The town of Halford was a huge contrast to the village they had visited before. For a start it was big enough that if it wasn’t for the castle dominating the skyline to the north it might be possible to get lost. The town was surrounded by stone walls, which had crenelated parapets and guards could be seen regularly walking the walls as well as looking out from the regular watchtowers. Each of the gates to the town had guardhouses and whilst there was no actual moat there was a deep ditch lined with spikes outside the wall and it was necessary to cross a drawbridge to enter the city. All of this suggested that the town expected to be attacked and yet there was no evidence of any invasion and the general attitude of the inhabitants and those entering was friendly and welcoming.

Another difference between the village and the town was that there was a number of different inns, hotels and other places to stay, catering to the various itinerant traders, short term visitors and travelling nobility. Where ranking nobility would stay at the castle, if they had a large entourage or just too many visited at once the town was ready with places and prices to match. Arriving as the group did from the hinterlands they found rough and ready accommodation at a reasonable price more suited to woodsmen than nobles.

There was another huge difference between the village and the town and that was the smell. Where the village had been clean, the town stank. Effluent trickled through the streets as animal excreta was everywhere. There was carts and cleaners working to remove this but the sheer quantity produced each day was clearly enough that the streets were not clean. The sides of the roads where people walked were raised higher so that you didn’t need to step through it but crossing a road was asking for dirty boots at a minimum. Mark could see that some people had metal fittings to their boots that raised them up a small distance and kept them cleaner. He wondered if he should find some.

Once they had found lodgings they decided that they would explore the town and sell off their remaining excess weapons and hopefully find an assessor as well. As with the village it wasn’t hard to find the blacksmiths who were all in one part of the town.

There were several blacksmiths as well as goldsmiths, silversmiths and those that dealt with tin and copper. There were also coopers and other trades which catered to the smiths like colliers. The whole area was covered in a pall of smoke. Each of the buildings had a display window where the customer could see what types of goods were made which made it easy to determine where they should go. There were only three weapon smiths and they had the largest and fanciest of the buildings. They also had the most apprentices who mainly seemed to be making arrow heads.

Entering the biggest of the blacksmith buildings Mike took the initiative.

“Do you buy weapons as well as sell them?”

The beefy looking blacksmith looked at the equally beefy man in front of him and replied “Yes, I’ll give you a price, it won’t be as good as you can get in a city but it will be fair.”

The group had the various weapons left to sell distributed through the various packs and it took a while to get the small pile of blades together. The poor daggers that they had gained from the bandits stood in marked contrast to some of the blades that they had found in the cave. The blacksmith took his time and looked carefully at the pile. He grabbed a sheet of parchment to write down figures and when he had finished looked at the group. “I’ll offer you 700 golds for the lot but I don’t have that much in the shop so I’ll have to get it from the bank. Do you want to accompany me there or come back tomorrow?”

The group looked at each other and Mike quickly assessed that they would accompany the blacksmith to the bank. As they walked Mark asked “Is there an assessor in town as we have some gold we got from a stream?”

The blacksmith informed them that someone at the bank could assess their gold and exchange it for coins.

The bank was an imposing building composed mainly of white marble and stood on the road that eventually led to the castle but was sat in the most affluent shopping area. They were greeted as they walked in and the blacksmith was clearly known as before they knew it they were all led into a room and the coins were being counted out in front of them. The blacksmith left very soon afterwards, thanking them for the business, which suggested that he would make a reasonable profit from the exchange. The group stayed at the bank and asked to see the assessor.

An older gentleman with a set of scales and a bag containing various chemicals appeared and as they divested themselves of the pouches of gold dust and the ingots that Mark had crafted, he determined purity and weighed the results. Finally, when everything else had been weighed Charlie brought out a sizeable nugget from their bag which must have weighed the pack down considerably.

“Where did that come from?” Mark asked.

“The cave, where else.”

“And you didn’t tell us about it because?”

“If we got separated, I wanted to have a backup plan but now that we made it to a bank, I’m sure we can create accounts and not have to carry all our wealth with us.”

Whilst Mark wasn’t happy about the secrecy, the fact that Charlie was still sharing the find between the group meant that there was nothing that he could really say.

The bank allowed them to each set up an account and by the time they had split the coins six ways they had something over three hundred golds each. That was enough for them to live comfortably for a while so they didn’t have to worry about earning money immediately. The bank had issued them cards that apparently identified them uniquely and were useable in any of the same bank in several countries. All of the cities would have a branch of the bank and most large towns.

With their finances sorted they could explore more but that exploration didn’t get further than a nearby bakery before they all stopped and purchased cakes. After enjoying those they then split up as they had various places they wanted to visit and it seemed more productive to separate. Unsurprisingly Jo and Mike headed off together and then Kajal asked Charlie to accompany him as he wanted to visit a church or temple but didn’t want to go on his own. This left Mark with Emily and Julius, the latter of which was being carried but not particularly happy about it. Emily had tried putting him down but the kitten was not happy about either and jumped back to her shoulder after looking to cross the road after them.

They wandered the shops looking at the various goods on offer and commenting about what was available. The options for clothes and food being much wider than they had expected. Then they reached a short street that stood out from the others. It was clean, in fact it almost shined. The buildings on the street were all suitable for prosperous individuals and the shops had nothing displayed in their windows but there were signs on each with symbols or runes written on them.

“This has to be wizard street” Mark commented. “Let’s go in and find out what they’re selling.”

Emily agreed to this and they entered the first shop. This was filled with bottles and jars with a small cauldron bubbling away in the corner. An old lady was chopping up ingredients and adding them to the cauldron.

“How can I help you?” she asked.

“We’re travellers from far away and were just curious as to what you were selling in here.”

“I have all the normal stuff, poisons for rats and other vermin, medicines for your ailments, potions for lust, fertility and the opposite, luck and stamina and even more. Is there anything you require?”

Mark couldn’t think of anything but Emily asked Mark to wait outside as she made some purchases.

They entered the next shop to find a man sitting in a comfortable chair reading. All round the room were globes that glowed in different colours and with different intensities. There were piles of boxes arranged around the shop each labelled with a price. Explosives, cooling boxes, heat emitters and more were available. Each box was decorated with various runes and jewels were embedded into the wood at points that were determined by the patterns on each box. The boxes and jewels ranged in size and differently priced. Mark could see that each used the forces he could detect but in a more permanent way than he had managed. The man said nothing as they looked around the shop and only grunted when they left without buying anything.

“Should we have talked to him I wonder.” Mark said to Emily.

“He didn’t seem to want to talk.”

There was only one more shop and they entered it to find a young man sat behind a counter.

“The master is out working at the moment but if you can tell me what spell you want him to do and where you can be found I can take a note and get back to you with a price and expected wait.”

“What sorts of spells does your master do?” Mark asked.

“Oh, the usual, vermin removal, healing, crop improvement, crop burning in Autumn, supplying ice, removing obstacles, healing, removing ghosts, he’s a typical town wizard.”

“Is it possible for me to talk to him? I’m hoping for some training as I can do some wizardry myself.”

“Come back an hour after dawn tomorrow and you’ll find him here but if your wasting his time he won’t be happy.”

“Thank you.”

With that they left and Mark had a chance to learn more about his new talents. He looked forward to the next day.