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“I’m sorry.” I said, “I should have well over eight times enough.”

“In investments, yes.” the loankeeper said. His name was Homron, and he had come to explain to me why I couldn’t afford a new suit of platemail. “But investments are not coins. It will take time before such large purchases can be countenanced. In any event...”

“Is this about the caste thing again?” I asked.

“It is tradition that only warriors need armor fit for making war in.” he said. “And, uhm...”

I sighed. “Tell me.”

“It is... normal for children to have their purchases limited, especially in cases such as this.”

“Homron, I thank you for your honesty.”

“Of course.”

.....

“I am hoping to leave for home next spring, caravan or no caravan.”

He blinked at me. “None of your investments will have returns by then.”

“Then why were such investments made?”

“Investments in the community are always made when one has as much funding as you had. Only a fool would... I’m sorry, it is not my place...”

“You think I am spending the money too quickly.” I said.

Raevik bounced a pebble off the wall and into his mouth. “His kind always thinks that. No sense for the immediate now.”

“And youths like the two of you have no respect for what can be accomplished only over time.” Homron said. “Meaning no disrespect, young sir.”

“I do still need to eat.” I said.

“You cannot long sustain your expenses without an income.” Homron said.

“And how would you recommend I earn one?” I asked.

Homron stroked his invisible beard. “I can only recommend that you cut your expenses most drastically. As an official child, your options for such are ... not encouraging.”

“In dwarven society.” I said.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“In dwarven society,” I said, “my options are severely limited.”

Raevik bounced a pebble off my head. “Don’t be too much of a slag skull.” he said. “If you go into the Mazes, some minotaur matron or other will enslave you. How will you get home then?”

“If there is nothing else...” Homron said.

“Oh. Yes, thank you for your time, Loankeep Homron.” I said. “And how would you deal with this matter, if you were in my place?”

“Well, it seems to me that you are always rushing things. Good when it is the regrowing of critical organs, yes. But like the warding so early in the last battle, haste isn’t always better than timing things properly.”

I cleared my throat. “Do you support Hagon’s actions, then?”

“He probably saved us all.” he replied, calmly bouncing a pebble off the wall and then off his shoulder. “Damn it, lad. Now I’m off my game.”

He caught the next one.

I slowed my breathing while he chewed. “I’m listening.” I said. “Tell me why what I did was wrong.”

“I just did. The timing was off. You’d have gotten a wave of Taint off that pool, moving quickly like that.”

“And that wave scared everyone as much as the thought of it scares me?”

“We put on a brave front.” Raevik said, “But four is more than three. Most of us would have ended our careers Tainted. Once it gets inside of you...”

“I remember.” I said. “It tries to spread all over your aura every time you touch magic.”

“Oh, it spreads any way, trust me.” he said. “But yes, it tries to go faster when magic is about.”

“Only tries?” I asked.

He spat out chunks of gravel. “Once it’s in a living thing, it never comes back out. Not fully. Today, Tomorrow, twenty years from now. Taint always wins. Always.” He bounced a pebble off the wall, off his hand, and into his mouth.

“It cannot be so simple.” I said. “Otherwise, everything would be Tainted.”

“Look at how dangerous and unreliable magic is.” he countered. “Tell me how it is that you think everything isn’t Tainted, if only a little bit.”

“But... we’d notice, wouldn’t we?”

“Using what? Your Taint-dulled senses?”

“But then how...” I couldn’t complete that thought, not in spoken words.

“Damn.” I eventually said.

“Indeed.” he said. “What if the old tales were entirely true, and modern people were just weaker, clumsier, and stupid? It would explain a lot.”

“No.” I said. “It just isn’t so, not to the degree you propose.”

“How can you say that with such conviction?” he asked.

“Because I can say it at all.” I said. “Among other things, I am a Truthspeaker; I literally cannot lie.”

“I don’t think your oath not to lie works that way.”

“I do.” I said, “And in any case, I think my System enforces that. I can’t say why.”

“Maybe your System has better ethics than you do?”

“I’m almost certain my System has no ethics, nor any thoughts to wonder what ethics are.”

“Almost. Certain.” he said.

“I won’t pretend to know how my System works, I only know with certainty that it does.”

“Does it?” he asked. “You might be insane, never having had a System, and only be deluding yourself.”

I shrugged. “I must really hate myself, to imagine such a System as I have. I find your proposal unlikely, Raevik.”

“What about that jaunt upward, into the Mines? It is Wrath-day, and I find myself with a few tiny coins.”

I flexed my wounded body. “Ugh. Perhaps next week.”

“Or the week after that?” he asked.

“Depends how much food I can afford.” I said, “But probably not much past that. I could use a good brawl.”

“Oh.” he said. “Then perhaps I should mention that we’re supposed to stop you?”

“Stop me? Why?”

“Oh, something about not being able to afford the casualties of another pitched battle.” he said. “It wasn’t about dark magic or food, I had trouble paying attention.”

“Oh.” he said, “And there’s the fact that while you’re a minor, officially a child, letting you wander off to such a dangerous place is just out of the question.”

I sighed. “How would you recommend that I earn an income, then?”

He scoffed. “I wouldn’t.” he said. “I have decades of time as you surface folk measure it. True, there are some urgent things in this life, but I find that the best way to get things you want is to work slowly toward them, and keep at it until they fall into your open palm. Go ahead, tell me you can’t wait a few decades for something. It’ll be funny.”

“I might have decades or longer,” I said, “But Uma doesn’t have that long. I’m not sure how many child bearing years a minotaur female has, but I can’t imagine it being longer than humans have.”

“Why humans?” he asked.

“Closest lifespan match that I know of.” I said.

“Eh.” he replied, “Logic. Boring.”

“Many things that work well are boring.” Miltor said, coming in.

“I thought you were looking into that street preacher.” Raevik said.

“Just finished.” Miltor said. “He’s harmless, at least to you and me. HIM, on the other hand...”

I sighed, and breathed in calmly. “Tell me.”

Miltor took a seat. “The good prophet says that YOU, sir, are the very spirit of vengeance.”

“An exaggeration.” I said.

“True,” Miltor said, “Although... you do seem to make things interesting, just by your very presence.”

He looked knowingly at Raevik, who flipped him a coin.

“Fine.” Raevik said. “I was mistaken. It’s not a curse. My next guess is that he’s just that special breed of stupid.”

“That seems more likely than me being delusional.” I said.

Miltor chuckled. “Oh my. It sounds like a conversation I’m glad to have missed.”

.....

“Almost as bad as you missing rebound snacks.” Raevik said, bouncing one off the wall into his mouth.

“Yes, yes.” Miltor said, “You’ve spent twenty years more practicing things like that than I have.”

“Start practicing now.” Raevik said. “I could use the competition.”

“I think I’ll keep my dignity, thank you.” To me he said, “How have you resisted the call, when he makes it look so easy?”

“Rocks have negligible nutritional value to me. At least for the moment.”

“Bizarre.” he said.

“I was going to go with freakish.” Raevik said, “But your word is accurate also.”

“I think we need to let him loose on the streets.” Miltor said.

“The last thing we need is for a symbol of dwarven resiliency to be walking the streets.” Raevik said.

“Exactly why we need the real person in plain view.” Miltor said. “To show that he’s just strange, but certainly not heroic or anything.”

“I TOLD Hagon not to bring him with us! They’re probably hailing him as the one who put that node into a deep slumber.”

“You know better than that.” Miltor said. “The public, as usual has no clue of the danger they were in.”

“Good.” Raevik said.