Josef shivered as he watched Claudius crouched down next to the sewerman and began to untie the rope from his mouth. Before he finished, Claudius whispered, "Fishman one. Sewerman zero."
The rope fell from John's mouth, revealing his blue-glowing teeth. He stretched his lips while looking up at Josef. "Didn't think I'd see you again, goo-drinker."
Josef didn't even want to look at him. His betrayal still stung. John had talked big about punching The Ba'ha Company in the gut, but it was just talk. Josef looked at him for a full second before deciding to shrug it off. If John was able to get them to Gangdrup, then they would make use of him.
"As I was saying, this sewerman here," said Claudius, placing his hand on John's head and messing up his floppy strands of grey hair, "takes an oath. I'd forgotten this detail in the heat of the moment. I was too busy saving my life. But I remembered that sewerfolk, especially sewerfolk acting as ferryman, abide by a code of honour of sorts."
A rope was still wrapped around John's body. He rolled onto his side and balanced himself on his knees, spitting pond water from his mouth.
"We need you to take us to Gangdrup," Josef said. They didn't have time to dawdle.
"I'll take you there," John replied, spitting again, "just get this bloody gujai away from my toe." He then jerked his head towards his foot still trawling in the pond water, the gujai still attached and suckling. Dark green reeds trembled as he did so.
Claudius narrowed his eyes, waited, letting the sewerman suffer a moment longer, until he finally poked the gujai's eye. The fish then mewled, croaked, and sulked lazily back into the depths of the pond.
John stood hesitantly to his feet, trying to maintain his balance, a cord of rope still lashed around his chest. "Are you going to untie me? And why, goo-drinker, do you want to go to Gangdrup? Did you invoke warfare against the crows?"
Josef stepped forward and looked straight at John. "We'll untie you when we can trust you more than a gujai fish. And no, I did not. That's why we're headed to Gangdrup. We need to go see this Mal."
"You broke your oath, sewerman," repeated Claudius. "And I also have your precious contract here Kipfish signed for you."
"Please stop the fishman from talking," John sighed. "I'll take you to Mal. If she'll see you. Tonight's a big night for her. Also, you know nothing about my oath."
John then turned his pale face up towards the Ten Moons. Josef looked too, gazing at their prismatic aura gushing across the night sky. John then spoke again. "Never heard of the crows rejecting anyone, but if what you say is true then we have to move quickly."
Suddenly Josef had an idea. He turned to Claudius. "Wasn't there a third feld you mentioned—"
"Nope. Not a chance. Bouldershore is way, way too far away. If we went there first, then maybe we'd have a shot, but it's already been a few hours. Moonsneeze could—"
Josef raised his hands up. "I know, I know. Don't remind me. Gangdrup it is."
John eyed Josef. "Josef, can you even play an instrument?"
"Is humming an instrument?" Josef replied, doing his best to relax the anger he felt just looking at the sewerman's face.
Claudius pushed John forward along the shoreline. "I'm hoping Mal will drop the musical requirement tonight seeing as one of her feldlings betrayed a passenger in her sewers—"
"Look," shouted John, his head nodding up at the sky. "A sweetwind!" Josef watched as Claudius snapped his neck in the direction John had gestured.
"Are you kidding me?" shouted Claudius, exasperated. "Go, John, go! To Gangdrup!"
John instantly began to hobble through the muck. "Follow me," he yelled back over his shoulder. The reeds swayed as he ran by them. Josef followed after, his bare feet pressing into shore's sludge. He looked around as he ran, trying to understand what they were running from.
"What is it? Where is it?" Josef asked, turning all about in twelve directions while he ran. All he could see were a few misty clouds.
"It's a sweetwind," said Claudius hurriedly. He spoke while pressing John forward. "They came with the 6th Conjoining, when the world of Yenasha decided to join The Gentle Void's ambit. Most agree it was one of the worst. In its effects both short-term and long-term."
"But why are we running from it?" Josef asked as he ran with them.
"I'm not taking us through the sewers," John stated. "It's too dangerous. We'll take the caves."
Claudius grabbed John's ravaged black cloak. "We take the quickest route."
"I thought you wanted the goo-drinker to live?" John snarled back. "If we take the sewers we'll be trapped if the Ba'ha Company finds us. We won't have Hilgooth's speed to save us."
"We take the quickest route," repeated Claudius. Josef understood why. No one was yet looking for them. Gupnit, in the worst case, was still barrelling through the meadow. In the best case, he was sitting where they'd left him writing out an apology note to Kipfish, or perhaps even throwing his luck in with Boojaw and ditching the company entirely. John didn't need to know this.
John cast a glance at Josef, whose face remained stoic.
"Alright," the sewerman said, "don't say I didn't warn you. This way then. We'll take the lower run." John then traced his finger through the night air, pointing first at the sewer exit they'd come through until he arrived at a jumble of boulders in the distance. "There."
John then sprinted ahead, his body shifting around awkwardly due to the rope around his chest. They had no time to waste. Speeding along, they flew past the edge of the pond and then ran across a wide, dusty, and red stone walkway. It bordered the jutting cliff face and contained splintered boulders littering the ground like fallen pastries. Josef realized some must've fallen from the very top of the Ba'ha Grotto's cliffs.
"Sweetwinds, by the way, are rolling, misty clouds" Claudius said, panting, and finally addressing Josef's question, "If you stare at one for more than a few moments you'll see they have a slight glimmer. Silver sweetwinds are considered the worst, by some, because they're difficult to spot. John here thankfully has a good eye, but not a good heart."
John turned slightly as he ran. He'd heard Claudius comment. "You destroyed my Hilgooth. My father's vessel, fishman! Multiple Ba'ha regiments pursued you, and they'd spotted you through a near-seer! Which you only obliged to tell me after the fact! " John shouted back at them as he ran ahead. He was enraged. But Josef was having none of it.
"600 gold chunks!" Josef screamed at him. "Admit you, you did it for the money!"
"Were you going to buy me a new boat, goo-drinker?" returned John, nearly stumbling over a red rock as he ran. Josef remained silent. He had no money. It was true, though he had asked Claudius if they should be pay him more
"As I thought, as I thought," said John slowly. "I did what I had to. I admit it, I feel shame. But remember, it was you who brought the danger to me!"
Josef was still indignantly pissed at the sewerman for betraying them, but he understood why he'd done it. He still hated him for it, and it still hurt. His betrayal almost saw him become a brainsnake sock puppet.
Josef continued to run amongst the smashed boulders. He resisted looking at the moons. He couldn't control Moonsneeze. All he could do was make sure he got to Gangdrup as quickly as he could.
Instead, he searched again for the silver sweetwind. "What does the colour have to do with it?" he asked, turning his head to look for the cloud as he ran.
Finally, he saw it on his third try — a supple glimmer-sheen buried within a low-hanging sky-mist. It was roiling above The Crow Meadow.
"Silver sweetwinds are notorious for one thing," explained Claudius. "If you breathe in its wind, you become nearly mad. Whatever you're feeling in that moment becomes amplified five times. Everyone reacts differently depending on their disposition, but it twists everyone's mind at least a bit. And, of course, it's Moonsneeze right now so they're even more powerful."
"One crept up on us in a sewer tunnel one time," John said. "I saw it as it entered. Tried to call out but it was too late. Watched a fellow ferryman rip a heirloom necklace from a woman's throat as soon as he sniffed its breeze. He apparently was jealous of her wealth. Took him a few hours to come back to himself, but the entire time he never stopped clutching the necklace."
Josef almost crashed into a boulder, but he swivelled his hips and avoided it. He kept glancing at silver cloud and then, without him even being aware, his gaze would drift over to the ten moons and their swirling prismatic flow.
He was anxious. The Moonsneeze configuration appeared to be breaking apart. His arm was also getting tired from carrying the sword, but he did his best to keep up with Claudius and John.
"Down here," said John, nodding to a dirt path that dove between two small plateaus. They followed the path down. It swerved twice, right and then left, and then opened into a narrow gulch. Sewer water flowed in front of them. Josef traced its flow back to its source and saw the sewer water gushing out from a jumble of boulders just to their right.
"This is it," John said. "These are the boulders I pointed to."
"It's collapsed," Claudius cried out, throwing up his hands. "Someone needs to report this. A Ba'ha maintenance teams needs to get on this on the double. This is despicable. How are we supposed to get through?"
John didn't pay Claudius's outburst any attention. Instead he bumbled forward, the rope still wrapped around his body.
Josef recoiled. The smell of the sewer brought back a wave of unpleasant memories. Gujai. Muck. Teleportation. Gujai. He was about to ask if there was another way to Gangdrup but he checked himself.
John jerked his head towards a small black hole within the jumble of rocks. Josef saw right away it was too cramped to walk through. They'd have to crawl. The hole seemed to run parallel to the sewer flow emerging from underneath the rock pile, but it was difficult to tell.
"Josef, how are you—"
"I'm fine, Claudius," Josef replied, interrupting him. "Are you fine?"
Claudius blew out a long breath of air, placed his hands on his head. "I just never imagined I'd—well, we'd make it this far. If I told Malark, he'd never believe me. I'm just getting a little worked up. Don't mind me."
"I'm glad this is so thrilling for you," replied Josef mildly. "By the way your description of Moonsneeze was spot on."
Claudius bowed.
John tapped his foot. "Are you two done? I understand I'm the prisoner here, and I've done you in a bad way, but I don't relish seeing Josef lad combust in front of me."
"I suppose you want us to untie you," Claudius said while staring at the rope restraining John.
"If you want me to lead you through the lower sewers, then yes. You'll need to untie me, fishman. I have nothing against either of you. With Hilgooth damaged, I needed the gold chunks." John looked at the ground as he spoke, seemingly both ashamed and exhausted.
A short silenced followed. Josef could hear the soft trickle of the sewer slithering out from underneath the rocks. The silver cloud still hovered in the sky. He seemed penitent and they didn't really have a choice.
Josef gave in. "Just untie him. We don't have time to waste. We need to get to Gangdrup as quickly as possible or else I'm toast."
John gave a snappy bow and hopped towards Claudius, presenting the rope's knot to the Sea Gwell.
But Josef strode forward and hacked off the knot's nub and then pointed John towards the hole. "Go."
"Direct and efficient. A goo-drinker you are," Claudius said, climbing into the hole after John.
Josef shook his head and climbed after the two of them. "What does that even mean?" Inside the tunnel it was dark, wet, and the rocks they crawled upon were sharp and uneven.
"It means you have goomp!"
"Goomp? That sounds like a kind of molasses," Josef replied, cringing as a jagged rock nuzzled into his soft palm.
"Actually," Claudius said, "it's the complete opposite. It's one of the most prized qualities about goo-drinkers, or at least the most well known."
Josef's curiosity was piqued. "Opposite of molasses you say. So speedy and quick?" Josef replied while keeping his head low. They'd lost the light from Moonsneeze when they'd climbed into the rocks. It was now nearly pitch black.
"Not precisely, but it can appear that way. Goomp is the word in the Lush Heap for one's capacity to act both courageously and efficiently. The Ba'ha Company likes to focus its energies on training their goo-drinkers for the efficiency component."
"Is this what John meant back in the sewers when he was talking about the revolutionary and the founder?"
"Precisely." Claudius said in response.
Josef's mind was once again spinning in every direction. He focused on avoiding smashing his face into a rock wall, but he also wanted to know more. "What do you mean when you say goomp is one of the more well known qualities. Are you saying there are others?"
"We've quickly reached the limits of my knowledge, dear Josef. I've heard things, but only whisper and hearsay, and often from people who can tell a very tall tale."
Josef listened, but he was sure Claudius wasn't telling him everything he knew. Josef promised himself if he made it through this Moonsneeze to interrogate Claudius later on. Up ahead, a shimmer of soft light flickered into view.
John shouted from the front. "You goo-drinkers are notorious shit-disturbers. Mal's only ratified one goo-drinker the entire time I've lived in Gangdrup. Ended up going on a recruiting spree and sailing for the Whiskwind Isles with some high-hitched plan."
"Agh!" Claudius cried out. "Damn rocks are everywhere. One just jabbed into my gills. But did I hear you correctly, John? I didn't know the Ba'ha Company ever made use of Mal for ratification?"
"It wasn't the Ba'ha Company's goo-drinker," replied the sewerman, grunting as he raised himself to his feet, exiting the small crawlspace. Josef watched as Claudius hesitated for one moment before leaving the hole.
Josef knew why. He'd had the same thought. John could've easily bashed away at their skulls when they crawled out.
But the sewerman was waiting patiently for them to emerge. "Welcome to the lower sewers," John said, sweeping out his hand.
Josef saw the torches down here were far fewer. The same sewer muck glugged by them, but the width of the sewer line had narrowed. With a good run, he could almost clear it entirely. But he wasn't about to test his luck. His run-in with the fallen tree back in the meadow was still fresh in his mind.
John marched forward and then leapt into a jog. Josef appreciated the hustle and darted after him. Without even intending to do so, his hand came up to his head and pushed itself through his damp black hair.
He'd been so close to ratification at The Crow Meadow. For a split second, when he'd first decided to stop the process, he'd felt his world, his life, collapsing in on itself. He'd almost lied back down out of fear.
But immediately after, and even now, he could feel a rising strength flowing from his decision — he'd looked past what seemed necessary and done what was right. What he felt was right. But would he come to regret it?
Josef shouted Claudius's name. "Can the sweetwind follow us inside here?"
"Sweetwinds can go anywhere," Claudius explained, "but they don't last long after they plummet down to the ground. That's when they're truly dangerous. You'll know you're in for it when you can smell sugar. That sweet strangeness."
Josef saw his first gujai of the lower sewers. It looked just like the rest, except even fatter and its mucus-coating even more robust. If Josef had a pebble, he would've chucked it straight at its wretched face.
But then he stumbled. He felt his brain fogging up. Everything was slipping towards a misty whiteness. He stopped running and leaned against the damp wall and then slumped down to the sewer floor. He was nauseous, confused, terrified. Was Moonsneeze over? Was this?
He heard John's voice. "Is this…"
Claudius said nothing, until finally, "Josef?"