CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE - GUBERNATORIAL ANTUMBRA

Tanner's face was completely flat. Indeed, while it was entirely accidental, she found herself doing a passable impression of a frog sitting in the middle of a pond. A curiously human-like face, but absolutely flat, not only flat, but apparently devoid of the ability to be anything otherwise. Human-like lips, but no muscles to drag them into a smile, a scowl, a snarl, a smirk, or even a leer. And eyes, flat and dull as the slime-slicked pebbles at the bottom of a stagnant pool. On the surface, she was an impassive, sage-like toad. Frog. Whatever. Underneath, she was currently disintegrating. Her organs all wanted to abandon this doomed ship and try their luck somewhere else, maybe in a performing circus, or maybe by blessing some unusual person with additional (and overlarge) organs. Imagine that. Mr. Canima appears in front of a woman, her face becomes not dissimilar to a toad, and then all of her organs explode out of her ears while using their asserted valves to burble 'you'll do', before favouring him with more organs than he really knew what to deal with, while Tanner slowly sagged down into the chair with a mildly disappointed 'oh' crossing her impassive lips. Come to think of it, she remembered seeing some tremendously ugly creature in an exhibition in Fidelizh, some awful being from the southern reaches of the world that apparently ejected parts of its gut in order to defend itself. Sea marrow, or something along those lines. So, you know, she was in good company.

What was she thinking about?

Oh.

Right.

Him.

Ah.

Mr. Canima was sizing her up. She was in the waiting room, surrounded by ledgers, and he'd just... manifested out of nowhere. Noiseless. Eerie. He smelled very faintly of almonds, and she wondered, idly, if he applied scent to himself, or if this was some Erlize thing... didn't cyanide smell of almonds? Oh, gods, he was poisoning the air around himself, he wore deadly poison as perfume, he... no, no, calm down. People had many reasons for smelling faintly of almonds. Even him. His flat, cold eyes examined her, and despite the fact that they were basically at eye level - Tanner's height reduced by the chair - he seemed to tower up towards the ceiling. He slowly, carefully picked his way over to the chair opposite, eyes sliding over the ledgers and maps arrayed before her, and she felt keenly aware of how dishevelled she was, how... even if she was expressionless, her stress was written in her clothes, in the bags under her eyes, in the light speckling of dew-like sweat over her forehead, like she was burning up. His fingers... as he passed closer, she noted that they smelled of vinegar. He'd been writing something, ink had stained his fingers, and he'd removed the stains just like she did. Keen memories of standing by a fireplace, dipping her fingers in a little pot of vinegar before bed. He didn't enter the chair opposite her - he oozed into it, like some odd fleshy de-shelled creature finding itself a new home, and letting every cavity be filled by the slow unfurling of pale, sun-starved matter. Indeed, his clothes blended easily in, and soon, it was hard to even tell if he was there. All that remained were his flat, dead eyes, his pale, long fingers, and the faintest scent of almonds and vinegar.

Tanner swallowed imperceptibly.

"Mr. Canima. Good morning, I hope I wasn't... disturbing anything."

He studied her for a long moment, and she felt her vocal apparatus aching to be used, to fill the silence. For a moment, she felt less like a person, and more like a vessel, a single twitching organ, something that, like all natural things, despised a void. Ached to fill it, ached to make the silence warm and comfortable through weight of noise. Canima stared. Did he ever blink?

Tanner barely restrained herself from babbling. The nervousness locked her face up, and while sound could brew in her lungs, could tickle the sides of her throat, it never got any further than that. Locked behind a cage of rigid teeth. Canima stared... and gave a small, official-sounding sigh, while forming his long, vinegar-scented fingers into a somewhat ecclesiastical steeple.

"You disturbed nothing. Are you well, honoured judge?"

His voice fell into the air like a stone, heavy and certain.

"...quite well, sir. A little tired, but..."

"Dreadful business, insomnia. I caution against forming it into a habit. I caution strongly against making it a point of pride."

"...yes, sir."

"You see it, sometimes. With... agents. Once you become aware of... higher matters, sleep seems like weakness. Some agents choose to shirk it entirely. They stay awake, for hours and hours, maybe catch the tiniest wink every so often, usually accidentally... they say they're simply busy, but then they start to hollow out. Memories fail, moods worsen... you find that they become oddly fat. Always eating, never full, they age and bloat, their eyes swell with styes, their hearts go faster and faster, and suddenly..."

Silence.

"It's a poor habit. I suggest conquering it. Wouldn't want you to make any mistakes."

Well, now she was going to be paranoid about sleep deprivation. Surely that would be wonderful for her sleep.

"The most dangerous symptom is false memory. Things move out of order, facts appear and vanish without rhyme or reason. I've run agents who've done the most atrocious work because they couldn't sleep. Once, we were tearing apart a monarchist cell, and one figure loomed larger than the others in every report I read. Every last one. A man called Ingi, no last name. Charismatic. Brilliant. Mysterious. His shadow lingered everywhere, he seemed to pull every string, stand behind even the smallest of events. Our agent was convinced that he existed, that he'd read the name in documents which had since been destroyed by the cell, and was always trying to tease out more information. Half a dozen people, interrogated. Invented. Purely invented. The delusion of a sleep-deprived agent. He imagined the name... and when he found no remnant of that name, he assumed it had been hidden from him, and that the cell was panicking. He did everything an agent should... but built upon a foundation of fantasy."

His voice rolled over her, and she found herself nodding along, even as... as two thoughts came to mind. First... paranoia. Pure and simple. Paranoia at the idea of deluding herself. Had she actually seen the references? Had she read addresses correctly? Her hands went to her skirt, and she had to force them to remain flat, as opposed to kneading in a frenzy of unease. Double-check. Triple-check. Don't be her own enemy. Second... surprise. Mr. Canima was talking more than he usually did. More than most Erlize agents did. And he was talking about his work like it was... nothing at all. Unless... no, no. Monarchist cell. He'd know about Algi, wouldn't he? He'd know, like he'd know about everything else in all the world. He knew her better than she knew herself. And he was dangling this fact right in front of her. Why? Why did she need to be more terrified? What purpose did that serve?

He glanced around smoothly, and Tanner coughed, her voice completely out of joint with her mood - steady, calm, without quiver or quaver.

"I see. I'll... do my best to sleep, sir. I just wanted to work a little later than usual tonight. Keep my momentum going. And... there was some business I had to attend to which woke me up a little more."

"Ah. The body. Handled?"

"Send to the mortuary, should be getting a report on it tomorrow."

"Yet here you are. Poring over ledgers."

His smile extended, lips oozing out horizontally like the slow passage of a slug. She wouldn't be surprised if they made people like Mr. Canima in some huge factory - fashioned skeletons from iron, then dipped them feet-first into vats filled with something between slime, algae, lichen, and flesh, something that crawled over the bones without reference to muscle or organ. It was certainly hard to imagine him as a child, a newborn, an awkward adolescent, a young man... he was one of those people who seemed to have never been anything but what they are now. No history lurked behind those eyes. No mortal feeling. Just existence.

"I rather thought you'd be marching around, interrogating everyone in sight."

Tanner wanted to blush with slight embarrassment, but she was so tense that she honestly thought her blood vessels couldn't expand enough to channel that much blood to the surface of her skin. She was overpowering the blush through sheer force of will. And terror.

"I... thought it would be more profitable to continue my research. I think there might be something larger at play, and I... well... it's too early to say, but I think the hanging was almost a distraction. It's too convenient."

"Hm."

"And... if whoever was responsible for the governor, potentially connected to the Tyer situation, is willing to do... that to distract me and everyone else, then I presume I'm getting closer."

A moment of silence. Tanner swallowed. Canima's smile remained, a wet thing that made her shudder slightly to look at - a shudder contained to the small of her back, a tiny twitch of the muscle that was quarantined by walls of tension.

"Excellent choice."

Tanner blinked.

"Oh."

Mr. Canima remained in his chair, and seemed to sink deeper into it, his eyes and fingers still pale as milk, livid against the camouflage.

"Documentation is pleasantly unambiguous. You can dissect a person's whole existence down to a book's worth of paper - you can dissect anything down if you have enough ink and time. It's a standard Erlize tactic. You, for instance... we know about your parents, your educational history, your friends, your habits... we know where you buy your buttons and have your dresses altered to fit. We know your hobbies, and your preferences. You have a fondness for eels. You write letters and burn them before they can be sent. Your work schedule is constant and steady, you never stay awake very long if you can help it... and you never eat the tail of a sardine."

Tanner stared.

"...you... know all of that?"

She didn't know all of that. Did... she thought it was just normal, not eating the tail of a sardine, not like she saw other people eating huge piles of sardines to check, not even back in Mahar Jovan, and... alright, she tended to cut them off, leave them in the can, but... did they examine her trash? Did they trace her left-behind food?

"It's our business to know. There are, strictly speaking, two Tanner Magg's in the world. One is flesh. One is paper. The bulk of this information sleeps in Fidelizh, sorted into a dozen archives. A summary exists here, of course."

He moved slightly, and his cufflinks caught the light, glinting like malign stars.

"Humans are unpleasantly tricky. Their habits constantly shift, they metamorphose from moment to moment. But dissected, stretched over a long period, you can see the changes, the trends. I dare say that... certain persons of interest in the city and its colonies are better-known to us than they are to their mother."

Tanner swallowed again.

"...may I... ask a question?"

"No, you may not see your file. Not unless you're inclined to put on a pair of cufflinks yourself."

Tanner bit down her fear. Ask the question. Ask the question. He already knew her, inside and out. She felt flayed, peeled, stripped down to a state of absolute exposure. Did... they couldn't know this much about everyone. Only people they were interested in. People coming into positions of importance, people who associated with monarchists, people who immigrated to Fidelizh to study, people who interacted regularly with the shantytown as part of her duties. They probably had the paper-body of Sister Halima in there, Brother Olgi, even that tiny Lord of Appeal. A thought. Humans perpetually forgot things about themselves, didn't they? Changed from moment to moment, like Canima said. But if a human was recorded... paper didn't forget. Ink didn't try and reinvent itself, to suppress things. Even now... the paper before her, it felt more real than any of the suspects did. They were hidden creatures, obscure and ever-shifting, clouded by the messy necessities of reality. They had valves, glands, hormones, chemical catastrophes, histories that they remembered strangely and reinterpreted every other second. Where they'd been was a mystery. Where they were was unknown. Where they'd be tomorrow was in the further realms of incomprehensibility. But on paper... on paper, things rationalised. Things coalesced. Noticeable trends. Lingering habits. Characteristics. Traits. History in its most objective format, devoid of muddying subjectivity.

The little sheets with her name on it - observational reports, purchasing histories, correspondence checks, room searches, professional documentation - scattered across a dozen archives, filed away with many others... if she piled them all up, the Paper-Tanner would be more real than she was. More... complete. An absolute record of her existence, not just the chaotic swirl of memories, most of which faded before they could enter her memory-room for permanent storage.

She'd always feared the Other Tanner, the lingering remnants of her impressions, wandering around with a life of their own, speaking with her voice, smiling with her face, poisoning minds behind her and remaining long, long after she was gone. A dancer on the black threads of witchcraft.

Now she knew that the Other Tanner was quite, quite real. And filled out in triplicate, if they were abiding by proper bureaucratic standards, of course. Tanner, stretched across dozens of ledgers, much like the ones in front of her. The Erlize operated this way, and so did Tanner. Because a person dissected into ink was, in many ways, more real than anything flesh could produce.

Kinship with the Erlize. What an odd thought.

"...no, no, it's not that. I just wanted to know, the bouncers, the door-guards, they meet with you fairly regularly, I heard. Can you... are there any ledgers on them? Anything I can use? There's nothing here but the employment ledger."

Mr. Canima stared at her.

And a minute later, he chose to reply.

"It is... true that I have met, in the past, with the door-guards. To arrange hiring. Termination. Movement. But the greater bulk of their work has always been the purview of the governor. My duty is security. My two assistants are, even now, currently at work investigating the murder, just as you are. But door-guards are a matter of... social control, like the keepers of a zoo, and the governor's great passion was the gentle caress of social control. Nudging people in one direction or another. I'm sure you're aware."

He knew about her conversations with Marana on the topic. Of course he did. What didn't he know?

"Are there any ledgers, though? Sir?"

"None that I am aware of. You understand, social control is an art, more than a science. My business is the dissection of men and women into thin, ink-covered slides, to be examined. I am a collector of data. When I find incomplete data, I move to fill the gaps, and in the process I frequently uncover crimes, sedition, treason, or the festering canker of plot. The governor regarded social control as... something that must resist excessive documentation. 'Control existed before paper', he liked to say. 'Before we could write or read, we still knew how to move people around. Even a newborn baby knows how to manipulate its mother by squalling loud enough'. His policies were not written, they were felt. The documentation was for reference purposes - he preferred to deal with people directly, understand them holistically. Subjective individuals must, in his view, be treated subjectively."

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Tanner blinked.

There was another flash of odd kinship that she wasn't... enormously comfortable to feel crawling up her spine like a clambering weed.

A subjective, holistic, experienced individual, working like an artist to slowly cultivate things in his own direction - one of those gardeners who, while possibly illiterate, could cultivate plants better and more beautifully than the most well-read individual in the world. And then someone colder. Less emotive. More... objective, dissecting people to ink and paper. With full understanding of a person came full understanding of a situation. Where lacunae in data existed, it ought to be found out, and if this was pursued systematically and comprehensively, then... well, everything would resolve itself in the end.

A feeling of unease ran through her.

Marana and Tanner, in a way, fitted the mould. Eygi, too, in a way. The governor and Mr. Canima, though...

Well, notably, the governor was dead, and Mr. Canima hadn't found his killer, the bouncers continued to operate in a possibly shady fashion, the mortuary produced errors in their reports, and yet another body had come along to add to the pile - a pile devoid of rot until the first spring rains fell. The sun was rising, and even as the light in the room increased, Mr. Canima never seemed to quite resolve, remaining hazy and indistinguishable. Resisting analysis. A flash of paranoia - did he know about... of course he knew about Eygi. Of course he knew about her letters, he'd probably read them all over dinner one boring night, if he ate at all and didn't just absorb nutrients from the air. Was this manipulation? Was this him trying to win her over? Was it working? Did she know anything, or was she too sleep-deprived to decide? What conditions of lucidity could she aspire to, when talking to someone who knew her better than she knew herself...

The sun was risen.

Had to get on with her work.

"...one question, sir. If you're... not needed elsewhere."

"I am always needed elsewhere. For now, elsewhere can manage. Speak."

"There are pages missing from some of the ledgers, particularly the migration records. A chunk, seems to be from a few years ago... and I was wondering, if it's at all possible, if I can have... some information on the quiet war the governor was involved in when he first arrived. If I'm looking for people with motives, I... well, that seems a good place to start, sir."

Canima studied her again, eyes flat and cold, smile withdrawing, swallowed up by his angular skull. He leant forwards very, very slightly, and the odd carbuncular growth on his forehead caught the light just as his cufflinks did, and she found herself being stared at by five glittering eyes, united in their lack of emotion, lack of passion. Like being studied by some enormous insect, many-eyed and deeply venomous, capable of coiling into the smallest spaces of a house. And now, the five-eyed insect spoke.

"The pages from the ledgers are removed frequently, for copying and reference. I'll look into it, and will get back to you. I believe I know the ones you're... concerned about. I assure you, your current track has more relevance."

"...oh. Of course, sir. I'll keep going. But the quiet war..."

"Let me assure you - there's very little remaining from that period. Soldiers were rotated out. Civilians departed and were replaced. The colony, in general, was overhauled. The colony before and after the governor's arrival are very different things indeed - the colony, now, is larger, stronger, practically rebuilt from scratch, and has almost none of the original population remaining. You might as well study any other colony in the world, for all the relevant information you'd find."

"...almost none, sir? Surely, there's..."

"My men are aware of those who lingered. And I assure you, we've kept notes on them, dissected them to sheets of paper, and found no lacunae in which guilt could lurk. Pure as the driven snow, at least with regards to this particular crime. Continue your investigations into the door-guards, of course."

Tanner nodded silently, her face rigid with tension. Right. The chastisement was... effective, certainly. Nice to have a little perspective on things, from someone who knew more than she did. She nodded a few more times, for good measure. And without any further ado... the man extracted himself from his chair, rising to his full height... and with a calm nod of dismissal, he picked his way towards the door. Seeing him opening a door, rather than simply vanishing into thin air, struck her as faintly unnatural, like seeing how the sausage was made. He was absolutely silent, and he opened the door to the barest possible degree, slithering out through the gap and closing it without even a single click.

She was alone.

No, she wasn't. A Paper-Tanner was out there, and Mr. Canima was never far from her company. In a way, Tanner was never alone. Not really. The sun was pale and shapeless, hidden behind thick clouds, magnifying it in size and vagueness until it swam before her vision. She rubbed her eyes, weariness coming away on her fingers as little yellow flakes. Dust that needed clearing, tumbling out of her fevered brain and making its way to her eyes.

She stood silently as well, and winced at how her 'silence' was really nothing compared to his silence. His silence could be modulated, could be demanding, could be beneath notice, could scream louder than a hundred words. Her silence was just the absence of noise, there was still the rustling of skirts, the light inhaling and exhaling of breath, the crackling of the chair as it returned to its old shape, grateful for being relieved of its burden... her silence was nothing. Some silences were wise. And some silences were just lids to cover up a well of ignorance. Tanner knew what her silences were, and it wasn't the more flattering option.

The house was quiet. People would still be in bed, if there was anyone here at all. Mr. Canima, Yan-Lam, one or two guards trying to stay awake... a few others, but not many. Not many. The woman, Beldol nee Femadol 25 would be here soon, ready to be kept safe. Safe as Tanner could muster, anyway. To be blunt, her track record thus far was... poor.

Bah. Couldn't see her way towards sleep. Not now. Even with the terror of false memory looming over her, sleep felt like a very distant relative indeed. Not estranged, just... distant.

So Tanner... went upstairs. Hunting for the governor's bedroom. Her breathing grew stronger with each step, and by the end, she was having to force herself to be moderate, to be dignified. Her hands were clasped in front of her stomach, and she slipped on a pair of gloves to cultivate a little luck... felt like she was trying to use a lighter with too little fuel. The wheel spun, a little spark flew, but nothing emerged, no flame, nothing to catch. And each time, the wheel was a little slower, the spark a little dimmer, the emptiness more noticeable. All around her clustered black threads of witchcraft, and she felt like things were only going to get worse, long before they got better - the lodge's protection might not mean much in this place. Swallowed up by the hungry earth with its immaculately preserved dead, intimidated into submission by the glares of alabaster statues. She was further from home than she'd ever been - maybe the dim light of her protective candle didn't stretch this far. Missed her pince-nez.

The bedroom was easy to find, thankfully. The door was locked, but she had the man's keys, and one of them entered the lock with lazy smoothness, turning without a sound.

The dark wood of the door swung open, silent as Mr. Canima's steps.

And beyond...

Well. It was a bedroom.

Not hers. And she felt a flush building around her collarbone, felt her breathing come tighter, like she was ashamed to steal the governor's air, or to expel her own. This room... it was funny, but with bedrooms, she always felt like you could feel the collective weight of every sleepy breath. When you were asleep, your breathing was steady, warm, heavy with the weight of food and drink... sleep-breath was different to waking-breath, and Tanner thought that a bedroom could hold every last sleep-breath expelled into it. Made sense, really. When you slept, sleep-dust built up in the corner of your eyes, your body seeming to expel residue from itself. So, maybe there was some kind of residue in sleep-breath, something yellow as old wax, and dry as dust, that caked the bedclothes, the bed-stand, the lampshades, the tables, the pages of books... the very walls were heavy with it. And she felt like she was invading a crucial part of a person's privacy by entering this place and coming into contact with this residue.

'Mad old cow' she wanted to mutter to herself. Restrained the impulse.

Nice bedroom, all things considered. Regimented, military, but not barren. Tasteful, that was the word. Nothing to excess. A wide, comfortable bed with heavy red sheets, embroidered with thin gold patterns that swirled before her eyes. Sturdy. She remembered the pills downstairs, for the sexually jaded, and wondered (wickedly) if the luxurious sheets were for him, or for... well. Somebody else. If so, was that person in the colony? She remembered the photo, too... an old flame? A current one? Alive, dead? Married, divorced? Only one daguerrotype - a military one, of him in heavy protective gear, surrounded by others. Younger, but with a few scars building up, and a flayed look to him from successive decontaminations. She doubted he had children, doubted he had a wife. Honestly, she doubted he had any... paramours around the colony, he was the headmaster of this place, anything sordid would be... well... no. Gods, stop thinking about the governor's proclivities vis a vis canoodling. Search the room. Ignore any stains.

Stop it, Tanner.

Yes, Paper-Tanner, your inky tears won't be spilled in vain. Paper-Tanner was probably a frightfully decent person, now she came to think of it. Odd in some of her habits, but very conventional in many others.

Anyway. Stop talking to the incarnation of your bureaucratic footprint. Probably a poor habit to get into. Like depriving herself of sleep.

She searched things carefully, systematically, weariness draining her of the desire to run around like a maniac rummaging desperately. Some books... a flash of hope faded as she found they were all works of fiction or military history, plus the occasional volume of well-regarded poetry. All very tasteful, all very well-kept. Some papers, blank, a typewriter (she stared mutely at the vulgar thing. What was wrong with an automatic quill? No, she wasn't bitter over the fact that typewriters were borderline forbidden to judges, no, she liked her lenses and her quill, she was squinting with happiness), a wooden stand for resting books, with little metal tabs to keep them open at a particular page... pens, pens, pencils, ink pencils... no unsent correspondence. One drawer, though, did open to a metal casket, sealed with a combination lock. Doubted Canima would have the combination... wondered if those theatrophone plays were correct, and a talented thief could open these things using hearing alone...

A minute later, she decided theatrophone plays ought to be banned for disseminating misinformation and false representations of the truth.

That, or she had bad hearing.

Possible, possible. Set aside for later. Ask for help, or at worst, tools to drill the thing open. If Canima would allow her to do that, of course.

Now... well, the desk was useless. Bed contained neatly folded pyjamas, and nothing else. A handful of small cupboards contained nothing but domestic bric-a-brac, tight packets of letter-grade paper, spare ink ribbons and bottles, spare parts for the typewriter, odds and ends... one cupboard, though, revealed something that made her twitch with interest. A box. A leather box. Well-loved. Not dissimilar to the one Tyer had used for his knives (if they really were his, she was questioning everything from that case, every piece of evidence was suspect). And when she popped it open, expecting secretive things, obscure documents, letters and drawings and blueprints and...

Collar stays and cufflinks.

She blinked.

Sorted like... geological specimens, separated by leather dividers. Several layers of the things. Collar stays and cufflinks. Lovingly polished. And all of them, in some way, interesting. Mother of pearl in a dozen shades, gold and silver, engraved with patterns no-one would see, one of them made out of steel with the most delicate swirls embedded in the metal... and the cufflinks, many-hued, varied to the point of absurdity, some metal, some silk, one exotic sample made out of stone...

Wow.

The governor was, with no shadow of a doubt, one of the most admirable and impressive men Tanner had ever met. He had a collection of mother-of-pearl collar stays. Only seriously intelligent men did that, would spend so much money (presumably) on building such a collection of things that no-one would actually see, given that they fitted inside the collar. Oh, she wasn't being sarcastic. She was legitimately impressed. This was a habit she wished she could form, it was just so... so dignified. And after all the events of the last few days, she was just happy to find evidence of a perfectly innocent hobby that probably kept a handful of craftsmen employed year-round.

Wished she could take them.

Resisted the urge. Closed the box. Returned it to the cupboard... and faced the wardrobe.

Goodness.

Didn't want to rummage around in his underclothes. Really, really didn't.

But here she was.

The door was opened...

Oh, gods, he was well-dressed. Suit upon suit upon suit, well-folded shirts devoid of a singular crease... nothing too eccentric, nothing too extravagant, everything tasteful and held to exacting standards of cleanliness. Excellent ties, too, and all of them silk. She... what kind of salary did governors get? What position had he held before coming out here that could pay for all of this? She thought he was a salt-of-the-earth soldier, not quite given to... fashion. Maybe she was just being blinkered and judgemental (oh, goodness, why would a judge be judgemental, better add that to the pile of mysteries she had to solve), or maybe... hm, if he was single, unmarried, then it'd be quite a bit easier to spend money on clothes like this. Or... well, he was older. Not like he was experiencing growth spurts. Maybe this was the accumulation of decades. A life history in cloth. She surveyed the suits sadly, and reached out to pluck one of the ties off a hook... green, with tiny red foxes embroidered into the surface, cavorting around and having a whale of a time. She held it, not sure what she was doing... glanced at her front. No, no, it would be uncouth to wear one of the governor's ties as a ribbon for her cape. Uncouth. Not necessarily illegal, not with her remit... hm. As she moved to replace the tie, she saw something inside the wardrobe. A paper bag. She stared at it. It stared back. Nestled into a corner, just at the base. Hard to see, really - Tanner's height helped her, gave her a little more perspective, but... easy to miss.

She drew it out...

A tiny label was affixed to the surface.

For Cleaning

Clearly hadn't dropped it off, or... hm. She opened it up. A scarf lay nestled neatly in the bag... very neatly indeed. Beautiful, really. Silk, embroidered with an intricate pattern of interlocking squares and diamonds, the whole thing bright enough to set off pleasingly against a dark coat, but not so bright as to be lurid. Like everything else - tasteful and exquisite, refined without being extravagant. Would match well with a whole host of things. Now...

Hold on. It was folded. It was clean. Completely clean, free of even a speck of dust. Then why... no, no, they just used the same bag, perhaps. Not like there was much business for silk scarf cleaning, not much chance of it getting confused with someone else's exquisite silk scarf. So...

She remembered the governor's body. The possessions in the mortuary. One of them was a plain scarf. His tie had been beautiful, his shirt well-chosen, his suit tastefully refined, but... his scarf had been simple, unadorned. Not sure if the stains were old or new, but... it was a work-a-day scarf, if there was such a thing. Not thick enough to be worn exclusively for warmth... probably about the same coverage as this one.

So... hm. She had to make some inquiries. When had this scarf been cleaned? Had it been the day of his death, dropped off when he was out? Or... well, why would the governor march off to die in a simple scarf? No, silly line of questioning, but... even so. She carefully took the packet away. Glanced at the safe. She ought to get a safe of her own in the mansion, a safe which only she could open, just for evidence, papers, that sort of business. The safe in her house would have to do.

And a moment later, she reached back to grab the fox tie.

Evidence.

Evidence of something anyway. Evidence of his good taste, why not.

And as she returned downstairs with her little lovely treasures, she hesitated. Mr. Canima's office was near here, a narrow little place with a locked door. She'd never seen it unlocked, really - it was only ever vulnerable in the split-second when he was slithering through the gap. Wouldn't be surprised if there was a chain on at all times, and he was thin enough to ooze through even this narrowed space, while anyone else would be rather out of luck. She'd be out of luck, anyway. Could knock. Ask about something was nagging at her. Dyen. The bouncer connected with two deaths, a crushed cat, and at least one exile. Dyen, who was no longer a bouncer, and thus had... rather vanished from the records. Could go through the individual employment ledgers for each company, of course. They existed, she could drag them out, look through the rolls, find him... or she could just ask Mr. Canima. Wouldn't be exceptionally difficult. Knock. Ask a question. Leave. Maybe she got something. Maybe she got nothing. Maybe she was told to bog off. Maybe she knocked on the door and then vomited all her organs up from nervousness. It was one thing to get approached by Mr. Canima, there was a feeling of just having to endure, like one did a natural disaster. It was another thing to voluntarily walk into a natural disaster. When Mr. Canima approached her, she knew he wanted a conversation. Did he want one now? How did he take being approached without an appointment? How did she make an appointment? How...

She went downstairs.

Sighed.

Unfurled an enormous ledger containing the employees of the fellow who was directing most of the work clearing rubble from the city. Narrowed down the date to when Dyen stopped working as a bouncer.

And got to work on the columns, tracing down, down, down...

"Honoured judge?"

She was too tired to be surprised.

"Good morning, Yan-Lam."

"Would... you like some tea?"

"Is there any coffee?"

"Plenty."

"That would do wonderfully, then. Thank you."

Wait.

"Isn't it a bit early for you to be..."

She finally looked up at the girl. The chambermaid looked... well, beat. Rings around her eyes, and a slightly bewildered, burned-out look common to the insomniacs Tanner had met. Aware something was wrong, but incapable of really addressing it. Sleep was so easy you could do it with your eyes closed, and being incapable of it was... well, like forgetting how to ride a bicycle, or how to blink, or how to stand up properly. Frustrating, slightly embarrassing, and most of all, bewildering and unmooring.

She hadn't slept, was the point.

"Up late?"

"I... find it hard to sleep at present."

Tanner tried to smile.

"I got a talking-to by Mr. Canima, so I think sleep's... not going to happen for me for a while."

Yan-Lam winced sympathetically, and shifted her weight from foot to foot. Didn't say anything, because a clever chambermaid in this mansion wouldn't go around badmouthing her... gods, her boss. Mr. Canima was now her boss. Closest thing to a wielder of parental authority. Leader of the colony, employer, and the person with a stranglehold over the rest of her life. Through him lay smooth adoption and return to normal society. Through him lay a state orphanage and all the loveliness that might entail. No wonder she couldn't sleep.

"Bring two cups, if you wouldn't mind. I think both of us need a drop of coffee."

"Yes, miss. Right away, miss."

Tanner got back to work, and a few minutes later, a tray rattled its way onto the table. Tanner parted great mounds of paper to make room for it, shoving them aside like some sort of world-shaping giantess who wanted the mountains to look a little different today. Nothing yet from the ledgers. Anyway. Two cups. Poured with a steady, practised, callused hand. Black for both of them. Tanner sipped hers, feeling a little feeble trickle of energy entering her exhausted form... the girl seemed to have more success, just a few sips and she was looking revitalised. The luxuries of the small - easier to experience the pleasures of various chemicals. Damn good reason why Tanner drank citrinitas, she needed a hint of exceptional potency if she didn't want to glug down gallons of coffee. She stood, drinking quietly, while Tanner took an opportunistic gulp or two, when she had to turn a page in the ledger.

"...may I ask, miss, what you're looking for in there?"

"A name. Well, a number that means a name."

"Ah."

A pause.

"...is it... a criminal of some description?"

"Remember that crushed cat?"

The girl paled, and nodded.

"Related."

Yan-Lam blinked. Sipped her coffee, before shifting and draining it entirely. And with that, she sat down, dragged another ledger over, and opened it to the first page.

"What's the number, miss? If it isn't impertinent to ask."

Tanner stared.

The daughter of a man she'd allowed to die was asking to help with finding a potential lead. A lead in... oh. Wait. The girl wasn't an idiot. She knew Tanner was looking very thoroughly into the Tyer case as a route into the governor case. Chambermaids heard all sorts of things at the best of times, and now she had nothing else to focus on, and every reason to focus on this. Tanner coughed around a little coffee that went down the wrong pipe.

"Wrong ledger, we're looking through companies, I'm trying to find where he's currently employed."

"...could you not... go outside? And ask people?"

"Yes. But I don't want people to know I'm looking for him."

"Because they'll kill him too."

Tanner coughed again - dammit, two glugs of coffee down the drain. Well, down the throat, but the term applied nonetheless, the coffee was where coffee shouldn't be. And she needed this energy, dammit. Anyway. The girl was being... well, grim wouldn't be the right word. Painfully realistic. Gods, Tanner had to be the optimist. Without her pince-nez. Feh.

"...or he might be prepared for an interrogation. If he's on-guard, it'll be harder to get anything useful out of him, harder to surprise him with something."

"Ah."

Tanner easily placed an enormous ledger in front of the girl, who looked wide-eyed at Tanner handling the thing with one hand like it was nothing. She showed her the number. Directed her at the right column. And set her to work, scanning the pages with religious dedication. And that was all. As the great, pale, vague sun swam higher and higher behind thick layers of cloud, as the world beyond turned into a shimmering mass of fallen snow, as the hours marched on and the killers remained at large...

Tanner and Yan-Lam searched the ledgers. And drank an unreasonable amount of coffee.

...maybe this was an apology of sorts. Letting her assist in the mystery which took her father's life.

Maybe.

Either way. Work to be done. And perishingly little time to do it.