Marci’s face pulled into a scowl. “Okay,” she grumbled. “I’ll admit taking the money and running does have its appeal, but that doesn’t mean we should let them rip us off. I say we hold out for forty thousand.”
“Marci,” Julius said with a sigh. “There are not four thousand lampreys here.”
“Doesn’t matter,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest. “The point is that we killed something they couldn’t, and now we own the bodies, which they want. That puts them over a barrel, and when you’ve got someone over a barrel, you have to shake them until their pockets are empty. It’s the freelancer’s code.”
“I’m not shaking anyone,” he said firmly. “I said we were going to agree on a mutually fair price, and that’s what I mean to do.”
“Juliuuuuuus,” she moaned. “The guy’s a trust fund kid! He won’t even miss forty grand. Don’t be such a goody-two-shoes.”
“Refusing to take advantage of people doesn’t make me a goody-two-shoes,” Julius said sharply, making Marci flinch. Normally, that would have made him feel guilty. Right now, though, he had a point to make. “I know you don’t have much respect for shamans, but these people seem to be doing legitimate good work. They’re also Katya’s allies. We still need their help to find her, and I’m not going to torpedo our chances there by ripping them off for a one time gain.”
“Are you nuts?” Marci said. “This isn’t a kid’s show, Julius. It’s not like these people are going to suddenly change their minds and give you all the info on this Katya person just because you were square with them. They live in asewer. We’ll probably never even see them again. If we don’t go for broke now, we’ll be SOL forever.”
“You never know,” Julius said. “I’m not saying it isn’t a gamble, but if I’m going to be taking risks, I’d rather take them doing what I think is right. That way, even if I do get ripped off, at least I’ll know I wasn’t the one being a jerk.”
Marci stared at him a moment, and then she threw up her hands. “Fine,” she said. “It’s your money. You want to pay the good karma fee, that’s your choice.”
The fact that she thought it was an idiotic one was clear from her voice, but Julius appreciated the gesture all the same. “Thank you, Marci.”
“Yeah, yeah,” she said, looking away. “Just never try and take that good nature to Vegas. You’ll get swindled down to your underwear before you can blink.”
That was a risk he was willing to take. For the first time Julius could remember, he actually felt good about something. Not just okay or not bad, but really, honestlygoodabout his decision not to use his unexpected superior position to squeeze Katya’s alligator shaman for all he was worth. And when Ross returned with his co-chair—a stern, middle-aged Indian woman with shed snake skins woven into her hair—Julius greeted them with such a smile that the lady actually looked taken aback. This only made Julius grin wider as he settled his shoulder against the wall and dug in for some good, honest, old-fashioned haggling.
***
An hour later, all parties were satisfied, and Julius was no longer an impoverished dragon. That wasn’t as good as being anunsealeddragon, but he was ready to call it a win.
The shamans had started out wary, but once it became clear that Julius honestly wasn’t trying to rip them off, the pace picked up enormously. In the end, Ross’s circle kept all the lampreys, and Julius received an immediate cash transfer of twenty-five thousand dollars, ten of which was actually for the big one, which Ross explained was full of magical components his circle needed for their wards.
“It’s not enough, really,” Ross admitted with a sigh. “Large, unique creatures like that are almost priceless. You could probably sell it for thirty thousand easy if you called in one of the big magical component suppliers from the Upper City. We can’t afford to pay that, of course, but you’ve been very upfront with us, and I wanted to make sure you knew the creature’s real value before you signed it over, just in case you wanted to pull out.”
“Thank you, but ten thousand will be fine,” Julius said, keeping his voice low so Marci wouldn’t overhear and fly to his rescue. “I meant it before when I said I thought you were doing good work down here. Also, have you seen that thing?” He jerked his thumb over at the bus-sized corpse of the giant lamprey that five mages were currently weaving a spell around in an attempt to finally lift it all the way out of the water. “Not exactly something I can put in my pocket. If you count that in, I think ten thousand for a monster I don’t have to pay to move is a very fair deal.”
“Fair indeed,” Ross said, sticking out his hand with a genuine smile. “Thank you, Julius.”
“Thankyou,” Julius said, shaking his hand firmly.
As soon as he’d settled everything with the mages, Julius hurried back to Justin. He’d fully expected his brother to get bored and leave once it became clear Julius was serious about not attacking the humans. When he hadn’t, Julius had started getting nervous, but his brother had actually been remarkably patient, sitting against the wall and snarling at people who got too close. From anyone else, such behavior would have been surly. From Justin, it was practically an audition for sainthood, and Julius wanted to thank him before the miracle ended.
Justin didn’t look up when Julius approached, just gave his sword a final swipe with the cleaning cloth before sliding the blade back in its sheath. “Well?”
“All done,” Julius said. “They’re paying us—”
“Screw the money,” his brother said. “What about Katya?”
Julius shook his head, and Justin lifted his eyes at last to give him a look of such deep disappointment it actually hurt.
“I don’t understand you,” he said, rolling to his feet in one smooth motion. “You’re not stupid and you’re not a coward. You can even be bold if someone pushes you. You’ll never be a really good dragon, but that’s enough to be an okay one if you’d just stop dicking around. But youwon’t.”
“I—” Julius began, but he stopped when Justin held up his hand.
“I don’t want Mother to eat you,” he went on, belting his sword back onto his hip. “We’ve been together our whole lives, and while you can be a total buzzkill, you’re also the brother I dislike the least.”
Julius’s eyes widened. That was the nicest thing anyone in his family had ever said about him. “Thank you.”
“Save it,” Justin growled. “I’m only telling you all this so you’ll understand why I took Bob’s ticket to the DFZ. I thought if I came myself to keep an eye on you, I could make sure you didn’t screw this up too badly. But after sitting here for a hour listening to you being so, so…”
“Reasonable?” Julius suggested.
