Oldric's shop was the largest in Saram, a stone structure with barred windows that always seemed to watch with suspicion.
As he pushed the heavy wooden door, the sound of a small bell announced his arrival. The interior smelled of cured leather, dried spices, and the thick smoke from an oil lamp hanging from the ceiling.
Oldric was behind the counter, weighing some grains on a copper scale.
He was a man in his fifties, with a grizzled beard covering half his chest and small, shrewd eyes that calculated everything. He looked up, and his expression hardened slightly upon recognizing the hooded figure.
"Ah. It's you," he muttered without enthusiasm. He set the grains aside and wiped his hands on the leather apron he wore. "Do you bring something, or did you just come to steal the warmth from my hearth?"
Roan approached the counter without fully removing his hood, but revealed enough of his face for Oldric to recognize him. His voice, when he spoke, was calm, more mature than his years suggested.
"Good evening, Master Oldric. I have pelts. From this week's hunt."
He placed the wicker basket on the counter and carefully removed the worn cloth.
One by one, he extracted the pelts and spread them out before the merchant's eyes. The red fox pelt, shiny and thick; the squirrel pelts, uniform and soft; the brown rabbit pelt; and lastly, the new one, white as snow, which seemed to trap the lamplight.
Oldric remained silent, but his expert eyes examined every inch. He reached out a calloused hand and stroked the white rabbit pelt, feeling its thickness, the uniformity of the fur, the cleanliness of the tanning. A grunt, almost of approval, escaped his lips.
"They're decent," he conceded, without much enthusiasm. "I'll give you one silver coin and two coppers for the lot."
Roan didn't flinch. He had expected that opening offer—low, almost offensive. He looked directly into Oldric's eyes, and for an instant, the merchant saw in the blue depth of that gaze a spark that didn't belong to a frightened child.
"They're better than decent, Master Oldric," Roan said, his voice firm. "They're choice, especially the white one. It's winter, intact. Not a single scratch. You know that in the city, nobles pay a lot for these pelts to trim their cloaks. For this lot, a smart merchant could easily get triple what you're offering."
Oldric frowned, his bushy eyebrows forming a severe line. He was annoyed by the confidence in the boy's voice. He was even more annoyed that the boy was right.
"If you're not happy with my price, brat, you can try your luck elsewhere," he snapped, making a move to take the pelts back. "Let's see who else in this village will buy them from you."
Roan was silent for a few seconds that stretched into eternity in the shop's tense atmosphere. Then, he shrugged with a calmness that exasperated Oldric.
With deliberate movements, he began placing the pelts back into the basket.
"Perhaps you're right," he said, as if talking to himself. "Perhaps Eric, the merchant who comes from Lys every season, will pay a fairer price. And perhaps, since I'll be seeing him, I'll also offer him the other pelt… the special one."
Oldric, who had already started to turn away pretending disinterest, froze.
"What other pelt?" he asked, without turning around.
"The frost-blue bear pelt," Roan said, as if mentioning the weather. "I got it last month, far to the north in the forest. You know, it's a very difficult and dangerous creature to hunt. It's as big as three men, and the fur is… like the sky on a full moon night."
Oldric slowly turned around. His eyes, now fully open, shone with a mix of disbelief and greed.
A frost bear was a dangerous beast in the region, and a pelt of that size and color… was a walking fortune.
"Wait," he said, extending a hand. "Don't be hasty, boy. We can always reach a better agreement. For this lot… and for that other pelt you speak of, I offer four silver coins. A generous price."
Roan shook his head. A faint, almost imperceptible smile played on his lips. It was the smile his grandfather told him to use when he knew he had the upper hand.
"The frost-blue bear pelt is not worth silver, Master Oldric," he said, his voice now a whisper laden with certainty. "My grandfather said something like that is only traded for gold. I wouldn't part with it for less than fifteen gold coins. For everything else, including today's lot, one more."
Oldric held his breath. Fifteen gold coins. It was an exorbitant sum for Saram.
But he also knew that in the capital, or even at the court of some border duke, that unique pelt could sell for ten times that amount, or more. It could earn him prestige, contacts… It was an opportunity he couldn't let slip away, not even from this demonic boy who bargained like a merchant from the southern league.
"Sixteen, I won't give more than that," Oldric grunted, the number coming out like a whip crack. "Sixteen gold coins for everything. The bear pelt included. But I want it here, now."
Roan smiled, this time openly, and the blue light in his eyes seemed to sparkle with triumph.
"I accept," he said. "But I didn't bring the bear today. It's too big and valuable to carry without a secure deal. I'll bring you the pelt tomorrow at dawn. You can keep these," he indicated the pelts on the counter, "as collateral."
Oldric paled, then flushed. A stifled oath died on his lips. He had been outmaneuvered, and by a seven-year-old brat.
"You little scoundrel!" he burst out, though without real anger, more with a kind of admiring resignation. "You've played me well. Me, Oldric, who's haggled with dwarves from the southern mines. Where did you learn that?"
Roan collected the silver and copper coins Oldric handed him for the initial lot (a small advance) and stored them in a leather pouch inside his tunic.
"My grandfather," he said, and for the first time, his voice sounded genuinely warm when mentioning him. "He told me words were like arrows. You have to know how to aim them at the right place. And he also said that knowing how to use words was the best way to… hmm, to reach a woman's heart, or something like that. To be honest, I never quite understood what he meant by that."
A silence. Then, a rough, powerful laugh erupted in the shop, making the jars on the shelves vibrate. Oldric was holding his belly, tears welling in the corners of his eyes.
"By the gods!" he gasped between laughs. "Your grandfather was a wise man, boy. A very wise man." He wiped his eyes, looking at Roan with a new expression, less surly, almost comradely. "Don't worry. You'll understand. In a few years, you'll understand perfectly."
Roan nodded, though he still seemed puzzled. He adjusted his hood, took his empty basket, and headed for the door.
"Until tomorrow at dawn, Master Oldric."
"Until tomorrow, little demon," replied the merchant, and this time the nickname didn't sound like an insult, but almost like a compliment.
Outside, night had completely fallen over Saram. Stars twinkled above the thatched roof of the inn. Roan breathed in the cold air, feeling the weight of the coins in the inner pocket of his brown cloak.
He had secured a good amount of money from selling the pelts, as well as selling the frost-blue bear pelt for a fair price. Although Roan knew that a pelt of such quality was highly coveted in the capital and would sell for a great price—at least twenty gold coins.
Its value came from how difficult and dangerous it was to obtain them. Those monsters were so strong that it would take at least a team of adventurers to defeat one.
Roan sighed, when someone bumped into him.
"Sorry," said a hurried voice, quickening its pace before disappearing into the alleys.
Roan shook his head, still feeling the weight of his money on him.
"It's good I learned from the previous lessons about theft," murmured Roan. The village of Saram, though outwardly opulent and peaceful, had poor areas with high theft rates, where children his age used distracted people to steal their money.
Roan had learned the hard way to guard his money after being robbed a couple of times.
"How did grandfather put it? 'Never put all your eggs in one basket?'" he thought to himself, leaving the village and returning to the forest. He would have to get up early and prepare the frost bear pelt to deliver to Oldric in the morning.