The White Fox never knew what name she was given when she was born; she only had a vague idea of who her parents were anyway. Her earliest memories were growing up in the streets of the port town of Nilzam in the south, wearing rags, sleeping in dark alleys, and stealing food. Quick hands and fast feet were what kept her alive, and she only got better as she got older. Over time, she was able to gain work as a professional thief, and her reputation grew to the point that people were coming to her jobs on a fairly regular basis.
She often thought about her past as she traveled. She was almost always alone and had plenty of time to explore her own thoughts. This eventually ended up with her thinking about previous jobs to recall useful experiences or simply remembering the dark times of her youth and being grateful of how far she has come in her life. Being a thief wasn’t easy living, but it was satisfying and paid well enough. There were certainly plenty of worse paths she could have taken.
She continued meditating on this as she made her way through a forest, thankful that she had recently bought new boots as the ground was wet from a recent storm. Dark clouds still hovered overhead, but were not threatening any more rain.
The White Fox was used to traveling the countryside like this, avoiding the main highways most people took. While she didn’t think horrible things would happen if she were discovered in public, her animal head and dark clothes made her look rather suspicious, and she didn’t want to deal with being detained by patrolmen for questioning, especially in her line of work.
Fortunately, there were plenty of outposts and trading holes on the fringes of civilization where people didn’t ask questions. Not only could she buy supplies for her travels and work, but she often found jobs in such places, so they were a great boon for her. She was making her way to one deep in the forest to stock up for the hike to Langry.
As she climbed over a large rock, she found the place she was looking for: a small, inconspicuous cottage at the bottom of a ravine. She slid her way down to the side, jumped over a pool of collected rain, and lightly walked up to the structure. It looked rather worn and abandoned, but that was the point. Only those who knew about the place were supposed to drop in. After jumping over the broken stairs to the porch, she pushed on the large wooden door, its hinges squeaking loudly, and she made her way in.
She shut the door behind her and focused on the dark, one-room cottage. There, she saw the worn-down fireplace that clearly hadn’t been used in years, with a few pieces of old firewood scattered nearby. There was also an old chair sitting in the middle of the room, facing the fireplace, and a half-rotted leather hide still hanging from the wall. The whole place was layered with dust, and even as she walked toward the chair, it all seemed to remain undisturbed.
None of this was new to the White Fox, as she had been here many times before. She simply lifted the chair up and set it aside, then crouched down and found a small notch in the wooden floor near where the chair had been. Reaching into her pack for a ring of keys and lockpicks, she found the right one and sunk it into the notch. After giving it a twist, a trap door popped up out of the floor, and she climbed down the ladder inside after retrieving her key.
Below the cottage was where the shop was hidden. As she reached the bottom of the ladder, she was greeted with the thick smell of various goods and items, especially tanned leather, as the entrance was surrounded by new leather coats and cloaks. Making her way around the shelves of tools, she walked up to the counter where the shop owner, Agar, was busy measuring vials of dark fluid on a scale against some counterweights. He looked up and, when he saw the White Fox, smiled widely.
“Chessie!” he greeted cheerfully. “I figured it was you by your soft steps. How are you?”
The White Fox cringed as she pulled off her hood. She had known Agar for more than a few years, but when they first met, she didn’t come alone. Her friend had introduced her with this nickname, and unfortunately it had stuck. She never liked it, as she thought it sounded weak and childish, but Agar had become attached to it. She had tried to explain to him that it wasn’t her real name, but he ignored her and continued to call her by it, so she had since given up trying to stop him. And yet, she still didn’t like hearing it no matter how many times he used it.
“Still in business,” the White Fox responded with a bit of a shrug, and Agar chuckled.
“Good to hear,” Agar said. “If you’re still in business, then so am I. What do you need?”
The Fox rattled off various supplies, mostly food, a new tinder box, and other travel necessities. As she said them, Agar quickly reached for them and put them on the counter, one by one. However, one ingredient caught Agar off guard.
“Tamalan Oil?” he asked. The Fox just stared back at him like it was not that big of a deal. “You must really be in for quite the job.”
“Do you have any?” she asked.
“Yeah, but not much. It’s not gonna be cheap.” Agar walked off to a corner where he kept his vials and fluids, searching through them shelf by shelf. “Are you going alone, or is the job a group effort?”
“That would be telling,” she responded, acting coy. She began picking at a scar in the wood of the counter with a gloved finger.
“Yeah, yeah, confidentiality and all that,” he said walking back to the counter, a bottle of Tamalan Oil in his hand. “It’s just that, if you’re using this stuff, I can guess you’re up against something that’s magically fortified. I just don’t want you getting in over your head, Chessie.”
The Fox made a noncommittal gesture, then looked at the small bottle of amber liquid. There was barely more than a swallow inside, not that she was planning to drink it. “Is that all you have?” she asked casually.
Agar’s eyes widened in shock and concern. “I’m serious here!” he said, putting the bottle with the rest of the supplies and walking back to the corner.
“I’ll be cautious,” she lightly promised. “Thieves don’t have careers like mine if they aren’t cautious. You know that.”
Agar sighed and shook his head as he continued looking through his shelves. He found another bottle and brought it back to the counter, this one with half as much as the first. “It’s all I got,” he said grimly.
“Then that should be all. How much?” she asked.
“Well, with the two bottles of Tamalan Oil, I’m gonna have to ask for at least 800 Standard,” he answered, rubbing his neck and thinking through the numbers. “Let’s say 850.”
“That’s a bottle and a half,” the Fox pointed out, sounding slightly indignant.
Agar glared at her, but had a smirk on his face as well. “Fine. 800. Unless you’ve got something to barter with.”
The Fox reached for her purse and pulled out four of the golden coins she had gotten from Luke. “I believe these will do,” she said, putting them on the counter. Then she began packing up her purchases.
Agar quickly picked them up and looked them over. “Wow! These are Shakka Gilders!” he exclaimed. “You really must be doing well if you’re getting these now!” She just smiled at him in response and continued packing. Agar then took the coins somewhere further into the back of his shop, to some hidden vault or container, she assumed.
When he came back, she was finishing up. “I guess if this job is anything like I imagine, I probably won’t see you for a while, huh?” Agar surmised.
The Fox smirked back at him. “Well, then, just assume I’m dead unless you see me again,” she teased.
“Chessie!” Agar said scornfully, but the Fox just smiled, shouldered her now-heavier pack, and waved as she walked back to the ladder.
“Take care of yourself!” Agar shouted after her, half in frustration. She just turned the handle to the trap door to open it, and climbed back into the old cottage. Once she closed the trap door and heard a mechanism lock it, she returned the old chair to its former location, and walked out the front door.
Agar was certainly charming and reliable, but she knew better than to get too close to anyone in her business. While not every job was a solo effort, the less liabilities there were, the safer it tended to be. Now that she had her supplies, she turned east, and continued her trek to Langry. On the way, she would need to consider the task ahead of her, as it wouldn’t be easy. Fortunately, she had plenty of time to do so.
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