Rora schooled her expression and body language expertly as she tromped down the stairs, but Mila had a harder time doing so as she slipped through in Rora’s wake. She was giddy at the prospect of not just a date, but several, and it was a fresh development in what was, on this side of reality, her nonexistent romantic life. Even in Scienceland, things had not been going great recently in that regards, and this had the comfortable warmth of a friendship blossoming into more, which was uniquely enjoyable.

Seeing Telit hunched over the table she had been sitting at earlier helped keep that feeling from washing her away, though. The man, of human stock, was seated in a chair that had been dragged over and looked about as happy to be here as everyone else at the table was to have him. It was not that their group disliked the man, just that he was the one who organized odd jobs out of Rat-Hate and he did not casually fraternize with the folks he passed jobs on to, or for.

By Mila’s reckoning, that meant he did not much fraternize with anyone at all, but she was not going to begrudge an old adventurer his retirement.

No, instead she was going to begrudge him giving them another job so quick on the heels of the last one, and they were all still trying to recover from that. Rora clambered on up into the booth and Mila gave her a moment to settle before she jumped up, tucking herself into the space and maybe pushing deeper in than she would have before, hip bumping up against her friend’s without making a deal of it. The solid press of Rora’s hip pressing back, just slightly, was as much distraction as Mila could afford. Stupid lovey-dovey, first date bullshit later.

Mila had heard folks described as gristly before, but Telit encapsulated the description. Scars and knotted muscles and greying hair and skin that had seen too much sun to stay healthy all spoke to a man that life had chewed up and spat out when it found him undigestible. He also looked *tired*, in a way that was unusual. Like he had not slept the night before.

“Mister Telit, good day to you,” Rora offered with a nod. Whatever Mila was trying to pry out of his appearance, Naw-Naw and Rora certainly got tenfold, so Rora treating him formally was… not a good sign. Aluca was tight-lipped and clearly it was best if Mila joined him in that, so she eased herself against the back of the booth and tried to stay out of the way.

He grumbled as he started to get underway. “Not that good, so far. Fixin’ to get worse for y’all too.” Telit looked like he wanted to spit, but knew better to do that in Darimash’s establishment. “Got a job for ya. Request from on high.”

A few raised eyebrows or eye ridges got him to continue. “A group of merchants came in from Kraddel yesterday. They verified what you said about the road washing away but before that, they saw some weirdness, which you’ll be investigating. Given that you’ve been out there recently.”

“What’d we be lookin’ for, that’s got us bein’ requested for it specifically?” Naw-Naw asked, not voicing what everyone at the table knew - there was some dozen or whatever groups that took odd jobs, and half of them could take a jaunt out to look around just fine.

Telit sucked air through his teeth and let the other shoe drop. “Merchants’re claiming the land’s changing, a new mountain kind of thing.” He raised a hand to forestall the coming protests. “And I checked my maps. It ain’t, ya know.” His voice softened, not quite a whisper. “A dragon. Too close to you-know-who’s territory. There woulda been a fight and we woulda heard it.”

“Even if that is true, why us? We just came back from our last job, and I’m still not quite ready to go back out, sir,” was Rora’s question. And they could refuse, but Telit probably would not be here if there were a better option. And given the look that the question pulled out of the fellow, this might be the best option for him but it was not a good one.

“I checked my maps, to verify. But the aldermen disagree with my expertise in the matter and feel they know best. With that, your recent work in that area, and, well.” His eyes flickered to the side, a purposefully conspicuous glance at Mila and Rora.

That was enough to pull Mila forward from her observing slouch, her singular bark of laughter humorless and sharp, fuck the people picking over their early dinner. “It’s because we have two fuckin’ kobolds? Fucking seriously?” It would have been difficult for her to look more affronted. She knew of the stereotype, of course - she had had her nose ground into it before. And she felt like her stance on the topic was pretty well known, given how it had gotten her into enough trouble in town before. Mila did not check the others, but she could assume they were some mix of angry and worried that she was about to attack the town’s go-to middleman.

The human had the good grace to look wildly uncomfortable under the glare and what he had just conveyed. “It was not said in that many words, but. Well. The aldermen felt…,” and he did not finish stepping through the logic, getting a clue from the now-collective glare of the table that continuing would be a bad idea. Because of course the fucking aldermen would think that. For a city that was robustly diverse, Rat-Hate’s leading council was pointedly not diverse. Of the thirteen seats, a whopping *one* was held by a nonhuman, and from what folks around the table had heard, the kinfolk representative’s presence was near-entirely vestigial.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

So of course the idea of a fledgling dragon being in the area meant throwing kobolds at it, personal feelings and potential lethality be damned. Everyone knew kobolds had a special connection to dragons! No need to consult with the people getting sent off to die or any actual kobolds, oh no. The humans knew best, and by extension, that meant the aldermen knew best.

Mila could feel herself starting to get swept up in her anger again, could feel it trying to get a hold of her mind, but this time she did not have to worry about how being rude could get her in trouble with law enforcement. That worry gone, she dipped a hand into one of the larger pockets in her shorts, yanking out an anemic notebook and catching the pencil that Aluca tossed her way when he realized what she needed. Charcoal tip met paper as she began to angrily sketch sharp lines, half looking at her work and half glowering at Telit.

The scratching sat over the table for a pointedly long time before Rora spoke. “The aldermen’s idiocy aside, you say you disagree with their logic but are here anyway. I take it there is a more robust reason for that?” The words were crisper than Rora’s normal tone, but still professional. Almost icy.

The lifeline that would allow him to explain his personal rationale was something Telit latched on to, the safest way out while being sure not to step on any more mines. “Yeah, their reasonings are so much horseshit. But whatever’s going on, it might have something to do with what happened to the Bletams, gods rest their souls. Y’all saw what happened there and are some of the more competent folks in a fight, so if there *is* trouble, y’all are the safest bet, the most prepared. And your team knows when to beat feet.”

He gave a shrug, and a wince when Mila’s eyes snapped to the motion, but she was calming down. The page she had opened before her had a diagram detailing the setup for a tunnel-based trap that would drop a block on the victim and seal the tunnel, a classic, but which would then detonate the block moments later. Grisly, effective at its goal of remote murdering, and impractical as hell given the setup and costs involved.

“What’s the actual job details? Payment and deliverables,” Aluca asked, sliding into business mode. Yeah, the group was each somewhere between annoyed and pissed, but at the same time, Telit’s actual reasoning made sense and while they could turn the job down, a job from the city council that was requested for them specifically would cause waves if they said no. Nothing that would capsize their personal boat, probably, but waves.

“The job is, as detailed, an investigation and assessment. You are to travel up to Kraddel and assess the environment as you go for any notable changes or new dangers. Returning and submitting your findings will see you paid a thousand monel. If you are in a position to *fix* any new problems that would hinder trade between here and Kraddel, and do so, you will be compensated up to ten times that amount, dependent on threat and contingent on testimony delivered under an Honesty Array.”

Telit looked back up from the scrap he had jotted the details on, a little returned to form with his seasoned veteran vibe. And to his credit, he had judged the reaction correctly - the entire table was stunned silent at how much money was there on the table. Even just her cut of the reward for a long hike was enough to keep Mila stocked in sweets and books for a while. If they did come across any problems and took care of them….

Shared, silent glances showed that everybody had done the math there. Faux pas aside, Telit was a good broker for jobs and they did not think he would throw them at anything they were unsuited for, even if that did seem to be what the local politicians had planned to do. And if Naw-Naw and Rora were not stepping in to call Telit out on just doing this to get the aldermen off his back, then that was not what he was doing.

A payday that good was tempting. Hughstace finally spoke up. “The merchants, how did they say that the land had changed? Why do they not trust it?” Which were good points, but did have Mila thinking back to that carpet moss critter they had seen, out that way. If it was skedaddling, maybe the travelers were right to do so too.

“Not a lot to actually go on, beyond it not feeling right and it spooking their beasts. There was a large swathe of forest in the distance that seemed blighted, and a big hill or mountain that wasn’t there before.” The older man gave a shrug, letting them know how much stock he put in the observational powers of the traveling group. “Their guards are green as can be, so not much help there either. And because of that, they want assurances before they return.”

“And that’s why the reward is as big as it is,” Aluca added, giving a nod. A fresh crop of adventurers acting as guards to a merchant group was one thing if you knew the route, but that route changing was not great for guarantees of safety. Kraddel was an important trading partner for Rat-Hate, that made sense.

That the merchant-types had apparently decided to push onwards instead of returning to Kraddel, which should have been nearer if the location description was correct, kind of churned up Mila’s irritation though.

There was a bit more back and forth on the specific details of the job, time tables, trying to weasel more details about what the trading group had seen, but soon enough, the conversation turned to what their team would need to carry this job out. That was verification enough for Telit it seemed, because he stood up and looked at them, clearly weighing something in his mind.

“I stand by what you’re not walking into, but it’s still a whole lot of unknowns. I’m willing to put half that baseline reward for y’all up front, alright? Don’t hold back on your preparations because of lack of coin, is what I’m saying.” He was serious, firm in his tone. “Consider it an apology for making you take this job, or being an ass earlier, or whatever.”

That was not usually how payments for their jobs went by at all, and Naw-Naw tried to sweep in. “You’n don’t have ta-“

“I insist,” he said, rapping his knuckles against the table. “Y’all do a lot of good work, for me and the folks around here. I wanna make sure that continues. Makin’ sure you’re safe for this job is part of that, I suppose.”

As he started to walk away, his gait just a little lopsided, he called back over his shoulder, “I’ll be back in a bit with that for ya.”