Market || Variable twenty-eight

Linden looked at the five boxes on the shelves, and asked himself, "so what do we have here?"

He checked the first box. Inside, there was a necklace so beautiful that it looked like it had been made for a queen. "Meh," he sounded disappointed.

"That looked expensive," Spruce commented after Linden put the box back.

"Everything here is expensive."

"I don’t have that kind of money," Yew felt anxious.

"Buy it on credit. It’s worth it," Linden provided him with the solution, as he opened the second box. Inside there was a dagger. "This looks good. Hold it," he gave the box to Spruce.

Looking into the third box, which contained an armband, Linden commented, "maybe, if there's nothing better."

When checking the fourth box, he immediately closed the lid with a judgement of "definitely not", then put the box back before the other boys could even see its content. As for the fifth box, he paused as he eyed the simple yet elegant brooch.

"Hmm… too difficult," he was going to put it back on the shelf, but then he turned to Yew. "Do you want a powerful item which is hard to control, or an item which is super easy to control but isn’t so useful?"

"Of course, he’ll take the powerful item," Spruce answered for Yew.

"What do these items do?" Yew asked.

"The armband can be used to change your appearance on top of having some basic sky magic. The brooch... It kind of looks like a mix of magic which allows you to control air and gravity. You may be able to fly with this."

"How do you know this?" Aspen inquired.

"Spells of perception can allow the user to see the world in different ways. I have something, which allows me to see magic. And since each magic looks different, it’s easy to tell them apart with one look, at least in most cases." He looked at Yew, "so? Which one do you want?"

"The brooch," Yew answered.

Spruce smiled gloriously, assuming at the time that Yew had ambitions as high as his own. However he was wrong. Yew selected the brooch, because Linden described it as powerful but hard to control. Thus in case of something unexpected, he could always blame the magical item in order to hide his talent.

"I told you, he’d take the powerful item," Spruce marveled at his accurate prediction.

"Okay then. Let’s go pay." Linden took the box with the brooch, and stepped out. When no one was inside the safe anymore, the door closed by itself.

They went toward the exit. As Linden put his hand on the handle, he commanded the boys, "stay here. I'll be back in a moment."

They did as told, and waited until Linden came back with the cashier several minutes later. The man immediately looked at the box held by Spruce, then he glanced at the box held by Linden.

"Twenty thousand and thirty five thousand, so a total of fifty five thousand syfras."

"They'll be buying it separately," Linden pointed at his classmates.

"Wait, what? How many syfras?" Spruce yelled out, bewildered at the price.

Yew's mouth dropped open from the shock. The most expensive thing he'd ever bought was his backpack, which had cost him two thousand syfras, and it was the very expensive type, waterproof with a lot of pockets.

The cashier grimaced at the idea of working with poor customers. He looked questioningly at Linden, who gave him a warm smile in return.

"Any discount?" the boy asked.

"You know I don’t give discounts to new customers."

"And how much would that be on the credit?"

"Hmmm," the cashier rubbed his chin, as he did the math in his mind. "No less than thousand fifty hundred per month on the dagger or two thousand fifty hundred per month on the brooch."

"They’re students of Hecate," Linden pointed at their badges. "They’ll be here for the next nine years."

"I cannot wait that long," the man crossed his arms.

"Maybe we can buy something else?" Yew quietly proposed to Linden, who snapped back at him with the ferocity of a mad squirrel.

"If you want good stuff, don’t give up so fast!"

The cashier shook his head sideways, disgruntled by the inexperienced customers. "I’m not giving in no matter what you propose," he directed his words at Linden. "Last time I gave you a discount of eighty percent, but I told you that it'll never happen again. Moreover, they're not even regular customers."

"They might become such. They're both magicless," Linden remarked back.

The man looked at Spruce and Yew, and scratched his chin, as he considered his business opportunities.

"I shouldn't have been so lenient on discounts," he grumbled to himself.

Linden heard him anyway. "I’m not asking for a discount, just a good credit option."

"No less than thousand monthly for the dagger and two thousand monthly for the brooch," the cashier stated in a tone as if he was repeating himself. Yet the boys noticed that he dropped the monthly installments by fifty hundred syfras.

"Spruce," Linden looked at his classmate. "How much money did your parents give you for this year?"

"Twenty thousand, but I already spent some of it," he responded.

"How about this?" Linden spoke to the cashier. "What if we pay half the cost of the dagger right now?"

The man nodded his head, while calculating in his mind. "Hmmm… hmmm… half the cost, then yes, I could drop down the monthly payments to fifty hundred, no, to forty hundred per month."

"Make it twenty hundred per month," Linden pushed.

"Oh no, no, no, no. I am not risking that," he refused instantly. "Not all students of Hecate graduate, and the last three years are always the hardest. You pay half today, and I can give you a credit for forty hundred per month," he directed the last sentence toward Spruce.

"Wow," Spruce said, "now it looks like I can afford it."

"But your money? What about food?" Yew asked, more aware of how foolish it was to spend half of one's capital in one purchase.

"Food is free for top students," Spruce responded with so much optimism that neither Yew nor Aspen dared to remind him of his latest score in History of Magic.

"Then get your money card out, before the offer changes," Linden pressured Spruce, who took out his money card and gave it to the cashier.

The man walked up to the row of big boxes standing on the floor. On top of one of them, there was a small cash register, with a slot for one money card.

"Ten thousand now and then a monthly charge of forty hundred until the counter reaches ten thousand," he narrated as he inputted the numbers. Then he put Spruce's card inside and charged it accordingly with the push of one of the buttons.

A moment later Spruce got his card back, together with a receipt.

"So about the brooch," Linden immediately restarted his bargaining. "How much credit can we get, if we pay, let’s say, twenty thousand for the deposit?"

"What?!" Spruce looked at Yew, amazed at the possibility that his classmate would spend that much in one day.

"Linden, I don't have that much money!" Yew shouted out. "I only have four thousand from my parents."

"I know," Linden waved a hand, gesturing to his roommate to calm down. "You already told me that they didn’t know that money was so needed in Hecate, so you’re going to ask them for more."

"Yes, but…"

"I’ll pay today, and you’ll return it to me once you get more money from your parents."

Yew almost cried at the situation, "I don’t know how much I’ll get… "

"Oh, just shut up. You wanted the brooch, so stop talking about money." He directed his words at the cashier, "fifty hundred per month?"

The cashier rubbed his chin again, but he spent less time thinking than previously. "Hmmm… sounds possible. Okay, I’ll agree to this."

Linden took out his money card and handed it to the cashier, "twenty thousand only."

"Yes, I understand. Twenty thousand directly from your card," he charged Linden's card then returned it back to him. "And I'll set up a monthly charge of fifty hundred on your card," he looked at Yew, "until the count maxes out at fifteen thousand."

Yew hesitantly took out his money card. He didn't want to buy it anymore, but he was afraid of making a scene, especially since Spruce had already paid for his magical item.

"All done," the cashier said before he handed Yew's card back to him.

Linden thanked the cashier for his service, and the man thanked Linden for his patronage. They both wished each other a good day as they walked out of the storage room.

At the counter, a matriarch was serving the customers. She looked similar to the cashier, so most likely she was his mother, or another relative.

The cashier walked ahead, and opened the shop's entrance door for Linden. As the boys were stepping out, he bowed his head and blessed them, "may you have a great day, honorable guests."

All the customers inside the store directed their gazes at the boys. Linden didn't care, but the other three sped up their pace to get as far away and as quickly as possible.

"Um, should I carry it?" Yew asked, looking at the box with the brooch. Only he had nothing in his hands.

Aspen carried the salad, Spruce carried the box with his dagger, and Linden carried the box with Yew's brooch.

"No," Linden answered. "I’ll give it to you after we write the contract. I want my money back, eventually."

After returning back to their cottage, Linden wrote on a piece of paper: «Yew Chirabilva Araukaria Sky will return twenty thousand syfras to Linden Tamalini Gomat Cave within the next ten years.»

Then he signed and dated the short note, turning it into a legally binding contract. After Yew added his own signature and date, Linden took the original, but gave Yew a copy together with the brooch.

Yew felt the importance of the moment, because for him it was the first time he signed a document all by himself without any supervision. Although he had signed his application to the school of Hecate just a month ago, he didn't think much of that, because his parents had co-signed every page, and had guided him throughout the process.

This time, he did it all by himself.