“Don’t call me friend. I’m here to meet your commander. You I can live without.” Theros went back to his eating.
“Oh, sir!” The barmaid looked scandalized. “Don’t you know-”
“Hush, Marissa. Go about your business,” the man ordered. He seemed to find something highly amusing. He leaned back in his seat. “You really don’t know who I am, do you? I am Dargon Moorgoth. Baron Dargon Moorgoth.”
Theros eyed the man with indifference. So that’s where he’d seen this man. Riding about town in his fine carriage or reviewing his troops in the market square. Lately, the baron and his army had been gone for months at a time, coming back with wagonloads of loot.
“So what if you are Baron Moorgoth? What am I supposed to do? Bow and kiss your feet like everyone else in Sanction? And why the disguise? Why not just come out and tell me who you are and what you want?”
Moorgoth smiled. “I heard you were a man who did things your own way. I also heard that you refused to give my guardsmen special treatment. I decided to see for myself. They were right. You treat me no differently now than you did when you thought I was an ordinary soldier. I like that.”
“Good. I’m glad.” Theros had little use for game-playing. “Now what’s your business with me?”
“Business? My business today is conquest. I am preparing to expand my holdings beyond Sanction. My men need good weapons and good armor. My job is to train my men and lead them into battle. Your job will be to equip them. To make it short, I need a new smith in my army.”
Theros thought back to his days with the minotaur army. He remembered the excitement of preparing for the battle, the hours of fast and furious labor, making ready for the fight, the pride in knowing that his weapons and armor had done their duty. He found the prospect interesting, for a moment. Then came back to Theros the hardship, the backbreaking labor, sleeping on the ground, eating cold food, driving wagons over rough terrain in all sorts of weather.
He thought of his snug little dwelling-not big, but comfortable. He thought of chilled ale and hot stew.
Theros shook his head. “What could you possibly offer me that I couldn’t get here? I made over fifty gold pieces for a single armored jerkin today. Could you offer me that sort of money?”
Moorgoth laughed. “You mean that jerkin that your lad made for the kender? Good work, I agree, but the little rat never knew the worth of what he was trading.”
Theros frowned. “Do not suggest that I am a thief, Moorgoth. It is no way to begin a business discussion. The kender got a bargain. Whatever I do, I am fair.”
“You are a soldier, Theros Ironfeld, and honorable as a minotaur, Huluk says. Huluk sent me word about you. Unfortunately, we already had a smith at the time, and he was good. I still have the letter from Huluk, of the Clan Hrolk, introducing you. I remember Huluk. He was quite a warrior. Someday we will see him again here on Ansalon. I hear that his new Third Army is second to none.”
He paused to take a drink of ale. Theros finished his meal, shoved his plate aside.
“My smith is dead,” Moorgoth continued. “My rear area was attacked last month when I raided a dwarven camp. I defeated the force on the ground, but not without loss. We took what we had come for, and left. The hole in my unit still remains, however. I have found a new quartermaster and a new fletcher. I need a new smith for weapons and armor.”
Theros grunted. “I’m not interested. I am doing fine where I am.”
Moorgoth shoved aside his plate, leaned back. “I am willing to pay you one thousand pieces of steel to join, and one of these gems a month for as long as you stay.”
The mercenary held up a clear jewel, exquisitely cut. It caught the light and splashed it around the room. The baron quickly concealed the bauble.
“It is worth at least a hundred gold pieces, and probably a lot more. I captured a huge load of these from the dwarves. I will pay you one per month. Further, I guarantee that I will buy them back at a rate of one hundred gold pieces if you cannot find a better deal elsewhere.”
Theros motioned for Moorgoth to hand over the jewel for inspection. The baron dropped the jewel into Theros’s huge calloused hand. Theros eyed it and then handed it back. “You should have come to me seven years ago. Then I would have been interested. Now, I can buy one of these myself if I have the mind.”
Moorgoth continued to try to make the sale. “You can keep your shop, Ironfeld. Just close it down while you are away. I will hire you for a three-year contract. I will even hire a guard to keep watch on the shop while you are gone, at no additional expense to yourself.”
Theros was impressed. He couldn’t help but be a little interested, in spite of himself.
“So what will I do to earn this wealth? It seems to me that if you paid everyone in your force with the same generosity that you are showing me, you would have to be raiding the Halls of Thorbardin, not a single dwarf camp.”
Moorgoth took a long swig of ale. “You know as well as I do that finding good infantry is never difficult. Young men and women are always out to prove themselves, to risk their lives for booty. And I have good, solid veterans who keep the backbone of my small force strong. It is the skilled labor I need and I don’t have three years to wait while some smith learns the fine art of sword-making. I need a skilled smith, one who can do fast work and good work in a field situation. You can bring your assistant along to help. I will pay him double what he is making now.”
The barmaid, Marissa, hustled over, asked if the baron would like a refill on his ale.
“Thank you, yes.” He gave her a pinch.
The barmaid flashed him a smile, left with a twirl of her skirt that revealed her shapely legs.
Theros gazed after her. In all the years he’d been coming to this bar, she had never looked at him like that. Granted, he was not the most handsome man in the world and he supposed his manner was crude and abrupt from living so long among the minotaurs. Still, the baron was no prize and the woman had smiled prettily for him. Money and power, Theros thought. That’s what makes the difference. She’d smile for me if I put that jewel in her hand.
From deep inside, a voice asked, “And would you want a woman who will smile only if she’s paid to smile? And do you truly want to work for this man when you don’t like him?”
Theros grunted. He leaned forward. “No, thanks, Baron. Like I said, seven years ago-maybe. If you’re looking for a smith, I suggest Malachai the Dwarf. He might be interested. I’m not.”
The baron tried this angle and that, but Theros continued to refuse. At length, it seemed that Moorgoth gave up. He didn’t appear to have any hard feelings about it. He had turned his attention to other things.
The barmaid came back to the table with two full mugs of ale. Moorgoth grabbed the woman around the waist, pulled her close. “My men and I will be going out to battle soon. Shall I bring you back a little something?”
The woman giggled and tried-but not very hard-to pull away. “Oh, yes! That would be wonderful, my lord!” She snuggled up. She knew how to win friends.
“I would really like this man, Theros Ironfeld, to join my army. Do you suppose you could persuade him to do that for me?”
The girl’s eyes widened. She had seen Theros in the pub many times over the past years and had paid little attention to him. She now eyed him with more respect.
“I’m not sure what I could say to him to make him reconsider,” she said.
Moorgoth gave the girl a nudge toward Theros. She wobbled and landed in Theros’s lap. “I’m sure you’ll think of something, my dear.”
Marissa’s eyes darted over the massive muscles of the smith in admiration. She ran her hand over his shoulder. Three gold pieces had been shoved into her hand while she sat with Dargon Moorgoth.
Theros didn’t know this at the time. He put his arm around the woman’s waist. “Say anything you like to me. You are a very lovely woman!”