The cheapest option was a sandwich shop whose specialty was grilled peppers and meat between two slices of rye. Zuri and the others gathered there, claiming a small, round table that was probably designed for four occupants rather than five. Zuri, the smallest of them all, ended up squished between Jem and Chike, a table littered with cloth napkins and sandwich remnants stretching before them.
Though it wasn't a tightly-packed institution by any means, the myriad sounds of the energetic city center floated in through the open window by which the group sat, along with the briny scent of water and mildewing stone.
"Really," said Aldric, leaning back in his seat and clapping a hand down on Chike's shoulder. For the last few minutes, Zuri had noticed he was being oddly peppy—at least as peppy as Aldric could be—and there was a dazed glitter in his eye. She didn't understand, until she noted the drained mug of beer resting on the table in front of him, an inch of foam sitting in its base, and sighed. "I don't blame you for not wanting to come along. It was a major dead end, anyway."
A strange look passed Chike's face. "A dead end?"
At that, Jem nodded her agreement. "Nothing in that old place but a shit ton of cobwebs and Schmitt's old loom. All we learned from it is how efficiently an old building gathers dust."
Kalindi let out an exhausted breath, her chin leaned into her palm. It was the first time Zuri had ever seen the princess slouch. "My mistake," she muttered. "I was convinced we'd at least be able to find something, but that was naïve of me."
"Cheer up, Kalindi," Zuri offered. "We only just got here. You can't expect to find him on the first day."
"No," she grumbled. "But you can hope."
Aldric slumped against Chike's shoulder, limp as a fish. Chike grunted in surprise, but didn't move him. "We'll just have to keep moving," Aldric murmured. "And...figure out what to do next. That's all! That's easy."
"Dude," Jem said, scowling at him. "You've only had one beer. How are you already tanked?"
"Tanked?" Aldric blinked, not picking up his head. "I'm fine. What are you talking about?"
Zuri shook her head. "You look like you could pass out any second now. That's hardly fine, Aldric."
"Well, it's been a long day," Aldric said, and hiccuped. "Traveling, and such. Makes you tired."
The strange look on Chike's face was still there as he cleared his throat then, drawing everyone's attention to him. Aldric sat up straighter, returning Chike the use of his shoulder. "About what Aldric said."
"What Aldric said?" Aldric repeated, his face blank for a moment. "Oh. What I said?"
"Yes, what you said," Chike groaned. He shoved Aldric all the way upright, then rested his hands on the table, as if he were preparing for a presentation. "I think I know what we need to do next."
Jem's response was automatic, her gaze on Chike intense. "Spill it, then."
"When I was visiting my family earlier, my parents mentioned to me that they'd just spoken to Schmitt recently."
Instantly the mood surrounding the table shifted; everyone was more awake, it seemed, even the well-inebriated Aldric. "What?" Zuri gasped, leaning forward. "Well what—what did they say? What did he say?"
"He came to the shop my parents run a few weeks back," Chike explained. Outside, a street band started up, so that the slow twirl of a guitar melody wafted in through the window. "He was looking for some distinct thread, or something. A specific type of material he was wondering if my parents carried or had seen before."
"Material?" Kalindi cut in, the tone in her voice nearly accusatory. "What was it? Wool? Yarn?"
Chike shook his head gently. "He didn't give them a name for it, just said it was a very fine, white thread and he'd know it when he saw it. My parents let him have a look through all their stock, but whatever it is, they didn't have it. He left frustrated and irritable."
Zuri's mind was working, struggling to decipher what this thread was, and what Schmitt would want with it. Did his power depend on the materials he used, somehow? She pondered and pondered until her head began to ache, and then she realized.
"Chike," she said, and he raised an eyebrow at her, silently beckoning her to go on. "Can you take me there? Back to your family home."
"I—sure, I guess. Why?"
"Because I can see exactly what they saw," Zuri explained, tapping her temple, right where the star-shaped scar rested. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a proud smile creep across Jem's face. "If it's alright with you, Chike, I'd like to take a look at your parents' memories."
They spent the night at the same inn whose fire escape they had climbed earlier in their search for Chike. It was a small, homely place, more like a bed and breakfast than a hotel, the beds small and iron and the sheets so tight Zuri had to yank them back with considerable force. She shared a room with Kalindi and Jem, the boys further down the hall.
Zuri slept fitfully, as if both her mind and body were uneasy at being forced to rest in a foreign place, so far away from everything she'd ever known.
When sleep finally did come to her, she dreamt of home.
She dreamt of her father, of the machine oil worked into the creases of his hands, and she dreamt of her mother—her gentle, diligent fingers tying silken ribbons into Zuri's hair.
A single tear slipped from her eyes, down her cheek, and left a dark blot on the bedsheet beneath her. In the darkness, Zuri hugged her pillow closer.
She rose early the next morning, when dawn was just beginning to tint the sky orange and Jem and Kalindi were still motionless in their beds—Jem's arms tossed wide across her mattress, Kalindi rolled into a tight ball. She dressed in a shorter, lightweight gown in a pale cream color, securing her leather bodice snugly against her waist. She hesitated in front of the inn's mold-speckled window, examining the frizzed curls that fell down her shoulders, the two round, wide-set eyes staring back at her.
Often, Zuri was told that she resembled her mother most, whether the resemblance be in the narrow shoulders and wide hips, or the natural pout to her mouth. It was a strangely weighty observation now, like Zuri was the last relic of her mother here on this earth, like her mother and everything she'd ever stood for would vanish the second Zuri passed on.
She blinked, not sure where such a dark thought had come from, and twirled the matching ribbons deftly into her hair, just like she did every morning.
Just as she was finishing up, a soft knock sounded on the door, so quiet she thought for a moment that she'd imagined it. The noise came again, however, so Zuri crossed the room and pulled it open just a crack.
Chike stood in the hall. Zuri smiled at him and stepped outside, bumping the door shut behind her, every move stifled. "Morning," she whispered. "How's Aldric doing?"
"Sleeping like the dead," Chike said, and frowned. "No, really. I had to check that he was still breathing."
"I don't understand why he ordered a drink if he knew it was going to put him out like that," Zuri said, a laugh on the edge of her breath. Though Aldric's little episode had been slightly concerning, there was also something endearing about it—watching one of Kiro's most feared assassins slur his words together and rest on someone else's shoulder.
Chike rubbed his already bloodshot eyes. "Who knows. The man's an enigma."
That was a good way to describe him, Zuri thought. She nodded, then pushed out a sharp breath, setting her shoulders. "Well, what do you say, Chike?" she said. "Are you ready?"
"Honestly," Chike began, leading the way as they started down the hall together, "not in the slightest. But I am curious to see how your power works."
"It's nothing special," she said, but when she thought of the wary way the royal soldier had regarded her, and later, Kalindi's risen eyebrow on the train, the words tasted so much like a lie.
Outside, the crowds were thinner, the main street locked in an early morning lull, the sun a pallid yellow blot behind cotton candy clouds. Zuri walked just a beat behind Chike, watching his confident strides, the polite tilt of his head he would offer to each merchant he passed. He was different here, subtly so: a minute relaxation in all of his muscles, a smile that spread more easily across his face.
Chike stopped them both at the same backstreet he'd appeared out of the night before, the daylight making a pleasant, rustic avenue out of what had looked like a perilous alleyway underneath the moon. As they walked, the avenue narrowed, then opened again onto a broad, light gravel road, lined on either side by pretty clay cottages.
"Artisan's Row," Chike said proudly, gesturing at a street sign above their heads. "It's more or less what it sounds like. Sinje's most talented artisans live here on this street. Tailors, potters, painters, mosaic artists, basket weavers—"
"Tapestry weavers?" Zuri asked.
Chike shrugged. "Maybe so. Here, it's this way."
He led Zuri to a thatch-roofed cottage the color of fresh butterscotch. She stood patiently on the front stoop, her hands nervously clasped in front of her, as Chike knocked.
The door pulled open just an inch, and a woman's face peered out into the morning. Even before the woman spoke, Zuri could see the resemblance between her and Chike, in her square jaw and broad nose.
"Chike, my boy," said Mrs. Lee, opening the door wider. "Back so soon—oh. Who's this?"
Zuri cleared her throat. "My name is Zuri Ayim. I'm, uh, a friend of Chike's."
"Oh," said Mrs. Lee, and now her gaze switched towards her son, her eyes saying everything her words didn't. "A friend, hm?"
Chike's cheeks were pink. "Mama," he said with a gentle shake of his head. "Please."
Zuri, on the other hand, had to stifle her amusement. "I'm sorry for disturbing you so early," she began, "but Chike told me that you and your husband had spoken to Vernon Schmitt recently."
Mrs. Lee's eyebrows shot up with interest. She stepped back, letting her hand slip from around the doorknob. "Yes, we did. What about it?"
Zuri looked at Chike, suddenly unsure. She hadn't thought about how strange her power could make other people feel, at least not deeply thought about it, until Aldric. Even if it was what she'd come here to do, was it really okay?
But Chike smiled at her, a slight upward tug of his lips that renewed Zuri's confidence like water to a plant's drying roots. She was no longer wilting.
Zuri moved her hair aside. A small gasp escaped Mrs. Lee's mouth as she noted the scar. "I'd like to hear what he said for myself, if that's okay with you."
Chike had four siblings, Zuri learned, though the only one who was awake at this hour was Ngozi, a bright-eyed man with a slight lilt in his walk who'd just turned twenty the previous month. Chike's eyes went shiny when he saw him resting at the kitchen table along with their father, so for the first few minutes of their visit, Chike filled his brother in.
"Ah," Ngozi said once Chike was done, speaking over the rim of a copper coffee mug, steam rising into his face. His eyes shot to Zuri's. "It doesn't hurt? Whatever you plan to do?"
"No," she said, and switched her gaze towards Chike's parents. "You'll probably feel sleepy, but that's about it. It's more dangerous for me than it is for you."
"What?" Chike cut in. The concern on his face was blatant. "Why?"
"Because," Zuri started, her tone completely matter-of-fact. "While I'm...searching, I'm completely vulnerable. It's almost like I'm not in my own body, and it takes me a second to draw myself back."
"I see," said Mr. Lee, frowning down at the table for a moment, before he heaved a long breath and picked up his head. "Well. I suppose we should get on with it, then."
Zuri swallowed. "You sure you're ready?"
Mr. Lee nodded his head. "If it can help you and Chike, I was born ready."
Quietly, Ngozi snorted. "Cheesy."
His mother flicked him in the temple.
Zuri rose from her seat, coming to stand beside Mr. Lee. She was surprised to find her nerves gone. She had done this a million times before, after all. Maybe the stakes were higher, but it was just another job. Why should she treat it as anything else?
She told him, "I'll try to be quick," and gripped his shoulder.
She felt the exact moment she became something else, the moment she transcended her own consciousness. It was like a shade came down over her eyes, and the memories flickered before her like a motion picture projected on a screen. The information was vast, a library brimming with titles. She tuned and tuned until she found it, locked on it: a door squeaking open, Mr. Lee shouting Welcome!, a man appearing on the jamb.
He was tall and long-limbed, his hair a sandy blond and riddled with split ends. Despite the season, he was in a wool cloak and there was a scarf obscuring his nose and mouth. He strode to the front counter and only then did he tug the scarf down, narrowing his beady, tired eyes.
He introduced himself as Vernon Schmitt.
I'm looking for something, he said. Can you help me find it?
Zuri felt Mr. Lee's unease as if it were her own. Depends, said Mr. Lee, after glancing towards his wife. What is it you're looking for?
A special material, Schmitt replied, rubbing his fingers together, as if the thread already lay between them. It's a very fine thread. Quite rare, as I understand it. Most likely white, though according to some accounts, it could be red. It has this funny reputation, you see. People say it ties the heart and the soul together.
A breath of pause. Mr. Lee told Schmitt, I'm afraid I haven't heard of anything like that, but you're free to take a look around.
Schmitt gritted his teeth; they were yellowish and uneven. Mrs. Lee vanished into the back storage room for a second, and returned with a stack of boxes that housed all their sewing materials. Schmitt tore through them like a ravenous dog given a chop of meat, his jaw tense. Finally he cursed and stormed for the exit.
Wait! Mr. Lee said, and Schmitt obliged, halting at the door. There's an artisan's market to be held in a few weeks, right on the main square. Perhaps you'll find it there?
Schmitt didn't turn around, but his shoulders relaxed away from his ears. Is that so, he said. I might just take a look there, then.
He vanished outside, the shop's bell dinging above his head, and then Zuri clawed her way back into the present.
She yanked her hand away with a gasp.
"Zuri!" Chike said, springing to his feet. "Are you alright?"
"I'm fine," she said, waving him off as her breath regulated itself again. To Mr. Lee, she asked, "The market? What market were you talking about?"
As Chike's father blinked at Zuri, stunned, Mrs. Lee stood and disappeared down the hall for a moment. She returned with a crinkled piece of paper, which she pressed into Zuri's palm. Chike frowned and stepped closer; she held it up for him to see.
"'Bem's Market,'" Chike read. "'Sinje's best market for supplies, artisanry, and inspiration.'"
"I told him to look for it there," Mr. Lee explained. "It's a market they set up at the end of every month; I've found countless resources for my tailoring work there myself."
"So if we went," Zuri started, handing the flyer to Chike, "then we might be able to run into him."
A thoughtful frown passed Mrs. Lee's face. "Well, theoretically, but—"
"Perfect!" Zuri said, and reached out, shaking Mr. Lee's hand. She crossed the room, exchanging the same gesture with Chike's mother, and a startled Ngozi. "Perfect. Thank you all so much. I'm sure we'll visit you again! Hurry, Chike. We need to get back and tell the others."
"Right," Chike stammered, and bid his family goodbye once again before he followed Zuri back out onto the street.
As the door shut behind them, there was a faint but distinct rustle in the bushes that lined the walkway. Chike turned to look, his brow furrowing, but Zuri was already dragging him along.
She just couldn't stifle her excitement. Maybe they had hit a dead end the night before, but just like that, they were once again on their way.