The Otori Prophecy

XVIII - Jinx's Hollow, The Underbelly

Abel said we were going to the rougher side of the city. We couldn't find any information from the locals in the lightside therefore, we needed to go to the underbelly of the city to get information where the only thing stopping us was money. Even if that knowledge happened to be forbidden by a King, information brokers knew stuff they shouldn't and had answers to pretty much everything as long as you paid them well.

The nights rest did me no good, Abel said I was fitful in my sleep, that being he let me sleep later. The midrise suns light was filtering through the narrow window. Must've been asleep for half the day. Most of my muscles were sore from last night's escapade. I'm sure they would've found the body by now. Most definitely would have people searching for us now.

"I went out at dawn, scoping things out and listening," Abel spoke. I knew that this was going to be a day full of plans and tactics. Going over countless strategies just in case me or him got caught or worse. "There is nothing we can do or plan to aid you in this place. It's pretty much no man's land. The map you got, at least tells us the stalls and what sort of businesses are set up. It doesn't mention anything about slave traders. Though I'm certain that they'll be roaming around down there," he explained.

My heart sank. This was bad, very, very bad. If there's no plan to follow then surely we will fail. I tried to think about the lack of plan in the first place how could I improve upon it. How do I make it into a plan that would work. I kept coming up with nothing. If I stick to the original plans to keep me safe by not drawing attention to myself in an overt way, then surely we can make it out of this place without a scuffle and maybe with our lives intact.

"Are we leaving our stuff here?" I asked. I wanted to make sure that if we were going to be leaving our stuff behind, then there wouldn't be a repeat of last night. I don't fancy sneaking into another building. This time I might not be so lucky as to escape or even get in in the first place. Abel stood up, fixing his bag to him, tighter than usual. I sprung up out of bed, copying his actions though, I halted at the remembrance of the twist of dough in my small satchel. The rest of the sweet treats can wait. "Abel wait,"

He halted in his movements, turning to me. I brought out the small paper bag. I pulled out one of the dough twists and offered it to him. "I thought you might want one, I saw a stall yesterday selling these, I didn't get much information out of him thought," I spoke. Abel took the sweet treat and bit into it. He closed his eyes and his face relaxed into something akin to delight. I ate my second one and I could completely understand why he felt like that. The dough just seemed to melt in your mouth, the sugar just adding to that sweetness.

It was a bittersweet moment of reprieve, a slice of normality that we needed, before the horrible dealings of the back-market fools. "What information did you get out of him?" asked Abel, steering our attention back to the mission at hand. "He told me, and most of the others told me, that information brokers deal with missing children," I responded. Abel took a deep breath, linking his hands behind his head.

"It's a slave trader trick. Lure in kids with sweets. If the kids say they're lost, point them in the direction of people who have direct links with slavers," Abel explained. Realisation hit me, this was exactly why the man had been so persistent about the information brokers. Suddenly the sweets didn't seem so nice. We gathered up our stuff, Abel said we weren't to leave it behind, he took my bag too, fixing it to his. He wasn't planning on staying another night in this town. Especially if there were slave traders.

We walked down the street of run down inns and taverns and an odd shop or two. Then, we came towards the cliff's edge. Anyone would be mad to walk so close to the cliff let alone creating winding stairs in the cliff's surface. We took those steps, carved in ancient rock, winding down into the underbelly of Jinx's Hollow. Chaos awaited dealt in forms of forbidden knowledge, ne'er-do-wells crowded together in ilicit sales. The stairs took forever, winding down alongside the cliff only sheer drop on one side, save for some rope as support and then back into a channeled out piece of rock. Such a fitting path for anyone mad enough to want to go to the darkside of this city.