Chapter 28: Swordsmanship Teacher

In the afternoon, Jace and Grid met near the gold-encrusted roses with what each had kept, and borrowed a scale from a cargo trading post to see how many herbs had been gathered on the trip.

Bundles of tied herbs were taken out of the bag by Grider as Jace weighed them.

The final weigh-in was 7 lbs of silverleaf, 0.6 lbs of royal bloodwort, 2 lbs of nimbus, 5 plants of heather, 2 lbs of stonecrop, and a suspected geoduck plant with about 1.1 lbs of cemetery moss.

“It feels like less than we were counting.” Jace lifted the whole bag and weighed it in his hand and said, “Did it fall off on the way?”

“More than likely it’s dried out a bit.” Grid picked up a bunch of silverleaf grass and shook it twice and said, “Look, these leaves have hardened.”

“Don’t shake.” Jace warned, “You could probably drop a few more coins with that shake.”

“That’s scary when you put it that way.” Grid put the herbs away and said, “Do the math on the total?”

Jace took out the scroll and read, “Nimbus Flower 2 silver, Silver Leaf Grass 2 silver and 50 copper, Ground Root Grass 1 silver a plant, Stonecrop Grass 2 silver a plant, Graveyard Moss 7 silver. This is the clearly given purchase price, she didn’t tell me how to charge for the Imperial Blood Grass, nor did she say what price for any stumbling grass type of herbs.”

The dwarf made a seven with his hand and said, “Graveyard Moss and Royal Blood Grass don’t count, cross out the price and take it for yourself, I want three or seven.”

“No problem.” Jess began to mime, “Two seventy-four, five seventy-three thirty-five ……”

“What are you reading?”

“Don’t talk ……32 silver 50 copper, there may actually be a discrepancy, you’ll have to go to the alchemy room to find out.”

“How did you do the math so fast.” The dwarf said, “Are you sure you did the math right?”

“It should be about the same, a ballpark figure anyway.” Jace said, “Don’t you guys learn arithmetic on Eagle’s Nest Mountain?”

“Of course learn.” The dwarf said in a hurry, “Then let’s go quickly, otherwise this herb will dry up again in a while if it sits here in the sun, the sun of the harvest festival is just poisonous!”

As the two shouldered their bags and headed over to the canal, Jace asked, “Did you ask the price of the weapons? Are the craftsmen in the Dwarf Quarter willing to take Elven weapons?”

Grid said, “6 silver for the long one and 12 silver for the short one. Are you going to sell them, or keep them for yourself?”

Jace said, “How am I supposed to use a short sword when I can’t even use a sword right? What about you, do you want to use it yourself?”

“I’m not very good with it either, elf stuff.” Grid said, “So it’s better to sell it.”

The two walked to the makeshift wooden bridge and Jess asked, “Speaking of which, why is the short one more expensive than the long one?”

Grid pulled the shortsword out from behind his waist and said, “Look at the pattern on it, it’s not a standardized weapon, it was made by a special craftsman, and the dwarf was willing to pay more only because he intended to use it for his collection.”

A bit skeptical, Jace asked, “The collection just costs 12 silver coins?”

Grid explained, “How much do you want to sell it for? It’s hard to believe that you think this dagger is of secret silver? Frankly speaking, the level of production isn’t that high, and it’s only more expensive because elven weapons are rare. The longer one isn’t even made by an elf. The copper-bearded dwarf over there said it was made by a Dalaran craftsman, but I think it’s about the same, as Dalaran objects like to follow the style of elves. At the time I said it would sell for a dozen silvers at most, and I was right.”

“Then I’ll listen to you.” Jess said, “So, did you ask about the black stick?”

Grid shook his head and said, “They couldn’t tell what the stick was made of, said they wanted 3 silver receipts, I didn’t agree, and it wasn’t a cedar stick! I think, maybe it’s made of some Draenor’s otherworldly material, selling him half a month’s rent for something that came across the Dark Gate, wouldn’t I be foolish? It’s not like we’re short on that kind of money right now.”

He switched the thing he was carrying over his shoulder and said, “By the way, I’ve recently prepared to move to the Dwarf District, and there’s a Barbarian Hammer Dwarf who has settled in Storm City who intends to rent me a room for a very cheap price. I’ll deliver that stick to you tonight, so keep it, since it’s that orc warlock’s stuff, if you have a chance, ask the people in your mage district to see if anyone recognizes what it is.”

“I wouldn’t dare ask.” Jess said, “If it’s really some unclean item then I’m going to get arrested.”

“It’s not that dangerous, is it?” Grid laughed dryly, glanced at the wizard’s tower in the distance again, and said, “Then you can keep it too, go to their library to see if there’s any relevant records, and don’t sell it until you figure out what the hell that thing is.”

“It’s probably just as good as an orc’s staff, remember to wrap it in a cloth when you bring it over so no one outside can see it.” As Jace finished speaking, he suddenly remembered that he might have to move soon as well, into the mage district to live.

If one were to move in, wouldn’t it be easy for one’s private stash of those orc warlock things to come to light?

There were a lot of things that could detect dark magic in the mage district, and it was uncertain what they would run into that would suddenly trigger it and then they would be found out, and it felt like if they were going to learn further about shadow magic, or other warlocks, they might as well have been living out there, and it was only half an hour to make the trip anyway.

Plus now that he was able to make a little more money, a few silvers a month for rent wasn’t that much of a burden. Why don’t he just tell Amy Marin tomorrow that he doesn’t need to keep an eye on the mage’s apartment for himself.

It was the first time the dwarf had been in the mage district, and he stared out at the beautiful houses on either side of him the whole way.

“Did you sell that bow?” Jace said, “The elf’s bow.”

“No.” Grider said, “I’m going to keep it for myself, I kinda like it.”

Jess asked, “Did you ask for a price?”

Grid said, “A hunter wanted 7 silver coins to collect it, it really is an old bow now. I thought it would be better to sell it than to use it myself, so I can go hunting, relax and improve my food.”

Jace smiled, “Then take me with you if you go out, I need to learn to hunt too.”

“That’s not a problem.” Grid suddenly said, “But I was wondering the other day if you’d be interested in learning how to sword fight. I think you have a good talent.”

“Talent?” Jace said, “You mean swordplay?”

“It’s not like I’ve ever seen you use a sword, I mean in terms of fighting.”

“Uh ……”

Grid said, “What, you don’t think I’m good with a sword? I’m a veteran swordsman, humans think dwarves like to use hammers, that’s because most of the dwarves they see are blacksmiths employed by human nobles.”

What he said was actually good, the dwarven warriors were actually very good at making swords. Prince of Lordaeron, Alsace Minethil’s sword teacher was Muradin of the Copperbeard family, how well Alsace learned is another story, but at least Muradin’s level of swordsmanship must have been recognized by the royal family of Lordaeron.

“If you’re free, of course I’d like to.” Jess said, “When do we start?”

“You can start tomorrow night.” Grider said, “Tuition two silver a month.”

“Making money on my head?”

“Ha, you still want to learn for nothing? I’m not your real dad!”

Jokes aside, after this trip to the Twilight Forest, Jace felt that he would be hard pressed to find a second teacher who was on the same level as Grid, and who would be willing to use this amount of money to teach him how to learn the sword.

2 silver a month to hire a serious former griffin knight to teach himself sword training is outrageous to anyone who hears it.