“One hundred gold coins!” The Guild Master snapped.
“If she was a virgin, it’d be even more.” Figuro shrugged.
“You promised…” I said while gritting my teeth. “You said that I could have her…”
“At market price…” Figuro sighed. “This is the market price. After he found out she was worth more, all he saw was gold. I didn’t even tell him she was a rare tigerkin breed, and he already wanted to rob me blind. I gave him all of the spare coin I brought. I even contributed some of my own wealth. I might have played a harder game with him, but he was ready to walk and I had already made the promise to you. Perhaps, he had realized we had cut a deal and played us both.
“One hundred gold is what I spent to buy her. I’m making no profit here. Be lucky that I’m a man of my word. In an auction, I could possibly earn three hundred gold. Maybe even five hundred if you trained her up a bit.”
The Guild Master put his hand up, stopping me as I rose up. “You know we prepared fifty coins today and didn’t expect to use a tenth of them. Why have you even told us this?”
Figuro nodded. “I know this has put a bad strain on our relationship, but I have a positive feeling about you... Deek.”
“Hmm…” I glared at him, and Figuro only chuckled to himself.
“I told you, I’m good at reading people. I think that you might be a good investment. I see you possibly buying more slaves in the future. That’s why I’d like to create a working relationship with you. The tigerkin would allow me to do that.”
“A hundred gold coins…” I began.
“I will take fifty now,” Figuro explained. “And the rest next month. But I will need… some assurance.”
“What assurance?”
“Something worth putting my profits on the line.” Figuro smirked. “Perhaps, yourself.”
“Is that what this is about Figuro?” The Guild Master hit the table angrily. “You’re trying to increase your slave stock? Want to put a hero in there?”
“No… no… not at all.” Figuro defended. “I have every trust that our friend here can come up with the money on time.”
“What do you mean?” I demanded.
“It’s very simple. I put a Temporary Slave Mark on you. In thirty days, you pay off the debt, and I remove it, or… it activates, and you become a slave.” Figuro explained. “In this case, you’re the assurance. It’s truly very fair, as I mean no offense, but even a hero is only worth thirty gold coins at most.”
The Guild Master looked over at me. “This is how these slave traders work. Someone gets in debt, and the next moment they’re a slave. Fifty gold coins is a lot unless you do dungeon diving, and even then, a month is pushing it.”
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I thought about the offer for a few moments. “You said, anything worth fifty gold coins?”
Figuro nodded. “Exactly.”
I sighed and then reached into my pocket, pulling out my storage ring. The jeweler had said that a storage ring ran about fifty gold coins. I put it on the table in front of Figuro. Frowning, he reached forward and picked it up.
Staring at it a moment, he let out a gasp. “A storage ring! And a large one too!”
“Will that suffice?” I asked, more worried that he would say no.
“Of course, of course. In fact, this more than covers the cost. You can even keep the fifty gold until you come up with the rest.”
“Can’t you just take the ring and the fifty gold and we call it even?” I asked.
“I’m not a jeweler, I’m a slave trader.” Figuro shrugged helplessly. “If I start dealing in other currency, the merchant guild will go into an uproar. Besides, this ring is only worth thirty-five gold.”
“The jeweler said it was worth fifty!”
“To buy it, maybe, but to sell…” He shook his head. “Plus, that’s out here. Magic items are a little less rare in the capital. You have to understand, I’m already bending the rules quite a bit here. Giving a slave in advance of full payment is virtually unheard of. If you’d rather I held on to her until…”
“No!” I cried out, biting my lip. “Fine. We’ll do things your way. I’ll get that money.”
“Good,” Figuro said, nodding respectfully. “We have a deal then. You have one month to earn the gold, or we repossess the tigerkin and the ring will be compensation for my time.”
I leaned back and scratched my chin. This isn't how collateral works in my world. However, this isn't like a car loan, either. He's trusting me with Lydia for a month. I could run with her, or she could die, and then he'd take a major loss. Meanwhile, if I can't keep my part of the bargain, I don't merely lose Lydia, but the ring also. It's a bit better than offering myself to slavery, but only a little. After a moment, I nodded.
“Done!” The pair of us shook on it.
Figuro lead me back out into the area, gesturing to a guard nearby. He left while we waited in front of the animalkin cages. In particular, I was looking into the sick cage. Most of the people were very old. There was one notable exception. It was a fox-eared girl. Her skin was pale and her lips were dry and broken. She turned and looked up at me as if noticing that I was glancing in her direction. She had dirty blond hair that looked nearly white. She had two triangle ears on her head, pointier than Lydia's, and a long, bushy tail that looked less flexible than hers.
“I wouldn’t show too much interest in her,” Figuro spoke up. “She’s diseased. It’s chronic. The Priest claims it requires a series of spells from a particularly high-level priest. She'd basically need treatment for the rest of her life, or an extremely rare potion known as an elixir. The cost would be far more than she is worth, I’m sorry to say it. It’s a shame too. She’s a special fox variant. They’re called the nine-tailed fox.”
I glanced up to her single tail, and the guy chuckled. “The other 8 tails are spiritual. That is to say, they exist on another plane of existence.”
He chuckled at my expression. I didn’t really even understand it. Magical tails? It truly was weird, and a shame that such a pretty girl was sickly and dying.
“M-master!” A girl shouted, and Lydia burst out and ran toward me without reserve, throwing her arms around me. “You came! You really came for me!”
She immediately started bawling as soon as she touched me, large hot tears falling on my chest, her arms holding me tightly. I reached forward and patted her head, feeling the warmth of her body once again.
The Guild Master laughed, patting me on the back. Figuro remained back but had a bit of an amused smile on his face. The foxgirl also watched us expressionlessly from her cage, but no smile reached her face.