“Please not shoot inside house.” Onewe pleads as Trouse fires the smooth, grey, fabric-like crossbow at a poisoned bird lying beside a small, cloudy stream, skewering an outstretched wing, and Gole whoops.

“Yeah, you got it! Good job, Trouse,” Gole exclaims excitedly, and Trouse scratches his neck,

“I was actually trying to hit its head. I promise I won’t shoot in the house, Onewe, don’t stress out. We’re not going to leave you here anyways.” Trouse says sincerely as they approach the house Onewe had been kept in as a slave making Providence Cloth, and Onewe smiles anxiously,

“I thanks you. I’m knowing, she just really angry if broke window.”

“Huh, well I’m about to make her really angry then.” Gole snorts as she springs over to the wooden door and scratches her claws down it, leaving long, craggy marks in the wood.

“Gole!” Poole exclaims, and Gole looks at him apathetically,

“You can’t make me feel bad. I’m sure they’ll have a new slave working to replace this door soon enough,” she spits, disgust dripping from her voice, and the door opens.

A man with white hair and wrinkled skin stands in the doorway. He smiles at the group kindly, his wrinkles scrunching into his eyes, and Onewe looks taken aback. She quickly inquires of him in the tongue she had originally spoken, and the man replies in a dry, scratchy voice, like he’s accustomed to drinking sand rather than water. Onewe slides off Gole’s back, and gestures for the others to follow her inside as the elderly man opens the door wider.

They dismount and cautiously enter the humble house. Wooden chairs are scattered all around in odd places, and the man gestures for the adventurers to have a seat. Erve peers in through the window from the outside, and the man chuckles as he waves to the diligent horse. He then holds up a finger, the universal sign for “one moment”, and hurries into a back room through a smooth wooden door.

“Okay, what’s the deal?” Gole demands, and Onewe looks like a burden has been lifted from her shoulders,

“The drank water was bad for woman. She gone. He chairs a living. Nice.”

“So, you’re saying the woman was poisoned by the water and is now gone, and this nice man who makes chairs for a living lives here now?” Thigi translates in an offhand way for the group, and Onewe nods enthusiastically.

“Yes.”

At this, the man returns with a plate full of greyish cookies, and passes it around. When it returns to him, one cookie remains, and he contentedly eats it as he settles down on an unfinished chair with three legs. He balances comfortably, as though he perches on broken chairs daily, and pulls an old, earthy pipe out of a pocket. He puffs it casually, sending out a wispy, brown, seaweed-scented smoke, before he rumbles out a chant in the unfamiliar language.

“There will be a girl who carries both tucker and human blood in her veins, who will attempt to stop a deadly poison in the Fountain of the Spire, but misfortune there shall find her,” Thigi translates softly, for the rest of the group, and Onewe cocks her head,

“That like Thigi,” she says, and Thigi sets down her half-eaten, metallic-tasting cookie.

Thigi sits in silence, and her companions quietly finish their cookies, unsure of what to do.

 “We need to go to the Bronze Spire with the bonny lily to stop this poison,” she says decisively, and Gole rolls her eyes,

“We’ve discussed this. The Bronze Spire does not exist because the Strange Lands don’t exist. Therefore, this song or whatever it is doesn’t apply to you.”

“No. You have said that multiple times, and we have disagreed each time. The Strange Lands do exist, and that is where we are going to fix this poison,” Seehea says emotionlessly, and Gole narrows her eyes at the tucker.

“You just like to disagree with me because you, for whatever reason, can’t stand me. Admit it.”

“I do not like you, but I am disagreeing with you because you are wrong,” the tucker replies evenly. Thigi jumps in,

“If the Bronze Spire doesn’t exist, then where do you think this poison is coming from?”

“I think we need to find that out, rather than wasting time on a foolish attempt to jump into a myth!” Gole roars, and silence covers the group.

The elderly man, not disturbed in the least, curiously inquires from Onewe, and she responds sheepishly in the same language. He nods in response to her reply and stands. He then shuffles to the smooth door to the back room and is gone for a few moments. He returns, carrying a small, black fabric with white ink on it, and sets it down on the table.

“That’s the map of the Strange Lands.” Poole gasps, as he pulls the fabric over to him and gazes at it in wonder.

The elderly man simply chuckles, says something to Onewe in the language, and then returns to the back room.

“He said we can stay here tonight.” Thigi translates before Onewe can, and the humor girl nods her approval of the translation.

“You Picat good,” she says, and Thigi smiles slightly,

“Well, a lot of creatures besides humors speak it.”