Chapter 36: Ports & Pirates

What had started as a hazy dark smudge on the horizon, had slowly come into more and more detail as we got closer. And one thing became more apparent the closer we got.

Port Marchnad was no Santarriral, nor was it a Fort Brightspring. 

Where those other settlements, not including their surrounding slums, had been awe-inspiring settlements of stone construction built upon the sides of hills and mountains, Port Marchnad was a smokey squat sprawl of mostly wood that messily spilled forth to meet the sea.

And it was growing. 

Like the other large settlements we’d encountered on our travels so far, Port Marchnad appeared to be expanding as people fled war ravaged villages and countryside for the safety of larger towns and cities. Even from a distance, I could make out the workers scurrying about on the edge of the city erecting new fortifications; log palisades gates and towers, even as they pulled down older ones that had been swallowed by the growth.

The mood as we approached was a mix of serious focus, quiet anxiety and the infectious gloom of my ongoing existential identity crisis. Having woken from my dreamtime visitation before dawn, I’d been left to stew in my own thoughts until the sun rose and my companions with it. My ruminations giving up no answers. 

Only more doubts and questions.

And they refused to let up. Every attempt at diverting my thoughts from them failed, succeeding only in banishing them for moments before I’d slip back into their haunting hold. My mind was clearly elsewhere and that elsewhere was purgatory, a hell where I was tormented by my own doubts and unanchored self.

I wasn’t fighting alone though, both Gael and Roxi had noticed my strange mood and attempted to draw me out of my funk as we breakfasted around our campfire and planned our expedition. Gael had made clear the night before that our plan was to go into the city, gather information without drawing attention to ourselves and leave as soon as possible with hopefully little to few diversions or distractions. 

And as for our list of destinations for our fact finding mission Roxi wished to visit the local branch of Ruinite faith for information, whereas our mercenary guide wished to visit contacts of her own down in the dock’s district. The big question however was how we would get inside Port Marchnad and around once inside it, if they were on the lookout for us and had our descriptions. At least this question had an answer.

Me.

I’d be a pretty crappy illusionist if I couldn’t work out a way to disguise myself and two others. The spell itself was fairly easy even if it took some trial and error with the ability creator to construct. I already had several spells that created illusionary constructs, it was really just a matter of finding a way to layer those constructs over people and tying their movements to those of the person underneath.

Three uses of [Illusionary Disguise] later and instead of an easily recognisable party of a silver furred cat type Alrec, a dark haired Oiorpatan and a midnight furred Cait Sifv, there were two average looking human farm women and a human farm boy. Yet another guise to embody and hide my lack of identity behind.

I’d found it almost amusing to watch as their hands rose to touch their faces and pick at their new clothes and hair, as they tested their new illusionary forms. Almost.

“Fuck these illusions feel real, my entire point of view seems to have been shifted downwards by a foot or two,” commented one of the farm women with Roxi’s voice in what sounded like awe tinged disbelief. “How come you’re a boy?”

“Ah… So, they’re probably looking for three women, not two women and a boy. We’re umm less likely to raise suspicion this way,” I replied, almost wincing at that sound of my deliberately altered voice.

A frown creased the brow of the farm woman I’d identified as Roxi. “You sure that’s necessary? These illusions of yours are pretty all encompassing.”

This time I was more ready to answer her question.

“Our disguises might be good, but they might not be enough to cover for our reactions if they chose to question us at the gate. Best to defy any profile or description as much as possible when avoiding the authorities to avoid second glances,” I explained. “I used to keep a wig and pink hoodie in my backpack for similar reasons when I knew I might need to throw pursuers or checkpoints.”

“So you crossdressed for crime,” nodded Roxi, looking thoughtful.

“Yes. For crime,” I confirmed as we left camp, before again falling silent. My mind lured into the tempo of my footsteps as I walked on autopilot, allowing my pre-dawn ruminations to claim me.

* * *

The first thing that hit me as we passed through the gates into the city was the smell, it almost had me thinking we were back in the swamp, yet somehow worse. The stench of wet mud, decay, sweat, smoke, cooking and layered through it all the stench of human excrement. 

Shit.

The city’s perfume was enough to rip me out of my own head with whiplash. It was almost enough to make me fear that it could dispel our illusions through sheer strength of stench alone. In terms of bad smell, Port Marchnad had my previous destinations beat. I guess shit really does roll down hill and we were all out of hills.

The reason for the smell was self-evident once through the gates. The streets could barely be called streets, no, they were more like shallow rivers of tainted wet mud churned and carved by boots and the wheels of carts and wagons. And on either side of the mud rivers were open stone drainage culverts where mud, stormwater and sewage sat stagnant waiting for the next rain to flush them.

At least we didn’t have to walk through the mud covered streets thanks to the raised wood plank sidewalks that ran above the shit slurry gutters.

The safety of sidewalks enabled me to look around at my surroundings, even as I wished for the smell receptors in my nose to die. Port Marchnad had very little stone outside of the gutters, chimneys, foundations or the odd mansion or temple, instead the buildings were largely densely packed one to two story wooden constructions with hanging wood board signs swaying in the breeze.

The next thing I noticed once my nose had grown numb to the smell was the sounds. I was starting to form a theory that every city had its own acoustic pattern that captured its identity and nature in part. 

Port Marchnad was noisy, yet quiet.

There was of course the sounds of distant trade craft and industry, the clang of a blacksmith's hammer, saw sounds from the workers on the wall, the rattle of cart wheels, the distant cries of merchants and fishmongers. Then there were the ambient sounds, the creak of wooden buildings shifting, the thump of boots on wood sidewalk, the cries of seagulls, the splashes of boots and wheels in mud, the rattle of chains in the breeze and the crying of infants in houses.

The ordinary people on the streets though, were almost silent as they moved quickly anxiously trying to avoid drawing attention to themselves. Avoiding drawing the attention of the mounted and unmounted soldiers marching through the streets and down the sidewalks. Even going so far as to flatten themselves in doorways or jumping into the mud of the road to keep out of the soldiers’ way.

It was a familiar atmosphere that took me back home to the Republic and the streets of Philly. The anxious fear-filled caution of people trapped in a place where violence was as sudden and sometimes unpredictable as it was common. Where that attitude of cowed fearful anxiety was the entire goal of the violence.

An attitude we did not have, even with our valid fear of detection. It made us stand out. At this rate we were going to get noticed. 

I at least knew how to hide in plain sight.

Hunching my back and shoulders to make myself smaller, I bent my neck to keep my head down and switching to a well practiced fearful scurry casting anxious looks around me, I bumped into my companions to get their attention. 

Thankfully it only took them a few seconds to understand my message and copy me.

Following Gael to our first destination, I couldn’t help feel a sense of familiarity or nostalgia with my present circumstances which sat like bile in my gut. There was too much that felt like the worst parts of my life before CORA. My scurrying gait, my hunched posture, our shying away from the eyes of those with power, hiding behind this uncomfortable illusion.

It felt like being caught in a net, tangled up in it as it was drawn tighter. The thin ropes cutting into my flesh, strangling me.

By the time Gael led us through the towering archway that served as the entrance to the Temple of the First Lovers and Roxi had gotten us an audience within one of the closed off sanctums, my entire world had narrowed to a small point on Roxi’s back. 

Throwing off our illusions to the surprised gasp of one of Ruin’s Priestesses, I felt the world lift from my shoulders. My full self and awareness crashed back into me as the pressure lifted. Blinking pain and blurriness from eyes that had stared at one spot too long, I couldn’t help but compare the sensation to an image burnt CRT screen. 

Finally looking around, my internal musings suddenly trailed off with an accompanying  involuntary shiver as I became aware of the looks of concern aimed at me by my companions.