Walk the Fetid Streets

You wrap a piece of cloth around your mouth and nose, and you walk along the boardwalk, up to the cobbles of Main Street. Whores and carvers scream in your ears, and up ahead the local elite gathers in front of the Opera House. You pass them by and head down another rickety bridge over dark, dead mud.

A stall catches your eye. A Raggedy Carver displays fragments hewn into familiar shapes. Tangle, Pole, and Roots. A crude approximation of a hammer. {if A Heretic = 1} All deliciously blasphemous. {elseif The Almost Bishop of Anceleisle = 1} All mildly blasphemous. {endif } All of inferior quality. Worthless, despite her cries.

But one is different. Not boney white, but discoloured, almost black. Its strange spirals seem to pulse, to flow over into one another. You dismiss her claims about its powers (”Invulnerability”, ”calm waters,” and ”just the right amount of fecundity”), but you pay the outrageous sum she asks, nonetheless. It squirms in your hand but calms when it rests, cool as ice water, over your heart. You mouth your soundless thanks and take your leave. Night is falling, and an empty room awaits you.