There were only a couple of things Dobri could have taken from the Black Market.
Money was one of them.
Gildana had given him the oxen, but she would demand he give them back. At least her pay was already handled.
But the thing was. Hans, Hugo, and Harald were yet to get more money from him. And he knew that if they forgot, which wasn't very likely, then he would manage to fix his roof and maybe buy a kitten bed for Morty.
Morty, who had been staring at the sky and meowing for the better part of the last hour. His fur was getting more and more bristled.
"Do you think he is really complaining to the Cat Distribution System?" Dobri asked Harald, who had grown the closest to him of the three troll brothers.
"I don't know. It is very likely," Harald told him, as he looked at the meowing kitten. "But if you don't want to get chased by a tiger or something like that, why don't you just treat the little fellow better?"
That was an excellent question. Dobri had no answer to it. For him, Morty was just fur that demanded food from time to time.
"I bet that for him, I am just a food delivery servant," Dobri protested.
"Yes, that's true," Harald wasn't even trying to sugar coat it. It was Dobri's life on the line, not his. "But that doesn't change the fact that there is no such thing as the Gnome Distribution System, which can save you from a lion or a tiger. And I think Morty is currently negotiating for a liger, if you have heard of those?"
Dobri shook his head.
"About as big as me." Harald made a pause, so Dobri could get a chance to look him up and down in mute horror. "With one parent being the tiger, the other a lion. Big cats, one of the biggest. Will eat you in a single bite."
"Oh," Dobri said, as he looked back at Morty.
The kitten threw him a glance, narrowed its eyes, and then began to hiss at the skies again.
"And if I just return Morty to sender?" Dobri looked at the skies as well. He could swear that there was a cloud with cat's ears up there.
Strange.
"Once you are chosen for a cat, only death can do you part. In your case, your death," Harald clapped him gently on the shoulders and took his sack with his share of the bartered goods. "If you need us as guards one day, do come by our bridge. We would love to come with you again. In case Morty doesn't get you stepped on, that is."
Harald waved, Dobri gulped, and Morty let out a battle cry.
The gnome knew that he didn't have much time on his hands. With his meager winnings, he rushed to the stall where they were still grilling chicken wings, and he got himself an entire bag.
He knew that begging a cat for mercy was beneath him, but that didn't mean that he was not going to do it regardless.
The smell of the ritual sacrifice made Morty pause in his hissing. He sniffed the air, noted the bag, then turned back to the skies.
If Dobri knew even a bit of the cat language, he would have run for the hills.
But Dobri did not. He only had a bag with chicken wings which he had to give to his angry cat.
"Look, Morty," Dobri began, as he took out a single chicken wing. The kitten's nose sniffed the air once more out of instinct.
"I know that we are not the best of friends," Dobri continued, as he set the chicken wing in Morty's food bowl. Which was just a normal metal bowl Dobri had decided to give to the kitten. "But if you don't want the chicken wings, I'll eat them. I am not joking. Those who are angry end up with nothing!"
Morty let out one last hiss at the customer support agent from the Cat Distribution System, sealing Dobri's fate as a Maine Coon chew toy.
The kitten shook itself gently to get rid of the accumulated stress, then he walked to his bowl and began to eat.
Purring all the while.
"Oh! So, you like chicken wings! Good to know!" Dobri was going to leverage that bribe to get even more fur!
He had no idea why, but Morty had an inexhaustible supply of fur. So, as if it regrew by magic.
The kitten swished its tail back and forth.
It didn't want Dobri to be under the illusion that he was going to get away with it all.
Soon…
****
Dobri was in the driver's seat, getting the oxen to walk by Mirstone with minimal fuss. The guards yelled something at him, but he didn't really care much.
They had not prepared their bows, nor had they yelled at him that he had the right to remain silent.
Everything was just fine.
But what he didn't notice was that one of the wagon's wheels was making strange noises. So, as if it was barely supporting itself.
Something he would notice, the hard way, when said wheel broke in the middle of nowhere.
But as Dobri drove off towards Gildana's hut, hoping that the witch was drunk off her horse, Morty at his side, who was giving final thoughts and prayers for a better owner who won't wash him just to steal his fur, life was good.
The oxen were happy and rested. Dobri had money now and could buy some better wares for his next trip to the Black Market; the sun was shining.
Kitten and Gnome exchanged a look. Both were thinking about how to double-cross the other. Both making sweet faces at the other
"You will make me rich!" Dobri said finally, as he petted Morty on the head.
"The Maine Coon is coming," Morty would have said if he could speak.
Unfortunately for him, his complaint had been escalated to the wrong customer support team.
The Maine Coon was not coming.
He was just going to get a nice cat costume, and that was going to be that.