back.

Urban Bonsai

Nothing particularly unusual happened today, so I have little to write about other than what I told you yesterday. Instead, I think I'll tell you about my visit to Fresmareel.

It was a few years ago, during my trip to the Railway Regions. Fresmareel is one of the few villages in the Regions that is not connected to the railroad. Perhaps it will be someday. The town is built on land ruled by the dragon Agnathrommilax, a drake of middle years - three or four centuries - and somewhat eccentric tastes. He paints his scales in bright colors, wears the flags of extinct cities like scarves around his long neck, and collects gramophone records of Rampastulan opera. On clear days, the villagers can sometimes hear him singing along on distant mountaintops. They often mistake the sound for thunder.

The dragon lives alone in his cave. However, the villagers have known him to fly off for several days, carrying a plump mammoth or a particularly nice boulder of quartz, and they suspect that he might have a sweetheart on one of the other mountains.

He has allowed them to live on his land as long as they follow a series of rules.

They can hunt the deer and ground sloths in the area, but are forbidden to harm wolves, foxes, and dreadgoats, as many of the ones in the area are intelligent and the dragon's personal friends.

They must ask the dragon's permission before clearing large areas of land, and certain plants - such as wild lilies and whistle-sedge - are to be left alone entirely.

The village must be built in a perfect circle. Every building within it must also be a perfect circle. They are allowed to expand the village, but only in concentric rings around the current outlines, so that they preserve its shape.

The houses are to be painted white or other pale colors. They can paint their roofs in any colors or patterns they like, as long as they stick to a palette selected by the dragon. He seems to favor reds, oranges, browns, and the occasional intense blue.

Certain colors, such as black, mauve, and chartreuse, are forbidden except on special occasions, such as funerals. Other than that, the villagers may wear anything they like.

The dragon encourages singing; he has even been known to give lessons to those villagers whose voices particularly offend his ears.

The land is a rich and beautiful one, and aside from broad aesthetic decisions, the dragon leaves the people of Fresmareel free to govern their lives as they choose. Most of them see it as an exceptionally good agreement. Other than a certain care in their hunting and their choice of pigments, most hardly notice the effects of the dragon's rules at all. Many even consider themselves lucky to live in such a beautifully designed village.

The villagers note that several of the rules, such as those on expansion, have only come into effect when the colony reached a certain size; there had been no need for them before. Presumably, new ones will continue to be introduced as the population continues to grow. This might also be the reason for some of the more mysterious rules, such as the unusually wide streets.

Hunters have occasionally come upon the dragon perched on one of the many rocky cliffs that surround the valley, gazing down at the colony with a satisfied expression, as one might wear when observing a garden or a favorite work of art. Some have speculated that, rather than collecting art or metalwork - the most common manmade objects that dragons hoard - he is instead a connoisseur of urban planning.

It seems he is growing a bonsai town.

Dragons, after all, live for centuries and can afford to take their time. Who knows - perhaps Agnathrommilax is already planning what the city will look like hundreds of years from now.

End of the River, End of the Road

Since Karkafel, I've been traveling through the cities and towns along the river Lahra. I reached the last one today.

The river begins with the Neverending Waterfall in Thrass Kaffa and flows through the Desert from there. In most places, rivers get wider as they go, joined by other streams and smaller rivers until they reach the sea. The Lahra gets smaller. There are no other streams or rivers in this part of the Golden Desert, and the hot air dries up more of the river the farther it goes. Numerous towns and cities have sprung up along the banks, diverting more and more water to irrigate their crops, which has only accelerated the process. By the time it reaches Denemat, the smallest and last village, the river is hardly more than a silty trickle. The villagers have to constantly clear sand out of its rocky banks to keep the water above the ground.

Obviously, further travel along the river is impossible at this point. There is no more river. What remains of it is spread out into Denemat's network of irrigation ditches, sucked up into the thirsty roots of the village's dates and drought-wheat.

The road - really just a path by now - continues a short distance past the village, parallel to the largest irrigation canal. I followed it this morning just to see where it led. It ended at a little mud-brick hut where an elderly couple was drinking tea in the shade of a small acacia. They shared a cup with me. The tea was a deep jewel-red, quite strong, with some sort of spice or fruit that made it taste like sunshine on hot metal.

The people of Denemat speak Amrat, a language only distantly related to Halsi. I couldn't understand a single word the couple said. It wasn't a problem. Like other older couples I've known, they were content to sit in silence, and so was I.

In return for the tea, I repainted the door of their house. It had a beautiful pattern of fossil ammonites that had faded nearly to oblivion in the Desert sun. It was a good way to spend the morning. Hospitality is hospitality, even when the guest and hosts can't understand a word the other says.

The hut was surrounded by a small ring of vegetable garden, arranged to take advantage of every drop of water from the vague damp patch that was all that was left of the river. There were Desert roses blooming between the cabbages and parsnips, laden with the occasional garnet-red rosehip. Perhaps that's what was in the tea. Beyond the little ring of flowers and vegetables, the Desert stretched to the horizon, shimmering in the heat, a parched ocean of dunes. It was unmarked by so much as a footprint, much less any sort of path.

It was obviously time for a different method of navigation.

Fortunately, I'd only been here for a day before the caravan arrived. It was late afternoon when the dusty train of wagons slid into the village. The wagons use runners, not wheels, for travel on sand; they seem to be mostly cloth, but I was too distracted by the gigantic hairy creatures that were pulling them to pay much attention. More on those later.

The leader of the caravan is a massive reptilian man named Tirakhai. He's a good foot taller (and wider) than I am, not counting the horns, with a booming voice and sharp golden eyes.

He speaks no English, I speak no Amrat, and both of us speak only a minimum of Halsi and Sikelak, but we managed to communicate well enough for me to ask to join the caravan. (I've found that pointing and offering people money often works almost as well as speech, at least if you're trying to buy something.)

Unfortunately, seats on a caravan are rather expensive, and the fact that my money consists of currencies from over a dozen different regions only complicated things. We were busy haggling over the price (I was losing) until Tirakhai happened to catch sight of the sketchbook in one of my bags. He pointed, and I took it out and showed him a few sketches. He seemed delighted at the sight. With a broad smile, he waved away my money, clapped me on the back hard enough to knock the breath out of me, and ushered me toward the caravan.

Needless to say, I was rather confused. Was he offering to buy my sketchbook? I offered it to him, but he didn't seem interested in the book itself, only in the fact that I had it.

After several attempts to explain why he'd changed his mind, answered by nothing but baffled looks from me, Tirakhai gave up and strode off to one of the rear wagons to fetch a tall insect in a striped vest. The insect (I'm not sure of his or her name, or gender, for that matter) knew a bit of both of our languages and was able to provide rough translations.

What had excited Tirakhai was the fact that I was an artist; they're in short supply here at the tail end of the river. (That explains the state of the door this morning.) He was offering to let me pay my way with skill instead of money.

Apparently, every caravan that travels in this region of the Golden Desert needs to have an artist along because of things called the "written ones," or something like that. I confess that I only had a vague idea of what Tirakhai and the insect were saying; my command of Desert languages, even the relatively familiar Halsi, is still not as good as it should be. This is something I intend to change during this trip. Neither Tirakhai nor the insect managed a clear description of what the written ones are. The claw-and-teeth gestures they made were enough to make me slightly nervous, but I haven't heard of any exceptionally dangerous creatures in this area, and no one else in the caravan seemed particularly worried. For free passage across the Desert, I'll take my chances.

You can tell caravans that have been through this area by the large amounts of decoration on their wagons. It's become something of a status symbol, as well as giving the caravans' artists something to do while traveling. While it's necessary to have an artist for each trip, for reasons I'm still not clear about, it seems that their skills are not always in constant demand, and no caravan will bring along a passenger who doesn't either pay or work the whole time. This caravan is new to the region and, compared to the others, woefully unadorned. They intend to keep me busy.

Being mostly cloth on top, the wagons are, quite literally, a whole series of blank canvases. This should be fun.

The Monologue Hermit

The man was sitting in a ruin by the side of the road. I mistook him for a rock at first. He was dressed in a huge, threadbare overcoat almost the same color as the sand. Only his head stuck out of the top. His hair was only a shade darker than the coat, bleached pale at the ends by the Desert sun; his beard had obviously not been shaved in years, but it had been carefully braided instead. There were small pebbles looped into it here and there.

He looked as if he had been there forever. The sand had formed a drift against his back.

He muttered constantly, a string of half-audible syllables that stopped only for the occasional gulp of breath. I couldn't make out any actual words. They sounded like the lyrics of a song - they had a rhythm, and hints of a lost, wandering melody - but if so, it was a song that had been misheard, misrepeated, held in a faulty memory and reduced to so much nonsense.

He was also occupying the only shade I'd seen all day. It was the remains of a tall, round building that looked as if it might have been a watch tower in the past. There was little left now but a jagged ring of stone. The man was sitting beneath the miraculously intact arch of its doorway. Behind him, spiral stairs coiled up to nowhere.

I was reluctant to interrupt him, but I'd been walking all morning, and there was nowhere else to sit if I wanted to rest in the shade. I sat down nearby as quietly as I could. He gave me a vague nod and muttered something that might have been "hello" between the other words. He looked half-starved under his tattered coat, so I gave him some of my remaining bread and a couple of red-skinned radish-potato things from Rikanta. He took them and wolfed them down, still muttering with his mouth full. His hands were covered with an intricate web of blue tattoos. Between the wrinkles and the dust, it was impossible to make out the design. Whatever it was, it was as incomprehensible as the constant mutter of his half-audible monologue.

I tried to resist. I really did. Eventually, though, curiosity overcame me, and I asked him what he was saying. He turned to me with a haunted stare.

"It is the incantation." mumble mumble mumble "It keeps the spiders down. I must not stop." mumble mumble mumble

"What do you do when you sleep?" I asked, fascinated.

"Sleep?" His stare was uncomprehending. "I do not sleep."

I didn't ask him any more questions.

When I finished my own lunch and got up to leave, he held up one hand in a wordless gesture: wait. mumble mumble mumble. Unlike the others, the tattoo on his palm was clear - a chambered nautilus shell, inked in exquisite detail and positioned so that his fingers became its tentacles. A blue ink eye stared at me from the base of his middle finger. With the other hand, he reached down to dig in the sand at the base of the ruined wall. He pulled out a pebble and handed it to me.

It was a perfectly ordinary pebble - small, rough, yellow-brown, and no shape in particular. I would have thought it completely unremarkable if I'd found it myself. In that hand, it took on a strange aura of mystery.

"Take it." mumble mumble mumble "Keep it safe until it is ready. You will know the time." mumble mumble "It will be grateful." mumble mumble mumble

I thanked him. I wasn't sure what else to do. He nodded once, gravely, and turned away, ignoring me again.

Tucking the pebble into one of my sturdier pockets, I turned and walked on. It was a long time before I was sure I could no longer hear the man muttering.

It is always hard to tell the perceptive from the mad. The world is full of all manner of people who see what the rest of us don't. Some of them are visionaries, seeing what is true, or what is hidden, or what could be. Others simply see what is not. For all I know, the pebble could be just as important as the man seemed to think it was; for all I know, it could be as ordinary as it seems, important only within his own mind.

I have no way to tell, so I'll keep it for now. I wouldn't want to disappoint him - or, for that matter, to disappoint the pebble.

Lunch Break

I left Rikanta this morning. It was time. After stopping to say goodbye to Mr. Haggadan, who gave me a vague, absentminded reply from the depths of a machine I couldn't begin to identify, I packed up my things and returned to the road.

It was a quiet morning. The average size of the towns along the road has been decreasing over the past month or so, and the traffic on the road has done the same. I saw only two other travelers before noon. They were a pair of rat-like mammalians - twin brothers, if I had to guess - with narrow, pointed muzzles and the striped robes of Gillivan monks. They gave me a polite nod each, then went back to a vehement debate about something. Both spoke at the same time, far too fast for me to understand.

For the next few hours, I walked in silence. A lone flying hyena flew overhead at one point, but unlike the ones from previous days, it made no sound. Other than that, it was just me, the road, and the sun.

I had seen no shade since leaving Rikanta, other than the pale shadows cast by weeds and the occasional small rock, so it was a relief when I finally saw the silhouette of a tree on the simmering horizon. It was one of the giant acacias that you find occasionally in the Desert. They grow from tiny seeds that can blow for miles on the wind. The few seeds that land near some source of water, and aren't immediately eaten by a jackrabbit or Desert rat, grow into tall, elegant trees with wide canopies. This tree was in the center of a depression in the sand, ringed with boulders that suggested a bowl-shaped layer of rock near the surface - perfect for collecting rainwater underground. The tree's roots probably went all the way down to anchor themselves in the stone. Through gaps between the roots, I could see the glint of water in the dark under the tree and hear the peeping of small frogs.

It seemed like a good place to stop.

I set my bags down near the trunk and sat there for a while, just listening to the sounds of the wind in the leaves overhead, the frogs singing in their hidden pool, and the occasional cry of a bird in the distance. It was quite peaceful. It took me a while to notice another sound added to the mix - a low, steady drone, somewhere between a fly's buzz and the deeper rattle of a locust.

At first, I thought the dark shape above the horizon was yet another flying hyena. I realized my mistake fairly quickly; the sound, and the decidedly non-mammalian shape, made it clear that it was an insect of some sort. It looked fairly small at first. It got closer much more slowly than I was expecting, though. In a few minutes, it looked twice as large as before, and I could tell that it was still quite far away. The sound of its wings was deafening by the time it actually arrived. It landed under the tree with one last rattle of its wings and the thump-click of six segmented feet.

The fly was the size of a tiger, leathery black all over with vivid bronze streaks across its pointed abdomen. There were fringes of bronze-colored fur around the plates of its exoskeleton, more fringes around its clawed and padded feet, and a thick tuft like a mustache in the middle of its face. I could see my own face reflected a thousand times in its compound eyes. The six pairs of claws on its feet were quite impressive, longer than my fingers and quite sharp.

If the dagger-like mouthparts and lean, tiger-striped body hadn't made it obvious, the claws did: this was one of the predatory species of flies, and it was large enough to hunt antelopes. I got ready to run if necessary. I'm not sure if it would have done any good.

The fly stared at me for a moment, as if surprised to find me there, then made a quick series of buzzes - bvRRzfbvt - from somewhere below its chest. When that provoked no response, it tried what looked like a sort of four-clawed sign language. I shrugged to show that I didn't understand. It mimicked the gesture, shrugging the complex joints at the base of its wings, then seemed to give up on communication and settled down on the other side of the tree trunk to rest.

When the fly showed no indication of wanting to eat me, I decided it was time to eat lunch. I'd bought a few root vegetables in Rikanta. They grow them interchangeably there; instead of separating the different species, they just toss carrots and potatoes and turnips and any other interesting seeds they have into the same field and harvest whatever comes up. I had a couple of potatoes, in various colors and sizes, and a pair of purple-orange things that seemed to be a hybrid of carrots and sugar beets.

It's considered polite in nearly every part of the world to share food with strangers, but the fly showed no interest in the vegetables, nor in the loaf of bread I pulled out next. I also had most of a jug of beef stew in my bag. When I poured some of this out into my largest mug and set it on a nearby rock, the fly noticed. It reached into a large mail pouch hanging from its neck - I'd been distracted by the claws and eyes and stripes and hadn't noticed the pouch - and pulled out a metal lunch box. There was a pattern of little rabbits stamped into the lid. Those huge claws opened it with great care to reveal a selection of fruit and small cheeses wrapped in paper. The fly plucked a few out and offered them to me.

That's how I found myself eating lunch with a giant fly. We sat there in the shade, sharing food in a companionable silence broken only by the frogs under the tree. The cheese and fruit were delicious - the perfect blend of sweet and strong, with the faintest overtones of metal polish from the lunch box. The fly gripped its own food with a bewildering array of jointed mouthparts and sucked up the stew with a long, crooked proboscis.

Most of the Golden Desert's inhabitants don't travel at noon, at least not on foot. It's just too hot. When I finished eating, I sat for a while and read one of my ambiguous novels. (The story in it at the moment is Toad's Labyrinth, one of my favorites by Oswina Dennenjay.) The fly put its lunch box away and pulled a miniature concertina out of its bag. The rapid, buzzing music it played for the next few hours reminded me of the sound of its own wings. I didn't recognize any of the melodies.

Finally, when the sun was approaching the horizon and the shade of the tree had moved to fall on the rocks to the east, I shouldered my bags and got ready to move on. The fly tucked the concertina back into its own bag and did the same. It gave me a brief, friendly nod before lifting the great veined windows of its wings and taking off in a buzzing blast of sand.

The fly had arrived from the empty Desert to the left of the road. It left in the opposite direction, rattling off across the dunes at a right angle to my own route. I have no idea where it was going. I waved as it left, and I'm fairly sure that I saw it raise one claw in reply. I could hear the buzz of its wings for a long time after it was out of sight.

Thrass Kaffa

We felt Thrass Kaffa before we saw it. After days in the dry air of the Golden Desert, the breeze this morning carried tiny droplets of water, which collected on every surface in the caravan. People walked along with their mouths open, drinking the water that condensed on their tongues. We were soaked by the time we reached the city.

The city of Thrass Kaffa is built beneath the Neverending Waterfall. The Waterfall comes straight out of the sky; if there were ever any clouds, it could almost be an exceptionally precise rain shower. Most of it has spread into a fine mist of spray by the time it reaches the ground. The constant wind of the Golden Desert blows the spray over the entire town, so everything is constantly wet. Rainbows appear at random in the air. Somehow, a whole collection of jungle plants ended up here many years ago; they've thrived in the dripping heat, growing over and through the entire city. Thrass Kaffa is a tiny patch of rainforest in the middle of the Desert. It's like being back on the Greenhouse Cliff. The buildings are draped with vines; orchids and bromeliads sprout from sandstone gutters. The streets are full of sunlit mist and the dripping green explosions of tropical plants.

There used to be a lake in the middle of the city, but by now, the jungle and the surrounding farmland drink up all the water that reaches the ground. The fish have taken to the trees instead, since there's nearly as much water in the air as on the ground. You can see them occasionally, wriggling up and down the trunks. Groups of Kaffans gather occasionally to race them.

Surprisingly, the city's aquifrax has never complained about the disappearance of its lake; it only seems to care about the Waterfall. The water that reaches the ground is no longer important. The aquifrax refuses solid gifts, disdainful of anything coarse enough to be affected by gravity, but it happily accepts offerings of music and poetry. It's said to have exceptional taste. When walking through Thrass Kaffa, it's common to find writers and musicians with their heads raised, blinking, singing or reciting their work to the rain. Every so often, the rain gives them an answer.

No one knows where the Waterfall comes from. Several of the city's avians have flown as high as they could, trying to find its top, but they all ran out of strength before they ran out of water.

Of course, not many avians live in the Golden Desert; most avians capable of flight need to eat nearly half their weight every day, and food is not quite that plentiful here. There are far more avians in the comparatively lush Blue Desert. In Thrass Kaffa, there are actually a surprising number of amphibian people - nearly all of the ones in the Golden Desert, I believe. Men and women with glistening, speckled skin pass by with perpetually damp clothes and brightly colored lap-frogs, only a few streets away from the waterless dunes.

The city of Karkafel often connects to Thrass Kaffa, though you can only travel between the two through catacombs and obscure back alleys. The cities are only visible to each other in the occasional mirage. Thrass Kaffa is built around the Waterfall, Karkafel around its famous Library; the cities trade life for information, nature for culture. Farmers pick fruit in Thrass Kaffa and bring it to Karkafel to trade for music. Archivists from Karkafel sneak into Thrass Kaffa when they've had enough of dust and dry paper and need someplace green. It's an unusual relationship, but the people of the two cities seem happy with it.

About half of the caravan is staying here; the rest is moving on, taking the jazz birds off to who knows where. I'll miss traveling with their constant warbling improvisations. I have friends in Karkafel, though, and I want to at least stay long enough to try to find them before I leave.

Leaving SuyMaTmakk

Farewell to SuyMaTmakk. Today I left behind the whirlpool lake, the wicker buildings, the endless living cacophony of life on Market Street. As the wagon rattled along the road by the River KleMit, the bird's-nest skyline and its crown of waterfall mist faded into the distance.

I've enjoyed my time in SuyMaTmakk, but it's time to move on before I get too attached.

I said goodbye to the TiLeKraNas before I left this morning. As thanks for their hospitality, I gave them a set of origami birds in bright paper, the kind that can be folded up and put into an envelope or a pocket. I learned how to make them in Mollogou. To my surprise, the family gave me a beautiful salamander lantern, a fluid shape like a turnip of blended metal and glass. HmoTan said it was an experiment that went slightly wrong. It makes a perfect home for a salamander. Apparently, the children have been playing with my salamander while I've been out,* and they'd noticed that its lantern was getting a bit small. My salamander has grown a lot since I got it. In fact, it's starting to get a bit fat. Maybe I should feed it less coal for a while.

The TiLeKraNas are going to spend a few more days in the city before heading back up the Hley. Instead, I got a ride with a merchant on his way out of town. His name is FlunDitChukk. Whether it's his first name or last name, I have no idea; he's said maybe six words since I met him, and that many only if you count grunts. His cart is pulled by something called a dunderblub, which looks something like a hairy mushroom with four stumpy legs. If it has a head under all the fur, I haven't been able to find it. I can only tell which end is the front when it's walking; even that's only a guess. I'm not entirely sure that it's even an animal. Its name is Tupp.

FlunDitChukk is taking a shipment of jazz birds to CheChmit. They look a bit like roadrunners, but they have clever faces and black-and-white magpie stripes. When they spread their wings, the feathers look like piano keys. They sit in wicker cages in the back of the wagon and warble syncopated improvisations to each other. Occasionally, one of them gets its talons on a trumpet. (FlunDitChukk has a shipment of those too. I'm not sure whether this is a coincidence or not.) I have no idea how they can play a trumpet without lips; whenever I look around, the music stops. All I ever see are a bunch of birds sitting around and whistling innocently.

This could be an interesting trip.

* I was surprised at this, but not particularly worried. My salamander was well trained even before I got it - Cormilack salamanders are some of the most reliable in the world - and children on the dry plains of the Scalps learn fire safety at about the same time they learn to walk. I wasn't worried that they'd hurt each other. I'd watched TiLi and HnerKipPeLo catch fireflies and phosphor moths on the way to SuyMaTmakk, and I don't think they harmed a single charcoal scale of their wings.