“Try again,” Balthazar said, adjusting his monocle before using his pincer to make a little notch on the clipboard he was holding.

“Come on, partner,” said Tristan, dropping his shoulders and sighing. “I don’t think it will get any better than this.”

The aspiring guildmaster stood on a circular carpet in the middle of the bazaar, wearing his brand new brown jacket and burgundy vest that he had recently purchased from Ardville’s finest tailor. The human merchant was also wearing a green cravat around his neck, its folds puffing out between his lapels. That piece Balthazar knew for a fact hadn’t been purchased by Tristan himself. According to what Madeleine had gossiped to him during the previous day’s five-o’clock crumpet and tea, the fancy satin piece had been a gift from Henrietta.

A detail the baker made him promise would stay just between her and the crab.

“I think you did great, Tristy!” exclaimed Suze, enthusiastically giving him two thumbs up from the large cushion she was sitting on.

“I don’t know,” said Olivia, lazily straightening herself on the sofa she was half sitting on, with one leg over one of the seat’s arms. “I think you could still put some more conviction on the delivery of the final line.”

“Hey!” Balthazar said, snapping one of his pincers at the two girls to call their attention. “Who’s the tutor and speech coach here, ladies? Let me work my magic, alright? I will get Tristan here to deliver the most rousing speech those old, dusty merchants have ever seen. After he’s done, they’re going to be begging him to be their guildmaster!”

Olivia glanced at the crab sitting on his stool in front of the counter and snickered quietly, while Suze unashamedly laughed out loud.

The Marquessian girls had made themselves at home in Balthazar’s Bazaar for a few days now, usually spending their mornings up in town before coming down to visit around lunch and staying until nightfall.

While the merchant did not mind having them around—and might even enjoy their presence, even if he wouldn’t openly state it—he had found it odd how the girls did not prepare to leave once the goods from the convoy had finally been unloaded and everything was delivered.

Curious, but cautious, Balthazar decided to try to suss out the situation discreetly.

“Hey, by the way, why haven’t you two left yet?” the crab bluntly asked.

“Sheesh, you’re subtle like a punch to the jaw!” Olivia responded, throwing her hands up in front of herself.

“Is Balthazar kicking us out, Liv?” the younger girl asked, tilting her head.

“You know, I think he might be, Suze,” the older girl replied, crossing her arms.

“What? No!” the crab said, looking back and forth between the two. “I wasn’t—I just meant—Argh!”

He threw his pincers up in annoyance as he saw the girls begin to crack and break into laughter. Over by the center of the bazaar, Tristan did his best to hold back his own chuckling at the exchange, not very successfully.

“We’re just messing with you, crab,” said Olivia, relaxing back on her seat again. “But we will leave soon, don’t worry. Once I cross the last two tasks my aunt gave me off my list, we will be off, back to Marquessa.”

Balthazar’s eyestalks relaxed for a second, before frowning again.

“I thought all you came here for was to deliver my trade goods?”

“That was part of it, yes,” the young woman responded. “Another part was making sure the mayor made the deal to trade Marquessian goods with you.”

This time, Balthazar’s eyestalks jumped.

“How do you know about that deal?!” he quickly exclaimed. “I mean… How would you know about that deal… if I had made one with the mayor… which I’m not confirming I did. Because I haven’t.”

The merchant watched from the corner of his eye as Tristan sat down on a nearby chair, a faint wince crossing his face.

“Wooow,” Suze breathed, rolling her eyes. “You really are one subtle lobster.”

“Come on, Balthazar,” said Olivia, tilting her head slightly. “You met my aunt. Do you really think she wouldn’t know exactly how this would play out? It was all part of her plan. If Marquessa can’t trade directly with Ardville, she would just have to find a way around that stubborn mayor.”

And back to frowning, the crab’s eyestalks went.

“Marquessa can’t trade directly with Ardville?” Balthazar repeated, remembering his conversation with Bergen and feeling increasingly confused.

“Yes, something to do with bad blood between my aunt and your dear mayor,” the baroness’s niece explained. “I honestly don’t know the details, and I’m not too interested in the politics of it anyway. It all goes back way before I was even born, and it’s all above my pay grade, so…” The girl produced an uncaring shrug. “The point is, Marquessian traders wanted to sell to Ardville, and now they will in a roundabout way, even if your mayor thinks he’s the one pulling a fast one on us.”

“From what I remember hearing, it might be a bit more than just politics between those two, young lady,” Tristan added from his chair by the corner. “But never mind that. You mentioned two tasks to complete before leaving. What’s the other?”

“Ah, that,” Olivia said, throwing her other leg over the seat’s arm too. “I gotta attend that guild meeting to nominate the new guildmaster too—you know, the position you’re vying for and have been practicing your speech for.”

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The girl punctuated her response with a sly smirk, while Tristan’s expression shifted to sudden surprise. Balthazar mirrored his partner’s reaction.

“Wait,” the eight-legged merchant said. “Why are you attending the merchant’s guild meeting? You’re not a merchant.”

Olivia started idly checking her nails on her seat, while Suze let out an exaggerated yawn of boredom and stood up from her cushion to grab a cookie from a jar on the counter.

“No,” the older girl said. “But when a new guildmaster is nominated, the guild charter says a representative from every other chapter of the guild needs to be present. Since the one from Marquessa was unable to make the trip, here I am as a representative. My aunt thought it was a good opportunity for me to gain some ‘diplomatic experience’ as she puts it. I wasn’t too thrilled about sitting in a boring room with a bunch of boring bureaucrats, but I figured since a talking crab would be involved, whatever, it might be at least a little entertaining.”

“Wait, how did Mayor Marquessa know I’d be present for the meeting too?” the puzzled crustacean asked.

Olivia tilted her head and rolled her eyes at Balthazar, her wry expression saying “really?” without a word.

“But, Ms. Olivia…” Tristan started hesitantly. “If you’re going to be part of the meeting, should you be here watching me rehearse for it?”

The girl waved her hand down dismissively.

“Don’t worry about it! I don’t actually get any say in the nomination. None of the other representatives do either, we’re just there to witness the meeting. The votes are cast by the guild members from Ardville only.”

“You heard the lady, Tristan,” Balthazar said, putting his monocle back on and grabbing his clipboard again. “Now get back on that carpet and do the speech we made again. You need to dazzle them with your charm in that meeting!”

***

A crowd gathered on the main square of a little town somewhere in the southeastern reaches of the continent of Mantell. Charles LaTan did not really know or care what the name of the place was, it was just another small backwater settlement on his road to mercantile greatness, and so long as they had some coin to do business with, that’s all that mattered to the peddler.

And business was booming.

“Here you go, you beautiful madame!” LaTan said to the wrinkliest old lady he had ever seen in his life. “A bottle of extra moist Potion of Hydration for you. A couple of days applying this to your skin twice a day, and you will see incredible results!”

The hunched woman smiled at him with the single tooth she had and dropped a few coins into his open palm as she took the glass bottle from his other hand.

The line of people waiting to approach the peddler’s cart extended all the way to the center of the town square, where a robed boy stood atop an upside down crate, spouting loud nonsense.

Charles wasn’t sure what Taffy’s secret was to make all those fools believe his wild tales about the merchant crab. What mattered is that it worked, and it made them all more than eager to purchase anything that was even just remotely related to the crustacean, and that’s where the peddler came in.

The unlikely partners had developed a method to work the whole madness. Taffy would travel with Charles from town to town, taking advantage of the peddler’s experience and vast knowledge of the roads, as well as connections on the streets. Once they reached their destination, the ginger boy would go off to spread his preaching about the ascendant crab, or whatever nonsense the boy believed.

Meanwhile, Charles would wait somewhere nearby, preferably at a safe distance. He had quickly learned not to stay too close to the fanatic loon once he started going off about Balthazar’s “awesomeness” to the locals.

The merchant couldn’t quite explain it, but something would always start feeling weird within him whenever the boy started getting too excited about his crab tale of the day. At one point he nearly caught himself raising his hands up in the air and clacking them like crab pincers along with a group of villagers. That was enough for him never to stand in the immediate vicinity of Taffy’s sermons again.

But Charles was more than happy to watch everyone else be roused by them. It always meant they’d be practically throwing their coin at him for any item the peddler so much as claimed to have come from Balthazar’s Bazaar.

Never had trading felt so easy for the low-Charisma merchant.

“And lo, our ascendant crab’s loyal drake descended from the heavens like a vengeful tempest!” Taffy shouted, his arms spread open as he addressed the enthralled townsfolk in front of him, who listened to his every word with bated breaths. “Just as all hope seemed lost, and the bazaar doomed to be consumed by the pests, she unleashed a blue firestorm upon the corrupted wooden miniatures that had come to life to wreak havoc on Mr. Balthazar’s home!”

LaTan watched from afar, shaking his head as the crowd gasped and then cheered.

After a few more minutes, and with most of the townsfolk present having run off back to their houses clutching whatever junk Charles had sold them at a premium, Taffy came to meet his travel partner again.

“Ah, there you are,” the peddler said to the robed boy, who looked slightly calmer now, as he usually did after exhausting himself with his energetic speeches. “Credit where credit is due, kid. I don’t know how you keep coming up with those wild stories about Balthazar, but they sure get these people in a mood to spend! I’ve done my fair share of telling tall tales, and even I have to admit you’re incredibly convincing!”

“What do you mean, Mr. LaTan?” Taffy asked with a confused smile, his eyes still looking slightly wide like during his speech.

The peddler shrugged as he finished closing the bags on his wagon.

“You know, like that tale you were telling today. About the crab figurines coming to life and attacking the bazaar, and Balthazar valiantly leading everyone else around to safety inside some magically protected kitchen, or whatever. And then the drake coming down from the mountain where she was having an epic training montage to unleash some newly learned technique to save the day. Seriously, you got some imagination in that carrot head of yours!”

Taffy shook his head and chuckled, his smile still not changing one bit.

“Oh, no, no, Mr. LaTan. I don’t make anything up. These are all true stories about our beloved Mr. Balthazar’s feats, I promise you.”

Charles chuckled too, a little nervously. “Right…”

Seeing the kid’s unchanging expression, the peddler dropped his smile and turned to face him with a frown.

“Wait, what do you mean?” LaTan asked. “We’re half a continent away from Boulder’s Point. We have been for weeks. Even if they did happen, how in the world would you know about any of those events?”

Taffy’s smile widened as he looked up, clasping his hands together. “I’ve seen them myself.”

The young preacher’s partner gulped quietly and hesitated for a second.

“You’ve… seen them?”

The ginger boy lowered his wide gaze back down to LaTan as he brought his face slightly closer, like someone about to tell a secret.

“Yes. I’ve seen all those events. At night. In my dreams.”

Charles felt goosebumps forming on the back of his neck as he nodded and tried to force a smile.

Internally, he started wondering once again if that whole business partnership had been a good idea.

But all it took was a quick glance at the bags of coins sitting in his cart for the peddler to decide that yes, it very much was worth it.

At least for now.