To follow the last crash deep inside the brick metal shop, a second louder crash followed it up.

  The reptilian symbiote probably wanted to keep his shop from getting wrecked completely by the whole lot of them. The shopkeeper darted away in a shockingly quick process of dropping to all fours, sucking in the tentacles to his neck, and going out, up, and across the side of the shelves with such speed that it made even Bodi roll his head to follow it. Away went the shopkeeper flapping metallic blue chainmail and all.

  A sudden shout could be heard, calling the “More assistance at the shop, please. Many, many!”

  The voice had changed in pitch from the more modulated humanoid sound into a high strange pitch that could carry better than the other tone. Soon the reinforcement would arrive then. Nettle spied the entrance, trying to determine exactly what he wanted to drop into his pockets. He checked the aglets were secured in his robes.

  What else around here could be grabbed? The shopkeeper would be the most experienced negotiator and a negator of value. If he wanted to get the box out into their cart without too much trouble, his best choice would be finding someone who would both make a bargain and ask very few questions.

  It wasn’t theft, so much as proper bargaining, just like a union buster did. So often travelers’ resupplies at the nearest zone getting heavily taken advantage of by the convenience of the location and the fact they could not live without the products there. Nettle himself once considered being only a shopkeeper but realized a great deal of people in the lesser species hated working with an immortal for negotiations. They felt on the wrong foot and often became quite irritable on just seeing Fae. His passion for crafting, and natural skill in it, also helped him take the step to owner manager, instead of public facing for expansion.

  He’d replaced himself with a half-ling manager and to this day had a nice thriving shoe shop. It accounted for a great deal of his income. Not enough income for that he needed though. Power to monetary connection didn’t always work. To be sure, he could have used the combined wealth of his ancestors which was considerable, until it became debt, but he preferred to live a life that at least somewhat stemmed from his own abilities. He liked meeting all the different people seeking shoes, except at that time his only clients had been Fae. Now it could be better.

  To this day he could identity, through footwear and associated person with the foot in it, hidden truths. Not that anyone much cared. They assumed he got his knowledge randomly from the arcane arts rather than reading someone’s feet. It was an easy trick he learned long ago. He built his entire party on footwear choices alone.

  Now he inspected the shoes carefully as a whole host of sweating, burly smiths pushed into the door of the shop. He tossed out of hand the apprentices. A lesser negotiator would have picked them, but when they got lost or confused, they would need approval from someone else in the shop to ensure they could sell obscure older artifacts. The last thing he needed would be a master of apprentice showing up to ruin his deal.

  By the same note, he imagined the better shoes that marketed smiths with hard toes boots to protect their feet from potential damage dropping valuable or enchanted items. The medium sized man mid group hardly noticeable would be the master of the forge. His boots were not just reinforced, properly referenced in other shoes and metal reinforced, but enchanted to keep the feet cool and comfortable all day long. It was masterwork shoe only a wealthy and knowledgeable man could own. Seeing how they all wore leather aprons, sweat stained shirts and robust pants. The pants, shirts, and coveralls made them indisputable only ages to be used as a factor. Multiples of species he couldn’t identify. Still, he watched them as they broke out in the groups. He needed to choose someone confident. Someone who had the authority but not the required knowledge to make the transaction an issue.

  He picked out a man who strode out confidently toward a route that wouldn’t immediately take him to anyone. Confident in his ability but heading in the wrong direction and not as familiar with the inner workings of the warehouse part of the shop as in the working section in back. Further, he recognized the aglets on the end of the shoe ties as the ones he’d already picked up. A craftsman first, not shopkeeper.

  Nettle quickly shuffled his way through the shelves and then called out as well. “Oh, good someone to help me, I am a tad lost.”

  The man took a frustratingly long time to find the route there, but he came around the corner with an eyes smile. He smelled of deep sweat, a human mixed with dwarf man. Brown eyed and a very lined face from the labor of squinting into his work. His big hands were ruff, and tools tucked into all sorts of pockets poked out. Unless Nettle missed his guess, this man was an artisan capable of creating master metalworks. He probably never came into the shop unless like now they needed a whole huge host of them to deal with such a large party all wanting something different and causing trouble in the shop itself.

  In those situations, Nettle ran a bet with himself, odds three to one loser has to apologize, that all too likely he’d been there for throwing people out and not for prices or breakdowns in product specifications.

  “I’m grateful to see you,” the man gave him a slight sneer, looking him up and down. “What’s a Fae want here?”

  He was prepared for the blunt question. “Oh, this and that. I’ve not fully decided. Most of the rest of them are really buying, I’m just along for the ride. But a little something did attract my curiosity.”

  “Oh, grunted the man.” He sighed. “And what would that be?”

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Nettle gave an easy chuckle. “If I can find it again that will be the miracle. I’m Nettle, I didn’t catch your name.”

  “Smith.”

  “Oh, like the shop’s owner?”

  He snorted, “No that Smith has been gone a long time. We all go buy Smith here. Keeps people from holding a grudge. Back in the shop we all have real names, but to customers like yourself, we’re just Smith.”

  “But what do you do when a customer comes in asking for Smith?”

  “Ask for a description.”

  He opened his mouth to ask how they could tell any of them apart when they all looked so similar but bit his own tongue. He’d been too closely staring at their shoes and basic clothing to look at features really and it wouldn’t be horrible if they were all totally different looking and he’d not noticed in his haste to make a good deal.

  “As you say then,” he tried to give him a smile, but the man frowned right back.

  “Why would you want a specific worker? Which customers need a name? Only the complaining ones.”

  By the sheer bluntness, Nettle was already feeling better about his choices. “Perhaps they consider them the best craftsman or what a specific style. Doesn’t anyone ask for you on such things?”

  He thought the man would lie but instead he struggled out a shrug.

  “That’s for those who make the pretty things. Or who use superior materials which are more expensive. Nobody asks for the work of a guy like me. All the skill but not onto the flourishes.”

  As they walked, Nettle had been doing his level best to make it appear as if they were getting lost rather than trying to lead them in a specific direction. This had been part of his strategy from the start. Feign interest in other things before wearing down the other person. Now he thought his choice of seller would make so much of a difference that he should instead get the transaction done with and managed before anyone else noticed. This particular seller would be all too happy to leave as the first chance.

  He took a slightly more direct approach, stepping just slightly forward to lead him deep in the back.

  Still, the smith paused at a similar section.

  “You want something in the deeps? We usually don’t let customers back here.”

  Nettle glanced around but could see no difference between this area and the last. No keep out signs or employee only or customers stay out or literally anything. Maybe a spike with a skull in a pinch, just uniform shelves and some knowledge they all possessed.

  “Well, it is pretty deep back there. But I supposed, I could try to give you some directions. It’s in a pile of boxes. They have dust on them. It will take a long time to find with instructions only.”

  Nettle gave his best hopeful expression. The man stared back blanky. His mix of dwarven and human ancestry making his face hard to read. For a long time, silence hung between the two. Finally, unable to hold himself back longer for fear of someone else coming to help him.

  “Alongside some barrels. And some metal work. You can’t miss it.”

  The man stared. Nettle stared. The willow the whisps danced. Far away the sounds of clattering and chattering of others making deals or fighting.

  His expression didn’t change. “Why don’t you come in this once? Don’t tell anyone yes?”

  “Of course,” agreed Nettle readily. He took a more leaderlike role, having been granted the access to the place.

  They went to the very far back. He put his hand on the box in question.

  The smith sniffed. “Nobody comes back here. Not even the cataloguers. Not much use for armor in the first place around here.”

  He leaned down and inspected the box, squinting with an uncertainty at the marking. “It’s ceremonial armor, gold leaf. Not much use for function. I doubt you’d want something like that.”

  He turned away but the Nettle hastily stopped him by stepped between him and the exit.

  “It’s for a friend. He has the most ridiculous row of old armors in his house. Calls it décor. Anyway, He doesn’t have a gold set, and it would shock him if I get him something on this trip. I think this would fit perfectly for her, er, his eclectic tastes.”

  Suspicions suddenly marred, the empty featured face. “How did you find this thing in the first place? Not a thing you usually go looking for.”

  The blunt expression might not be hidden but it would be hard to fool. “In all honestly, I got back here because I was looking for Fae weaponry. Didn’t find anything I wanted, but this seemed like a good idea once I stumbled upon it. I forget to bring gifts back every time!”

  The expression fled and switched into annoyance. “It’s under a great pile of boxes. Why don’t I just take one off the top? It will be a terrible mess to get this thing out when others could do the job.”

  “That’s true,” Nettle muttered to himself and then gave him the best lopsided Fae smile he knew how to make. “It’s the curse of choice you see. One of the long running bloodline issues in my family. Once we pick things, picking again is so painful. All of us have it. Once chiocism. They say it heralds down-“

  The smith threw up his hands. “It’s alright. Please don’t give me the history and lineage of your family and their curse. I know you types get curses and gifts and strange fairy godmother stuff all the time.”

  “Exactly right,” the Fae agreed trying to hide his pointy teeth. Most Fae did not in fact have any curses or blessings that ran in the family, but the stories about the very few exceptions that did ran rampant throughout any chronology of his family primarily because to get a Fae curse to blessing to stick it had to be a unique one and they all made for interesting tales. The curses of never being in love, or the curses of dancing to death, or the curse of falling in love with the first female you see. Many different tales and all of them lies. No Fae had a fairy godmother. That was purely ignorance.

  “And now that you’ve picked this one box it’s that or nothing?”

  “I’m afraid for me. Once it’s purchased in the category of course ever since the despelling of-“

  He rambled for long enough until he saw the frustration clear with his opposition.

  “How much for this box of ceremonial armor?”

  The Smith grunted thinking. “As you can see this stuff never sells around here. I can’t see any of the makers sign on this label since it faded so much. It’s probably been in storage since before this building existed. I cannot vouch the contents of the box itself to be in prime condition. I’m sure you understand how this is a risk for you, to buy this box, unopened.”

  Truly, it would have given him pause if he’d not already done the spell previously when he couldn’t see the packages. Now though he reconsidered the matter. This expensive and odd material might not be the useful objects he hoped for.

  Seeing his open hesitation, the smith feeling rushed rather than slowed down or tired of the conversation to this point, blurted out a number.

  The fairy shook his head to hide the shock at the low figure. That would be bad even for regular gold leaf armor. Clearly this evaluation was already inaccurate if he started there.

  However, the mixed dwarf took this as a negative. “Well, if you wouldn’t want it to pay then we can show you some fairy weapons instead. We have a few in here if I can find the Platinum-special-sauce section.”

  His deal was sinking. Would he get them all thrown out? What exactly could go wrong? He considered the next steps.