It is little more than a wide spot in the road; certainly naming it "plaza" would imply a grandness undeserved. Only several hundred yards long, and perhaps as wide as a goodly building, the area has been a quick hand in the mutual pickpocketing that is WestEnd commerce for generations. Most call if The Gizzard.
The name is apt, for it is animal life, most of it fowl (and more of it foul, as well), that is traded here. Chickens and ducks, turkey and geese, small handballs of huddled quail, even four and twenty blackbirds should you want them. Most are packed tightly into cages of bamboo or wicker, open at the bottom to allow the hot stream of defecation egress. The ammonia reek is everywhere, the very cobblestones buried under generations of guano that even the heaviest of summer thunderstorms can only stir to a thick muck.
Poultry are not alone among the animals offered by the Gizzard's hucksters. Legendary creatures, beasts of magic, can be had; both the wondrous real and gross imposters only fit to fool the most na've of eyes. Unicorns whose storied beauty shines through the filth and matting of their coats are sold side by side with ponies whose brow horns"implanted with the crudest of surgeries"will only remain until the violated flesh around them succumbs to rot. Many of these, true wonder or weary counterfeit, have walked in hobbles for so long that the flesh above their hooves is red and wet.
More horrible than these bindings, perhaps, and more disturbing than the birds packed in crushing cages, are the creatures that have been spellbound, and thus require no material restraint. They do not move, not even to blink their eyes, but in the black depths of frozen pupil you can see the brute terror that begs to scream its way free.
It is a place of horror and stink and the fertile interbreeding of disease. Little wonder, then, that those who frequent the Gizzard tend to do so masked, with thicknesses of cloth, often scented, covering the face below the eyes. For this reason, there are those who have naught to do with the buying or selling of bird or beast who can also be found here.
One of these moves among the stalls today. Her boots, though of delicate manufacture, apparently not a matter for concern as she ignores their care as she splashes and slides through the worst of the Gizzard's puddles. After perhaps an hour of wandering from cage to creature, our curious shopper encounters another, a small man whose clothing marks him as a regular here. Business seems to be done, but rather than furred or feathered creature only a slip of paper with an address scrawled upon it is given in exchange for the yellow coins she spills into his palm.
She keeps her mask in place as she leaves the Gizzard, only removing it when the lack of such gear among others in the lanes threatens to draw unwanted attention to it. Her features remain mostly hidden by a deep hood, with only a wedge of honey-colored hair swinging free at each side of her shadowed face. It is unlikely that any in WestEnd would recognize her, but she is a cautious thing, and keeps the hood up until she disappears into housing prearranged for her. There is time to rest before another night falls, and things to begin when it does.
The name is apt, for it is animal life, most of it fowl (and more of it foul, as well), that is traded here. Chickens and ducks, turkey and geese, small handballs of huddled quail, even four and twenty blackbirds should you want them. Most are packed tightly into cages of bamboo or wicker, open at the bottom to allow the hot stream of defecation egress. The ammonia reek is everywhere, the very cobblestones buried under generations of guano that even the heaviest of summer thunderstorms can only stir to a thick muck.
Poultry are not alone among the animals offered by the Gizzard's hucksters. Legendary creatures, beasts of magic, can be had; both the wondrous real and gross imposters only fit to fool the most na've of eyes. Unicorns whose storied beauty shines through the filth and matting of their coats are sold side by side with ponies whose brow horns"implanted with the crudest of surgeries"will only remain until the violated flesh around them succumbs to rot. Many of these, true wonder or weary counterfeit, have walked in hobbles for so long that the flesh above their hooves is red and wet.
More horrible than these bindings, perhaps, and more disturbing than the birds packed in crushing cages, are the creatures that have been spellbound, and thus require no material restraint. They do not move, not even to blink their eyes, but in the black depths of frozen pupil you can see the brute terror that begs to scream its way free.
It is a place of horror and stink and the fertile interbreeding of disease. Little wonder, then, that those who frequent the Gizzard tend to do so masked, with thicknesses of cloth, often scented, covering the face below the eyes. For this reason, there are those who have naught to do with the buying or selling of bird or beast who can also be found here.
One of these moves among the stalls today. Her boots, though of delicate manufacture, apparently not a matter for concern as she ignores their care as she splashes and slides through the worst of the Gizzard's puddles. After perhaps an hour of wandering from cage to creature, our curious shopper encounters another, a small man whose clothing marks him as a regular here. Business seems to be done, but rather than furred or feathered creature only a slip of paper with an address scrawled upon it is given in exchange for the yellow coins she spills into his palm.
She keeps her mask in place as she leaves the Gizzard, only removing it when the lack of such gear among others in the lanes threatens to draw unwanted attention to it. Her features remain mostly hidden by a deep hood, with only a wedge of honey-colored hair swinging free at each side of her shadowed face. It is unlikely that any in WestEnd would recognize her, but she is a cautious thing, and keeps the hood up until she disappears into housing prearranged for her. There is time to rest before another night falls, and things to begin when it does.