Michael

Michael was deep in concentration, trying to visualize the spell, and then spoke the invocation, "Lord Idas, blind my enemies with your light. Blinding Light!"

Nothing happened, the same as the hundreds of times he had tried before. He shook his head frustrated; he had no idea why his incantations weren't working. He had no problems with instinctual magic but the moment he tried something more complex with an invocation, it never worked. Sola had told him that making the connection between an invocation and the spell could take a lot of time and he shouldn't be disheartened by his lack of progress, but he had seen the doubt and concern in her eyes. For the past year, he had tried to get into more advanced magic, but he had hit a wall and didn't know how to overcome it. Blinding Light was one of the easiest spells in the church's catalog, creating a gleaming orb that would hover in the air and flood everything around it with light, but he couldn't even get this spell to work.

His thoughts wandered away from his constant failure to the red book, he had found yesterday, currently hanging over his shoulder in a bag. He wasn't quite sure what it was but there had to be a reason why someone put it in his room. He sighed and leaned against the wall outside of the town watch garrison. He was waiting for Pollok to come out, Michael had gotten there early so the plump man wasn't there already.

A group of watchmen ran out of the gate and into the town. These were not the first to be in a hurry, something must have happened, Michael thought. Finally, Pollok exited the gate looking around until he spotted Michael and Geron and waddled over to them. "Greetings, milord."

"Hello. What is going on, the watch seems to be in quite a hurry today," Michael asked without hesitation. The man looked miserable, pale as a corpse, and with rings under his eyes, something truly horrible must have happened. "You were right about the problem that could come off the thievery, a very valuable item was stolen from an influential citizen and now half the watch is out searching," the sergeant explained, he had lost his sly tone and sounded genuinely afraid.

"What was it that was stolen and from whom," Michael asked with interest, he was wondering who could make the man look so spooked.

He took a moment to answer, probably thinking about if he should share this information, but finally, he spilled it, "The owner of the Red Lady Fredrick, or Red Fredrick as some call him. He is a very influential and rich man in town, and he got a red book stolen, he said it was very important for his business, and he even put a reward of 3000 Ruan for anyone that returned it."

Michael grabbed onto the bag more tightly, he suddenly had a really good idea what this book was and his mind raced. 3000 Ruan is a lot of money for anyone in town, except maybe the nobles, this book must be either really vital for his trade or very volatile. "Are you alright, milord?" Pollok's words ripped him out of his thoughts, he hadn't noticed that the man had watched him, so he quickly answered, "Yes, sergeant, I am alright. I was just lost in thought. My father gave me the task to get to the bottom of the thievery before it swamped the merchant district, but it seems I have started too late."

The man nodded and Michael was glad that he seemed to believe his lie. "It seems you have an important matter in your hands, sergeant. I will return home today; you have better things to do than take care of curious me. We can postpone this until you have solved this case, but you will have to prepare to tell me the story of how you did it," Michael smiled at the watchman, knowing fully well that they would never find the book. He then deflected the polite protests of the man and sent him on his way.

As they watched him return to the barracks Michael said to Geron, "I think we got a blessing from Idas." Geron frowned at him in confusion while he grinned like a child who just got a pot of candy.

- one and a half hours later in Harald's smithy -

They were sitting in a small room in Harald's house next to the shop, that the smith had freed up as a future accounting room, present were only Solon, Geron, and Michael. Michael had just finished telling Solon about what Pollok had said about the stolen book and its importance. With a smile, he grabbed the book out of the bag and said, "I would assume they mean this book."

Geron's and Solon's eyes widen, and they start talking at the same time, "How did you get that?"

"I found it on the ground in my room, it seems someone wants to help."

Geron frowned and said, "Or blame you for the theft." Michael blinked, oh right, that could be it as well. Geron seemingly guessing what he thought looked at him with disbelief, "You haven't thought about that they might have come behind what you are doing and tried to frame you to get you to stop?"

Michael rubbed his neck and laughed nervously, then he said, "Might have not thought that one through but we should at least check what it is before making any guesses. I am sure this has something incriminating in it."

Solon agreed and Michael opened the book on the table for everyone to see, "I have skimmed through it a little and every page is filled with names and numbers, also I found Sergeant Pollok's name here." He showed them the page and Geron pointed out another two names that he recognized.

"I know what that is," Solon said with a victorious smile. "This is a ledger containing bribes, it's the only explanation, if it is real this will be a great help for us, and with the reaction from the town watch and Fredrick, we can assume it is."

"You mean we have a list of who in town is being paid off?"

"Exactly and at the same time it is proof against Fredrick as well, as bribing officials is indeed a crime." Michael got infected by the smile of the dwarf and grinned again like at the garrison, whoever dropped this book in his room deserved a commemoration.

Geron looked less enthusiastic, "This seems a little too easy, don't you think? A conveniently extensive ledger serving as proof and at the same time helping us identify everyone involved?" Michael thought about it, it could be a trap but how would they know what we were doing? Following us and listening to us on the street? That was dumb but we talked very quietly and enhanced our hearing, so there is no way that anyone could have heard us from further away, right?

"We might want to look into it further before doing anything, confirming this list would be our first priority," he decided for now. He could hear a quiet bump that he would have missed if his senses weren't pushed to the maximum and whirled around to where the sound came from. Geron was already back on his feet and sprinted outside.

"What is it," Solon asked with a frown, following his gaze.

"There was a sound, someone might have listened," Michael said while also hurrying outside.

They couldn't find anyone to Michael's confusion. Lina was at the market and Harald and his son were in the smithy. They returned to the room shortly after. "We might be a little jumpy right now," Geron concluded.

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"So how are we going to confirm this list," Michael got back to the subject at hand.

"You two go through the list and try to identify as many people as possible, I will look at the calculations and see if I can find any mistakes or similar that would suggest it being fake," Solon suggested. Geron nodded and then said, "We should probably visit the home of some of these people, who should have little money, and see if they live over their monetary situation. Talking to friends and neighbors would probably also be a good idea but we would need to be more careful there."

They worked through the book and Michael was shocked at how many nobles and watchmen were in the book, Geron had become very quiet after he found a couple of knights as well.

"I can't see a reason anyone would fake a book like this, incriminating so many powerful people," Michael said while shaking his head. Solon shook his head and added, "This is a well-structured ledger, the ink on the earlier pages is a lot older than on the newer ones, if someone forged this, they would have either needed to use some tricks or started this years ago. I can't find any clue on this book not being real either."

Geron finally said with a dangerous tone, "I have a good idea how to confirm this."

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Geron

Geron had left his ward in the smithy and had made his way toward the castle. He knew exactly where to go and quickly found the person he was looking for, Sir Trenton, the guardian knight of Lord Oska. He had always been a rather jumpy fellow, so a prime target, Geron had never understood how a man like this could become a knight, but he had to admit that Trenton was a respectable swordsman once he got his nerves under control.

He was currently sitting alone in the dining hall, eating his lunch with a stressed expression. Geron approached the man from behind and placed his hand on his shoulder, leaning over him and growling, "Hello there Trenton, we are gonna have a little talk." Trenton was startled by him and jumped a little but was held in place by Geron's hand. He winced and asked with a nervous smile, "What is it, Geron?"

"Come on we are going somewhere more private," with these words he grabbed the knight and pulled him off the bench, making use of his larger physique. He ignored the complaints and pushed Trenton towards his room, after they got in, he slammed the door of the small room shut and fixated on the other knight, who was visibly uncomfortable.

"You can't do this, I am a knight as well," he protested again this time with more vigor, and tried to push past Geron who blocked him with a hand on his chest. "I wonder how long you will still be one."

Trenton looked at him with wide eyes, normally he was a little jumpy but not a coward but right now fear surrounded him. Geron was pretty sure he didn't even have to get a single word out of the other knight to know the truth.

"What are you talking about," Trenton asked him while his eyes shot around the room looking for an escape. Geron tried to look as intimidating as possible, which came easily with the fire of anger burning in his chest. "If I tell Lord Rowan that you take bribes, what do you think how long it will take for you to be thrown out of here?" Pure panic came over Trenton's face and he began to stutter, "I-I d-don't know what you are t-talking about."

"Oh really, a little book says something else."

Trenton fell on a chair and finally resigned, "You stole it?" He clamped his hands in front of his face before he continued, "I couldn't refuse, my family needed the money and I don't get enough from being a knight, please I beg you don't tell on me."

"How did he approach you?"

"I came to him for a loan, and he offered to pay me for some assistance."

"What kind of assistance," Geron asked in a neutral tone.

"I introduced a couple of people and intimidated others for Fredrick," the knight looked a little relieved to finally have it off his chest.

"Who else is in his pocket?"

"I don't know much but when Fredrick called us in to send us on the search for the book, he said that all of us are in there and we would all be fucked if it gets in the wrong hands." He rattled down a couple of names that he knew of, they overlapped with the names in the book Geron had seen. He now just needed to make sure Trenton would not tell anyone about their conversation, good thing that he already had made a plan for this.

"I knew you would break," Geron said with a disdainful look. "I told Fredrick if someone does, it would be you."

Trenton looked at him with confusion, "What?"

"You just told me everything, without ever checking if I had any information or was just fishing, with the book stolen, we can't risk you opening your mouth like that," Geron said while closing in on the knight.

"You are one of Fredrick's men?" Trenton looked like he was dreaming, not understanding the situation at all.

"Yes, and you are a liability right now. You have two choices you either pretend you are sick and stay in your room for a couple of days while we find the damn ledger or we will go on a small patrol," Geron's voice had dropped down to a threatening growl, and it showed its effectiveness immediately as the other knight got pale as a ghost.

"You can't ...," he gritted his teeth and tried to keep his composure.

"Good, you are a natural at looking sick, remember if I hear that you have talked to anyone, you will not be the only one that is going to have to carry the consequences, now get out." The knight quickly left the room and Geron was confident he wouldn't talk, at least not unprovoked, it would be really bad for their investigation if he did.

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Michael

"Concentrate Michael. We have to wait for Geron anyway so we can at least get some work done," Solon reprimanded Michael. They were planning the repair and reorganization of the smithy, but Michael's thoughts were continually drawn toward the book. He rubbed his eyes and tried to concentrate more when the door swung open and Geron stepped in.

Solon leaned back waiting for him to speak while Michael stood up too tense to sit right now. Geron nodded slowly, "The book is real." He sat down heavily and looked like he was seething under the surface, Michael could understand him. For him becoming a knight of House Rowan was the biggest honor and the best thing that ever happened to him, to see others kick that oath with their feet must have been hard on him.

"So, what now," Michael asked the group looking from one to the other.

"We should inform your father of everything we have found," Solon suggested. "He will take care of things."

"I said I would take care of it; I won't run to him to finish what I started. It would also be risky to involve my father because he is always under pressure from the nobles and with some nobles in here," - he tapped on the book - "they would want to bury it. I do not intend to put Father in this position and rather take care of it without making it a political nightmare." Michael didn't want to hand it off to someone else, the whole thing went through much faster than he had anticipated, thanks to their secret benefactor but he still wanted to see it through to the end.

Geron interjected with his proposal, "Then the next option will require us to muster enough force to take care of it, we need to get Commander Johnson on our side, he isn't in the book but there is always a small chance that he is in on it anyway. It would also be very beneficial to get a couple of knights to participate. I can get four knights that I trust with my life, I am sure they will happily join a raid if I explain the situation."

Michael nodded, that could work. "Good we will have to go to Commander Johnson then and you can talk to the knights later, we need to do this as fast as possible to prevent anything from leaking and give them time to react. Solon, I am afraid I will have to cut our planning session short."

The dwarf smiled proudly at the boy, "That is alright."

- half an hour later in watch commander Johnson's office -

Johnson walked towards his desk, Michael and Geron right behind him, and said, "Can this not wait till tomorrow, I have a lot of work to do." Michael said nothing until the commander had sat down, he signaled Geron who locked the door and threw the red book on the table.

Johnson first looked with confusion towards Geron locking the door and then with widening eyes at the red book. "Is that the stolen book we were searching for? How do you come to be in its possession?"

"Open it," Michael said without further explanation. The man frowned and reached for it, after skimming over the contents of the book, his frown only deepened. "What is this?"

Michael sat down and leaned back before starting to explain, "This is Red Fredrick's bribery ledger. It contains all the people he has bribed in the town and how much, it also contains at least a dozen names belonging to members of the town watch."

Johnson's gaze fixated on the book as he frantically turned the pages, after a minute he leaned back with a tired sigh. "Son of a ... It seems I have failed in my duty, I had absolutely no idea. 12 years I have done this job already, I hated every moment of it, but I wanted to be useful and provide for my family. I should have resigned a long time ago and now I have brought shame over myself."

Michael watched the man, it was true, he never seemed happy and was always tired. Father had always put much value on the man as he was a friend of his mentor, so Michael was inclined to believe him that he didn't know. Michael wanted to say something but before he had the chance the old man growled with fire in his eyes, "I would love to go out there and rip their limbs off myself, but I reckon you have a plan."

Michael grinned, he liked the man way more like this than his tired, buried by bureaucracy, kind of attitude, so he began to explain.