Dantes pulled himself away from the fresh green scent and looked down at the dwarf, ignoring his comment in favor of asking a question.
“How did you grow all this down here?”
The dwarf’s eyes narrowed. “You trying to steal my secrets?”
“No, I’m asking for them directly.”
The merchant chuckled, taking a pull from his pipe and letting some smoke seep slowly out of his mouth. “Mutts like you wouldn’t know, but the Pit is a big place. Us dwarves have managed, over the centuries, to carve new chambers, or excavate old ones. Though it’s been hellish work without proper tools, and with the strange thickness of the walls, and the magic shield that seals us in, otherwise we’d’ve just tunneled out of course. There are some chambers where the walls are like reflective glass, and in a few of those there is light, like sunlight, that bleeds through them.”
“What about the seeds?”
“Ah, those came in with the other supplies that they dropped in. Collect them over time, and cultivate what I can from what I grow.”
“Even the weed?”
He shook his head. “Well, that came in the dwarven way. Just like the Elfland King and Consortium get things in their way. That’s obviously not something I can share.”
Dantes nodded, pretending to respect the secret. He already knew that the Elves brought their goods in with some type of magical mirror shards, the human gangs tended to have people toss goods into the Maw at specific times, the consortium bribed the guards to bring in goods during their Arena recruitments and prisoner withdrawals. He was certain that there were other methods going on, but those were the ones he’d managed to determine since he’d arrived. No one knew that he knew that, and he did his best to keep it that way.
“Anyway, I assume you’re buying something? If I spent this much time talking to you and if you’re not well… I’ll probably have to stab you or give you a beating.”
Dantes nodded. “Understandable. I’m interested in trading.” He pulled out his separate sack of mushrooms and pulled a single one of them which he held out to the dwarf, focusing on his bearded face as he did so to gauge any reactions. He saw the dwarf’s nostrils widen for just a moment, but no other facial twitches. Dwarves were either stone faced or as easy to read as a child. Dantes had never known one to be in-between.
The dwarf reached out for the mushroom slowly, but Dantes pulled back before he could reach it. “Interested?”
The dwarf wiggled his jaw, the mushrooms within his beard shifting side to side as he did so.. “Aye, I suppose I am. How much have you got?”
He held the sack open so that the dwarf could see the dozen or so mushrooms inside.
The dwarf stroked his beard. “Hmm, I can do ya a bit of weed for that.”
“A bit of weed for each one, I assume?”
The dwarf shook his head. “Yer cheeky, I appreciate that. How about a half pouch, and you owe me one?”
“How about a full pouch, and the next time I harvest them, I remember how generous you were?”
The dwarf’s eyebrow flicked up. “You grew these? Didn't just find them?”
Dantes hesitated, but nodded.
“Interesting… You’ve got a deal.” The dwarf spat on his hand, and held it out. Dantes matched the gesture and had a firm shake before exchanging the goods.
“I’m Clay, by the way.”
“Dantes.”
They exchanged a nod and Dantes walked away, tucking the weed into a small compartment he’d made in his coat. He hadn’t been looking specifically for the weed when he’d come to the market, but it was a good choice to trade for. Unlike the mushrooms, which had limited utility for most, the weed could be traded to anyone for anything and would keep for a much longer time. Not to mention that he could put some to the side for his own personal recreation. He could’ve gone with coin of course, but only the consortium dealt with straight coin, bartering tended to be more economical in most cases.
He considered doing some more trading, but figured that Tel had likely been done for quite some time. Dantes imagined that any man may not have a lot of stamina after a year without any of that kind of attention.
He made his way through the narrow alleys between buildings, ignoring pleas from desperate sellers who didn’t seem to be earning what they needed to cover the consortium’s fees for the day. The nearest bar to the Which Wench was full of Elves, so he drew his hood close over his head as he passed by. On the surface, and in the Pit, there were a number of advantages to being a mutt. It usually had the benefit of making him easy to ignore and hard to distinguish. He could sometimes pass for human, or orc in the right light, but elf was never going to happen. He was too short, his skin too gray, and while his ears were pointed, they were hardly going to disguise anything else about him, but if one of the Elven Kings with a belly full of drink and a desire to blow off steam saw him, he knew he’d be the first target they would choose. They could stand mixing of the races, but only as long as Elves weren’t part of that mix.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Dantes was so distracted by trying to appear inconspicuous he didn’t notice the three men standing between him and the brothel. When he did, he tried to adjust the direction he was walking, and the men fanned out to block him. He looked at them more closely, sensing he’d just walked into trouble. All three were human, wearing ragged clothes, and wielding either clubs or shivs, one of them smelled of dried blood and looked vaguely familiar.
The bloody one took a step toward him and he took a step back, looking for a way out only to find the path behind him blocked by a fourth man.
“I figured you’d come here. Thought you could steal my hard work and hock it in the undermarket before we found you, huh?”
Dantes finally recognized the man. He was the one who he’d stolen from earlier that day. He’d thought he’d killed him, or at least remained unseen when he struck, but either he’d gotten a good look, or one of his friends had.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve never seen you before.”
The men started to close in. Dantes wasn’t much good in a straight up fight, he’d been the planner, face, and occasionally the quick hands of his gang, but never the muscle.
Dantes' face became nervous and he fell as he backed away. “Please, please, I’m just trying to do what I can to survive down here, same as you. You know, it’s dog eat dog down here.”
One of the men got closer and raised his foot. “Shut up you filthy mutt.” He kicked at his head.
Dantes hands shot up. He grabbed the man's foot and dragged the blade of the shiv he’d taken from his boot when he’d pretended to fall across the man’s heel and tendons.
The man screamed as he fell back clutching his leg.
Dantes grabbed a handful of dirt and chucked it into the next nearest man’s eyes, blinding him as he stood. Then he tried to make a break for it.
Unfortunately, he hadn’t noticed the fifth man, who caught him by the hood and threw him back between the three who were left standing. Dantes threw himself back to his feet, brandishing his shiv, his eyes looking for some way out even as the three men closed in, ignoring their fellow as he rolled on the ground, howling in pain and clutching his leg.
At this point the elves from the bar had noticed the scrap, and brought their booze over to take a closer look.
“I think the humans will probably take the mutt,” said one of them.
“I dunno, the points on the mutts' ears… a fourth an elf can probably take four humans. Or at least get away.”
A third elf, one covered in tattoos of trees and roots, the same one Dantes had seen arrive in the Pit earlier, smashed his fists into the second one’s gut, causing him to double over and spill his drink.
“The blood that’s muddied only grows exponentially weaker, you fucking moron. The mutt will die. Worth watching it happen, I’d say.”
Dantes wasn’t paying attention to the elves. He lunged toward the nearest of the men, managing to jam his shiv into his gut, but when he tried to pull it away it got caught on a rib and he couldn’t remove it.
The bloody man grabbed him and threw him to the ground. He and the two uninjured men began savagely kicking him while he was down. Dantes curled into a ball, focusing on protecting his head. His reflexes kicked in from when he was a child picking pockets.
“Wait! Wait!” yelled Dantes. “I still haven’t sold what I took from you! I have it hidden, but I won’t be able to give it to you if I’m dead.”
The men stopped, and hesitated for a moment. At that second, Dantes pulled a second shiv from his sleeve, and threw himself forward at the bloody man, jamming the crude stone blade into his eye. They fell, and crashed into the tattooed elf, knocking him backward, and spilling his drink.
Dantes stood up, disoriented from the beating he’d just taken, and tore his shiv from the man's face stumbling into the elf once again. He threw him off of him, and Dantes' arm jerked up and sliced across the elf’s face.
Dantes stood there, his eyes widening as he realized what he’d just done, seeing the blood begin to flow from the wound on the elf’s face.
The elf’s solid green eyes looked at him with hate, and he brought a hand to his face, wiping away the trickle of blood. His mouth was twisted into a sneer as he looked at the men around him. “Grab that fucking mutt. I’m going to gut him.”
Dantes bolted, one of the elves narrowly missing a lunge for him. He made his way toward the furthest exit tunnel from the undermarket, dodging through the people buying and selling, leaping over blankets scattered with goods, and ducking through narrow alleys. He could hear the elves starting to pursue him as he wove through the market.
One elf jumped in front of him, but he slammed the shiv still in his hand into the man's shoulder, leaving it there as he kept running. Two more of them moved to cut him off, but he slid through the legs of one of them, tripping him as he threw himself back to his feet and kept running.
He made it to the exit, and moved into the tunnels. He’d chosen the far exit not only for the increased number of obstacles it would create between him and his pursuers, but also because it linked up to the Clan Stonedust territory. His movement through that territory stirred the dwarves there up just in time for them to meet the elves.
He heard the mixture of elvish screaming and dwarven curses collide, even as he wove deeper into the tunnels. He didn’t slow down until he was near the Kobold tunnels, and even then he kept changing paths, and doubling back. He even left a few false trails leading into forbidden tunnels in the hopes they might find them and think he’d run to his death in desperation to escape. By the time he made it back to his cave he was drenched in sweat and gasping for air.. He stumbled onto the pile of cloth he called a bed and tried to steady his breathing.
He was fucked. He was in danger from the Elfland Kings already, just by the nature of his ancestry, and now he’d actually drawn their ire. Cut a man that was clearly one of their leaders, and stabbed another of them in his attempt to escape. He could stay hidden for a long time in his cave, maybe scrape by and survive, but eventually he’d need to go back to the undermarket, or the maw, and they’d find him. He’d made it five years, and now, it seemed, he wouldn’t make it another.
“Fuck,” he muttered. He shouldn’t even be in the pit. Well, he should, in that he’d committed more than enough crimes to earn his time there, but he should never have been captured. If his old crew hadn’t fucked him over, he would still be on the streets. Gold in one hand, a woman in the other, a reputation that put fear into people’s hearts. Now he was going to die in the underprison, unremembered and unremarkable. He let out a frustrated yell and slammed a closed hand down on the stone before putting his face in his hands.
There was a squeak from the corner of the room. Dantes looked to see the brown rat there, twitching its whiskers. He sighed, letting his desperation and rage go for a moment and went over to where his food was stored. He took out a small piece of potato and tossed it to the rat.
“Thank you,” the rat squeaked.
Dantes sighed. “No problem.”
He blinked, and looked at the rat again. “Wait…”