Finally finally FINALLY I got to smoke and eat everything I wanted! Unfortunately, a consequence of this (big words makes it seem like you’re actually sorry about things) is that my journal from the last some days – to be specific the 9th and 10th days of November and the first bits of November 11 – doesn’t make lots of sense. Or doesn’t make much sense if you think the point is to remember what happened in order, but makes lots of sense if you like drawings and words like “foogle” and “jabe” and “moxx”. So, using my tracking skills on FACTS, I found out what actually happened and mixed it in with the funny stuff so that I don’t have to figure out what wet feathers and a picture of a cake-sheep made out of tiny ink dots has to do with anything. Slanty writing means the stupidest stuff that I was actually thinking and feeling at the time.
November 9, 7pm – In Jacob’s Boat
We spent all day just at the beach and hanging around, and now, as usual, we are sitting in Jacob’s boat, but NOT as usual, I’m allowed to smoke the little white cigar! Biter is too! All we feel is great and very snackish. After a much more enjoyable kind of “what should we do now” talk, we decide to go to get ladies, food and drinks and cookies. Jake is worried about if the “classy” ladies here will like his top, so we decide to get him a nice shirt on our relaxed adventure. I remember being really excited about getting some cookies; Ed wouldn’t let me have the ones that Jake kept trying to give me. Jon and Ed fill our little-big sack with bricks of herbs.
The first place we go is The Salty Gull, where Ben tells us that the best place to find girls that will hang out with us for free, and stores that will sell us delicious cookies, is to go to the uppity part of town. This place is called “The Park”. Ben also tells us that Prince Orin is having a party tonight, which is about as interesting as everything else that isn’t me eating cookies. If I hadn’t been so hungry I probably would have noticed that everyone was muttering about how much money we have.
On our stroll down to the nice area make me understand the word “contrast” very well, because everyone there is dressed in the same kind of material that the curtains in Willard’s study are made of. My tunic looks like sand. Ed goes up to two ladies with what Mom would have called “exotic” (“exotic” means “weird” in Mom) skins – light yellow and brown. They are beautiful enough for Abby to not like them without even talking to them. While I wait on the ground for everyone else to get there, Safin watches Ed talk to the ladies then says “Keep an eye on Edmund, I think he’s talking to royalty right now. See those guys flanking him?”. I don’t see them, because two of my eyes are busy looking for cookies and my third one is busy not existing. As Ed walks back, Safin says “Don’t break their hearts, they have guards”. While everyone is looking at the place where the girls used to be standing, Jake passes me one of his cookies and I shove it into my mouth like a snake about to swallow a rat. Unlucky for me, Ed sees this and tells me that if I swallow, the cookie will hurt Biter. I imagine a cookie putting Biter into his mouth whole, and spit out the snack so I can plan a drawing of this to help me explain it to Ed later.
Our quest for cookies keeps being interrupted by Ed inviting more girls to Pier 21 and giving them our cigarettes as invitations. On the most brightly lit and pretty street yet, Ed goes into a bakeshop that I choose by squashing my face against the window, and buys a box of cookies wrapped with a bow. Of course, I start eating them as soon as he gives them to me. They are almost as good as Mrs. Douglas’s chocolate cake. So that we all can impress the ladies at our party, we go into a shop called “Fanny’s Fine Vestments”, where they sell shirts with sleeves, too. Jake gets a soft white shirt, Abby one that laces up, and Ed gets a see-through magenta… thing for his top. They all look great, but I barely notice them because a lovely little bird is laughing at them and sitting on a hat! It’s the funniest thing I have ever seen ever, and I want that fancy hat for my head. Ed gets Safin to buy me the hat and we head back to the docks.
Once we are back on Jacob’s boat, well I don’t really remember that much, so who cares what exactly happened but eventually we go up and see Ed on the dock talking to a man dressed in “fancy as bird hat” clothes. His name is Liam. He is security for the yellow and brown (named Loxie) ladies Ed was talking to before. Liam must have been smoking and kind of stopped making sense for a while talking about the woman in the black and how she sees lots of men all the time and is… a disease or something? I don’t know. Then all invited the ladies swarm down the pier like a flock of jungle birds, but don’t worry, my hat bird isn’t jealous, and things get really crazy. People are naked in the water, getting all tangled together, and there’s smoke and drinks and what Safin calls a “faggity” man playing a lute. Biter and hat bird and me dance lights around the boat and dance so loud that the sun pokes up her pink head to tell us to go to bed.
November 10, 2pm – In pain and on Jacob’s boat
The sun stabs our eyes open and I hear Edward say “Hello”. We all run upstairs and Ed is having a little chat with a guy who looks so raggedy he could have been at our party last night. He looks like he was snuck up on, and mumbles that he “went to the wrong boat” or something, then leaves. Abby thinks he’s a pickpocket or something, and everyone forgets about him pretty quick because we have realized something very important – we are out of herbs. This is not that bad, because, after a frustrating conversation about distances and traveling times, and OH HELGA MY HEAD HURTS, Jacob tells us that the island in the distance (about 4h away) is where the plants are grown. There is a quick talk about going there today, but I grab my head in my hands and wish that there was a huge jug of ice and water right there because my mouth feels like it’s full of sap. I also find my scraggly bird hat at this time – she’s with Biter all nested in my hair. Since looking at my spidery writing makes my eyes burn, I am going to write the rest of our lazy day in point form.
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- Jacob was sleeping with Lisa (some naked girl) when we woke him up.
- We go eat at Ben’s.
- UHHHHHHHHHHHHH.
- Safin buys his armour at Links for 2700gp. The salesman heard there were princesses at our party. Big deal, I had a hat with a bird on it.
- Ed checks on Rouse, who is doing ok.
- Ed talks to Jana, who says Linnfaggity isn’t back yet.
- Liam comes to the boat during later afternoon armed with two guns and Lisa, who Jacob is in love with.
- Biter wakes up for like, 2 minutes.
- We buy very beautiful jewels for Mabel in the jewish quarter.
- People watch us all the time.
- Then we get to go to bed again.
November 11, 1am…ish – On the boat.
I was just sleeping, and then… NOT BECAUSE I HEAR STUPID SAFIN MOVING! Turns out he is trying to wake us up on purpose, so I shake my head in case Biter and I have to save the whole crew. I string my bow. Safin tells us there are 16 men in boats pulling our boat, then he and Edmund turn invisible and I hear the whispering words of Ed’s flying spell. A few tense moments pass. When I hear splintering noises and screaming outside, I know that Safin and Ed must have flown outside and done a mini “pirate village”. I lead Jake upstairs and he kind of freaks out when he sees all the wood in the water and a giant whale next to us in the water. Safin gives Jake some mushrooms that make him act even weirder than usual, and Jake goes to bed and tells us to wake him up when we’re at the island so that he can guide us to it safely. Oh yeah, we are headed in the direction of the herb island! The whale looks friendly, so I try to talk to it, but it’s not saying anything. Maybe it’s tired, like me. Everyone else must be tired, too, because Edmund, who is back too late to see the whale, allows me to have some of Jake’s mushrooms. While I melt for a few hours, everyone else talks about what to do with Jacob now that everyone in Quashie thinks he’s powerful or a millionaire (16 people for one guy!?). We decide we should leave to stay out of trouble.
It’s interesting that people never notice that all the knots in the wood of the boat have eyes, and only eye noteyece. All the rams are too busy being pink to notice, as usual, right? (I have a picture of sheep eating cake and honey from jars labeled “water” drawn under this). I’m never eating those things again.
Ed’s little servants are pushing our boat through the water, but since there’s a reef near the island we need a better way for getting into the harbour safely. Our invisible slaves make a harness and Ed transforms into the whale and pulls us safely into the dock. On the island there are little dark huts, and no people. To make sure Jake has money to stay away from Quashie long enough to be forgotten, Safin leaves him 500gp. We can’t leave yet, though, because Ed needs to get Vinnik (luckily Biter is being a necklace tonight). This takes a while because Vinnik is very fat. That is not the mushrooms talking, it is just the truth. After another night with no sleeping, we teleport back to Willard’s house, where it is 8am. We all go to bed, and it’s not the first time that real life was even crazier than my dreams.
