Copper Interlude

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It was a quiet day at the shop. Copper was working on his knife again. The calamity had begun, he knew in his veins, but it wouldn’t matter for him anytime soon. If he was very unlucky, he might need to run for cover, but he had a while. If he was very lucky, he might get to reach the Nexus of the calamity. According to rumor, the last owner of the market had gained the power to found the market that way.

Copper Salvage was a goblin, and not a pure-blooded one. By goblin standards, he was tall, at four and a half feet. Like most goblins named Salvage, he had been dropped off at the Orphanage. Unlike most of his siblings, he had actually managed to pay off his debt a few years ago.

Running a shop in the outermost rim of the market was quiet. Nobody came here if they could afford to go somewhere better, neither to sell nor to buy. If the rent wasn’t just as cheap, he’d be broke by now. Instead, he eked out a life of the bare necessities, and a little more.

His knife was made of scraps, at least as a goblin would count such things. The blade was made of low quality Goblin Steel, and the magic within was nearly as weak. Every Fae needed a weapon, and this was his. Hours of labor had allowed him to compensate for the flaws in the materials. It was far more deadly than his base materials, but far less than his commissions. After all, he had actual paying customers providing the supplies for those.

He wasn’t adding anything to it today - if he had anything better to be doing, he wouldn’t be working on it at all, but this had been a slow month for commission work. He was left with nothing to do but hone, sharpen, and realign the three attributes within the knife.

He had long since passed the point of meaningful returns, but practicing skills was the trick to improving them. Enchanting both bullets and arrows would require the same precision he was honing through his work on the knife.

A woman confidently marched into the shop. She was tall even by royal standards, at least six feet tall. Her orange-on-hazel eyeballs weren’t something that happened naturally, but Copper didn’t know what they signified. She was dressed casually, wearing a pair of jeans and a red t-shirt. Her brown hair was long and messy. None of that was quite normal, but the oddest thing was the next thing he noticed.

She should have been dead. There wasn’t a trace of magic in her, and he could feel its absence. Any fae that lacked magic was dead. Copper suspected that she might be a brownie, but even brownies had magic, for all that they crafted bodies of meat as well. She was probably a human, or something even more unusual than that.

Of course, that could be a trick. Fae couldn’t lie, but they could deceive. But even so, it wouldn’t be wise to confront her on the matter yet. He was a humble shopkeeper, and there were no guard patrols in his area. If it was a trick, she could probably rip him to shreds.

“What’re you selling?” Copper said.

“Let’s start with this.” She said, and threw down a handful of magical materials. The first thing that caught his eye was the gems. They were, at the minimum, an incredibly plausible facsimile of an Angel’s Gems.

If they were really from an Angel, they would each be worth more than the contents of his entire shop, including him. Not only were Angel Gems incredibly powerful magically, but their unique properties made them a status symbol among the nobility. How likely was it that someone could sell that and couldn’t afford the bribes to buy access passes for farther into the market?

Beside them was a pile of glass. Most’ve that glass was nowhere near as valuable. It was still potent, and not worthless, but it wouldn’t trade for more than a month’s rent.

However, a few of the shards were just as potent as the gems. Whatever the gems had come from, those pieces of glass shared the same source. They would be harder to process, and they weren’t as obvious a status symbol, but they’d be nearly as valuable.

Just going by the raw magic in these things, they would’ve been worth more than he’d made in the last year. Even if they were fakes - and they probably were - he could tell that they really held the power they should have.

It was almost painful to make the lowball offer, but it was literally all the funds he had. He wasn’t desperate enough to admit how desperate he was.

“Two hundred and thirty for the lot.” He said. That would be almost absolutely ripping her off. It was a tidy sum, but just from quantity alone, the pile of glass shards was worth it even after removing the possibly-angelic pieces.

The lady grinned back, “Two hundred, and your services as a middleman for a job.”

Her ease wasn’t faked, she knew what she was doing. His hands ached to grab the treasure on the table. He knew better than to agree before he knew the terms, however. If she had even the faintest idea of the value of these treasures, this would be a trap.

“I don’t sign blank contracts.” He said, and grinned back at her, “Tell me the details.”

He half-expected her to storm out and look for another mark. Instead, she grinned at him.

“I’m a human. I need a bodyguard to go to the Nexus and protect my sister.” She said, “Goblins can trade in history, right? I’d be willing to trade either of my birthbonds to a bodyguard for a contract.”

That was a tempting offer. A “birthbond” was the mark of your ancestry. If she traded one away, she would no longer be the daughter of either her sire or her dam. In exchange, as far as the universe was concerned, the new bearer of the bond would be the offspring. This caused interesting cascade effects, especially since siblinghood didn’t intrinsically transfer with the bonds. Fortunately, the parts of the universe that cared about this sort of thing were stupid about reproduction. It didn’t know that a person couldn’t have zero ancestors, or that a pureblooded fae couldn’t have a human ancestor.

The actual use of that was access to the nexus. The true value of the trade was unclear, but some piece of him instinctively knew that whoever held the birthbond would be able to enter the Nexus without issue. They’d be able to join in the mess with all the benefits the natives had, and keep their natural powers.

He didn’t fully understand how the Nexus had changed, but he knew, instinctively, that partial access was almost as lucrative as it was risky. Full access would make it somewhat less risky, and significantly more lucrative. It probably wouldn’t be impossible to find someone for the contract.

“What terms would you want?” Copper asked.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

“The standard contract, with good faith effort required and no penalty clause for failure. My sister will hold rights to the contract. They’ll need to not be nobility, and to have taken bodyguard work before.” She said, “I’ll want them to protect her for seven months and a week, starting tomorrow.”

In other words, work as a full-time bodyguard with reasonable terms. No death for failure, at the cost of being bound to genuinely do your best. If any fae signed a goblin contract, they would be bound to follow through, but that was more than fair for the promise of surviving if they failed.

Admittedly, it was dangerous work, and seven months would be a long while, but it was also a fairly significant fee. Finding someone willing to take the contract before the day was over would be a struggle, but only because of the deadline. The terms were somewhere between generous and lucrative, at least for the quality of bodyguards Copper would be looking through.

“A hundred, and the job, for the lot.” He said.

She grinned at him, “Deal.”

He grinned back, with his least threatening smile.

“Anything else you want?” He asked.

“A Goblin’s friendship. I’m willing to trade my other half of my heritage for a contract enforcing that. Any goblin, as long as they’re willing and able to be my friend.” She smiled innocently, as if she hadn’t spewed horrible filth at him.

A contractual friendship meant whatever goblin signed the other side would have no choice but to consider her a friend, no matter what she did. If he found someone desperate enough, it would sell. He had seen enough desperation to know that.

It wasn’t a loyalty contract. Those were all but selling yourself into slavery, even if you set terms of treatment first. He’d seen fellow orphans take those, either out of desperation or greed. They were tighter chains than any literal chain.

A friendship contract could be slipped, worked around. All it meant was that you would always be willing to go as far for the holder as for any other friend. Schemers and politicians bought and sold them if they lacked the charisma to make friendships through other means. Why would she need that? If she ticked off the goblin market - he wouldn’t expect the other party to break the Market-law for a friend. He wouldn’t. But why else would she need a goblin friend?

Nobody ever tried to manipulate outer rim orphans with friendship contracts, but he’d heard stories. Sometimes the contract succeeded for its holder’s scheme, and sometimes it didn’t. Sometimes it was genuinely benign, or a ward against betrayal.

He could almost comfortably sell this to someone, without worrying about the ethics of the matter. It would come down to the terms. He’d never written one before, but most defined friendship unambiguously.

“All they have to do is be your friend?” He asked. Most contracts demanded more than that, or defined what friendship needed to be. If it didn’t, she’d be practically signing a blank contract. A vicious one, but with only the smallest of hooks in the signatory’s mind. That might tempt even someone who was merely ambitious or greedy.

“All they have to do is consider me a friend.” She answered, “No other obligations. I’ll give you a hundred coins to act as a middleman.”

Copper hesitated, looking for a catch. He knew that humans could lie freely, but if she didn’t tell him to put in further terms, they wouldn’t exist. She was definitely up to something, because there was no other reason to make a contract like this. It might not be a competent scheme, however, because humans were not Fae. They didn’t grow up in the same society, and they didn’t have a chance to learn the history of such bargains.

Regardless, he could turn a profit on this beyond the coins she’d return. He could definitely get some bidding on this contract. It was powerful enough to make it worth paying for the chance. That might be her plan. By offering a contract that was too good to be true, she’d ensure that her new friend was more powerful than where she could reach naturally.

“I’ll find someone within three days.” He said, and offered her the contracts, “Read and sign. They should contain the same meaning you understand, with the standard resolution clauses.”

Some of those failure clauses would be horrifyingly punishing for him, but Copper was confident in his ability to finish the bargains. He felt both contracts settle into his heart, and grinned.

No matter how this turned out, this had certainly been his lucky day. Now, he had a decision to make. Was he going to stay here, or was he going to take the gamble he’d been offered for himself?

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Paradise Interlude

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“You know, you don’t need to sneak in there.” Hector said, “The Judge can find Hell’s pawn on his own.”

Hector was short by Taleborn standards, at 64 inches. He looked like he’d been ripped out of a drama, and he was perfectly handsome in the way that most Taleborn heroes were. His outfit was covered with a rainbow of blood and paint stains, and he was working on drawing a complicated mess of lines in the ground.

“It needs to be done.” Marie said, “There’ll be worse collateral damage if I don’t.”

She was practicing fighting with a glowing blade of light as big as she was. Every strike in the routine flowed smoothly into the next. She was wearing a shining suit of silver armor polished to perfection, and a clear crystal helmet that showed her face. Hector didn't need to look at her to know she was frowning.

He groaned dramatically, “Why do we need to assassinate the Hell Princess at all? Can’t we just live and let live?”

“She’s recruiting, corrupting souls. If we don’t take her down now, we might not be able to later. Already, her power is growing.” Marie said, “Do you really want evil to win?”

“I don’t.” Hector said, “Will this even help with that?”

“Of course it will.” Marie said, “We need to bring down Eris’ right hand before it’s too late. Someday, it will come to a war between good and evil. We need to win that war.”

Hector sighed, “Yeah, but is this really worth the risk? She's supposed to be as strong as you are. It's not worth your life to get her name, not when we already know where she is.”

“I won't die.” Marie said, “Maybe I’ll even save some people in the process.”

“You’re going to leave me to set up this trap alone, aren’t you?” Hector said, “Fine. Go. Do your scouting. Take one of the angels with you. Six should be enough to make the snare, and I have a feeling you’ll need it.”

“William won’t appreciate you deviating from the plan.” Marie said.

“William doesn’t care who dies, as long as Light wins. Matches does, and she’s our boss.” Hector said, “I care, too. You want to save people too, right?”

“Of course.” Marie said.

“Then you should understand where I’m coming from.” Hector grinned, “If you don’t take it, the chances of evil winning will skyrocket.”

“Is this the seer act again?” Marie asked.

“Yes, but I’m serious.” Hector said, “But here’s a seer’s question - would you rather die to ensure good wins, or not?”

Marie sighed, “You should know my answer by now.”

“I do. You’d die to see Eris dead, wouldn’t you?” Hector said, “Good and light must always win. Evil and darkness must always lose. What happens when they aren’t the same thing?”

Marie sighed, “If evil is allowed to persist, they’ll do enough harm that cutting them down could be worth forsaking goodness. It needs to be decided case-by-case.”

“The princess is almost certainly trying to help people. She taught them how to replicate her shelter.” Hector said, “But she’s still Eris’ pawn. What will you do?”

“I’ll figure it out later.” Marie said.

“You’ll need to choose soon.” Hector said, “or you won’t get to choose at all.”

Marie scowled, “Haven’t I proven I’ve already chosen?”

Hector sighed, “You have. Every day, you’ve chosen. But there’s always a new choice to make. Make ones you won’t regret.”

“I will.” Marie said.