"'Bout as ya'd expect, lordin' over us with their pig snouts pointin' at Yerta's navel. But I seen 'em tie on different togs when they come wantin' somethin'. Then it's all "How are you today, Mister Frummagem?" and "We admire what you do here" and "Ain't your whores the prettiest in town?" Da hates all've 'em. He hates 'em more than anyone else. The angriest I ever seen Da is when the toffs come to hire us and all the while they're cuttin' him or us real sly like, thinkin' we're too stoopid to know what they really mean behind what they're sayin'. But Da, he knows and he makes sure I know, and he tells me all the time one day he'll be one've 'em and he'll be doin' the cuttin' and holdin' up his nose and walkin' by the shops like he never shat or broke wind or spit on the ground a day in his life."

"Sneaksy. Tailsplosion. Beautifulnessgorgeoustastical. Can ya do a word longer'n that, zombie-face?"

I stand defeated.

"You're... grey. Vexing. Tall."

All right. That could have gone much worse.

My sanity relies on the belief that the utter ruination of my flesh would at last release me to some other state. When the time comes that neither my arts nor my mechanical tinkering can keep me upright and functional I shall light my own bier and test the hypothesis for myself.

"I would DIE!"

I am a skilled enough poet that I once oversaw a Temple and trained boys in pymary for a living; which is to say I was not a terribly skilled poet at all.

I will not do work that involves Gefendur scripture nor the disparaging of the Ssaelit faith or Alderode.

The reading and writing of correspondence and the duplication of legal documents are my chief occupations. Now and then there is a spot of translation work but that blackguard Josef Barnaby lured most of my clients away when he disparaged the quality of my Continental as "prosaic and tediously Aldish."

"He were right. We get back home though and you pay me and I'll get some lads together and we'll shave his dogs and egg his shop."

...we'll talk.

I would treat them like a man. Too well do I realise that this state is a punishment; and it is a punishment exquisite enough that it need not be exacerbated by the harsh treatment of the remainder of the world.

"Wrights can make things unsmellable which is why I don't trust wrights far as I can punt 'em. All things have smells, even clean things have smells. I tried to explain to granny once but she got cross and thought I was sayin' she needed more baths. It ain't wrong to smell!"

The Rachshanians do something similar, I have heard, using some daft and convoluted interpretation of certain Gefendur scriptural passages to convince the population that pymary is a moral crime. It's put them at a martial disadvantage that they have purportedly counteracted with a focus on machinery and the natural philosophies. I suspect if Cresce was not terrified of splitting its forces it might have invaded Rachshane decades ago.

Without hesitation. Second to aiding others, we are given our lives to enrich our spirits and explore and discover this strange and wondrous world. No opportunity to cross uncrossed thresholds or scale unscaled heights ought to be ignored.

"How come you're always yellin' at me for wantin' to explore then?!"

Because all you wish to explore are the insides of strangers' pockets, squirrel.

Not to my recollection but there was an Aldish sailor who frequently would dip into my shop so that I might proofread his tattoos.

Beautiful countryside. The ruthlessness of the local criminal element has been surprising.

"Hicks and cops everywhere, I miss home."

"Duane don't smell of nawt BUT pymary. He's got his rotten bits all blocked off from smellin', it's unnatural and not right."

Would you rather that fragrance up you nostrils then? It would trouble me little to have one less blasted enchantment to maintain.

"Puh, I don't give a dog's ball whatcha do. Your pymary stink ain't no worse'n awt else's, but I'm used to it. Boo's stink is all right too. Both of 'em smell similar like... like an apple left out in the sun but also poo. Slightly off apple and poo, aye."

Of course it would not.

I could throw my eyes at individuals.

"Cor, that's true. Have ya ever?"

No, but imagining the act has kept me from otherwise braining with my staff many a mutton-headed client in my scrivening shop.

It indeed has an effect. The lines stabilize the further into the earth one travels, meaning one enjoys a much farther range and can load a greater quantity of Aspects into the lines at once rather than the customary technique of splitting them into packets and storing them in the ports of the hands. This effect continues to a point, and then the stability reverses - the lines become TOO thick. A typical surface line is the breadth of a strand of vliegeng mane, allowing for precision strikes. When that breadth swells to the size of a human finger, then a sausage, then a birch trunk, you can no longer control precisely where in space Aspects will exit.

Further into the earth the lines grow unwieldy, then, and the khert exercises its Laws in an increasingly unpredictable manner. It is dangerous to travel too deep.

I prefer not to enchant or involve any weapon on my person in a pymaric assault. A hiccough of the khert and your weapon may be damaged or destroyed, leaving you bereft one sizable option. Better to alternate pymary with melee, an effective combination against foes so accustomed to wrights have little martial ability.

I have no idea.

I have wondered what that extra sense is like - what man denied it hasn't? But I suppose, in a way, it is as futile as wondering what it is Sette imagines she smells when she says she senses pymary.

"I don't imagine it, I do smell it! Some pymary smells like shuttin' your tail in a door and some pymary smells like purple and some pymary smells like slime."

That clears the matter up entirely, thank you.