A Drink in Toulon - Part 2 - (A Kip the Quick Adventure)
A thrilling romp with theft, magic, and humor.
Kip the Quick is a thief and a rogue, but he wants to go legit. Really, he does. So, when he meets with a nobleman to talk trade, all is fine and dandy until someone comes knocking. Loudly. And violently. Where’s a good spot of the Essence, when you really need some?
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Part 2
BACK AT TWINKY’S SHOP, she was telling me all there was to know about Lord Gagne LeClair, whom I would meet later that day. “Gagne’s family has history, but he’s not a prideful man.”
“What does he need?”
“There’s little that he needs, but he does seem to want to marry his daughter off.”
“Oh?”
“She’s not your type.”
“Do you even know my type?”
“I know enough,” Twinky said with a raised eyebrow. “Just be leery of certain promises.”
“Got it.”
She paused, considering me from behind her counter. “You sure you want to dabble in a merchant’s trade? The margins of profit take time to grow to anything of note. I could point your quick hands a dozen more profitable directions.”
“I have my reasons.” And they were named: Kay.
Twinky shrugged her lumpy shoulders. “Well, then, off with you. I’ve got work to be about.”
“There’s just one more thing, Twinky?”
She squinted one eye and crossed her fat little arms. “That so?”
“I need to arrive in style.”
She grunted. “You need a ride.”
“It’s a nice carriage.”
“It will cost you.”
“A five percent well deserved by you.”
“Make it twenty.”
“Inclusive of your finder’s fee.”
“In addition.”
“For the first month’s haul?” Right? She couldn’t possibly mean to take such a percentage of the contract for life, but Twinky was resourceful and though we may have gotten on so far, she had plenty of friends to enforce the price gouge.
“Eh, who do you take me for? I’m not out to steal you blind. That’s your job.”
I tilted my head to her in respect and silently breathed out. “After you, madame.”
“You really hitting the road after this?” Twinky asked later from the driver’s seat of the carriage, wearing her chauffeur best.
“Not until I get my cut from the colaine,” I replied with a smile, watching her through the window.
She snorted and Pruneface whickered with her. “Thought you had a fellow you were still looking for? Toulon’s a big place.”
“I do…”
“Then why not stick around a little longer. I would qualify you as definitely not terrible to work with.”
“Thanks,” I said wryly.
“It’s what I’m here for kid. To make you feel better about yourself.”
That was Twinky for you. Adept. She was savvy enough to not ask further, and we passed the minutes in quiet. A rider in the royal vestments of the Royal Post rode by, his back as straight as a board. We rolled through the Square of Flowers, the finest market in Toulon; named for the smell of all the cut flowers they draped the edges with to keep out the stink of the wharf and the tanneries down the hill. Then we turned onto a boulevard of small estates of low nobles and successful merchants.
Twinky was right, I did still want to find someone. I’d been looking off and on ever since I had arrived in Toulon, but besides some whispers here, some hints there, the trail was cold. I looked up at a cloud blowing across the sun. If my father was out there somewhere, and if he had a memory of little Kip tucked away safe, I was little closer to finding out.
Other than what Ma had told me in anger from the midst of one of her drunken fits, I had a memory of Dad. Just the one. He was tall, like some giant; with long, graceful limbs and a quirky grin. Sticks in hand, he used them to juggle three small sacks of dried beans, then five, then seven. His hands were a gentle blur, the sticks guiding the sacks through the air in a whirl. I laughed. A lot. He changed the pattern from a circle to an oval, then to a figure eight, before letting the sacks all land in a growing tower at my feet. I remembered trying to pick the little bags up, but my hands fumbled with so many, and then he was picking me up, his wide grin in my face, breath smelling of garlic.
I bit my lip, turning away from Twinky, staring at a dark roiling column of smoke from some part of industry. I couldn’t even say for sure if the memory was actually of him.
The carriage turned onto a boulevard of neatly fitted cobblestones. “Here we are, boy. Ready to turn on the magic?”
I screwed up a smile and sat straight. “Always.”
Twinky pulled the carriage to a stop in front of the moderately sized LeClair estate. Pruneface stamped his hooves as I rose to step down.
“Your man looks like he’s keen on security.”
Past the iron-wrought gate and shaped hedges, a large fountain was half demolished where workers labored on a second and taller stone wall, with an iron banded oaken door that was far more formidable than the decorative front gate with crafted ivy leaves of iron.
“Indeed.” Toulon was not a city for the faint of heart. Full of con men and cut-purses, a ravenous poor that would stop at nothing to feed their own. It was a city for plenty to take care. But here in the wealthy heart, just a few blocks from the Square of Flowers where city constables regularly patrolled, it was hard to understand why any noble would concern themselves with more security than Lord Gagne already possessed. But the men sweating and grunting as they fitted stones into place were testament otherwise.
“Must have something mighty fine to protect.”
“You work your magic, Kip, and see if you can lighten his load.”
“Call me Lord Kipley.” It was high time to try out the new guise.
“How long did it take you to find that name on some faded and forgotten tombstone?”
“The name’s mine own, but the family is real enough… House Vilay.”
Twinky paused. “Why in the world would you choose a dead House. Not a soul will believe you.”
“It’s something to grab attention, and not all of House Vilay died that fateful night.”
“And how do you explain House Lussetou’s thorough destruction stopping at your forebears.”
“Third cousins, already poor and on the other side of Farland.”
She shook her head. “It is a name to get noticed. But do take a care, m’lord. Some of the poor make a name for themselves and the rich do travel.”
I grinned and slid my feathered hat on. “Come back and wait on me, so you can take a whiff of the fresh ink on the first contract of what will mark my burgeoning trade empire.”
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