Travel to the city, see the Sapphire’s Crown

  See the learned maidens, unknown to scorn.

  But as they pull you to a bed of down,

  Beware, beware, the Bloom’s Thorn.

  -Thaddeus Savoi – Explorer and bard

  Sabbelah was at its best at night. The sunbaked cobblestones still radiated enough heat to be warm no matter how cold the sea winds were. The clear sky that let the sun burn unabated also let every star shine, lighting the city up enough that torches were redundant. There was an entire subset of the city that were entirely nocturnal. Entertainers and the idle entertained. Either one might recognize the Dean from a portrait as a drinking companion, a dancing partner or gambling opponent.

  Like any other city, you could divide Sabbelah into districts. They wouldn’t be particularly precise, as the city’s development had always been a panic to find and use livable space, but there was a patchwork pattern there. There was the market district that Komena had set up shop in, the academic district that contained all the libraries, auditoriums and government buildings, the half-built slums on the city borders. But the most likely place to find the Dean’s tracks were going to be the pleasure district.

  Located near the center of the city, the pleasure district was accessible from almost any other part of Sabbelah. It was home to most of the impressive restaurants and music halls. There were miniaturized recreations of every racetrack to exist. Tiny boats circled pools as illusory hounds ran back and forth. Hidden even deeper, there were dueling pits. Not just for spells, but the savage mundanity of fists on bone as well. She was certain that there were other distractions being sold in the cellars and patios of this district she hadn’t even heard of before. But she was here for business, so there was only one place to go.

  According to its owner, the Peach Vale was a typical Ao Guang style tea house. It was the only one in the city, so Komena couldn’t argue against him. A set of small wooden tables and chairs were arranged around a room, lit by paper lanterns hanging from the ceiling, as the lone waiter walked around, delivering pots of tea to the sound of customers chatting and illusory water running. Even this noise was muted thanks to the runes inscribed at the center of each table. A customer could send a small amount of magical energy to activate a small field of silence. Depending on how much was used, the field could go from muffling to completely silencing all the noise coming in and out. Only two tables seemed to be using the feature to its full potential, one had three formally dressed workers muttering to themselves over a tableful of graphs, the other was young couple holding hands over the table and presumably talking about one another.

  The shop was run by one family, who handled everything themselves. They’d brought over potted tea trees, which they dried and served. Besides the unique menu and exceptional quality, the shop was different from the city’s usual due to only being open at night. They catered to a crowd of caffeine hounds and insomniacs, who spent their hours drinking tea by the light of the moon and to the sounds of streams. Another store selling an oasis in the desert.

  “Hey, Huang. I need to speak to your grandfather again.” Komena said as she entered.

  The waiter, Huang Qin, jerked his empty hand towards the kitchen door across the room. The man was busy and had never liked having a private investigator dropping by his shop whenever she pleased. She grabbed a pot of tea, jasmine by the smell, and two cups as she passed through the kitchen, leaving a gem in its place. Coming out into a back alley, Komena pushed aside a bushel of tea hung to dry. It revealed a small work area with harvested leaves laid out across a few tables. She filled the two cups, leaving the pot on the ground by the door. Keeping one of the cups, she passed the other to the old man sitting on a stool.

  Long Qin, the original founder of the tea house, spent his days sitting out here, sorting dried leaves, looking out on to streets and aggressively gossiping. The differences between him and a catty student were his uncanny accuracy and the simplicity of his motives. Long cared about two things: getting more information and not getting involved. Komena was a good enough investigator to have plenty of the former and was small time enough not to risk the latter. A couple years of swapping stories had built up an almost friendly working relationship. What she was dragging him into could put that relationship at risk, but she didn’t plan to be involved long enough for it to turn serious on him.

  “Ah. Komena. I was hoping it would be a little longer before you darkened my door stop. I’m sure this means someone’s lost a beloved trinket or some marriage is falling apart. Or maybe it’s base greed and you’re here to harass me for your package.” Long said, not looking up from the leaves he was sorting through.

  “No, I’ve come to bother an old man before his innards finally give up and collapse completely to dust. Hopefully he talks quickly.” Komena said. Long seemed to take great joy in appearing as old as he could. He had a full mane of long, thin white hair worn with a beard in the same style. To complete the image, he wore an Ao Guang styled blue robe with loose sleeve and the golden serpents embroidered on the back. Komena assumed it was a joke he played on his adopted city. “Specifically, I’m looking for news about this woman.” She put the portrait on the table. If Long recognized her, he didn’t interrupt his leaf sorting to show it.

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  “Oh, this might be the first time you’ve ever brought me good news. Finally, the opportunity to play matchmaker again. It’s been terribly dull since Huang got married. Tell me, who is the lucky lady?”

  “Someone who’s personal life I’m being paid to look into. Have you hearing any news about a beautiful, stranger drifting around?”

  “I did hear some market hens clucking for the last few months about someone who fits this description flitting about. She was being made out to be a real ‘lock up your sons and your daughter’s type’. It would be quite indiscreet of me to name names.”

  “Yes, quite indiscreet.” Komena answered with a sigh. “We can only imagine how embarrassing it would be to have me hounding them with questions.”

  Long stood up, stretching his back with a few gentle cracks. “Yes, I’m sure that would be quite embarrassing for both of you.” He said as he went back into the kitchen. Komena enjoyed the warm cup in her hands and looked at the stars for a few moments. Then Long was back, a small red capped scroll in in one hand, a small box in the other.

  “Hypothetically, of course. Like my package not being ready.” Komena said as Long passed both to her. He picked up his own cup again and took a deep breath of the steam coming off it.

  “We had some spares from a celebration last week. I’m tempted to give you the recipe. Have a chemist mix them for you so you don’t need to wait for our scraps.” He said.

  Komena grimaced. Doing that would mean getting a mage to transmute the base materials and that was something she’d rather avoid. They’d get the wrong idea for her interests, take it as some sad imitation game. “I don’t see why either of us should go to that much effort simply for some children’s toys.” She said, then turned to leave but was interrupted right before going back into the shop.

  “Then, to speak of practical things for a change, there is another thing I am curious about. Why were you hired to investigate this woman? Another jealous lover?” Long said.

  Komena was thankful that she was behind him because she couldn’t hide the tension in her body. This wasn’t the first time he had asked about a case and it wouldn’t have been the first time she answered him.

  “It’s a case where I’m being paid enough to put off the joy of our usual talks.” She said instead.

  Long drank from his cup, a deep slurping noise at odds with his composed appearance. “I understand. I’ll tolerate my ignorance for now, though I’m sure you’ll alleviate my suffering when your contract expires. Hopefully your new, professional attitude will allow you to scrape up some modicum of success.”

  ***

  The list of the Dean’s ‘acquaintances’ was shorter than Komena would have liked at less than ten people. Either those market hens were quieter than normal, or the Dean was more restrained than a restricted portrait implied. The search took all night, but by the end of it, she had tracked down almost everyone on the list. There were bar tenders, waitresses, musicians, and a few high-class socialites. A few of them were married, but none were officially students or professors at the university. The only exception was named Trin Rappoport. People she asked knew the name and could give a description, an older woman with vibrant red hair. But no one could give any details to find her. It was always nice when it was easy to tell who was important in Long’s lists.

  Interrogating them wasn’t difficult. It also wasn’t very useful. The Dean had told her partners that she was a high-ranking member of the Faculty of Evocation, and very little else. The meetings were generally short, if enthusiastic. A few had started kept in contact longer than a few months through letters. Komena had been able to see them with a little implied coercion. They had been full of charming anecdotes about academic life, but nothing of use to the investigation.

  The sun was rising by the time she’d worked through the list, the sands turning an almost delicate rose in the earliest morning light. That meant it was time for two things, breakfast and a check in with Struth and Kave. The former was handled by a street stand, selling eggs poached in a peppery tomato sauce and wrapped in flat bread, along with a doubled portion of coffee. The latter was only a stroll through the city away.

  Komena took her usual route, cutting though some of the safer alleyways. This early the streets were as empty as they got in the city. A steady stream of slowly moving delivery carts still worked the main paths to and from the docks and the Transmuters Faculty, carrying goods for sale and necessities for the citizens respectively. The alleys were all empty save for a few beggars, who had curled against the wall to sleep. One coughed themselves awake as she passed. They rolled over, revealing several empty waterskins, before wrapping themselves tighter in rags to cover their face. Komena gave them a wide berth. She recognized the cough.

  Everyone in Sabbelah had lost someone to the Bloom. Maybe not someone close, but someone. They called it the Bloom because of the colors the fungal infection bloomed into under the victim’s skin right before it entered the fatal stages. Infected would starve as they ate and drank, drained to grow the disease.

  There wasn’t a cure, but the infection vectors were understood. The University had published a pamphlet on evading infection, then considered the matter settled. Unfortunately, the best advice was to avoid other infected. Advice that doctors were free to follow.

  Komena took a few gems from her wallet and tossed them to the beggar. They landed above their head and were quickly scooped up. Charity was supposed to bring good luck, and she needed to find a way to spend her newfound fortune from the Dean of the Mundane. There were only so many dried figs in the world. Maybe she could more, but medical mysteries weren’t her field.

  Komena stepped back out to a main street. Now there were a few people wandering around. Likely working towards their own breakfasts or taking advantage of the peace to get some exercise.

  “It’s simply terrible what happened to Muarim! It was like a beast broke into his shop, I heard.” A matronly woman said to her partner as they passed. Komena broke into a run.