“You don’t strike me as a coffee person.”

Martin sipped his coffee hot, Namo took hers at room temperature. Whereas yesterday her hair had been done up in a bun to keep it out of her face while traveling, today it was let down. Her straight locks cascaded down her shoulders like waterfalls of molten silver.

“Oh, I love coffee! A bean that’s nothin’ short of a miracle. It keeps ya alert, keeps ya focused, has all kinds good effects, don’tcha know? I’d write a song about it if I didn’t know one already!” To illustrate her point, she sipped from the mug, holding it in both hands. “Wanna hear it?”

Martin waved his hand in dissent. He supposed it was too much to ask for peace and quiet as he caffeinated for the day, but it was certainly too early for singing. “Maybe some other time. What is it with you and singing anyway?”

“Do humans not enjoy singin’ very much?” Namo asked. “I mean, it sure seems like they enjoy listenin’ to other people singin’, judgin’ by last night!”

“That’s not it. Plenty of people enjoy singing. But it seems like, I dunno, it’s your life or something.”

“Oh, well I s’pose that’s true, in a sense. Ya see, I’m travelin’ the world to gather information from people in places all over, compose songs that tell stories about what I’ve learned!” She paused for a moment. When she resumed, there was a hint of uncertainty to her voice. “I-it’ll be a great way to share knowledge with other folks I meet in my travels. I wanna find a way to give back to the people of my village for putting up with me for fourteen years.” She took another sip, the confidence returning to her voice after doing so. “Besides, it’s a great way to meet new people. Like you! And also learn more about plants, which is my other love…in case that wasn’t obvious!”

Martin took another sip of his bitter dirt water, his wonderful dirt water. “Okay, but like… how are you going to make money?”

Namo tilted her head, perplexed. A lock of hair fell over her eyes and she brushed it aside.

“You know, like, being able to afford food and a place to sleep and whatnot?”

The faun deflated a bit, if only for a moment. “I… I haven’t really thought that far ahead. But last night worked out well! So maybe I’ll just do that, or something!”

“Have you considered, I dunno, writing down and selling your travels in a journal?” He thought to his preferred method of recording information on the road. “Maybe folks will find use for your notes.”

“Well, that might work for you Amonuunkep,” she said, using her language’s word for humans, “and I s’pose it isn’t a bad idea, but my people like to sing and tell stories and dance and perform instead of reading. That’s how we communicate best, don’tcha know? Besides, not everybody in my village knows how to read. I’m one of the lucky ones, and even my reading isn’t the best.” She sipped her coffee. “That’s why I’m here in Fordham—“

The pair were interrupted by a thunderous crash from outside of the saloon. Martin stood up to get a better view through the saloon doors and watched as half a dozen people gathered around a cart that had buckled under the weight of the wooden crates it was carrying. One man was shouting at a handful of other people who Martin surmised were his subordinates, who in turn each began blaming each other for the items falling.

Shaking his head, Martin sat back down and turned back to Namo, who was still looking outside from her seat. “So, you were saying.”

Namo turned back to Martin. “Huh? Whaddya mean?”

“You were explaining why you were here in Fordham.”

The faun took a moment to recall what they had been discussing a moment prior. “Oh right! Yes, so I heard there was a herbalist or some such in town whose specialty is on local plants from the forest. I was told to check her out from the folks I was staying with in U’snuk-Pinuntuu—um, that’s where I was visiting before we met. Based on what the folks up there said, I thought Fordham would be more… well, foresty. I’m surprised that it seems mostly like a grassland. But anyways, I was hoping to chat with her about plants from U’snuk-Pinuntuu and Jeju, where I come from, and do a bit of trading, maybe get a couple samples to bring back home!” She triumphantly finished her coffee, to put a fine point on how well she was following her goals, perhaps. Meanwhile, Martin still had barely touched his.

“Yeah, I imagine Fordham was probably a lot more densely forested before the townsfolk clearcut the area for lumber. I can’t say I know much about medicinal plant products other than gin and tonic, so good luck. I need to ask around about an old friend who was in town not long ago.”

“Oh, for cute! An old friend! How special. Do ya want me to come with ya?”

Martin shook his head. “No!” He answered a bit too forcefully, before correcting himself. “No thank you, sorry. I can take care of it on my own and come find you at the herbalist’s. With any luck, I won’t be long.”

Namo tilted her head again and Martin’s awkward outburst. “Allllright then, if you’re sure!” She mercifully chose not to pursue the topic any further.

The two finished their coffee, or more accurately, Namo enjoyed the company of the laconic thief while he finished his coffee. When they had finished, Martin requested directions from the barkeep, a chipper young man who seemed out of place compared to the Joplin matriarch and her son who had served the travelers the previous evening. “The mayor’s office? Easy. You’re gonna need to head to the Northern District. Take a left out the door and follow the road north ‘til you get to a footbridge that leads up some stairs. That’ll take you to the market square. From there you’ll take the first road you come across to your left and follow that two blocks. You’ll see a big brick building with a bell tower. That’s what you’re looking for.” He turned to Namo. “As for Mrs. Goro’s shop—that’s who I’m assuming you’re talking about—that’s a bit tougher, so bear with me. She’s here in the Central District, but her shop is a hole in the wall. Head right out the door and follow the main road south. After, mm, five or six blocks, you’ll see a schoolhouse. Take a left at that road and it’ll narrow. You’ll see a side street three houses past the schoolhouse. Take a left at that street and follow it to the end. Mrs. Goro’s is at the end, sandwiched between a bunch of old cabins.” Martin looked to Namo, who had her eyes squinted in concentration. “Got all that?”

After a moment, Namo nodded. “I think so! Maybe I’ll get lost, but I can always just ask for directions.”

The pair thanked the man for the help and resolved to meet at the herbalist when Martin had finished his business in the Northern District.

Martin retraced his steps toward the Northern District, enjoying the pleasant morning sun before it grew molten hot, as he knew it would become later in the day. Far along the western horizon, Pan, the smaller of Penelopeia’s two moons, was beginning to set. The streets were rather quiet for mid-morning, which Martin found a bit surprising for a town as seemingly bustling as Fordham, at least in comparison to his hometown of Vernon, a few days’ travel on foot to the north. It wasn’t as though the town was dead quiet: merchants hawked their wares in the market square, passersby exchanged greetings with one another and with him, and the occasional carriage carrying goods or passengers rode by, but Martin supposed he had expected throngs of people, at least in the commercial areas of the Northern District. The sound of sawing and permeating odor of sawdust and sap from the mills indicated that the town was far from idle, however.

The itinerant thief found the mayor’s office with little incident: an appropriately stately gray-bricked building with wooden accents along the façade. He pulled open the heavy wooden door and entered the government building. The interior was clad in elaborate stained pine paneling, as if paying homage to the lumber industry that the town was renowned for. Public seating in the form of uncomfortable wooden benches lined the atrium along the building entrance and adjacent walls. A few people sat in these benches, perhaps waiting for appointments with city hall staff or, for all he knew, perhaps just loitering and reading the newspaper. A lawman was dozing on one of the benches against the left wall. At the far end of the atrium, a clerk sat behind a wooden desk of the same style as the wall paneling. The nervous looking, middle-aged man scribbled feverishly in a ledger or some similar government book.

Martin stepped up to the counter and the clerk didn’t seem to notice, even though, from the sunlight shining through the windows of the building’s entrance, he cast a shadow directly over the book the clerk was writing in. “Excuse me.”

The clerk seemed to epitomize the concept of small in both physical size and metaphorical stature. He looked up and noticed Martin for the first time. “Yes, sir, welcome to Fordham City Hall and Mayor’s Office. How can I help you on this fine morning?” His voice was quiet and his eyes half-lidded, as if Martin had just broken the trance the man was in and he was still shaking off its residual effects.

The man rolled up his proverbial sleeves. Time to gamble. “I’m a traveler from Vernon, here on business. I just learned that an old acquaintance of mine is staying in town and I’d like to see if I can find her before she moves on to her next destination. I have reason to believe she requested an audience with the mayor two or three days ago. Would you be willing to confirm that she stopped by?”

The clerk reached in one of the desk drawers to his immediate left and pulled out the guestbook almost preemptively. Excellent. “Beg pardon, sir, but I need a bit more information to confirm. Can you provide a name and address of residency?”

Martin nodded, expectantly. He didn’t know whether she used an alias while traveling but was undeterred nonetheless. “I know her as Fadina Afzal, but I suspect she may be traveling under an alias. I don’t know what address she may have used.”

The clerk opened the visitors’ log to the most recent page and began scanning the log from the past few days. Meanwhile, Martin scanned over the man’s finger as he read the names of recent visitors. The itinerant rogue was able to keep up with the clerk’s reading position in the guestbook thanks to his years of experience speed-reading hastily scrawled field notes and margin annotations from his prior life. The man gleaned that in the past five days, the local elementary school as well as the local mason’s union had visited, both irrelevant to his query. However, he noted five names of individuals who had visited between two and three days prior:

GRACE COUZENS

TOBIAS FRANCO

PHILIPPE FILS-AIME

JUDITH MONTGOMERY

LIN ZHAO

As Martin expected, the clerk shook his head and stated, “Hm, I apologize, sir, but it doesn’t look like anyone by that name visited here in the time frame you suggested.”

Martin pretended as if he wasn’t just reading over the clerk’s shoulder, which was simple enough, as the clerk avoided eye contact. “Not too surprising.” Then, almost on a whim, Martin decided to press his luck further. “Would a physical description help? She’s average height, athletic build, long dark hair which may have been done up in a bun or ponytail.” Then, watching the clerk’s reaction carefully, he added: “Oh, and she may have had a silver dagger belted at her waist.”

The clerk’s expression was neutral, perhaps a bit bored, until Martin specified the woman carried a dagger. Upon uttering that additional phrase, the clerk carefully hid a furrowed brow. Without even pausing to think, he stammered “N-no sir, I’m afraid that nobody matching that description visited the other day. Now then, erm, is there anything else I can assist you with?”

Satisfied, Martin had gotten all the information he needed. He nevertheless let the silence suspend itself in the atrium for a moment. “That’s too bad. Well, thank you for your time, but no, that’s all I was hoping you’d be able to help me with. Good day to you, sir.” He left the clerk to his books and made his way out of the building.

Back on the street, Martin recalled what he had learned from the conversation. Five names. He recited them in his head to commit them to memory: Grace Couzens, Tobias Franco, Philippe Fils-Aime, Judith Montgomery, and Lin Zhao. Of these five, two were immediately recognizable as men’s names, rendering them unlikely to be the alias of the woman of interest. That left Couzens, Montgomery, and Zhao as possible aliases for the woman he knew as Fadina Afzal. Or maybe Afzal was the alias, for all he knew.

He rounded the corner of the City Hall building, retracing his steps to make his way back to the Central District to rendezvous with Namo. One thing was certain to him after the visit: someone carrying a dagger of the description that matched Afzal’s had visited the building within the past couple of days, judging based on the man’s reaction. What’s more, if the clerk was willing to lie to cover up the fact that she had visited the mayor, the nature of the visit was such that the mayor didn’t want it broadly advertised. Why the subterfuge? The man wondered to himself. He had expected it from Fadina, perhaps, but a public-facing government official? That, to him, seemed suspicious.

The rogue walked past the alleyway flanking the city hall and felt an arm grab his shoulder. Something small and cold jabbed harshly into his upper back through his road-worn duster.

“Don’t move a muscle. You make any sudden moves, or you scream, you’re dead.” The voice was calm, but firm. Martin guessed an older man, mid to late twenties. Judging by the slightly muffled character of his voice, he surmised he had something covering his mouth. A bandanna, perhaps? “You’re comin’ with me, buddy. Walk backward, eyes forward. Nice and easy.” The hand on his shoulder tightened and guided him backward into the alleyway, which was cast in shadow by the still ascending sun. The ruffian’s manner of speaking was a bit unfamiliar to Martin, who had spent most of his life living in central Sinoe. His racing mind surmised that whoever this person was, he was not originally from this area.

Martin attempted to turn his head to look at the man but the hand on his shoulder roughly pushed his head straight ahead, toward the street he was walking along moments before. “I said eyes forward, asshole. You deaf?” The hand returned to his shoulder. It was just out of his eyesight when his head was facing the street in front of him, likely intentional on his assailant’s behalf.

Martin’s heart raced. “What do you want from me? Money?” He was too panicked to recognize the irony of a nearly creditless thief being mugged.

The gunman laughed, gruff and raspy. “Please. I take one look at you and know you ain’t worth the time it’d take to get the coin off ya. No. I heard you in the mayor’s office. You was asking interesting questions. Dangerous questions. Questions you don’t need to know the answers to, ‘cause they might get you hurt. That’s why we’re having this conversation, see? Because I’d hate for something to happen to you.”

How magnanimous of you, Martin almost uttered, but found his courage lacking. Instead, he stammered out “C-come on man, just let me go. I-I didn’t do anything.” Sweat beaded on the nape of his neck and his mouth had run dry.

“Don’t play dumb with me, asshole.” The barrel of the gun jabbed firmer in his back to the point of causing a twinge of pain. “You get one warning, as a courtesy. After that, it’s over for you. Consider this your warning. Ya get me?”

Martin had no choice but to comply. He felt faint. “Yeah, s-sure, I get you. No more questions.”

“Good answer. I knew we could come to an agreement. Now get the hell outta here. I don’t ever wanna see you again, and you sure as hell don’t wanna see me again.” The hand on his shoulder let go and he was jabbed again by the gun, urging him to walk. Martin quickly exited the dark alleyway, into the illuminated street, knowing that the gun was still likely pointed at his back, but too interested in self-preservation to look behind him to confirm. He could scarcely tie two thoughts together as he made his way back to Namo.