Five Ways
Subscribe to my newsletter and get a free story!
Share this:

Documents of Tabat: An Instructive and Useful Listing of the Chal Shops of Tabat

What are the documents of Tabat? In an early version of the book, I had a number of interstitial pieces, each a document produced by the city: playbills, advertisements, guide book entries. They had to be cut but I kept them for this purpose. I'll release them at the end of April in e-book form; careful readers will find clues to some aspects of Beasts of Tabat in them. -Cat
What are the documents of Tabat? In an early version of the book, I had a number of interstitial pieces, each a document produced by the city: playbills, advertisements, guide book entries. They had to be cut but I kept them for this purpose. I’ll release them at the end of April in e-book form; careful readers will find clues to some aspects of Beasts of Tabat in them. -Cat


An Instructive and Informative Listing of the Chal Shops of Tabat, being Pamphlet #4 of the second series of “A Visitor’s Guide to Tabat”, Spinner Press, author unknown.

While in Tabat, the visitor will want to try the drink it’s famous for: chal, salty fish and seaweed mixed with strong black tea in what is admittedly an acquired taste. The abundance of such establishments supplies the city dwellers with places to exchange thoughts and news. Many chal houses pride themselves on the antiquity of their brews, which may be years, decades, or in at least one case, centuries old.

Located at the edge of Salt and the Serpentine, the Dancing Cup hosts students from the nearby College of Mages. Go here to catch a glimpse of them showing off new spells and minor magics, particularly in the open air of the back courtyard. Their house chal is over a hundred years old, but they offer many variants, including cider and other fruit drinks. Open all hours.

Two chal shops near Tabat’s Arena are renowned: the Blade’s Savor and Berto’s. The fierce rivalry between the two often leads to free chal for customers willing to switch allegiance. Both shops frequently sponsor gladiators, many of which can be found drinking in one or the other. Bella Kanto and the majority of the Brides of Steel school can be found in Berto’s. These are the only shops you’ll find open during Tabat’s Games. Open all hours.

The Salty Purse, situated a block from the docks on Trade Way, claims a chal of over 200 years provenance, and serves only that, along with ship’s hardbread, doing a hearty business in the former, if not the latter. Open all hours.

In Tabat’s small theater district, actors and wealthy theatergoers favor the Fuchsia and Heron. The most expensive shop in the city, it subsidizes actors’ tabs and even pays a few to patronize it, ensuring a steady flow of Tabat’s most glittering figures. Open from the last afternoon bell till the last night bell only.

***

Love the world of Tabat and want to spend longer in it? Check out Hearts of Tabat, the latest Tabat novel! Or get sneak peeks, behind the scenes looks, snippets of work in progres, and more via Cat’s Patreon.

#sfwapro

6 Responses

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Get Fiction in Your Mailbox Each Month

Want access to a lively community of writers and readers, free writing classes, co-working sessions, special speakers, weekly writing games, random pictures and MORE for as little as $2? Check out Cat’s Patreon campaign.

Want to get some new fiction? Support my Patreon campaign.
Want to get some new fiction? Support my Patreon campaign.

 

"(On the writing F&SF workshop) Wanted to crow and say thanks: the first story I wrote after taking your class was my very first sale. Coincidence? nah….thanks so much."

~K. Richardson

You may also like...

Sentence from Today's WIP, The Super Hero and the Coffee Goddess

...

The Inevitable Award Post

I have been noticing a lot of these over the last couple of months, and I was going to skip it, but then I was totting up the publications from last year, and I’m proud of the fact that I had 19 stories published.

They are all either short story or flash (Swallowing Ghosts, Futures, Lost in Drowsy Dreams, The Forbidden Stitch) and are eligible for various short story awards. There’s some favorites from last one (marked with *), but the one I’m hoping will get some notice is “Long Enough and Just So Long” which appeared in Lightspeed in February, 2011.

Here are links to the online stuff:

Long Enough and Just So Long – Lightspeed, SF

Love, Resurrected – Beneath Ceaseless Skies, fantasy
Pippa’s Smiles, Swallowing Ghosts – Daily Science Fiction, fantasy
Bots d’Amor – Abyss & Apex, SF
Karaluvian Fale – Giganotasaurus, fantasy
Whose Face This Is I Do Not Know – Clarkesworld, horror? sf? fantasy?
The Immortality Game – Fantasy Magazine, fantasy
TimeSnip – Basement Stories, sf
Lost in Drowsy Dreams and The Forbidden Stitch -10 Flash , fantasy
Futures – The Dream People, sf? fantasy?
Zeppelin Follies – last issue Crossed Genres, sf

I am happy to send the stories not available online to anyone reading for Hugos, Nebulas, Tiptree etc. They are:
Close Your Eyes – Apex Magazine, horror
A Frame of Mother-of-Pearl – Intergalactic Medicine Show, fantasy
A Querulous Flute of Bone – Tales From the Fathomless Abyss, sf
Flicka – Subversions, sf
The Coffeemaker’s Passion – Bull Spec, fantasy
Aquila – Shadows and Light II, sf

...

Skip to content