The Bygone Caper (The Greater Lands Saga Book 4)

A guy could get used to this.

Fel snapped the reins of the wagon and leaned back with a grin. A “normal” day for the workhorse of the Masker clan was a frustratingly difficult thing to define. His job description included tasks as mundane as hauling silverware back and forth from the family shop for polishing to tasks as absurd as raiding a dragon’s hoard for missing components. There honestly weren’t many things that he’d feel confident crossing off a list of potential tasks his family might assign to him. But today he’d had the pleasure of doing a good old-fashioned vault dive.

Raiding a Bygone Era trove was a bit like eating an apple. In the beginning it was all about taking the biggest, juiciest bites. But as the pickings started to get slimmer, he found himself going over portions he thought he was done with in order to nibble at previously disregarded morsels. All the vaults within three days’ travel of Beffshire had been picked clean, or such was the popular wisdom. But when there was nothing else worthwhile to occupy Fel’s time (and when he was out of money to gamble away at the grum table), a quick trip to one of those scoured-out old vaults always seemed to turn up enough antiques and contraptions to keep the shelves stocked and the bills paid.

Perhaps the best indication that both he and his family felt as though this trip to a musty old vault just a few hours from home would be worth the time and effort was the presence of the full cargo wagon and a proper horse. Much as he enjoyed having the little family cart and his goat-size and impressively strong lesser unicorn Parch towing it, one could only fit so much in its limited bed, whereas the wagon could be heaped with enough goods to keep the shop busy for weeks. And right now, it was groaning under the weight of his haul.

“We’re going to have to start paying visits to all the old haunts, now that it turns out you have a nose for goodies,” Fel said as Parch hopped down from the pile of goods and