Newly Broke Heroine! [Book One Complete, Cozy Fantasy Adventure]

To say that Barry was displeased when they got back to the Merchant's Guild, was an understatement. He narrowed his eyes as if he knew they had been up to something. "Why do I feel that your absence will be followed by a giant headache for me?"

Not wanting to put up with Barry's condescending attitude, Fiona leered at him, and the elven glare of doom had its intended effect. "Remember how you were risking becoming an invalid for your stupid idea to try to control me? You know, you could be a little nicer to the woman who is trying to save your posterior. How I go about that is my business. I want this to go smoothly, too."

"You could at least keep me in the loop–"

"Barry, my patience with you is as thin as rice paper," she uttered with a growl. "Look, if you want me to line up Fiefdala's future, you better give me as much rope as you can afford. Doug and I are working–"

He squinted his eyes the second she realized she'd made a mistake, and he tilted his head toward Doug, who wore the look of an escaping convict, wide-eyed and snout tightly pressed like he was suppressing the urge to scream. Barry looked back and forth at them a few times, then, he made the connection.

Barry's eyes widened, his mouth went agape, and then he started letting out a deflated sound of half-formed words. He had the look of somebody having a mental break. Or a stroke. "The–Doug–he's–"

"Shush, cool your brain for a second." She put a finger to his lips, which stopped his stream of half-formed words, bordering on panic. "It's a nickname for Derek. Possibly not a nice one, considering the plastering I gave Douglas a few months ago, but I like this nicer, cuter, more plushie-like version of him! He likes his nickname, he chose it!"

"To my eternal regret," Doug growled, trying to play along. Barry still wasn't buying it, and apparently, no one cared that the king was having a bit of a mental snap. "Fi, no offense, sit him down and get him a glass of water."

"Don't call me 'Fi', you winged terror not-lizard–species amalgamation…whatever!" she shot back. She guided Barry to the bar, where people nodded in respect. "Barry here would like a bloody Shirley. Minus the blood. Oh, and add a fancy little umbrella."

"Why are you–"

"Shush, the adult is talking," she interrupted. The finger in front of Barry's face tactic worked twice in a row–she shouldn't press her luck, as he fell silent. The bartender, a stout young man with arms as thick as logs, got a drink ready for both of them, and Fiona casually sampled Barry's drink first. "Now, let's have a chat."

"Yes. Let's," he responded meekly, and they took a spot at an empty table. Barry's accompanying guards seemed to be giving them a wide berth. Either because they were paid too little to deal with Fiona, or paid enough to realize she was the least of his problems. He glanced warily at the two of them, then narrowed his eyes on Doug.

"You are a thieving–"

"Barry, bad-mouth my work partner, and you get the broadside of my hammer. We're talking this out. Doug, I think you and he have something to say to each other."

"Oh, do I ever, now that this kobold is out of the bag," Doug uttered through gritted teeth. "Listen, you little brat, you already screwed me once, so don't do it again. Your father conveniently forgot the help I lent the Kingdom in years past, along with my mother, and your country was stupid enough to fall for the ruse of my brother, Karlin. Who we just saw in Vale."

"So the rumors–"

"I had a bit of a mishap. We are working to uncover the truth about your missing gold and mine," Doug spat. "Karlin did the switcheroo, stuffed me into a closet, and caused just enough mayhem to get everyone thinking I orchestrated it." He spent a few more minutes going into detail, quietly talking it over.

Barry was still in disbelief. "So why are you helping–"

"Your agreement was for Fiona to settle her debt. How she did that was by her means to control. My brother's reveal as a schemer and a false flag instigator is a requirement of my continued cooperation."

Fiona nodded thoughtfully. "Better listen to him, Barry. Considering how you tried to cheat him out of money once."

Barry's eyes widened. "But, he undervalued–"

"I didn't have to cheat on tax forms, you twerp," Doug snapped. "I'm good with two things: numbers and history. Was the warning from Daddy Dearest not enough of a clue? Hereditary monarchy is how we end up with idiots like you."

"I resent that!" he protested, a little louder. One of the knights started to approach, but Barry gave him a hand wave that all was well before he settled back down. "I resent that," Barry hissed through his teeth.

"Resent it all you like. Leadership comes with experience, and you're getting a dose of it, now, aren't you?" Doug asked with a twitch of his snout, eyes focused on Barry. "Now, you and I have a common foe, and we think Vale is doing you dirty. But, on the chance that we're wrong, we've also found several avenues of supplies and other goods that we can exchange at good rates. And, we can import them for dirt-cheap prices, and they'll find themselves very desirable, to be in every household of Fiefdala, which will make a lot of money for the treasury, while we're at it. We also have some opportunities with some friends I have out here."

Fiona had the feeling that could be the Bar'dathi, who likely knew the score and were more skeptical of Karlin's trickery.

But, Barry was still stuck on the 'This is the dragon I screwed over' moment, and Fiona had to jostle his shoulder gently, to snap him out of it. He looked fearfully at the little kobold, whose arms were crossed and wings were tensed, and he tapped a claw patiently on his vest. "Despite what you might think of me, Barrimeth, I call Fiefdala a home, too. By the way, the price of this reveal is, tell no one."

Barry took a sip of his drink before nodding. "I'm willing to let this one play out a bit. Swiftheart, I presume you have a plan?"

"I do. Look, you two might have a score to settle right now, but everybody is looking to act in the kingdom's best interests. Set the differences aside, or we'll all be working out of a labor contract house from Vale, if we're unlucky."

"It won't come to that," he countered, fingers tensed on the table. "You just enjoy putting pressure on me, don't you, Swiftheart? You must love the power swing."

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"Dumbass, this isn't about me enjoying you squirming. This is about making sure the shop, my friends, and my neighborhood stay a cheery, happy-go-lucky place. I don't enjoy having to fix a screwup this big. I've been only semi-responsible my whole life, and swinging all the way to responsibility sucks. Now that we've said our peace, when I ask for help, and I ask for it loudly, I expect you to move heaven and Cepalune to make whatever I need to happen, happen. Clear? If only for keeping your arse on the throne, and showing your father that you weren't the worst choice."

She let out an internal sigh when Barry nodded his head in the quickest reaction she'd ever seen out of this pasty-faced placeholder. He said nothing more, and his assistant, who just arrived, read the situation as contained. Barry said only a few words and gave a dismissive wave to Stewey.

Fiona decided that now was the time to relax. After Barry and Stewey departed, she and Doug grabbed a spot at the bar. Soon, she was sipping from a wine glass, hoping this day couldn't get more complicated.

"I can't believe you screwed that up," Doug grumbled, breaking the ice between them.

"He was already suspicious that you were related; it was gonna come out eventually." She did realize, though, that this slip might have costs, if Barry talked to his darling secret Fiancée. She doubted he wanted to risk tangling with her, so he'd stay quiet. "Besides, doesn't it feel good, knowing he'll owe you a massive favor for this?"

"It would be nice not to have been subjected to this in the first place," he grunted. "Though it could have been worse, all things considered." More surprising to her was that Doug was holding a tankard of ale and nursing it gently between his claws. " So I have to ask, Miss Swiftheart. Is every week like this for you?"

She took another sip of wine and enjoyed that fruity raspberry flavor, which gave it a much-needed sweetness. "Doug, let me tell you something. By comparison? My last life was a wreck. But, I probably could have salvaged it if I'd gotten out of my own way. There might almost be a point where I would go back to it."

"But you'd be going back to rubble." She let out a soft huff at the unpleasant assessment from Doug.

"Doug, I didn't need giant monsters to wreck my life. I was good at doing that myself. And honestly, there were more than a few things I could have done to avoid that. I know it's easy to say that now, but I also needed time to reflect on it . To think about how I got there." She took another sip and swirled the glass aimlessly.

"So, how did the problems start?" She couldn't help but notice Doug scooting his chair a little closer. He also spoke in a quieter tone than she normally associated with him--the tone he took with Kali, and Greg. She realized she hadn't even told Greg, Bonnie, and Darla all the details. Not entirely.

She thought for a moment, squinting at him. "I thought you hated me."

"Well, I mean I did. You ransacked my home, and also, because I didn't know you. Others pulled you into this game. Karlin's made fools of more than just us," Doug pointed out. "You, also, have set aside…some differences with me, as well." He'd needed a few extra seconds before responding. "History is the tale of the people, not just the cities and the empires."

She took more than a courageous sip from her wine glass before sitting back in her chair and relaxing, glancing at Doug intermittently while she rubbed the glass stem gently with one hand. "Well, I suppose the best place to start is at the beginning. I left my house when I was 18. My parents...Well, no, I suppose just my father, even though my mother didn't say anything. He didn't like my life choices."

"And what life choice was that?"

"The fact that I had a girlfriend date to my prom, and elsewhere. For the record, that's a bit of a formal dance they hold when you're about to finish your primary education. After that, my father and I didn't see eye to eye, so I left because I didn't want to constantly be judged. There were other reasons, too. I went to do some military training, and I signed up as a volunteer.

"Later, when I finished with that, I ended up taking over a store that an old lady was no longer capable of running. I ran the store for seven years...eight, almost? Along the way, I met someone, after a string of false starts."

Doug nodded thoughtfully, his claws wrapped gently around his tankard, and his attention was all on her. "Young love, foolish love, or true love?"

"Young love, I think. Her name was Bianca. She was about my age. She grew up a few towns over, and was a little different, like me. We started dating, and we hit it off well. After a while, she helped me run the store. Bianca was a gem of a personality. She was funny, smart, and sometimes a little blunt. But she was also very kind. We had a cat together, and it was just the three of us."

Fiona's words faltered, and her smile did, too. "No, that's not entirely true. Bianca had...I don't know what it was. A certain kind of sadness about her. It was always there. When we sat on the couch, watching a movie together. The way she..." She paused and thought better of that detail. "The way...her art came out. Beautiful, but often sad, hauntingly so. I never met someone who tried so hard to put on a smile when she just couldn't."

For the first time she'd noticed, Doug wasn't looking at her with a slight look of annoyance or wearing a knowing smirk. Instead, he seemed to be paying attention, for the sake of actually listening to what she had to say. "And then, there's you. The woman that the whole universe can't wear down. Quite the pairing."

She laughed softly at that. "Yeah. It took a demonic army and an eldritch dragon god to take me down, finally. But that came way later."

"But, things were going well?"

She looked at her left hand and the emptiness that wrapped around one finger. "Yeah, things were going well. We have great moments together. Real moments when we had breakthroughs. She brought an artistic flair to the store, beyond what I could do. We ran it, time passed, and we saved some money. Everything was going fine until the country had some issues, and many people stopped spending as much money. You wouldn't notice it at first; maybe, a few percentage points? But, that's enough to turn from a slight profit to a slight negative."

She took another sip of wine and cleared her throat. "I also had a bit of a spending problem, Doug. I always wanted to have the next best thing, even if I couldn't fully afford it at the time. And many of those efforts eventually stacked up and came back to haunt me."

"Well, what started as a slow trickle became a bleed, and it eventually impacted our ability to keep the lights on. We fell behind on payments, and we tried to take out loans, but the rates were cutthroat and essentially unaffordable. Nobody at the store besides us knew what situation was unfolding in the background. Bianca kept telling me to settle my debts to avoid bankruptcy, and I wanted to try and hold on to the store. I told her we could fight our way out of it. I thought I could turn it around.

"All the while, nobody at the store knew that we were having trouble. The young crowd would be sitting there on their cell phones–their relays," she corrected when he raised an eye crest. "They'd grab drinks and chat idly, and the old folks, as well. Or, usually with a cup of coffee. And they were always there, Doug. It was like a little community I didn't even realize I built."

She noticed Doug's wings were drooping just a little while. Maybe not as much as people would notice, but she did. He spoke after a moment of reflection. "Does this tale end the way I think it ends?"

"Yep, it does, Doug. I took out a risky loan, knowing that it might backfire. And then, I attempted to do a couple of things to get more business for the store. Bianca kept telling me, 'You need to stop trying to double down and let it go, before you lose everything.' I didn't listen, because I'm a little headstrong. And for the first time, I think it was just my stubbornness that took its toll. She told me to either pick her, or the store. And not thinking about it, I shouted out the wrong answer."

The last of the wine glass now stood empty, and Fiona gazed forward. She didnt know what to focus: the upscale bar, the bartender who wasn't wearing a stained apron, or the colorful, fancy bottles on the shelf weren't covered in dust and grime. She just stared forward for a few seconds. "Yeah, I lost everything, Doug, and that was before the monsters hit. I might be a little self-destructive, in hindsight."

He glanced at her, not judging, but taking in what she'd said. "You know, not everyone can realize the mistakes they've made. That puts you in a better position than most."

She didn't have a response to that surprising insight. "Well, now that you know my history, Doug. Or, at least the highlights. So, what do you think?"

"I think it's my turn," he added calmly. "Because I've made mistakes, too."