Doyle stood with his arms crossed as he watched the metalmancers get loaded into the cart.
To say that the metalmancers looked haggard would have been an understatement - all four of them were scrawny and underweight. Each one had sunken, dead eyes which one may have mistaken for the eyes of the corpse - the only thing that made it clear that they were alive was the fact that the attached bodies were in locomotion.
Their movements were slow and skittish. Anytime one of Doyle's men got close, they would recoil and look downward.
Doyle smirked at the sight. He shifted one of his hands downward to start absentmindedly rubbing one of his legs. He enjoyed the sight, feeling a sort of satisfaction that he was causing discomfort to the type that had hurt him so.
It was a fine line that had to be walked in keeping the metalmancers in check. If you fed them too well and let them rest too much, they might feel strong and brave enough to hurl the piece of steel that they were working on into your skull. If kept weak, they would be too feeble to do any sort of metalmancy and were as good as useless at that point. No, there was a "sweet" spot that let them have enough energy to perform low-level metalmancy tasks - for a few hours at least. Doyle's men had discovered that "sweet" spot over time, and it had only cost the lives of a few of the freaks.
Once the metalmancers were secured, one of the nearby dark clad soldiers, a sergeant in Markus's little private army, directed two other soldiers to carry a small chest over to lay at Doyle's feet.
Doyle scanned the area before moving. They were in the private courtyard of the temple that he had taken as his headquarters, surrounded by ancient stone walls and currently locked in behind a heavy wooden gate that Doyle recently had installed since the last one had rotted away. His men would be patrolling outside, so by all accounts this transaction should be safe, but in the life of a gang leader, one could never be too careful.
Doyle bent down to open the chest, revealing a pile of coins and gems. It was a great fortune, but it definitely wasn't near the amount that Markus had promised him.
The sergeant seemed to know what question Doyle was going to ask before he even asked it.
"It's one third," the black clad man said.
Doyle clenched his fist, and gritted his teeth. "One third!" He shouted.
The sergeant held up a hand, palm facing outward. "My boss said you will get the rest when you will complete the job."
"Complete the job?" Doyle began to rant. He held out his hands, motioning to the cart, causing the metalmancers inside to flinch. "My entire stock of these.... metalmancers are now in your care! What else does he want?"
If the sergeant was deterred by Doyle's outburst, he didn't show it.
"You promised that you would take care of something - has that been done already?" The sergeant inquired. His tone was somewhat haughty now, like he was pleased that he had successfully lured Doyle into a verbal trap.
Doyle paused, caught off guard. He had been so focused on recalling and prepping the metalmancers from throughout the city, that he had forgotten about his promise to Markus to take care of his rivals.
Still clenching his fists, he narrowed his eyes and stared straight at the guard. The sergeant was right about the job only being half-done and Doyle knew it, but after that outburst he needed to save face.
"No, but I've done half the job by giving you the metalmancers. I should get paid half now."
The sergeant looked around, seeming bored. He reached down and picked a piece of invisible lint off his armor while he waited for Doyle to finish speaking. Despite being in the epicenter of Doyle's power, he seemed confident that he and his men could take anything thrown at them.
"That's something you should've discussed with Markus."
Doyle moved as if to speak again, but the sergeant held up his hand to cut him off.
"However, my boss did anticipate your questions and has asked me to pass along this explanation."
Doyle crossed his arms again. Any leg pain that he had earlier from thinking about the metalmancers was now completely out of his mind.
"This better be good," Doyle said. "Well, get on with it then!"
That last part had been Doyle's attempt to regain some control over the conversation.
The sergeant clasped his hands behind his back and gave a grin. He started to pace around as he spoke, as if to intentionally be dramatic.
"Great, he's one of those." Doyle thought.
"Well, it's pretty simple actually." The sergeant began. "My boss believes that you've only done 1/3 of the job so far. If he believed you have done half, he would have paid you half."
Doyle raised an eyebrow at this, "Wait, you're telling me that taking out his rivals warrants 2/3rds of the pay?"
"Precisely," the Sergeant grinned.
**
Doyle watched the cart with the metalmancers roll out of his compound with Markus's men. He was about to turn to re-enter the temple when he felt a presence beside him.
"Zery," he acknowledged her.
"This is starting to stink," she said, wrinkling her nose for extra emphasis.
"Like yesterday's catch," he said. "I should have been suspicious by the amount of money that he said he was willing to spend on this.
He looked down to the chest, knowing that even if he didn't get the rest of the promised funds, he would be able to keep the gang afloat a long time - even with the loss of the income from the metalmancers.
"He has a good 20 men with him, and from what I can tell, they are all highly skilled." Zery said. "The question is, why hasn't he taken care of this problem by himself?"
Doyle thought back to the leg wounds that he had seen on some of the soldiers. "Unless he tried and failed..."
Another thought then. "It sure would be convenient if I were somehow taken out while trying to fix his little problem."
Zery cocked her head, "So, what do we do?"
Doyle gave a crooked smile. There was a reason why he had survived this long as a gang leader. He looked the part of a big and dumb thug, but dumb was one thing he wasn't.
"We do what we promised... for now."