Unfortunately, traveling through the night meant that we didn't get to watch as the city drew closer. Instead, we did our best to sleep while we rocked back and forth in the bumpy uncomfortable wagon the rest of the way. The bright side was that we would be arriving to the outskirts of Ironcastle in the morning rather than at night, right as we would need to sleep.

  Iris had woken us up when she heard the whistle that meant we were stopping soon. No one in the wagon looked particularly rested. Trying to sleep in the moving wagon had been difficult. Iris looked pretty bleary-eyed in particular, even though she was the one who had woken all of us. I had seen her sleeping earlier, so I don't think she had been up the entire time, but she must have been a pretty light sleeper to have woken up to just a whistling sound.

  I didn't have any luggage to worry about because of my ring, but we still needed to settle the issue of the dead umber hounds strapped to the top of the wagon. I also still needed to talk with Kitaka, the copper merchant, one more time before we left. I had already told her about how the lightning rod worked and we settled on a deal for her to keep the one I had made. She wasn't carrying a significant amount of money on her though, so we would have to go to her warehouse before she could pay me for the information. In exchange, I would give her some basic diagrams Luna and I had drawn up together using charcoal on some of the rough paper Kitaka had given me. That probably meant we would follow her right after we unloaded since we were here during the day.

  After another whistle, we opened the door and gathered outside the wagon while we waited for Korr'tak to dismiss us and give us a letter to give to the Hunter's Association. Some of the people nearby asked about the adolescent umber hounds on the roof, so Aria stepped aside to handle that while we checked over all of our things. From the bits I caught, Maxwell wants one of them, but we need to give them to the hunter's association as proof of their sighting first. Aria sounded like she knew what she was doing, so I stopped paying attention to her conversation.

  "I'm glad that we're finally done with this escort mission. This experience was horrible," I grumbled to the others.

  Piper laughed. "Really? This one wasn't so bad. They hardly made us work at all for the first third, and the last third was just riding and watching the terrain fly by."

  "It was the middle third that I was complaining about. You didn't go clear out an entire goblin den on your own. It smelled disgusting," I said with a grimace.

  "I would have rather gone with you. We hung around getting yelled at by that drakken the entire time instead," Maxwell commented.

  I fumed at the thought of him and shook my head.

  "I had fun on this trip at least," Milana commented. "Are you guys planning on staying in Ironcastle long?"

  Maxwell shrugged. "We haven't talked about it yet. We need to take care of some business first, but we might do some dungeon delving in the Ironcastle dungeon afterward. What about you?"

  "We've never been to that one!" Talia said excitedly. "We did some delving out in Palma, but Ironcastle is supposed to be better for our current skill."

  Maxwell scanned their group. "You might want to get something for the ghosts in the Ironcastle dungeon. The last time I was there, I couldn't do anything on a few of the floors."

  Valkin nodded. "We were planning on buying some enchanted weapons when we got here. Magic-imbued blades should work well enough for us, though I don't know what we're going to do about Norrik's shield."

  "They make mana-imbued shields as well, but they're a bit pricy," Piper commented as she adjusted the positioning of the bedroll on her backpack. "We need to look for a new shield for Maxwell too."

  "Where are you staying? Maybe we can go to the same inn together," Milana asked before turning to face Luna. "We can continue to work on silent casting as long as we're both in the city."

  "We have a few errands to run today but the place I usually go is..." Maxwell then started to give them directions so I tuned him out for now.

  ("How are you doing, Luna?") I asked.

  She smiled and leaned against my arm. ("I'm doing decently enough. I would have liked a bit more sleep, but it's good that we'll be able to spend some time in the city with the weight of our debt off our shoulders.")

  ("Hopefully everything goes well. I have this anxious feeling that we'll run into more trouble before all of that's settled,") I said shaking my head.

  ("I hope not. I'm looking forward to it no longer being a concern,") Luna said with a sigh.

  ("Is there a bathhouse near the inn Maxwell is taking us to?") I asked.

  Luna smiled and nodded. ("Yep! We've gone to it a few times between delves. The delves in Ironcastle don't take as long as the ones in Fallow, but it's a bit harder to make money here.")

  ("I'm glad. Can you believe I used to shower every day? Now I'm lucky if I get to bathe properly more than once a week.") I thought about the shower in my old apartment. I never knew I could miss a bathroom so much.

  Luna giggled. ("And Iris thought that I was the noble between the two of us. Daily baths? Isn't that a bit extravagant?")

  I shrugged. ("I've told you about this before, but indoor plumbing is great. If I can turn the water on whenever I want, why not take a shower every day?")

  She rubbed her chin and looked off in thought. ("Well, come to think of it, if I had plenty of mana for water magic, bathing daily wouldn't be that luxurious. If it hardly costs anything to do, I could see myself bathing daily too...")

  ("Well soon—")

  I paused when I heard Iris suddenly raise her voice. "No! You can't! I need this job! Where will I go?"

  "Now calm down, Iris. You're a hard worker. I'm sure you'll be able to find work here," Korr'tak told her while anxious from the sudden scene they were causing.

  "But I was working hard! You can't retire now! I don't know anyone here! How will I find anyone willing to give me a chance!? You- you... this is unfair!" Iris was crying now, breaking down in front of everyone.

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  "What's going on?" I jogged over to Korr'tak to see what was happening.

  "He's abandoning me here!" Iris cried out.

  Korr'tak held up his arms. "It's not that! It's... I-I just can't do it anymore! I almost died! Those beasts dragged me back to their den to eat me! I can't do it. I can't go on the road anymore. I'm going to visit my brother and beg him for a job doing logistics for his company. I'm closing down the Grey Meline Shipping Company and selling everything off. It's not personal, Iris. I just won't need your help anymore."

  The mousegirl fell to her knees and started crying into the dirt. With every sob, Korr'tak looked more and more uncomfortable. After a long awkward moment, he tossed a coinpouch on the ground and quickly walked off. Iris grabbed the pouch and held it to her chest, but hadn't stopped her tears. The small crowd that was watching shook their heads and walked away, leaving Iris all alone.

  I kneeled next to her and put my hand on her shoulder. She flinched before looking up at me with red eyes. I patted her on the shoulder a few times before smiling. "For now, do you want to come with us?"

  Her brow furrowed and she suddenly had a look of irritation come over it. "I don't need your pity or your handouts," she spat.

  I tilted my head at the rebuke. "Well... do you have somewhere better to go? If you don't want to feel indebted to us, we can work something out later. For now, we should at least stop sitting in the dirt. I think we're getting in everyone's way."

  She wiped her eyes and didn't resist me pulling her to her feet by the hand. I pulled her along after me back to our group. Everyone nearby had watched the situation and there was an air of awkward tension.

  "Do you mind if we bring Iris along?" I asked Maxwell.

  He glanced at Iris and then back to me. "Do you really think this is a good idea?"

  I turned to Iris and shrugged. "You're not going to pick any pockets this time, are you?"

  "N-no!" she suddenly said defensively.

  Maxwell sighed and shook his head. "That's not what I meant."

  "Maxwell, guys, she doesn't have anywhere to go. We have a bit of money and Kitaka is going to give me some more money once we visit her warehouse. I'm sure we can find something for the girl to do," I said.

  Piper turned and grinned at Maxwell. "Did you ever think the monster that saved us that night would one day go on to beg us to help a street urchin?"

  Maxwell pinched his brow. "You're not helping, sis. Well... Luna, Aria, what do you two think?"

  Luna glanced at me and then at the kid. ("I... I don't know. She did try and steal from me back in Fallow, but at the same time... she's been pretty helpful on this trip. I'm not sure what we could have her do for us, but I don't mind if she comes with us for a while.")

  Aria shrugged. "Why don't we just take her into the dungeon with us? We can help her with her early kills, get empowered, and get her on the road to becoming a delver herself."

  "Don't you think she's a bit young for that?" Piper asked.

  "I started out when I was about her age. Though all I did at first was carry everyone's stuff," Aria replied.

  "I don't know if that was what I was suggesting," I said hesitantly.

  "I-I'll do it! If you take me with you, I'll help you in any way I can! I just can't be alone on the street again..." Iris begged.

  I scratched the back of my head. "I don't know. I was just thinking she could cook and clean for us or something. I didn't think we would be bringing her along in the dungeon."

  ("Ask her if she has any magic aptitude,") Luna requested.

  "Uh, do you know if you can use magic, Iris?"

  Iris shook her head. "No... I've never had the money to check..."

  I suddenly had the image of the short mouse girl throwing fireballs like my Luna. While the thought was amusing, it didn't seem realistic...

  "For now, let's just take her with us and we'll figure out what to do with her later. I want to get paid for the lightning rod thing and then we can go settle your debt," I said to Maxwell.

  He sighed. "Fine. If all of you are so set on bringing her along, I don't really have any complaints. It's still early in the day, so we'll have plenty of time to take care of both of those things. Maybe we can talk about it over lunch.

  "We'll see you guys at the inn later tonight," Milana said with a wave. She had been listening to the conversation, but it was obvious that they didn't want to be dragged into the situation with us.

  I grabbed Iris and pulled her along after me while walking toward Kitaka's wagon. Before I could get all the way over though, Phoebe stopped me. "Helena, I wanted to thank you again for everything. I hope those spices serve you well. You should come visit my shop sometime and sell any of those out of season herbs you come across in the woods," she said with a grin. "I won't ask about that, but I would like it if you swung by sometime."

  "Sure," I said with a laugh. "Where is your shop at?" She started giving directions but quickly switched to giving those directions to Piper when she realized I had no idea where anything was in this city. Piper seemed confident she knew where to go though.

  Once we slipped away from them, we made it to Kitaka's wagon. "Helena! Are you here to head over to my warehouse? It's not far from here. I just need to wait for my inspection to finish and then we can leave." She gestured at her wagon, which had several people dressed similarly to the ones that escorted us here looking through everything. One of the inspectors was looking at the lightning rod, but it didn't seem to bother him. He moved on a moment later.

  "Yeah, I have those diagrams ready like requested. I don't think my art skills are all that amazing but I think it gets the point across."

  "As long as I can understand it, that's all that matters," she said with a nod. Her eyes followed one of the inspectors looking through her drawers. "Can't trust these lot. I once had one of them try to steal an ingot. An entire copper ingot. As if I wouldn't notice," she scoffed.

  The inspection passed quickly, and then we followed the wagon through the streets to Kitaka's warehouse. I was eager to get our business over with and get Maxwell and Piper's debt settled. After everything we had been through together, I was excited to help them lift that pressure off their shoulders.

  Hello! Some of you had guessed it already, but Helena has claimed another companion. Iris is cute and pretty fun to write, she'll get some more development in some of the upcoming chapters. It's probably a bit silly to admit, but I was tearing up a little writing the part where she was being abandoned. I hope you enjoyed the chapter, thanks for reading!

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