Edmund Humes

After eating and drinking to their heart's content. Well, it was mostly William doing the eating and a bit of drinking while Edmund just sat there and barely touched his plates.

William finally decided to start the conversation that he needed to have with the man in front of him, addressing the big elephant in the room that was what their plans are going to be moving forward.

William had decided to keep his identity as the lord's son a secret for now, though the cat is going to come out of the bag eventually, he still preferred to roll with it this way for now.

It helped quite a bit that the 'old' William rarely came out of the castle district and mostly spent his days indoors, save for a few occasions at which he ventured out to the city and even rarer beyond it.

He was frankly unremarkable as a person; this was probably why lord Ulric pretty much considered the fact that his eldest son Marek was his only option to nurture as a successor, despite his many inadequacies.

William even went to the extent of telling the guards to stay disguised even after the transaction was done, so right after William and his new 'acquisition' entered the tavern, the guards did the same and sat a few tables away from the duo, they ordered drinks and started talking while keeping an eye on the young lord.

"So why do you think the young lord bought this merchant's debt?" asked one of the guards, he had a strong build as well as thick eyebrows.

"Who knows maybe he took pity on him, he is even treating him to a meal. The young lord doesn't come out of the castle much, so he probably does not know how hard life is and how common this practice is around the city, if not probably all over the kingdom." Answered Lancelot.

"Morton, Lancelot, the lord's affairs are none of our business. All you need to focus on is keeping him safe from harm, so keep the drinking to a minimum and look out for any potential dangers. Lord Ulric had to see his son being carried back injured and unconscious just a few days ago, if anything happens to him again, especially so soon."

Said the man with a scar on his forehead. He was the leader of this squad that has been tasked with the young lord's safety.

He did not finish his sentence leaving the rest for their imagination. The consequences of angering the lord would be not be something that they could bear.

Everyone swallowed a lump of saliva after hearing what the squad leader said.

"What a way to ruin the mood Gerald" commented Morton as he turned his head from the table to keep a lookout for any danger, as did everyone else. Except for Gerald who smiled as he took a sip of his drink, satisfied that he got his squad back into high alert mode.

Back to William's table, the two were just about to have their conversation.

"So, Edmund, would you mind telling me a little bit about yourself?" asked William.

Edmund looked carefully and a bit suspiciously at William and replied "such as?"

"You know, nothing too serious, are you a native of Landow? Did you grow up here? How about your family? What kind of business are you into and why did you go take a loan from the debtors? Let's start from here I guess." Replied William with a slight smile on his face.

"Where do I start, I guess I should answer your first question. I am not a native of Landow, I was born in the capital and spent my childhood there, eventually, we had to move here for better opportunities since the competition there was quite fierce and it was hard for a small merchant family like ours to survive much longer."

Edmund paused and took a sip of his drink before he continued.

"We sold all our possessions and moved here a few years ago, unfortunately, we were attacked by pirates and lost most of our wealth in the sea, so once we arrived it was pretty hard for us to start anew, my father's health quickly deteriorated and he died last year. Now It rests upon my shoulders to take care of my family and secure our livelihood."

Once more Edmund pause took another sip of his drink before he continued, this time the pause was longer as if what he was saying was bringing back some bad memories.

"Recently I was able to negotiate a deal with a lord upstream of the Fabious river; his village was at the base of the dragon-tooth mountain rage in the north. I was going to import ore from his territory, manufacture them into farming and mining tools and resell them right back to him for quite a nice profit. As you know it's not easy to find tools for remote villages, they often don't have skilled enough smiths for anything more than the simplest of tools. I take care of all the middle man work and tool manufacturing and he gets the tools he needs for a reasonable price and in the quantity he desires."

William just sat there and listened, there was a possibility that Edmund may be lying, but he decided to just listen for now instead of trying to poke holes in his story to probe for any inconsistencies.

"For this kind of deal, I needed capital and a lot of it. The only option I had was to get a loan, it took a lot of convincing but eventually, I was able to persuade them and I got the money. Yet fate is a cruel mistress, even as everything was set, a group of bandits robbed the shipment, they didn't even take the ores, I heard they took anything of value they can carry and set fire to the riverboats. The rest I believe you are already aware of, I couldn't pay the debt and now it belongs to you."

In the end, Edmund became really melancholic, from his voice end expression his emotions seemed pretty genuine to William. He even felt sorry for him.

"Life is as such unfortunately, for every great success, there are hundreds if not thousands of failures. Especially in this period of time, there is no safety net, hard work and talent can only take a person so far, in the end, you lacked the sprinkle of luck needed to bring the recipe of success together."

William thought to himself and sighed.

"It is unfortunate that this happened to you Edmund, sometimes bad luck can ruin a person's life. Though Don't worry too much, from what you told me I can already sense that you are a hard-working and insightful person, even if you fail and stumble, as long as you are willing to stand back up there will always be away." William said as he patted Edmund on the shoulder.

"How? My life is over, I can't pay back my dept now, nor can I earn enough to sustain my family." Edmund replied, from his voice he seemed to be in despair.

"Well, it's all about opportunity, and I am about to present to you one that will skyrocket you from a nobody to a potentially filthy rich big-time merchant. As for your dept, well… let's say that 50 gold coins would be nothing but cheap change in your pockets. Of course, this is based on the fact that you follow my instructions, I give the ideas and you, my new friend shall implement them based on your business know-how and your market connections."

William took a pause to allow Edmund to digest what he had just said, then continued "So what say you?" asked William with a big smile.

Edmund thought about it for a while, he didn't really have a choice anyways but at least he appreciated the fact that William asked nonetheless.

He couldn't figure out if this 'offer' that was too go to be true could ever be realized, yet as he thought about his family back home and the expectations riding on his shoulders, he hesitated no longer and firmly responded.

"I would do my best to help you in any way I can"

William smiled widely and said "Good enough for me Edmund, welcome to the team" as he extended his hand and firmly shook Edmund's.

This was going to be the start of prosperous cooperation, but most importantly a long and close-knitted friendship.