Heart of Dorkness

Scourge Twenty-Eight - Noon

I wake up at noon.

It really blows. I’d much rather stay in bed and continue sleeping for a while, but I guess my body’s just... awake now. I turn over, tug up my blankets, and try hard to get back to sleep, but there’s nothing for it.

I can’t even remember what my last dream was about.

Sighing, I turn onto my other side, then blink my eyes a few times to clear out the crud in them. It’s pretty clear that I’m an inn room, a fairly nice one. There’s a vanity, an end table covered in careful carvings, and a wide window overlooking one of the city’s main streets.

I shove myself up so that I’m sitting, then bring my legs around so that I’m kinda cross legged. I grab a foot and knead it a bit, putting pressure on some of the soreness. It’s not nearly as bad as it was last night. I guess this is one of the advantages of being young or whatever. Little sores don’t last long.

I wiggle my toes, then step off the bed, only wincing a bit at the cool touch of the hardwood floor.

Last night we were able to book four rooms on the top floor of this inn. They’re not the most expensive inn rooms I’ve ever seen, but they’re not exactly cheap either. At least the innkeeper was helpful when we started putting gold in front of him. There are guards hired by the inn to keep it nice and quiet, and we get free meals for our stay.

I get dressed in a change of clothes, toss on my cloak, then leave all my dirty things on a neat pile in the middle of the floor. The inn has a person whose job is to clean travel-worn clothes, so I’ll just leave that up to them.

“Hey, you’re up,” Esme says as I leave my room.

My bookish friend is sitting on a plush armchair next to a window, legs curled up under her and a big tome resting on her lap. She hasn’t changed out of her nightgown yet.

“Yeah,” I say. “How long have you been up?”

“Since this morning,” she says. “I had breakfast already, did some stretching, then sat here to wait for the rest of you to get up. You guys sure do like your sleep.”

“Look who’s talking.”

She sniffs. “Hey, at least I wake up at a reasonable time every morning.”

“Yeah, like weird clockwork. It’s like you make up for being unmovable while sleeping by always waking up at the same time. It’s not normal.”

“It’s perfectly normal,” Esme says calmly. She glances up from her book. “I’ve optimised sleep.”

“Uh-huh,” I say. “Want to help me optimise waking up the others?”

“Just get some food that smells strong and wave it around Felix’ door, she’ll stumble out of there like one of those zombies.”

I giggle at the image. She’s probably right too. “I don’t know about Bianca though.”

A door creaks open across the hall from us, and Bianca steps up, a hand cupped over her mouth to disguise a yawn. “I’m awake,” she says. “I haven’t slept in this late in a long time.”

“Feels good, right?” I ask.

“I suppose. I think I needed it. My legs felt like jelly last night and they’re still sore today.”

“Some exercise would help with that,” Esme says.

I glance at her. “Aren’t you lounging there like that laziest cat that’s ever been a cat?”

“I didn’t say that I wanted to take part in that exercise,” Esme replies. She chuckles and stretches as she stands up. “So, what did you plan on doing today?”

“Eat and sleep, mostly,” I say. “But if we’re done with that ahead of schedule, I guess we can walk around town. Maybe they have a bookstore?”

“I’d like to visit a cobblers,” Bianca says. “I believe there are a few in the main square that might be able to help. We can verify rumours at the same time, maybe learn about what Altum’s up to.”

I shake my head. “The cobbler is fine, but we’re supposed to be having fun and relaxing today, that means no rumouring.”

“But gossip is fun,” Esme says. “Not that I’d partake in it myself, just... you know, as an aside.”

I bump my shoulder against hers. “Sure, sure. So, I guess all that we need to do now is wake Felix up? We can have lunch for breakfast.”

With something of a plan, I head downstairs while Esme and Bianca get dressed for the afternoon. The inn’s main floor has a nice restaurant built into it. Not a tavern, but a proper space to order a meal. I flag down a waiter and ask him to prepare a big meal for four.

Since I don’t have anything better to do, I wait downstairs while the first course is prepared. When the waiter returns with a loaded tray, I follow him back up to our little corner of the inn.

“Whose room is clean enough to eat in?” I ask.

“Mine is unsullied,” Bianca says with a gesture to her room. The waiter gives me a look, but he doesn’t say anything as he brings the tray in and sets it on a table. Esme and I steal some chairs from our own bedrooms and set them down.

Felix takes a whole two minutes to show up at Bianca’s door, looking like a mess with her eyes still closed from sleep and her hair a big matted mess. “You guys having breakfast already?” she asks.

“It’s noon,” I say.

“It’s noon? Really?”

I nod. “If you opened your eyes and looked outside you’d see that.”

“I don’t want to,” she retorts before pulling out a seat and plopping herself down next to me. “What’s for breakfast?”

“It’s lunch,” Bianca points out.

“Even better,” Felix says.

By the time the waiter arrives with the main course (mostly breads and soups, as well as a few thin slabs of carefully marinated meat on skewers) Felix is licking Esme’s plate clean of crumbs and she’s actually gotten around to opening her eyes, mostly so that she can spot any stray bit of food.

“So, what’s the plan for the rest of the day?” Felix asks. “Can I go back to bed after this?”

“I guess you could,” I say. “I was thinking shopping? Bianca needs a thing or two, and I don’t feel like doing anything too serious.”

Esme nods before adding, “We should probably look into a way to travel to the capital from here. If this is a transportation hub, then it stands to reason that there’s going to be a way to get from here to where we need to go.”

“Hey, Esme, where is that vault you’re supposed to look into?” I ask. “I know it’s not too far from the capital, but is it on the way there, or past the capital? We could stop there before hitting the capital.”

“You know that the location of those vaults aren’t meant to be shared with anyone who isn’t one of Semper’s Archivists,” Esme says.

I roll my eyes. “Yes, I know. And I’m pretty sure Auntie Semper wouldn’t care if I found out, and I think she likes Felix too, so it’s not a big deal. Besides, you’re not an Archivist, are you?”

“But I’m on a holy mission,” Esme says.

“Come on, we’ll see the place when we visit it one way or another.”

Esme grumps a bit more, but she does relent eventually. “I have a map in my bedroom, but basically it’s a little to the west of the capital. There’s Lake Casselfella, to the south of that there’s a river feeding into the lake from the mountains. The vault is near to that river, on the southern shore inside of this big hill. My map’s a little more precise.”

“I’m a little familiar with the lake,” Bianca says. “There are some nobles who have held celebrations onboard large barges in the middle of it. And there’s some fishing done there as well. I didn’t know that Semper’s church had any interest in the area.”

“If just anyone knew, then that would make it much more difficult to hide the vault,” Esme says. “Not that it protected this one. Someone broke into it even if it was hidden. I don’t know if it will be abandoned or not though.”

“You think it’s those Altum necromancers?” Felix asks.

Esme hums a bit. “It’s possible, but I don’t want to say until I know for certain. I mean, what could they want with the vault?”

“It’s meant to be filled with lots of books and knowledge, right?” I ask. “Maybe they needed to know something about necromancy?”

“The worshippers of a god of necromancy needed to learn about necromancy from another god?” Esme asks. “I trust that Semper’s libraries are the most complete in the world, and the vaults probably have huge amounts of knowledge hidden away in them, but the kind of specific knowledge that’s so deep into another god’s domain? I don’t know.”

“Well, we’ll find out later. Are you guys done eating? I want to go and have a bit of fun,” I say.

“Give me a minute!” Felix says.

I roll my eyes, but I can’t ask Felix to change.

***