Chapter 155: *The black market*
Liam could see that Kerry was starting to lose patience, and that’s when he saw a shop that looked nothing like the others they had just visited, but the owner also seemed to sell everything there.
He showed it to Kerry, who winced but still said, "Alright, let’s go. It can’t be worse than the other three that we just visited, whose owners were pure thieves."
Kerry walked into the shop and immediately saw the young girl behind the counter, and he exclaimed, "Damn, Alice! Is that really you?"
Liam saw the young girl frown, but according to Kerry’s enthusiasm, she had to be a friend and not an enemy, so he said to Kerry, "Maybe you should take your hood off; she doesn’t seem to recognize you."
Kerry chuckled and said, "Oh yeah, that’s right; I forgot."
As soon as Kerry pulled off his hood, the girl stammered, "Kerry... Kerry, but what the fuck are you doing here?"
Alice walked over to them but didn’t stop to greet them; she went straight to her shop door, which she locked, and she also turned the sign to let passersby know that her shop was closed.
Alice turned around and finally threw herself into Kerry’s arms, who also hugged her. She said, as she moved away from him again, "It’s dangerous here; why did you come back? All these bounty hunters are looking for you and your brother. Most of them are looking for you near the border, but there are always some hanging around here because that was where you spent time with your uncle before you all disappeared."
She finally turned to Liam and greeted him politely, and Kerry introduced Alice to him as a childhood friend, but oddly he didn’t tell her anything about him, not even his name.
Liam found it interesting; Alice and Kerry seemed to know each other well, so why didn’t he trust her? He decided to step aside a bit to let them discuss and to watch them from afar. As he had told Kerry, he was only there to protect him and not to mingle with their business.
Kerry was curious to know what she had been up to all these years; she was quite a troublemaker when they were young. But it wasn’t the right time to ask this kind of question, so instead, he asked her where her father was. When she told him that he had been executed because he had refused to pay the new taxes ordered by the king, he finally understood why the prices were so high in the other shops.
She explained to him that she had been forced to sell their shop and buy this one, which was much smaller, but at least the taxes were more reasonable. Kerry apologized sincerely; he didn’t know about her father, and after exchanging some trivial news, he ended up asking her more seriously, "Do you still have access to the black market?"
Alice smirked, and she showed him her right wrist, where the same black bandage that Liam and Kerry had—along with everyone who fought for the same cause as them—was worn.
The only difference was that the demons didn’t have a tattoo under it. A legend said that when the rightful demon king would reappear, all the demons would get the same mark, but no one knew exactly what it would be or where the mark would appear.
Alice looked at Liam and asked Kerry, "Do you really trust him?"
Kerry laughed but said with a serious tone, "I trust him more than you. He has saved our lives many times already and taught us a lot of things that helped us survive. Besides Solomon and Alyssa, he is the only person I will trust with my life."
Alice nodded and said, "That’s fine with me then; follow me."
Kerry looked at Liam to see if he was okay with it, and when Liam imperceptibly nodded, Kerry followed Alice, while Liam stayed a little behind them. He had used his senses, and they were alone in the shop; there hadn’t been any suspicious movement in the street either, so far this girl looked clean. He couldn’t wait to find out what she wanted to show them.
Alice had stopped in front of a section of the wall, and she had taken out from around her neck a pendant with a black stone that had green reflections on it. She put that stone on the wall in front of them, and it immediately disappeared, revealing a staircase that led down to a basement.
Kerry hissed in admiration and said, "An illusion stone; looks like you still have some tricks."
Alice smiled sadly and said to him, "Unfortunately, it belonged to my dad; sorry, but I don’t have that kind of wealth, but do not worry, if you need the black market, then you came to the right place."
Kerry apologized again for his awkwardness and motioned for her to go first, and once everyone had entered, the wall of illusion fell back into place, and they continued downhill until they arrived at a large storage space where there was really a bit of everything: weapons, all kinds of items, documents. She guided them to the back door, and on the other side was a meeting room that could hold up to twenty people.
Kerry hissed again in awe and asked, "Fuck, Alice, what the hell are you involved in?" Liam found this young girl more and more interesting; it seemed that she had the potential to become the equivalent of what Tony was for the organization.
Alice replied then, as if to confirm his assumptions, "I never stopped working for the black market. Before my father was killed, I was already at the head of one of our branches that covers the border and the cities all around it. Now I manage the whole southern network, and the city of Dunkur is one of our three main bases. We try to help you as best as we can, and by you, I mean the rebels who want to overthrow the power and kill this bastard who has proclaimed himself our king. We have hideouts where we shelter the rebel families, and we provide them with the best weapons we can. But the problem is that we are short of money, and without money, everything is difficult."
She stopped there, looking at Kerry, and she said, "We have never been able to come into direct contact with the group leading the rebellion; you and your brother are fucking good at hiding. So, other than laying the groundwork for when you will need us, we haven’t been able to help you much so far."
