Book 2 - The Summer of Legends

  Archie had always called the hills between Sain and Ambrosia City ‘mountains.’ And why shouldn’t he? They stood hundreds of feet tall, the largest thing he had ever seen in his life. They hosted entire forests and rose in steps and had cliff faces. If it required a vertical climb, it must have been a mountain. And so that’s what he had always called them.

  He would never make such a mistake again.

  The mountain range dividing The Platter and Khala grew and grew and grew as he got closer. Every few minutes, he would poke his head out of the window of the carriage, expecting to be at the base of the mountains. But again and again, the mountains stayed on the horizon, only growing upwards. Finally, when Archie had to crane his neck back to see where the mountains pierced the sky, the carriage tilted and began its long uphill climb.

  The road took them up over the smallest of all the mountains—more like one of Archie’s “mountains.” Still, the climb took hours. Rocking in the carriage, Archie fell into a delirious nap, believing in his half-conscious state that they might climb above the clouds and float off into the sky.

  But then his dreams took a turn. First, he was trapped in the carriage. Then, he was trapped in Prince Waldorf’s kitchen, chained to the floor. The Glutton never made an appearance, but in the fever-state of the dream, Archie was always watching the door, waiting for it to open for his regularly scheduled beating.

  After slipping into the same nightmare twice, Archie kept himself awake for the rest of the ride. But still, every so often, the chains of the carriage would rattle just right and send him back into Prince Waldorf’s kitchen.

  The driver called for a break after cresting the mountain road.

  Archie left the carriage first, walking off the road to a small rock outcropping that looked back on The Platter. He hurried to distance himself from Nori, Barley, Blanche, and Sutton as they spilled out of the carriage. He wanted this moment to himself.

  From up high, The Platter’s trees seemed infinitesimal, yet its forests infinite. Archie couldn’t see the blades of grass, but he could see the wind as it carved its path through the yellow ocean of the plains. He couldn’t see buildings, but he could see towns. He couldn’t see animals, but he could see herds. The seemingly infinite details of his homeland were washed out into the infinity of the world.

  The view filled him with wonder.

  He thought of how many other wonderful views there were in the world. The volcanic islands of Uroko. The mesas of Kuutsu Nuna. The lush valleys of Labrusca. He wanted to swim with the dolphins, to follow the Kuutsu, to hunt with dogs for white truffles.

  He wondered where Petrichor was in all of that vastness. How could it ever be so small when it had been so large his entire life? His home, his world, his dream. It seemed so insignificant from the top of the mountain. So easy to turn his back on.

  And so he walked away from The Platter, cresting the final hill of the mountain and observing Khala for the first time. For a while, it didn’t seem too different than The Platter. Yellow grass. A little more rocky. But instead of forests stretching to the distant horizon, they stretched to the sky, climbing mountains that blocked the view of the beyond. Even in the first month of summer, snow still capped the mountains, melting into rivers and waterfalls that nourished the valleys below.

  “What do you think?” a voice asked from behind.

  Archie turned as Nori walked up to him. The cold wind whipped past them, forcing her to hold the black hair that ran down the side of her face so that she could see. A few errant strands still spilled free, dancing on top of the subtle freckles that were scattered around her nose.

  “It’s beautiful.”

  Nori walked past Archie to get a look at the view. She scoffed. “Yeah. Looks harsh and cold.”

  “Like looking in the mirror for you, huh?”

  Archie laughed at his own joke, and Nori joined him, but just barely. She shook her head, but didn’t punch him. Didn’t insult him back. She just took it, which was worse. Archie wondered how he had stepped on a nerve so easily.

  But he wouldn’t let her spoil the mood.

  “So far from home,” he said, putting his hands on his hips and looking back and forth between his past and his future. “I never thought I’d be this far.”

  Nori just looked forward, her voice having none of Archie’s excitement. “And so close.” Archie stepped forward to look into her eyes, but in them, he didn’t find the reflection of Khala. He saw Uroko captured in her icy gaze. “I never thought I’d be this close,” she said.

  Archie frowned. Maybe she could spoil the mood.

  But then Barley walked up. Good ol’ reliable Barley. Not exactly a cup of cheer, but he never let a bad vibe linger. Archie waited in anticipation of his classmate’s next words.

  Like always with Barley, the words took a while. He stood next to Archie and Nori and just stared out at his homeland. Finally, he spoke, his voice wistful and somber. “It seems so small. How can a place like this exist in the same world as a place like Ambrosia City?”

  Archie stuck out his lips and exhaled with disappointment.

  “I still feel sick,” Sutton groaned as he approached.

  Archie inhaled through his nose with disappointment. He breathed in and out and in and out, always disappointed. This was the beginning of a great journey. A chance to explore a new world. Make new friends. Learn new techniques. Sure, they had work to do. Sutton had already reserved plenty of Archie’s time to go delving in the ancient libraries of Khaldeer—something Archie wasn’t particularly excited about. But their summer was full of possibilities. Full of excitement. And everyone else was raining on his parade.

  But then…

  “Wow, wow, wow!” Blanche exclaimed as she skipped up to stand with the rest of them. “Look at those mountains! Is that snow? Barley, is that snow? I thought it would have all melted.”

  “There are still summer snows high in the mountains,” he explained.

  “Wow.” Blanche put her hands on her hips, unconsciously mirroring Archie’s posture. “Summer snows. I didn’t know that was a thing!”

  Archie smiled. As the wind blew past Blanche, it took some of her warmth with it and carried it to him. “Maybe we’ll see a waterfall,” he told her.

  “Ooo, that’d be cool!” She squinted her eyes and surveyed the valley. “I heard the world’s biggest waterfall is in Khala.”

  “Maybe we can go see it!”

  “Yeah!”

  Archie’s and Blanche’s excitement mingled and built off of each other. But even with his nausea, Sutton couldn’t help himself but to bring them back to the world of rationality.

  “That’s way east,” he explained. “And way north. We’re going to Khaldeer. That’s south central.”

  “Maybe we’ll slip away and go visit it,” Archie suggested, goading Sutton on.

  “That would require weeks of hiking through uneven, harsh terrain,” Sutton stated in an attempt to shut down the conversation. He had no time for their frivolities and no appetite for their irrationalities. “So no, I don’t think you will.”

  Blanche leaned in close to Archie, whispering in a tone that was both hopeful and mocking. “Maybe we will.”

  “Come on,” the carriage driver announced. “It’s time to go.”

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  “You Society?” the balding innkeeper asked. The driver flashed a piece of engraved bronze that marked him as a member of the Caravanserai Society. “Alright. I’ll make sure the stableboy feeds the horses. Take the last room on the left.”

  “We leave an hour after dawn,” the driver told Archie’s group before heading upstairs.

  The innkeeper did a quick headcount. “Five of ya, then? How many rooms?”

  Archie stepped up. In an odd reversal of roles, Nori had let Archie dictate and control their budget. But Archie had learned how much blood each piece of gold was worth. He wasn’t about to let his go to waste. “How many beds per room?”

  “Got some with double beds, some with a double and a single.”

  “One of each, then. Nori and Blanche, you get your own room but you’re sharing a bed.” He looked at the boys. As much as Archie wanted his own bed, Barley had three inches and about sixty pounds on him. “Me and Sutton will share a double. Barley, you get the single.”

  “One gold and four silvers,” the innkeeper said.

  Archie’s group displayed synchronized shock.

  “That’s a crazy price,” Nori said. “Half of that would still be expensive.”

  “I’m the only Caravanserai thirty miles in any direction, and I have more guests than usual.” The innkeeper pointed at a group of men wearing wool robes and arguing over a large map that they had spread across the table. “There’s always a nice pile of mud in the stables. I only charge a copper per head for that. Two if you use my hay to soften your bed.”

  “Ripoff,” Nori grumbled.

  Being a Caravanserai, the inn received regular payments from the Caravanserai Society in exchange for providing their drivers with free service. This in turn made them the preferred stop for drivers but did nothing to help the passengers, who were frequently charged exorbitant prices.

  Archie turned to Sutton, breaking into a quiet sidebar. “How we looking?”

  Sutton tilted his head back, making the same thoughtful expression he always did when performing the magic of mathematics.

  “Well,” Sutton whispered. “With the budget you gave me, something has to give at some point. We’ve paid the driver five gold, but still owe him another ten. Khaldeer Monastery is letting us stay with them for free, but we still have three nights of travel after this one. That’s at least another two gold for beds. Plus meals. Call it another four gold…”

  Archie started to lose track of the numbers. “Broad strokes, Sutton.”

  “Right.” Sutton nodded, bringing his consciousness from the heavens of theoretical numbers down to the muck of reality. “We’ll have a week or two in Khaldeer before we need to start working for our meals.”

  Archie turned back to the innkeeper. Sutton handled the back end of the finances, Archie handled the front end.

  “We’ll work for it,” he said.

  “Already got one more stableboy than I need,” the innkeeper said dismissively. “Will it be sleeping in the stables, then?”

  “We’re Chefs,” Archie said. He pulled the collar of his overcoat down to show the orange Chef’s jacket underneath.

  “Oh, Chefs.” The innkeeper lifted his lower lip toward his nose as he nodded in approval. “The kitchen could always use an extra pair of hands that aren’t covered in horse dung.”

  Archie smiled back at his group, celebrating their potential victory.

  Then the innkeeper continued. “Of course, you’re just an Orange Jacket. My wife could probably cook as good as you.”

  A couple of eavesdropping patrons laughed.

  Nori stepped up. “I’m a Yellow Jacket.”

  Archie turned so that Nori couldn’t see him grimace. He still hadn’t shaken his natural reaction to being outranked. At the time of the jacket ceremony, he had been okay with his underachievement—and he still was to a certain extent—but in the days that passed, he couldn’t help but feel that his talents were underrepresented by his jacket.

  “Yellow don’t mean much.”

  “Does being a Harper mean anything?” Nori’s face was hardened steel. For as much as she despised her name, she was still willing to use it. “I’m not your usual Yellow Jacket.”

  “Hm.” The innkeeper scratched his beard and made eye contact with another patron. “Give me a couple hours of work, and I’ll drop…three silver off the price.”

  As Nori took over negotiations, Sutton tugged at Archie’s sleeve.

  “What’s up?”

  “I can’t take much more of the carriage,” Sutton said. “I get so nauseous.”

  “Well then quit reading while we’re riding.”

  Sutton tilted his head down and peered up through his eyebrows. “I’d be willing to sleep in the stables if we use the savings on movemash.”

  “How much did the driver say he’d charge us?”

  “Five gold to cut out a day of travel. With the savings from not needing to stay at another inn, that’s an effective cost of about four gold.”

  “These prices are ridiculous…”

  Sutton shrugged. “It’s a tough route to travel.”

  “Can we afford it?”

  Sutton closed one eye, the other eye looking up at the ceiling. “Well…it’d accelerate our timeline for working. We’d probably need to secure some form of employment our first week in Khaldeer.”

  Archie sighed. He didn’t want to spend any longer in the carriage than he had to. The claustrophobia of the carriage reminded him too much of the claustrophobia of Prince Waldorf’s kitchen. Plus whatever he lost in comfort for forgoing a bed, he’d make up double by not having to be crammed into that tiny cabin for another day of rocky travel.

  Archie pulled Nori away from what was becoming a heated negotiation.

  “Sutton and I are gonna sleep in the stables. We’d rather do a day of movemash and sleep on hay than get a bed and be traveling all week.”

  “I’ll take the stables too,” Barley added.

  Nori scoffed. “Alright. One room for me and Blanche, I guess.”

  “Actually…” Blanche lifted one shoulder and tucked her face into it. “Sleeping in the stables could be fun.”

  For a moment, Archie was surprised. But then he remembered how Blanche often stayed too late in the greenhouse and would end up sleeping there.

  “That’s not going to be enough to pay for the movemash,” Nori said.

  “It’ll help,” Archie countered.

  Nori narrowed her eyes at him.

  “We’ll have enough,” Archie said.

  Nori’s face softened. “Alright. Whatever you say, Archie.” She looked back and forth at everyone and sighed. “I guess I’ll sleep in the stables too.”

  “It’ll be fun!” Blanche interjected.

  Archie turned to the innkeeper. “We’ll take the stables.”

  The innkeeper laughed. “Silver and a half, then.”

  Blanche stepped toward the innkeeper. “I saw your garden out back. I’m a better cultivator than most Green Jackets. Give me two hours out there and I’ll progress your harvest by a week.”

  The innkeeper laughed. “Well aren’t you an industrious bunch. What’ll it cost me?”

  “We stay for free,” Blanche stated. The rest of the group recoiled in surprise at Blanche’s confidence.

  “Deal. Give me the Yellow Jacket in the kitchen for a couple hours and I’ll let you use our spare bedrolls.

  Nori nodded. “Deal.”

  “What about us?” Archie asked.

  “While us girls do all the work, you…” Blanche pointed at him. “Can go set up my bed. Put some hay under it so it’s soft. Oh, and make sure there’s no dung within ten feet of me.”

  “Fair deal.”

  The stables smelled of manure and wet fur and old hay, the lanterns were kept low for the animals’ benefit, and the students had to all pile into one pen in order to not share with any of the goats, but aside from that, it wasn’t too bad. The bedrolls were thin but well-worn, and there was plenty of hay to cushion them from the hard ground. Archie didn’t mind it. There was a certain romanticism to the roughness of it all.

  But the sun had set early, and the students had napped on the way up, leaving them unable to fall asleep but stuck in the dark. They cleared out a space on the ground between them, placed a lantern, and told stories across the flame. Sutton took the conversation over with a particularly boring tangent on economics.

  “...and that’s particularly interesting given the financial state of the middle class during the eighth century. You see—”

  “Sutton,” Archie interrupted.

  “What?”

  “It’s not particularly interesting at all.”

  Sutton looked around to confirm. Nori stared at a little mound of hay that was more interesting than Sutton’s ramblings. Blanche looked halfway to death. Barley looked back at Sutton and nodded solemnly.

  “Well, I think it is…” Sutton muttered.

  They sat in silence for a moment.

  “Well, if no one else is going to talk, I’m going to continue!” Sutton whined.

  And then to everyone’s surprise, Barley volunteered himself. “I have a story to tell,” he said. “But it is not a pleasant one.”

  “Is it scary?” Blanche asked hopefully. She sat up and squirmed, absolutely giddy at the prospect.

  “You like scary stories?” Archie asked. It had only been a couple days, but Blanche had already surprised him half a dozen times.

  “Oh yeah. I used to torment my sister with them.” Blanche wiggled her eyebrows, proud of her own mischievousness.

  “I would call it scary, yes,” Barley said. He looked at Sutton and then Archie. “It’s a story I’ve been wanting to tell for a while now. About the origin of Gluttony.”

  Archie and Sutton both sat up straight.

  The origin of Gluttony?

  “You have a story about that and you haven’t told me?” Sutton whined.

  Barley pursed his lips together in a frown. “Some stories have rules. Places and times to be told. This one cannot be told outside of Khala, nor can it be told when there is snow on the lake. Now that we’re here, I can tell it.”

  Archie leaned in.

  “Shall I tell the story?” Barley asked.

  “Yes!” Archie, Sutton, and Blanche all yelled in unison.

  Barley offered a solemn smile. “Alright then. This is the story of the one we call…the wendigo.”