After Alexia had received her orders from the Princess, she'd spent an entire day searching the city for the mysterious man.

She found no sign of him, nor any new rumors. She did hear another eyewitness account of the unusual story he had told in the Hard Fought Rest inn, but everything that woman had recalled was cast into even more doubt by the amount of free beer she'd been drinking. The one important detail that Alexia gained was the man's name: Zach.

The second day was far more productive. After an informant mentioned seeing a civilian climbing the Gwendolyn Wall, Alexia changed into her unassuming peasant clothes and rushed to the site. Zach was long gone, but people in the nearby market spoke of a man frantically asking for directions to a mapmaker.

Alexia knew of only one cartographer in the city, but she had a lot of distance to cover to get there before Zach moved on again. She hired a carriage to make good time and arrived just after Zach did. She snuck up to the building's front window and hid behind a shrub, then she watched.

By the end of Zach's visit, Alexia had learned some new things and confirmed a few more. First, Zach was totally clueless about even basic matters like rivers. How someone could travel to New Albion without that knowledge was a puzzle in and of itself. She'd also observed that he had far more money than his plain clothes suggested and he wasn't reluctant to spend it.

From there, she stealthily tailed him as he went about his day. He gorged himself on cheap street cart food, then tried to buy some clothes. He bought nothing from the first two stores, but Alexia couldn't tell whether it was due to lack of interest or funds. Then he entered a third store which sold casual clothes marketed to the merchant class.

Alexia pretended to shop as well, putting on the familiar persona of a maid out shopping for her employer. While she lurked on the other side of a rack of men's overcoats, she listened in on Zach's conversation with the female shopkeeper.

"Um, sorry about my current clothes. I promise I can afford to buy some here." Zach said. It seemed he'd had issues at the previous stores.

"Oh, okay…" the woman replied, still sounding unsure about her latest customer. "What are you looking for today?"

"Casual pants and a shirt, as well as a light jacket. Uh, and boxers— err, undergarments, if you sell those here."

The woman awkwardly assured him that they did in fact sell undergarments, but only the most basic styles.

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From there, Zach selected an outfit for himself. It consisted of narrow-legged pants of a dark blue color, a simple white collarless shirt that was normally used only as an undershirt, and a lightweight tan leather jacket that buttoned at the front.

The shopkeeper and Alexia both blinked in surprise as he stepped out of the dressing room. The outfit didn't look bad, but it definitely looked different than current New Albion fashion. As Zach turned and bent down to reclaim his old clothes from the dressing room, the shopkeeper's eyes wandered in a way that said she rather liked the way the clothes fit.

Alexia's eyes followed the woman's gaze, but then returned to the shopkeeper. She thought that the shopkeeper's bodice looked much nicer than Zach's pants.

He paid a Crown and some change for his purchase, which included two pairs of undergarments and some socks, then waved goodbye. Alexia waited as long as she dared, then made an excuse for not buying anything and slipped out after Zach.

The combination maid and secret agent followed him for the rest of the day. She watched as he wandered around the city and talked to people, apparently just gathering information, then finally returned to his inn. He ate dinner in the noisy common room, speaking with some of the other customers, then retired to his room after 9 in the evening.

Alexia didn't want to have to track him down again the next morning, so she paid for a room near Zach's and she waited and listened for his door to open. She also stuck a piece of string in his door that would fall if the door opened, just in case she somehow missed his departure.

She waited all night, staying awake in case he left in the middle of the night. Then she waited all day, passing the time by documenting her observations thus far in a journal. She took only the shortest of breaks for food and restroom, always checking on the bit of string when she returned.

Alexia even tried to stay awake through the second night, but she didn't manage. She eventually fell asleep with her ear to the crack under her door.

Luckily, the morning noise of the common room just downstairs woke her up before Zach left. When he finally exited his room, she scrambled to get presentable and followed after. She took a seat facing away so he couldn't see her face, then listened in on his conversation with the innkeeper.

"Good morning," Zach started. "Can I ask how many paid nights I have left?"

The innkeeper quickly and confidently answered, "None. You've used 'em all up."

"Wait, what? Are you sure? I thought I had two left."

There was the sound of a heavy ledger being placed on the counter, then the innkeeper said, "See here? You paid for two nights. Then two days later, you paid for two more, and for some breakfast. That was two days ago."

Alexia thought there was just a bit of irritation in the innkeeper's voice, but he didn't seem surprised at Zach's questions.

"Two days ago?" Zach asked. "I thought that was yesterday…"

"Two days ago," the innkeeper repeated in a patronizing tone. "That was on the 7th, and it's the 9th of September now."

Alexia was pretty sure the innkeeper of the reasonably respectable Hard Fought Rest would never try to scam a guest out in the open like this, especially not over a couple measly Harts. That left just one possibility: Zach had somehow slept away an entire day.

Based on everything she'd seen and heard so far, Alexia came to one other conclusion about Zach: he was a totally harmless, clueless idiot.