I already had my notebook out. “Okay. System. Eastern stalls first.” I looked up at him. “Do not let me get distracted by anything before I've done at least one full pass.”
He nodded solemnly. “Understood.”
“I mean it. No food stops until I’ve inquired about my friends for at least six stalls.” I tapped my pen against his chest, where his shirt opened in a tempting V-shape.
“Of course.”
“Guruk,” I warned.
“Sammy,” he said with perfect patience, “I will not let you get distracted.”
I studied him for a moment. He had mischief in his eyes. I sighed. “Fine. Let’s go.”
The eastern stallshoused traders from the low valley, mostly comprising fabric, tools, and preserved food in neat, waxed parcels. I worked my way through them methodically, describing my friends in turn, watching faces for any flicker of recognition. Most shook their heads with genuine regret. A few asked clarifying questions. “Human, you said? From another realm entirely?”
I grew tired of answering the same curiosities over and over with no positive leads.
Guruk followed half a pace behind, hands in his pockets, unhurried. I was vaguely aware of him stopping at a nut vendor two stalls back. Then, a bread stall. Then, something involving small wrapped parcels he tucked into the canvas bag without commentary.
“You’re provisioning,” I said, not looking up from my notebook.
“I am browsing,” he corrected.
“You have been browsing at exclusively food stalls.”
“The food stalls are very interesting.”
I turned to look at him. He was holding a small parcel of something that smelled of cinnamon and honey and looked deeply, irredeemably like a snack.
“One,” I said, pen held at the ready to scold my unrepentant orc. “I will accept one snack before the six-stall mark.”
He produced a second parcel from the canvas bag and handed it to me without a word.
It was still warm.
I ate it in three bites, made a mental note to never admit how good it was, and kept walking.
Guruk
The market had its own rhythm, and I found mine in it quickly, trailing Sammy at the precise distance that allowed her to work without feeling followed, yet close enough to appear at her elbow if anything required it. She had a method that I recognized as deeply her own: a specific sequence of questions, building from broad to narrow, with her notebook open and her pen moving in quick shorthand between answers. Several stall owners leaned forward as she spoke. Her earnestness had that quality, and it made people want to help her.
I kept one eye on her. The other I let roam.
The market was busy enough to offer good concealment if someone wanted it. That was the thought I had been carrying since the gnome village, and it settled heavier in the noise and press of the crossroads square. I scanned as I walked. Not conspicuously, but with purpose.
The nut vendor had a good vantage point. I bought a bag I did not need and stood there longer than the transaction required, watching the crowd.
Nothing.
The bread stall was set slightly back from the main flow, which meant its proprietor—an ancient tortoise being of great dignity and slow speech—could see most of the square without being in the thick of it. I engaged him about his grain source for several unhurried minutes and scanned the market shoppers from his angle.
Still nothing.
I was finding the wordnothingless reassuring than it should have been.
Then Sammy called from four stalls ahead, “Guruk, come look at this.”
I went to her at once, the sense of unease still prickling at my neck.
