The Merchant of Tiqpa: The Bathrobe Knight's Sequel
Page 42
Not to say that everything was bad. Businesses everywhere in town seemed to be growing at an unprecedented rate. Business at the bar had picked up dramatically, and it was everything she could do to get finished up at work and home before the sun started coming up. These past few days she had only been able to grab a few quick hours of sleep before having to wake up and tend to her chores, and she found herself going through the day stifling yawns and rubbing at her tired, weary eyes. The smiths seemed to be sharing in her plight, and they were keeping their shops open and forges burning long into the night in order to keep up with demand for new weapons and armor. No matter how much they worked, however, there was always a line of customers outside their doors waiting for them to open up in the mornings. There was far too much work to go around with most of the men gone to the front lines, and several of them had already taken on several new apprentices just to try and keep up with the increased levels of demand.
Eliza took a deep breath and did her best to calm her nerves before she finally stepped out into the busy street. It was already late into the afternoon, and she had taken care of her chores for the day, but she wanted to be at work as early as possible. Peter had been encouraging everyone to come in as early as they wanted to help with the extra customers, and if she was lucky, she could snag a quick meal from the kitchen before the real rush hit.
Normally, if she managed to get through all of her housework this early before work, she would have a small bit of time to herself. She had used one such opportunity to sneak off outside the walls not too long ago in hopes of finding some time alone, but the return trip and her encounter with two of the newcomers had been so awkward and nerve-wrecking that it almost hadn’t been worth it. A small shiver ran up her spine as she remembered the threats one of them had made. He had wanted to kill her! She just couldn’t believe that anyone would ever act so ghoulishly to someone they just met, let alone didn’t even know. Ever since then, she had done her best to keep her head down, stay out of the way, and be as far away from any of the newcomers as much as possible. It was impossible to completely avoid them since there were so many, and she had to serve them at the tavern, but she somehow felt more comfortable there knowing that Peter was just moments away behind the bar in case anything bad happened.
The bar was located near the center of town, just past most of the merchant’s shops, and it wouldn’t take more than a few minutes to get there. She took another deep breath and pulled her long braid over her shoulder to stroke it. She preferred being able to wear it down and loose, but it was far more convenient to keep it tied up and out of the way while she was at work. Plus, as an extra bonus, it gave her something to do with her hands as she made herself busy watching the back of someone’s heels as she made her way to work.
She was so busy making sure that she kept her head down and doing her best to go unnoticed that she didn’t have time to react before someone ran right into her. She caught a brief glimpse of a large man’s shoulder in the top of her vision before he slammed into her and sent her sprawling to the ground in a rather awkward and very unladylike fashion. She collapsed on her butt with an “Oof!” and a small squeak and immediately felt her cheeks flush with embarrassment.
“I’m so sorry!” she began, immediately looking up for the man that she had run into so that she could apologize. When she looked around, however, there was no one there. She twisted her head around trying to find him, but the man was already gone.
“Did you see that?” someone wailed. “That chick just got dropped right on her butt!”
“That was awesome!” another responded. “I can’t believe anyone could be that clumsy!”
“Hey, why don’t you learn to watch where you’re going?!” the first called out through fits of laughter.
She could hear several other people laughing at her along with those two, and she could practically feel them pointing at her as they made their jests, making her face burn that much more. She did her best to ignore them, but it was hard. Despite her awkward landing in the middle of the street, no one had even stopped to help her. The waves of people seemed to flow around her as if she were a small island in the middle of a stream, making it all-the-more obvious exactly what had happened and calling attention to her for everyone to see.
She finally took a deep breath, pushed herself to her feet, and dusted off her dress as best she could without further embarrassing herself. She took a moment to look around one more time for whomever it was she had run into, hoping for a chance to say that she was sorry, but he was certainly gone. She couldn’t even catch sight of the people who had been laughing at her. They had seemingly disappeared, and she was able to take a small bit of solace from the fact that they hadn’t stuck around to jibe her even more.
She finished smoothing out her dress again, satisfied that she had removed as much of the dust from it as she could, pulled her hair back over her shoulder, and started back her way toward the bar again. The foot traffic grew even thicker as she made her way closer to the merchants’ stores, and she was careful this time to keep an eye out for anyone she might run into again. The whole ordeal had passed quickly, probably less than a minute for it all to occur, but she was left with a new sense of trepidation as a different realization began to set in.
Everywhere she looked, all she could see were unfamiliar faces. There wasn’t a single member of the town that she knew, no one that she had grown up with or even met before, and it left her feeling utterly alone. She was used to seeing townsfolk moving about and going about their daily business, but there wasn’t a single person that she recognized. Despite the fact that she had spent her entire life navigating the town’s streets, often running down them while playing games as a child, she was left with the strange feeling that she was in some new and unfamiliar land that she had never visited before. The buildings were still there, all dressed up with familiar painted signs and wooden fronts, but the people were all wrong.
She came to an abrupt halt as the thought struck her, growing wide-eyed and feeling a sense of panic plant itself in her belly. As soon as she stopped moving, someone immediately ran into her from behind, clipping her on the opposite shoulder this time. It wasn’t nearly as hard as it had been before, but she was still knocked forward a few steps, and she was forced to stutter-step to keep her balance and stop herself from falling over.
“Stupid NPCs,” the man muttered as he moved past her. “For all the effort they put into designing all this,” he said to someone much more loudly, “you’d think that they could at least take the time to teach them some manners.”
“Hah! Right?” someone answered back. “Everyone around here acts like a bunch of yokels who look at you like you’re stupid and can’t understand a thing that you’re saying. I was trying to figure out where a trainer was earlier . . .”
Eliza recovered her sense of balance and turned to look at the two just in time to catch a glimpse of their backs before they disappeared into the crowd. She may have felt a growing sense of anxiety before, but now it was completely displaced by utter shock. Did that really just happen? She ran forward a few brisk paces after the men before she stopped again. She spun around in a circle, scanning everything around her as she tried to figure out where they were, but the two men were already gone. Just like before, they had disappeared before she could even get a word out, and she couldn’t so much as catch a glimpse of them. That’s the second time that someone’s practically run me over! Seriously?! They’re acting like even see me! she fumed indignantly. They plowed me over like I wasn’t even there, and they insulted me as they did it!
She sighed irritably and stamped her foot in frustration. How can someone be that barbaric and so arrogant at the same time? She unconsciously tugged her braid over her shoulder and squeezed it so tightly that her knuckles turned white before she realized what she was doing. Ugh! Teach me some manners? Really? And I suppose that he thinks he’s some type of saint as well!
“Hey, hurry up in there!”
“Come on, man, I’d like to actually get out of town before the night’s over. I didn’t sign up for this just to stand around waiting in line all day!” he continued. “How hard is it just to buy and sell and move on?”
She scowled as she studied the man and had him pegged almost immediately, realizing that he was another one of the newcomers.
“Come on, gramps! I don’t have all day!” he called out again, this time directing his taunts to the burly blacksmith behind the shop’s counter. “How long does it take to buy and sell around here? If you can’t move any faster than this, you’ll be dead of old age before I ever even make it inside the shop!”
She could just make out the inside of the shop. Its interior was dim compared to the bright afternoon sun, but she could tell that it was almost completely filled with people. I knew that they were having trouble keeping up with demand for new weapons and armor, but now I can see why, she thought as she studied the crowd of people waiting to get inside. Tamos was of the best smiths in town, and probably one of the richest, but he was also one of the stingiest. He flat out refused to pay anything close to market value for goods, and was well known for marking up his wares at an unreasonable rate. That said, he was also probably one of the best blacksmiths in all of the Human kingdom. Even before this influx of newcomers, people used to travel from as far away as the capital just to contract out weapons from him. He was also known for having quite a temper.
“Excuse me,” she said, approaching the man. The man ignored her and continued staring impatiently at the door.
“Excuse me,” she repeated a little louder, but once again she failed to get his attention.
Eliza sighed testily. Is this really how it’s going to be? Fine, then. She turned sideways and slipped past the man, pushing her way around him and into the doorway. Finally, she had his attention.
“Hey, what gives?” he demanded. “Back of the line! Wait your turn like the rest of us!” he shouted at her, despite the fact that he was only a foot away at this point.
Eliza did her best to ignore him and stood planted in the doorway with her back to him. So much for trying to keep my head down, she thought wanly. As soon as she was inside, her eyes quickly adjusted to the dimmer lighting. She had originally thought that the shop was completely packed, but realized that she had been wrong once she was inside. There were only seven or eight people inside, all of which except two seemed to be perusing the racks of armor and weapons that were lined up in front of the counter. It was immediately evident that Tamos’s shop had been busy, as several of the racks sported empty spaces where wares had been sold and not yet replaced.
Eliza was mildly amused, and she couldn’t help but grin at the sight. The man was notorious for diligently running his business, and there was no way that he would let those shelves sit empty for long under normal circumstances. He took far too much pride in his work to not keep it on constant display for everyone else to see, and it must be driving him crazy to know that there were vacant, unfilled slots in the racks where his product could be on show. She looked up towards the counter, where he seemed to be engaged with two customers at the same time, and he glanced up at the exact same moment.
“I said no more customers inside!” he shouted crossly, waving a cudgeled mace menacingly. One of the two men in front of the counter had to duck to avoid having the side of his head smashed in, and Eliza’s grin widened at the sight.
“I told you,” a voice said petulantly from behind her, and Eliza felt someone grab her arm. “Get out and wait like the rest of us!”
Eliza jerked her arm away from the man’s grasp and quickly turned around, kicking him in the shin. The man tried to jump backward and avoid her well-aimed foot, but all he managed to do was bump into the next person in line behind him, and he still failed to dodge her swift kick. The man behind him was roughly pushed back and onto the ground, and the other collapsed on top of him.
“I said none of that,” Tamos boomed from across the shop. “Get out!”
Eliza turned around with a satisfied smirk and started across the shop. “It’s just me, Tamos,” she called, moving closer.
“Oh, Eliza.” His voice lost all its bluster when he realized who she was, but it was clear that he was still a far cry from placated or appeased. “If you’re looking for him, he’s not here right now. I sent him out with those other two runts to try and round up some more iron. I can’t keep the forges burning if there’s no material to work with.”
“If you would hurry up and buy these axes,” one of the two men grumbled, “you might have some iron to work with.”
Tamos turned a rueful eye on the much smaller man, but he didn’t say anything. “Come back later tonight, Eliza. He should be back by then.”
“Hey, old man,” the customer snapped, “I don’t have time for all this. Are you going to pay a decent price for these or not?”
“Iron might be in short supply, boy,” Tamos said flatly, “but my patience is even shorter. I told you that I’d buy whatever you have, but I’m not going to pay more than two gold coins per axe.”
“But these are worth at least two gold coins and fifty silver each!” he protested.
Tamos appeared to be done with Eliza, and he had turned his attention back to the two customers that were apparently attempting to haggle with him over the prices that he was willing to pay for some of their wares. There was nothing particularly distinguishing about either of the two young men, and for all intents and purpose, they could have been just another set of customers. Eliza noticed that they were actually better armored that most of the newcomers she was used to seeing, and they were both actually wearing full sets of studded leather armor with proper bows slung over their backs. Compared to the usual deplorable state that most of the newcomers were dressed in, these two actually could have passed for part of the town’s guard. The only telltale sign that they weren’t actually from the village was the fact that they didn’t know well enough to know that they shouldn’t ever try and haggle with Tamos. You’d have better luck trying to get a bull to jump through a series of iron hoops than you would trying to get him to pay what something was actually worth.
“Two gold coins, and that’s all that I’m willing to pay,” Tamos replied flatly.
“Come on, Sean, remember what we talked about?” the second man asked, turning to his friend. “You’ve got to walk away from the deal or you won’t get a better price.”
The customer, apparently named Sean, picked up the axe and the cudgeled mace that were lying on the counter, turned, and walked away from Tamos. He didn’t make it more than three steps, however, before turning back around and walking right back to where he had been standing before. He laid out the axe and the mace on the counter and looked up at blacksmith.
“Hey, I’ve got some items that I’d like to sell,” he said, addressing Tamos. “Perhaps you’d like to take a look at them?”
Tamos stared at him flatly without saying a word. Eliza could tell that he was doing everything he could to maintain his professionalism and suppress his temper. After a moment, Tamos took a breath and said tensely, “I’ll pay two gold coins, and not a silver more.”
“What?” Sean asked, looking surprised. “You’re supposed to offer more after I walk away! That’s what everyone has been saying!”
“Look, boy, I’m in need of the iron, and I gave a price. I’m sticking to it,” Tamos answered.
“Maybe we should leave the shop entirely?” Sean asked, looking at his friend. “Maybe I didn’t go far enough away to reset the encounter?”
His friend just looked at him and shrugged his response. “They just said to try walking away to try and get a better price. They didn’t say anything about how far you had to go.”
Eliza watched on in a mixture of interest and confusion. These newcomers are weird. Who are ‘they?’ Tamos isn’t going to change his price, so ‘they’ must not know him at all.
Sean picked up the axe and the mace from the counter and quickly hurried across the shop. He pushed his way out of the door, where everyone else was still waiting outside, and quickly turned around and jumped back inside before anyone else could enter the building. He strutted up to the counter, laid the axe and mace back down and asked, “I’d like to sell these, what can you offer for them?”
It took everything Eliza had not to laugh as she watched Tamos’s face turn a dark shade of red that bordered on purple. The veins bulged out in his neck, and his mouth worked its way back and forth in an unhappy scowl as if he were chewing on a tough piece of meat. After a long pause, Tamos said harshly, “Two gold coins.” His voice was gravely, and Eliza knew that he was close to losing it. Tamos may have prided himself on the quality of his work and his ability to turn a gold coin, but he was about as close to losing control of his temper as Eliza had ever seen him.