I tug the door shut and weave between the shelves. “You know I’d catch them for you, Ruse.”
“Don’t sweet-talk me, Raeve. I’m eyeball-deep in inventory and a hair’s breadth away from losing my ever-loving mind.”
I round the final shelves, coming to a stone counter that dominates the store’s back end. Ruse is seated behind it, slouched over a bowl brimming with bugs armored with brown interlacing shells that can wrap around their wriggling bodies and contort them into tiny balls of stone.
One by one, Ruse is tucking them into bottleneck jars stuffed with a sprig of greenery and half an inch of rust-colored dirt, scoring lines on a scroll to the side with each weighty plop.
I watch her work, her wild tangle of curls such a bright shade of orange. “Looks tedious.”
“I want to impale myself with this quill,” she mutters, then corks the bottle she’s currently filling and places a lid on the bowl. She clasps her hands together, slaps a wide smile on her face, and beams at me through pretty, sunburst eyes. “How can I be of service?”
I pass her Essi’s list.
The white tuft of an otherwise lanky tail rises from behind the counter, waving back and forth, making me smile.
“Hi, Uno.”
The tuft wiggles faster before brushing Ruse’s jaw affectionately, an adoring softness spreading across Ruse’s face as she reaches beneath the counter, no doubt to rub Uno behind the ears.
I wonder how big she’s gotten. Miskunns are so scarce and greedily coveted I rarely glimpse more than the expressive tail of the creature who dotes on Ruse like a mother. Which is a shame.
She’s such a sweet thing.
Ruse hums, gaze still skimming the script. “Can’t help with whatever’s supposed to be beneath the splat of blood,” she murmurs, lifting her hand to scratch at it. “Messy job?”
“Unfortunately.” I shrug. “He was a squirter.”
“Ah.”
“Do you have any of the other things in stock?”
“You’re in luck,” she says, winking. “I have it all.”
I breathe a sigh of relief, thankful I don’t have to repeat the jar debacle.
Ruse grabs a cloth bag and moves around the counter, humming while she shifts between the shelves. Returning, she lumps the laden bag before me and sits again, sliding a large leather-bound ledger into sight. She lifts the front cover, flicking through until she settles on a page titled:
RAEVE
Dragon Bloodstone: 721 BKTS
My eyes widen.
I had no idea I had so much currency, the swelling digits a running commentary on how many bodies I’ve shoved off the wall to be picked apart by the predators that dwell beneath.
“I see your numbers have grown since—”
The inky scrawl stating my well of wealth bleeds off the page like watery ink blown off a slippery surface, before new digits appear in their place.
Smaller digits.
I frown.
Guess Sereme decided to charge me for the mission I begged the Elding for support on, and only because there was no possible way I could save all those younglings by myself.
Lovely.
A stark reminder that the hand that gives can just as greedily take away.
Ruse clears her throat, sliding her pink spectacles further down her nose, glancing up at me from beneath a fan of orange lashes. “Busy slumber?”
“Not the sort of busy they like, apparently.”
She gives me a rueful smile, then recomposes herself back into the vision of stoic storekeeper. “Well, besides your purchases from the list, would you like to spend any more of your six hundred and ten buckets of dragon bloodstone?”
I chuff.
“Actually …” I look at my gown, brushing my hands over the thick ruddy panels. “I had to toss a layer of this to the trogg. Am I able to replace it?”
“Won’t be a problem.” Her gaze flits over my ensemble, then back to her book as she lifts a curly blue quill, dips it in a pot of ink, and scratches something on my page. “Anything else?”
My mind tunnels back to the moments following Tarik’s disposal. To the quiet allure I experienced toward a heavily accented male I probably should’ve slaughtered. But I didn’t. Because he smelled good.
“Got any sawtooth blades?”
She pauses, looking at me from beneath an arched brow. “Planning to hack somebody up?”
Hope not.
I shrug.
Humming again, she spins in her chair and pushes to a stand, snatching at the stone wall behind her. What’s actually a runed drape ripples as she rips it wide, revealing the full, gloomy expanse of the store that goes so deep it’s hard to see the end, the real walls lined with vaults of bloodstone, weapons, armor, and various infantry.