A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor

Chapter 29: A Meeting With The Devil - Part 5

People talked animatedly in front of stalls, as buyers attempted to haggle their way down to lower prices and merchants made shows of walking away and cancelling the deal entirely when they went too low.

It was through that crowd of people that Beam had to force his way through. He headed to the big white three-story house at the other side of the square, the one where the local lord's son often stayed, and from there he took a left, arriving at the door of Greeves' home almost instantly.

It too was a three-story house, though it wasn't whitewashed like the noble's. Instead, it was left in its raw stone, with the wooden support beams that ran through the brickwork stained a dark brown by varnish.

The shutters of the ground-floor windows were open as Beam approached, and though he couldn't see anyone inside the rooms, he could hear loud shouting from deep inside the house.

"DAMN IT! IF YOU CAN'T PAY, YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE TAKEN ON THE LOAN IN THE FIRST PLACE THEN, SHOULD YOU?" Came the loud shout, followed by the sound of flesh being struck. Beam gulped, recognizing the voice belonging to Greeves.

"Just my luck…" he cursed to himself. It seemed the already foul-tempered merchant was in an even worse mood than normal. That did nothing to calm Beam down. His anxiety shot up, his hands began to sweat, his head felt light, and he battled the overwhelming urge to run away.

He sought something to cling to as he rampaged through his mind, needing any reason that he could not to just turn away now. He recalled one of the first things that Dominus had told him upon starting his teaching. "Everything for a knight should be a lesson," he'd said, and Beam repeated that to himself.

"Nghh!" For a few moments, the middle-aged man lay with blood streaming from his balding head, looking like he was moments away from death.

But Greeves came out after him, chasing him away. "Go on now!" He shouted, kicking the man in the stomach again for good measure. "Don't you be getting blood on my nice pavement, do you hear?"

The man groaned again, before somehow managing to scramble to his feet, staggering away drunkenly, clutching his stomach.

Only a few townspeople looked his way. They were used to Greeves' antics. And, because he was still operating within the confines of the law, none of them moved to stop him. It seemed likely to Beam that they even were on Greeves' side, thinking that the man he'd just beaten up probably deserved it, for trying to cheat money in some way or another.

Greeves watched him go, his hands on his sides and the gold threads of his dressing cloak wide open, exposing his hairy chest and somewhat out-of-shape belly.

"The fuck are you looking at?" He turned, sensing Beam's gaze, before holding up a hand. "Naw, wait, let me guess, mm…" he put a hand on the thick stubble of his rounded chin, making a show of thought, but all the while, his eyes never left Beam and his thick black eyebrows were left arching menacingly.

"Ah!" He said, clicking a ringed finger together with his thumb, before pointing at Beam with a hairy hand. "You're that little fuck that burned my house down in the woods, aren't you? What's your name again, lad? Rock? Boulder? Something stupid like that, I remember."

"Beam," Beam offered, his anxiousness forgotten, as he felt anger begin to rise in waves in his stomach.

"You alright out here, boss?" Judas chose that moment to come to the door, checking that his employer hadn't simply left him behind and gotten into a dangerous situation. He soon noticed Beam as well. "Ah! On your feet already, lad? I could have sworn I'd put you out for at least a week. Sturdy little thing, ain't ya?"

"Shut up," Greeves said, motioning to Judas with a hand for quiet.

Judas didn't hear him. "What was that boss?" He asked, his two lackeys appearing behind him.

"I SAID: SHUT. THE FUCK. UP." Greeves shouted, before flashing them a smile in an unhinged and unsettling sort of way, before motioning to Beam as though by way of an apology. "I'm trying to talk to a customer, you see? Why don't you fine men just stand there and mm… Keep your fucking mouths shut?"

"Yes, boss," Judas said. It felt strange to Beam to see a man of his size act so timidly. He couldn't even fit through the door frame that he was standing in front of without ducking his head, and he had mountains of muscle on top of that. It was a wonder he bowed to any man.

"Now… Where were we?" Greeves asked, threading his fingers together, making a show of exposing all his rings – he had nearly one for every finger. Silver, gold and jewels.

Looking at him now, as he swaggered about, Beam suddenly found him less intimidating. He wore wide white trousers and leather slippers on his feet as he strutted around in his golden threaded dressing gown. He looked, by Beam's estimation, frankly ridiculous.

"Ah yes," Greeves found his train of thought. "You burnt down my fucking house. You are here to pay, I presume?" He held out his meaty palm as though asking for coin.

Beam shook his head. "My possessions burned with the house. I came to negotiate."

"Negotiate?" Greeves spun the word around on his tongue. "Negotiate, is it?" He nodded again. "Negotiate? Me? With who? With some fucking digger boy, hmm? How long you been digging for, boy? Would have thought they'd have found a vein to mine by now, mm? So, digger boy, what is it? What are you offering me, hmm? You going to sell yourself into slavery? Sick of the pain? Or have you come for another beating off Judas."