The goddess decided to be merciful and spared him an extra trip to Kakariko, as the general store- as that was what it turned out to be -had blank books for sale. He wasn't sure if that was part of their normal inventory, but like hell was he going to protest.
He almost walked out with just that, done for the day, stop in and say hi to Riju and return the Thunder Helm (and pass along Zelda's message, he'd almost forgotten about that), and finally go home, when he spotted what looked like a pocket charm in the shape of a Silent Princess, on a display table on his way out the door. Closer inspection revealed it was a hair clip, looked like an old antique that the shopkeeper had possibly just had sitting around forever and got sick of trying to sell at a respectable price.
He recognized quality enough when he saw it to know that the ten rupees the shop keep charged him was a gross undervaluing. He outright offered her more on the principle of both that rupee hoarding problem he clearly had, and that she was getting robbed with that ten rupees.
She seemed surprised, but honestly, the Gerudo were well-known for their metal working, all she had to do was take that to Isha and the other owner to get it appraised and know that she should charge way more than ten rupees. He wasn't an expert, but he could tell that was bronze, had seen more than enough statues back in Castle Town and the castle itself of heroes and queens from so far back that nobody could even remember the time the people had lived in. 'Some thousands of years ago' was the best anyone could tell, and the statues had all been in good condition. No amount of polishing and upkeep would keep a metal from corroding eventually, and while one could never describe those statues as 'pristine,' they didn't look like they were as old as they were known to be.
A piece of jewelry didn't have to have traditional gemstones to worth their weight in gold. That bronze was far to old to not have achieved 'antique' status, which added a historical value to it.
Not about to rip the woman off, he offered fifty times her asking rate, told her that he'd even take it to Isha to make sure he hadn't underpaid her, though she declined that part, was more than happy with the five hundred rupees.
Well, not completely rip her off. Given that the Silent Princess was a favorite flower of the royal daughters for several generations before Zelda, for all he knew, that had been hers, or had belonged to one of her ancestresses, and it'd just been looted from the castle sometime after Zelda contained Ganon's power enough to shut down the Guardians and make it semi-safe to go in.
If that was the case, that hair clip was worth a lot more than five hundred rupees. But if he said anything that would hint it might have been a royal treasure, she might not have been willing to sell it at all.
There. Now he was done shopping.
Time to go see Riju.
He was sure she was going to wonder what on earth he was doing this time, trudging into her throne room with three shopping bags, one entirely too big for his tastes, the Slate on backwards, without an army-worthy arsenal on his back, and what two weapons he had on his lower back like a Gerudo and not strapped over his shoulder like he preferred. Never before had he gone in there taking this big of an extra mile to pass as a woman.
And wearing makeup.
Before she could say anything, he immediately pointed at her. "Not. A word. One of your merchants insisted on putting this stuff on me."