Hello, Everyone!
Welcome to the second part of the fifth Arc of Mary Windfiddle's story!
Last time, our heroes went to see Dynatos Perres, the ruler of Pamagos, but found out that his office building was blocked off by an angry crowd. They were invited to see him in his home later in the evening and went back to the inn they had settled in. When their new companion Agatha wasn't in the room, Mary talked to her friends, expressing the fear that she might be a spy or assassin. Bruno and Aurum didn't think to much of it.
Agatha came in and confessed that her visit to Pamagos wasn't so casual that she'd first made it out to be. She'd witnessed a Green dragon gathering an army on the Islands and had come to warn Erathos about it.
Mary took her to the library to find information on dragons and what the weakness of the Green one might be, but after finding too little, Agatha excused herself and went off ‘for a walk’. Mary, still being suspicious of her, sent her familiars to follow her.
After Agatha went out on the street, she briefly talked to a few people, each of whom more shady than the previous. Finally, one of them seemed to point her in a direction, and she rushed on.
The tabaxi raced through the city like a whirlwind of motion. She ran with amazing speed, dodgind crowds and somersaulting over obstacles. At one point, going on the street obviously turned out too bothersome, and she took to the roofs. Even Mary's raven had a hard time following her.
Finally, after what seemed like fifteen minutes of headlong sprinting, the tabaxi went back to the ground. Her pace got less hurried, her pose more confident and aloof. She went to a tavern--the sign atop the door frame said 'The Leaky Sink'--and casually walked in, as if she was one of the usual patrons.
The raven flew down and perched near one of the windows,1 and Mary peered through its eyes to try and see what Agatha was doing inside.
The tabaxi went to the female halfling bartender. Tapped on the counter. They looked at one another knowingly. The bartender whispered something in her ear. Agatha nodded and moved aside when two other patrons approached the counter.
Back in her own body, Mary frowned. She thought Agatha didn't know anyone in the city.
Mary didn't see any point in spending more time in the library… which, she later realized, was very uncharacteristic of herself. Actually, during the past months she’d hardly spent any time among books--although Bruno and Aurum would certainly disagree--and even less for her own enjoyment. Maybe she, too, had started preferring to experience things.
When had that happened?
Anyway. The flyers passed around on Freedom Street hadn't left her mind the whole day. She knew only one business in the city that was able to make them. 'Steel Printing House' was just around the corner and she headed up there.
The halfling secretary Sherry recognized her and went to get Mr. Steel. Like last time, he came from the room where the printing presses were rhythmically thumping. However, this time there was a woman behind him. She was beautiful, dark-haired and carefully made up. She smiled warmly when she saw Mary.
"Welcome, Ms. Windfiddle," Mr. Steel said. "Have you met my sister and partner?”
“Michelle Steel, at your service,” the woman said.
“Oh!” Mary said. “Honestly, I didn't expect a woman to co-run a place like this.”
“Most people don't,” Michelle Steel said. “I love your book, by the way.”
Mary blushed. “Thank you,” she said. “It's not really my…”
“Yeah, I know,” Michelle Steel said.
“Anyway,” Mr. Steel said. “I presume you’ve come to see to the books’ distribution. The sales have slowed down since the last time you came. As agreed, we’ve been distributing only the copies that are already in stock at our warehouses. However, in the last week we’ve seen a second rise in the book’s popularity. Seems like it’s because of a… line of toys?”
“Oh! I was going to ask,” Mary said. “We saw children playing with some us-dolls. Do you have anything to do with this?”
“Not at all. The toys were manufactured at Mrs. Hat’s factory, Pamagos’ own ‘Plush Tycoon’.”
“I see. We’ll make sure to visit that place and see if we can do anything about it,” Mary said, remembering how upset Bruno and Aurum had been at the sight of the dolls. “Anyway, that’s not why I’m here. I’ve been on the tracks of these.”
She showed them the flyer. Mr. Steel averted his eyes.
“I should start by acknowledging that this was only a job that we were paid for,” he said.
“Yes, of course,” Mary said.
He told her that a customer had come to him three days ago and had ordered 5 000 of these flyers. The description of the man--bald-headed, tall, with half his face deformed and his left arm all dried up--just made Mary nod. She was kinda expecting it.
She still remembered the card reading they got at ‘The Hut’, all the way back in Belfast. "Someone is mudding the water," Granny had said. "And you know who."
Mary wished she knew why.
She thanked the Steel siblings and asked them to send a Bearer her way if the Dry Hand came again. Then she bid her farewell and headed back to the inn.
"That old harpy!" Bruno grumbled into his ale. "To dare tell me that we can’t have claims over our own images!"
He’d just come back from Mrs. Hat’s factory and his visit had obviously not gone great.
"Let's burn the place down," Agatha suggested.
Mary squinted at her, wondering if she was being serious.
“I’d rather find some legal way to bring her down,” Bruno said. “She is stealing our intellectual property! There must be a law against it!”
“If there isn’t, you know where to find me,” Agatha said.
“Who do you think came up with the idea for the dolls?” Mary said.
“Jared?” Aurum guessed.
“But why?”
“We cut him off by transferring the vault to Mary’s name,” Bruno said. “He can’t withdraw from it anymore. So, I imagine he’d want another--illegal--way to get money from our hard work.”
“So, you think he's come back from Ekoba? After all, if he started a toy business in Pamagos, wouldn’t he need to be here?”
Bruno shrugged. “If he’s here and we get to meet him, I’ll make sure he understands the importance of copyright.” He patted his hammer. “So, what did you two do?“
Mary shared all the information she was able to get in the library, as well as what she’d learned at the printing house.
“One by one, Granny’s card readings start coming true,” she said, thinking of the Dry Hand and his cencer. “Mine was first, with the Traitor." She gave Aurum a look but he didn’t seem to get the hint. “Then, there was Bruno's. The Bishop is the Dry Hand, he’s probably taking action as we speak. The only thing left is Aurum's prediction, the one about the Tax Collector. Has there been anyone who ‘wanted something of yours and was willing to do everything to get it’?”
Aurum raised his eyes to the ceiling. For just a second, Mary thought she saw a recognition on his face but then he shook his head.
“Nope, no Tax Collectors here.”
“So, anyway, after we finished with the library, Agatha went out,” Mary said pointedly. “To take a walk. In this unfamiliar city.”
She thought she’d give the tabaxi a chance to explain herself before making any accusations.
“Yeah, it was nothing special,” Agatha said. “Though, I got a lead which I might be able to follow later in the evening.”
“I thought you didn’t know anyone here.”
Agatha shrugged indeterminately.
“What did you do?” she asked Aurum. “While we were out doing tasks all around?”
“I was teaching the Ekobian boys the elusive art of being charismatic.”
Mary gave him a glance and quickly looked away, feeling her face redden. He certainly knew how to do that.
Sooo, mysterious card readings, eh? It's very easy to tell what they mean, once the prediction has already happened, but until then, they remain a mystery.
Have you ever had your fortune told? And has it ever come true?
See you next time, when our heroes are finally going to head out to see Mr. Perres.
Take care and be well!
(Also, here's a link to the Chapter Guide, the Glossary and the Map for the series. You're welcome!)
An important disclaimer: These are my notes from a D&D game turned into a narrative. All the worldbuilding and NPC encounters belong to our DM, and all the actions of the other main characters (Aurum, Bruno and Agatha) belong to my co-players. My contribution to the story is only everything Mary-related (actions, reactions, inner thoughts), as well as the writing itself.