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“I don’t think I can ever match the gall I had when you walked through my door, Jeren.”
Walking side-by-side, Jeren Silviers and Leopold Winchester looked like a stag party and a merchant’s awkward mistake rolled into one. Beneath the jade green canopy of early morning Radasanth, their jet-black clothing and sweaty brows told of another night of excess and debauchery. Unfortunately, for the pair, only taxes and stocktaking kept them up past midnight.
“You were on exceptional form, I’ll admit.”
Leopold rolled his eyes. Jeren had been his first and only interview for the position of caravan guard in the formative years of the Winchester Rose trading Company. The swashbuckler had gone beyond those duties, and now, they were business partners.
“Poke me in the ribs if I start droning about something inconseque-”
Jeren poked Leopold in the ribs.
“Not now,” the merchant wheezed. He rubbed his side for dramatic effect.
“Oh. Sorry,” Jeren quipped.
They exchanged mischievous glances and continued. Spring was kind to the rural parts of Corone, and ahead, the forge belonging to the next of many prospective allies in the assembling of avengers stood regal and folk-like in the scattered beams of sunlight that broke through oak and maple.
“Is he is well endowed as they say?”
“You’d have to ask my wife,” Leopold sniggered.
“John, I meant John.” Jeren wrinkled his nose, and stopped at the wooden fence surrounding the structure. He looked up at the smoke stack, sign that the forge blazed and had occupants.
“’A titan of a man’, I believe my sister said of him.” She had said a lot more, too, but he did not wish to risk being overhead. Shooting himself in the foot was for late evening drunken rambles and forgetting to do the dishes.
“Good enough for me. Anything I need to know?”
Leopold gave it some thought, but before he knew it, he stood before the ramshackle doors and knocked several times. Inside, the sound of hustle and bustle and banging and crushing told the duo they had come at a good time. He shrugged his shoulders.
“You know me, Jeren. I like to wing it,” he chuckled.
His right hand man approached, stood a few paces back from Leopold, and checked his appearance.
“I swear,” he began through clenched teeth, “if you make one more Raven joke before sundown, I’ll run you through.”
They waited patiently, polite smiles plastered onto tired faces. The steam work on Leopold’s hat stopped hissing, and Jeren tucked the hilt of his rapier beneath his overcoat. Leopold gave ample warning that today; they would make their case with the good to do manners of businesspersons.
“Hello?” Leopold cried. “Hello?”