Chapter 57 – In My Own Company

Mithra was waiting for me when I awakened. I hadn’t even remembered climbing into rat-bed, but at least I hadn’t slept for days this time. In fact, I’d beaten Annalisa downstairs with a couple hours of daylight left. When Mithra saw me, she put two fingers against a kettle. The tin turned red under her touch as she poured steaming water into a waiting cup.

I sat down next to her in silence for a few minutes, then took a sip of the tea.

“Apology accepted,” I said. “How are the collections coming?”

“At a trickle,” said Mithra. She slid a package across the bar that must have been my missing clothing while shaking her head. “They still underestimate that girl. And they don’t understand what it means to have you backing her. There’s a lot of small wagers to collect, and a lot of people to convince who got the idea that they don’t have to pay up just because the Teeth aren’t running things anymore. But Jeedle’s got his boys making the rounds, and we expect at least a quarter of it by midnight.”

“You put a lot of faith in us, but it was far from a sure thing.” I thought back to the fight, and that big axe-blade swinging for my face and shuddered. “Will it be enough to finish paying off the dwarves and get some adventurers patrolling the matchbox?”

Mithra wrinkled her nose. “Maybe some tinners barely worth their badges. But it’s best to be on good terms with the carpenters—knowing your reputation.”

“Hmm...” I said. “I need some walking around money, too,” I said.

“Not too much, I hope,” said Mithra, using her tail to draw a small purse out from behind the bar. She dropped it in my waiting hand. “Bring back enough for me to shave the top without you noticing. Whats it for?”

“Trust me, I notice,” I said, tying the purse to my belt. I patted the package of clothing. “First, I’m visiting the tailor to make sure that this,” I gestured to Damen’s ruined clothing, “doesn’t ever happen again.”

I could definitely tell Mithra was trying to suppress a smile. I glared at her, but that just made her smile grow wider, which, in turn, made me blush when I remembered what she’d probably(definitely) seen. Not that I really minded, but she made such a spectacle of it specifically to get under my skin.

“Then? You’re going to be disappointed. Stuffy mage stuff. Books and ink.”

“Sounds lonely.” Mithra blew out a breath and tucked the hair out of her face and behind her horns. Then she brightened. “Want some company?”

“How much?”

“Normally two cunnings. But for you? One and six clips. And dinner.”

I tsked as I got up from my stool. “Too rich for my blood. I can’t afford you, Mithra.”

“With the silver you’re flush with?” She spun on her seat and arched her back against the bar, stretching her arms overhead. “I’m worth it,” she said in a sing-song voice, and then laughed. Her laugh sent shivers down my back. And not in fear.

“Of that, I have no doubt.”

I went out back for a quick(blessedly cold) dip before heading upstairs to change into freshly laundered clothes. There’s something about fresh threads after a bath that make you feel like a new man—even if the water had been almost black by the time I was done scrubbing the grime off. When I came back down, Mithra was gone, but Miss Trundi had decided to attack the floor with a broom. She pointedly ignored me as I made my way out into the evening. I decided to go without Annalisa. Both to let my partner recover and to maintain some amount of anonymity in the circles I’d be visiting.

The wane dragons were just starting to show themselves in the sky. I made my way to the seamstress who had mended my robes and got her recommendation for a good tailor. The only one in this neck of the ‘Maw who patterns for bean poles, she’d said. Then, she tried to feed me so that I could fill out my clothes a bit better.

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Unable to refuse under threat of violence, I took the proffered fish sandwich that tasted marginally better than a tide pool and ate it on my way to the tailor. Once there, the seamstress’ name got me a discount (about as slim as the seamstress claimed I was) on three shirts and two pairs of trousers with reinforced knees and gussets. He took my measure and my coin and sent me on my way.

I headed north after that, into the middle city. Mages were rare, as were the storefronts that catered to their needs. I wanted to avoid the ones near the Soul Seekers academy. Instead, I swung by Alondalis’ home to ask his advice. He wasn’t in, and I briefly entertained breaking in to liberate a few battle wands—but decided against it. Beside the fact that I liked the elf, undoubtedly he would have some magic defenses against harmful intent that I had no wish to run afoul of. I’d gotten the book of wards from him, after all.

So, that left the best of worst options that I knew of in the upper city. I headed for the closest shop to me, because it was also the furthest shop I knew from the upper city guilds. It’s about two hours uphill walk from the downs to the upper city, if you hoof it. I was glad I’d left the heavy seeker robe in my office for this trek. Late in summer, the sun baked the city and all that heat still radiated off once the sun set. At dusk the sea breeze stilled, and I had picked a particularly stifling day. By the time I got to the upper city, I was sweating and thirsty. I’d stop in a pub for an ale on the way back down. I didn’t want to give these posh upper-city swank clubs my silver.

I had to admit, it had become strange to spend the entire day alone. Most of my time at the academy had been spent in my own company, but for the past months I’d been almost inseparable from Annalisa. Without Annalisa bouncing off every wall in the city, it almost felt too quiet. Just me, the night traffic, incoherent angry shouting, the odd twang of a crossbow or pop of a pistol, the breaking of glass, and vague muffled threats. You know, Dragonmaw. Plus, no one was trying to kill me—which had become somewhat novel. Life really had been easy in the upper city. But, easy was boring. I’d stagnated here. Lost sight of my goals and stalled out my magic with stuffy lectures and dusty classrooms.

Hawkley’s didn’t look like much. A narrow facade crushed between a book binder and a cosmetics store, the little magic shop looked as though it’s neighbors had squeezed it from a double to a single with the second story that sprouted out the top at an odd angle. I let myself in to the chorus of the little bell over the door. The smell of old parchment and reagents took me right back to the academy days.

“Young master,” said Hawkeye, bustling up. He was a dwarf, and it seemed they always bustled. He wiped clean a pair of spectacles before wiping the top of his head with the same cloth. “What can this humble peddler offer you?”

“Humble my narrow ass,” I said. “You always said you had the best goods in the upper city and thrice damn the cod of any man who argued.”

He put on his spectacles and squinted. “Cock of a dragon! Darcent! Why, I’ve not seen hide nor hair of you in months!” he bustled back between the narrow shelves. Hawkley had always had a soft spot for me because I didn’t treat him the way the posh highborn kids did. I treated him like a dwarf, with all the swearing and wheeling and dealing that came with it. “You’ll be needing a heap of books for the fall semester, then?”

I made my way through the store, running my fingers over the shelves filled with reagents and apparatus for everything from divination to the culinary dark arts. “Afraid not, Hawkley,” I said. “My deck has seen better days. I need to make some replacements.” I pulled out the deck and set it on the counter.

“Pains me to hear that, lad,” came his response from the other room. Hawkley returned with an armload of books stacked as high as his head. He muscled them onto the counter and then glared at them.

“You don’t give a shit,” I said.

“I give a shit about the book stipend I’ll be missing out on,” he pointed out.

“Fair.” I pointed at the one on the bottom. “Just this one. Pointre’s Portraits in Ink.”

His glare shifted to me. I held my hands up. He grunted and wedged the book on tarot portraits from the stack and slid it over. Then he picked up my deck and began to thumb through it.

“Cor, you weren’t bluffing. These look like you took a sword to them.”

An axe, but who’s keeping track? I remained silent while the dwarf nodded.

“Blanks and ink, then. The cedar and terrapin shell, if memory serves?”

Crushed Terrapin shell made for a decent enough arcanist ink, but it was the cheapest of the cheap. and tended to gum up when inking fine carvings. Likewise with blessed cedar from the Daybreaker druid glades. That had a tendency to swell when moist and did not stand up to a mad half-orc chieftess’ scrutiny. With how much I’d been relying on this deck to save my life, recently, I weighed the purse on my belt and considered investing in something stouter.

“Starfoil, if you have it. And do you have any fae teak?”

Hawkley’s bushy eyebrows climbed halfway to the top of his bald head. “Oh-ho! moving out but not moving on, I see. Let me see.”

Hawkley disappeared into the back and the distinct sound of rummaging filtered out. The old, salty dog. I knew he was just stirring his thick fingers in a bowl of bits while he puffed on his pipe. He knew exactly where he kept everything. But he was at least as much a showman as I was.

While I waited, trying not to smile at the exaggerated clatter, the bell at the door chimed, and a set of voices filtered in. I stiffened when I recognized them.

They were classmates from the academy.