“I didn’t expect it all to look so… legal.” Andril complained. “I haven’t nearly enough Dwer to understand most of this.”

“It always is.” I yawned at my own parchment. “If it was obvious it would’ve been caught.”

Fredrick and Breale had quickly given up on helping us sort through the papers, in the vain hope that they’d manage to find something incriminating in the warehouse proper. So with Gideon standing watch, the two of us had been poring over receipts, orders, and manifests close to an hour now, trying desperately to find anything that would link the owner to the Orthungs.

So far, to our immense disappointment, nothing had shown up.

“It’d be easy enough if it just showed up on the manifests.” Andril glared at the stack of papers we’d just finished. “If only these weren’t so detailed! It’s like reading a dictionary.”

I weakly nodded, setting aside my own paper. Every crumb of logistical information possible had been recorded on each manifest, so while it was easy to find one for each day the actual lists were obscured under minute and specification.

“If we had a worker to interrogate this’d be much easier.” I said. “I doubt Orthungs are exactly quiet things to store, and they would’ve needed more care than a normal box.”

“If only we had the luxury.” Andril sighed. “That’d reveal our interest though, which would make the next part of this plan pretty hard to do.”

Next part? I had to wonder where he planned to take this evidence anyway, if the king had already promised inaction. Wouldn’t it be a little hypocritical to arrest someone after saying that?

“Ehh…what is the plan after this anyway?” I laid my head on the top of the large box in the corner of the room.

“Why, I take this to the press, of course.” Andril said. “The court of public opinion would push my father to action, even if he’d already promised leniency.”

“Wouldn’t that upset your dad?” I asked, a little confused. Wasn’t the whole point of this to avoid having his father take action?

“I think you misunderstand.” He shook his head. “My father wants an excuse to punish the offenders. Public pressure would be a perfect way to renege on his promise. He’s the king of the Veroline first after all, not just its nobles.”

“It all seems so roundabout.”

“Think of it like this: for the public, the reason why the king does something is way more important than what he actually does. He could be the justest, the fairest, and the strongest king man has ever known, but if his subjects think he was evil then those virtues wouldn’t hold the doors against rebellion.”

To a self-proclaimed vigilante, I had to admit that seemed like a pretty depressing position to be in. I was only glad I didn’t have to care about what other people thought of me, only what Gideon and I did. It made life so much simpler.

I cast a sideways glance towards the prince, finding him deep in thought at his own words. The sight sent a strange premonition to my gut. Was the prince speaking from experience here? It almost seemed to me like he was.

I picked up the manifest I’d set down again, preparing to start the whole process again, a new desire to see the prince vindicated rising within me.

“Then lets get back into…”

Four men, two armed, at the front door. Hide.

I froze suddenly, causing Andril to look up from his pondering.

“Saphry?”

I didn’t respond, instead looking around at every corner, finding nowhere clear of paper to hide before my attention was drawn to the box I’d been sitting against. Without any further explanation, I grabbed Andril’s arm and pulled him towards the box.

“Get in!” I hissed as I pushed open the lid and jumped inside. “Hurry!”

“What?”

I slammed shut the lantern’s light shield as I heard loud footsteps stomp towards the office, plunging the room into darkness. As they approached, I grabbed Andril and yanked him arm first into the box, shutting the lid right as the door handle began to jiggle.

“There were two boxes, I-”

“Quiet.” I cut him off with a whisper.

It was a large box, to be sure, but even then the both of us in there barely fit inside, and definitely not in a comfortable way. He’d fallen backwards into the crate, and I had to bite back some pain as my chest and face were smashed under him.

I knew he was tall, but did he have to be so heavy? His physique hadn’t prepared me for this at all.

“You must be working your people hard.”

An old voice, gruff and wizened, reached my ears as a group walked into the office. Was this the noble from Ostip? What was he doing at the warehouse so late in the night?

“Yesterday was a long day, sir.” This voice was higher than the other. “I’ll make sure they clean up better in the future.”

“No need, manager. Your boys do a fine job as it is, and this is already more orderly than most.”

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“Thank you, sir.”

Curious, Andril and I craned our necks to the planks of the box, where a small crack in the crate allowed us to peek out at the room. Outside, I could make out four people, two strapped in arms and the other two in fineries. Somehow, it was obvious which voice belonged to who, with one of the men having a chiselled grey beard and a cane while the other was dressed in a plainer coat. To me, the old man looked as though he were the pinnacle of wisdom, not at all like the evil villian I had imagined.

“How much longer will it be?” The old man asked. “It’s important that we’re ready ere the moon leaves.”

“Everything is coming in as expected, sir. Material wise, at least.”

The man glanced over a paper handed to him and nodded.

“And what about your other task?”

“Yes, about that.” The manager shook his head after a moment. “I wasn’t able to find anything about them. They purchase everything in Fahnporte, but the blacksmiths aren’t affiliated.”

Them? Who were they talking about? And where was Fahnporte, was that important?

“So it is as they say?”

“I can’t see how not, Lord Agos. Such a quantity of goods… it’d be a miracle the Brepolise hadn’t confiscated it if they weren’t.”

Aha! A name!

I nearly whooped out loud when I heard it, only stopped because the noble himself walked over and leaned on our box.

That was always the first step in any investigation like this: find out who exactly you were investigating. That might sound easy or obvious, but a lot of villains tended to hide any real connections quite well, seemingly renting out warehouses and skyscrapers with abandon. But as I’d learned well enough on Earth, every plot always had some kind of financial backing hiding somewhere. It only had to be uncovered.

“What a fateful thing.” Agos muttered to himself, ignorant of our eavesdropping. “That we should seek our salvation from the Brepolise.” And then, more loudly: “We must keep a stalwart watch on these ‘Moon Thorns’. Your next goal is to that effect: find out what they want, but quietly. I’ll thank them for their support, but the fact that they gave it doesn’t bode well either.”

Moon Thorns? It almost sounded like some neat rpg ability rather than an organisation.

“As you wish.” The man nodded stiffly. “Though I must wonder the depths of this paranoia. Is the fact that they help not enough to earn your friendship? Surely these Moon Thorns are true friends of Verol.”

“You are a fool if you believe that fully.” Lord Agos snapped. “Esiland is working on his counterplays, there is no doubt about that. This offer was entirely too convenient to be purely good will. Nothing is that easy.”

I heard Andril seize up besides me at the noble’s admission, and I drilled my eyes into him as if to say ‘keep it in’. Thankfully, he seemed to understand, and settled back down with a look of outrage plastered across his face.

“Pray tell how this import could be considered easy.” The manager said. “But you speak of King Esiland? Hasn’t he-”

“You cannot be so ill-versed in the King’s own history to think that he has merely let the attempt slide.” Lord Agos interrupted. “Any suggestion otherwise is political theatre, nothing more.

“Of course, sir. I apologise.”

Lord Agos pushed himself off the box, allowing me a silent sigh of relief, and walked over towards the door again.

“No, no, it is good to question these things, I shouldn’t bark.” From the crack I could see him stop next to the manager and put a hand on his shoulder. “Now… let us make good on the point of this trip and inspect the shipment. It is a gift, yes, but it would be no good to let our men labour under inferior Brepolise iron!”

“If you would just follow me then.”

The guards held the door open as the two left back into the entrance hall, the office falling under a pall of darkness once more. The both of us waited a couple minutes before I broke the silence, making sure that they weren’t about to burst back in suddenly.

“There we go, then!” I triumphantly whispered. “That was the one who ordered your assassination, don’t’cha think?”

“Indeed! If the world was just I’d leap out and smite him myself. Now…” A note of embarrassment crept into his voice. “...can you help me out of this crate? You pulled me in backwards.”

“Oh, sorry!” I apologised. He probably felt more uncomfortable than I even did, folded over like he was. My hand stopped short of pushing the lid off. “Eh… actually we should probably wait a while longer, until they leave the building again. It’d be a shame to get caught after that, ya know?”

“If we wait any longer I’m going to lose all the blood in my arm.” The prince coughed. “Nor is this the state I’d have Fredrick find us in.”

“Ah, yeah…” It dawned on me just how close the prince was, and I was suddenly glad for the gloom as I looked away. “Well, eh, grab the edge with your right arm and pull…”

…

I was dusting off my pants next to the box when two pairs of footsteps started clacking down the hallway again. I had barely glanced towards the crate again however when Andril instead grabbed my shoulder and pulled me down behind it.

As we waited, I drew my knife from its hidden sheath.

The door opened to the blue glow of a magic lantern, its glow blinding me for a half second. But before my eyes had even adjusted, I stood up again to the sound of tiny flapping wings alongside two sets of boots.

“Silst!” I quietly cried, setting my dagger on the box. “And Breale!”

“Are they gone?” Andril popped up beside me.

Lord Agos left through the alley entrance with the rest. Gideon flew over to my head and landed.

“Indeed!” Breale said before her brother. “And you’ll never guess what… wait, are you two alright? Your faces are re-”

“Ready to discuss what we all found!” I said quickly. “Because we heard the strangest stuff.”

The others listened intently as I described the conversation that we’d overheard, and how we’d hidden in the crate. By the end of it, Breale and Fredrick looked grim.

“I hate to say it.” Fredrick finally said. “But none of that means he orchestrated the assassination attempt.”

“What?”

“What!”

Andril and I asked in tandem.

Andril cleared his throat.

“Er, how do you mean? He was clearly talking about the plot and Esiland’s retaliation.”

“I suppose he was right to worry, as well.” Breale grinned.

“Then, if that retelling was accurate, he never mentioned any assassination plot.” Fredrick pointed out. “Only that Esiland could respond to some slight.”

“Well…” I tried to argue back, but the more I thought about it the more I realised Fredrick was right.

“He clearly implied the assassination attempt!” Andril said. “What else could he be talking about? This should be enough to bring him in.”

“Andril, even putting aside whenever he meant that attempt or not, we don’t have any proof he put them there.” Fredrick responded. “We still have no case beyond hearsay, and the only way you could’ve heard that conversation was if you’d broken into this warehouse and eavesdropped on him.”

“But… er…” Andril’s fury died in front of my eyes, replaced by frustration. “Fine, you’re right about that. But my word is surely enough to get him arrested regardless. I am trusted in the Royal Senate.”

“Which wouldn’t help your father in the slightest.” I said, suddenly understanding how useless the whole ordeal was.

“Exactly.” Fredrick nodded at me approvingly. “Saphry has the right of it. They’d see that as your father working his will through you, and the whole point of the pardon would be voided.”

It was a tricky situation, this politicking, which was why I normally designed to avoid it all I could when I worked back on Earth. One wrong move was destined to blow up in your face, and more often than not some well intentioned blow could end up benefiting your enemy instead. It was much easier to punch someone deserving of a punch than to prove they deserved to get punched.

Andril clicked his tongue angrily.

“What about this ‘Moon Thorns’ then? Surely there’s some proof in their shipments?”

“We did investigate this place because they ship up from Brepoli.” I said. “If they were the ones who did it, it’s likely they could’ve gotten the Orthungs from that group.”

“Unfortunately, it wasn’t beasts they were looking at.” Breale said, looking more than a little disappointed. “But weapons and armour.”

“Weapons and armour?” I asked. “Isn’t that enough proof of a plot?”

My optimism wasn’t shared by the others, who all shook their heads.

“The Temoif lords stockpile wargear all the time, especially the ones with holdings in the east and south.” Fredrick said. “This is nothing new, nor illegal. In fact, with the contracts they hold, it is encouraged.”

“They do send out armed groups to Summark and Brepoli on occasion after all.” Breale added.

My head spun with more questions. They sent out armed groups outside the country? For what purpose? As far as I was aware Verol wasn’t at war, but again this seemed like one of those questions I should already know the answer to…

“At the very least.” Andril continued. “We’re pretty sure that Lord Agos is involved now, if not all the Temoif. We just need to find proof. If only it had actually been written down here…”

“Indeed.” Fredrick said. ”We should go back for tonight, and discuss our next move.”

At that point a great yawn came over me as the weight of the last hour or so settled upon me, and the others all looked at me in amusement.

“What?” I asked. “Is it criminal to feel tired?”

“Maybe not tonight then.” Breale laughed. “How about again this weekend?”