Isekei vote chapter 2

Chapter 2

The darkmarket stunk.  Isekais never stank.  Some how, if they mentioned smells at all, it was usually some sort of exotic cooking.  This place stank of too many people who washed way too infrequently in too small a space with too little air.  I wondered how everyone kept from suffocating.

Still, despite the confines, there was order to the place.  Every shop seemed focused on moving goods or delivering services.  There was a wooden barrel and sheet for washing that I almost wished I had money for.  Another was cooking a multitude of rats on skewers over charcoal, with a line of people eager to buy.  In fact food seemed to be at least a third.  I tried to ignore the red tents with salaciously clad ladies attempting provocation.  That would have been awkward enough even before I died.

What no one seemed to do was care that I was a felyn.  Oh, everyone was looking, and I tried my best to ignore people addressing me as ‘Kitten’ or ‘Pet’, but no one was grabbing me.  I wondered if there was some kind of arrangement or rule for the darkmarket.  Even criminals needed rules.

I tried to ask some of the masked figures but they ignored me.  Thus I fell back on profiling, looking for ‘elvish’ people and asking them if they were ‘Uncle Oxxo.’  A few said yes, but when I mentioned their nephew they scowled and said no more, insulting me.  Others tried to guess the name, and became even more furious when they got it wrong.

Finally I spotted a small tent in the corner.  A quartet of gray skinned elves were carefully watching what looked more like a miscellaneous clustering of goods, none of which were too nefarious.  No daggers or poisons or scantily clad people out front.  “Uncle Oxxo?” I asked nervously.

“I’m no uncle of Felyn.  Shoo.”  He said with a wave of his hand.  He was bald, with a number of blue swirly tattoos on his scalp.

I swallowed the lump in my throat.  Had I been tricked?  “I met your nephew.”

He glanced sharply at me.  “My nephew?”  I swallowed and nodded, fighting the urge to spit out the name.  “Vala?” he asked.

I tried not to sob as I gave a nod.  “Please.  Can you help me?”

He stared for a moment, then sighed and nodded to the back of the tent.  I followed past shelves loaded with a variety of goods to an open space in the back with cushions on the floor.  A purple haired girl sat cross legged on a pillow, working on a doorknob... no.  On the lock under the doorknob.  “I almost got it, Uncle,” she said as she scratched at it with little bits of metal.  Then she looked up in surprise and stared at me.  Her eyes immediately narrowed.

“You’ve gotten it when you’ve gotten it, Sonna.  Not a moment before,” he said as he took a seat. “Now shoo.  I need to talk to this person.  He reached over and opened a bottle, pouring him a glass of amber fluid.

“Your name is Oxxo?” I asked, getting a snort from the girl as she departed.

He waited a moment till we were alone.  “Oxxo is a dusken phrase for a cautious acquaintance.  Vala is a feminine phrase for freedom. It’s a sign and countersign for those fleeing the Solanari purges back home. I would like to know how they came to be in the mouth of a felyn in the darkmarket.  You can call me Axelenar.”

Oh.  A password and counter password.  And if the counter was feminine, it was unlikely someone would guess it.  I wondered what necessitated such a practice, but purges was a daunting suggestion.

I thought a moment.  Should I say everything, or would that make him dismiss me as insane?  I had no idea how common outsiders might be, or how these people might feel about them.  “It’s... a very strange story.  My name is Akira.  I woke up this morning and my memory was... damaged. I think I was... hurt.  Badly.  I don’t remember being a felyn or anything in this world.”  I rubbed the bruises on my wrist.  “I chanced upon a pair named Lurue and Xoxothiel.  She wanted me to swear to the law, but the law has a bounty on felyn.  I’m not even sure why.  He suggested I go to the darkmarket.  He told me about ‘Oxxo’ and ‘Vala’.”

Axelenar seemed the sort to make long pauses before speaking, and I struggled not to blurt out more details.  Finally he responded,“I see.” He cupped his chin thoughtfully.  “I do business with Xoxothiel.  Occasionally useful things fall off his wagon at useful places.  If he sent you to me, he must have thought you had some interest to me or value beyond the bounty.”

“I can work.  I’m a hard worker,” I said desperately.  If I could do swing shift in a convenience store I could try to help him.

“I don’t need a worker.  I have all the hands I can trust, and I don’t trust yours just yet.” Axelenar rose and paced back and forth a bit.  “I can, however, direct you to others who may have use for a felyn with a bad memory.”  I felt my stomach clench as uncertainty set in again.

“The first are the red knives.  They’ll take anyone with a willingness to kill.  If felyn are as murderous as the crown claims, then I suspect you’ll do well there.  The second is the House of Passion.  You’re female.  That’s marketable here.”  I felt a spike of alarm at that.  I’d only been female a few hours, but it wasn’t like I could say so!  “The third are the Whisperers.  They work in spying, and intrigue.  Felyn have good ears.  They’ll put them to use.  The last would be...” he paused and glanced at Sonna before looking at me again.  “The Brass Rings.  They’re a gang of thieves, specializing in breaking in and entering.  High turnover, so they can’t afford to turn anyone away.”

I pondered my choices.  A bunch of murderers?  Could I actually do that?  It was almost as daunting as the thought of selling my body.  The whisperers might be useful, but who knew the lifespan of ‘spies’?  Was it any better than being a thief?