The Price of a Ship

When adventuring isn’t as quick or easy as you thought it would be, it might be time to embrace some of the weirder (im)possibilities.

The sweet scent of spices and pomegranate syrup wafts dreamily through the air. I’m sweating in my tunic, while in front of me, a game board lies set with stones of jet and opal, my opponent ready to sweep my forces into the void.

To be honest, we’ve already spent more time than I would’ve liked here, in Tarħiin, a desert village perched on the outer edge of the Verse. This was only supposed to be our jumping off point for further exploration — but if I don’t win this game, “more time” might very easily turn into “forever”.

I blame our sponsor. Turns out there’s a few pertinent facts about the Verse that they neglected to mention. Perhaps most applicable to our situation, the Verse is really more like a collection of snow globes (known as “Spheres”) than a proper universe (or multiverse, as the case may be). People here get around either through Doorways — gated connections between different Spheres — or by “Jumping”, which of course requires a ship.

Then again, Doorways also tend to be heavily guarded, and in our case, it turns out that if we want to get out of Tarħiin the long way, we’re in need of a visa or two.

So what to do while waiting weeks for a Doorvisa in Tarħiin? Mostly, we’ve been taking in the sights: the hot sun rising over the sand dunes, which stretch endlessly in every direction; old men playing board games and smoking water pipes in the main plaza; moonset against a sky alight with stars, each of them another Sphere that could be mere moments away, if only we found the right Doorway.

And finally, today, at the end of the local five-week month, we have finally caught a glimpse of the Bazaar.

Glass knives from the slopes of the volcano of Kaxan, great night pearls from the darkest deep of the infinite Sednesi Sea, heartwood seeds and trinkets carved from the iron oaks of Nidhi — last night, when we headed to bed at midnight, the plaza below our window was empty. Yet somehow, an entire miniature city of tents, umbrellas, and market stalls has popped up in the scant three chimes since.

A line of food stalls at the edge of the plaza serves up breakfast — hot fried bread with honey and something halfway between yogurt or cream cheese, a brew made from the local holly bush that hits like coffee.

“You’re a long way from home, Visitor,” says one of the Merchants as we drift between his table and a stall hung with a variety of instruments — maybe musical, maybe medical. His side of the aisle, on the other hand, is empty: just a bare table sheltered beneath the front awning of his tent. The Merchant fans himself as the heat of the day begins to rise. “I think I might know what you need.”

I raise an eyebrow at that. “Such as?”

He smiles as he beckons us into the tent. It’s bigger than it looked from the outside — a bare, golden space big enough to hold only one thing:

A jumpship.

It’s not a new jumpship — not by a long while. It’s shaped, vaguely, like a bat — bent wings lined with silk-steel, its head a cockpit, its hunched body somewhat rusty around the bolts.

Still, it’s enough to get us out of here. I hope.

“So, Visitor,” says our Merchant. “What do you think it’s worth?”

Of course, if we’d come through with enough cash to outright buy a jumpship, we would probably have been able to urge those doorvisas through a little faster, gotten more solid documents. But until we get off of Tarħiin, it’s unlikely we’ll be getting any more cash at all. “Likely more than we have,” I say, turning to head back out into the market.

“How about a game for it then,” he says, stopping my retreat in its tracks. “Have you ever played Plangency?”

He’s talking about the pastime played by the old men in the plaza every evening. You’d probably recognize it as something close to Go, though it’s played on a board that’s infinitely more confusing to the eyes, with some obscure rules that I certainly don’t know. “We haven’t got anything to wager.”

“We’ll each throw in a favour, and that’ll be enough to start,” says the Merchant smiling, as he sets the key to the ship on the blanket next to us. And that’s how we’ve ended up here, with a victory on the board standing between us and further adventures. My white stones are dwindling, so I grab one of the special pieces — a Cantor stone — and turn it in nervous fingers.

And reaching forward, I make my move.

Turns out I am terrible at Plangency. Over the span of a chime (that’s about two hours, to me and you), I’ve almost lost at least half a dozen times, only managing to stay standing through a couple desperate plays. And yet, somehow, as I get the hang of the rules, my empire starts, once again, to grow.

Each of us has only a couple moves left, and the Merchant considers a long time before deciding to place one of his last stones to reinforce his main territory. Taking a deep breath, I grab my last Cantorstone, and claim the center.

At once, light ripples through the stones. Somehow, I’ve won.

The Merchant’s face is an even blank, as he presents the key across the width the board, holding it out to me in both hands. Yet in his eyes, there’s a small glimmer of something, like amusement — or mischief. “Well played,” he says. “The ship is yours! I look forward to seeing where it gets you.”

And without another word, he pushes himself up from his seat, throwing us a wink as he disappears back through the entrance of the tent. We’re left looking at our new jumpship — though honestly, junkship might be the better word — and a strange sense of confusion begins to settle on my shoulders.

You’re the first one to say the thought out loud: “He must’ve thrown the game — but why?”

“Was I really that bad?” I joke, even though I think you might be right. In any case, it’s all a bit of a mystery: the possible answers for why range from curious to criminal, and I’m not sure we can really afford to throw away this piece of luck if we find it’s the latter.

So often when travelling, you have to just accept what the multiverse throws at you, whatever it happens to be: good, bad, or highly suspicious. So at this point, the one thing I’m certain of is that any investigations can wait. For now, it’s finally time to start planning our next steps into the wider Verse—

Assuming, of course, that we manage to get this thing off the ground.

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