"Exactly." The young woman nodded eagerly at me. She smiled as she placed a hand on my shoulder. "That’s why you can trust us. Trust me."
I glanced up at her and met her gaze. I held it for just a second, before replying.
"Nice try, but I’m not paying you until tomorrow."
"Oh well, it was worth a shot." Lisa stood back up and shrugged.
I watched her as she began to make her way out of the room, before calling out to her.
"So was that all a lie?" I narrowed my eyes.
"No," she said. "I didn’t make any of that up. It’s all the truth, but I would feel better if I knew I had some of my payment with me right now instead of tomorrow. I guess I’ll just have to wait."
Slowly, I lowered my hand to the coin pouch at my side; Lisa paused, noticing the subtle movement. Then I let my hands droop to my sides.
"Sorry. You’ll indeed have to wait."
She sighed. "Oh well. As long as I’m paid by morning."
"That’s only if we leave in the morning," I stated.
Lisa just nodded nonchalantly. "Right, right. Well, I’ll have to head off to bed. Goodnight, Aria."
With that, she closed the door behind her and I was left alone once again. The door slowly creaked back open due to the broken lock and I just watched with narrowed eyes as her shadow disappeared in the hallway.
I had almost wanted to pay her; it only made sense for me to give her what she wanted to ensure she did not betray us. But gold only bought so much loyalty: if I were too liberal in my spending, it could be taken as a form of naivete. I had to ensure that these smugglers were both disincentivized from betraying me as well as discouraged from exploiting me— plus, I did not fully trust her. The way she barged in… was suspicious, to say the least.
So I put my foot down instead of giving her what she wanted.
I was not sure if that was the best thing to do here, but I had to do it. It might backfire or it might not. All that was left was for me to sleep and see how things went tomorrow.
Hopefully, it would be smooth sailing from here.
Chapter 25: Pursued
I watched as the city of Luke slowly disappeared into the horizon; I held firm to the wooden side of the ship as it rocked with the waves, keeping myself from losing balance and falling over.
We continued to sail away from the Capital city of Laxis until it was nothing more than a speck in the distance. The strong but steady tides of the ocean took over, and I found myself walking through the deck of the ship with very little difficulty.
Lisa saw me approach and broke off from the Captain of the ship. She called Jack over as the grouchy man stepped up in front of her and took the lead to meet me.
"Here," I said, handing over the pouch of gold coins. "This is the first half of the payment."
Jack grunted in affirmation. "Good." He tossed it back to Lisa. "You and your friend better have the second payment ready once we reach Taw. I’m not going to wait around that damned country for you to scrape up whatever gold you owe us."
"There’s no need to worry about that— you’ve already seen the gold, haven’t you?" I cocked my head to the side.
"No. We’ve only seen the tip of it. You could’ve easily given the appearance of a bag full of gold coins when it’s gold stacked on top of bronze and silver. I won’t believe it till every single coin is fully accounted for."
I gestured at the coin pouch I just gave him. "So why aren’t you checking that?"
"Because," Lisa started, cutting off her companion, "I’ll take care of it." She nodded at him with a smile, and he simply accepted it.
"You heard her. She’s my partner, and she’s trustworthy. She hasn’t given me any reason to believe otherwise."
"Likewise for me," Lisa agreed. "I trust his judgement, and he trusts my attention to detail. That’s why we work so well."
"That’s good," I remarked. "I hope to see you two in action when you bring Gennady and I safely to Jahar’taw."
Lisa stepped forward, and placed a hand on my shoulder reassuringly. "We’ve got the first half of our payment, so we’ll make sure you get to the Taw Kingdom. Trust me," she said.
I hesitated, eyeing her companion standing behind her with his arms folded. Slowly, I lifted her hand off my shoulder. "I’ll trust that my gold is convincing enough for you to actually do the job."
She shrugged. "Same thing."
I didn’t respond to that. Lisa returned to discussing something with the Captain as Jack took off to do his own thing. I took a cursory glance around the ship— there were about a dozen sailors going about their duties, although some were clearly more free than others.
I stood there for a moment, taking a final look back at the direction we came from, and saw no city; we were in dangerous waters now. There could be Monster attacks coming from down below, or pirate raids coming from anywhere around us. I was nervous.
I had traversed through the Free Lands alone as a kid facing little trouble; in those months, I had only run into a handful of incidents which ended in unfortunate bloodshed. Those experiences had taught me how to take care of myself while in a city, even if it was a poor one with a high crime rate. However, here out in
