I pushed the cart back toward the leader's station while Zoe stared at her pickaxe like she was reconsidering every choice she had made in the last hour. Lia had hers resting across both shoulders, which was the posture of someone who wanted to do more swings.
The leader was sitting on a small cushioned seat with a book open in his lap. He looked up when he heard the cart.
"We're done." I said. "How much for what's in here?"
He stood and walked around the cart, picked up a rock, turned it over, and repeated the process for a while.
"There's some ore in here for sure." He set the rock down. "But it's mostly still attached to the surrounding stone. Needs processing before it's worth anything useful." He scratched the back of his neck and did the mental math. "Best I can do is one million."
'One million. The cheapest sword in the shop was two million.'
"That's fine." I said. "Do you have a larger cart?"
