Death Cap - Forty-Two - Meeting Those Who Have Been Where You Will Go

I was bundled up in a few layers of warm, self-knit clothes as I waited just outside the delvers’ guild. Winters in City Nineteen weren’t all that cold, but they were far from warm.

The snow here was sporadic at best. Mostly it was little more than a dusting in the morning. But on some days it would come down hard and fast. This day was one of those.

My breath misted the air, sending a scattering of fat snowflakes dancing before me. There wasn’t any wind, so the snowfall was gentle and calm. It made the city much prettier than it usually was.

You couldn’t see the muck on the streets, the faded paint on walls, and the rust on rooftops when everything was covered in a foot-thick layer of snow.

I decided that I liked the winters here. Sure, it was cold, and when I didn’t have enough clothes on and a full belly, that little bit of cold was a clawing horror, but when you had both and a reason to keep moving, the winter wasn’t all that bad. The streets weren’t as busy, the city’s constant clamour was muffled, and the muggers were too busy huddling by a trash fire somewhere to try and stab you for your coin purse.

I was waiting for two people to show up.

The bid reply only included one of their names. Phillipe Greene. It had come with a tiny bit of information about the man, just the sort of profile you’d expect to be public.

He was a guild veteran. Seventeen years as a delver and accredited member of the guild. He had worked for three teams, one of them for twelve consecutive years. He was technically still employed with that group, but this bid was being answered privately.

His partner was a complete unknown.

I waited next to the guild’s front door, occasionally rubbing my hands together for warmth (I regretted not doubling the thickness of my self-knit mittens) while Sir Nibbles buried himself around my neck as much as possible. He refused to stay above my sweater and insisted on squeezing close.

If he was a bit softer it might actually be nice, but the ugly badger was all coarse and rough, but he was also very vocal about his dislike of the cold. I imagined that wherever he came from, it was a warmer place than City Nineteen.

“Are you the Mushroomancer?”

I jumped and turned, then looked up to the person who’d addressed me. Then I looked up some more.

I was used to having to look up to people. Even Bet was a head taller than me, and with how tall my mom was, I was certainly going to have strong neck muscles from looking up to everyone forever.

This guy though, he took the cake.

I wasn’t a great judge of distances or heights or whatever, but I imagined this guy was nearing seven feet. He would have been taller if he didn’t have a bit of a slouch from wearing a heavy coat. He was also, I noted, broader than anyone I’d seen up close in this world.

The man was rocking that Arnold-in-his-prime body with a huge blond moustache that was artfully curled up on the edges.

“Um, yes,” I said, just a little wary.

I wasn’t unarmed, but I didn’t know if the amount of poisonous mushrooms I had on me would be enough to kill an elephant, let alone this man.

“Wonderful!” he said. His voice was surprisingly tame. I half expected a bellow. “You certainly fit the description we received. Did you want to talk within? I can pull a favour and we can use one of the quieter rooms above.”

“That’s acceptable,” I said. From what I’d learned, that was the norm for more specialised bids. The client would meet with the delver team and they’d go over details together. “Are you mister Greene?”

“I am!” he said. “I’m sorry, but your bid didn’t include your name.”

“I’d rather not use one,” I said. “You can call me by the name I set on my bid, if you want.”

“The Mushroomancer?” he asked.

I nodded.

He shrugged. “Very well. Come along then.”

I followed him into the guild, then up past the front counter and to the second floor. I was breathing a little hard by the time we reached the meeting room there. Mister Greene’s every step was worth three of mine.

The meeting room wasn’t empty. There was a man there. Or maybe a teenager? He was tall and slim, his coat discarded on the back of one straight-backed chair. He had a thin attempt at a moustache of his own. His hair was blond, the same as Mister Greene’s.

There was a slight familial resemblance there, but I didn’t know for sure yet.

“Please, sit,” Phillipe said with a gesture to one of the free seats.

I moved up to it, turned, then with a jump backwards I climbed my butt onto the seat. “So, you’re Mister Greene and...”

“Tyro,” the younger man said. “Also Greene.”

“Oh? Father and Son?” I asked.

Mister Greene senior grinned and placed a meaty hand on his son’s shoulder. “That’s right,” he said before sitting down. “Now, Miss Mushroomancer.” Tyro turned his head towards his father, obvious confusion on his face at the name. “Your bid was rather interesting. And it’s been sitting there for a while.”

“Yes,” I said.

He rubbed at his chin, then shrugged. “Well, I’m curious, how old are you?”

“Does that matter with regard to the bid?” I asked.

He chuckled. “Smart one, aren’t you? Yeah, you’ve got that look in your eyes.”

I stared at him, but he didn’t elaborate. “I’m seven,” I said.

“Seven,” Tyro muttered. He glanced to his dad. “Are we really going to work with a seven-year-old?”

“For,” his father said. “And don’t question the client in front of the client. I didn’t think I’d have to teach you about basic politeness.”

“Sorry,” he said. Then to me, he repeated the same. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” I said. “This is all very unusual, I’m sure. Which makes me wonder, why did you accept the bid.”

Mister Greene grinned. “For the experience, of course,” he said. He smacked his son on the back. “Tyro here is getting into the delving business soon. We want to make sure he’ll survive and thrive, which means making sure he has the right kind of class for it. For that, we need to reach a dungeon’s core. The smaller the team, the better the chances he'll get a rare or epic class.”

“Oh. thank you, I didn’t know that.”

He shrugged. “It’s a poorly kept trade secret,” he said. “My boy here’s been working hard to get good Generals. He’ll be able to switch out his class, train his new one up a bit, then become a competent delver.”

“Interesting,” I said.

“What about you? What are you trying to reach the lowest floor for?” he asked.

“Mushrooms,” I said simply. “While we travel down, I’d appreciate some time to study every mushroom we run across.”

“Wouldn’t it be less costly to just buy the mushrooms from a team that travels down more often?” Tyro asked.

His father frowned a bit, probably because that was a good idea and one that wouldn’t need me to hire them for. “I could,” I said. “But I want to see them for myself. And... maybe I want the experience too. I’ve noticed that my skills grow faster when I’m using them in new and creative ways. I think this will be a good opportunity for that.”

Mister Greene nodded, then he reached into the pocket of his jacket and pulled out a small stack of papers. “We should sign the preliminary papers,” he said. “Before we start telling each other too much.”

“Those are the disclosure agreements?” I asked. I did have some time over the last couple of months to learn about how this kind of thing went down.

The old men who lingered at the guild were always willing to talk a lot to a curious child. It was good training for my [Social Manipulation] skill too.

The first pages were a literal non-disclosure agreement. It was more of a formality since all that would happen if Misters Greene and Greene went blabbing was the guild giving them a slap on the wrist, and that would only happen if I could prove that they blabbed.

The rest of the contract I set aside. It would require more careful study and reading, and maybe I could show it to some of the old men downstairs to see if it was entirely legit. “Here,” I said as I signed the agreement.

It went both ways. The Greenes couldn’t talk about me, and I couldn’t talk about their abilities. Nice and clean and simple.

“Wonderful,” Mister Greene said. “I have questions about this bid. Foremost among those... you want to descend as well?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Can you?” he asked.

I frowned. “On my own? Maybe, but I doubt it. I’m not defenceless though.”

“No offence,” Greene-younger said. “But you don’t seem... physically strong?”

I shrugged. “Maybe not. But I’m an expert in my field, and my field is exceptionally lethal if mishandled... or handled in just the right way. Trust me, I can clear out any room as long as the things in it need to breathe.”

***