The cataclysm

THE COBBLER'S SON

The Authentic Field Reports of Walnut Arskin

To Astinus of Palanthas,

As Set Down by Me, Walnut,

Foster Son of Jeraim Arskin,

Famed Amanuensis, Scribe of Astinus, and Licensed Cobbler

(Open All Week Long)

Newshore-Near-Gwynned, North Island, Ergoth

Report Number One

Year 22, New Reckoning

Spring day 12 or maybe 13 (I forget), dawn

Hi, Astinus! It's just after dawn and I'm now your newest field recorder, and I'm making my very first official field report to you on official Palanthas paper with my brand-new steel pen while wearing my once-holy symbol of Gilean and my official gray recorder's robes and my best walking boots. I've even put on clean underwear. I just want you to know, Astinus, that I will be your best field recorder ever, and someday I might even become a great amanuensis like Ark!

It's pretty cold outside for springtime right now, so my handwriting is sorta wiggly, but I can still read it. Can you? I'm a little hungry, as I would have had breakfast by now only I lost it after Ark sent me out of the shoe shop right after he made me his official field recorder, which is an interesting story, and I should write it down in case it's important, and anyway there's not much else to do in this alley at this hour of the morning.

Ark — known to you as your loyal scribe and amanuensis Jeraim Arskin from Newshore, but known to me as Ark and sometimes Dad, and known to everyone else in New-shore as Arkie — woke me up early and told me to get ready for the ceremony. I'd been begging him to let me be a scribe for ages, and Ark said he was going deaf from hearing me beg, but then something happened last night and he said he had something important for me to do today, but I'd have to be out on my own and out of his way. He was awfully nervous, and when he got me up he looked like he hadn't slept much, and he wanted to hurry through everything, and when I asked him what was wrong, he just said, "Don't be a kender right now," which I can't help, since I am one.

Ark first gave me a set of gray scribe's robes that he had hemmed up, which I put on, and then he gave me some official paper from Palanthas, where you live, and this new steel pen and this once-holy symbol that used to belong to a real cleric of Gilean until he disappeared (the cleric, that is) when the gods lowered the boom on Istar twenty-two years ago and left without telling anyone their next address, but I guess you know that part, since you're a historian.

I looked over at the wall mirror then and saw all three feet nine inches of me in the candlelight, with my dark brown hair combed out and bound in a high tassel and my gray robes with the nice silver borders and my writing paper and once-holy symbol and official steel pen. It was strange, because I didn't look like me, and that made me feel funny. I looked like a kender I didn't quite know.

Ark stood behind me, and in the candlelight he looked old, and that made me feel funny, too. He's about average in size for a human and is almost bald and has a hooked nose and a potbelly, and I knew who he was, but just then he didn't look much like the man who had raised me and told me funny stories when I was sick and took me fishing and bailed me out of jail every so often. Maybe it was the hour, but he looked old and tired, like something was both ering him. I worry about him sometimes.

Ark sighed after a moment and said, "Well, let's get started. I've got a lot of work to do today — and so do you, of course." Then he put his hand on my head and used some big words that I didn't know, but you probably do, and when he was done, he said, "Walnut, you are now my official field recorder. Your mission is to go out among the people of Newshore and record all things of importance. I know I can trust you to do a good job. Don't come back until sundown, stay out of jail, take lots of notes, don't upset anyone, and let me get my correspondence done. I'm a little behind, and Astinus will use my skin for book covers if I don't get those reports to him."

(I should say here that I certainly hope you do not intend to skin Ark, Astinus, especially not for book covers. You may skin me instead if you have to, as Ark is late with his correspondence only because I made paper fishing boats out of his last reports. I thought they were just waste paper, like when he writes letters to you when he's mad and tells you to jump off the roof of your library but then never sends them. He says it makes him feel better, and he gives the letters to me to make boats out of them. I grabbed the wrong stack and am sorry.)

Anyway, I am now a field recorder, which Ark tells me is the first step toward becoming a real-live scribe and eventually an amanuensis, which is the most incredible word, isn't it? I've wanted to be a scribe for years, ever since Ark taught me to read and write, and I've learned almost every word there is, except the biggest ones (except for "amanuensis") and I've practiced and practiced at my writing until Ark says that if I write on the walls or furniture one more time, he will put me in jail himself, but I think he was only kidding, except maybe once or twice.

I am determined to make Ark proud of me, and after the ceremony, I said, "Ark, I will be the best field recorder ever, and you are going to be so proud of me that you will bust."

Ark smiled without looking happy and said, "Good, good. Just stay out of jail." Then he hurried me toward the door and gave me a pouch with some hard rolls and cheese and dried bacon and raisins and other stuff in it, which I dropped when I cut through the Wylmeens' garden on the way into town and their big brown mastiff, Mud, chased me out. Stupid dog.

I tried to get my pouch back, but Mud tore it apart and ate it, so I went back to the shoe shop after that to get another bag for breakfast, and when I went in, Ark was sitting at the kitchen table, sound asleep. He had all of his papers out and his pens and his ink bottles, and he had just started what looked like a long report to you about the political and religious situation in Newshore, but he must have been pretty tired, what with staying up so late last night, and I wondered if it was because I had been up late, too, because I was so excited about being made a recorder, and maybe I shouldn't have tried to make tea, because I spilled hot water all over the dirt floor in the kitchen so that it turned to mud. I didn't want to bother Ark, so I went looking for food, and while I was doing that I found his "facts machine," which is why you are getting my reports the moment I write them down.

The facts machine was in a leather satchel by Ark's feet, and I couldn't help but look at it, because Ark usually throws a fit if I get near it. He says gnomes and wizards made it and that all you have to do is put a page of paper in the machine and it sends the page by magic to your library so you can read all the facts right away. What will those gnomes and wizards think of next? Ark said only the most trusted scribes get their own facts machines, and the machines are the most incredible secret, and I must never tell anyone about them, and I never have, not even Widow Muffin, who comes over to see Ark and me now and then and is the sweetest person, so don't worry, because you can trust me.

As I was looking through the satchel I also found the letter you sent to Ark yesterday, telling him he had better send in his assignment to find out how people feel about the Cataclysm (as you call it) and how peeved you were that Ark had not done so before now. I also read the part where you said you understood Ark's concerns about talking to the wrong people and being lynched, but his job required dedication, and you seemed to imply that being lynched wasn't half as bad as what you had in mind if Ark missed his next deadline, which was tonight at sundown.

You said that Ark's assignment was important because you were concerned that the purpose and lessons of the Cataclysm were being lost in a sea of deliberate ignorance and intolerance that could lay the foundation for future disasters (I'm copying from your letter now), and you said you counted on Ark and others like him to keep you informed of the condition of the land and its peoples, because if the peoples couldn't get off on the right foot (or is that feet?), then maybe they never would and one day we'd be sorry.

Well, I was amazed that anyone wouldn't know why Istar had a flaming mountain dropped on it, since Istar was such a poop nation and went around enslaving and torturing and killing people, all the while saying the people were being killed for their own good, until the gods got fed up and turned Istar into the bottom of the Blood Sea of Istar for everyone else's own good. Ark taught me all that, and I always thought everyone knew that but then I never asked, and I was surprised to read that Ark said he was afraid to ask, and I couldn't figure out why not understanding the Cataclysm meant we would be sorry later. Are we going to be tested on it?

Anyway, you had told Ark to send in his report by sundown tonight or else, and I knew Ark couldn't very well do that while he was asleep, so I've decided to do his work for him and surprise him when he wakes up. Isn't that great? I'm going to find out what everyone thinks of the Cataclysm, and I'll write it all down and send it right to you on the facts machine, which I took with me. Ark will be so proud! Sometimes, when he's bailing me out of jail, he says that he should have left me by the side of the road, which is how he became my foster father, as he found me on his way into town when I was a baby just after the time of the Cataclysm. He raised me and showed me how to fix shoes and how to count and read and everything, but we do have our moments when things don't go right, which seems to happen more often lately, now that I'm bigger, but that's how families work sometimes, you know.

Anyway, here I am now, down by the harbor in the alley beside Goodwife Filster's bakery, trying to stay out of the wind and keep warm. Ark said I should write down important things while I'm out today, so I will do that and send them to you, and I think I should write down something about Newshore and its politics and religion, but Newshore doesn't have much of either. I could also talk about how Newshore got its name, as it used to be a farm until Istar got mashed and the sea came up and northern Ergoth turned into an island, and you can still see the sunken foundation stones of an old barn just offshore, in a place Ark shows me when we go fishing, but everybody here knows about that. I could talk about Goodwife Filster's sugar rolls, which I can smell baking now, and they are on my mind a lot because I forgot to get something to eat before I left the shop the second time, but no one would want to read that, either. I should just get started on my assignment.

But, first, I am going to get a sugar roll.

Report Number Two

Same day, about midmorning

Hi, Astinus! I am writing this from the Newshore magistrate's jail in cell number four. It is dark in here, and I cannot see what I am writing or even if my pen is still working. It smells like somebody drank too much ale and it didn't agree with him, so he got rid of it in every way he could and then didn't bother to clean it up. I can hear someone snoring in cell number one, and cell three has someone in it who needs to use a handkerchief.

How I got here is very interesting, so I will put it down in case it is important. I was really hungry and was getting cold in the alley, so I went on into the bakery, which smelled of fresh-baked sugar rolls and breakfast pastries, the whirly kind with the melted cheese stuff on top that Ark says gives him gas but which I like anyway (the pastries with cheese I mean, not the gas, which is awful).

Ark always buys pastries from Goodwife Filster by him self. When I tell him I want to get them, he always says, "That wouldn't be a good idea," and he buys the pastries. Goodwife Filster always frowns at me while I wait for Ark outside her shop. She knoFws I'll be eating the sugar rolls Ark is buying, which I think makes her mad, but I have no idea why. She's one of the people I want to understand by being a recorder, but so far I haven't figured her out.

When I opened the oak door and went inside where it was toasty warm from the baking ovens and smelled the way I imagine Paradise does, Goodwife Filster saw me and frowned (she never smiles) and said in a nasty voice, "I'm not open yet, kender."

I said, "I thought you always opened about now."

And she said, "Get out of here, before I call the magistrate. Go on!"

About then I knew I wasn't going to get a sugar roll or even a cheese pastry, because Goodwife Filster is funny sometimes about people who aren't human like her, only she's not really funny as in funny ha-ha, she's funny as in funny uh-oh. Ark calls her the Minotaur, on account of she's strong and heavy and has such a terrible temper, but he says it's because she's as ugly as one, too.

I was leaving when I remembered what you had asked Ark to do, so I stopped and said, "I have just one question to ask before I go."

Goodwife Filster's face knotted up in a way that reminded me of the Wylmeens' dog, but she didn't say anything, so I quickly got out my papers and pen and got ready to write down her answer. When she looked like she was going to yell at me, I asked my question, which was, "Do you think the gods did the right thing when they struck down Istar so that the balance of the world was preserved and freedom of thought, will, and action was granted to all once more?" I'm not sure I asked the question exactly as you wanted Ark to, and I borrowed some of your phrases from your letter to get it right, but I figured I was close enough and didn't think it would hurt.

On the other hand, maybe I didn't ask the question properly after all, since Goodwife Filster called me a name that meant that my real parents weren't married, which for all I know they weren't, but that wasn't any business of hers, and then she came at me with a bread knife, so I ran outside and down the street and was cold and hungry again before I knew it.

As I was standing outside her shop with my arms crossed under my robes because it was too cold to write this down yet, a fisherman came up to go into the bakery, and I said, "It's not open yet," because I'd never known Goodwife Filster to lie, even if she once said that all elves carried diseases and kidnapped children, which I don't think they do, or at least not all of them, or at least not the ones I know. Anyway, the fisherman said, "Oh," and left.

Then the Moviken kids came up, and I said, "It's not open yet," so they made faces at the bakery window and left. Then the spinster sisters Anwen and Naevistin Noff came up, and I said, "It's not open yet," and they groaned and left.

Then Goodwife Filster came out, wiping her hands on a towel, and she looked around and frowned at me, and I said, "Are you open yet?"

And she made a snorting noise through her nose and said, "When Istar rises, you damn kender," then went back inside to bake some more.

Then Woose, the dwarf, came by and said, "Morning, Walnut," and I said, "Morning, Woose. The bakery's not open yet."

Woose peered at the bakery door and scratched his beard and said, "That's funny. She's usually open at this hour," and then he left. Woose isn't a human, but he has lots of steel coins from his mining business, and maybe Goodwife Filster forgives him for not being human on account of that.

Five more people came by whose names I've forgotten, and they left, and then Goodwife Filster came out and mumbled to herself and looked around and glared at me and said, "What did you tell those last two people who were here just now?"

And I said, "That you weren't open yet," and she got a look on her face that reminded me of the Wylmeens' dog when it bit me on the finger, and she called me a name that meant I liked my mother more than normal people were meant to, which was silly because I don't even remember my mother, and Goodwife Filster grabbed me by my robes and brought me here to the magistrate to be hanged.

We had to wait until Jarvis, the magistrate, could get out of bed and find his spectacles, and he was as tall and thin as ever, and his black hair was all messed up from sleeping on it. He combed out his hair and big moustache, then looked at me and said, "You again?" and looked sad, probably on account of this being the fifth time this year he would have to throw me in jail for being a public nuisance, which Jarvis says is really just a way to let everyone cool off and forget whatever I had done so they wouldn't tie me to a rock and drop me on a kelp farm, as Jarvis puts it, which sounds interesting but which I don't understand, since that would mean I was underwater.

"What now?" said Jarvis to Goodwife Filster, who then said a lot of things that weren't true, like that I was a plague carrier and a thief and a liar, and she was about to explain what she meant by my being responsible for the fall of Istar when Woose, the dwarf, ran into the magistrate's office and yelled, "Fire! Fire at Goodwife Filster's!"

Then Woose saw Goodwife Filster and yelled, "Gods, woman, your bakery is on fire!" and Goodwife Filster went all white and staggered like someone had hit her, then she ran out, and Woose ran out, and Jarvis ran out, but before Jarvis ran out he locked me in here and said he would be back.

So here I am with my facts machine and nothing to do. I should write down some notes on the economic situation in Newshore after Istar blew up and the crops drowned because of the ocean that used to be two days north of here but now comes up to the place where the Karkhovs once had a giant melon field and is where Ark and I fish for moonfins, but Jarvis is back now, and he's waiting for me to leave my cell after I finish this first.

"What are you writing?" he just now asked me, and now he's looking and…

Report Number Three

Same day, about an hour after noon

Hi, Astinus! I'm writing this from the rooftop of the Cats amp; Kitties, which is really just a tavern with a sign showing a woman's bosom with no dress on and isn't a pet shop at all, which was what I thought all the time I was growing up but Ark wouldn't take me there to find out. It's warmer now, and the sun is out and the sky is clear blue, and I can see lots of bird droppings on the roof from last year now that the snow is gone, and I might be sitting on some but I can't help it. Someone should clean this roof up, but then no one is supposed to be up here and I wouldn't be either except that Magistrate Jarvis said I was safer here than in jail, and he's gone to try to calm down the mob before I show up in town again.

So here I am, writing away on the roof and reading over some letters that Ark left in the satchel with the facts machine, and those letters are very interesting, though I can't imagine why Ark put them in here since I doubt very much he meant to send them to you. I think Widow Muffin wrote these letters to Ark, and she says a lot of things that make me think that maybe they aren't telling me the whole truth whenever Ark asks me to go into town to buy groceries when Widow Muffin comes over, and when I get back they tell me they were just talking. I was quite amazed at some of the things she said, and I don't think I will ever be able to look at either her or Ark again and not think about them playing "warming the weasel," which I should probably explain but am too embarrassed to do, and you wouldn't believe me anyway.

How I got up here on the roof is an interesting story, and I will write it down in case it is important. After I left off last time, Magistrate Jarvis took my satchel away while I was sending my report through the facts machine inside, and he took me out of jail, then gave me my satchel back and said that I could leave now, but I shouldn't try to talk to Good-wife Filster for a few years.

"What happened to her bakery?" I asked, and he said, "Oh, the old windbag left a cloth sitting on an oven when she went outside, and the cloth caught fire, and that spread to the wall and ceiling. The place is pretty well ruined now. She's probably going south to Gwynned to stay with her brother until she gets things sorted out."

I felt bad for her having to leave town, but I also felt bad for myself and everyone else, since she had the only good bakery. Jarvis went on about there being a lot of confusion as they were trying to put out the fire, but when Woose tried to get people organized, no one would listen to him, because he was rich or a dwarf or both, so the whole place burned up and took the tailor's shop with it. Jarvis said a lot of things about certain people that I should probably not put down here, because I think he was just angry, and I doubt he would really know if those people were as much in love with their barn animals as he implied they were.

Magistrate Jarvis stopped and rubbed his face and then looked at me and said, "By the way, where did you get those?" and he pointed at my gray robes, so I said, "Ark made me his official recorder this morning, and these are my official recorder's robes, and this is my official Palanthas paper, and this is my steel scribing pen, and this is my once-holy symbol," and I showed him my silver necklace that has the tiny silver open book with the tiny little scribbles in it that you can't read no matter how close you hold it to your eye, which I did once when I was smaller but poked myself in the eyeball and couldn't see for two days, so I don't do it now.

Magistrate Jarvis snorted and said, "Arkie'd be better off sticking to his shoe business. People don't have a need to read or write all that much. A little bit of knowledge goes a long way."

I was going to ask what he meant by that, but he looked at my satchel and asked about that, too, and I said it was just to hold all my papers.

Jarvis sighed and said, "You'd better be getting on out now. Try not to get yourself killed before nightfall," and I promised, and he let me go.

I was almost out the door when I remembered what you wanted, so I turned around and said, "Can I ask just one question?"

Jarvis was heading back to bed, but he groaned and said, "If it means I can get to sleep afterward, sure, anything."

So I took out my papers and my pen and tried to remember the question, and I asked him, "Do you think the gods did right when they sank Istar to preserve the balance of the world and to protect the freedoms of will, thought, and action among all beings?"

Jarvis stood real still for a while, which made me a bit uneasy, and I slowly began to roll up my papers in case I had to run for it. His face got old and white, and his black moustache looked droopy and dark, but he only said, "Why would you ask me such a damned foolish question as that? By the Abyss and its dragons, no, that wasn't good at all. The gods ruined everything for us. Istar had evil on the run. We had those goblins and minotaurs and other scum in our grip, and we were smashing down the wizards' towers right and left. We could have had a golden age here on our world, the first true age of freedom ever, but the gods broke Istar and turned their backs on us. I was a soldier for Istar before the fall. I was out here in Ergoth hunting down blood-crazed barbarians when the sky lit up to the east and the mountain fell on my homeland. Then the earthquakes and windstorms came, and there was suffering and starvation for all of us who were left, every damn one. That was twenty-two years ago, and I remember every moment of it, every single thing, just like it was yesterday. The gods did us wrong. The good gods turned evil and sold us out. They sold us into a pit of serpents like the lowest goblin whelp."

Jarvis didn't look much like the Jarvis I knew. He looked more like someone else, and I thought maybe I'd better be going before he threw something at me even if he did promise not to. But Jarvis only stared at me some more and then said, "Get out of here," so I left and didn't write anything down at all until now.

I walked around town for a little bit after that, thinking about what Jarvis had said and wishing I could get something to eat, because I hadn't had anything so far, what with being chased and thrown in jail and starting fires by accident. I wasn't getting very far on my assignment, and I didn't feel very good at all. I finally got a drink of water from the town fountain, and that helped a little, so I sat on the fountain rim and bunched myself up because if was still a little cold, and I wondered why you were so worried about Ark finding someone who understood why the gods had destroyed Istar, and how you would feel if no one ever understood but Ark and me, and how you would feel if sometimes even Ark and me don't quite understand, either, since the Cataclysm seems to have made everyone so rudeminded. And I didn't understand how not understanding would cause everyone more problems later. Nothing made any sense then, and it still doesn't now, but I'm getting ahead of myself, because it's boring to be here on the rooftop, even with the nice view.

Anyway, I was sitting by the fountain when a man riding a horse came over. He wore a little bit of armor, so I knew he wasn't from town even if I didn't recognize him anyway, since no one here wears any armor because goblins never come to the coast and the barbarians aren't bothering anybody this year, because they're all sick. The man looked like he was very old but very strong, and he had a moustache bigger and thicker than Jarvis's, but it was full of gray hair. He rode his horse up to the fountain and got off and let his horse drink while he stretched and scratched his backside and began to rub his horse down. It was about the time when he pulled a cloth out of his pocket and began wiping off his armor that I thought he might be a knight, because only a knight would do that. Nobody else cares what his or her armor looks like.

Ark had told me a lot about the Knights of Solamnia when I was younger, and I never knew if he liked them or didn't like them, because the knights did both good things and bad things, but they often did them both at the same time, so I was pretty confused as to which side they were on. I got out my papers and pen so I could ask my question, but I saw the knight pull out a long steel sword with notches and scrapes cut into the blade, so I decided I would wait a little while and ask about the weather first instead. Ark always says I should think first, since I'm not very good at it sometimes, and maybe I would live longer that way, and right then I decided that maybe he knew what he was talking about.

The knight glanced at me a few times but said nothing as he cleaned his armor, every bit of it, then got himself a drink from the fountain. He acted like I wasn't really there. I forgot how hungry I was getting because I had never seen a real knight up close, and this one smelled like old sweat and leather and fur and steel. His eyes were like a gray winter sky, and the more I looked at him the less I wanted to ask my question, but I knew I'd have to do it anyway for Ark and you. I was just clearing my throat and was trying to get the question framed properly, so that I could run if necessary, when I saw Kroogi walk up from the blacksmith's shop to wash his face before lunch like he always does, and I knew I was saved. I would ask Kroogi the question first.

I smiled at Kroogi and sat up straight when he came over, only he wasn't looking at me. He was looking at the knight and the knight was looking back, and neither was looking away, and they didn't look too happy about seeing each other. I waved at Kroogi to get his attention, but he didn't wave back. He slowly stripped off his shirt to wash, and you could see the old tribal tattoos on his chest and arms from when he was a warrior with the Red Thunder People who lived east of here before they all died from fighting or being sick, which was why Kroogi left them. The knight stared at Kroogi's tattoos and Kroogi stared at the knight's armor, and neither of them said a thing.

"Kroogi!" I said, waving my arms. "Kroogi, I have a question. Do you have a moment?" I felt safe asking Kroogi, because he was real quiet and never did anything mean, even if Jarvis said Kroogi once cut two men in half using a hand axe in a battle with Istarian army renegades before the fall of Istar, but that wasn't anything anyone would hold against him, as Istarian army renegades were not very nice and they're mostly dead now anyway.

Kroogi didn't look at me, because he was still staring at the knight, and then Kroogi began flexing his huge arm and chest muscles so you could see the places where spears or swords or arrows had cut him here and there. Finally, he looked away and bent down to soak his shirt in the fountain water, ignoring the knight.

Several more people had wandered over to the fountain in the meantime, so I knew I'd have lots of other people to ask if the knight or Kroogi didn't give me an answer. "Kroogi!" I said.

Kroogi glanced at me as he began to wash himself using his shirt, and I knew I could go ahead and ask my question. He never said much, but he always made what he said count.

"I just have one question," I said, and cleared my throat. It would be easier to get a response from the knight after asking Kroogi first. "Kroogi, do you think the gods did right in dropping the flaming mountain on Istar so that — "

"Yes," said Kroogi. He lifted his wet shirt and ran it across his chest, washing away the ash and dust.

"Wait," I said. "I didn't get to finish the question. Do you think the gods did right when — "

"Yes," he said again. 'They did right in killing the murdering mongrel dogs of Istar and their Solamnic ironassed lackeys. The blessed gods, praise their names, did right in crushing out the Kingpriest's filth and purifying the lands that Istar and Solamnia had defiled, washing them with clean fire and water." He dabbed at his forehead. His face never changed expression. It rarely did.

"Oh," I said in surprise. This was easier than I'd thought. "Oh, well, would you — "

"I agree that the gods did right," interrupted the knight. His voice was like low thunder from a distant storm. "They killed the mad murderers of Istar, who would have chained or slain us all, but afterward they allowed evil to roam the lands in the form of ignorant, filthy, barbarian scum who spread plague as they looted and burned their way across the injured lands. The gods did right in destroying Istar, but they didn't finish the job when they let hordes of masterless vermin prey on innocent and law-abiding people. The gods instead left the cleaning up to those with the wisdom to separate the grain from the chaff, and the strength to dispose of the chaff properly."

Well, I thought this was great! Here I had two people who completely agreed that the gods had done right. I was going to ask both of them to detail their answers just a little bit more, when Kroogi's arm snapped put and he Hung his wet shirt into the knight's face and knocked him off balance. Then Kroogi screamed at the top of his lungs so loudly that my ears rang, and he leapt at the knight with his big hands going for the knight's throat.

I was so surprised that I just sat there with my papers and pen and satchel and watched the two of them fighting and rolling in the dirt, yelling and cursing each other and using words that Ark would have slapped my face for using, as he'd done once when I said a word I'd heard a fisherman use but which I won't say ever again, or at least not when Ark is around.

More townspeople gathered around, shouting at Kroogi to beat the knight up, but some people came who yelled for the knight to beat up Kroogi because they didn't like the fact that Kroogi was once a barbarian, even if he was a nice guy mostly and made toys at Yuletime for some families when he had the chance.

Then someone pushed someone else, and then the whole crowd was going at it and everyone was kicking and punching and shoving and flailing away, and grown men had blood coming from their noses and mouths, and their hair was pulled out, and some had clubs and hoes, and someone else screamed like he was dying, and about then I felt someone grab me around the waist and drag me off, and it was Jarvis.

"Damn you!" he shouted at me as he dragged me off. "What in the Abyss did you do now?"

So I told him, and he put me up here on the roof of the Cats amp; Kitties, where he said I couldn't cause any more trouble while he tried to restore order in town. It's nice and warm up here, and I have a great view of the town and sea and farms, but I can still hear people yelling, and some lady is wailing over and over, and I wish I had asked Jarvis for something to eat, because now I am really hungry. I think Jarvis is coming back up the ladder now, so I'd better close this up. Oops! I see that it isn't Jarvis, it's Goodwife Fils -

Report Number Four

Same day (Cotterpin says the 13th), late afternoon

Hi, Astinus. I'm a few miles outside of town now, sitting under a tree, where no one except Cotterpin can find me, I hope. This is probably my last official report to you, because there doesn't seem to be much point in continuing to try to find someone who understands why the gods got so tired of Istar, when everyone gets so upset about the whole issue and thinks either that Istar was wonderful or that Istar was bad but wasn't as bad as some other places around here that should have gotten hit with their own fiery mountains first.

My stomach hurts but I'm not hungry, and I feel just awful, like I'm going to have a good cry in a minute after I finish writing this all down, even if Ark says boys shouldn't cry, but I'm a kender and not a human so maybe it's okay if I feel bad for just a little while.

Everyone hates me, and I hate me, and I hate being a recorder, and I hate sitting out here on a rock in the wilderness because I have no one to talk to except for Cotterpin, the tinker gnome, but he's already gone to sleep in his steam-powered lawn chair under the oak tree here. Ark is going to be very disappointed that I got thrown in jail and made part of the town burn up and started a riot and everything. I'll write down how I got here, but I don't care if it's interesting or important anymore.

After Magistrate Jarvis caught Goodwife Filster on the tavern roof and wrestled with her and they both almost fell off and he took her butcher's cleaver away and made her get down the ladder again and leave me alone, he said it would be best if I left town for a while.

"How long is 'for a while'?" I asked, and he said, "Until Goodie Filster leaves town, that's how long. Maybe it would be even better if you were gone for good. Permanently. Forever."

We climbed down from the roof of the Cats amp; Kitties, and he took me by the arm and ran me back to his office. I could hear people fighting in town all the way there, and I wondered how they could keep it up for so long and wouldn't they be tired of it all by now, but obviously they weren't yet.

Jarvis kept me inside his office long enough to give me a blanket, a bag of bread rolls with no sugar, some cheese, and a skin he said was full of water but which was really only half full of ale, which I hate and have already poured out. Then he said, "Just get out of here. It's for your own good as well as everyone else's. You can't stay here any longer until Goodie Filster's out of here."

And I said, "Where can I go?" And he said, "Gods, you idiot, anywhere! Just get out of this town. She'll kill you if she sees you here!" And I said, "But what about Ark? Can't I go see Ark?" Then Jarvis called me a name that means my head looks like my backside and told me to leave, so I left.

I walked and walked until I was past the Dormens' farm, which was as far as I'd ever gone away from town in my whole life, and then I went around a hill I always used to look at when I was small but had never visited, and I looked back one last time at the town and felt like part of my insides had fallen out and been left behind, and I missed Ark terribly but didn't know if I could ever go back, because things were in such a mess.

There was smoke drifting over the town near the waterfront, but I couldn't see if it was from Goodwife Filster's bakery or someone else's place that was burning up. I turned around and walked on down the road, scuffing my feet in the dust and kicking rocks and holding my blanket and wishing I was dead.

I thought of you, Astinus, and Ark, and I was ashamed because I had promised to do my best to find out if anyone understood the Cataclysm, but I had done it all wrong and now I would never get to be a real scribe, much less an amanuensis. Even worse, I was afraid that because I couldn't find out the answer to the question, then something would go wrong someday and no one would know what to do about it and it would be all my fault.

But even this was not as bad as missing Ark, because Ark is my father, even if he isn't my real father, because he took care of me when no one else would, and I knew he would be upset with me, and I missed him so much that I just couldn't feel anything at all. I was empty inside and knew I would be empty forever. I wasn't even hungry anymore.

I walked a long time, but I didn't walk very fast. Part of me wanted to keep on walking forever, but I got so numb and tired that I found a rock under an oak tree by the road and dropped my blanket and satchel and just sat down and didn't move at all. I must have sat there a long time before I noticed that a donkey cart had stopped in front of me and the driver had come over and was asking me something. The driver was shorter than I am and had wrinkled leathery skin and a snow-white beard and eyes like the deep sky. He wore a red and brown outfit covered with belts and pockets and tools. It was Cotterpin, the tinker gnome.

Cotterpin has been visiting all the villages in a huge circle around the coast of northern Ergoth for years, and everyone knows him. When I was small, he let me play with some of the toys he had in his cart, and he was always careful to take most of them back from me so other kids could play with them in other towns, but he always left some toys behind. I think now that he did it on purpose, but I used to think he was just forgetful.

"Obviously a newly generated social outcast," he was saying to me as I sat under the oak tree. "Sociological tragedy of the first magnitude. Disgraceful phenomenon."

I just looked at him, then looked at the dirt at my feet as I had been doing for however long I'd been there. I thought for a moment that I should ask him the question you wanted Ark to ask, but I didn't want to ask anyone that question ever again. I knew if I asked him, he would hate me like everyone else hated me, and I just couldn't stand that.

Cotterpin went back to his cart and heaved something out of the back, then began to set up something beside my rock that looked like a box with a metal plate on it and a switch on one end, with red gnomish lettering all over it that I couldn't read. He fiddled with the box for a bit, then went back to the cart and got a clay mug from it and filled it with liquid from a tap on the side of his cart, then set it on the box and flipped the switch. I knew I should run or hide or shield my face when he did that, as everyone knows that gnome-built things can make craters as big as the one Istar now rests in, but I didn't feel like running, and I thought maybe it would be best if I blew up with the box.

But the box didn't blow up; it just got warm after a while and the tea in the mug got warm, too. I was trying to figure that one out while Cotterpin went back to the cart and brought back a steam-powered folding chair that also failed to blow up and which he set up next to me under the tree so he could relax in it and enjoy the same warm setting sun that I was not enjoying.

"A pleasant respite it is to renew our long acquaintance, Walnut Arskin," he said in his same old deep but nasal voice, "though I suffer some concern about the circumstances. Perhaps you would care to elaborate on your condition."

I thought about it and finally said, "No."

"Mmm." Cotterpin took a sip of his tea, then held the mug in his short, thick fingers and swirled the contents. "I am not unaccustomed to seeing wayfarers as youthful as yourself fall victim to any number of unfortunate mishaps in the undisciplined confines of the wilderness. Being moderately fond of our visits together in the recent past, I was hoping to hear some motive or rationale for your presence here before you, too, encounter any of the aforementioned mishaps. Are you perhaps running away from home?"

"No," I said, and then I said, "Yes," and then I said, "No. Maybe. I don't know."

"Mmm." Cotterpin took another sip of his tea and looked off at the sun, which was just above the hill that hides New-shore from view. He didn't say anything more for a long time, and before I knew it I had told him everything, even the part about the question that you wanted Ark to answer (but I didn't tell him about the facts machine).

"Mmm," he said when I was done. "I see." Cotterpin was quiet for a while, and we looked at the open fields around us and watched deer graze and a hawk hunt for rabbits. The wind was getting a little cooler, but it was still okay to be out.

"It seems like an eon ago that I dwelled in Istar," said Cotterpin at last, watching the hawk with a peaceful face. "Yet even now I remember it far better than I would like. In the twilight years of that sea-buried land, I labored as a menial slave, the chattel of a priest. I had arrived there but scant decades before as a fully accredited diplomat from my homeland — the extinct geothermal vent called Mount Nevermind by the knights. Unfettered I was at first, able to commune with priest and commoner alike in that proud city, until the Istarians manifested great annoyance with my fellow diplomats and me over the failure of one of our gifts of technology. We had directed the construction of a new mode of urban transport, a steam-powered cart that traveled over fixed rails, but on its trial run it caused considerable damage to some important buildings in the capital. I was put on trial and sentenced to enforced servitude for the remainder of my life, as were my fellow diplomats, whom I never saw again.

"My overseer, whose glacial visage I shall bear with me to my grave, brought me along on an inspection tour of a distant military encampment just before catastrophe overtook Istar. In the anarchy and discord that followed, I was able to effect my escape and leave my overseer and his retainers to their own fate, which could not have been pleasant given the multitude of ills that plagued the region at that time. I journeyed westward on foot, feasting on the meager bounty of nature like an untamed beast, until I found a bare remnant of civilization in old Solamnia. There, among bitter-eyed men who cursed the gods and slew one another over trifles, I labored until I had saved enough steel to cross the new sea to Hylo, on this island's eastern shore. I then purchased a cart and a donkey — dear old Axle, whom you see now — and took up my most recent and probably final vocation as a tinker. As such, I am now content with my lot and desire nothing more."

"Did you ever want to go home to Mount Nevermind?" I asked. I had forgotten all about my problems and was trying to imagine what it would be like to walk across the whole continent, from Istar to northern Ergoth. I couldn't imagine it. I was also thinking about Ark and wishing that I could go home myself.

"Mmm," Cotterpin mumbled. "The thought has made its disquieting presence known to me on occasion, but I take thorough comfort in the realization that Mount Nevermind will continue to exist regardless of my actual physical location. I have determined that my best course is to find my own footway in the world and meanwhile examine the long-range consequences of the catastrophe that the gods visited upon Istar. I have been content with my work since then and have not regretted a moment of it. My original life quest was to have something to do with mass transit, but given the results of my development of the prototypical urban travel system in Istar, for which I was enslaved, I decided that another form of life-quest expression was called for. I also fear that I've been much contaminated socially by my contact with humans, and I am concerned that my brethren at Mount Nevermind might find my speech and mannerisms peculiar and would perhaps ask me to volunteer for psychiatric research, which at this time I am minded to avoid. No, I'd rather not voyage to fair Mount Nevermind again. I am an itinerant vagabond, happy at last, and wish to remain so to the end of my vagabond days."

We sat there for a while longer, and Cotterpin sighed. "Would that I could render some comfort to you, Walnut," he said, "but I wonder if perhaps your father, Jeraim, might give you more comfort than I, and if perhaps a visit with him might not reassure him that you have not fallen victim to tragedy. You have taken up a dreadful and thankless assignment. It might be time to recuperate from your excursion and renew your personal energies."

Cotterpin yawned and set aside his mug. "Tea always has a soporific effect on my psychomotor system," he said, his words slurring a bit. "The local angle of solar radiation is also inducing drowsiness, and if you would be so generous as to excuse my lapse, I would like to take a brief moment to relax my… to relax my eyelids." He closed his eyes, and, only two heartbeats later, he began to snore.

I looked at the countryside for a while more, then took out my paper and pen and wrote all of this down. The sun is about to sink behind the hill, and I can hear crickets chirp ing and birds singing, and I can still see a deer across the field, near some trees.

I stopped after I wrote the last paragraph above and thought for a while like Ark told me to do. I don't feel as upset as I did when I started to write down this report. I've just put my blanket over Cotterpin and left my bag of food with him after I ate some of it, and I've made sure that Axle has enough grass where she is standing, off to the side of the road. I am taking my papers and pen and facts machine, and I am going back to see Ark. I might have something to write to you about later, but if not, then it won't matter.

Report Number Five

Same day, after midnight, I think

Hi, Astinus! Its really late, I know, but I had to get one last report to you about how everything went. Ark doesn't know that I'm up or that I found out where he hid the facts machine after I gave it back to him and he ordered me never to touch it again or else I'd go to jail for a year, so don't tell him, please. He and Widow Muffin are asleep right now, and I don't think they could wake up for anything, and I'd rather not wake them up anyway. It's been a busy evening.

I went back into town right at sundown and went home to the shop, though part way there I slowed down a lot and was worried about what Ark would do when he found that I had his facts machine and had burned down the town and all, even if the last part was an accident. I felt bad, too, because I had failed to find out everything I think you wanted and Ark would be angry and disappointed in me, and I was also rather mortified that Ark might find out that I read Widow Muffin's letters, but I didn't read them all, just the first twelve.

The town was quiet again, though I could smell some smoke, and I saw candles burning in the window at the back of the shop where I usually go in. As I got closer, I saw that the back door was open, and I could hear voices inside the shop. The light inside was flickering, and at first I thought it was the stove. As I got even closer, I could tell that one of the voices was Ark's and one was Widow Muffin's, and I almost stopped, but I kept going anyway, even if my face was red.

It was when I got even closer still, almost up to the doorway, that I could hear a third voice in the shop, and that voice was Goodwife Filster's.

I stopped right then, holding the satchel and not moving a muscle. Goodwife Filster was saying something in a loud voice, growling like the Wylmeens' mastiff when he catches scent of me walking through the garden that he thinks is his territory. After a moment, I edged up to the door on one side, so no one could see me, and I listened to them talk, though Ark had once told me to never spy on anyone, and I never have, except just then and maybe two other times.

"You have to be reasonable about this," Ark was saying. His voice was a little too high and tight. "If you could just listen to me for a minute and think about — "

"Shut your dung-eating trap," shouted Goodwife Filster. "You brought that wicked little monster into this good town, and look at me now! My bakery's burned down, and I've got nothing left to my name except the clothes on my back. My whole life has been a sewage pit ever since blessed Istar died, and it's all because of vermin like that kender and maggot-brained asses like yourself who feed and clothe them! You're to blame for this even more than he is. You brought him among us, and you blinded everyone to his evil nature. You let him work his evil on us, and now he's had his way, and good people like myself are destroyed! I'm ruined!" And then she called Ark some names that I'm not going to write down here, because they were awful and I don't think I could spell them correctly anyway. I might ask Ark about them tomorrow.

When Goodwife Filster stopped for breath, I heard Widow Muffin say, "Goodie Filster, please, listen to us. You need to go back to the inn and rest for a while. If you do anything to hurt us, you'll feel terrible about it. You've had some terrible things happen to — "

"Shut up!"

The wall I was leaning against vibrated when Goodwife Filster yelled, and among other things she called Widow Muffin a prostitute, only she didn't use that word.

"You can't talk to me!" Goodwife Filster finished. "You have no right to say anything to me! You deserve the same fate that the kender should have had years ago! He should have died out there, eaten by rats and wolves. It's your fault, Arskin, for dragging that demon child in among good folk."

"He's not a demon," Ark said, his voice shaky. "You're just upset, now. He's a kender, and they're just like you and me, even if they cause a little more — "

"The Abyss take you!" screamed Goodwife Filster. "The evil gods delivered him into your hands to destroy us!"

"Goodie, he was just a little baby, and his mother was dead. She'd been wounded by goblins or bandits, and she'd carried him all the way through the wilderness to get him to safety. I couldn't leave him there after I buried her. If you had been me, you would have done the same. You know it!" Ark sounded like he was trying to reason with a swamp viper he'd almost stepped on.

I was shocked to hear about my mother, because Ark had never said a word to me about her, and for a moment I couldn't think of anything else until Goodwife Filster laughed.

"I would have known what to do to the little bastard," she said, and my insides went cold when she said it. "I would have spared us all this torment. But because of you and that kender, I lost everything I ever owned. It's only right that you should suffer as I have, just exactly as I have."

I slowly moved around the door frame. No one was by the door, but I could look into the wall mirror nearby and see part of Goodwife Filster's back and one of her arms. She was holding a torch in one hand and had a meat-cutting knife stuck in her belt. That was bad enough, but, being so close to the door, I could also smell something like lamp oil, only it couldn't have been — or so I thought — because Ark doesn't own any oil lamps, because he says the local oil burns too fast and smells awful, like burned fish, which is what it comes from (we call them greasegills).

Of course, my next thought was that Goodwife Filster had brought her own lamp oil, and that she meant what she said about Ark suffering exactly as she had, and suddenly all I could think about was my growing up in the shoe shop and how it was the only home I had ever known and how Ark and I, and later Widow Muffin, had always had so much fun here. I realized I had no idea how much lamp oil Goodwife Filster had brought in with her, but it smelled like enough to burn up my memories and the shoe shop and maybe some people with it.

I stopped listening then so I'd have a chance to think. Think first, Ark always tells me, even if it's just for a moment. At first I thought I should run for help, but I didn't know if Goodwife Filster would behave herself long enough for me to find Magistrate Jarvis and get back without anyone being hurt. I carefully put down the satchel with the facts machine and looked down at the steps and thought and thought. Goodwife Filster was saying something about beasts and dragons and fires from the Abyss, and she wasn't making a lot of sense, though in a way she was, even if it was a very awful sort of logic.

About then I remembered a trick I had once played on Ark when I was small, something I had sworn never to do again after I'd tried the trick, and Ark had broken two of his fingers, for which I'd been spanked and felt bad over for weeks. I was looking at the bottom of the door frame, where part of the frame had fallen off but left some nails sticking out, just enough to tie a string across the bottom of the door above ankle height.

I felt in my robe pockets for some string, but I didn't have any. Then I remembered my once-holy symbol of Gilean, and I carefully slid its chain off my neck and knelt down by the door as quietly as I could. It took a few seconds for me to wrap the chain around the nails on either side of the doorway. It was dark, and I didn't think Goodwife Filster would see the chain until it was too late. Then I grabbed the satchel.

I thought about calling for Goodwife Filster to come outside, but I thought she might say no and burn down our home. That left only one solution, and from the sound of things inside, I was going to have to do it now.

"Don't set the house on fire," Ark was begging. "I don't want any of us to get hurt. Please take the torch outside."

"I have no fear of you," cried Goodwife Filster. "I am the arm of righteousness. I am the avenger of fallen Istar."

"Goodie, that's crazy talk!" said Widow Muffin, and right then I knew she had said the wrong thing. I leaped up the two back steps, stepped over the chain at the bottom of the doorway, and stomped into the shop as loudly as I could.

"You — !" Goodwife Filster was starting to shout a bad word, but she stopped when I came in and turned around. When I saw her, I wondered if I had made a very bad mistake, because Goodwife Filster had a hatchet in the hand that didn't have the torch. Her eyes were shining like black stones at the bottom of a cold creek. Ark and Widow Muffin were bunched up in a corner, and Ark was holding a footstool with the widow back behind him. The place stank of burned fish. Everyone froze as I came in. The only thing I could hear was the crackling of the torch flames.

It was time to do something, so I waved my arms and the satchel and shouted the first thing that came into my head. "Hey!" I yelled at Goodwife Filster. "Got any sugar buns?"

I didn't know what to expect, but I certainly didn't expect that Goodwife Filster could move so fast for someone built so dumpy. She didn't say a thing, at least not that I remember, but she came at me like a wild horse, and I knew I was going to be a very sorry kender if I didn't move. I ran for the back door, and my plan to trip Goodwife Filster and hit her over the head with the satchel would have been perfect, except that I forgot about the chain at the bottom of the door in trying to get away from her and that axe and torch she had, and the chain snagged my foot, and I fell out the back door and down the steps into the dirt.

I got up right away, and it was a good thing I did, too, because Goodwife Filster hit the chain right after I did and fell down the steps, too, but she fell right next to me, and the torch singed my hair before it stuck in the dirt and went out. I had no time to do anything with the facts-machine satchel except hold it. I had to run, so I did.

I took off for the low place in the stone wall between Ark's place and the Salberins' property, and it was hard to see where I always came up and hoisted myself over the wall, but I could hear Goodwife Filster behind me, her thick feet thumping on the ground, and suddenly I had the idea of vaulting over the wall on my hands, so I did exactly that — the first time I ever did it — and I sailed over the wall on one hand, holding the satchel in the other, just as something struck the top of the wall by my hand and threw up sparks as it went by. It looked like her hatchet, but I didn't want to find out for sure, so I hit the ground on the other side and almost lost my balance and the satchel, too, but I managed to keep running. I thought I could hear Ark shouting my name way back behind me, but it didn't make much difference to me right then.

As I tore across the Salberins' flower beds and headed for the rail fence between their place and the Wylmeens' property, I heard someone scrambling over the wall behind me, screaming something like "evil spawn" over and over. For a moment, I wondered if Goodwife Filster had always been strange in that way, and if she was really crazy or was just so angry she couldn't think straight anymore, and maybe having her bakery burn down was just the last straw. She had always been mean but never really awful or strange like she was now.

I reached the rail fence, slowing down just enough to climb over it with one hand because it was too high to vault over. I couldn't seem to get a grip on the wood for a moment, but I heard her shout, "Evil spawn!" right behind me, and in moments I was over the fence and on my back in the Wylmeens' tomato bed. I scraped my leg on a tomato post in falling over the fence and the satchel banged my nose, but none of it hurt very much and I had a lot more to think about right then than a scratch. I also thought that I didn't have the faintest idea of where I was going to go, but I just wanted to get Goodwife Filster and her torch away from Ark and Widow Muffin and our shoe shop. That was all that mattered.

I got up and started running across the tomato bed and into the cucumber vines, but it was dark and my foot caught in a bunch of vines and I fell Hat on my face and knocked all the wind out of my lungs. I still had the satchel, so I started to get up and run again, but I fell down right away because my ankle felt like someone had stuck it with a redhot iron. I heard someone scramble over the fence and land on the ground a dozen feet behind me, so I got up again but couldn't run on my bad leg or even hop on my good leg, and I fell again and said the very same bad word I'd heard the fisherman use, the very same word Ark had told me never to say again, and I said it real loud.

And that's when I heard Mud coming.

The Wylmeens call their dog Mud because he has the same color coat as the mud in the road after a heavy rain. He comes up almost to my shoulders and has eyes that glow white when he sees something he wants to kill, and the Wylmeens haven't been very good about teaching Mud not to kill everything that comes into his yard. He killed a wolverine one year in an hour-long battle, and the Wylmeens stuck the carcass on a post by the road, where it stayed until Mud figured out how to get it down and tore it into little pieces. I sometimes slip through the Wylmeens' garden because I figured out how to get to the other side before he could get off the back porch and catch me, and I have to confess that it was a little exciting to tease him like that, even though I knew I shouldn't if I wanted to live a long time.

Unfortunately, I had never expected to fall down in the Wylmeens' garden, though I had long ago figured out from the number of close calls that I'd had with Mud that falling down meant I would probably not get a second chance to get out of the garden in one piece. I heard Mud coming off the back porch, and I looked up over the vines in front of my face to see him hurtling across the garden right at me, moving like a wild black shadow with white moons for eyes. I couldn't see much of him but I saw enough, so I wrapped my arms over my head and curled up and hoped the Wylmeens would be able to call him off me before I looked like that wolverine.

Mud was on me in a rush. Then he was over and past me, and I heard a shriek that could have awakened a graveyard full of dead people. Mud was snarling and fighting, and someone was screaming, and I decided it was time to get out of there no matter what had happened to my ankle. I started to crawl away on my hands and knees as fast as I could, but as I was trying to leave I heard Goodwife Filster screaming "HELP ME!" at the top of her lungs, and I did what I had never thought I would do. I crawled back to save her.

Humans think that because I'm a kender I am not supposed to be afraid of anything, and I guess it's true, but I must admit that my stomach turned over when I saw how big Mud was and what he was doing to Goodwife Filster on the ground. Mud wasn't paying any attention to me, so I crawled over and got up on my knees and banged him twice on his dog butt with the satchel. It was like hitting a tree stump for all the good it did, and the satchel handle broke right then anyway, and the facts machine fell out in the dirt and cucumber vines. Goodwife Filster was screaming, and Mud was about to tear her arm off, so I picked up the facts machine and threw it at Mud, and I hit him.

I have to admit that I didn't expect the facts machine to light up like it did and shoot out little lightning bolts and make Mud Hip up into the air and spin around for a moment before he crashed back into the cucumbers and wiggled around in really bizarre ways. I found the facts machine, and it didn't seem to be broken, so I put it back in the satchel and crawled over to see what I could do for Goodwife Filster, who was groaning and holding her arms in front of her face.

About then Ark came over the fence and all twenty of the Wylmeens came out of their house and ran over to help, too, which was a good thing, as I had never seen someone with so many cuts and bites before and I wasn't sure where to start in trying to fix them all.

They carried Goodwife Filster into the Wylmeens' house and washed her off and wrapped up her arms and face and legs and everything else in white bandages until she almost looked like one of her own sugar buns. It seemed to me that she was going to live, though she wasn't going to be chasing people around with sharp objects and torches very much in the foreseeable future. They also wrapped up my ankle, which wasn't broken, only sprained, and made me sit off to the side out of sight while they made Goodwife Filster more comfortable. I admit that I was a little jealous of the attention she got because, after all, she was the one who had been chasing me with a knife and axe and torch and had wanted to burn down Ark's shoe shop, but I decided not to point that out. It was when I was watching everyone get Goodwife Filster fixed up that I had a funny thought, and I hopped over to ask her a question.

They had finished wrapping up her head and everyone was gathering around her to talk when I came over. No one paid any attention to me, so I went right up and stood beside the cot where she lay, and I put down the satchel, which Ark had forgotten to take back from me right then but did later. Goodwife Filster looked terrible, but she was breathing and that was good, I guess.

"Goodwife Filster?" I whispered, and when she didn't do anything, I asked again, "Goodwife Filster?"

She groaned then and half-turned so she could look at me through all the rags that were tied over her head. Her eyes opened, but they looked like they were dead.

"You were pretty mad at me for asking about Istar, weren't you?" I asked.

Goodwife Filster just stared at me and didn't make any noise, but I assumed her answer was yes. No one else said anything. They all just looked at me, so I kept going.

"I was supposed to ask that question for Astinus of Palanthas, to help out Ark," I said. "I was just thinking about it all, and I think I know the reason Astinus wanted to find out what people thought of the Cataclysm. It goes like this:

Nobody liked Istar very much, except maybe for you and a few other people. But, then, from what I've heard, nobody really liked anybody at all very much back then, and things don't seem to have gotten much better now, because everyone down deep still hates everyone else. Asking people about Istar brings out all the worst in them and opens up all the old wounds, though I'm saying that as a metaphor and not because you have so many wounds right now, really. I think Astinus knew that would happen, and he wanted to find out just how bad things really were now, and maybe he wasn't so much interested in Istar after all. Astinus is really worried that someday something bad will happen that will need all of us to pull together and work together and maybe fight together to set things right again, and if we don't learn that being different is really okay, then we aren't going to make it in the long run and we'll be just like the Karkhovs' melons and be swept away by the ocean or whatever it is that Astinus is afraid will come at us. What do you think?"

Goodwife Filster kept staring at me while her lips moved. I had to lean close to hear her. "Astinus and you?" she asked. "You were both doing this?"

I nodded. "Yup. See, Ark made me a field recorder, and I decided to — "

I'm afraid I didn't get much further with my explanation, because at that point Goodwife Filster sat up on the cot and yelled out that both you and I should get together and do something that was remarkably disgusting and which I'll bet is physically impossible, but which I have to admit sounded pretty funny to me later on, though you might not think so. Then she tried to get off the cot and come after me, but the Wylmeens got to her first.

After things calmed down a bit, Ark and Widow Muffin carried me back to the shop. On the way, we picked up Woose, the dwarf, and Cotterpin, the tinker, and Magistrate Jarvis and Kroogi and several other people who were friends of at least one of us, and when we got back to the shop, Ark closed the back door and everyone cleaned me up and fed me while Ark and the widow told the story of how I had saved them. They put fresh dirt over all the lamp oil Goodwife Filster had spilled in the shop and swept it out, but it still smelled almost as bad as the gas Ark gets from eating cheese pastries, which I guess he won't eat anymore. In the process, I heard that the Wylmeens' dog, Mud, was still alive but he wasn't the same old Mud and was actually pretty quiet now and wasn't chasing or biting anyone this evening and maybe won't do it again, or so I hope.

Eventually everyone went home and Ark took his facts machine and satchel away from me, and the machine was a little dirty but not broken, and Ark never once asked me if I'd seen the widow's letters, and I never once brought it up. I never even asked why the widow happened to drop by the shop while I was gone or where her shoes had gone. (When I got the satchel and facts machine back just a few minutes ago to send this to you, I noticed that Ark had taken the letters out of the satchel and had hidden them somewhere else, but I won't try to find out where they are, as I don't think I could stand the shock. Widow Muffin stayed on with us tonight, but I didn't mind. She and Ark seem the happier for it.)

This will be my last report to you, Astinus. I told Ark that being a recorder was very exciting, but it was maybe a little too exciting, and I would rather be a cobbler for now and later an amanuensis, though to tell the truth I have given some thought to being a cave explorer or a sea pirate (I didn't tell him that part, though).

I also asked Ark if tomorrow he would show me where my mother is buried so I could say hi to her and maybe visit her once in a while. Ark said yes and also said he was sorry he had never told me about her before and said it had hurt him to even think about it. All he could remember about her was that she was pretty. I thought about it and finally figured that I could forgive him, because I don't know what I would have done had it been me finding a baby Ark, and it was all past anyway.

I have been thinking about the question I tried to answer for you and how much trouble that one question caused, and for a while I was feeling bad about myself for asking it, but now I don't so much. I feel sorry for Goodwife Filster, even if she is so crazy and angry that she lost control of herself, but there are a lot of people like her around who have bad attitudes and don't want to make life better for anyone else. If you are afraid that people haven't learned anything about working together as a lesson of the Cataclysm, then it seems to me you have a lot to worry about. But Ark and I (and maybe the widow, too, though I haven't asked) have it figured out most of the time, so there's still hope.

It was fun working for you, Astinus. Maybe I will get to see you again someday when I sail my own pirate ship. Be looking for me!