Total pages in book: 194
Estimated words: 187021 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 935(@200wpm)___ 748(@250wpm)___ 623(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 187021 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 935(@200wpm)___ 748(@250wpm)___ 623(@300wpm)
The rest of the street was taken up with human items: restricted substances, offers for forged documents, and luxury jewelry, as well as the ubiquitous “food”—whatever that meant for monsters or men—and, of course, sex.
In New York, Kierse had lived in the attic of a brothel owned by Gen’s mother, Colette, who was the premier madame of Manhattan. Kierse was far from naive and wasn’t surprised to see goblin brothels inside the market. After all, it was the oldest profession.
They skirted the brothels and continued past other vendors until they reached their destination. It was a plain door with the word Vriosa on the front in red letters and a little yellow sign read: beware of dog.
“Dogs,” Graves said with a sigh.
Niamh grinned. “Not a dog person?”
“Dogs love me,” he corrected her and turned the handle.
Niamh and Kierse exchanged a look as they followed him inside. The room was bare and dusty. A row of wooden shelves had been smashed and left in pieces, and whatever had been on them had long ago been looted. Probably by whoever had done this. The floor near the rear of the room was strangely eroded and caving in, the remnants holding together precariously. Beyond the door, deep gouges marred a door that led to another room. Its broken hinges clattered as Graves pushed it open.
“Nothing,” he said, standing on the threshold as Niamh and Kierse picked their way to him.
“What do you think happened?” Kierse asked. “A fight, obviously.”
“Bookkeepers are notoriously difficult to find because they get a lot of angry customers.” He kicked aside a few boards. “And angry customers in the market usually leave people dead.”
“I’ve never had to use a bookkeeper to find spell supplies,” Niamh noted. “Is this risk really necessary?”
“Probably,” Kierse said. “What I read about them said that they can find anything you want in the market, but the rarer it is, the more difficult to locate.”
Niamh waved a hand. “Assuredly that’s true, but what I meant was: is what you want worth all this?”
Graves’s eyes shot to hers. She stared him down, daring him to say it was not. Thankfully, he didn’t voice his opinion on the matter.
“Yes,” Kierse said with determination. “Where would the bookkeeper have gone? I didn’t see a handy note with their forwarding address.”
Niamh snorted. “That would be convenient. Is there another bookkeeper that would be easier to locate?”
Graves shook his head. His gloved hand sifted through a pile of rubble, and he came away with nothing but scraps. “There are other bookkeepers. None close. Plus, since the goblins at the gate mentioned Rio, we’re more likely to have some leverage in negotiations with them. I wager it’d make the most sense to follow through with this if we can.”
“All right.” Kierse would have liked an easier option, but she hadn’t thought that going into the market was going to be easy. “So our next move would be to get information about Rio. I’m guessing there are pubs down here?”
“In fact there are,” Graves answered. “I know just the one.”
“Why do I feel like we’re not going to like this?” Niamh asked as she followed him to the door.
“Because it’s Graves.”
“I have an…acquaintance who frequents a place in New York.”
Kierse blinked at his back. “How exactly is that going to help us?”
“You didn’t think that Dublin was the only place that opened into the market, did you?”
“Well…no. I know there’s one in New York, too, but I didn’t think we could reach it.” She frowned. “How many are there? Is there one in Paris?”
“No,” Graves said. “There are only seven openings—Dublin, New York City, Shanghai, São Paulo, Lagos, Istanbul, and Rome.”
Niamh linked arms with Kierse as they followed Graves down the main street. “It’s like the spoke of a wheel. Each entrance comes to the same place, and when you enter from other doors, that section is built out to the aesthetic of that location. That’s why here on the Dublin side, it has the old-world feel.”
Kierse frowned at that analogy. She could picture a giant wheel connecting corners of the earth to this one location. It would be incredibly valuable to have that setup.
“How did the goblins achieve this?” She stepped around a particularly filthy puddle, avoiding a lumbering troll who barreled past.
“They didn’t. Goblins don’t have magic,” Graves said.
“Something great and powerful built the portals. Some long-lost god probably. After the god—or creature—left this realm, they were abandoned,” Niamh told her.
Gods. Right. “If everything else is true…”
“It all comes from somewhere,” Graves muttered.
“Anyway, the goblins have built everything else you see here. They found the empty doors and figured out that the fruit would power them to stay open. They’ve been using it for their market for much of recorded history.”
“Wow. That’s pretty impressive. We’re walking through dead god tunnels that have been repurposed as a black market. The world is a strange place.” She continued down the cobbled street. “So explain how these portals work. We could jump from Dublin to New York like right now? I could be home just by stepping through their door?”