7 Vhalar 722
Early Breaks
Early Breaks
Maxine had heard many rumors regarding the start of the partnership between the Dorricks and the Kimbers. While some parties swore on the juicier renditions of blackmail and conspiracy, the more likely story appeared to be the one that dominated oral history. Fenwyn Dorrick was a struggling jewel merchant new to the trade, but young and ambitious enough that he remained steadfast against closed doors and jockeying traders with better reputation. Adam Kimber, his best friend, was just as young and industrious. More importantly, few possessed a more noble character.
Everything changed for both men when Adam's employer, dying and childless, left his mine and the mining business itself to his most trusted and deserving worker. The friends partnered quickly to advance both their businesses. When a new tunnel led to a cavern with jewels of astonishing quality was discovered, the business agreement turned exclusive and both men's wealth roared to life.
Under Fenwyn, The Dorrick name flourished and coffers overflowed with newfound prosperity. Adam had hoards of respected men from Oh'Pee pounding on his door for work and he too reaped the benefits of business with his best friend. Things changed after Fenwyn passed and his son Ed took over the Dorrick jewel trade. Ed was brutish and while he was willing to play the odds like Fenwyn, he didn't have the head to ensure his dealings panned out in the end. The Dorrick name remained robust throughout Ed's reign on the family fortune, but his impatience and greed led him to dabble in parts of society best left alone.
Tristane was happy to let Benjamin enjoy both the praise and pressure that came with taking over the business when Ed passed while he explored the military and politics, but in no way did he give up the reigns on the family wealth as the oldest child and heir.
Jimmy Kimber inherited the mine. As Maxine watched him through the window of his home, she couldn't help but note how very forgettable he looked. He had a kind appearance but there was nothing striking about the man. His features were bland and his hair a dull brown. He was a robust man, predictable from a man who made his living doing hard manual labor, but that was all that seemed outwardly notable about him. His body seemed exhausted the way it hung over the end of the couch, an arm limp over the boy child he cradled on his chest. The child was pale and sickly, and poking out from the blanket covering them she could see one of his legs was small and deformed. A crutch rested on the floor at the foot of the couch where they slept.
Edward Hunt was right...
For a man with a plethora of wealth in his grasp just underground, Jimmy looked worn. He should've lived lavishly in a large house or apartment like the Dorricks, enjoying hunting lodges, catering to politicians, and spending money in a way that brought him joy. The house he lived in was surprisingly modest. The furniture within looked of great value, but she could tell it wasn't new. Hints of generational wealth were there. Hardship was more pronounced. The circumstance was unique, but Maxine knew what a man struggling to provide for his family looked like.
Not yet but soon, Jimmy.
Max allowed her curiosity to be temporarily sated and quietly turned from the home's window. She wandered away from the dim candlelight toward the tree line. The Rusalka stayed off the main worn path, preferring to be safely tucked in the shadow of the woods paralleling instead. Before long she slipped past the sleepy shack that served as a watchman's post, disappearing into the torchlit tunnel of the small Kimber Mine.
"At least I'm not trapped in this one," Maxine lamented darkly to herself as she followed the flicker of light down below. The last time she'd been inside a mine had been Slags Deep. Down there she had wielded a pickaxe, hunting for gems and metal to pay off her arcs of incarceration with bribes rather than just time alone. It had been a worthless endeavor and she wasn't skilled in the craft enough for it to matter. She was lucky the sound alone hadn't gotten her killed the few times she tried her hand at it before learning her lesson.
It felt like she walked forever when she finally veered down a new path that looked especially well trodden. Pickaxes sat against rocky walls and buckets, troughs, and all sorts of mining tools littered her path. She followed it until the tunnel narrowed, eventually ending with a large open cavern that sparkled with as much radiance as the suns. Max slipped her skinny frame through the opening and into the center of the cavern. Her jaw fell slack and her eyes widened.
"Wow," the Rusalka awed, turning slowly in place as her eyes caught the glimmer of endless gems deeply embedded in their stone prisons. "Yeah...I'll say this explains it." Maxine hadn't seen a mass of potential wealth this impressive since the onyx cavern in Slags Deep. It was no wonder the Dorricks worked not only to keep the Kimber Mine exclusively partnered with their gem trade, but to keep Jimmy firmly dependent too. This honey pot was likely not short of historic by measure of Etzos. If not for their contracts and deals, the Kimbers could've been masters of their own destinies without the Dorricks.
Mystery solved. Now what?
Max tried to see through the wealth in front of her to focus on the mine itself. According to Edward's letter, it seemed like Kimber had been forced to keep his staffing abysmally short due to inability to pay wages. Fewer miners meant less output. Less output meant fewer gems from this vast collection were flooding the market. Max wasn't a genius, but she understood supply and demand in the most basic of sense. The financial control and restrictions placed on Kimber helped keep the gems and jewelry sold by the Dorricks scarce, which in turn helped them control the market price and their profits.
Tristane was immersed with his politics but he seemed to have used his military career, now finished, as a stepping stone. He was wholly committed to campaigning now and it was a full time devotion. Benjamin based his entire worth on whether he could keep the family business alive and prosperous, and when he was losing sight of that it was when he was gambling all the family money away into steep debt. Quinnley wasn't alive to do her spending without contribution. Outside of the fruits of this cavern in this mine, the Dorricks had no side business or large investment to fall back on. All their eggs were in one basket, and it was from this basket they dipped to follow their ambitions.
But how to break the basket?
The Rusalka frowned in thought, standing in the center of sparkling beauty of numerous gems of various sizes, colors, and qualities. She wandered slowly out of the tunnel back the way she came. Before long she found the spot in her path she'd been looking for. At the junction of the main tunnel and the tunnel to the gem cavern, a pile of wood rested against the stone along with various construction tools. She picked up a torch from the wall and held it up. It was then that she saw the stabilizing wooden blocks in place were savagely worn with insect bites, fraying from arcs of humidity and water soaking through its layers, and splintering.
That's something.
"What a miserable break to be alive," a stranger's yawn echoed from down the tunnel toward the entrance.
"Aye," another agreed. "Suns aren't even up but here we are another trial."
"Can't say I mind it. You seen Jimmy?"
"Haggard, no?"
"Been lookin' rough for the last couple arcs, but lately he just looks bloody defeated..."
"I told ya. I feel for the guy. Hits just seem the keep rolling on a good man..."
Max made it halfway to the exit to duck behind a massive empty gem bucket as the miners walked by.
"These deadlines are outrageous."
"Oh, they know it too. Got to. I've heard Jimmy explain it to that sour Jarl. Man won't listen to reason."
"He's just a Dorrick man. Obviously they just see numbers and not what's real. It gets closer to impossible every arc with them lately."
"Some trials I swear they're trying to screw us."
"Some trials I think you're right. Wait until Jimmy finally has to tell them about The Big Fix."
"Whatchu mean?"
"When they hear we ain't gonna be able to safely mine for half a cycle until we re-stabilize the tunnels to the gem cavern, they're gonna lose theirs minds. I already told Jimmy we can work a few more trials before we really gotta shut 'er down. I can hear the rock shifting. Someone plays around with the rock in the same area as those posts, we're all gonna have a bad trial."
The Rusalka quietly emerged from her hiding place when the miners passed her completely. She popped out into the twilight of the new trial, eyes squinting at the tiniest of light that seemed jarring by comparison to the darkness of the mine. Her survey was quick but it was enough. Her curiosity was sated and the veil of shadow was slipping away. The further she ventured away from the Kimber mine and Jimmy's home, the more the property seemed to pull her back. Max barely made it into the tree line again when he heels rooted in place.
"Fates," she cursed quietly. Spending time with the Old Man had brought that old phrase back. "Yeah. Yeah. It's about as good a time as any..." She sighed and crouched down behind the tree she hid behind earlier in the night while observing the land. The parcel she discarded there was back in her hands. Before she could talk herself back out of the plan for the second time, her feet were back on Jimmy Kimber's porch. Her knuckles tapped against the front door. Then she brought the hand back to her face, hovering it over her silently moving lips.
"Mornin', miss," Jimmy yawned with a frown. His hair was in absolute disarray and his patchy beard hadn't been cleaned up in weeks.
"You Jimmy Kimber?" she asked him after clearing her throat and dropping her hand to her side.
"Aye, miss, that sorry sap is me."
"Some gimp paid me to ride this out to you," Max lied smoothly. She presented the parcel. "Said it was urgent."
"Who?"
"Couldn't tell ya. Kept lookin' over his shoulder and I need the coin if we're honest." She gave the parcel an innocuous tilt back and forth. "Book or somethin' I reckon?"
"Ah, okay. Right then." Jimmy reached for the parcel. Max let him grasp it, gently touching his hand with her other one when they made the exchange. Jimmy smiled politely at her. "Safe travels off, miss."
Max was off the porch when Jimmy closed and locked the door. He frowned at the parcel, tipping and shaking it. He wasn't much of a reader but it sure felt like a book of some sort. A long trial was about to begin. He tossed the wrapped up square on a table and peered at his sleeping child. A yawn took him, and while he should've been looking to gather his gear and start his trial with his laborers, he found himself staring at the mystery brought to his door step.
"For cryin' out loud," Jimmy groaned before he returned to the table. He tugged the strings that kept the brown paper wrapped around the bookish item. When he ripped the wrapping back he was faced with an oddly stiff, leather bound book. He began to flip through it. At first his eyes glazed over with immediate disinterest. Then his whole world stopped spinning.
He saw his own name.
Then he saw it again. Again. Again. Again.
He kept flipping. He stopped, heart hammering, flipped the pages back, and then flipped them forward again. All the evidence on the pages suggested the ledger belonged to the Dorricks. It had their every transaction going back arcs, including the business between their fathers. His mind began to race and sweat beaded his curious forehead. He flipped the page and found a loose letter slide into his view. He lifted it, reading the letter written by Edward Hunt and addressed to Jimmy himself.
Kimber's lips moved rapidly as he moved from one line to the next. His fingers gripped the small page so tight it was a wonder it didn't rip in his quivering grasp. When he finished he jumped straight back to the ledger and poured into it. His laborers, the mine, breakfast, and all his daily doings fell right out of his brain. The Seed of Spite grew roots, watered by all the evidence delivered to his hands that he'd been so deeply and unjustly betrayed.
While the Dorricks lived in their beautiful apartment, hosting parties in lavish outfits adorned with great wealth, campaigning for great influence and dining without a bead to their perfect brows, Kimber knew only suffering. His children suffered. His wife suffered. The harder he worked for the Dorricks, the more he suffered without fair compensation. He was sinking while they soared.
He hated them for it.
The woman was long gone when he dashed for the window, but he obsessed over the ledger and everything it contained for trials. When Benjamin dog, Jarl, showed up to yap and bark about productivity and deadlines, Jimmy stewed. He knew the stories about Jarl. He knew the man was seasoned in violence and the misdoings of the Etzori underworld. Nonetheless, while Jarl played messenger with Dorrick words Jimmy only thought of squeezing him until his head popped.
Jimmy did none of that. He listened. He nodded. He said nothing of the ledger. He kept this card close to his chest.
"Y'know, Jarl," the Kimber miner tried slowly. "I been thinkin', and thinkin' real hard. The war, Rhakros, it was bloody work. We're all scarred for it, and I know Benny and Tristane got their hands full and scores to settle. My boys here though?" Jimmy gestured toward the miners behind him at work. "Most of 'em are vets. Good men. Hard men. They served their city and now they serve me just as loyally, and y'all by extension. There ain't many of 'em, but they work harder than any cuntin' Morty they fought out there. It just don't sit right with me."
"What's that?" Jarl rolled his eyes, sighing. "What possibly couldn't sit right with you, Jimmy?"
"What's fair is fair, Jarl. For my men. For my family. For me."
"Just say what you mean, boy."
"The numbers don't add up to me, Jarl. Now I ain't a smart man. Ain't say I was, and Benny and Tristane know I ain't tryin' to disrespect 'em. I'm just sayin' with the work we're doing here, hard work, and the coin we make them Dorrick boys? Sir, I'm thinkin' it's 'bout time we re-negotiate."
"Re-negotiate?"
"Else I might be so inclined to find new partners. We ain't greedy, but we're barely makin' it out here, Jarl. I'm just huntin' for a fair shake."
"Working with other merchants would be a breach of contract, Jimmy..."
"Aye. I reckon it would be."
"I don't have the authority," Jarl answered with a glower. "If I did I'd tell you to piss right off into a mine shaft, boy. My bosses have been plenty generous, and I think you know you are well compensated for your work. Work that's plenty appreciated." He gave the miners watching the exchange a friendly wave and smiled, but his voice was low for Jimmy. "You vets know Tristane's a lion heart, and one of you. He's been more than fair. You ever heard of the dog that bit the feeding hand?" Jarl smiled and gave his sheathed dagger a tap. Then he gave Kimber a pat on the shoulder. "Until next time, yeah? Increase that output."
The Seed of Spite, imprinted by touch with a whisper of "Unfairness", festered.
Dialogue|Thoughts
