Yngvild and the Forest of Dreams

Beretha

The voyage to Beretha was remarkable only by its smoothness. We did the ten day trip in seven days due to some exceptionally favourable winds. Each day we did raider drills, just in case. On two occasions we saw what could have been hostile sails, but both times we outpaced them easily.

The speed of the trip resulted in a bonus for the crew, including us. We left the company at Beretha as soon as the cargo was unloaded and the crew paid. We'd added 22 siller to our purses. 1 each for the days we'd been on crew and a bonus of 5 because some of the perishable cargo was worth a lot more than expected.

Beretha was a fairly major port, slightly smaller than Kronstadt, but not by much. It straddled a very wide estuary of a major river and faced North, and was the terminus of the Great West Road. It was a good deal warmer, even though the nights were noticably longer than Knarvik. We were sweating in our woollen clothes under the weight of all our gear. The port was busy, people were coming and going, stalls on the ends of the pier were piled with all sort of foods and spices, many of which I'd never seen before.

'Let's find somewhere to stay for the night, and then we can get a ship lined up to take us to Caratis.' Noren said.
'Fine by me. I'm famished, can we get some food?'
'You want place to stay? I got top place to stay.' A boy tugged at my arm. 'Come with, come with. Top place.'
'How far?' I asked.
'Top place, come with.' He kept on tugging my arm.
I put my hand on Jafnadr, but she was silent.
'Why not, we've got nothing to lose.' I said.
'Right, take us.' Noren said.

We followed the boy, who looked about ten or eleven winters, through some narrow streets and down an alley full of refuse that stank of rotten food and excrement. The houses were wood and plaster, with red ceramic tiles on the roofs. The windows were all shuttered, and a number of them seem to be missing slats.

'I'm not sure it's going to be the best place.' Said Noren.
'As long as it's cheap. clean and safe.' I said.
'You don't ask for much.'

The boy lead us up a flight of wooden stairs to a landing with two doors at the top. 'Top place, you like.' He said, before opening the left hand door.

Inside a young woman sat on the bed. She stood as the door opened.
'Two? Why have you brought two?' she hit the boy with the side of her hand on the top of his head. 'You like to watch, miss?' she said, looking at me.
'I think the boy made a mistake' I said 'we wanted a bed for the night, not a friend.'
'He's no use. I can get you a room though.' She said.
'Will it be clean, and how much for the night?' I said.
'Very clean, my older sister runs a guest house, not all sailors want company when they get off the ship.' She said.
'Does she do food?'
'For two of you, a room to share and dinner will be one siller, tell her Tanni sent you.' She said, then turned to the boy. 'Take them to Yanni's and tell her  one siller for two, with dinner.'
'Thank you.' I said.

We followed the boy back down the stairs and round the corner to another house. This time we went in the front door from the street rather than up the back stairs. The fronts of the houses were in better repair than the rears. This house was recently painted, and there was a defined line on either side of it. It also had Yanni's Guest House painted above the door.
The boy took us in and passed the message on. We got shown a clean room only slightly larger than the bed that filled it. There was a small table on the side of the bed nearest the door, the other side of the bed was pressed against the wall. On the table was a jug of water and a basin.
'Dinner is downstairs, in the common room. Drinks extra. We stop serving when we run out of food.' Yanni told us as she showed us to the room. She took the siller from us before leaving.

We left our gear under the bed and then went down to eat. I took off my bodice and one of my skirts before we went down. It was too hot to keep them on.

#

The next day we made our way back to the docks to look for a ship to take us to Caratis. The local office of the Skyssian Board of Trade was open.
'Well met!' said the agent as we entered.
'Well met!' Noren said. 'We're looking for a ship to Caratis.'
'You'll be lucky, the locals have banned ships to Caratis.' The agent said.
'When did this happen?'
'About a week ago. There's been some sabre rattling, people are worried that Cottalem is going to invade here. So no trade.'
'That's bad for business.'
'Isn't it just. We're expecting some people to come and help us broker a deal, but no sign of their ship just yet.'
'We came incognito' I said. 'We're Heroes.'
Noren looked at me with his eyebrows raised.
'Jafnadr, show yourself to him' I thought.
'Oh! So I see. Did you need any more briefing?' he said.
'It's always best to be briefed by the local agent, you know the place better than we do.' I said.

Behind him Noren was shaking his head at me and waving his hands for me to stop. I ignored him. Jafnadr, if you can give me any clues about what he's expecting that would be fantastic.
'Would you care to explain what you hope to achieve?' Jafnadr replied.
'I want to gain entry to Caratis, and if we can help solve the problems here, so much the better.'
He's expecting two Board of Trade agents, but hasn't been told who they are. They're special agents from the department of resolutions. Rojden used to run that before he went off the reservation.
'We're from resolutions, Radulfr sent us personally to resolve the situation. Anything you share that's helpful will be appreciated.' I said. 'But remember, this is a secret operation, and nothing is to be entered into your logs or reported. We'll handle the reporting back home.'
'I understand. I'm Erik.' He said.
'Best you don't know our names, makes it harder for anyone to get anything from you if they take you. We're expecting two more colleagues to join us.'