Legend Mage: Fifth Fulfilment 1 (On Hold)

Chapter One

Chapter One

Taela’s shoulders were aching by the time she loaded half a dozen hatboxes into the luggage compartment of a carriage. She didn’t know why the owner, who probably had dozens of people working for her, couldn’t get one of their servants to carry her purchases. On the other hand, there were seven coins in it for them. Enough for lunch, maybe even dinner, if they were lucky. The sound of laboured breathing came from around the nearby corner leading to the market itself. Her brother, who staggered with the effort of balancing several boxes with his hands full.

“Xan, let me take some,” she said. He’d tried to take too much again, attempting to use his forearms to carry more boxes. Xanir set his jaw and shot her a look, the angriest he could be at her without attracting attention. Nine times out of ten, any attention they got came from the wrong people. People that could relieve you of money, legally or otherwise. Taela ignored him and took the boxes he was balancing on his arms.

“You need to hold those bags or they’ll split.”

“I’m twelve years old, Tae. I know how a paper bag works. And I was fine.”

Anyone who ran around with other people’s things for a living knew you didn’t get paid if a damp paper bag deposited their purchases onto the ground. If he could have, he’d have taken the boxes from her, no matter what he was risking. That was why she took them, not the bags. Those, he could take back, but he couldn’t grab the boxes with both his hands full.

“Alright, alright. Is that the last of it?

He nodded in response, still annoyed. But at least there’d be lunch. If Taela hadn’t been around, Xan would have probably ended up a thief, but no matter what, she refused to allow her little brother to become a criminal. Kids like Xanir were a patrol’s favourite kind of prey – the easy, defenceless kind – and he’d only try to fight them and make everything worse. The image of her little brother being dragged away by armed men haunted Taela some nights. It didn’t matter that it had never happened. It could. Or worse.

“Hey! Get a move on if you want to get paid!” The carriage driver leaned the side and scowled at them. Taela nodded and made a show of hurrying her brother along, even though the scrawny man couldn’t have intimidated a newborn baedi. A scowl began to appear on Xanir’s face, but then he grinned quickly – they both knew she’d just been faking for the skinny driver. He couldn’t have been much richer than they were, but Taela had met a lot of people like him – people looking for any excuse to look down on others. And she and Xan were about as far down the ladder as they came.

 As soon as the last bag was in the luggage box, Xanir was hurrying round to collect their payment. As he turned to the front of the carriage she heard a fearsome growl from his stomach, then a quickly stifled sound of indignation. Underpaid again, then. In theory, they could complain to the authorities that he hadn’t kept his word, but the words of anyone with an actual job held a lot more weight than the words of two underfed children. He could even accuse them of stealing the money and pretend he’d never hired them in the first place. It’d probably work, too.

Taela ran round to salvage the situation. “Thank you very much, sir. Me an’ my brother’ll just be going now, if that’s alright.” 

“It’s my brother and I, you stupid girl.” His words dripped with barely concealed disgust. It was the voice of a man who thought that children like them had no rights and if asked, would probably value one of the carriage’s horses over Taela. Unfortunately, the horses may actually have been worth more. Quickly apologising for her mistake, she grabbed Xanir’s hand and led him back into the busy market. She was grateful for the fairly narrow streets, which were made much narrower by numerous market stalls. If it wasn’t for them blocking the carriages, they wouldn’t have made half of what they did.