“They fed this thing fit to bursting,” Dez remarked, surprised by the amount of gold spilling from the gulon’s stomach. Even in our adventuring days, we’d never made a killing like this, and even if we had, it’d have been split seven ways.
“Yeah, all this money could’ve turned to shit, literally.”
I scooped up the gold coins and tossed them into the air. It was raining money. They hit me on the head, but I was so overjoyed, I didn’t feel any pain. It was worth all the trouble we’d endured.
“And we’re splitting all this between the two of us!”
They said Heather’s hidden fortune was worth a million gold coins, but there was only about half that much here. Still, that was five hundred thousand, and it was split between Dez and me, so we had two hundred and fifty thousand each. That was enough to have Arwin’s antidote made with change to spare. Dez wouldn’t need to be run ragged by the guild anymore. He could lead a better life with his wife and child.
“The three of us, you mean,” said a voice behind me. I spun around and made a horrendous face when I saw who it was.
Natalie. She was dressed in the traveling garb she’d worn when she first showed up here.
“I wondered where you and Dez were going in the middle of the night. Now I see what you’re up to,” she said, scooping up a jewel. “This is that buried fortune everyone’s been talking about. Of course, I’m no monster, so I’m willing to share it with you two evenly.”
“Fuck you!”
She didn’t do a single thing to earn it, and now she thought she was going to stroll right in and help herself?
“I saved you before, didn’t I?” she said proudly, the git. “And you know what’ll happen if I let this secret slip, of course.”
Obviously, the Devil’s Alliance wanted it. And given the amount, the other underworld groups would love to get their hands on it, too. Every last crook in town would be after us.
Dez just nodded in resignation. I wanted to shut her up forever, if possible, but we were underground, and given the inherent instability of the temporary sun, there was a good chance I would be the one silenced.
In the end, we agreed to split the fortune three ways. Natalie picked out just the easy-to-sell jewels, tossed them into her raggedy old satchel, then scampered off. We decided to hide the remaining coins in the back of the old underground tunnel.
“Damn that bitch. I swear I’m gonna choke the life out of her someday.”
“You two are always squabbling about something.”
“Only because she keeps picking fights with me.”
Nothing good had ever happened since she showed up. She always brought a damn tempest with her.
The next morning, I went to the Adventurers Guild to see Dez. I wanted to ask how to cash in that hidden treasure. The coins were one thing, but there was a lot of artwork and such that could easily be traced back to me if I wasn’t careful with how I sold it.
Before I even got into the building, the guild was in an uproar. There was a huge crowd around it—not just adventurers but also ordinary folks who were passing by. With my excellent height, I could see at once what the commotion was about.
The old man was back. April had her arms wrapped around him, weeping. Arwin’s negotiation must have borne fruit. And Vincent kept his word.
“Oh! Matthew,” April said when she saw me. She ran over and hugged me this time. “Grampa! Grampa’s back…”
“I’m happy for you,” I said, patting her head.
Then I turned to the old man. Ruefully, he admitted, “Sounds like you’ve done a lot for us.”
“In various ways.”
We’d taken care of his granddaughter and even helped get him out of captivity. We’d been busy little beavers.
“We need to talk,” he said, then took me to the roof of the guild building. He cleared everyone else out, so it was just me and him. Idly, it occurred to me that if he wanted to, this was an easy opportunity for him to kill me. It was the roof of a three-story building, after all. Though with my body, a fall like that wouldn’t do the job.
“Thank you for everything you’ve done. I’m grateful,” he said, bowing deeply. I could scarcely believe the arrogant old man could do such a thing. “It’s meant I can see my granddaughter’s face again.”
“You could back up your words with action. No more than a thousand gold coins would suffice,” I said. Then I’d forgive him for trying to screw me over and eliminate Donald.
“This will have to do,” he said, tossing me a stack of white cards.
“I’m not much for card games.”
“They’re magical; I picked them up on the black market. A little bit finicky, but I think you can master them. I’ve jotted down how to use them, so make sure you read it closely.”
I wondered how they were supposed to help me. Well, I was never one to turn down a gift, as long as it wasn’t the gift of venereal disease.
“By the way, just a random question: You ever heard of the Scissors of Lombardi?”
Randy had showed up at the old man’s special hiding spot in search of those scissors. It stood to reason the old man either had gotten his hands on those scissors or was connected to them in some way.
“Ah, April mentioned something about that, too. She said a preacher was looking for them,” he said, scowling. “Feel like I’ve heard the name before, but I don’t remember where. At the very least, I don’t remember ever having something called that.”
“I see.”
It didn’t seem that he was lying or pretending. He really didn’t know. I’d asked Nicholas about them, too, but they didn’t ring a bell for him, either. I was running out of leads to follow.
“So what happened on your end?”
“With the buried treasure gone, they didn’t have any reason to keep me locked up any longer. I managed to wrangle the ringleader’s head and some reparations out of the lord’s grubby hands, too.”
“And what about the guild? I heard they were sending a new guildmaster.”
“That’s canceled, of course,” he said, grinning. The old man’s reign of terror would continue. Donald had died for nothing. I felt sorry for him, but on the other hand, I needed the old man to survive until April was an adult who could fend for herself.
“That’s not the end of what you wanted to talk about, right? You want to talk about your own hidden fortune, don’t you?”
He wouldn’t bring me to this private spot if all he cared about was extending his gratitude and sending me on my way.
“Don’t worry,” I reassured him, “I didn’t take a single coin. All that belongs to April.”
A few of those coins had been melted down, but that was all Randy the preacher’s doing. And the amount was so paltry that it was well within the margin of error.
“…What did you see down there?” the old man asked, his eyes narrowing dangerously.
“Why, did you keep some naughty books there?”
“I’ve got the scoop on you. You balled up the letter and threw it away after you saw it, didn’t you?”
He must’ve heard it from Ralph. I knew I should have silenced that stupid kid.
“It was quite impressive,” I said. “April’s father wrote you a letter entrusting his young daughter to you, doing what he thought best for her. I thought I might drown in my tears after reading it.”
“Just be honest, damn you!” the old man snapped, smacking the railing of the rooftop. I’d been hoping to keep this quiet already. Did he really want to silence me so badly?
I shrugged. “What do you want me to say? ‘Wow, turns out Elton the safekeeper was April’s father all along’?”
He exhaled. “Did you tell her about it?”
“Not a word. I’d heard he was a great scholar whose ship sank while he was traveling…but that’s not true, is it?”
In this town full of morons, there was no economy to support a man of letters like that. If someone wanted to do research and had the mind for it, they’d go to the royal capital. Plus, the mobsters around here didn’t have the kind of ingenuity that hid gold inside a monster contained in a magic scroll—but maybe the guildmaster of the Adventurers Guild, who would know more about monsters and magic, did.
“That’s right,” he said, scowling bitterly. “His name was Morris. And Morris was a born gangster.”
April’s father, Morris, had originally been a hired servant of some merchant or another until he got involved in gambling, then stole money from the business and ran. He might have sunk as low as you could go, but he had a calculating mind and joined a criminal group within a larger syndicate called the Devil’s Alliance. They prized his ability with smuggling and accounting. But one day, he happened to meet April’s future mother, Flora, when she visited the town, and he fell in love. Morris swore to reform his ways and tried to go straight. He attempted to cut all ties with the criminal world.
The criminal world, however, did not take that kindly, and sent men after Morris. He couldn’t go on the run with his young daughter, so he left April with the old man, then fled with his wife.
“You couldn’t keep them safe?” I asked.
“I tried to negotiate for him, but he was involved in some pretty bad business. At best, they could spare his wife and daughter’s lives.”
In truth, Morris was hoping to set up a foundation for his new life in another town while things calmed down, then bring April over when the time was right.
“But a plague swept through and took Flora out, just like that. I assumed Morris was dead, too, but he was alive and well—and working as a safekeeper for a senior member of the Devil’s Alliance.”
Whether he was compelled to do it against his will or had grown despondent and desperate after his wife’s death, we’d never know, but Morris had changed his name to Elton and found a safe place as the secret keeper for this fortune.