Chapter 4-1

The three of them didn’t bother leaving Linebar immediately. They had no idea which direction to go in, and Linebar was a nice enough dutchy, if a bit old fashioned. The result was an impromptu war council held in a small room in the local inn, the Name’s Noun. (Apparently it was a chain.) The room was old, and a crack in the wall let a chill wind through, but it was at least tidy and had some furiously jury-rigged plumming.

“Okay, so that? Can never happen again,” said Anjanette. “Any suggestions as to how?”

“Well, I really think that we should use more reliable sources,” suggested Milly.
“I mean, instead of guys in bars, we should be looking at news reports, seeing if there are any reports of what’s going on. If we research we might be able to find the history of the books as well, which would give us a place to start—“

“Too long, too boring,” said Anjanette. “Leonas, do you have any suggestions?”

“Well, Milly’s right in general, but her method would take a lot of legwork,” said Leonas. “I guess we could do it magically... an augury would do the trick.”

Anjanette beamed. “Well, why didn’t we do that in the first place?” Leonas started to answer, but Anjanette cut him off. “Yeah yeah, only use magic when absolutely necessary, yada yada. Now whose soul do I have to sell for decent info?”

Leonas shrugged. “The traditional spell involves gutting some animals. Nothing fancy... some sort of bird is a must, maybe a goat, and a cat would be good.”

“Consider them gutted,” said Anjanette.

* * *

The farm hummed with the buzz of rural nothingness. Crickets chirped, and Anjanette swore she heard some tumbleweed blow by in the dark night. She remembered many nights on her home farm, staring out at this same unchanging landscape, too bored to sleep. A large red barn sat slumped over in the dark, a house lurking in its shadow.

Of course, back then Anjanette didn’t have a bludgeoned stray cat slung over her shoulder. She snuck through the long, browning grass to the chicken coop, where a few of the chickens were wandering around, doing whatever it was chickens did to pass the time. She grabbed the nearest one and plucked it out. It only got a single squawk out before she neatly snapped its neck.

“Okay, now all we need is a goat...” she said to herself. “It’ll be a bitch to carry, but one solid hit to the head and it should be out, entrails in tact.”

She was halfway to the goat pen when a torch caught her. She glanced up to see a lanky pubescent boy, covered in pimples and tan, gawking at her. “What are yah doing on mah farm?” he said, his rural drawl unmistakable.

“Um, stealing some animals,” Anjanette said.

“Aw,” he said, not expecting that response. “Uh... don’t. Or I’ll hafta fight you, even if I hate fighting girls.”

She sighed. “I wanted to do this the easy way, but you had to make me do it the hard way.”

Anjanette whipped her top off.

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