Josie and Elaine looked at the bank. They looked up and down the street. People on

the street moved by them without interest.

“The building used for holding for the Montrose is over there,” said Josie. “We

brought the women down this street and Linus helped them out with rooms.”

“Did he?,” asked Elaine.

“I checked on them,” said Josie. “Jack made the deal, but Guin came through for us

on the first day. He might be a wheel locally here, but he is looking out for anything

stirring his pond.”

“The way you two work makes that the responsible thing,” said Elaine. “Jack hurt his

money gatherers and then made threats they weren’t sure he would carry out.”

“He would carry them out,” said Josie. She frowned at the Money Exchange. “He

likes to show that he is an easygoing goof that wouldn’t hurt a fly, but he was in the

army, and he was known in the neighborhood for doing things no one else would do.”

“Brave?,” said Elaine.

“I blame his sisters,” said Josie. “So the goal is we need to set up a fund for Jane, and

we need to look at whether this building can stop the watches. If it can, we need to

rethink our breaking in.”

“How are we going to do either of those?,” said Elaine.

“First, we need to take a look at the Exchange with Zatanna,” said Josie. “That will

show us something about the building itself.”

She stepped into an alley and transformed. She held up her hands. A book appeared

and wrote itself with everything that it could gather from the air. When it was done,

the book closed and became real.

She grabbed a brick from the ground. She concentrated and it became gold. She tested

it and it was real according to her magic. She frowned at the realization she could

tank the economy by producing gold bricks any time she wanted.

She switched back to normal.

“All right,” said Josie. “We have something to give to the Exchange to open the

account for Jane. Keep your eyes open, and watch the guards. Jack said the creep

factor inside was the size of a Labrador. It will probably go up once they see what

we’re using to set up Jane’s house of refugees.”

“I can see where they would want to know where you got a brick of gold like that,”

said Elaine. “I doubt they will believe that you conjured it.”

“Didn’t conjure it,” said Josie. “I transformed it. The brick came from where Jack

busted through the wall above us. I just made it gold instead of clay. If we have

problems, call Jack and let him hear what’s going on.”

“We could be dead by the time by the time he gets here,” said Elaine.

“Then we won’t have to see what happens when he starts using Blade on this crew,”

said Josie.

She already had seen what happened when the fifty blades of floating death had been

unleashed. She had no doubt that any staff would be chopped to pieces before they

could come up with a way to stop Jack.

She put the brick in her messenger bag. She nodded as she looked up and down the

street. The guards shifted as they noticed her, but they didn’t move from in front of

the bank building.

She led the way across the street, nodding at the guards. One opened the door for her

and Elaine to step inside the building. She crossed the room, hand gripping her watch.

She wanted to turn into the Human Bomb and see what happened when she turned the

persona loose.

Elaine touched her shoulder. That brought her down. She couldn’t risk her assistant

in the middle of all this.

“Yes, miss,” said the counter clerk. The eyes weren’t as blank as they had appeared

to be the first time she had been in the room with them. “How can I help you?”

“I came in with Jack Lee,” said Josie. “We opened an account with four sheets of gold

being converted to silver to spend.”

“I remember,” said the clerk. She glanced at Elaine. “Let me pull the ledger for you.”

She stepped away from the counter. She came back with a pass book. She opened it.

She looked down at the entries.

“I don’t see any activity on your account yet,” said the clerk.

“That’s why we’re here,” said Josie. “This is our assistant, Elaine Numera. We want

to give her access to the account, and set up a fund for a business we’re engaged in.”

“Is Mistress Numera going to need access to that too?,” asked the clerk.

“She is going to be managing it for us,” said Josie. “Also this business will need to

be able to write markers on the account to be paid from the Exchange.”

“Of course,” said the clerk. “Let me get another passbook. How much money will you

need to put in the new account?”

“This brick of gold,” said Josie. She pulled the rectangular cube out and dropped it

on the counter.

The clerk’s eyes went wide. She looked around.

“I’ll have to have this weighed so I can give you an accurate reading of how much the

Exchange can give you to start your account,” said the clerk.

“Go ahead,” said Josie. “Elaine and I can wait.”

She struggled to carry the gold away from the counter. She vanished into the back

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

room.

“This is where they come back and tell us they never saw the gold,” said Josie.

“I’m more worried about how the guards are looking at us,” said Elaine. “They all

have their hands on the cudgels on their belts.”

“If things go bad, drop and crawl away to cover,” said Josie. “I don’t want you to get

hurt.”

She glanced down, and nodded at Bulletgirl being uppermost on her watch face.

“Yes, Milady,” said Elaine.

The clerk came back without the gold. She pulled down an empty ledger and

paperwork to be filled out. She took a breath before looking at Josie and Elaine. She

knew something was wrong. Her face and eyes said it even she didn’t know what.

“I have been instructed that your bar of gold is worth one hundred thousand silvers,”

said the clerk. “I am going to need you to fill out the paperwork, and the name of your

business.”

“All right,” said Josie. “We need something that Jane will be comfortable with when

she writes the markers.”

“Jane’s House should be good,” said Elaine. “Jane is the actual manager of the

operation. Send notices for the markers to Hole in The Wall on Cot Road. I will

authorize payment as part of my duties.”

“End of the meridian?,” said the clerk.

“Yes,” said Elaine. “Who do I talk to in case of fraud?”

“Master Emer is the chief in charge of that,” said the clerk.

“Master Emer knows what will happen if there is fraud with these accounts?,” asked

Josie.

“There is a law of insurance in place,” said the clerk.

“I think what the lady is asking,” said Elaine. “Is does Master Emer know that if

anything happens to these accounts, that he will be held responsible in a way that the

law does not usually permit.”

“Yes,” said Josie. “That was exactly what I was asking. Some of this money is going

into the Silver Coin and other enterprises. If it suddenly disappeared, Master Guin

will want to have words with Master Emer.”

She made a throat cutting motion with her thumb.

“I will be glad to tell him,” said the clerk.

“Thank you,” said Josie. “That is a relief.”

They filled out the paperwork, and asked for a book of cheques for Jane. The clerk

kept an eye on them like they were exotic animals ready to attack. An authentication

seal went with the rest of the things so when Jane wrote a marker, she had to put the

mark on the bottom of the page to make sure the payments would be passed on.

“Thank you for your help,” said Josie. “If there is a problem, send it around for Elaine

to look at it. My partner and I will let her use the money as she sees fit.”

“Understood,” said the clerk. “Will this Jane come in draw from the account?”

“I don’t think so,” said Josie. “I will talk with her. If she has to come in, I will have

a letter of authorization written out for her.”

“Thank you,” said the clerk. She put both ledgers away after filling out the entries.

“Thank you for you help,” said Josie. “We will be by if our operation moves out of

Hawk Ridge to let you know how we want things done.”

“Yes, madam,” said the clerk.

The ladies retreated from the counter. They headed for the door. The guards stepped

out of the way so they could leave. Josie smiled at them. They took a further step

back. One opened the door for them to leave.

Josie led the way out in the street and turned toward the Corle mansion. She kept her

hand on her watch as she eyed the people on the street with them.

“We’re being followed,” said Elaine. “From the Exchange, perhaps?”

“Probably,” said Josie. “After all, we just handed over a brick of gold worth more

than the price they were giving us. They might want to know if we have more.”

“They also have Jack’s Makeover,” said Elaine. “Why does he call it that?”

“Where we’re from women and men want to make themselves look better to attract

partners,” said Josie. She walked into the next alley she saw. “They get professionals

to go over how they look and improve what they can.”

“Hence a makeover,” said Elaine. “Irony?”

“I assume so,” said Josie. She pointed her assistant to a place behind a trashcan where

she could duck down and hide for the next few seconds. “I think this is far enough

away from the Exchange I can get rid of the bodies without any problems.”

“I left my crossbow,” said Elaine.

“Don’t worry about that,” said Josie. “Keep an eye out in case there are more than

two.”

“Yes, Milady,” said Elaine.

The two bank guards paused at the entrance of the alley. They looked down the street

after not seeing Elaine with Josie.

“What do you two want?,” asked Josie. She had her hand on the watch. It was

charged enough for her to deal with two guys in leather suits.

“We want the rest of the gold,” said the guard on the left. “And we think you’ll give

that to us.”

“You don’t know who I am, do you?,” asked Josie. “You think you are going to scare

me into giving you some gold when I have taken a vow to kill everyone in your

organization? What do you think is going to happen to the two of you? The moment

you started following me around was the moment you decided to die.”

“That’s some big talk,” said the guard on the left. It looked like he had talked his

buddy into trying to rob customers of the Exchange, and things weren’t going as well

as he liked and he was regretting it.

“Bulletgirl,” said Josie, touching her watch. Her persona took over, converting her

body into roving marbles rotating around central axis to mimic a human body. The

guards realized they were in a lot of trouble and started to run from the alley. She

pointed her fingers and the cracks of the sound barrier followed as the two men fell

with holes in their legs. “I can’t let you live now.”

She walked to where they were trying to pull themselves along. She put two more

bullets into them. She stepped back into the alley and let the persona go.

“Let’s go, Elaine,” said Josie. She waved at her assistant. “Let’s get out of here before

more of them show up. I don’t want to fight with you here.”

“That was something,” said Elaine. “How long do you think it will take before they

realize they are missing guards?”

“I have no idea,” said Josie. She continued down the alley.

“I wonder how many others will try to visit us,” said Elaine.

“I might have overplayed the gold,” said Josie. “Let’s talk to Jane about her account

and management. If the Exchange comes down to the Hole in the Wall, I will have

to make sure they have a warm welcome.”

“I found it interesting that Master Guin’s name didn’t reach those guards,” said

Elaine. “I doubt that he is so unknown in the city that common thieves don’t know

who he is.”

“They weren’t the outside guards, were they?,” asked Josie. She stepped out on the

next street. She started back toward the bank building, peering down the alleys as

they passed. She paused when she had a view of the Exchange. “The two outside

guards are still there. The one has a distinctive scar on his face.”

“So the two dead guards came from inside the building,” said Elaine.

“You want to find out who sent them,” said Josie. “I can see it in your eyes.”

“If they traffic women, they might not be above trying to steal from them first,” said

Elaine.

“I think we should talk to Jane first, and then we should turn Jack loose on these

people,” said Josie. “I think that he is better at the questioning part than I am.”

“We should let the girls know that the Exchange knows where we live,” said Elaine.

“You’re right,” said Josie. “I wonder how long it will take before the guards are

missed. I think they should have returned by now.”

“We did leave their bodies where they could be found,” said Elaine. “Anyone from

the Exchange that looks around will find them soon enough.”

Josie started by calling the girls and letting them know to keep an eye out for anyone

in the neighborhood. She hoped they had learned their lessons with Harp well.

She called Jane to let her know they were coming by the manor. Paperwork and the

seal had to be handed over so the markers could be written for supplies. Jane agreed

with that.

She called Jack last to let him know what had happened.

He made sure he had the name of the fraud chief down before he told her he would

look around.

Josie and Elaine walked to their destination with eyes out for anyone else who might

want to rob them.