章節 7: 07. Pearl silk

I can't write faster. Sorry. As a volunteer, I seriously lack time. Now I have to start working again, as damn bills are not paid alone, so please give me some slack :) Thank you in advance :)

Near the town was the place where everyone parked their horses and carriages. Lee's found a burly man with a huge reddish beard and strange coloured grey eyes and waved at him. ''Passa, are you free?''

Passa nodded as he pointed at the smaller carriage and huge donkey. ''If you need me today I am free. I am done with my land so I planned to earn some extra money. My wife is pregnant again and we could use some savings.''

Miss Lee shook her head in disbelief. ''You already have a dozen kids, isn't it enough?''

Passa started laughing with a deep voice. ''Don't ask me, tell my wife. I asked her to stop at fifth child but somehow she loves having many children around her. Seriously.'' He rose his hands and smiled brightly showing rows of good and bad teeth.

Miss Lee pointed at Mina. ''Passa, you know we can't let our old donkey carry too many heavy things. this young girl needs to buy food so could you please wait until she is finished with her shopping and bring her to our village. She is now in old Kang's house.''

Passa looked at the simple-looking girl with astonishment. ''Nice. Good. I will come with you and show you everything. What is the first thing you want to buy?''

Mina sighed and shook her head. ''If you are in rush take other people. I need first to see the town on my own. Then I will come back and we can go buy everything we need.''

Passa nodded. ''Miss, in that case, I will just wait for you here. You can buy things and on our way, you can pick it up in stores. they usually leave the packages with names on the side. Just don't go to Gong store. They cheat.''

Mina suspected that already so she nodded. ''I understand. Then who's store could you recommend me?''

With troubled expression eh looked at Old Lee. ''Actually, there is a foreigner that gives fair prices but not many people talk to him. If you go there and tell him I sent you he will send it all to me straight with his carriers. What else?''

She looked at miss Lee. ''I need to buy some cloth for me. Is there textile or embroidery store, or something similar?''

Miss Lee nodded. ''There are five clothing stores one next to another. Check them all as they all have different materials. That is their inside deal. Like that no one is a competition to the other. Go straight through the main gate and go straight. You can ask anyone on the street to tell you where you have to go.''

Mina smiled and nodded. As she slowly bowed to all of them she turned around and walked straight to the main gait where huge flow of people gathered and waited to enter.

The Old Lee looked at her straight back and shook his head. ''She can't even hide her previous life even though she wears such simple clothes. I fear many bad things might happen to her if she stays in the city too long.''

But she could see Passa shaking head with a huge smile. ''Don't worry. Kang's sons are in the city. Not even City Lord dares to mess with those people. If someone tries to touch someone like this girl, you think they will sit still?''

The two Lee's nodded. ''She might be nasty and have a foul tongue but Elder Kang has quite a piece of gold inside her heart. She just hid that piece way deep inside...'' They laughed and started chatting about their usual things while Mina finally passed the main gate.

Actually, this town is nothing different than any town in their kingdom. After great king combined all the lands in surrounding they became so powerful that even southern pirates, northern wild tribes and eastern great Empire tried to avoid to attack it.

Many cities like this one on the north were actually the centre point where many different people and many tribes loved to trade here. She was from the other side of the country so many people with all their strange attires and languages were quite interesting to her but she then snapped out daze and went to the first vendor.

She bowed slightly and smiled at the older woman. ''May I please ask you were is clothing store?''

''Oh, the Colour street you mean? It is right there, child. Do you see the Gong store? Next to it is the corner to the Colour street. You can buy finished clothes or just materials.'' The older woman explained while she pointed at the nearby street.

Mina bowed politely and walked straight to that street. As she passed the Gong store she could see many people standing there and arguing, so she just quickened her pace and entered an almost a different world.

The calm street was was still crowded but was not as loud and it felt quite comfortable to walk around it. Not long after she found the first store and asked for Embroidery house or something but the woman just shook her head and with a smile pointed at last store. ''They make or sell embroidery, you can ask them.''

Mina nodded politely and walked straight to the last store. As she passed the other stores she clouds see a clear difference in their products. The first store had a simple hemp cloth with many accessories that could be added to it. Usually for simple commoners. The second had only leather and fell. The third had wool, cotton and linen. Fourth sold actually finished clothes. And fifth had silk and embroidery.

As she entered one woman looked at her with disgust and then left the store as she waved her hand. ''If this was not the only silk store in town I wouldn't come here ever again. Every commoner can enter. How disgraceful.''

Mina just shrugged and went straight to the counter where a seriously looking woman looked through the materials. ''This is strange. It looks like ice silk but why is the density so thick?''

Mina looked at it and shook her head. ''Because it's not ice silk. It's pearl silk. It's tougher and thicker than ice silk but actually at the same time rarer. Strange, you found a bolt of pearl silk so far in the north.'' She literally itched to touch the material so her fingers rose but then she put them back.

The woman looked at those soft hands with interest and as she looked up she sa woman inside inside simple clothes that just didn't fit with the picture. ''You know about this cloth. How much is it usually?''

Mina scrunched her eyebrows. ''It's extremely rare as it takes blue spider silk to produce this bolt almost ten years. I guess one bolt between two thousand and five thousand gold. But as it has still pure colour and it's not embroidered I guess around two thousand. but... considering its far north and not many bolts of pearl silk could be found here, three thousand will be a fair price.''

Her calm words and constant flow made woman rise her eyebrows. ''And how do you know this? This might as well be the cheap silk from far south.''

Mina chuckled. ''In that case one bolt is not more than one silver. Even her on both. You can sell it to me then.'' She took out silver and pointed at the bolt of silk.

The woman shook her head with laughter. ''I believe you. Fine. I won't ask too many questions. You probably came here because something you need. Tell me.''

Mina took out her side bag a small wrapped package and slowly opened it up. Inside was two well-embroidered handkerchiefs. ''I did these. I plan to sall it. If you know is someone would buy such things please help me and show me the way.''

The woman coughed and slowly took the embroidered handkerchiefs. Looking at double side embodiment she was astonished. ''I will buy it. You have more?''

Mina chuckled and shook her head. ''No. I will buy silk and tread and start embroidering again. But, you need to tell me do you want simple embodiment, double side embodiment or double side with different motives.''

The woman nodded. ''Simple. This double embroidered is really delicate and amazing, but women here are not used to see it. So simple embroidering should be fine. I will pay you ten silver pieces for each handkerchief and for these two I will pay you twenty-five each. But only these two. I like it so I will buy it for myself.''

Mina nodded and as she saw a huge amount of money she got a headache. But then remembered the basket on her back. ''I have found good wine. Where can I sell it?''

''Found?'' The woman was interested. ''How can you find wine?''

Mina chuckled. ''Well I bought a house and it was hidden in some corner. I thought I could use it was cooking wine, but then I could feel nice taste so I thought if I could earn some money for it...''

She took off the heavy basket and opened the jar...