Ascendance of a Bookworm (LN) - Volume Short Story-2 - Chapter 7

Otto — Winter Preparations and a Traveling Merchant’s Request

Description: A sales bonus story for Part 4 Volume 7. On the cusp of winter, Otto meets with an old friend from his days as a traveling merchant.

Author’s Note: It was fun having Otto return to the bar he used to frequent as a soldier, and the fact that Tuuli was able to bargain with him shows how much she’s grown as a leherl. I tried to touch on how traveling merchants feel about the changes to Ehrenfest’s lower city as well as Benno’s and Otto’s thoughts on Karin, which Rozemyne never had a chance to hear about.

After taking out and changing into my old clothes, I called out to my beloved wife. “Corinna, I’m goin’ out to meet someone. I’ll see you later.”

“Oh, Otto... Should you not change into something more presentable?”

“It’s an old friend.”

To me, that meant someone from my days as a traveling merchant. I said goodbye to the kids, then stepped out into the cold. A bitter wind blew down my neck.

“Whew. Sure has gotten chilly.”

I turned up the collar of my coat and got a move on. Thinking back, I’d been so busy over the summer that I’d barely had a chance to enjoy the heat. Now that the merchants from other duchies had gone home and the women of the archducal family had finished their dyeing contest, my store finally had time to breathe. Too bad it was almost time to start preparing for winter. The busy times would continue.

“Now, let’s see what Dhorme wants...”

Dhorme, the reason I was braving the cold, had done plenty to help me during my days on the road. He was a traveling merchant known to wander between Ehrenfest and Frenbeltag—a man I owed dearly for telling my parents how I’d come to marry Corinna and what I was doing with the money I’d earned. As I reached Ebbo’s bar, I thought it was the perfect opportunity to pay him back.

During my days as a soldier, I’d come here all the time with Gunther. Now, I spent so much time at the Italian restaurant, hosting the owners of other large stores, that I could never find a chance to go to any bars at all.

It was busy at Ebbo’s, but it didn’t take me long to spot Dhorme waving at me from a corner. I waved back and headed over to him.

“Ebbo,” I called. “One behelle and a sausage.”

“Well, well, well. If it ain’t the owner of that big ol’ store!” Ebbo said. “Never thought I’d see your face ’ere again.”

“Gotta admit, it’s nice to be out of those fancy clothes. Can’t stand the damn things.”

“You got that right!”

Ebbo cackled as he took the large copper from my hand and replaced it with a wooden tankard full of behelle beer. I took it straight over to Dhorme’s table.

“Heya, Dhorme. Been a while.”

“Otto! Thanks for coming. The city’s changed so damn much; doesn’t surprise me that you’ve changed too. One moment you’re a soldier, the next, someone tells me you’re running a huge store!” He let out a heavy sigh and offered me a seat.

I shot him a slight smile, sat down, and then took a hearty swig of my beer. Traveling merchants didn’t pray to Vantole when drinking together; the gods didn’t approve of our existence here.

“Still, the heck’s going on?” Dhorme complained. I could tell that he was well in his cups. “Didn’t know a city could change so much in a year. Thought I’d come to the wrong one at first. And it ain’t just how clean things are—when I tried to dump some trash, one of the soldiers came over and started roarin’ at me about it bein’ against the rules. The heck was that all about? Sheesh.”

Dhorme’s shock didn’t surprise me. I’d seen plenty of traveling merchants react the same way to Ehrenfest’s changes.

“Sure wasn’t easy to get used to,” I said. “And if we don’t keep it clean, the archduke’ll use magic to destroy the lower city.”

“You can’t be serious...”

“Why d’you think the guards were on your back? They weren’t too hard on you, since you’re an outsider, but be careful. If someone who lives here keeps breaking the rules, they can get banned from the city for good.”

Dhorme grimaced. “What a pain in the neck.”

There were plenty of downsides to the archduke paying so much attention to the lower city. A lot of older people were pretty upset about all the sudden changes, but me? I thought they made things way more exciting.

“Otto, weren’t you sayin’ this time last year that you had purveyor merchants on the way? And what’s with there being nothin’ interesting for sale? I thought there’d be somethin’, what with all the new well pumps and such.”

Purveyor merchants were big-name merchants who did their business based on decisions made during the Archduke Conference. They were the opposite of traveling merchants, who just wandered around without being registered to any duchy in particular.

“The Saint of Ehrenfest woke up and got to work. That got us some attention from other duchies, hence the purveyors. But why’d you really call me here, Dhorme? Can’t have just been for a bit of gossip.”

Dhorme didn’t need my help to sell the goods he got from other duchies; he had plenty of stores to choose from. He must have wanted to make a request that only a former traveling merchant would understand and sympathize with.

“Still quick on the uptake, eh? Glad to see it. I want a hairpin for the daughter of a town chief who looked after me last winter. She loved the hairpins I was carryin’ last year, so I promised to get ’er a red one. Problem is, haven’t seen a single one since I got here.”

This time last year, our shelves had been stocked with hairpins of all colors in preparation for the autumn coming-of-age ceremony and the winter baptisms. Now, we didn’t have a single one for sale.

“That’s because the purveyors from Klassenberg and the Sovereignty snapped ’em all up over the summer. Bought as many as they could get their hands on. Now we’re busy trying to make them all in the order they were purchased. We’re packed so tight that we might not even have time to get the girls of the city everything they wanted.”

“Welp, that ain’t good...”

“Then there’s winter handiwork. Can’t expect too much overtime when there’s prep around the corner.”

Skimping on winter preparations wasn’t an option. Well, not unless you had a death wish. It went without saying that the hairpins would need to be put on hold; we could take our time making them when the snow picked up and trapped everyone indoors.

“Still—haven’t forgotten my days as a traveling merchant,” I said. “I get the importance of having somewhere to stay for the winter and making sure everyone there’s satisfied.”

For traveling merchants, who had nothing but their wagons to their names, securing a place to stay for the winter was a matter of life and death. They also had to make their lodgings comfortable for everyone, though that fact wasn’t quite as obvious. Being holed up for a long time made it easy for tensions to rise, and people sure loved to vent their frustrations on the merchants they were hosting. Dhorme’s winters would depend on whether he could win over the town chief’s daughter.

“Knew you’d understand, Otto.”

“The problem is, our hands are full, and there aren’t many outside our employ who know how to make a high-quality hairpin.”

The lady Dhorme was trying to impress wouldn’t be satisfied with a practice hairpin made by a beginner. She was the chief’s daughter, one of the most important people in her town; whatever she received would need to be good enough for a rich girl. Getting a hairpin of that quality was easier said than done when our experienced craftspeople were all too busy to help.

In my head, I went through every rich girl who’d ordered from us. My involvement in the store meant I clearly remembered each sale, but our workers who had made the hairpins had too much on their plates.

Has anyone who can make those hairpins not been formally registered...? Myne and Tuuli were behind the first ones, so... Ah!

Out of the blue, I remembered the girls’ mother, Effa. Not only had she been involved with Myne’s hairpins from the start, but she’d also helped Tuuli to make hairpins for Freida of the Othmar Company’s and Lady Rozemyne’s baptisms. She was exactly who Dhorme needed... but would she really have the time? Lady Rozemyne had ordered some of Effa’s cloth after the dyeing contest, and the needs of the archduke’s daughter surely took priority over those of this other woman.

“One—and only one—person comes to mind,” I said. “But don’t get your hopes up. She might be too busy.”

“I’ll take what I can get. Please.”

“There’s gonna be a huge urgency fee, mind you. Especially with winter prep right around the corner.”

“Got it.”

I accepted the fee from Dhorme, then returned to the Gilberta Company. I would contact Effa through her daughter Tuuli, an apprentice leherl at our store.

“So yeah, that’s the situation,” I said. “Would be a big help if you could ask your mom for me.”

Tuuli looked up at me in thought—I’d just brought her to my office—then smiled. “Sure, I don’t mind. She finished dyeing the cloth and delivered it to the workshop, so I don’t imagine she’s too busy at the moment. And the extra-large urgency fee is sure to win her round. In return, however, I need more maximal-quality thread to be added to our next order.”

“Er, Tuuli... I don’t quite get it. Why the extra thread...?”

Tuuli had never tried to bargain with me before. I chewed over her request, feeling a little taken aback. We already had thread to match Lady Rozemyne’s divine colors; was that not enough? To be honest, I wasn’t sure I could get behind ordering maximal-quality thread we didn’t have immediate plans to use.

“Well, this is just my instinct, but I think we’re going to receive another major order out of nowhere this year. We should get the thread now, when it’s easiest to acquire, so we aren’t caught short later. Sure, we have enough colors that suit Lady Rozemyne’s hair, but what if an order comes in for someone else?”

“We prepared thread for every female member of the archducal family. Are you telling me you want more in case some unknown person places an order we have no reason to expect?”

Tuuli nodded, her eyes completely serious. “It sounds unreasonable, but that’s why I’m proposing it as part of an exchange. I really do have a bad feeling about this, which is why I’m working so hard to finish Lady Rozemyne’s hairpin as soon as I can.”

As crazy as her request sounded, Tuuli really had put a lot of thought into it. I couldn’t deny how much she’d grown. It was hard to believe that just a year ago, she’d trembled in fear when that order from the royal family came through.

Seeing this young woman debut her merchant side was funny enough that I agreed to her deal. There was nobody else I could turn to, in any case.

“Alright,” I said. “I’ll start looking for the thread you want.”

“Thank you.”

A day later, Tuuli returned with the good news, so I took her out to look for the thread she’d requested. I could have ordered it without her, but her knowledge of the luster, thickness, and whatnot that appealed to royals most couldn’t be beat.

“We have barely any colors outside of those that suit Lady Rozemyne and Lady Florencia,” Tuuli said. “That’s what we’re here to remedy.”

For obvious reasons, we’d only invested in thread we were guaranteed to make money from. Lady Rozemyne purchased hairpins every season, so there were no problems there, and the thread we used to make accessories for Lady Florencia could also be used for Lady Charlotte, who had almost the same hair color. We wouldn’t have that same security when ordering for customers who were, for all intents and purposes, imaginary.

“Hmm...” I muttered. “In an ideal world, we’d get a wide enough variety to make hairpins for anyone who might ask, but we don’t want to waste too much money on materials we can’t repurpose for Lady Rozemyne. Get five colors at most, okay? We can’t go too crazy here.”

Tuuli hummed as she looked over the shop’s wares. The thread nobles could use depended on their status; no matter how rich they were, there were boundaries they simply couldn’t cross.

“Worse comes to worst, what if Lady Rozemyne shows the hairpins to her friends from other duchies and markets them as having been sold to the royal family?” Tuuli mused aloud.

“It’s a shame, but I doubt the members of top-ranking archducal families would ever buy ready-made accessories. Lady Rozemyne’s the only one who’d purchase a hairpin just because you made it.”

I really couldn’t imagine nobles of such high status touching hairpins that weren’t made specially for them, especially when people would compare them to royalty. Even when Lady Rozemyne had given hair ornaments to her fellow students to make an impression at the Royal Academy, she had ordered each one with the recipient’s hair color and status in mind. Anyone buying hairpins made with maximal-quality thread would want the color and design to be to their exact preference.

“Still, not having enough would cause us just as much trouble as having too much. Remember how hard it was last winter when— Ah! Over there!” Tuuli rushed to pick up a pot of tiny beads, her eyes sparkling all the while. I’d seen the store owner nudge them into her peripheral vision.

“The owner of a button store came and sold ’em to me,” he said. “He figured you could use ’em for those hairpins of yours.”

“That’s a great idea!” Tuuli exclaimed. “They’d look just like morning dew if we stuck them on our leaves and petals. Can we buy them, Master Otto?”

The store owner grinned and said that he’d even give us a small discount. He was a damn good businessman; how was I meant to refuse?

“We’ll get them this time, but I don’t wanna keep paying the intermediary fee,” I said. “Once we’re done here, we can go make a deal with the button store.”

“That’s fine with me,” the store owner chimed in. “Beads aren’t my thing. I don’t want ’em on my shelves all the time.”

Once we’d purchased our thread, we went straight to the button store to buy all sorts of beads. The owner was extra pleased to have our business.

“There were so many cute things in there. Maybe I could make even better hairpins by matching little buttons and metal accessories...?” Tuuli murmured, clearly in a great mood. I didn’t know enough about designing hairpins to add to the conversation, so I just looked around instead.

“Huh? Is that... Benno and Karin?”

We’d just entered the north side of town from the central plaza when I saw them head down a side road. My eyes couldn’t have deceived me; those brownish-red tresses must have belonged to Karin. Not wanting to miss my chance to see something I could tease Benno about, I quickly followed them down the street.

As I got a closer look at the two people ahead of us, I made a silent note that they really were Benno and Karin. I couldn’t tell what they were up to—maybe preparing for the winter or just taking a tour of the city—but they were pointing all over and chatting about something. Time must have brought them together because they looked much closer than when they’d first met at the Merchant’s Guild.

“Hmm... You know, those two make a surprisingly good match,” I said. “Benno should quit grumbling about interduchy relations and start thinking about marrying her. Don’t you think?”

“She’s way too young for him. I mean, she isn’t that much older than me. I don’t think Mr. Benno would pick her.”

I seemed to remember Karin saying she was sixteen. She was a distinctive beauty with blue eyes and auburn hair. Tuuli was three years younger at thirteen, but she’d grown so much and acted so maturely that anyone would assume the two girls were the same age. Even so, I could tell at a glance that Benno was far more comfortable speaking with Karin.

Is that because she’s technically of age? Maybe knowing Tuuli from a young age made Benno feel more like her guardian than anything else.

“Well, I agree that Benno won’t choose her,” I said. “He’s still in love with another woman—though I really do think he should marry someone else.”

“Wait, what? Mr. Benno loves someone?” Tuuli asked with widening eyes.

“You didn’t know? Well, I guess I only heard it from Corinna.”

It was an old story—not one I’d been around to witness—but I told Tuuli all about Benno’s late girlfriend, Liz. We arrived back at the Gilberta Company before either of us knew it.

Effa finished Dhorme’s hairpin much sooner than I’d expected. It didn’t have any tiny flowers hanging from it, but the large petals resembled those worn by Lady Rozemyne. I wrote on a small piece of card that the ornament had come from one of the women working for the archduke’s daughter, then gave it and the hairpin to my old friend. He wouldn’t need to worry about his winter plans any longer.

I was glad to have done a good deed, but Benno must’ve felt otherwise; he stormed toward me with a grimace, ready to launch into a truly fierce lecture. He asked my kids to give us some space—for a work-related discussion, he said—and urged them out of the room. I would need to thank him for letting me save some face as their father.

Corinna came and poured me some tea, though the air was too tense for me to enjoy it.

“I don’t mind you keeping friends from your days on the road, but be more careful with what you do for them,” Benno said sharply. “We told some of our other customers that we’re too busy to take their orders; what would they think about all this? People are paying close attention to your store, so start putting our customers in the city first.”

Benno was right, but my heart just didn’t agree. “Is it not more important to help someone avoid disaster? Our customers here might want hairpins, but their lives don’t hinge on them getting one. I guess, deep down, I’ve still got the mind of a traveling merchant...”

“That’s of no concern to me or anyone. People see actions, not thoughts, so shape up and stop being conspicuous. And while we’re here, stop using Tuuli to reach her family. I doubt anyone will say anything, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.”

Effa had a lot of eyes on her now that she’d won the dyeing contest and become Lady Rozemyne’s personal dyer. Benno didn’t want any bad rumors to come from her helping me out, not to mention the risk that someone might question her connection to Lady Rozemyne.

“Alright. I’ll take more care going forward,” I said. “Now, if you’re done with your lecture... I saw you two.”

Benno’s eyes narrowed in response.

“You and Karin, I mean. You two seem pretty close now. Imagine how good it’d be for business if you went ahead and got married already.”

“Excuse me? We were shopping. Mark shooed us out so he could finish all the work we can’t have her knowing about.”

On a previous occasion, Karin had apparently been sent out with an apprentice. The two had gotten separated, so Karin had returned to the shop earlier than expected, causing quite a stir. Benno didn’t know if she’d genuinely lost her guide or if she’d run away from them on purpose, but he’d taken to accompanying her ever since.

“I get that we need to prevent leaks, but it’s still a real pain in the neck,” Benno groused, crossing his arms in frustration. “Mark’s better than me at directing all the apprentices, so I’ve been stuck babysitting.”

“Look,” I said, my eyebrows drawn into a frown, “I get that you don’t wanna look too favorably on Karin when this whole thing’s a plot to get you married, but I still feel bad for her. She’s in a real tough spot here. Can’t you be a little nicer to her?”

Karin had grown up in a major store in the highest-ranking duchy in the country. Yet here she was, stuck in a backwater duchy with a man nearly old enough to be her father just because Ehrenfest had gotten a bit of attention recently. To make matters worse, the merchant she was stuck with had turned her down to her face.

“Sure, Karin’s father sounds real pushy and arrogant, but that’s not his daughter’s fault. She hasn’t done anything to the Plantin Company. In fact, she tried to go home, but you told her not to, since you were worried about her dying on the road. I think she’s done pretty well here for a girl everyone’s on guard against. Have you ever thought about how she feels?”

A rich daughter of a major store was being forced to spend an entire year as a live-in lehange. If she went back to Klassenberg next summer, she’d surely be mocked for getting turned down and treated as used goods for having stayed in Ehrenfest. I could easily envision her father shouting at her for not being useful.

On top of everything else, I was well aware of Karin’s financial circumstances. I’d dealt with her personally when she’d tried to sell all the spare clothes and accessories she had to get enough money to catch up to her father’s boat. I doubted she’d make it through winter without being in debt to Ehrenfest’s merchants.

“It might not seem like a big deal, but that’s only because Karin’s so stronghearted,” I said. “Someone less hardy might have taken her own life to escape what she’s going through here.”

“Yeah, I get that...”

“Then—”

“But I don’t intend to make compromises. Karin’s and my store’s situations are entirely different; I won’t marry her just out of sympathy.”

The Plantin Company had risen up to working for the archducal family through Lady Rozemyne’s support, whereas Karin’s store was old money from a top-ranking duchy. Benno thought he was at an overwhelming disadvantage when it came to keeping information secure.

“I think you could manage, Benno. You have Lady Rozemyne to—”

“Think before you speak, Otto,” Benno snapped, glaring at me. “Do you really think I can rely on Lady Rozemyne for everything? She’s fighting a tough battle to make things easier for us commoners, but her place in noble society is tenuous at best. She’s not a full-blooded member of the archducal family, remember—we have no idea how or when her position might change.”

I didn’t quite follow. It seemed to me that Lady Rozemyne was doing amazingly in the archducal family. She was engaged to the archduke’s son and seemed pretty stable to me...

“Lady Rozemyne’s situation is precarious enough already. I don’t intend to add to her burden. Not to mention, I made the decision to support her when I was still making my way in the world; I don’t have the leeway to take anyone else under my wing. My top priorities are the Plantin Company, the Gilberta Company, and my promise to Liz.”

Why’s he bringing up his promise to Liz all of a sudden? Talk about clinging to the past.

I swallowed those words before they could escape me. Benno’s dark-red eyes were too sharp for me to risk joking around.

“Otto, I won’t do anything that might put Lady Rozemyne or the archduke at a disadvantage against Klassenberg. I’ll even get rid of Karin, if necessary.”

Benno’s resolve was painfully clear, and the look in his eyes reminded me of how he’d used to be. He was radiating irritation that made it impossible to get close. I needed to calm him down, or else he’d end up losing his temper with Corinna or Renate.

“Sorry. I spoke out of turn. I thought you were being too harsh with Karin, but I see now that I’ve just made things worse.”

On that note, I finally reached for the tea Corinna had poured me. It was stone-cold, but I sipped at it nonetheless.

Benno exhaled, then picked up his own drink. “Forget it. Maybe I should ease up a little. As you said, she hasn’t done anything wrong.” The cold tea must have cooled his head.

Relieved, I set my cup down. “Alright, let’s talk about winter. Tuuli told me she predicts that...”

I went on to explain her premonition. Benno grimaced, instructed me to prepare as much as I could, and then started thinking about the Plantin Company’s response. He was back to normal.