Bizar Zirak's client workshop was a massive room, filled with glass boxes where he kept all the orders he had finished and were either ready for delivery or for a client to pick up. "What is your name, child?"
"Kayla Brynhild." I answered.
Bizar Zirak walked around the room but my necklace seemed not to be there.
"I know your father, Lord Byrnhild. He wrote a heartwarming letter to me, for the making of this necklace. I assume you'd like to take your mother's necklace as well. He is a very good client. Your brothers armor has been forged here." He had a heartwarming smile on his face, I doubted for moments if I should tell him if my stepfather was dead or not. Perhaps not. I couldn't afford the necklace, but I know it to be paid already. My mother was a second wife, she had some jewels, but the first wife had a jewelry store, so Lord Byrnhild was a very good customer.
"I can imagine. He praises your talent very much." I tried to vague, I'm sure the news hadn't arrived, nor was my stepfather that much newsworthy, sure his sons had already taken over every little big possession he'd ever owned.
"I shall retrieve your necklace, can I offer you a drink while you wait?" It was a question I did not had to answer he was already filling me a glass of strawberry wine. When he left I could peacefully observe all his work, there was such beautiful creations, for lords richer then my stepfather. There was a time my mother dreamed of marrying me to a rich lord, so I could be safe in the world, but the night stars told me a different story. There was a world out there that I wanted to know, lands far beyond the walls of my house, creatures to hunt, others to admire, wandering wizards and magical lands to uncover. I wanted to see it all, even if it cost me the warm quiet life my mother had imagined I'd have, embroidering at night by the fire while my three children were sleeping peacefully in bed.
The door was closed behind, I was trying not to be caught admiring jewelry, so I pretend to be admiring the wine shade by the candle light.
"I never understood why a glass must have stones hewed in it, one cannot admire the color of the wine." I said, wanting to show I knew something of wines.
"Most people don't need to admire the color of what they are drinking." It was not Bizar Zirak's voice. I wanted to turn and face the man speaking to me, but instead I stood there, my back turned. I could hear him serving himself a glass of wine.
"When you spend your life drinking out of these glasses you start to wish for simpler ones, taller, you want to smell the wine before you taste it." I was proud of myself, I knew I sounded like a wine appreciator, but I was merely repeating words my stepfather used to say to my simple mother.
I turned, trying to return to my seat, one of two in the main table. There he was already sitting, Thorin, Prince of Erebor.
"When one becomes accustomed to what one has…" I needed to interrupt. Of all the people I wanted to meet, a widow prince was not one of them.
"Master Zirak is not here. You must await ...perhaps in another room." I swallowed what was left of my wine, sat down in the other chair, with two candles between us and thought that my mother's death was too recent for me to want to speak with someone who had lost a loved one too. He filled my glass and replied, as if I wanted an answer.
"Master Zirak's wine is my favourite. I come here often, he stops taking customers when the feast begins." He fills his glass finishing what was left of the wine.
"Doesn't he scold you in the morning for drinking all of his wine? I'm sure he needs for his customers."
"He doesn't. He is actually quite fond of me." For a moment I questioned my first assumption on this man. He seemed nothing like he appeared, but perhaps, it was the wine shaping his thoughts and words. "Should I assume you ordered a white gem necklace? They seem to make the likings of every woman these days."
"No. I ordered a mythril necklace, enlaced with gold lines."
"A very unusual request."
"I am an unusual person."
"May I ask what brings you here?" Asked the prince. "Aside from the necklace."
"The sword and axe training pit."
"For your brothers?" He asked as he walked up to a closet bringing another jar of wine.
"No. For myself."
He laughed loudly as he poured me and himself more wine. I could swear it could not take so long for Master Zirak to fetch my necklace.
"Why so amused? Dwarf women practise sword and axe, why can't a human? I should say I excel at bow and arrow."
"Ladies prefer to come here for the jewels."
"Ladies are boring women who spend their days shopping for things they don't need to make up for their husbands absence." I should tone down on the husband and wife comments, after all it seemed his marriage was short lived and his deceased wife left him with no children.
"Husbands play a game too, they drink so they don't miss them."
If this was a bedtime story, Master Zirak would've had come into the room, saving me from the awkward silence, but it was not. I had this fear, when the world started to feel too real for me I would freeze.
"Well it has a simple answer, spend more time with your wife, or give her less money to shop." As soon as the words came out of my mouth I felt as bad as they sounded, but I was still pretending I had no idea who he was, therefore a simple apology would suffice.
"I can tell you have no husband of your own. Speaking of what we don't know leads us to simple solutions, it is different when we are in the situation."
"If one is going to marry a man who is never around, what is the point of the marriage." Perhaps I had been harsh in my answer, but yet again, I was not there to make friends.
Thorin filled up a glass and drank it all, standing up he spoke, before he left the room.
"Best of luck for your training, we begin at sunrise, those who are late do not train."
I thought that perhaps staying for a few days would not change my plans, after all, I would need to learn more than to shoot arrows to travel unknown roads.