Triella needed only follow the stench of the Leatherworkers’ Quarter to find it, though as she questioned the people of Leyrvallti on its recent occurrences, she found that three in four didn’t actually know the Quarter by its polite name. But none were unaware of the Shitbucket, the Stinker, the Pisswater Alley. Here was where the filth of Leyrvallti ended up, one way or another, where the jobs no one wanted to be done near their homes were performed. Here were all the fetid tanneries, the lime burners, the cesspit diggers, the puer gatherers, the city’s matchstick workshop. Triella had almost worked in a place like this, as a child, but the tanner who had hired her as a puer-finder died the day before her work began, when the pauper quarter of Clerciennes was forburned in the Great Winter Fire.
There but for happenstance go I, she thought of the little girl collecting dog shit into jars. She felt the impulse of giving her some ryals, but now was not a time for calling attention to herself.
“In Altengrie these industries were not confined inside the walls but forced outside,” Triella remarked. “I’m surprised such filth and stench is allowed within the city, and that the people haven’t run them out of Leyrvallti.”
“That is not the way of Loclain,” said Stel. “If there are walls, then people are allowed inside, and the gates are never shut to those seeking shelter. Only scattered villages don’t have such defenses, as even in safer lands all are aware of the Gairning Host’s gluttony. If we forbid people from seeking the safety of timber and stone, then there is nothing preventing them from being slaughtered, sacrificed to demons, shackled and enslaved. It is said that the first Gairnites were outcasts ostracized from the first great city in Loclain, and the world then was fraught with dangers darker than the ones we know, for the wilds were untamed, chilled by ghosts and demons stalked prey under sun and moon. They sought to tame the wilds together, for if the world would refuse them, they would refuse the world, and give themselves to diablerie and chevache, plunder and debauchery.”
“Is there any truth to that tale, do you think?” Cecilia asked, silken handkerchief pressed against her nose and mouth.
“I doubt a story so ancient is more than allegory. Perhaps the first Gairnites were cast out because of their crimes, and in their tales they’ve perverted the order of affairs. Regardless, the people of Loclain bar their gates only when directly besieged. We know too well the dangers outside. To be sure, districts such as this are isolated within the cities, for all the good it does, and care is always taken for water sources to be untainted by the filth. Still, the isolation and penury does lead to these quarters becoming lawless havens. You’re more likely to be robbed in the cramped slums, but as guards seldom patrol these wards any more than absolutely necessary, this is a fine place for secrecy. No wonder a Gairnite informant would be found here.”
“If this is known,” Cecilia said, “why not have the guards actually do their jobs?”
“Cille,” Triella spoke softly, kindly, “if you as captain tell your soldiers to wade through puddles of piss and shit and to, without reward, inspect places like this on a daily basis, your men will ensure that you won’t remain captain long.”
It was so in Clerciennes, loath as she was to think back on those days. It was an unsightly past unworthy of a Blossom, one she hoped to keep all to herself, knowing to her sorrow that even friends would look differently at you if they learned you were once such a wretched lack-all. Triella rubbed the fingers of her gloves, leather scraping against leather, and found her eyes drawn to Cecilia’s pale, soft hands. When mantled, I can be like that, too. Superficial though it may be, it was still something she treasured, a sensation she’d never known before. A Blossom must be perfect. A Blossom shouldn’t dig graves or wash pans, shouldn’t know where stolen items are bought and sold, shouldn’t have…
There were better things to worry about. Depositing such thoughts in less frequented recesses of her memories, she accompanied Stel towards the tanneries, leaving Cecilia behind after convincing her that the way she was so utterly unversed in such a space called as much attention to her as if she came mantled in spell-woven satins.
A loud and constant thudding greeted the two as they approached, as workers beat on dried skins with their heavy mallets. Triella watched from afar, catching glimpses of the interior of the huddled outbuildings, and was relieved that the men and women hard at work had much of their faces covered with cloth. Though it was a ghastly sight, like faceless wraiths moving slowly, in repetitive motions, it was better than breathing in the caustic fumes. Precarious as the conditions here were, the toilers were cautious and had sufficient gear for basic precautions: their boots were thick wood rather than leather, bodies clad in tallow-dank hides. Even so, they coughed, and shambled when navigating the puer pits, the vapors rising there like emulsions of vomit that spilled through the gaps in the walls, and through the chimneys, dissipating slowly as they reached the clouds. This was not a fine place to get rained upon. Triella saw the marks on the bare skin of passersby, reddened stretches or circles where skin burned and sloughed off, and more than a few of the people she saw had spots on the back of their heads where hair no longer seemed to grow.
Three tanneries, it looks like, or at least there’s three buildings for the work. Triella had been under the impression that Galm would have been Leyrvallti’s sole tanner, but of course that wasn’t the case. If only Yawen had stayed her sword hand another instant, perhaps they’d have more to go by.
“We know where to look for this man Galm,” Triella told Stel. “Hm… Maybe we ought leave matters at this until we meet with the others to see if they learned anything of note. It would not do to frighten our quarry.”
“You’re right, but I mislike how little we’ve gathered that’s of use,” Stelmaria grumbled. “We don’t even know what our man looks like, and we can’t strut into the tanneries to ask for a man we can’t even describe, else we might as well bear a rosen banner.”
A thought came to mind, fleeting enough to spur her to seek the closest person, a short, pock-fretten man whose age was impossible to determine at a glance, but whose gloves seemed to be pigskin of agreeable quality. And clean enough to look new.
“Beg pardon, sir,” she called his attention, and he turned to her with an unchanging expression, eyes tired and dull. “I’ve been in town not too long and don’t mean to trouble nobody but I need some directions, if you’d be so kind.”
“Eh? Have you asked the guards?”
“Aye, and they directed me and my cousin to a brothel, t’make a mockery of us. ‘Twere leatherworks I is looking for, sir, fix me boots, or buy me new ones. I know there’s some here, but I been tricked before, bought me some gloves that were leather of man, if you understand, led me to some trouble with t’law…”
“I… I understand, girl,” his initial confusion turned to a pitying condescension that city folk inevitably displayed towards youths who spoke with this cant of rural naivety. “Right, well, that big workshop is Myren’s,” he pointed towards the one with the most visible workers, “which is cheap but doesn’t really do repairs, and I don’t think they sell directly to customers. Galm does repairs,” he pointed to the smallest tannery, where just one man was now applying oils to half a dozen hides stretched along a wide rack. There’s our man. “Works alone, usually, but has some helpers who come from time to time, it looks like. I recommend that one, owned by Nitta’s boys since their father passed. They work fast.”
“My thanks to you, sir,” said Triella, shaking his hand with exaggerated obsequiousness. “Blessings to you and yours,” she told him before they parted ways. He seemed to be in great haste, with how he quickened his pace. Perhaps he had urgent business in a shit foundry.
That was enough for a starting point. Triella and Stelmaria regrouped with Cecilia, who had wisely put further distance between herself and the Pisswater Alley. Even when humbly dressed she all too clearly did not belong there.
They were the first to return to the inn, and so could enjoy a plate of thick slices of mutton, parsnips roasted with honey (Triella found she wasn’t too fond of these) and even some cups of coffee with thick cream and cocoa powder. Indulgent, but not overly so, and Triella had worked on her justifications and explanations should she ever be asked: they were scholars returning from Tesmaria and among the first to make the journey passing by Agaepsonia, once again garrisoned by allies of the Red Rose. We are new to these southern lands, for we are used to journeying north and around the Range. Thus far they had not been questioned. A smatter of travelers was not worthy of scrutiny in this city, to their fortune.
Sieglinde arrived with Ise not long after, bearing news about the city guard and its connections with the Host. They were not all bought, but enough were paid to look away that Gairnites were able to supply the liss dens of Leyrvallti and make a tidy profit from it.
“I claimed to be seeking my poppy-addled hellion of a cousin in the haze of liss,” Sieglinde explained. “I did not expect to immediately learn that the Host had such dealings, I’ll admit, but it appears to be an open secret.”
“Some of the guards appear to be bribed into silence,” Ise explained. “Addicts are beaten if they’re found outside the liss district, but there’s no regulation whatsoever in those domains. It doesn’t seem to be a large-scale operation of the Host, however. More something that a few Gairnites do for coin and influence, and the city guard looks away because it’s better than making an enemy of those fiends.”
“And because of the bribes, of course,” said Cecilia.
“Of course. A guard was kind to us, and honest, too,” Ise continued. “His own mother was addicted to liss for some time, after some family tragedy. He helped Sieglinde look for her cousin, and when we found nothing, he wished us luck, and remarked that as painful as it is to see people in that condition, cutting the flow of liss entirely was attempted some years in the past, and led to a string of suicides and violence in the streets.”
“I wonder if our tanner has a connection with that,” Stel questioned. “His workshop was a humble thing compared to the others, and it seems that from time to time he hires some helping hands for temporary work… That could make for opportune moments to meet with fellow Gairnites.”
“But we cannot be certain that such a meeting will occur while we are here,” said Sieglinde. “We cannot linger overlong waiting for something we are not unequivocally sure will even happen.”
“Can we question the tanner directly?” Triella asked the obvious question.
“Certainly,” said Sieglinde. “But the missed opportunity is a matter to consider. I doubt the Host would take action against so many Blossoms assembled here, so it’s best to stay our hand for as long as we can.”
Footsteps approached once again, suddenly close, startlingly so. Erika’s boots were soft upon the wooden floor, but Yawen’s were completely silent. They’d caught the last words of the discussion, and, once privy to all the relevant information, they were able to join in and share their thoughts.
“We can act without revealing our numbers,” said Yawen. “Now, there is no surety that we will provoke a reaction from the Gairning Host in a timely manner, but disrupting their business here may stir them to action. With our strength obscured, as they think it’s merely their liss dealings that are being disrupted, Leyrvallti will not be imperilled, and there will be more scum to question and cull.”
“It’s not a long journey from here to the nearest cities,” said Erika. “Two days between here and Genalmedwe, four separating Leyrvallti and Pendreigrafe, as well as some inns and hamlets along the roads. It wouldn’t demand too much of our time, I believe, if we try to draw these hidden Gairnites here. And if we can uncover any of their nests here, so far from their domains, well…” She smiled with a cruel edge. “That ought to make Cleirn happy for a while.”
“It’s a start,” Stel said. “Our duty comes first, however. As we wait for a Gairnite response, we should proceed with our investigation. The more we know, the better.”
Another week of staying here rather than sleeping out in the wild. Triella could never say no to that. And the miserable stench of the Leatherworkers’ Quarter barely reached this part of the city. That alone made Leyrvallti a better place to live than several cities in Altengrie. What does it say about me, Triella thought to herself, recalling Cecilia’s disgust and surprise, that I know so much of shit and rot? Some Blossom I am. Some Blossom indeed…
The Rose's Torn Petals 