Siinji - Or, Ankūro and the City of the Golden Boughs

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We cannot pick our
Companions upon the road.
The road picks for us.
- Momiji.

Tuccé didn't sleep at all. With the worry that Drellis and his henchman might return and the constant snoring, mixed with occasional farts, from White Eye, he doubted he could have slept if he tried. Waiting for dawn to arrive felt like the longest period of his life and he shifted constantly, unable to find comfort upon the reed mats, clutching the satchel to his chest throughout the night.

Why these people couldn't have seats, he would never understand. Even in the cities, he had passed through, chairs and beds were few and far between. He missed Villeta. He missed the mainland and cursed the day he had ever set foot upon this island.

Greed. That was the only thing he could think of that had brought him so far from home. That and that he had worn out his welcome in the cities, towns and villages of the Shivering Desert. If only he had travelled elsewhere. To the Three Kingdoms, perhaps? But the ongoing war between the Three Kingdoms and their enemies in the Vale and Eass had forced him to look elsewhere.

He could have booked passage on a ship to the north, across the Inland Sea, but that would have involved passing through Orususk which, itself, had begun preparing for war. The Empire of the Sun and Moons resurgent after the death of the last Emperor. Tuccé disliked war. It involved people dying and dying was something he avoided with a passion.

That only left south. He had had no intention of even attempting to cross the Strass Mountains, to the west of Villeta. Too many tales of travellers succumbing to the cold, or terrible monsters, or simply finding themselves unable to breathe at the greater heights where the paths across the mountains lurked. Death, again. It was as though the world itself hated people.

So, south. To the island of Kaguta, with its strange people, even more strange religion and the complicated, unending parade of class, honour and ceremony. He had thought the island would prove less willing to try to kill him and found his thoughts less than accurate.

Ever since meeting with that Patrons damned Kannai and his infatuating tales of gold, Tuccé had had a distinct sense of unease every time he looked around a corner. The Kannai had not mentioned that others also sought this gold. He had, mentioned something about an ancient weapon, or trinket of some kind, but it was the thought of gold that had caught Tuccé's attention.

Now, after surviving that temple, deep in the heart of the forest, Tuccé had Mafosi Drellis chasing him and he had still not seen even the slightest glint of gold. Only this dusty tablet within his satchel and the remaining journals that the Kannai had spent so many nights writing in and reading.

All Tuccé had to do, was find somewhere safe where he could examine the tablet, read the journals and find the last resting place of all that beautiful gold. Once done, he could leave this island forever and spend the rest of his life in luxury, surrounded by all the trappings and nubile wenches such wealth could attract.

The old woman snorted in her sleep. It seemed she had no intention of waking any time soon and Tuccé felt more than happy about that. Opening the slats of the building a little more, he took a good, long look outside. He had heard no more movement since Drellis' thugs had left and he could see no-one in the vicinity.

Sliding open the doors to the shrine, Tuccé pulled on his boots, poking his head from the door, looking in both directions, but could still see nothing. Cautious, he stepped out into the early morning chill, low-lying mist covering the ground, and recognised where he actually was.

In his rush to evade Drellis and his followers, Tuccé had missed the road that wound through the bamboo forest, right outside the door of the shrine. Tutting to himself, he scratched his thin, pointed beard and tried to remember which way to go. With the Sun rising in the south, setting in the north, that would mean that the road ran east-west.