“Why is he still zero?” the giant asked threateningly.
It was the same raspy powerful voice I heard before falling asleep! Now I knew who it was!
Frodi gave a silent half-turn toward Happy. And he extended my bag, which a thin frail criminal promptly snatched. Deftly removing all my trophies, he announced:
“Fifty esses and thirty clays.”
“What kind of clays?” the animalistic giant asked shortly.
“Agility, herbalist and knife proficiency. Ten apiece,” The thin one reported back straight away.
The bearded man had no reaction, just stared gloomily at Frodi.
And Frodi lost all his friendliness and happiness, and snapped angrily:
“It looks like One-ear pulled one over on us. The kid can’t use esses.”
“Why the hell not?” the bearded man asked in surprise.
The right corner of Frodi’s lip slightly contracted. He always did that when I asked him stupid questions.
“The esses he earns are level one.”
I saw Frodi holding back a snotty comment by the skin of his teeth.
The bearded man cursed loudly.
“Looks like Knud might have known the little guy can’t ding,” my friend added fuel to the fire.
More like former friend now...
I stared at Frodi’s harsh and angry face and couldn’t tell where the happy jokester I had come to consider my best friend had gone. So in the end his good nature, happiness and openness was all fake?
My memories of the last few days all fell into place like pieces of a puzzle. So the club in Frodi’s hands back in the cave wasn’t just my imagination. This whole act was just something he put on to dazzle me so he could rob me as soon as I hit level one.
My former friend could sense my gaze, looked me in the eyes and gave a scathing smile.
“Nothing personal, kid. You’ll be smarter next time. Think of this as a learning experience. You’ll be thanking me one day.”
The prisoners other than the gloomy bearded guy all whinnied raucously. The scrawny one, throwing my knapsack at my feet, handed all my loot to the ringleader.
He tossed an animal gaze over me and barked:
“Leave him a couple esses. Let him buy himself some food. He’s gotta get back to work tomorrow.”
Chapter 7
I PICKED up the knapsack and squeezed the two experience essences they were “gracious” enough to let me keep, then left the barrack. Was I really that bothered by the lost loot? I don’t think so. I followed my father’s advice and he was right. Sure I was robbed flagrantly, but most of what I gathered was safely squirreled away in the cave.
To be frank, deep down I was prepared for this. Again thanks to my father’s lesson.
But alas, there was something else I was not prepared for... Being betrayed by a person I thought was my best friend... Yes, I understand I had only known Frodi a few hours, too little to consider him even a friend, much less a best friend... But still...
I was also struck by how insanely fast he was able to make me like and trust him. He was so good at it that I was about to help him out of peonage in good faith. It boggles the mind! What a trusting chump I am!
Seemingly, I said the last phrase out loud because I heard a quiet mocking voice behind me:
“Now that’s for sure. A real chump.”
I turned around sharply.
It was the beggar kid from before with his shock of black uncombed hair and gray wrinkled clothing. He had a joyful smile playing on his grimy face and there was understanding in his chestnut eyes along with, seemingly, sympathy. But I’ll try not to pay any attention to that. I’ve given him enough! Today Frodi had really taught me one of life’s most important lessons. From here on out, the only person I can trust is me.
“Don’t let it get to you. You’re not the first, not the last,” the boy said, wiping his nose on his dirty sleeve. “Frodi’s Charisma is sky high. Trusting dopes like you are easy pickings for him. You can’t even imagine all the people he left high and dry in the middle of nowhere. Honestly, that was why he bailed on the mines. But the way they took all your stuff, that’s bad. Next time try to tuck some of it away.”
It was hard to keep a straight face. I hope Crum didn’t notice.
“He didn’t get everything,” I finally spoke up. “He let me keep two experience essences.”
“Woah! Two esses! You’re a rich man! I wonder why Livid was feeling so generous?”
“Livid?” I asked.
“Yeah,” the kid nodded. “The big hairy guy. He’s the head honcho of that little operation. All the convicts work for him. Scary dude.”
“That’s for sure,” I agreed and shivered.
“And it’s rumored that he’s a werewolf,” Crum told me softly, looking around in fear.
“Oh yeah?!”
“I mean, you saw him. In a word, a beast. Did you see his eyes?”
“Uh huh,” I agreed and took a heavy sigh.
My stomach gave a loud involuntary groan.
“Hungry?” Crum asked understandingly.
“I could eat a horse!”
“You won’t be able to buy a horse for two esses around here...”
“So, you been living here long?” I interrupted him.
“Since the day I was born,” the kid nodded.
“You know how much everything costs?”
“You offend me.”
“Then I’ve got an offer. You help me turn my two essences into food and find me a place to spend the night and I’ll share my dinner with you. How does that sound?”
“Agreed!” A smile of satisfaction played across Crum’s grubby face.
As we shook hands, both of our stomachs gave a simultaneous groan.
* * *
On our way to the village, several times I praised myself for the good sense of having Crum help me find food.
I don’t know what my guide spent his tablets on exactly but he was a master negotiator, which led me to other thoughts.
But everything in its turn...
The first stop on Crum’s itinerary was someone named Glumb Duckgrass. A gaunt and unwelcoming old man, he raised chickens.
“Ahh... It’s you, little scallywag!” he rasped when he saw us in his gateway. “Who’s this you dragged to my home? Another shiftless layabout?”
“No, come on!” Crum exclaimed, throwing his hands up cartoonishly and quickly dashing forward. He was talking and didn’t kick us out right away. That means we have to get to business quickly.
“This is Eric,” the boy continued, pointing at me. “He works in the mine.”
And in a reassuring tone, at half volume, he added:
“He’s one of Livid’s.”
The old man’s face stretched out slightly in surprise. And Crum shot me a furtive wink and smile.
“Alright, sure,” said Glumb, finally having his surprise under control. “And what brought you two here?”
“Well, here’s the thing... Livid gave his man here a bonus for hard work. And we wanted to spend some of it on a couple items.”
As soon as Glumb heard the magic words “bonus” and “spend,” his face lit up. Well, as much as it could.
“Keep going!”
Crum didn’t keep him waiting.
“You see, honorable Glumb Duckgrass, my friend has a difficult job. Fraught with mortal danger. He comes back from the mines all tired and beat down. Plus he needs to rest well so he can eat well.”
“I see.”
“And how can you get good rest without a soft pillow and warm down comforter?”
“You can’t!” the old man exclaimed happily. “Look at my chickens, young men! They’re white-crested Orchusians! The down and feathers of this breed are used to fill the beds and pillows of our dear baron!”
I shot a glance at the sad scrawny birds and it was hard not to laugh. I wondered if this Glumb had even once seen real Orchusian chickens. They were three times the size of these emac
iated fowl.
“Excellent!” Crum feigned admiration and gave me another wink. “Then we would like to purchase some of your outstanding wares!”
“How will you be paying?” Glumb asked, shifting to a businesslike tone. “Copper or silver?”
“We wanted to make a trade,” Crum answered and, seeing his face cringe, immediately hurried to add:
“For experience essences.”
Glumb’s thin dry lips spread into a smile again. He looked happy. Oh, his little eyes were shimmering. He even rubbed his hands together despite himself. Seemingly the experience essences or, as they were also called here, “esses” were a perfectly valid instrument of exchange.
“How much of your feathers will you give us, for let’s say...” Crum pretended to think. “One... No... Hm... How about two esses?”
He said it all with a tone as if we had pockets full of esses.
Glumb’s eyes lit up greedily.
“One bale of high-quality feathers!” he shot out instantly and quickly added:
“That, by the way, is enough material for one comforter and one pillow!”
Even I, hardly a sophisticated negotiator, could understand this man was trying to pull one over on us. How obvious it must have been for Crum the ace.
“Yeah, we heard you, mister,” he said with a sour face and turned to me:
“Let’s go, Eric. Let’s see what we can get from Mr. Coalblack Thickman. I wonder how much he’ll offer us. They say when there’s a windstorm, he has to tie his chickens down so they don’t blow away. Can you picture how nice a pillow made of those feathers must be? Eh buddy?”
It hurt to look at Glumb. It seemed like every muscle was twitching on his gray wrinkled face. He was about to have a stroke!
“Two bales of feathers!” he shot out.
Crum pulled me to the exit for show.
“Three bales!” the old man shouted at our backs, nearly weeping.
My new acquaintance turned around. With a chuckle, he said:
“Three bales and ten fresh eggs.”
“Three bales and five eggs.”
“Let’s shake on it!”
* * *
Unbelievably satisfied with himself and even more with the effect it made on me, Crum said:
“Now let’s go see Mrs. Agneta.”
“And what’s she got?” I asked, curious and trying to catch up to the kid’s fast pace. And that was with him trying to compensate for my rough characteristics by walking slowly.
“Mrs. Agneta is a seamstress. Yesterday, I overheard that she got a big order from Wishstay, the innkeeper. I’d bet my own hand that she needs feathers and down for her new beds.”
“I see,” I said and asked a question I’d been wondering about for a while:
“Wouldn’t it be easier to go straight to the tavern or the inn and just have a nice calm dinner there? Then in the worst case, we can buy some provisions in a store.”
“No,” Crum shook his head. “It wouldn’t be. The tavern and the inn are owned by the same guy. As I already said, his name is Wishstay. That means the prices, as you understand, are the same. For a bowl of vegetable stew, which at most is worth three copper, he’d charge us seven or eight, maybe even a whole ten coins. Two stews would be twenty ‘bats’ at least.”
As I listened to Crum’s explanation, I distantly mulled over the fact that copper coins were also called “bats” in this part of Orchus. We also called them “flyers” for the same reason. It was all because the back side of a copper coin depicted the profile of Queen Aslog the Great, who was Duchess of Farmount before her marriage. The coat of arms of her father, Duke of Farmount, was emblazoned with a bat, it’s membranous wings spread to the sides. Queen Aslog died about twenty years ago, but in memory of her unpopular reign, people continued to call her a bat. And that nickname stuck to the copper coin bearing her image as well.
Meanwhile, Crum continued:
“One stew won’t be enough for both of us, so we’ll have to order a mushroom porridge, too. And that’ll be another twenty coins or so. Then add some bread and milk or berry drink... It all comes to around fifty or sixty bats. And that just so happens to be how much two of your esses are worth.”
My stomach reacted with dismayed grumbling to the mention of food.
“Well, what’s the big deal then? Let’s go eat!”
“Eric, Eric,” Crum shook his head. “Don’t take cues from your gut. Trust in me! I promise we’ll have some food in an hour or two at most!”
To be fair, I should mention that he kept his word. Over a bit more than an hour later, we managed to visit several houses. In every single one, he negotiated furiously and capably, making exchanges and demanding a bit thrown in on top. In the end we had a whole knapsack full of food. And at the bakery, the last point of our journey, Crum was somehow able to sell all the honey we exchanged for sheep’s wool from the beekeeper’s wife for seventy-five copper. And he got two warm flatbreads thrown in.
“So then,” he said victoriously. “Two flatbreads, a quarter wheel of goats’ cheese, five apples, five carrots, two onions, a little pot of honey, five eggs, cured trout... Mm, what else we got?”
“A flagon of goat milk and a link of mutton sausage,” I said.
“Well and, of course, seventy-five copper coins!” Crum announced with a victorious bow.
“Bravo!” I clapped him on the palm, smiling.
“Of course, we won’t be able to get this much every day,” Crum started explaining on the way to the barracks. “We got lucky this time is all.”
“You’re doing yourself a disservice,” I objected. “You were able to turn two esses into copper coins and fill a whole knapsack with food on top of that.”
“Nonsense,” he dismissed my praise. But I could tell he was flattered by his red face.
* * *
“I don’t know how it is for everyone, but to me a full stomach is halfway to happiness!” Crum doled out some wisdom, breathing heavily.
Lying on a small pile of gray rags he used as a bed, he was patting his stomach in satisfaction, now double its normal size. For the record, I was lying on the very same “bed” and my stomach looked about the same as his.
Crum kept up his part of the deal. He found us food and a place to sleep. He had invited me to his little room, which was in the attic of a rickety abandoned barrack on the edge of the settlement.
And though the cold and damp barrack was a pitiful sight, the little attic was warm and even cozy. Crum had put a good amount of effort into improving his living space.
There’s a little window with a decaying frame carefully boarded up. Cracks in the walls are stuffed up with rags and moss. To my surprise, there’s even furniture. A little table with spindly legs, a crudely jury-rigged chair, a three-legged stool.
But Crum’s pride and joy, beyond all doubt, is a thick trunk with bronze bands and a big old hanging padlock. It was in the corner of his little room in the most prominent place, its rounded sides shimmering. It was immediately obvious that it was Crum’s favorite object. The bronze was polished and the lock had traces of grease.
After we went up and Crum pulled up the cleverly rigged ladder, I froze staring at the bronze giant despite myself. I could see in his eyes that he was flattered by my reaction.
When we took the food out of the knapsack and put it on the table, Crum told me about when he found the attic a bit more than a month earlier. The trunk was already here, filled with all kinds of junk nobody would want. It looked horrible, but he put a good amount of effort into getting it up to snuff, sanding it, then polishing all the bronze. He also pulled out all the moldering cloth inside. Lacquered the wood.
He had to bring the lock to a blacksmith. He disassembled it and cleaned the mechanism. And made had a new key made. To pay for that, Crum had to run errands for the blacksmith for two months.
When I asked whether it was worth putting so much effort in, Crum answered without hesitation that, if he got the chance again
, he wouldn’t change a thing. I didn’t question him any further. If he was feeling like it, he could tell me later. What difference did it make to me? Some people like horses, some like carving figurines out of wood or stone. Crum here likes taking care of an old trunk. Anyhow, when dinner was ready, I no longer cared.
Dungeons of the Crooked Mountains Page 8
