Eric Guindon Writes

This is some rough draft material and out of context, but I’m sharing it in case it is of interest to visitors. This is a Marek section:

As the road flew by outside the carriage window, Marek simply sat and took in the change in his circumstance. Had Inzadei planned this? Was this her meddling in affairs to help him?
The others in the carriage with him did not let him brood on these questions long. “Who is it you have brought back with you, dearest Ettian?” Asked the woman seated across from Marek of the man who had brought him along.
“I don’t really know, my sweetest, I just found him dazed in the middle of the way and he seems dazed still.”
Marek felt he must speak or risk being considered simple or mute. “My name is Marek. I thank you for your help. Please excuse my rudeness.”
“He speaks!” Exclaimed the man Marek presumed to be Ettian. “I’m glad you have your sense about you, friend. I was worried for you for more than a moment, I tell you.”
“I had not realized I was so tired, I would have camped if I had. You did not need to trouble yourselves with me.” Marek made motions to indicate that he would disembark if they but stopped, but his three companions would have none of it.
“Nonsense,” said the woman who had first spoken to Ettian. “The road is long and company is always appreciated.” She smiled at Marek as she spoke, her eyes roaming over him in appreciation of more than just his conversation.
Ettian clapped his hand on Marek’s thigh. “Nevermind her,” he told Marek. “She does that to make me jealous.”
The third passenger, a woman a few decades older than the other two, spoke then. “She does it because it works and you both enjoy the game. Ignore that fool and his wife. I am the one with wits around here and this,” she motioned grandly to take in the whole of the caravan, or perhaps the world, “is my troupe of players and entertainers of all stripes. I am Jerussa, the only one of this lot with manners it seems, and this is my son Ettian and daughter-in-law Raza.”
Ettian and Raza did not look at all chastened by the older woman’s words, laughing her criticism of them off good-naturedly.
“Thank you again for helping me,” Marek said. “I am recovered enough to make my own way now—” He began but Ettian cut him off.
“—You need more rest than that, my new friend, and we have the space to spare. Please do not rush off so soon. We enjoy the company of new folk and you definitely seem to be an unusual sort.”
When Marek’s discomfort at the attention grew clear, Ettian said with less intensity. “If you’ve a story to share we’ll gladly hear it, but you needn’t feel pressured. The ride is yours regardless. To where are you bound?”
The atmosphere in the carriage had felt overbearing to Marek. Ettian’s words managed to diffuse some of his desire to simply leave the company of these strangers, kind though they were. He certainly did not feel like sharing any of his story with anyone at that moment, feeling rather overwhelmed by the recent visitation and revelations from Inzadei.
“I’m bound for Fount, though I hardly expect me to take me there. A short rest should set me right and then I will bother you no further,” he told his benefactors.
“Nonsense,” both Ettian and Jerussa said in unison. Raza laughed at their surprised looks at one another then added, “Please, stay with our company. We will be in Fount soon enough—Faster than you could walk there yourself I’d wager.”
Marek frowned. “You’re headed to Fount?” It seemed all too convenient to him.
“Is that so surprising?” Asked Ettian. “We tour up and down the Maja. From Essaniel down the river’s west bank through all the cities and towns on the way to Fount and then back up the east bank, playing our way back up to Essaniel in time for Confederation Day.”
“So you will be stopping at every settlement from here to Fount,” Marek said.
“Yes, but don’t let that dissuade you from taking our offer of hospitality and transportation. We stay only one night at each of our stops and otherwise rarely halt at all,” Raza explained. “You see, at any given time a portion of us are sleeping in the wagons, others walking, and the rest riding in coaches like this one, and we take these roles in shifts. We even have a kitchen cart preparing meals throughout the day and night all while rolling along the road and we eat on the go.”
“But why not play longer at your stops?”
Etttian laughed. “We would if they’d have us!”
Raza gave him a look then scoffed. “We maximize our profits by limiting our availability. Staying longer would only hold us up. This is better.”
“And we’d get bored!” Added Ettian.
Marek could not help a laugh. “You lead a strange nomadic existence then, I guess.”
“Many of our players prefer it so,” said Jerussa. “Possessing friends and family all over the confederacy.”
Ettian waggled his eyebrows. “Sometimes more than one family, if you know what I mean.”
Raza swatted him then said, “As if you could keep up with more than one woman!”
“Don’t underestimate me, dear,” Ettian retorted with a smile.
Jerussa waved their antics aside. “Don’t mind them, Marek. The point is that we will gladly take you to Fount and it will be to your profit in terms of time. We expect to make Fall’s End in less than two weeks.”
Marek knew this to be the settlement in the foothills nestled on the shores of the small lake into which Fount’s falls emptied.
“We don’t go up to Fount itself, it’s too much trouble and it has little need of one more troupe of entertainers, but we do play at Fall’s End and you can find your way up mountain from there well enough, I suspect.”
In the face of the enthusiasm and generosity of the Fools Marek could only accede and accept their offer to stay in their company.
It did not take him long to grow used to the rhythm and ways of the caravan he had joined. Each settlement they reached knew the troupe was coming well ahead of their arrival. Marek found out there was a group of forerunners traveling nearly two days ahead of the main body of the Fools which took care of arrangements for their encampment, set up the show tents, and promoted the acts on offer to the locals. The first stop for which Marek was present was at a middling town of no more than two thousand souls, which went by the unremarkable name of Spalling. As he watched the road ahead while chatting with the driver of the lead wagon, Marek spotted the welcome that the town had prepared for their visitors. Mobs of children, many not even accompanied by anyone more senior than perhaps an older sibling, lined both sides of the road as far out as a handful of kilometers from the caravan’s destination. They cheered when they first caught sight of the colourful pennants flown from poles mounted on the wagons and other carriages of the troupe and their excitement did not abate when as the players grew closer, it only grew. Marek heard requests for what he presumed were songs ring out from knots of the children and was impressed when musicians of the troupe began playing catchy simple arrangements as they walked or rode, pleasing the crowd, which sang along. These were evidently local favorites unknown in the north.
Spalling, when it came into view at last, was not so different from the few other smaller towns along the Maja that Marek had seen thus far. It had a central town proper with a square and a variety of stores and houses for the townies and on the periphery whatever industry was practiced locally, which looked to be lumber milling prominently to Marek. After these the rest of the area was farmland for many kilometers around until it could be debated whether a given farm was part of Spalling or one of its neighbors.
The area arranged by the advance team of the troupe was rented from one of the farms closest to the town centre. This flat cleared area was lying fallow anyway and the team had mowed what vegetation had sprung up to allow for the setup of the three large and garish pavilions needed by the Blessed Fools for their acts. Aside from these there were small collections of smaller tents for lesser attractions and side interests, including local merchants setting up to sell their wares that would normally show up at market to the customers of the troupe. As soon as the main caravan stopped and started unloading, the members of the advance team departed toward the next show destination on the group’s route, taking with them the second set of tents that the caravan had been hauling so that they could set up the next show. In effect, the troupe had two sets of tents, alternating which were used at each location.
Marek’s role once the wagons and carriages stopped rolling at their destination, was to help unloading supplies and sundries and then to join the members of the troupe working as security for their site, keeping curious townies from getting in the way. Marek did not have to work for his ride and keep at all but he was not the sort to simply sit while other worked and so he did whatever they would let him in order to be of help. On the ride and during these stops, Marek managed to get to know many of the troupe on at least a casual basis. Though he was reluctant to talk about himself, Marek liked learning about the lives of others, always being curious as to experiences which had never been offered him, be it because of events, location, or happenstance. For his part he only really let others know the general facts of his own life, such as where he hailed from, details about his family and what he did to sustain them and himself. He never spoke of Audra or of his reason for traveling so far from home and the Fools did not press him on such, respecting his desire for privacy on this subject.
His reluctance to speak on some topics was not so unusual among those who traveled as part of the troupe, many of which had joined after checkered pasts which they preferred to leave behind, unspoken and best forgotten, so Marek fit in well.
The caravan tried to time its arrival at its stops such that the troupe would have a few hours of prep time before it opened its doors to the public, roughly an hour after the usual supper time of the town they visited. The anticipation of the townies built during this time, serving the interests of the troupe, certainly, but also this time was needed for setup and final rehearsals.
Marek learned that during this tour the Fools’s main attraction was a play written by Jerussa herself, a farce titled The Mustache. At their first stop after his joining, Marek took in the show. This was a completely novel experience for him. Such players did not visit the barely inhabited hinterlands such as his own Loggan. In fact, it would be doubtful if anyone outside of Loggan’s inhabitants even knew the name of even the region of Flore, much less that of the village of Loggan.
Entry to the show was free for Marek as a member of the troupe, even if a temporary one. He was waived inside the largest of the two large pavilion tents at the center of the arrangement of smaller tents housing the side-show acts by the large, bearded man who also served as an assistant to the cook. Within, Marek found, the ground was covered in carpets and cushions upon which the crowd was settling. At the tent’s center stood a platform stage. He found a comfortable cushion to call his own and settled down for the show.
The play began with a narrator stepping onto the stage and setting the scene. As she described the location, a farmer’s field, cutouts of a barn—miniature and more representative than realistic— was stood up onto the platform, near the back. There followed a fake fence portion and a cutout of a cow. Soon the farmer’s daughter stepped onto the stage and into the arms of another new player, this one dressed as a fancy city-fop with a ridiculously elaborate and enormous mustache. They kissed and exchanged dialog setting up that their affair was elicit and making comical cultural references which were opaque to Marek’s understanding. The crowd understood them though and laughed at the bawdy dialog and innuendo. Soon the city man had to run away because the girl’s father was coming, but the two made a plan to pass notes to one another through an intermediary, the girl’s friend, Lucinda who worked in the village as a barmaid. In the next scene the farmer’s daughter made these arrangements with the barmaid.
“How will I know who he is?”Asked Lucinda.
“Oh, it will be clear who he is, he has a majestic mustache which you cannot miss!” Replied her friend.
Of course this turned out to be the source of confusion and hilarity later as Lucinda passed a note intended for the farmer’s daughter’s lover to the wrong man, a stuffy old widower who misunderstood the note as being from the tavern’s proprietor, the widow Skalla. The comedy grew more ridiculous as, in an attempt to correct her error, Lucinda later mistakes yet another mustachioed man as the beau, causing ever more confusion. In the end the lovers have to run away from town, chased by the farmer who pursues with his pitchfork, much to the enjoyment of the crowd. The show was well received by the townies and Marek liked it well enough, though it was too bawdy for his tastes.
The other large pavilion, he found, was set up in a similar fashion except here musicians took turns playing requests from the crowd upon its stage. When Marek looked in, he found it a raucous place where spirits flowed freely. The off-key singalongs were off-putting to him so he rarely spent much time frequenting it.
The attractions in the smaller side-show tents included a fortune teller, the delightful Mariarch, a blind man who read destiny by feeling the bumps on the heads of his clients; Clemeny, a woman who made herself up using blue makeup to appear as though she might be Eshite, to the gullible anyway; and an exotic islander whose name was unknown. The last had been shipwrecked, gaining a head injury and losing his memory and the capacity to understand speech out of the bargain. Kind strangers had suggested to Jerussa she recruit him for her side-show and in this way he managed to earn a living as the incomprehensible foreigner. There were less savory attractions in some of the other tents, but Marek did not wish to see them as he had no interest in seeing medical oddities or frequenting prostitutes.
Time and distances flew by for Marek as he rode along with the players going from settlement to settlement on the road south to Fount that ran beside the Maja. The Fools were easy company and the weeks spent with them went a long way toward mending Marek’s heart and mind. His part in Wilmar’s death still weighed on him, but he had come to terms with his role in the man’s death. He had made errors which he promised himself he would not repeat and he was reconciled to that being all he could do to honour the old man.
He was less at peace with the revelations he had received from the lady of stories. He ached to return to his family, to be done with the exotic and the novel, of which he had already had his fill even now before even reaching the fabled city of Fount. He wanted to return to the familiar, and to those he loved, more than anything. But Inzadei had been clear that such a return before the work that lay ahead for him was completed could spell doom for that life. To indulge these desires was to give up the longer term, this much was evident to Marek, and so he had to resolve himself to ride the threads Inzadei had said she saw to their ends, whatever those might be. Duty was no stranger to Marek and he could endure it, even if doing so seemed like it might keep him away from his family for far longer than the few months he had planned. Inzadei had said in no uncertain terms that his part in this mess Morvru had made would not end with his retrieval of Audra’s bow. He had to resign himself to these facts so he did his best to come closer to acceptance of the situation as the kilometers of the road unwound on his way to Fount.
When the troupe left behind the small riverside village of Clake at the end of Marek’s first week with them, it became clear to that the indistinct shapes on the southern horizon were the first hints of the Harrakan range of mountains, the closest peak of which housed the city of Fount.
“It’s quite a sight, eh?” Asked Laraden, the driver of the wagon. Marek had not had much chance to talk to the woman in his time with the Fools and had decided to remedy the situation by riding beside her that day.
He could only nod in reply. Mountains were not unknown to him, there were two ranges in the north, but these were not local to Flore, one being to the south west and the other to the east, in Ustra. These two were also not nearly as impressive as the Harrankans. They grew and grew as days flew by, and Marek’s awe of their size did likewise. When they pulled up to the troupe’s southernmost stop, on the shores of the pools at the bottom of the great falls flowing down the almost vertical face of the cliff up which Fount could be found, the mountains were no longer visible as such, that horizon had seemingly become a wall of rock.
Jerussa had been true to her word, the journey had taken thirteen days, much less than it would have taken Marek on foot. Wonders piled on wonders as he took in his surroundings.
The falls were impressive if sparse, trickling things. They made up for their meager fullness with sheer height. The cliff down which they flowed was easily over two hundred meters tall—Marek later found out it was two hundred and thirty-six meters, though he was mystified as to how this was determined. The falls emptied into a set of pools which form a sort of lake which itself flowed into the Maja heading northward. The air at ground level and for meters above was wet with mist resulting in fertile conditions for rainbows when the sun was right, which it was at that moment, making for a dazzling display.
Clustered around the pools were two small towns, really two halves of a single one separated by the lake and falls. The architecture on display caught Marek’s attention. The buildings had a simplicity to them that appealed to him more than those he had seen on his way down the Maja. It seemed the newer styles he had been seeing leaned toward more gaudy elaborations whereas older constructions, such as those here, saw plainness as a virtue. This reminded him more of the frontier housing of his home, which warmed his heart.
Seeing him gawking, Clemeny, the erstwhile Eshite from the side-show, pointed to the town on their side of the lake and said, “Cassel,” then to the one on the other side, “Grendelton.” She then shrugged. “Most people not from around here just call them both Lower Fount, lumping them together, but the locals don’t like that at all.”
“Do you do two shows here? One for each of the towns? Or do you go up to Fount proper only?” Marek asked.
Clemeny laughed. “Oh no. We don’t go to Fount at all. It’s just not practical.” She gestured upward toward the top of the falls by way of explanation then shook here head. “We alternate which side of the lake we do the show each time we come here, though we do stay a few extra days here and at the other end, in Essaniel. These are breaks for us.”
And there did seem to be an electric feeling among the troupe as though they were about to embark on a holiday, which in a way they were. The good cheer was evident in the eagerness with which the caravan members met the townies coming out to greet them.
“Consequently we know more of the folk here and at Essaniel, and many troupers have family at one or both ends. These two places are home to us, you could say.”
Marek understood how they must feel. He himself longed for home with all his heart. He was certain than when he finally did return to Flore, he would never want to leave it again. It was mind-boggling to him how Inzadei’s Blessed Fools could tolerate being on the road and away from their homes for the majority of their lives. They were a different breed than he, he decided.