Complications

Chapter 131

Elim was up with the sun, having let Sven and Agustus into the manor in the evening after he dealt with Oisen. A situation that had quite nearly gotten out of hand as Tanner had wanted to kill the man on the spot. Instead, he was manacled and locked in the root cellar.

“You really don’t want to give justice yet?” Tanner asked over breakfast. Elim was taking it in the office while he went over records.

“He's a witness to a conspiracy. He’ll hang for trying to poison me, but not before he testifies,” Elim explained.

“Even if he agrees to, will it matter? One servant’s word against a baronet?” Tanner asked, understandably confused.

“Oh, believe me, Earl Savex won’t mind. I’ve seen a Baron hanged on the word of a scullery maid,” Elim said with a chuckle. That was a fond memory for him from early on in the tax escort mission that ultimately brought him to 42’s valley. The man had been treating his servants atrociously and the poor girl had heard gossip he was evading import taxes and reported it.

Elim had no idea how but the Earl had ways of telling if someone was lying. It was one of the reasons that the lesser nobles closer to him geographically tended to be extremely careful. If they ended up questioned there wasn’t any telling what misdeeds might be brought to light under questioning.

“Besides, I’m seeing a good case for it happening even without that, unless I’ve overlooked where the more recent tax records are somehow,” Elim added. The tax records starting two years after Elim’s grandfather died were missing. A truly odd thing to happen since they weren’t valuable. Nobody would normally bother protecting them. Ledgers were normally the thing people guarded as they might reveal a past or ongoing crime.

When Tanner had been out of the room Elim had put everything into the inventory, including the locked safe with a missing key. One of 42’s monsters had sorted that out in a couple of minutes. Unless things had been hidden, he had all of the significant documents already. He’d even double-checked the office's small library, in case they’d been misshelved, to no avail.

“That's because the collectors didn’t come ‘round. At least not like they should have. Occasionally they’d come ‘round and ask for timber or something, but that was all and they didn’t issue receipts,” Tanner said.

“That's odd, the local Viscount would be in charge of that,” Elim said, unamused. Having escorted the tax collectors he knew a bit more about the subject than the average soldier. An estate was an estate. With the baronet dead, the next noble up would have handled collection, which was the local viscount. Trade wasn’t accepted for tax payment, the estate should have been informed of the amount and given time to sell timber to meet the requirement rather than the viscount accepting goods in trade. It made transitions easier to track for the Earl.

“Well, problems for later. I want to meet Oisen’s wife and the other serfs before I head into town,” Elim said. He had a list of things to address and daylight was burning. He was halfway to the office door when he realized Tanner wasn’t following him.

“That's only in name. A serf can't… please don’t be hard on her for what he’s done,” Tanner said, stumbling. Elim took a moment to process what he’d heard. He’d forgotten but a Serf couldn’t marry without express permission of the land owner.

“Worst I’ll do is ask her a couple of questions,” Elim said flatly. He understood why Tanner was worried but wasn’t about to explain himself further, no more than he would take offense. The only real way to prove himself in this case was simply to do as he said he would.

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The walk to the small cluster of houses the serfs used took a little while since it was past the servants' quarters. It had been omitted from the prior day's tour, but so had the servants’ quarters outside of a passing mention as they walked by. He was curious if Karl was trying to be polite to the residents or something else.

Elim hadn’t been expecting anything fancy and the earth berm houses weren’t, but they were reasonably weatherproof. Nobody was likely to die in winter and there was a well. One he dropped a purification stone into on principle. He always kept a couple of them in a pocket, paranoia born of watching more than one body of water he considered clean turn out to be anything but.

The scent of burning sage caught Elim first. To him, that was the scent of sickness, as the ill often burned it in hopes of clearing the air of whatever had made them ill.

“How long have these people been ill?” Elim asked.

“Ill? They-” Tanner looked genuinely confused as he stopped. Somewhere nearby there was a sound of a man heaving.

“Go back to the main estate, check everyone,” Elim said.

“For what?” Tanner asked, voice betraying a bit of fear. Elim plastered on a smile and clapped the older man on the shoulder.

“Anything, it's probably just a cold, but no sense in letting it get out of hand. Anyone who's even a little sick goes on rest and everyone else puts on a kettle of soup. I’ll look around here myself because I’ve already had the worst the season had to offer,” Elim said like the prior tension hadn’t existed.

“Really?” Tanner asked.

“What else is there to do? It's what we do for our neighbors in Selton, what they did for my ma’ when she caught blue veins,” Elim offered.

“Right, that's a good way to handle it,” Tanner said, looking relieved.

“Did that pass through here by the way? Blue veins? Came through with the cold this year,” Elim asked.

“A few months back, yeah. Nearly killed Karl but he pulled through, the rest of us only got the cold,” Tanner explained.

“Lucky then,” Elim said, smiling still. “Have some blankets cleaned and soup made up for these folks too.”

“I will, you're a good lad Elim,” Tanner said with a relieved smile.

“Thank you kindly… How many people live here anyway? Just to make sure I check in on everyone,” Elim asked.

“Just ten with the kids,” Tanner said. Elim’s heart was in his boots at that, but Tanner was already turning to leave thankfully. Elim was already texting 42.

Mistress,

I think there might be full-blown bloody mana fever here. Someone caught blue veins a few months back and the others got sick but not that. Will the potion work still and may I please have enough to treat everyone?

Your Servant,

Elim Grey

Elim didn’t have to wait long and with the reply text came a glut of potion bottles into the inventory. That was a blunt answer in its own right. 42 would help and going by the lack of a contract window it wasn’t going to cost him anything extra.

Elim,

That probably is what's happening. Not sure if the potion will work once it reaches the critical stage but you can't get it so go ahead and try giving it to them. I’ve put a bunch in the inventory,

-42

Elim heard the wailing of an infant and instinctively looked toward the sound. He didn’t know if he had a cure in hand or not, but it was more than anyone else would have been able to do. Something available to him only because of 42.

It wasn’t easy to trust the strange dungeon master, but Elim believed that she’d at least abide by any agreements made, both in spirit and word. He paused long enough to write a reply before heading in the direction of the crying, he needed to get to work.

Mistress,

Can my family come stay with you?

Regards,

Elim