Chapter Text
Laios didn’t think this was a good idea. And considering he generally wasn’t among the naysayers of the group, that was…really saying something. But it wasn’t a monster they were going to get, it was Chilchuck’s pack. Chilchuck’s pack, which was…
Apparently in that room.
Chilchuck had wanted to go get the pack on his own. He’d been pretty insistent about it, actually. But he was also barely back on his feet, and in Marcille’s firm opinion (seconded, quietly, by Senshi and Laios), no one should face that room alone. Least of all someone who’d just experienced what Chilchuck had.
So they’d compromised. Grudgingly, Chilchuck had agreed to Laios coming along, as long as the other two stayed away, and Laios…hoped that would be fine? Chilchuck was currently marching doggedly ahead of him, so tightly-wound his shoulders were nearly up around his ears. Laios simply hung back and let him take the lead. The silence was so uneasy that it made Laios’s ears ring, and he itched to fill it with conversation, but resisted the urge with difficulty. He knew he wasn’t spectacular with social cues, but if Chilchuck had been a monster, every inch of him would have been screaming danger right now, and if he’d been a dog, he would have been on the verge of biting anyone who came near.
Which, as social signals went, was a pretty clear one even to Laios.
The thing was, Chilchuck wasn’t upset at him. Or at any members of the party, not really–not to the degree of stress he was showing right now. If he was this mad at them, he would have told them so. It was one of the reasons Laios felt so comfortable around Chilchuck. Abrasive as the half foot could be, and secretive as he was about his personal life, he wasn’t remotely cagy about his boundaries. Even Laios never had to guess if and why Chilchuck was upset–if it was relevant to him, Chilchuck would simply tell him. Laios had expressed appreciation for this to him once, and had gotten a surprised laugh out of Chilchuck in response.
The word you’re looking for is ‘professionalism.’ Chilchuck had told him. And you’re welcome.
So Chilchuck wasn’t upset with him. Which meant this was about that room full of bodies.
Not that Laios blamed him.
“We’re here.” Chilchuck’s voice was flat. Laios looked up to see he’d paused in the hallway ahead, and hadn’t actually gone in yet.
“Ok. You know where your pack is? Let’s grab it and get the hell out of–”
Chilchuck was shaking his head. “No. We’re going to be here for a little while.” He seemed to be steeling himself, and glanced briefly up at Laios. “I’m going to need your help to get them off the spikes. I can do it myself, but it’ll be slower.”
Laios blinked. Twice. “You–I thought we shouldn’t move them, to make it easier for the people from the resurrection office...”
Chilchuck sighed, turning his back on the room to face Laios fully and holding up two fingers. “Two things: one, they’re going to have to be moved anyway. The revival people can’t exactly revive them while they’re still impaled. And two, Flickpenny’s going to be taking a ton of notes, but it’s not like it’s a crime scene, a monster did this. We don"t need to preserve evidence.” He watched Laios’s face for a long moment, and whatever he saw there, he clearly still anticipated an argument. “...I’m not leaving them like that, Laios.”
What could Laios say to that? “Ok.”
It was grim work. Knowing that everyone was going to be revived in a few days helped, but it was a lot of bodies, almost all of them painfully small, and knowing that they’d all gone missing and not been reported weighed heavily on Laios’s mind. He and Chilchuck worked in tandem, Laios lifting each half foot down and leaning them against the stone spire they’d been impaled on, careful not to move them too far for fear of making it harder to revive them. Chilchuck worked alongside him, looking for a long time into the face of each body, then making rapid notes in a tiny notebook and tearing out the pages, leaving a heavily-scrawled scrap of paper under the hand of each corpse. Laios wasn’t trying to snoop, but it didn’t escape his notice that the notes weren’t in common; he couldn’t read a single word on the papers he got a look at.
It took a long time. Laios could only hope that the others wouldn’t come looking for them as time dragged on, but finally they were done, and Laios had to admit that the horror of the room–at least visually–had retreated somewhat. Chilchuck looked spent, several shades paler than normal, and sat against the wall with his knees up while Laios went and got his pack. He stayed sitting when Laios got back, so Laios sat down too, not sure what else to do. Chilchuck thunked his forehead against his knees and stayed there, keeping his face hidden.
“...Do you…want to talk about it?” Laios ventured.
“Do you?” Chilchuck’s voice was muffled by his knees, but there was sarcasm there, thick enough that even Laios could detect it.
“Guess not.” Laios looked out at the room of spikes. It gave him a sort of weird double-vision to be here with Chilchuck. Part of him couldn’t help but find the shrikerats fascinating. A cave-dwelling creature whose closest genetic relatives were passerine birds, using natural cave formations in the way their mundane relatives used thorns on bushes. A communal hunter with food storage habits like a squirrel, despite the lack of natural seasons in the dungeon. Excellent parents who mated for life and nurtured their young for over a year, capable of disabling their prey at 100 yards by destroying the inner ear. Specialized predators who rarely even had to use that ability due to the downy feathers on their wings that allowed them to fly perfectly silently, like owls. Shrikerats were fascinating, and they were excellent predators, and they were rare. In any other circumstances, Laios would feel incredibly fortunate to have had a chance to see one.
He still kind of did.
But those same monsters had also terrorized and nearly killed one of the very few people who Laios could safely consider a friend. And for all that Laios could see the room of stalactites as fascinating, he could also–sort of–see it how Chilchuck probably had.
He was very, very glad they hadn’t found Chilchuck on one of these spikes.
“...Hey, Chil?”
“Mm.”
“Why’d you need to come back here?” Laios hoped he wasn’t overstepping to ask, but he genuinely didn’t understand, and Chilchuck was usually willing to explain things to him when that was the case. “The rest of us could have done this. And why didn’t you want the others to come?”
“You’re lucky I let you come.” Chilchuck muttered, but there wasn’t any heat to it. He lifted his head and propped his chin on his knees, staring out at seemingly nothing in particular. His eyes were red-rimmed, although as far as Laios knew, he hadn’t been crying. “I…” He hesitated. “I had to check.” He took a long, shaky breath and let it out slowly, and when he spoke again his voice was hoarse. “I have a family. They don’t live too far away, and one of my daughters sometimes works as an adventurer. Last I heard she was headed elsewhere, and I suspect I would have heard if she’d taken a job on the Island, but–”
Laios’s head swam. He’d never really had trouble seeing Chilchuck as an adult like the others did, but the idea that he might have grown-up kids had never once crossed his mind. It wasn’t the kind of information Chilchuck had ever volunteered before. And the idea that one of his kids could have been in here and Laios and the others could have just walked past her without ever knowing–
Laios kind of felt like he should give him a hug, but Chilchuck was busy wiping his eyes rapidly on his sleeve, and it didn’t seem like a good idea. Besides…
“She…she wasn’t here, was she?”
Chilchuck’s laugh was watery. “No. Thank fuck. What, you think I have a poker face that good?”
Laios let out a breath, relief for his friend washing through him. “Thank god.”
“Yeah.” Chilchuck rubbed his forehead as though he had a headache. “I knew most of the others, though. Most of them are guild members–some of them, I should’ve known something was up, I’d heard rumors they’d moved to Kahka Broud, but I never should’ve let that go without at least following up–I mean what the hell else did I even form the guild for–”
“Hey, Chilchuck. Take it easy.”
“Easy for you to say.” Chilchuck snapped, rounding on him abruptly. “D’you know why I was so mad about the fishmen thing? A lot of people consider half foots demi-humans. We barely get by on a taxonomic technicality in most places. Being considered demi-humans makes us as disposable as orcs, just cuter and less dangerous, so people try to use us for shit instead of killing us on sight. Twenty-three of us went missing, and–forget warning the guild, some of these peoples’ parties were covering it up. And I fucking missed it. It’s my job to make sure this kind of thing doesn’t happen.” All the fight went out of him at once, and he buried his face in his knees again, shaking like he was cold.
Unsure what else to do, and suddenly feeling very guilty about his dismissal of Chilchuck’s discomfort about eating the fishmen, Laios reached out and squeezed his shoulder. He wasn’t sure how to ask, but…it seemed important. “When…you said you’d been used as monster bait…”
“Which time?” Chilchuck sounded bitter, although Laios couldn’t see his face. “Thought I told you I didn’t want to talk about it.”
“Yeah, but…” Laios fidgeted. “I want to know. If that’s ok with you.”
Chilchuck was silent for so long, Laios thought he wasn’t going to answer, and when he did finally speak, his voice was so quiet Laios could barely hear him. “It…happened twice. Once, I got out of it. Team of succubus hunters scouted me when I was first starting out. I got a bad feeling and ducked out when no one was looking, overheard them talking on my way out. It wasn’t about me, I just happened to be the nearest gullible half foot, they were feeding half foots to the succubus to boost their population, trying to keep the hunting business lucrative. That’s why I only take jobs that pay me up front now. Authorities on the surface were no help at all, I had to just take my family and skip town as soon as we could.” He took a shaky breath. “Second time was when I came to the Island. I needed passage, and all the ships either wanted or needed a half foot on board as an early warning system against sirens. I couldn’t find a single ship that wasn’t like that. They were all way too happy to have me on board, and not a one of them had safeguards in place. It didn’t feel right to me. But I’d already pulled up stakes to come to the Island, so I didn’t have a lot of options. The ship I settled on had already talked some half foot kid into doing the job. I talked the captain out of using the kid, leveraged my experience as an adventurer, got him to agree to give both me and the kid passage in exchange for me staying up on deck instead of the kid. They made us pay full price anyway, and they were pissed I raised a stink, but they agreed to let the kid belowdecks. Should’ve known better than to take that ship, but I didn’t want to leave the kid alone there.”
“And…were there any sirens?”
Chilchuck nodded. “The kid didn’t make it. There wasn’t a single fucking thing I could do. They didn’t snap me out of it as fast as you, I think it was mostly luck I didn’t go overboard too.”
Laios swallowed. “I’m sorry, Chilchuck.”
“I’m not telling you because I want you to be sorry, I’m telling you because I want you to be aware.” Chilchuck was still drawn up very small against the wall, but his gaze was intense. “You’re a good guy, Laios. You’re crazy, and you’re a real pain in my ass sometimes, but you’re a good guy. And I know you’ve probably seen bad shit before, but I want to make sure you understand this one.” He jerked his chin at the room. “This had nothing to do with monsters. Not the dungeon kind, anyway.”
Laios nodded hesitantly. He thought he understood. “So…why didn’t you want Senshi and Marcille to come?”
“Are you kidding? This is a hard enough conversation to have with you. I’ve known you longest and I know you know people can be bastards. Senshi barely listens to me half the time, and anyway he thinks I’m a kid. Marcille obviously grew up sheltered as hell. She’s not gonna believe some people can be that awful just for the hell of it until she sees it herself. She’d just get all righteously angry at the people I mentioned just now, she wouldn’t get how deep that runs–that it was every ship that was like that, and those succubus hunters were a well-established group that kept operating after I got away. Adventurers gossip endlessly, everyone who saw me with them knew exactly what their plan was. Marcille thinks the biggest problem short lived races have is that our lifespans are shorter. I could’ve died at fourteen and no one would have blinked, because I was just some half foot kid. I would’ve been missed, but only by other half foots, so…” He gestured widely at the room. “See where that leads?”
“Yeah. I think I get you.”
“Good.” Chilchuck levered himself to his feet. He didn’t exactly sway, but he did put a hand out to the wall to steady himself. He really did look awful.
“Let’s see if Marcille can hit you with more healing magic when we get back.”
“I don’t think healing’s really my problem at this point. I could use a fucking drink, though.” Chilchuck reached for his pack as though to pull it onto his back, but Laios stopped him.
“I’ve got it.”
Chilchuck made a slight face, but he didn’t object as Laios shouldered the pack, and despite the grimness of their errand, the silence as they headed back was a hell of a lot less uncomfortable than it had been on the way out. So much so that Laios was willing to risk more conversation.
“If you don’t mind me asking…what were those notes you were writing?”
“Hm? Oh. They’re promissory notes. They wouldn’t do a bit of good at an actual bank, but the guild’s got emergency funds. My signature should be good enough for Hopmarin to free up some of those funds to help those guys get back on their feet. Doesn’t make up for it, but at least they won’t be broke.”
“Didn’t you say not all of them were in the guild?”
Chilchuck glanced up at him, as if weighing what to say. Finally he sighed, his shoulders slumping.
“The guild’s not a charity, it’s a collective. We can only financially support people who actually join.”
Laios frowned. “So the rest of the notes were…”
Chilchuck looked away. “Those were…also promissory notes. For money from my personal savings. I’ll hear it from Hopmarin when I get back for sure, but she’ll make it happen.”
Laios wasn’t very good at finances, but he was pretty good at math, and ran a rushed mental calculation. “Is…that why your rates are so high?”
“No, dumbass, my rates are high because I’m good at my job. I don’t make a habit of using my bank account as a personal charity.” Catching Laios’s confused look, he rolled his eyes. “Look, people think half foots are greedy. I know I’ve got a hell of a reputation for it. But we’re even shorter-lived than you tall men. Think about it; an elf who wants to buy a house can save up for as long as they want and get someplace really nice–and they’ll probably end up with a nice fat inheritance from their parents besides, who’ve had hundreds of years to casually accumulate money. Us? We tend to marry young, so half foots usually have to figure out how to provide for a family before we’re fifteen. That’s not a long time to build a career or savings. It’s sure as hell not enough time to save up to compete financially against longer-lived races. Ever get into a bidding war with a dwarf? I don’t recommend it. Most people would rather sell to a dwarf than a half foot anyway. We usually live in pretty close-knit neighborhoods, and people think it ruins the neighborhood to have us move in. That’s part of why we all tend to live in the same area; we go out of our way to buy and sell from each other, because none of us can compete financially with longer lived races, and tall men usually won’t sell to us. Add on to that the cost of getting pretty much everything made custom–half foot sized clothes and furnishings usually cost more–and you get the picture.” Chilchuck seemed to realize he’d started to lecture, and visibly cut himself off. “So, yeah, I’m pushy about money. You could stand to be a little pushier about it yourself. But no one should have to go through getting attacked by a monster and then wake up a few months later penniless, without even a revival fee. It sucks to get revived into debt. At least half of them have probably lost their homes and all their belongings to their landlords in the interim, and it’s not like their parties will pay them backwages for time spent in the dungeon. The Island Lord’s no help at all to half foots, he can barely stand dwarves, you should have heard Namari go off about the guy.”
“So what are you going to do? If you’re giving them your savings…”
“I’m not giving them all of it, jeez. I’m not crazy. It should be just enough to keep them afloat and fed until they can find new jobs. I’ll just have to push my retirement back further, that’s all.”
Laios was thrown again. “Oh. Uh. You’re retiring?”
“After this mess? Yeah. Soon as I can. It’s been my plan for a while, and after this,” Chilchuck waved at their surroundings. “I’ll be more than happy to hang up my picks. Dungeon diving pays real well, especially going to the lower levels, but there are plenty of ways to make a living with a picklock’s skills without the constant near-death experiences.”
“Oh. That makes sense.” Laios couldn’t help but feel a pang at the idea of Chilchuck leaving the party. He liked Chilchuck. He didn’t play mind games like most people Laios had met–on a number of occasions he’d been the one to pull Laios aside to tell him that someone else was trying to manipulate him, actually–and he was easy to get along with. And for all Chilchuck’s crankiness, he was pretty sure Chilchuck liked him. Why else would he take the time to explain things like this to him, time and time again?
But this whole thing with the shrikerat…wasn’t it kind of Laios’s fault?
We’ll keep you safe, you don’t have anything to worry about.
How many seconds had passed after he’d said that, before Chilchuck had gotten grabbed? Sixty? Maybe? What a dumb thing to do, assure Chilchuck he’d keep him safe and then walk away from him. Laios knew damn well that shrikerats hunted in pairs, he’d just…in the moment, in his enthusiasm for seeing a rare monster for the first time, he’d forgotten. And Chilchuck had paid badly for it, and Laios had talked him into going along and had promised to keep him safe, and he had let him down.
“You’re making that face again.”
Laios blinked. “What face?”
“The sad face. I’m not retiring because I got attacked by a monster, Laios, I’m retiring because I’m at retirement age. Or not quite, but getting there. Like I said, I’ve been planning it for a while. There’s plenty of talented picklocks in the guild, I can introduce you to some of them if you’d like.” He gave Laios a tired look. “You’re gonna have to knock some sense into Senshi, though. Most adventurers really don’t like being called ‘kid.’”
Laios wasn’t quite sure he believed him about his reason for retiring.
He’d been relieved that he could be helpful, back when they’d found Chilchuck near the shrikerat nest. He’d jumped at the chance to be included in Marcille’s spell, because it felt like a tiny step towards fixing his mistakes that had gotten Chilchuck into this mess. But that had backfired. Chilchuck had been mad about that. And Laios guessed he understood his reasoning, but the way he’d talked about it had bothered him.
I’m just stressed out you all put yourselves at risk like that for no reason.
That ‘for no reason’ kept prodding at the back of Laios’s mind like a pebble in his boot. They’d had a reason. Laios had been around for the hot oil trap incident, he’d seen Chilchuck die before, and die badly. Chilchuck’s job was dangerous, picklocks had a high mortality rate even with all the protections Chilchuck’s contract gave him. There was just a high baseline level of risk for someone whose job involved disarming bombs and traps in varying states of disrepair. Even back when they’d been casual coworkers, it had bothered Laios to see Chilchuck take those hits for the party when something went wrong. It was rare–Chilchuck really was excellent at his job–but unavoidable for it to happen sometimes. But now that they were genuinely friends, Laios couldn’t stomach the idea of letting him die again if it could be avoided. Laios didn’t think he was the only one who absolutely hadn’t been thinking of strategy when they found Chilchuck half-conscious and bleeding in that cave. All he’d been thinking about, all that mattered, was keeping Chilchuck alive. Chilchuck had been the reason. It hadn’t been easy to see him like that, and they’d all simply been desperate to help.
…But how could he tell him that without simply annoying him about Marcille’s spell all over again?
“Hey, Chil?”
“Yeah.”
“I…have some savings put away too, if you wanted to retire sooner. So you wouldn’t have to do this again.”
Chilchuck looked up at him, exasperated but not surprised. “Y’know, this is why I worry about you. Well, one of the reasons.”
“What?”
Chilchuck stopped in the hallway, cutting Laios off and forcing him to stop too. “Stanner Pylo’s leg healed just fine. He only uses that crutch when he comes to ask you for money, and he’s doing just fine for himself, he’s started a new job as a dock worker. Y’know, lifting and carrying heavy shit all the time. I overheard him joking about you last time we were on the surface, talking about how gullible he thinks you are. You’re not a bad leader, Laios, and you’re smart, at least where monsters are concerned. But you know reading people is one of your weak points, and when it’s someone you feel responsible for, you aren’t careful enough to protect yourself from them. He’s scamming you, and from the way he was talking, I’m not sure he’s the only one.” He fixed Laios with a look. “What I do with my money is my decision, and I’m not going to take your money to make up for what I’ve decided to do with my own, even if it sets me back a bit.”
Laios felt like he’d been punched. “Stanner–why didn’t you say anything?”
“Because it wasn’t any of my business, and I was pretty sure you’d err on the side of generosity anyway. Hell, maybe his knees really do hurt and he’s just got a weird way of showing it. It’s really none of my damn business. Maybe he really does need the money. It was the shit-talking that caught my attention though, not his damn leg. Whether he needs the money or not, he’s telling people he’s scamming you. Anyway, Stanner and I aren’t on good terms. Mention it to him, and he’ll probably tell you I’ve just got it out for him. There might’ve been some threats tossed around when he noticed me listening in, along the lines of what he’d do if he heard I’d told you about his leg.” He rubbed his neck. “He can really move, for a big guy.”
He added that last bit as an afterthought, but Laios felt his teeth grind together. Stanner was even taller than he was, and maybe he’d given up the adventuring life, but his preferred weapon was an axe that even Namari was impressed by. He could picture the man cornering Chilchuck in town to threaten him a little too easily. “Really.”
“Hey.” Chilchuck snapped his fingers, breaking him out of that mental image. “We’re talking about you, remember? I can take care of myself. Stanner Pylo’s the least of my problems. I just want you to be more careful, that’s all. What if I’d said yes to taking your money, huh? We’re eating monsters because we couldn’t afford to buy food for the trip down here. That’s not the move of someone with a lot of gold to spare, and don’t forget, we’re not on commission for this trip. Next time we try to kit up to come down here–and it’ll have to be pretty soon after we reach the surface, or you’ll run out of gold entirely–we’ll be doing it with even less money than you had to prepare for this trip. Turns out monster cuisine isn’t that bad, but unless I’m mistaken the reason you keep picking up swords from living armor is because you can’t afford a dwarf-made one like Namari always gets on your case about. So what happens if I screw up an acid trap and wreck your armor, huh? Can you afford to replace it? Just worry about yourself first, so I don’t have to so much.”
I just want you to be more careful. There it was again, the same thing Chilchuck had said when he’d found out about Marcille’s spell. Like it was ok for Chilchuck to worry about Laios’s finances, but that Laios shouldn’t worry about Chilchuck’s safety from an axe-wielding tall man with a grudge. Like Chilchuck could worry about them all being caught up in the risk of Marcille’s spell, but that they shouldn’t be so concerned about him nearly dying from a monster attack. Like Chilchuck could be worried he was going to find his daughter’s body, and keep that information to himself, as though no one should be there for him through that. And–Chilchuck was right, Laios did know that reading people was a weak point of his. But one thing he was good at was working out patterns. How many times had he seen Chilchuck run into a fight to try to get a downed party member to safety? It was just about the only time you’d ever see Chilchuck in battle. Laios had been coming to help when Marcille had lost her grip on the shrikerat, when it had taken Chilchuck. He’d seen Chilchuck kick her away when it became clear how much damage the shrikerat was doing to her with that sharp beak. And maybe Chilchuck had never come right out and said he cared about them, but Laios was painfully familiar with how it looked and felt when someone was trying to act as a mentor but really didn’t give a shit. He’d had his own father to demonstrate that. Chilchuck, on the other hand, almost never yelled at them except when he was worried. Chilchuck had grown-up children, and was constantly lecturing Laios on how to better manage his leadership role and finances, but he never undermined him. And other parties had let Chilchuck down–he’d been used as bait, for gods sake–but their party hadn’t done that. They’d helped, and put themselves at risk to do it, and Chilchuck had nearly torn their heads off for it. Because he’d been worried for them. Just like he’d been worried for his daughter. Just like he tended to worry about other half foots–hell, wasn’t that why he’d told Laios he started the union to begin with?
It must really suck, Laios realized, to have that much protective instinct, but to be so poorly suited to fighting, and to have such an uphill battle to be taken seriously.
Chilchuck was still waiting for an answer, he realized. Laios had been quiet too long, and had forgotten exactly what it was he was supposed to be answering. “Uh…”
Chilchuck sighed as if he hadn’t expected anything different, turning back to the hallway. There were bags under his eyes, and Laios felt a pang of guilt realizing he was partly responsible for putting them there–his carelessness about the shrikerat, his failure to understand Chilchuck’s worry–hell, even the stupid thing with the fishmen. Chilchuck had said it didn’t feel right, and Laios had taken him at his word–he just hadn’t considered that there might be something to those feelings, and had subsequently walked all over them. And just moments after Chilchuck had been charmed by sirens–something else Laios hadn’t realized he had baggage with. In retrospect though, it made sense that Chilchuck was borderline fanatic on the rule about demi-humans being off-limits, knowing there were places and people who would put him and his family in that category as well.
And all that while Chilchuck let Laios call him by his first name. He’d mentioned that theirs was the best working relationship he’d ever had with a tall man. That was apparently a deeply low bar, and Laios felt it on his shoulders like a weight. He didn’t have a single clue how to make all of this up to him. Or if he… could make it up to him? Was there something Laios could do to make this right?
“Hey, Chilchuck?”
“Yeah.”
Laios hesitated. “I’m…really sorry we worried you. But I’m glad you’re ok.”
Chilchuck looked up at him again, seemingly surprised by the apology. Or maybe surprised that it was unprompted–it wasn’t like Laios had never apologized to him before. After a moment of studying Laios’s face, he sighed and dropped his head, scrubbing a hand through his hair.
“It’s fine. Sorry I blew up on you guys. And thanks for coming to help me with the rest of it.” Laios didn’t have to ask to know that ‘the rest of it’ was a polite attempt to sidestep the brutal reality of what the two of them had spent the morning doing. No wonder Chilchuck had been so willing to talk on different topics on the way back. Critiquing the inequality of the real estate market and bashing Laios’s finances had probably been a bit of a refreshing distraction, after…that.
“Don’t mention it. And…Chil? When we, uh, get back to the surface, first round’s on me.”
It earned him a startled huff of a laugh, and Chilchuck smacked him in the side of the leg. “What did I just say about money?”
Laios rubbed his chin, relieved that the tension seemed to have broken. “Mm, if I understood you right, there was something about other people not being responsible for what you decide to do with your money, even if what you decide to do with it sets you back a bit?”
Chilchuck made a face. “Ha-ha. Smartass. Fine, if it gets me free beer, you won’t hear me complaining.”
“...At least not about that?”
Chilchuck managed an actual smile at that. “Take it where you can get it, Laios.”
Laios hesitated. He was reluctant to break their banter, but there was still something he wanted to say. “Also…thanks. For telling me all of that.”
“Don’t mention it.” Chilchuck echoed Laios’s words from moments before back at him, and after several seconds, looked up, fixing him with a look. “Just so you know, my rate for life advice is double my normal rates.” Laios blinked, and Chilchuck rolled his eyes, looking fond. “I’m joking, Laios. But it better be good beer.”
Laios felt himself match Chilchuck’s smile. “Yeah. Don’t worry, it will be.”