Candour looked over the ledger with a morose gaze. It was typical of him. Smiles ill-suited his sagged, wrinkled face, and at his age he hated unnecessary strain. His sunken eyes followed along with the numbers, trailing down from top to bottom of the tome which was nearly as old and worn as he was. He flipped the page, finding a fresh, empty line in which to take the record. He reached for the quill, his arthritic fingers gripped the frayed feather from its pot, dipping the cut utensil a few more times before placing it to the page; ready to scratch in new numbers. “How many crates of the Vanhoover Liqueur did you manage to move?” he asked, looking to his at his nephew with an expectant eye.

The young, trimmed and finely dressed minotaur was leaning against the fireplace. He watched the flame’s dance for a few moments more, seemingly entranced by the movements. Candour waited, patiently, fingering one of the silver rings he wore looped through a string around his thick, black-furred neck. He seemed preoccupied. “Eighty crates. Not one of their forked tongues has a taste for it. Every coin I earned from selling those bottles felt like charity...” he bemoaned, trailing off as he directed a sneer to the flames before he gave Candour a pointed stare. “Damn that blonde bastard. Swindled me. Me!” he growled, before letting out a heavy exhale, gaze softening. “Why not sell to the griffons instead? They’re heavy drinkers aren’t they? And as much they pretend not to, they have a taste for the sweetness that only ponies produce.”

Candour pursed his lips, releasing a patronizing snort as he scrawled the earnings down. “Then our profits would have shrunk even smaller,” he drawled, sucking his teeth before looking back to his iron-jawed nephew. “The Caru family have managed to gain something of a monopoly over the griffon-pony trade routes. The Celestial Sea is covered coast to coast with their caravels and sloops, and money is pouring on them like rain. I would wager they stocked every inn and tavern from Griffonstone to the Talon Isles from their cargo alone.”

“Then the hippogriffs when they come in to dock? I’m certain they’d prefer the taste of sweet liqueur to sour lemon juice,” his nephew proposed. Candour shook his head.

“What if, due to an overabundance of alcohol, we hear word one day of a hippogriff fifty-decker crashes off the coast of the badlands?” Candour countered, bushy brows furrowed. “We can’t risk unloading several dozen boxes of alcohol onto a ship of disciplined sailors. We’re not the Dites.”

His nephew shrugged. “Hypotheticals you old bull. Besides, they can breathe underwater, can’t they? So what if it crashes? Is every arms merchant responsible the deaths their weapons cause, is every pipeleaf seller responsible for each customer who gets lung rot?”

Candour shook his head, clenching his frail jaw. “You’re but a calf, nephew. You care not for the finer points of merchanting. You have to show finesse, care for the long term. Diplomacy.”

The young minotaur scoffed. “When have we ever cared for diplomacy over profit?”

“When the world deemed that trust became the one luxury you can’t negotiate a price for,” Candour said, closing shut the ledger and placing the quill back into its pot. His nephew scowled at the floor like an angry toddler, and Candour earned his attention by smacking his hand against the desk; the authoritative bull snorted and sneered. “Whatever happened to wisdom? Is it a mythical concept to you? You’re certainly my brother’s son if you’re so stubborn!”

The young bull pouted, but Candour’s exclamation - despite its harshness - calmed him. “Then what do you propose I do with this burning hole in my ledger, uncle?”

“You keep selling to those bugs. Force it down their throats if you have to, you just want it gone. Take the loss and move on, that’s how business works,” Candour answered, his tone softening, the brief explosion of volume left him fatigued. He hated being old. He noticed something then, a subtle twitch in his nephew’s face. “What is it?”

His nephew squinted, as though he was trying to force his idea into clarity. He trailed over to Candour’s desk, leaning on it, his steel ring dangling from his neck; lip curled. “What if we’re selling to the wrong changelings?”

“What are you thinking?” Candour sought clarification, leaning towards him.

“The Pharynxi-”

“What would they need alcohol for?”

The young minotaur shrugged. “Disinfectant.”

“Pony alcohol is weak. Even then, they wouldn’t drink it. They don’t want it,” Candour parried, swatting the thought dismissively with his wrinkled hand.

“Then…” he paused, giving the desk a few taps before taking a seat in the chair before it; eyes glinting with inspiration. “We trade it for something they do want.”

The old bull gave a half smile, intrigued. “Like what?”

“Oil.”

Candour blinked, his lips straightening back out again. “Like the kind they put in street lamps?”

He shrugged, wearing an innocuous smile. “Or fuel an entire swathe of Solenata.”

Candour felt a breath escape him, yet curiosity bade him inquire. “You want to fuel their burnings? What… what you’re proposing is a hair’s width away from arms dealing. The ponies won’t allow weapons to pass over their lands, air or caravan.”

“What? On what grounds can they seize such innocent merchandise? Oil is a necessity in many places. They need it for light, to power radiators and steam engines. In fact, not selling them oil would be the cruel thing to do,” he argued with the saccharine cadence of Crystal Empire denizen, but with the subtle deceit of a Chrysalasi spy.

“Oh, look at you. A good samaritan are you? I suppose you’ll be selling it to them at cost then?” Candour jested.

His nephew scoffed, crossing his arms over his chest. “I might be a kind-hearted and charitable soul, uncle. But I’m not a lunatic.”

Candour leaned back in his chair, scrunching up his features, pondering. “I’ll entertain this idea, nephew. But where could you possibly get a pot of oil for a crate of liqueur?”

“Kludgetown,” he replied.

Candour cocked a brow. “What does Kludgetown have aside from slaves, unwilling concubines and indentured servants with permanent contracts?”

“They also sell stolen and less-than-savory goods. But for the honest merchant, as rare as they are in Kludgetown, there’s one thing they can sell. Something that is abundant to them as gems are to diamond dogs, only they’re not as clingy about it: oil,” the younger minotaur tapped the desk with his forefinger before sitting back, self-satisfied. “Now, those things make them dissuade people from buying from them, but when have you known a minotaur to prejudiced about customers or sellers?”

“But non-minotaur do discriminate. ‘Business ethics’, whatever the hell that is. And many do believe in the notion of guilt by association. Buying from merchants in Kludgetown could get us blacklisted from the E.E.L, and we do need them for caravan routes across the mainland.”

“Ah, but we won’t be the buyers. The Pharynxi will. We’ll just be a... intermediary,” he phrased it delicately, his words as unsteady as his ethics.

Candour filled his lungs to release a weary sigh, dragging his tongue over his dry lips he uncrossed his arms to stroke his chin; tugging at a lone wisp of long fur. “How do you make the first transaction, get the first batch for sale?”

The younger minotaur shook his half, lip curled. “The transaction wouldn’t be financial. It’ll be barter, a trade of goods, not the purchase of them. It doesn’t have to be recorded under our law. The only ones who’d know anything at all are us, the seller, and the caravan driver. And I’ve been to Kludgetown. The only time I’ve seen paper is when it’s hanging from the inside of an outhouse.”

Candour nodded, listening. “What about the driver?”

He shrugged. “Doesn’t have to be a ‘driver’, driver. There are plenty of mercenaries who’d see it as an easy payday, especially when you throw on a discretion fee.”

“Won’t that get recorded down? You are paying for their services.”

He smirked. “‘Discretion’, discretion fee.”

“And you’d be willing to pay that premium?”

“I’d consider it an investment. If the Caru can have a monopoly over spirits and pastries with the griffons, then we could have a monopoly over business conducted with the entire Pharynxi if we foster that ‘trust’ that you’re so fond of. Not just on oil, but on everything! Imagine it,” he pitched, and Candour was unsure if he was ready to catch. “We’ll be swimming in amber and marble, gems and gold.”

Candour saw avarice in his nephew's eyes but felt it grip him also. The last time their treasury was full, and caravans full of wealth travelled to and fro from anywhere, was when his horns were but stubs barely several inches from his head. He grabbed a hold of one of the rings he wore in a necklace around his neck. As he grew older, he began to feel the weight of them more. Copper, bronze, iron, and silver. His place as a merchant, as an esteemed member of their society. But the silver. The silver marked him as an important elder. A wealthy and important elder. But to him, it was the ring given to those who had lived long enough without achieving a single, memorable thing.

“Do you know how to be discreet, calf?” he asked, boring into his nephew with a firm stare.

Candour saw the turn in the minotaur’s expression, the hardening of his face, certainty in his eye. “Like a shadow in the dark, uncle.”

Candour nodded. “Then do it. If you succeed in this endeavor, there may be some hope for this family after all,” he then gave him a fleeting smile.

“Thank you, uncle.”

Thereafter, a pause followed, and after a few more moments Candour grumbled, sighed, and reopened the ledger. He reached for the quill, pulled it from the pot and put it to a new line, looking at his nephew with a plain expression. “Now, with that matter is resolved. What of the yak timber?”

Author's Note

This was a chapter my great friend Jackelope said he wanted to write for my story, and I said of course.

Hope you all enjoyed his work, cause I certainly did.