Bert’s wagon was quite a bit bumpier than her carriage, but the view was so much better. Instead of only being able to look out the side window, she was able to look forwards, sideways, and even backward if she wanted to turn around. It made the city look busier, with more people than she was used to seeing.
The first part of the trip out of the nobles’ housing district was pretty dull. Just street after street of houses with the occasional park or horse barn. But after they made it down to the shopping district Maril started to get excited. Although she had been to the shopping district before and had ridden through it in her carriage many times, it was a completely different experience perched on the bench of the Hinkleton’s wagon.
The row of shops had bright signs and colorful displays in the windows. Other wagons and some carriages rode down the street with pedestrians milling around them. Occasionally they passed a street vendor selling food or small trinkets.
Partway down the main street, they pulled off into a side street. Bert pulled the wagon to a stop as soon as they were out of the way of the pedestrians walking down the row of shop windows. Before Maril thought to ask if they were there, Bert leapt off the wagon and began tying the two ponies to a hook on the wall of the building.
“This is the first shop. Let me tie up the ponies and then, if you will wait here a second, I’ll go see where they want us to put the crates.”
As soon as he stopped talking Bert disappeared through half of a double door that looked like it was a side door to a shop on the main street. Maril looked around. The wagon was just off the main shopping street. This smaller street still had nice looking shops with bright displays in their windows. But the street was more in shadow since it was narrower and there were no street vendors or other wagons and much fewer pedestrians.
After just a few seconds Bert came back out the door and said, “He says we can leave them just inside the door. Would you mind handing the five crates with the blue hammer painted on them to me?”
Maril climbed over the back of the seat into the wagon bed and noticed, for the first time, that some of the crates had small blue hammers painted on the sides. The other crates had a purple book painted on them.
She slid the first crate over to the side of the wagon. Between her in the wagon bed and Bert standing beside the short wagon, they were able to lift the crate out and Bert carried it through the door.
A few crates later Bert came out of the shop with a piece of paper, “Delivery complete!” he said waving the paper. He put the paper into his satchel, being careful not to wrinkle it. “On to Leo’s Item Collection,” he said cheerfully.
Bert untied the ponies and carefully began leading them in a tight U-turn to get out of the side street. Maril suddenly realized that she didn’t know where Owen had gone with her carriage. He definitely wouldn’t have been able to make the U-turn that Bert was doing. After the wagon got turned around she saw Owen and her carriage stopped at the edge of the wider main street. She waved at him.
After waiting for a break in the walking people, mostly humans with a scattering of elves and gnomes, Bert pulled the wagon back onto the street and they continued. A few streets later he stopped in front of a tiny shop with a bright purple door, trim, and awning. Lettering on the only front window said Leo’s Item Collection.
“Would you mind holding the ponies’ lead? There isn’t a good place to tie them here.”
“Sure,” Maril said jumping down from the wagon with Bert. She held the small ponies’ lead while Bert picked up a crate and carried it into the shop. Looking back down the street she saw Owen and the carriage right behind the wagon. The door of the carriage opened. Owen startled and leaned over to look around the side of the carriage.
The two gnome sisters climbed down the stairs from the tall carriage. Owen hurried down from the driver’s seat and around to help them, but they still made it to the ground before he got there.
Maril smiled remembering when she had had the boundless energy of a twenty-something young gnome.
Maril watched as they thanked Owen and skipped over to the bright purple door. One of them opened the door and they had a brief shoving match before they settled, leaning in the door. Maril snorted but managed to avoid laughing out loud. It looked like the sisters had at one point been instructed to not enter the shop. They were both leaning as far as possible into the shop, each hanging from a hand clinging to the side of the doorframe. But their feet were still outside the threshold. She could hear them calling for Bert.
He came out, shooing them ahead of him.
“We are going to the dress store,” Hanna said, pointing to a shop a little ahead of where they had stopped the wagon.
“Wait,” Bert said, reaching to grab Jenna’s arm as both girls began to dash off, “Message mom first. Right now, before you leave,” He continued, interrupting Jenna’s stuttered complaints, “You know I will be in trouble if you say you will do it later and then forget. So do it now before you go.”
Jenna glared for a few seconds more but then pulled a small square of wood out of her bag and returned to fishing in the bag until she found her writing stick. Hanna was mimicking her movements in her own small cloth drawstring sack on a shoulder strap.
After a few quick scribbles on the wood, Jenna held it up in Bert’s face, “There are you happy?” she asked.
Bert nodded and Jenna ran off. Hanna trailed after her, the younger girl writing more meticulously on her square of wood.
“What was that about?” Maril asked as Bert came over to the wagon.
Bert sighed, “My dad made a really neat letter sender for my mom. Half of it is bound to a letter sender that he carries, the other half is divided into six squares, I and each of my siblings had a square that matches with it. But for some reason, it is difficult to convince Jenna to use hers sometimes.”
Maril looked over her shoulder to the shop the girls had gone in to, “So they can just wander around wherever they want as long as they let your mom know where they are?”
Bert shrugged, “Not anywhere, they have to stay near the shop where my mom works,” he gestured farther down the street, “But yeah, they go wherever near here. Let me carry in the rest of these crates, I’ll be right back.”
A few minutes later they climbed back on the seat of the empty wagon. “Okay, let’s go drop off the wagon and we will be ready to go to the city wall,” he grinned at her as the wagon pulled away from Leo’s Item Collection, “I am so excited to go up on the wall.”
She shook her head, “It is just an assignment. Don’t be depressed if it isn’t that interesting.”
“The view from the top of the wall is going to be awesome and I am sure it is more interesting than you are admitting,” Bert said as he slowed the wagon to let pedestrians pass so he could pull into the next side street. “Hey, would you mind opening the gate there on the left?” he said pointing to a wide gate in the wall.
Maril jumped down from the wagon and hurried over the gate.
After a brief pause while she tried to figure out how to activate the magic that held the smooth paneled gate closed, Bert said “Pull that string near the middle, it opens the latch on the inside.”
Maril pulled the string and both sides of the gate began to swing away from her. Pushing open one side of the gate she walked into a courtyard. The cobbled stone of the street gave way to a dirt path between grass and garden beds full of flowers, herbs, and vegetables. There were even a few trees that she hadn’t been able to see over the tall gate.
“The family that owns the shop my mom works at lives above their shop, this is their garden.”
“Wow,” Maril said, “This is definitely not what I expected on the other side of that plain gate.” She backed up a little more so Bert could get the wagon all the way into the courtyard. She leaned over a berry bush to inspect a trellis against the wall that was covered in a vine adorned with hundreds of tiny orange flowers.
Bert unhooked the wagon from the ponies but left them harnessed to each other. He tied their lead to a post near a trough of water.
“Let me run inside and tell my mom we dropped off the wagon and we will be ready to go.” Bert grabbed his bag off the wagon and went through the back door of the shop.