Claude grants himself a solid week to settle in to his new environment, to spend the warmest (as far as this winter goes, anyway) part of the day hunting and the colder parts either in the library or at the Oak & Iron, trying to make some sense of this strange little town.

Then he gives some solid thought to what he's going to do to get by while he's here. He'll need more resources than the bare minimum stipend, and he wants a place of his own-- living out of a tavern room makes all the paranoid parts of his brain flare up in protest.

Somewhat embarrassingly, he finds that his experience leading the Alliance and leading her armies didn't leave him with a lot of practical job experience. While he can certainly put his tactical and diplomatic skills to use, it's going to take some doing, some building up of social capital, before he can make his living that way again.

While the idea of picking up a new craft, maybe pottery-making or something, sounds interesting, he ends up passing by the apothecary and some of the familiar-looking instruments through the window remind him of his old hobby of poison-making. Well, how different could it really be? Same processes, just new ingredients and to a different end goal. The only difference between some medicines and poisons is dosage, anyway.

He gives his best charming smile to the woman in the shop as he enters. "Good afternoon. I don't suppose you'd be willing to take on some extra help around here?"