Chapter 5 (Part III): Papers, Please

One fall when daddy was serving overseas, I told mama about a kid at school picking on me. The kid ended up in jail for embezzling. At the age of nine. Mama always said daddy did it, that he heard what had happened, came home while I was asleep, and took care of it. Obviously, I know better now – daddy was good but he wasn’t that good. Mama had to have been the one to set the kid up. I think.

-          Antiope Vexarius recalling her childhood in Tulusa.

Making arrangements for the printer paper hadn’t been as easy as Vinny expected. He still had some connections in the city, of course, and plenty of gold to work with, but none of his connections were the sort that dealt in blank paper. The best they could do was to offer to help him steal some from one of the other printers in town.

Unfortunately, due to regulations related to government taxes on printed materials, several hundred sheets of paper disappearing would be noticed, not only by the print shop’s owner but by the city guard as well. Vinny spent quite a lot of time trying to figure out how to cover up the theft, particularly considering arson, but he didn’t really want to contribute further to the chaos in the city.

When Vinny finally decided that covering up the theft was impossible, he’d decided to make the best of it and singled out the single most unpleasant print shop owner affiliated with Broad Beard Press, a man named Elberte Cesster. Cesster had been quick to capitalize off the shutdown of The Kingstown Herald and its associated contractors. 
In Caelia at that time, privately contracted lawyers and barristers only participated in civil cases; in all of Caelia's criminal justice proceedings legal counsel for the prosecution and the defense was provided by the state. Unfortunately, although accused individuals would be represented by a state-chosen counsel, they still had to pay a variety of court fees to fund their defense. If they didn't have the cash to cover it, the state would liquidate however much of the accused's property was necessary to cover the fees. The writers of Caelia's constitution likely thought themselves quite clever when they came up with the process; it hypothetically ensured a fair proceeding regardless of a defendant's economic status, and avoided imposing a tax burden that many Caelians were opposed to. 
Unfortunately, there eventually came to be a significant disparity between how the system was intended to function, and how it actually did. Affluent defendants could pay bribes or call in favors to influence the state's choice of legal counsel, while lower class individuals were stuck with the most inexperienced, overworked, or incompetent representation - poor individuals who couldn't cover the fees languished in debtors' prison until someone else paid for their defense. Up to that time, however, the system was maintained despite its problems because it could be quite profitable for the individuals managing the liquidation of a defendant's property. In this case, when the The Kingstown Herald's  printers were shut down, the new Chief Counselor to the King - Syliva herself - had sold all of their materials at a “limited attendance auction” to pay for their defense. Cesster and other printers who contracted with the dragon's heralds had obtained large amounts of fine printing materials at these exclusive auctions for very little money. This arrangement had left a lot of Cesster's competitors facing an inevitable loss of livelihood, but it had also left a whole lot of fresh printing paper sitting in the storeroom of his shop. Still bundled up, it was practically gift-wrapped for Vinny. 

Cesster had also been one of the printers that Azraea had approached when they were looking for an accomplice to pass on their news. Given his association with the Dragon’s herald, Vinny wouldn’t even have considered it, except the man was a notorious sellout. His services could apparently be bought by anyone if he thought he could get away with accepting the bribe. Apparently that had changed since Vinny had been away, though. The man suddenly had 'principles', and for Cesster, that not only included having nothing to do with ‘non-people’, it meant regarding everyone who wasn't a fair-skinned human as a 'non-person'. Apparently there’d been an altercation in which Azraea nearly burned down his shop.

Azraea had stayed her hand because otherwise she would have been tempted to move onto the other print shops and do the same; that apparently crossed a line for her own principles. Scorched earth tactics and asset denial didn't conflict with Vinny's principles, but that approach would have crossed his line for subtlety. And Azraea's restraint had turned out to be fortunate, if not deliberately prudent; everything their little underground press needed was now sitting packed up in the storeroom of a man Vinny would truly enjoy dealing with.

Vinny never shared the story of what happened with anyone except his wife. In truth, it was rather unprofessional of him. He could have simply set the man up and let him hang. He could have dealt with him with the same quiet efficiency he dealt with Meingen. But Meingen had been a chore – something that needed to be done, and Vinny, well – Verax – had taken care of that quickly, professionally, and as emotionlessly as possible. Verax was good at infiltration and assassination, but he didn’t enjoy it. The game the Gnoman agent staged now was one he did enjoy.

When Cesster walked into his shop one morning and discovered that over 500 unused broadsheets had disappeared, he hadn’t hesitated to contact the city guard to report the theft. He’d spent the entire morning answering their questions before they finally took his books and left to start their investigation in earnest. Cesster had been on his way out the door when a lone Gnoman merchant walked in sipping a Facian coffee.

“We’re closed,” Cesster had curtly informed Verax, “And I don’t want anything to do with your kind.”

“Elberte!” Verax said, “What a terrible way to talk to a faithful business associate!”

“What are you talking about?! I’ve never had anything to do with you.” 

“Oh come now, there’s no guards to hear us talking now. I’m surprised you called them, by the way. Seems like a risky move to me.”

“What are you… did you take my printing materials?!”

“Well, you sold me the materials off the books so that we could avoid paying the rather atrocious tax on them, so… yes. I suppose in a sense I did ‘take’ them.”

“What?” Cesster flustered, “I’ve never sold you anything. WHO ARE YOU?!”

“Believe it or not, I’m a friend,” Verax said, “The best friend you’ve had in a long time, probably. I’m surprised you don’t remember – I’m sure the guards will also be surprised when they start asking questions.”

“What are you talking about?!”

Verax sighed as if he were dealing with a fool, “Allow me to jog your memory. This morning, I graciously concluded our business by taking possession of the papers – per our arrangement, I did so while you were gone because – after all – we agreed you’d be better off not knowing where they were going.”

“We never made any such agreement!”

“Oh Elberte… Is this some sort of seller’s remorse? Or do I really need to remind you? You didn’t want to take cash directly for the materials, so instead I just did a few favors for you.” Verax flashed a predatory smile.

“You haven’t done anything for me!”

“Who do you think the guards will talk to first when they start investigating those books they took, Elberte? My guess is they’ll go to your bookie first. They always go to the bookie first.”

“How would they…?”

“Any guard worth his salt knows every bookie in their city. But just in case our local law enforcement is running a bit slow this week, I did make sure to leave a receipt in the back of one of your books – I'm sure they’ll find that within the hour.”

“What?!”

“Oh, you shouldn’t be so concerned. I don’t know why everyone treats bookies like they’re the slime of the earth – they’re in one of the few lines of work that being successful hinges on maintaining a trustworthy reputation. And Joey’s an especially nice guy. He was very happy to have a large portion of your gambling debt paid off last night. So happy, in fact, that he didn’t mind me paying him in foreign gold. He was curious why a Gnoman was paying your debt, of course, but you needn’t worry; I didn’t go into details about our arrangement – I just said I was doing you a favor.”

Cesster went pale, imagining what the guards would think if they talked to the man, “It’ll be my word against yours, though,” he said, “I’ll explain to them that you set me up. And Joe will back me up when he knows what happened – there’s no proof you and I are connected.”

“Well… technically, that is proof. But you’re partly right; one piece of circumstantial evidence wouldn't carry much weight.”

“One?”

“Well, I can’t really guess how thorough the investigators will be, but if they question Joey much at all, they might learn about your time at the Forking Tongue.”

“The what?”

“Elberte – I’d think you’d know what I’m talking about having just spent the night there.”

“What?! I did no such thing!”

“Of course you did! I paid for a full night there! Of course, the proprietor wouldn’t take Gnoman gold, so I had to pay some of her debts to Joey when I paid yours - lucky for us you two go to the same bookie. None of this rings a bell?”

“This is ridiculous!”

“That’s not what Madame Fleur will say when the guards talk to her. In fact, I imagine she will refer them to one of her workers – a lovely young woman by the name of Samantha – who is prepared to give a very detailed accounting of your activities last night. Right down to that birth mark on your left ass cheek.”

“How do you…?”

“Really, Elberte, you shouldn’t walk around your house naked like that. It’s disgraceful.”

“My wife will vouch for me – she knows I was home!”

“Adria would, of course. And that would carry a lot of weight with the guards, since only a very devoted or very well kept wife would lie to cover her husband’s infidelities.” Verax smiled again.

“No… no… no… what did you do?”

“Just what you asked me to do this morning when you realized what a mistake you’d made last night – I went back to Joey, asked for a good jeweler in town, and purchased a very nice necklace for Adria. It’s being delivered to her as we speak, actually. The card has a note from you, of course, but don’t worry – it’s my name on the store’s receipt.”

“W-why?”

“Well, for one thing, Adria deserves it. You really don’t appreciate her enough, and, honestly, I think your toxic marriage is killing her day by day. Frankly, I was surprised you weren’t a regular at the Forking Tongue – she might be glad to get you out of the house.”

“But what…”

“What will they think when they question your wife and find out you had me buy her a very, very nice present before they turned up at your door? If I were them, it might undermine my confidence in her accounting of things. Like I said, pretty bold move actually contacting the guard like that; if it were me, I would have just kept quiet about the stolen papers, but I imagine it’ll make sense to the guards. Maybe they’ll think you reported the papers as stolen to make sure there weren’t any irregularities in your books? That would make sense.”

“Why? Why would you do this to us?”

Verax stared at him coldly for a moment, but he did consider the question in his mind. He knew that when he eventually got home, this would be one of the first stories he told his wife when they were alone. It was an informal tradition, between them – she never wanted to talk about the people he’d killed, but she was always eager for details about the people he’d screwed – literally or figuratively – and he was always eager to tell her. He was always eager to brag about it.

Which is essentially what Verax was doing now; he was bragging to his victim, rubbing it in his face. He’d known that was why he was doing it, even before he walked in. He’d even thought about what Azraea had said about Syliva and Jake, and realized that in going out of his way to gloat, he was not so different from either of those monsters. Yet, even knowing that he’d still been unable to resist the temptation.  

Although Verax couldn’t resist the urge to play god with the man’s life and lord it over him, he regretted the inconvenience to Mrs. Cesster, who was, by all indications, a lovely person. Worried over her fate, he’d come with one last card to play. He opened his cloak, pulled out a small scroll and handed it to his victim.

“What - What is this?”

“Like I told you Elberte, I’m your friend. And I thought you might do something foolish, like talk to the police, so I brought this as a sort of backup plan.”

Cesster unrolled the document and studied it, “This is a check? This is… a very large check.”

“The Gnoman Empire takes care of its friends, Elberte, it takes care of them very well,” he handed him another piece of paper, with notes on it, “There’s a boat waiting for you and Adria on the other side of the King’s Lake reservoir; it's ready to take you down river to the northern territories of the Gnoman Empire. You can deposit this check at any imperial bank you choose and start your life over down there. I know you’re not fond of foreigners,” Verax acknowledged, “but, well, between the coastlines and the islands of the Facian Sea, the Gnoman Empire hosts about 25,000 miles of beach front property. I’m sure you and Adria can find some place agreeable to settle with that much money.”

Cesster seemed ready to have a heart attack. He probably suspected it might be a con, but with the promise of the guards coming down on him by the end of the day, he apparently didn’t see any good in challenging it. He grabbed some of his things from the shop and left, leaving the front door swinging behind him.

Verax made his way over to Cesster’s home later that evening to check on his collateral victim, Adria Cesster. He hung about one of the windows as the guards explained the situation to her. They told her that her husband had gotten involved with a foreign agent, apparently to cover his gambling debts, and when they’d started asking questions about his personal activities, he’d left the city in a hurry, last seen headed south of the border.    

Apparently, Elberte had been so overwhelmed by the number of zeroes on the check that he forgot to bring his wife to the boat. If Verax felt any guilt at all for manipulating the man, that absolved him of it. Elberte would find a Gnoman bank about a week down river, at the soonest, and there he would learn something important about Gnoman law – a check made out to two people cannot be cashed without both parties present. Elberte was about to find himself jobless and penniless, adrift in a culture he had never tried to understand.

But Adria was blameless, and though she was frightened and unsure of what life had in store for her now, she wouldn’t stay that way. Verax paid a few more debts and the guards’ investigation closed. With a little leverage provided by an anonymous benefactor, Adria was able to sue for an annulment and win her husband’s assets, rather than have them sold at auction. Just to be thorough, Verax re-procured the necklace the guards had confiscated as evidence, and left it in Cesster’s shop with a personal thank you note apologizing for the inconvenience.
Verax had little doubt he was still a terrible person for feeling schadenfreude in response to a situation he himself engineered, but fate had rewarded his sadistic streak with a career he enjoyed and a wife he loved. Verax wasn't an overly spiritual individual, but if one of the many Gnoman gods had been looking out for him over the years, Verax knew he or she must have been a real piece of work.