The tavern keeper's eyes locked onto the pendant lying before him with a shock he could not conceal before rapidly pulling his features back together with professional composure.
"One hour. And the lamb will be in your hands."
He delivered it in a smooth, level tone stripped of any expression.
"That will do."
Kilan answered as he rose from the rickety chair, gripping the Kirnebis horns. He leaned toward Manuel and whispered firmly in his ear:
"Keep your eye on Lira until I'm back, Uncle."
Bewilderment spread across Manuel's face.
"Where are you going, son?"
A faint smile pulled at the corner of Kilan's mouth.
"To earn a few coins."
---
Kilan slipped into the crowds of Kildor's market — that wide street lined on both sides with stalls and counters overflowing with all manner of goods, rare branches and fine timber rising above everything else. The market was so dense with people it bordered on suffocating.
His eye swept the surroundings like a hawk searching for prey among the clutter, until it settled on the far left of the market, where a vendor sat half-hidden behind a rectangular table displaying taxidermied heads of strange animals. The area around him wasn't loud — only three men stood before him, the kind who kill time with no intention of buying.
Kilan approached.
But the vendor gave him no more than a flat, dismissive glance before turning away in resignation, trying to hold the attention of the three browsers. In a swift, unexpected movement, Kilan shifted the edge of his cloak to reveal the Kirnebis horns — their sharp points gleaming in deep, light-absorbing black.
"I have a catch that might interest you."
The vendor's eyes lit up after a quick stolen glance at what lay beneath the cloak. In an instant, the three men ceased to exist for him, and every bit of his attention poured toward Kilan.
"Are you here for a real deal, or just passing through asking about prices?"
"A deal of mutual benefit."
The vendor turned at once toward a building crouching behind him — unremarkable among the other two-story structures whose stones bore the color of rain-soaked leaves, were it not for the heavy curtain that had replaced its door. The vendor stepped through and gestured for Kilan to follow.
Inside, the place resembled a large and desolate cage. Animal heads hung on the walls like icons of death, cages crammed with fierce wild birds and rabbits, while the smell of fur mixed with animal droppings imposed itself on everything.
The vendor — who appeared to be in his thirties, with a slightly hunched back that gave a misleading air of gravity — moved behind an old wooden table and gestured eagerly.
Kilan placed the horns on the wood. They measured one arm's length — though Kirnebis horns naturally exceed two — as the deer's collision with the tree at that force had prevented him from retrieving them whole.
The vendor's face opened into a wide smile.
"Remarkable. You clearly know how to handle this breed."
It was well known that Kirnebis horns secreted a sticky, foul-smelling substance the moment they were severed — unless handled with a skill that left them fit for use.
"So, what do you say?"
Kilan asked with a contrived smile, watching the gleam of greed in the man's eyes.
The vendor raised an eyebrow with dry amusement.
"You want my opinion, boy? Let me be frank — if I had even the most basic fighting ability, I'd slit your throat right now and take them for free."
Kilan let out a sardonic laugh.
"Terrifying man."
"All right. What are you asking for them?"
"Two hundred and twenty orins per horn."
Astonishment seized the vendor. He thought to himself in silence: *Two hundred and twenty? The lowest going rate for a horn this length is no less than three hundred. Is this boy an amateur, or does he genuinely mean mutual profit?*
Fearing Kilan would notice his hesitation, he said quickly:
"Fine, agreed, I'll buy them—"
"But I'll be taking other things from you as well."
Kilan cut him off with a provocative smile.
"No problem, take what you like."
The vendor answered with forced warmth — this was the most valuable deal he'd seen in a long while.
"Thirty grams of wild pepper powder, ten grams of Arvil plant nectar, and a wind whistle."
Kilan listed his requirements with cold precision.
The merchant's brow furrowed as he pressed his hand to his forehead.
"The total for all of that is a hundred orins."
Kilan produced twenty silver coins and scattered them across the table.
The merchant looked at the coins with genuine puzzlement.
"Why are you paying the difference? I could have deducted it from the price of both horns."
"And who said I'm selling both? One horn is enough."
The merchant's pupils widened.
"Why in hell's name?"
Kilan shrugged with complete indifference.
"Perhaps I'll find a better price for the other one elsewhere. Who knows?"
The vendor struck the table with his fist, sending every creature in the room into a chorus of noise, and fixed Kilan with a heated stare.
"Name your price and you won't find a better negotiator than me."
The smile disappeared from Kilan's face, replaced by a dark stillness.
"You want it that badly?"
"Give me your price. Don't hesitate."
Kilan was quiet for a moment, his eye moving across the horns.
"I'll sell it to you. But not for money."
"What?"
"What I'm after is information. And the horn is its price."
"What kind of information?"
"About a secretive group, in all likelihood."
Silence settled over the vendor as he weighed the matter. Then he stepped out from behind his table, moved a birdcage aside to reveal a hidden curtain, and gestured for Kilan to follow.
---
The exit led into a narrow, deserted alley — a stark contrast to the noise outside. They wound through twisting passages until they arrived at a dead-end street dominated by a small shop dealing in used weapons.
Inside, the shop was cramped and smelled of rust and oil. Behind the counter stood a young woman in her late twenties, absorbed in sharpening a battered sword.
"Welcome, how can I help—"
Her sentence died the moment she saw the vendor's face.
"How are you, Barkal? And who is this guest?"
She spoke slowly, as though time moved thickly around her, her eyes taking in Kilan, who stood with his hands in his pockets, studying the place.
Barkal answered with a thin smile.
"A seeker who hasn't yet found an answer to his question."
The woman smiled with quiet mystery.
"If he comes through you, he'll find Scotus downstairs."
She gestured toward an old wardrobe in the corner of the shop.
Barkal opened it. It was nothing but a doorway into a dark stone corridor. They descended a long staircase lit only by a faint blue glow of unknown origin, in air thick with moisture and the smell of old stone.
Then a vast circular hall opened before them.
Its floor was engraved with a crescent symbol glowing in deep blue light. At the far end of the hall sat a curved golden divan shaped like a bow, and before it a table of polished black obsidian that reflected everything before it like a warped mirror.
On the divan sat a figure draped in an opaque black cloak, wearing a smooth white mask of porcelain-like finish, blank of all features save two hollow openings where the eyes should be.
Before him stood a massively built man with broad shoulders carrying an enormous sword on his back, snarling furiously at the masked figure.
"What do you mean by that, you wretch?"
The masked figure answered with infuriating calm.
"As I told you — what you offered in exchange for the information is not enough."
The large man erupted like a volcano.
"I gave you five Noble coins, you scoundrel. I nearly died in that cave to get them."
The masked figure sighed without interest.
"I'm sorry to hear it. But if you don't pay what the information is worth, you won't be leaving with it."
The large man drew his sword in a fit of rage and lunged forward. Then suddenly he dropped to his knees with great force, and his body began to swell grotesquely from within.
"What... what have you done to me?"
The large man screamed with genuine terror.
The masked figure waved his index finger slowly from side to side.
"I did nothing. You were the one who broke the contract between us."
With a muffled concussion, the large man's body exploded, spraying blood across the hall and staining the clothes of both Kilan and Barkal, whose face had gone white and whose eyes had widened in horrified shock.
The masked figure turned toward Kilan with a composure utterly at odds with what had just taken place.
"Please, take a seat, sir. And I trust that what you witnessed just now will not affect your desire to do business with us."
---
*Author's note: I hope everyone who read this chapter enjoyed it. Please support the novel with a power stone, add it to your library, or leave a comment — it will encourage me to keep going.*