You have to realise that my family was originally upper caste Nothering. Everyone has to obey the head of the household who in our case is my father. You learn that from the day you are born, along with your importance in life.

When father learnt about the construction of the boardway he was more than curious. He had already used one of Over-master Andern’s ideas to make himself wealthy and he didn’t want to miss out on another opportunity. I think also that father’s contact in Nothering could see more possibilities. Either way, through his own greed or through instructions he wanted to know more.

Unfortunately he had already alienated Andern. He had stolen the idea along with the three men that Andern had trained. It was clear that he wasn’t going to be able to find out anything directly. It was only when the call went out for students to attend the keep that he sensed an opportunity. He sent me there with the instruction to learn everything and to pass all the details along to one of his agents.

I met with an agent in the woods once every few months and passed everything I had learnt about impressing along to him. I didn’t really understand what was happening in the classes so I don’t think my information was as good as they wanted.

Before I went to the keep Andern won a small victory over father. He hired two of the three impressors father had working for him and they became masters at the keep. The person who stayed with father was the least able. He can impress but he doesn’t really know what he does either. It meant father was stuck with no way to get any more impressors. He couldn’t hire any, as those who were working elsewhere wanted nothing to do with him. He couldn’t train any, as his one impressor wasn’t up to the task.

It all began to get a bit worrying for me in the last year at the keep. I was going in to the woods to meet with the agent. I had to go there for a few days because he was late. I don’t know why. Anyway, when I went to meet him one day he had been killed.

I knew who had killed him. At the time I was seeing Strawn. He was always very possessive and he had a terrible temper. He accused me of seeing another man when I left him to go into the woods. I told him he was daft to think so. He must have followed me one of the times and found our meeting place. I guess he killed the agent only a few minutes before I found the body. It was still warm when I got there.

I didn’t know what to do. I dragged the body into the brackens hoping to hide it. I didn’t do a very good job. I was in a rush because I had to get back to the village inn before anyone knew I was missing. When I came back the next evening the body was gone. I didn’t know where but I got out of there as soon as I could.

When I heard the body had been found I knew that I had to distract people. It was Strawn who gave me the idea. I don’t know what I saw in him; all he ever talked about was murderball. So I thought if there was a big murderball match then everyone would talk about that and the body would be forgotten.

I knew one of the maids at the keep. She was having an affair with the mayor of Asgril and could twist him round her little finger. I suggested to her that it would raise his prestige if he were to instigate a murderball match between the keep and the villagers. She latched on to the idea straight away, hardly needed any prompting at all.

Anyway that worked a treat. The mayor initiated the match, everyone started talking about it and the body was forgotten. Everything was going just fine until one of the villagers started having a go at keep students. They nearly cancelled the match and I had to force the maid to make the mayor insist the match went ahead. I threatened to expose them to his wife. It worked.

I wanted to be rid of Strawn. He could have told someone that the agent was meeting me. I told one of the village boys that he had been mouthing off about them and in particular about the one villager who was bigger and stronger than him. It almost worked; the boy pulled a knife on him during the match but Strawn was only slightly injured. When we won the match I had to act like he was my big hero.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

I still hadn’t found a way to get rid of Strawn but when we were travelling here to visit the boardways I saw another chance. For some reason he wanted to try his hand at gambling and I urged him into the game on board the boat. I also let the other gamblers know that he was fairly wealthy and could afford to lose quite a bit of money. Their greed was all I needed and I just sat back and watched whilst they cheated him out of his money.

I knew he would get angry but I hadn’t realised that he was stupid enough to pull a knife on someone in full view of everyone. Unfortunately no one was hurt, so they only took him away for a week but it gave me the chance to do the things I wanted.

I needed him out of the way. I hadn’t been able to pass on any information since the agent had been killed and I needed to let my father know what had happened. Fortunately I saw someone who worked for him at the boardway site and he told me whom to contact at the Black Lion. All I had to do was meet him there.

Bethel interrupted her story. “Who was the person at the site?”

“Oh, he was caught trying to steal papers about six months ago. That was when they put a guard on the gate.” She continued with her tale.

I got quite a lot of information from that trip. I talked one of Strawn’s cronies into doing some drawings for me and when the masters let us wander around town I had the opportunity to pass on what I had learnt.

Of course I had to lose Elsebeth for a while. It was easy. We visited her family on the first night as you know and so on the second night we went where I wanted which was the Black Lion.

I managed to lose her in the crowd near the end of the night. We had already agreed to meet up outside the house if we separated so I had enough time to meet with this new contact and give him everything I had and let him know about the agent dying.

By this time I knew that I was never going to be an impressor. I just didn’t have the aptitude for it. So by the end of the year I assumed I was going to have to finish at the keep and probably go back to father.

It was Andern who got me a job with the boardways. I don’t know why. When it came to leaving the keep he suggested that I talk to Tarim about an administration job and I grasped the opportunity.

To start with, I didn’t have much to do with the workings at the site. I was in with the group that administered the money. Now I was good at sorting out paperwork but I have never had much success at handling numbers so I made a few mistakes and they were looking to get rid of me. At the same time over-engineer Tarim was getting swamped by his paperwork so my supervisor suggested that I help him. Although they did it to suit themselves it couldn’t have been better for me.

I had access to virtually all the papers that crossed Tarim’s desk. I filed all the latest plans on the design of different carriages and boardway junctions. I had to make notes at the planning meetings. I even dealt with most of the correspondence from the palace. The only thing I didn’t know about were any meetings he had at the palace and generally I could find out the information.

About half a year ago I was told that Nothering needed an impressor who could train some of their people. Now there wasn’t much chance of getting any of the masters from the keep and so it was decided that the best chance was to get someone from the works over in Esteril. Unfortunately there was no easy way to guarantee that the person captured would be co-operative.

Well I’d been friends with Elsebeth for years and she was always saying how keen she was on Nedric so I thought if they were together, the likelihood was that they’d grow closer. Then if they were both captured, pressure could be put on one that if they didn’t do as they were told the other would be tortured. With luck there would be two experienced impressors helping to train others and that should mean that I could go to Nothering. I’ve had enough of this country! People don’t show me the proper respect!

Of course the capture didn’t go according to plan. That’s the problem of using mercenaries but it wasn’t safe to have Nothering troops seen to be capturing Setherland personnel. There was another plan going on at the same time to get Setherland to invade Nothering and if any of our troops were captured other countries wouldn’t allow us to war on Setherland without interfering.

After that, things started happening rather too fast. I kept any information from Tarim because I didn’t want him interfering. I had been told by that time to cause as much disruption as possible. I thought I’d blocked the order that brought the impressors back from Esteril but someone must have sent a copy to Alhern as well as Tarim.

When the impressors turned up at the gate I knew I would be caught if I didn’t take quick action. So I locked Tarim in his office and taking the latest set of plans, tried to cover my tracks by setting light to the rest of the paperwork. If no one knew the plans were missing they wouldn’t suspect me of taking them. I slipped out the office, saw Nedric heading towards me and took a different route to the front gate. The guard was not at the gate so I just walked through.

I knew that there was a fair chance that I’d be caught if I tried to make a run for it on my own. Apart from anything else I heard that the borders have been closed with Nothering. So instead I went to my contact at the Black Lion and he told me to stay there for a while. I don’t know how you found me.

“Where’s Elsebeth?” It was Nedric who asked the question.

“I don’t know for sure but there is a good chance that she is at the Shadow Guild headquarters which is in Fusdown. If she isn’t there she will be wherever they decide to base the boardway.”

“Who was your contact at the Black Lion?” Bethel questioned.

“The night manager, Merkin. I expect that he will have disappeared, it was fairly clear that the guards were looking for me and he’s the only person I knew.”