The man shouldered me out of the way with complete disregard for my very existence. I liked to think that I was a somewhat sturdy fellow, but the abject rudeness of the gesture caught me so off guard that my legs got twisted as he pushed me, and I fell to the ground. My tailbone smacked hard against the floorboards, sending a jolt up my spine.

  “Hey, friend, watch it!” I cried, and already, my anger was rising to the surface, though I did my best to tamp it down. I didn’t want to upset Elloy, but I also didn’t want to let this slide so easily.

  “Sit down, boy,” the man said with a sneer.

  I looked up at him at last. He was a well-groomed man with a shaved face, a soft jaw, and a twirling brown mustache that was oiled to perfection. The man wore a fine velvet suit and vest that probably cost more than my uncle’s house, and he walked with a solid-wood cane—a deep red and fine as wine, definitely high quality and expensive.

  Alarm bells were chiming around my head, telling me to stay calm and let it pass, but there was no way I could do that. I shot to my feet and stood up to him. “You think you can just go around knocking people down like it’s nothing? Maybe you can do that mess back East, but not here.”

  He sniffed at me and had such a look of disgust on his face that I was almost flattened a second time by the sheer audacity of it, as if he didn’t even think of me as human. This wasn’t a unique experience for me, sad to say. More than a few wealthy men and women who’d passed through the town on their way west or east to check on investments had treated me and other lower-born people with contempt and disgust. To them, anyone born out in the Badlands was lowborn and unworthy of their respect.

  My hands clenched into fists, though I knew I wouldn’t win this. How could I when the man surely had a wealth of cards up his sleeves? Quite literally. The sleeves were fine, supple silk, but I had no doubt that there were powerful cards tattooed underneath.

  Still, I didn’t cower to people like him. I brushed myself off, knocking the dust from my trousers and shirt. Of course, that was there already and not this man’s fault, but the theatrics helped my point.

  “That was quite rude of you,” I said, feigning one of the posh accents from back East that these hoity-toity rich folks liked to affect upon themselves. It was uppity and pretentious. I stood tall, very unlike most people from these parts who generally got on their hands and knees to cater to the rich folk that passed through town. Not me.

  The man cast a contemptuous glance my way, then brandished his cane like a sword. Then he pulled it apart, and it became twin batons, one in each hand. And the long rods began to crackle with electricity.

  My heart nearly leapt out of my chest, both from fear and from excitement. Elemental magic was a trait that only a [Legendary] card could achieve! I’d never seen elemental magic before, and I was more flabbergasted that it was right in front of me than anything else. Sure, there was the rational voice in my head telling me that this man who thought I was scum was about to end my life and go about his day, but I was too bewitched by the crackling energy to heed those thoughts.

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  “Alright, that’s enough of this nonsense!” roared a voice.

  The man hesitated, turning his gaze from me to the newcomer. It was none other than Master Elloy. He stormed out from the back, swirls of smoke trailing after him as he emerged from the curtain that led to the forging room.

  Elloy was a large man of immense stature, tall as a pine and broad as an oak. He had a long graying beard that fell down to his chest and was braided with several different beads and doodads. It was a far cry from his clean-cut brother, showing the difference in their learning. Elijah had gone to the East where grooming standards were far different.

  Unlike his brother, who wore a thick leather heat apron for his forging, Elloy wore a flowing robe of velvet or corduroy, I wasn’t sure which. It was dark green with golden tassels on the hems of the huge sleeves and gold trim along the collar, waist, and down the middle. His arms were covered, but his strong hands that were large enough to palm my whole head were studded with rings. A tattoo on his right hand showed a swirl of smoke with three small rectangular cards floating over it. It was a skill card tattoo for [Card Creation], one that all Cardsmiths possessed. The only difference was that his had three cards, which meant it was in the third tier of its progression and made it a [Rare] rank. This meant Elloy could forge just about any card below [Transcendent] cards, and I wasn’t even sure that level of card could be forged… or even existed.

  Elloy was a kind man for the most part, though he had his rough edges, and like I said, he had been courteous when Uncle Deebo died. He ran a tight ship and was a shrewd businessman on top of his cardsmithing skills. I’d never known him to be unfair.

  But when he looked at me in this moment, he frowned so deeply that the hair on the back of my neck stood on edge.

  “I can’t deal with you right now, Griff. Are you harassing my customers?”

  “Me? I am a customer, and I was here first! He didn’t even take a number.” I showed him my number and didn’t care that my voice sounded a bit whiny. The other gentleman harrumphed indignantly.

  Elloy didn’t dispute my claim, but he did something even worse: he ignored me. He plastered on a pleasant smile for the man, his whiskers wriggling as his wide leathery lips turned jovially upward.

  “Ah, Mr. Jadewell, a pleasure to see you again. I wasn’t expecting you today.”

  The man, to his credit, did not show the same disdain to Elloy as he had to me. He might have viewed Elloy as someone beneath him, but Elloy was a very necessary someone with a skill you couldn’t get everywhere.

  “I never announce myself, Master Elloy. Would you curse a god for an unexpected summer shower?”

  “No, I reckon I wouldn’t. Come on back. Let’s see to what you need.”

  And the two men left. No number, no appointment, no waiting. All smiles and no worries. And not a single glance back my way. They disappeared to the back, the curtain fluttering in their wake.

  Landrid looked sympathetic. But only barely. He shrugged and went back to his reading. “Sorry kid, that’s how it goes sometimes.”

  I couldn’t even spout a word in argument before the door on the far-left wall banged open, and a ripped young man about Landrid’s age barged in, his face and bare arms covered in soot and dirt. He had a clean-shaven face, though the ash and soot made that fact less obvious.

  “Landrid, we need an extra set of hands, pronto,” said Leiter, one of Elijah’s apprentices. Landrid groaned, but he didn’t put up an argument. He simply stood from the desk and trudged over to where the apprentice waited.

  “Okay, let’s hurry it up then, or Master Elloy will tan my hide.”

  I was suddenly by myself.