Johann pushed past the doors, exiting the dining area of Pikkōnheim’s jobseeking guild building. He lazily raised a fist to cover up his yawn—he was groggy enough that taking even one step felt heavy to him, but someone had to man the desk today. Klemens had called in sick for the tenth time this month, and it was starting to get on everyone’s nerves, to the point even Sarah had started to refuse to cover the first shift for him. That left Johann as the only one left without an excuse not to do it.
He dragged a stool from the bar, making several patrons cover their ears at that teeth-grinding noise. Johann paid them no mind, really. What did they expect? Did anyone seriously think he would stand behind the desk for hours on end?
Preposterous, he’d say.
As he summoned a small wooden box from his inventory, Johann took his seat, awaiting any potential jobseekers. Their guild technically offered far more services than that, but over time, the popularity of their jobs board had eclipsed everything else. Most of what they had didn’t even qualify as anything remotely related to adventuring, so it didn’t seem right to call themselves an adventuring guild anymore.
The charcuterie board’s quality was subpar, but he couldn’t have expected much from anything that came in an unlabeled box. It still served its purpose—that of a snack—and it helped Johann kill time. Most people would have browsed the current jobs by now, and no one approached him to take one or ask any questions. The only visitors they got headed straight for the tavern they so graciously shared space with.
Sarah was late.
Johann might have been fairly close to falling asleep then and there, as even a wooden stool could prove quite comfortable when one was exhausted enough, but his rest was cut short by the slamming of a door.
A man with a scrunched-up nose walked straight to the board and practically slapped it, his palm glowing a faint yellow for a split second before he pulled back. “Heed this!”
The man waltzed off without so much as an explanation, leaving the door ajar in his wake. The freshly-reawakened Johann was not the only one watching, as tavern and guild hall alike had grown silent.
“Wasn’t that the Saint of {Row}? Hreyk hlāford?” someone near the bar whispered, and hushed conversations erupted into unintelligible cacophony.
A Saint? Oh, I smell a story.
Johann had half a mind to leave his post and question people himself—they clearly had a better idea as to what had just happened than he did—just as Sarah came rushing in, her hair disheveled as if she had only just awoken. At least she finally shut the door behind her.
“We’re in for a nice commission!”
“We are?” Johann’s trepidation and anticipation mixed—he had a nice feeling about this.
“Yes,” Sarah grinned. “One of the Prince’s children has gone missing. They’re opening jobs for the search everywhere, but we ended up being among the first! I practically had to dodge a stampede to make it here in time. Anyway, got to run! I skipped breakfast for this. Good luck!”
Before Johann could ask what she meant, his coworker ducked into the dining area. He raised an eyebrow. Certainly, he could understand needing to rush to grab a bite before work, but she’d been meant to take over for him already. He wouldn’t fault her for taking a little longer in order to eat…
So why did he have a bad feeling about this, now?
The door shook on its hinges as it was violently pushed open yet again, and a veritable avalanche of people in rustic outfits barged into the building, all seemingly willing to climb over each other to be the first to reach the board.
One man with an oversized hat and three different fanny bags yanked the notice off, elbowing several others to reach the desk as others attempted to tackle him and claim the prize for themselves.
Johann shot a glance in the dining area’s direction, as Sarah remained absent.
Wave take me! You Devilsdamned woman!
----------------------------------------
“This is good,” Theo admitted, stirring another cube of sugar into his coffee. Alaric hadn’t known it was possible for someone to add this much sugar to a beverage and still find it palatable. They’d been commiserating about the inadequacies of their respective parents—though the boy was often vague in details about his own—for months now, but this was the first time they’d successfully gone someplace to eat and chat.
It didn’t hurt that no one recognized Theo here, this coffee shop distant enough from the one where the sandwich theft had occurred. The boy was great at changing his appearance, Alaric had to admit. That alone kept him from believing his claims of being some common runaway who’d had a disagreement with his parents—the guy was far too educated for that.
That, and he’d insulted Alaric when they’d met, using common derogatorily. But Alaric wasn’t about to pry, not when he’d found himself a new coffee-drinking buddy, at last.
“Are you sure you aren’t too young to—” a waiter who’d arrived with the new shift went to ask the age-old question, and Alaric summoned another gold coin without a word. The waiter scooted away with the empty cup and swiftly returned with it refilled.
Theo laughed. “I like your style.”
“Devils know life is hard enough to go through without a cup a day,” Alaric shrugged.
“My mother would say the same, but of glasses, if the meaning reaches you,” Theo sighed before sipping his coffee again. A waitress walked by them, carrying a lemon tart to another table, and Theo pantomimed a gagging motion—he had a thing against citrics. “In seriousness, though… Does it not concern you, to flash coin like that? Anyone who sees you could seek to rob you! Wave take me, even I might have considered it.”
“I thought you were too fond of your nose for that?”
The boy shot Alaric a glare, eliciting a smile.
Something about Theo’s story was off, in any case. Alaric had a hard time seeing the boy get robbed when he clearly had at least some magical training under his belt—then again, he’d folded with ridiculous ease with a mere punch from a mortal just around his age.
“Your meal, gentlemen,” the same waiter from earlier returned carrying a plate in each hand. They had both ordered the same specialty of the coffee shop, two poached golden eggs with thin galina slices and jam over bread. It was quite the savory offering, and for a decent price, too. Alaric always appreciated it when both his meals and the requisite bribes allowed him to stick to his budget.
If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
Theo scarfed the meal down like a starving man, as if Alaric hadn’t been bringing him food all this time. For his part, Alaric only raised an eyebrow. Despite the boy’s speed in eating, he still made a visible effort to keep his hands off the table, and held the utensils a bit too daintily.
Definitely a noble.
Not that it really mattered to Alaric. Bernie—as he had fully transitioned to calling his stepmother by now—had been a noble once too, even if no one liked to talk about it. Alaric didn’t have anything in particular against their ilk, beyond the Champion Saint’s journals labeling them as greedy folk who punched down on mortals.
So long as Theo didn’t go out of his way to antagonize him, he was quite sure they could keep this quasi-friendship of theirs going, at least for a little longer.
“The fact that you have anything this edible here in the middle of nowhere never ceases to amaze me,” Theo mused. “I’d have thought those sandwiches would be the peak of what mortal cuisine could accomplish.”
Alaric’s good mood evaporated, though the other boy appeared oblivious.
“Dessert?” the obvious noble asked with a pleading look after they were done eating.
Alaric exhaled slowly and motioned for the waiter to come to them. “Can I see your desserts card?”
Examining the offerings, he chose to order two slices of lemon cake, not bothering to get Theo’s input for it—the boy wasn’t the one paying, after all, and knowing him, he would go for something more expensive if left to his own devices.
Theo glared at him, sniffling as the lemon cake was placed before him.
“You are an evil man, Alaric Rīsan,” he hissed.
Alaric, in turn, shot him the most devious grin he could muster.
----------------------------------------
“Your estate’s decor is atrocious,” Theo muttered as they returned to Alaric’s quarters. The boy was staying on one of the futons, having only steered clear from Alaric’s personal furniture after numerous threats that might have involved kicks. He was sort of like a beast one might encounter in the wild and opt to take home, kept only in line with reminders that he was on the receiving end of favors that could be taken away.
“Remind me, again, why I haven’t tossed you back out into the streets?”
“Because you aren’t heartless?”
More like, because, I think this is what Beryl would have done. Though even his older sister’s patience would have likely been put to the test by now.
“Everything’s pretty slow this time of the year, so we should be clear to speak for a while, if you want,” Alaric noted, taking a seat before the chess table. He’d had the staff get him his own, seeing as he could no longer walk into that studio without being overwhelmed by a profound sense of awkwardness.
“I guess,” Theo joined him at the table. He was an adequate opponent when they bothered to play, but the boy approached the game with an air of disinterest that made it difficult for Alaric to want to push it as a regular activity.
“I’ll say, I’ve been a bit jealous of my youngest sister as of late,” Alaric admitted, to get the conversation started. “I never got multiple teachers for anything, just a governess. That was it. I suppose I did have Thekla to fall back on, but please. She even has the antiquarian doubling as a history teacher for Adelheid. She’s a nice girl, and I’m happy that she’s finally sticking around more, but… yeah, there’s no other way around it. I’m jealous.”
Theo shrugged, waving to the side. “It’s woeful from your point of view, certainly, but your sister was born with potential, wasn’t she? And you weren’t. It’s only natural that more resources go to her education.”
“We aren’t exactly hurting for resources, Theo,” Alaric raised both arms, motioning to his surroundings as widely as he could.
“Neither are most well-off families, and they still cut their losses when need be. It’s likely the type of thing few choose to state aloud, but widely accepted nonetheless. Coin isn’t endless, especially as generations go by. You have to choose which children to invest in, and there’s little point in investing in mortal children who’ll just grow old and die without achieving much.”
“How are your grades, Theo? Didn’t you say you were doing great?”
Their standoff was short-lived, as a newcomer’s voice came from the back of the room. “Who is that, brother?”
Alaric nearly jumped off his seat, pushing it backwards and nearly hitting the ground. Mercifully, he managed to avoid taking the chess table with him this time around.
“I go by Theo,” the boy supplied. “Pleased to meet you. And you are?”
“I’m not ‘pleased’ to meet you,” Adelheid pouted, ignoring Theo. She eyed Alaric as he tried to mend the wrinkles in his clothes, having only just now managed to stand back up—Alaric had to shoot down his instinctive annoyance that she hadn’t helped him. She was tiny. Of course she hadn’t helped him, when she was barely a toddler. Said toddler continued to stare at him. “Who is he?”
Alaric’s mind flipped through the possibilities. What sort of excuse could he come up with? Adelheid wasn’t the type to start blabbing about this, even if he told her the truth, but he struggled to settle on an explanation a child her age could understand.
His sister, however, smiled. “Oh!”
“Oh?” Alaric blinked slowly, taken off-guard by the change in her expression.
“It’s okay, brother. I know how to keep secrets!” Adelheid placed a hand to the side of her mouth and ‘whispered’, giving him a look far more conspiratorial than he would have believed any four-year-old to be capable of making. “Mother always tells Sister Matilda that she can’t sneak boys into her room once she’s older, but I think she should get to have whichever friends she wants! So you should, too!”
Alaric choked—Theo, for his part, simply burst out laughing.
“Adelheid, this is my friend Theo. We met in Beuzaheim when I went out for lunch. He is not someone I’m sneaking in. I beg of you, banish the thought.”
This entire situation was bad enough a problem so far, that Alaric could do without the misunderstandings of a literal toddler being thrown into the mix.
“So Theo’s a noble?” Adelheid asked, practically out of the blue. It looked to Alaric as though she were having a conversation with herself. “How’d he end up here, then?”
“I had a troubling home life. I’m just never good enough for my father, despite my best efforts,” Theo said with a shake of his head. “So I left. It was about time I started thinking about myself. But I had some… trouble along the way, and lost much of what I’d brought along,” he at least had the decency to gloss over the harsher details when speaking to a child. “I ended up in Beuzaheim, and your older brother here was kind enough to offer me a place to stay.”
To Alaric’s bafflement, his little sister nodded along sympathetically. “Oh, that must suck. But I get it! Sometimes I feel like nobody cares about me, too.”
“Adelheid, that isn’t true. I care!”
“Yep!” the girl didn’t disagree. “But I get it. Mother and Father are always busy with their fancy papers and training. They don’t always have time for me… or any of us.”
That stung in how true it was—but mostly given the source of such a claim.
Alaric bit his lip, Theo and even Adelheid’s intrusion now forgotten. Should Alaric be doing something about this? He knew his little sister tended to get overlooked, everyone far too used to her antics by now for them to be impacted by her tendency to appear and disappear.
But to hear it stated so plainly, and by the girl herself? That she felt unloved? Adelheid might not have used those exact words, but it still struck a chord in her older brother.
“Maybe we could take turns playing chess?” Adelheid asked, her gaze shifting between the two as if begging for someone to break the abrupt silence that had descended upon them.
“Yes, Adelheid,” Alaric managed to sit back down and pull the chair closer to the table without falling on his rear a third time. “We can.”
But after they were done, Alaric would be paying his father and stepmother a visit.