A Deal at the Hilshor Bazaar

“Those beautiful golden eyes!” The sights and sounds of the Hilshor bazaar came in such quantity, in such depth and vibrancy that it should have been an impossible task for any particular one of them to be seen or heard apart from all the rest. Only a child or stranger could stumble through the overcrowded alleyways and even notice a man swallowing a sword just a pace to their right, or pay any attention at all to a twirler of flames, dancing and juggling just an arm length away. A lifetime of staring into the sun would dull any eye, and in such a spirit the senses of any market regular lulled into deafness once they entered the city’s bazaar. It took a cunning tongue to whip a word that could strangle and reel back an otherwise well guarded ear, yet there existed in plenty such masters of speakership, and so too existed at least one pair of ears caught entirely off balance. 

All it took was a glance and Jata knew she had made a terrible mistake. 

PINC [mf, slavery, wmaf (indian)]

Labor alone could never get you into a city, investment was the only way to build up funds like that, smart investment over time, passed down a few generations until the family had enough of a vault and a name to get past those high walls. Time and effort, and a little smarts, and even that was asking too much of the average Joe. I never really thought of myself as average though. I spent nearly the whole of my forty four years in towns, the poor man’s city, working odd jobs and trying desperately to put the little cash my father left me to work in the stock exchange. He farmed his whole life, and in that regard he succeeded in raising me above him, and it would have made him smile to know I was on my way to have his great grandchildren in one of those glass and steel towers, never having to do any real work for a day in their lives. I think he might have cried if he saw me now.