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Chapter 12: The Interview
Part 1
A strange odour, that of crisp sawdust, woke Junelight. She didn’t know where she was. All the smells were wrong—too clean—the bed too soft. She turned over, blinking, and saw a neat wooden ceiling, the slats laced in a simple repeating pattern.
Morning light streamed in through a glass window. Dancing dust motes reminded her of a Roythan temple she’d visited, and then the veil of sleep lifted. She was in Wood Ribbon South. The sweet stiffness in her bones told her she’d been out for a while. The hearty pulse in her crystals backed that up. Her stomach roared.
She was so happy that she didn’t have to go hiking out to a food tent. Crystals charged, she pulled the communal stone’s energy into her, relaxing back into the soft mattress as she channeled her Cropforth Artwork. The scents of the coastal town were fresh in memory, so she brought down some crunchy dried seaweed, along with pinenuts and plump strawberries.
On the bedside table, the seeds snapped into being with little pops. Red flesh wiggled then ballooned around the berries, and the nuts wobbled and hardened as they grew. The seaweed pods took a little longer, unfurling, fattening and crackling in the dryness of the air. It would be preferable to grow these in Culdur itself, but this would do for a quick breakfast. The nuts and berries finished, allowing her to concentrate on the quality and aroma of the plants. Air growth did make the drying go a lot faster, and soon she had a little platter ready. Milk or cream would have been nice too, but that took a lot of effort and she opted to conserve her energy and look for some in the feasting hall later. After she ate, she found some glassware and brought plain ol’ life giving water into the glass.
The simple joy of making her own food put her in a good mood. Today was important: she needed to seed her blinding probes and try to get some time with the Vetteris girl. Then the real excitement would begin in two days' time.
She spent the morning weaving among the lodgings, getting a sense of how they were positioned, and hoping to bump into the girl. She ran into a bunch of townspeople, who were chatty. From their conversations, June had a sense of where she might find her quarry.
She stopped by the feasting hall and enjoyed a frosty glass of milk. Here, Viktor found her.
“Miss Junelight, hello,” xe said, folding into the seat across from her.
“Viktor. Wood Ribbon South has been quite hospitable so far, I appreciate it.”
“I’m glad, I’m glad. And the stone, you found everything to be well?” asked the Torchkeeper.
“First pass was good. I’ll probably spend a bit more time with it today just to be sure,” she said.
“And your investigation?” Xe smiled. “If I’m not overstepping.”
She grinned back. “Uneventful. But there are still a lot of questions to ask.”
“Did you want me to introduce you to the elder Vetteris sister?”
“Atrocity. Yes, sure. I was actually on my way to go see if I could find her. I’ve been told she sometimes organizes a little, ah, sport north of town? Some sort of game?”
Viktor patted the table with both hands, chuckling. “Ah ha, yes. Yes indeed. Quite the inventive one. She’s got all the youngsters hooked on it, even some of the senior carvers. Please, come see.”
They left the hall, continuing north past the last of the little lodgings, into the neat rows of the tree farm. It was an odd landscape, these perfectly aligned trees. She’d been in the enormous forest province for long enough now to appreciate the wild tangle of the foliage. The marching rows of identically grown saplings somehow lacked charm, even purpose. She had a feeling her Falsesparker friends would find it repulsive.
“We accelerate them as slowly as economy and demand will allow,” Vik was saying. “This batch is at the three week mark. Lorruspine. It maintains good internal structure even at a two-week turnaround, but if you pace it, the patterning comes out nicer and you usually get a better trade for it.”
“Uh huh,” she said, looking through the columned expanse. The leaves thickened as they went, blotting out the sky, giving the sense of being in a very big room with too many support pillars. “Which trees have the best yield, trade ratio wise?”
“Steelbarch variants for structures or demontrunk for fancy sculptures. Aged very slowly, of course. Those specimens are yonder, yonder.” Xe flapped a hand off to the left. “I can show you later, if you like.”
“Perhaps.” She heard someone yell in the distance. “Is that them?”
“I suspect so. Come.”
They veered to the right and towards the sounds. Eventually they came to a break in the monotony of the farm, to a wide strip of perfect, even grass. It ran north to south, as far as Junelight could see. A group of some forty people were farther ahead.
“Wood bay, that way,” the Torchkeeper said, pointing past the crowd to the north. “This is the transport path to the temple, as you may have guessed.”
They got closer, and June saw that seven people had lined up, all facing the same direction. Across from them, perhaps a hundred paces apart, stood a young woman that she recognized as Atrocity. Beside her, Kelron. Some two dozen onlookers gathered to one side.
“Ready?” shouted Atrocity.
The people in the line shifted their weights, and one by one their eyes flickered to a low red. Several of them looked quite tired, breathing deep. Atrocity and Kelron stood facing them, and raised one arm each so that their fingers touched.
Out of the grass, a line of seven red stones floated up to eye level. One for each contender. Junelight checked the mindtether, and sensed a strong arc of Artwork rainbowing over and into the area.
“Brace!” shouted Kelron.
“Here we go,” said Vik.
“Away!” cried Atrocity.
The arc pulsed, and the stones fired forward simultaneously. A half second later, Junelight felt a twitch of smaller surges, then the crowd cheered as all the stones bent off course. Some angled lazily up and away, some careened as if they’d struck something. One blasted down, spraying dirt and grass onto the contender who had deflected it. Junelight heard them curse.
As soon as it was done, the spectators chased out behind the contenders, looking for the stones’ landing places.
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