Your current liquid funds, if converted from Imperial and Kislevite coinage to Dwarven, comes in at a little over 2,200 gold coins, which came from various windfalls and if exhausted would take half a decade of frugality to replace. It is just capable of repaying the 2,000 crowns of the debt you now owe to Gotrek's widow. You'd found, to your surprise, that she'd ended up in Karak Eight Peaks, but instead of moving in to Karag Rhyn she'd joined the small community of Imperial Dwarves that have made a home in Karag Nar. This raises an interesting possibility, as with most of the economy of Karag Nar dominated by the EIC, there is what might be thought of as a more elegant way to repay the debt - credit her with that sum at EIC-backed establishments and allow it to disappear into the ledgers as just another operating expense. This could be classified as a form of embezzlement, but could also be classified as a good way to strengthen the EIC's good name and to gain influence over an unexpected but influential minority among Karag Nar's community. And besides, two thousand crowns in retail credit will cost the EIC significant less than that in wholesale acquisitions.
Or you could abrogate the matter altogether, let them know that a debt you owed has been passed to them and let them decide how to use it. The ephemeral economy of boons is one very familiar to the Dwarves, and there could be services you could do for the two of them that money could not buy.
Or you could just... keep the gold. You did remind Borek about it when you could have not done that, but perhaps part of you thought he'd just wave it off and then you'd have done the right thing for free. And Borek is doing his best to die on the other side of the continent, he's not going to be dropping by to audit you.
Is this what we have become? one corner of your mind asks. Robbing the widow of a comrade in arms?
This is what we have always been, another counters. We have done worse to achieve a fraction of the good that much gold could accomplish, and will do so again.
To at least consider it is what we seek to be, a third muses. A Grey Wizard weighs all possibilities, not just the nice ones.
You absently push a gold coin around the table, your attention turned inwards as you observe in fascination as parts of your mind war against each other.
Typical Celestial. The most annoying thing about them isn't that they speak in nothing but riddles, but that these riddles should always be paid attention.
