and
With a slight hint of trepidation, Friesden walks up to Virtue’s door, and laying the grate down for one second, knocks on the door.
’Please be there, please be there...’Virtue’s attention is drawn to the knocking, and she gets up to go investigate who it was. She opens the door, fearing for a moment it would be Indigo or somepony else she wasn’t in a hurry to see, but is relieved to see only Friesden standing there. “Oh, Friesden, hello. Come in.” She leads the young mare inside and continues, “How can I help you?”
Friesden puts the grate in front of Virtue, and trying to recall the words she’d practiced, says “I...I want to....I want to trade...This grate...For a sword. Please?”
“Trade it? For a sword?” She ponders the question for a moment. “What do you need a sword for?”
“I-I-I-I,” Friesden stammers, caught offguard. “I...I’ve been training with dad. And...I...I want to help protect Dawnpick,” she goes on, trying to compensate for her previous stammering. “I...I thought a real...A real sword could...Could help.”
Virtue silently thinks about the request. They may well need all the help they could get, but somehow... she didn’t picture gentle little Friesden as much of a soldier. But if she had been training with Fauchard, maybe she had learned a thing or two. “I see...” She takes a look at the grate again. “Are you sure that’s what you want to do? I mean, there’s a lot of other things you could trade that for.”
Friesden swallows. “Y-y-yes. I’m sure. I...I don’t need much anyway.”
She raises a hoof to her chin and nods thoughtfully. Perhaps she should speak with Fauchard about this later. Just in case. For now though, it wouldn’t hurt to at least look at it. “Well, let’s have a look at it.” She examines the grate and tries her best to appraise it. Always something tricky to do for items like this. Five thousand bits was probably a bit optimistic, but she didn’t mind parting with a bit more than that considering they were sitting on so much in the treasury with little else to do with it. “I... think this is worth a nice sword at least. It is pretty special...”
“R-r-r-really?” Friesden asks incredulously. “I...Um...Thank you, miss Virtue.”
Virtue gives her a small genuine smile. “You’re welcome. I don’t know if Castiron has ever forged a sword before, but I’ll go speak with him in a little bit to ask him about it. I’m sure he can produce something nice for you.”
“T-t-t-thank you, miss Virtue! I won’t disappoint you!” Friesden says.
“I know you won’t,” she responds, keeping the smile on her face. “Actually, I think I might go talk to Castiron about the sword now, if you’d like to come along?”
“Yes, of course miss Virtue!” Friesden says.
I’m going to see another sword being forged! This is the best day ever!Virtue stands and leads Friesden along to the forges where she hoped she’d find Castiron. The grate was worth a fair bit, but she was going to see about having Castiron make the best sword he could. It wasn’t like they had a whole lot else to do with the steel. She just worried about Friesden herself. If she was serious about joining the militia, they could use her help, but she just didn’t feel quite right about it all. She would go find Fauchard later and talk to him about it. Maybe he’d be able to put her mind at ease.