Chapter 61
Meat on a stick would not be enough for Aiden and the group had continued on to a restaurant Jay hadn't been to before. That vast majority of restaurants in K'tharkle were unknown to Jay so that wasn't a surprise. The storefront was a white adobe like structure with a bright blue sloping roof.
Inside was a fireplace that took up one entire wall, a semicircle of chairs and couches spread before it on a red and black patterned area rug. The rest of the room was taken up by various tables and chairs all alike set up neatly on a wooden floor polished to a mirror shine. The tables were set with white linen tablecloths and the chairs all had padded seats.
They took a seat and Aiden grinned, “Great! Never been here before, when do we order?” asked Aiden excitedly.
“We don't.” said M'redith. “They only serve one thing. You'll see.”
Moments later as the group settled in to their seats a big tray was brought out by a chubby looking man wearing an apron. He was bald but had tufts of hair on the sides of his head. Black eyes peered out from under shaggy eyebrows. He plopped the tray down on to the table and handed out three paper plates.
On each plate was a large bread roll that had been hollowed out. The hollowed out bread was then used as a bowl and piping hot clam chowder was poured in to it. The bread that was removed was used to make croutons that were flavored with spices and then sprinkled on top of the soup. Each of them were handed a wooden spoon.
“Enjoy!” the man said jovially as he snatched the tray off the table and returned to the kitchen.
“That was fast,” said Jay as he looked over at Aiden who was already eating.
M'redith laughed. “He really is starving I guess.”
They ate their soup which was delicious. The clams weren't too chewy and the broth was thick and creamy.
“This is amazing,” Jay said appreciatively as he scooped another spoon full in to his mouth and chewed.
M'redith smiled and nodded. “It tastes like they used sherry in it instead of chicken broth. I like it.”
Jay smiled. “Thanks for bringing us here M'redith. I'd rather sit and eat with you two than sit and talk with whoever those two were back at class.”
“What,” Aiden said in between chewing, “the two adventurer chic fellas?”
M'redith chuckled. “Fellas? What are you, 80 years old?”
Aiden grinned playfully, “What, I can't use certain words now? Who are you, the gate keeper of words?”
M'redith laughed, “Nope. You use whatever words you feel like grandpa, don't let me interfere. I know better than to argue with my elders.”
Jay laughed but stayed quiet as he finished up eating his soup. Now that it was gone it was time to eat the bread bowl it had arrived in. The bread was hot and delicious and tasted faintly of clam chowder.
Aiden had already finished his and was dabbing at his mouth with a napkin. M'redith was still chewing on her bread. Jay finished eating and sat for a moment before he brought out his Mighty Book and set it on the table with a thump as it expanded to its full size.
M'redith raised an eyebrow and said while still chewing her bread, “Story time?”
Aiden laughed. “What are we going to do now? If we go back to the Guild those 'fellas' might still be at the dining hall. There's a chance we'd still run in to them.”
Jay shook his head, “Let's hang out here for a bit. I need to write a list of unfinished tasks. I keep forgetting them and I think I'm starting to miss things. So – can anyone think of something I'm supposed to do?”
Aiden laughed, “Well you haven't even mentioned Redgrass since we last went. Should you check in on them at some point?”
M'redith shook her head, “He's a minor partner, not a major one. He puts up money and gets paid a portion of the profits but he doesn't have a hand in operating the business. We could definitely visit for fun though.”
“We could also meet up with the owners. C'nthia seemed very nice.” Aiden said with a guarded expression.
“Ya, very nice. We saw you and her together last time, you don't fool us for one second Aiden.” Jay said with a wry grin.
Aiden blushed lightly but ruined it by grinning like an idiot the entire time.
“How about Putt-Putt and Toren? You should maybe visit him? See how he's getting along?” M'redith suggested.
Aiden nodded at that. “You should talk to Boland too.”
Jay scribbled those down in his book on a page titled TO DO. “Ok, those are good. So visit Toren, Boland, and Redgrass for Aiden,” he said with a wink at Aiden.
Jay sat and thought for a moment before he snapped his fingers, “Picture frames. I have a few pictures but I really need them framed.” Jay scribbled that down in his book.
M'redith grinned happily – all of Jay's photos so far had her in them. Jay wanting to frame them said a lot about how he felt about her M'redith thought.
“Ok. What else?” Jay asked.
M'redith said, “Ooo,” and smiled, “you need to stop sending letters with blank seals. It's embarrassing even if you don't know enough to be embarrassed. You need to design a seal, then register it, then have it made. Just put down 'design/register/buy seal.' she said as she pointed to the next blank line on the page in front of Jay.
Aiden grinned. “Great. No more 'mysterious unknown sender' seals. Do you have any idea what you want to use for a seal?”
Jay smiled, “I was thinking about something with Sunny on it. He seems to have really made an impression on others.”
“Oh,” said M'redith as if she had just remembered something. “Make it 'buy seal kit' instead. You'll need a seal and the kit to make seals since you're just starting out and don't already have a kit.”
Aiden chuckled, “You're going to need to do another dungeon run at this point just to afford all of this. Oh, speaking of dungeon runs, how about a trap kit? You know, for finding and disarming traps? Not for making them obviously.”
“Obviously.” M'redith said with a teasing grin. Jay laughed but wrote down trap tools in his book.
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Aiden picked a piece of food out from between his teeth and sighed as he digested happily.
M'redith's face became serious, “You need to straighten out things with Walter. Unless you think 3 gold is fair for what you put in to every dungeon run you've been on.”
Jay went to speak but she waved him down with one hand politely, “I know what you're going to say. You thought 3 gold is a lot. Well it is. But that isn't how to measure payment. You measure the value paid to the value provided. Did the payment you received fairly cover the work you put in while also considering the price Walter takes for your work.”
Aiden nodded after looking at M'redith strangely. She could kick a grown man clear across the room, dance in a crowd and have every eye on her, and also discuss business dealings as if she had been making deals her whole life. She was a.. complicated woman it seemed. Farmer, my ass, thought Aiden to himself but shook it off and rejoined the conversation. Everyone had their secrets.
“If Walter is charging 10 gold for your services and only gives you 3 that would be unfair. To you. Which is the important side of things in this discussion.” Aiden said flippantly with a smile.
Jay laughed, “Ok. How do I even talk to him? From what you two have told me he's a big deal in the Guild. I'm not. What if he decides just not to use me anymore for dungeon runs?”
M'redith smiled, “Then we shop your abilities around until we find a patron willing to pay you fairly. Your choices aren't 3 gold or nothing – your choices are 3 gold or whatever everyone else is willing to pay.”
Jay thought about that for a moment. He was interrupted by a family at the table next to them. There were two parents and two little girls, four years old at the most. The parents were trying to eat but the children had both already finished and were hounding the parents and making a bit of a scene.
“One second,” Jay said as he reached in to his bag and brought up his Traveler's Interface. A 3x5 grid appeared in front of him, some of the squares containing items. Jay selected one square and his Toy Chest of Class Choices appeared.
“Excuse me?” Jay said leaning over to the two parents, “We're just relaxing and will be here for a little while and I thought your girls might like something to play with? I'll need it back when I leave but you're welcome to play with it in the meantime.”
The mother smiled and said thank you with a relieved expression before the father interposed himself between the mother and the toy chest. “That looks too finely made to hand to two children. We appreciate the offer though.” he said sadly.
Jay laughed startling the two parents. “I don't think you can break what is inside – its made of magic. Here, take a look and then decide but I assure you your girls can't hurt the toys.”
The mother smiled and pushed past the father's hand and lifted the lid. Four toys spilled out on to the table top and the girls squealed in excitement. The toy Sunny flew from one girl to the other while occasionally whistling or yelling UPGRADE. The toy Peril crawled about the table trying to catch Sunny.
The two children were familiar with toys but magical toys were something new to them.
One of the girls picked up the treasure field divided in to nine dirt squares. She played with it until she found that one of the squares was different than the others and moments later a tiny bright chest popped in to existence on the square and opened, spilling impossibly tiny magical gold toy coins on to the table.
“Thank you!” said the mother as she smiled at Jay. The father nodded in thanks as well as Jay leaned back to his own table as if he wasn't concerned about the toy chest at all.
“That was nice.” Aiden said. “Hope they don't break your toys though.”
M'redith smiled up at Jay happily. She didn't say anything but reached over and gave his hand an affectionate squeeze. “Back to Walter. You need to have a frank conversation with him. Be polite but firm. Be very polite.”
Jay sighed, “I'd really rather not. I'm not thrilled with confronting someone that could make my life miserable in the Guild.”
M'redith shook her head. “In some ways you are right, he could make trouble for you. The thing you are forgetting is that you have immense value thanks to your Class Abilities. No one is going to kick you out. People will want to get closer to you, not push you further away – Walter included.”
Jay thought about that. If Walter was taking advantage of him financially then he needed to fix that quickly. Jay wasn't rich enough that he could ignore someone cheating him, even if he wasn't exactly sure how he was being cheated or by how much.
“Ok. Next time I'll speak up and try to come to a better agreement.” Jay said noncommittally.
“So, what is that, number 6?” asked Aiden.
“Nope, seven. Talk to Walter about fair pay.” Jay said as he wrote in his Mighty Book.
“Oh I know, rain gear. It was pouring out the other day and I had to just walk and get soaked.” Jay said as he sat back and remembered how uncomfortable that had felt.
“But you dry off in 30 seconds!” Aiden complained.
“Doesn't mean I enjoy getting wet or waiting for those 30 seconds.” Jay insisted. Jay wrote 'buy rain gear' in to his book.
M'redith grinned, “The only other thing I can think of is spellcasters. We need one that can cast that.. what was it?” she said as she wracked her brain for the spell name.
“Spirit something.” Aiden suggested helpfully.
“Mantle.” M'redith finally said. “We need to buy spellcasters that can cast a Spirit Mantle.”
Jay wrote that down as his last item on the list, number 9.
“So,” Jay said as he stretched, “nine tasks, all unfinished, all in need of doing. Not including studying and practicing with my staff as well as figuring out the rest of what we need for the Dungeon of Rebirth. I need an assistant or something at this rate. Damn, I forgot one.”
Jay leaned back over his book and M'redith and Aiden read over his shoulders.
“I need to learn how to wear leather armor. Then I need to buy some. With all the money I don't have.” Jay said with a sigh.
“That makes a total of 11 unfinished tasks. You're starting to make me worry that I've forgotten some things too.” Aiden said worriedly.
Jay smiled, “I feel like I can relax a little more now that I'm not trying to keep all of that straight in my head. Notes are much easier.”
M'redith laughed at that just as the family next to them got up to leave.
“What do you say?” asked the mother in a kind voice as her two girls tried to hide behind her legs. One of the girls poked her head out from behind the mother.
“Thank you!” the little girl said before hiding once again.
Jay laughed, “You're all very welcome. Hope you have a good night.”
The father thanked Jay again and then left. Jay reached over and picked up his Toy Chest. He shut the lid and the toys all disappeared. Taking up the opening of his bag he pressed the Toy Chest against the opening and it disappeared in to it, once again taking up one square of space inside.
“We should get going too. Its getting late and we all have to get up extra early tomorrow.” M'redith said smartly.
Aiden looked puzzled, “Early? Why?”
She laughed, “Weapons practice? We're helping Jay work at getting better in combat with his staff? Is any of this ringing a bell for you?”
Jay smiled, “If it's too early I understand.”
Aiden sighed, “I like being your friend more when it involves free meat on a stick. This getting up early crap is ridiculous.” He said it with a smile though to take the edge off of his words.
Jay got up and went to the back of the restaurant to thank the cook and workers for the meal before he paid with a nice tip and caught a cart back to The Guild. It was late enough now that anyone who might have been waiting for Jay would have surely given up by now.