• Mature • [Bolstrum] Auditing Season (Graded)

[Kasoria]

19th Trial, Vhalar, 718a
Bolstrum, eighteen trials ride South of Etzos Prime
18th Bell

"What can I get for ya, Francis?"

"Oh, the usual will do me fine, Mary."

"Ale wiv' that, love?"

"Just a half-pint, please."

It wasn't the "please" that marked him out to Mary; even the drovers and laborers and caravan guards and, Fates save her, the soldiers had enough manners to remember that word. No, it was the "pint" after "half" that would raise the eyebrows of anyone at the bar inclined to pay attention. A swift half, a cheeky half, a wee half, or just "a half", all these were common enough requests. But just adding the last word, with that clipped tone... it made Mary smile a little wider, if only because she knew what it meant.

Gentler soul and softer hands, does that one have, she thought as she scribbled down his order and passed it back to the cook. Andy probably wouldn't even need it: Mister Francis was a regular. And he's not a complete twat with them, either.

"I'll bring yer ale over in a trill, love. Take yer-"

"Table by the window?"

The old woman chuckled and nodded. As if by magic, or just the result of the lull between Lunch and Dinner, his usual table was free. "As y'wish, love. Maybe pick a new spot, eh? Live a little."

The man who looked just... cleaner, than everyone else in the cafe laughed and blushed a little. Another sign of where he'd come from. Any humor directed at him, about him, was likely to flush his face with blood. He waved the suggestion away and continued to his regular spot, as things always had been and thus how he liked them.

"Maybe another trial, Mary."

"Suit yerself, love..."

He made himself comfy and enjoyed the view, just like always. Fork and spoon and knife were laid out, just like always. The little ledger of reminders and outstanding transactions was opened, pen trapped between the pages, and he would busy himself with them until his food arrived. Just like always.

Francis did not mind the sameness. In fact, he appreciated it. He knew that other men would be bored with such predictability, and truth be told, her understood why. But his life was precarious enough, properly considered. He'd been born and raised in the Oh'Pee, and thus earned the right to call it as such. His smarts and quickness with figures had seen him apprenticed to a bookkeeper, where he learned to talk nicely and smoothly. He also found the structure he craved, the order of a regular wage and a nice, neat nook to work from. He finished his apprenticeship and found another position, better paying, but further south. Away from the Big Rock and down closer to the Southern Border, where it was said Rhakros forces still prowled.

Crosstown had been sacked, after all. Sacked. A term that conjured such bloody, chaotic imagery in his timid mind. Reminding him of the brutal, merciless gutter fights he'd seen in his youth. But this was where his employment was, and Mister Yancy required him to be at his best, marauding hordes beyond the horizon or not!

So did their mutual master, far to the North. Francis was from the Oh'Pee, as has been said. He knew people there. Had family there. Friends. Chums that had grown to adulthood and stable careers... or just grown bigger and meaner and found uglier work. So when Mister Yancy told him the name of the man they worked for, who owned the business where he kept the books and Yancy kept the legal wheels turning and properly greased, the lawyer was surprised to see stark, pale recognition on the young man's face.

"Ah," Yancy had said, smiling over the rim of his teacup. "You know the name of Bangun Vorund, do you?"

Francis had nodded his head. That had been three arcs ago. Now he struggled to focus on the columns of numbers in his notebook. It had been three arcs since that day, one arc since his suspicions had begun, two seasons since they'd been confirmed, a season after he'd contacted Mister Vorund... and now twenty-two... no, this made twenty-three trials since he'd heard word back from the under-lord of the South Side. The more the trials stretched on, the more his mind twisted and contorted his fears into outright nightmares. Taunted him with images of his throat cut, or his head smashed him, his bloated body dragged from a river, or just him... vanishing. Leaving nothing but shrugging shoulders and a vague recollection of a quiet, bookish man who'd worked for Vorund Trading and Transport, right?

Calm down, he told himself, taking a deep breath and a slightly shallower swallow of ale to help him. It's been seasons. If Yancy knew, you'd... well, you would know about it. So there's no-

A shadow fell over him and Yancy's stomach growled with joy. But when the man shuffled away his pad and stylus away and looked up, expecting to see a beaming Mary bearing a tray of beef stew, steamed vegetables, two bread rolls and a spoonful of butter... there was someone else there.

Not much taller than Mary. Thinner. His body looked... tighter, even under his loose traveling clothes. A sword was at his hip, hilt visible under his cloak. The man held a hat in one hand, and Francis could see the hair under it was neatly combed and tied up in a long tail stretching down his back. Black, cold eyes like shards of ebony looked down at him, above a beard neatly trimmed around a pointed jaw.

Clerk and Traveller - for that's what the man smelled like - regarded each other for a while. The stranger seemed like he... knew him. Was expecting him to know him. But it took a while for Francis to put things together, and remember what the letter from Mister Vorund had said.

The description he'd given of the man he'd be sending to "sort this out". When he would be arriving, or thereabouts, and wouldn't you know, today was that day (or thereabounts). Realization blossomed on Francis' face, chasing away the confusion until he managed a flittering smile.

"Oh, ah... M-Mister... Kasoria?"

The newcomer nodded, and took a seat without being offered one.

"You are Francis." The clerk nodded, unease killing the voice that questioned how the man knew that. It wasn't a question, after all. The man stated if, as if giving the sky its proper color. The traveler set down a bag that clanked faintly when he did, and folded his hands together atop the polished wood. "We have much to discuss."

[Kasoria]

One thing he'd learned after so many arcs in his chosen trade, was that these things often came down to a conversation. That was often how they started, but not in the way one would think. Being contracted, retained, ordered, dispatched, however one wished to term it, was but the catalyst of what would follow. But it dealt really only with the Who. The Why was not of any particular concern to Kasoria. Anyone could find justifications, excuses, noble reasons and petty whims.

When, Where, and How were the meat of his mission. The first and second informed the third. They armed him as invaluably as did his sword, his dagger, his fists, and his arcs of experience. They gave him knowledge. He began with a name, a description, like an item scrawled on a grocery list. But with the right conversation, from an informed individual, he had so much more. He had a canvas, brightly hued with depth and detail. The full breadth of what he had to do, and how best to do it.

"My master, he's... he's stealing from Mister Vorund."

Kasoria took another mouthful of stew and spared the clerk a quick glance. This was his artist of the day. One that spoke with a surprising, simmering anger, oddly enough. His accent was somewhat refined, without the drawl and meandering meter of a true son of the Oh'Pee. Plenty of time spent with his "betters", from what Vorund had told him. In the counting houses of the Comm'See, where a veneer of class was essential to impress a more... discerning clientele. Even in the presence of a man born a few streets over from him, Francis didn't seem to relax it. The tone and pitch was not an affectation to him; it was who he was.

The assassin chewed his stew. Lamb and sprouts. An oddly inspired combination.

"Go on."

"I... Well, it started arcs ago. The doubts, I mean. Nothing solid at first, just little... discrepancies, that didn't really make sense. I mean, the business has plenty of money coming in and out. Wages, contracts, road expenses, feed, storage space, internal customs taxes, regular taxes, and that's not including the local graft and payments..."

The bookish wee man rambled on for a while and Kasoria listened, but knew when he was hearing something that he could afford to slide into the background, as it were. Instead he looked around the man, as if examining his aura... or the space behind him. His gaze slid further along the bar, onto the next table, over the men hunched over there eating. Past and through the window, at a middle-of-nowhere town suddenly a booming miniature metropolis, now Crosstown was... out of service, for the moment.

Kasoria could read a map. Bolstrum was now the biggest town this far south of Etzos Prime, and four or five towns almost as large depended on it and its fat, safe caravan road for pretty much everything... and everything they had that couldn't be sailed up the coast, went through it, too. And that was if the merchants didn't mind risking more of those fucking pirates that had caused so many issues a season or two ago.

Lot of money to be made, Kasoria thought as he chewed, Francis still reeling off all the species and subspecies of costs a thriving business could acrue. Lots of chances to hide it, too.

"... but like I said, the numbers just didn't add up. I mean... eight percent for gate taxes, instead of six? Four hundred gold nels for a season's feed when the going price is a third of that? Not to mention purses and cuts here and there for, ah... gifts, to Customs and tax collectors that don't even exist." The accountant shook his head, faith in reality clearly shaken that innocent sums and their simple truths had been so perverted. "I wrote them all down. Went through the books, all of them. Compared them to what we should have made and lost, and what we actually marked down for Vorund's records-"

"How much short are you?"

Francis clearly didn't like the "you" part of that. He was the loyal employee, here! He'd sent back word to the dreaded owner of the business, which told the world and his wife that he wasn't stealing. What thief would draw such attention to his crime, after all? And now... "you"? He swallowed and flipped through his little notebook. There was a back page there, probably one he didn't use often, given by how little the corners were turned. Even in his private thoughts, Kasoria could see he guarded himself.

Not a bad idea.

"Twenty-two thousand, four hundred gold nels. Give or take a moonie."

Ordinarily, Kasoria would have favored the office boy with a snort and a soft smile. Been a while since he'd heard that little big of ancient slang. Moonie, silver moon, silver nel... well, if sufficed for wit where he'd come. They'd come from, apparently. But the sheer amount of money just spoken aloud, like it was tips from a beggar's bowl... he swallowed what seemed like a whole steak, rather than a mouthful of soggy beef.

"Twenty-two grand?"

"Yes. And four hundred."

"Twenty-two thousand, in three arcs?"

"And four hundred, yes, sir. That's how long I've been noticing these-"

"Discrepancies."

"Ah! Always nice to know you're being listened to."

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"Oh, well, um, you seemed to be looking around and-"

"Y'think I can't pay attention to you an' mark my surroundin's, too?"
"No! No, of course not, it-its just-"

"Ah, hush, boy, an' lemme think..."

Kasoria embraced the silence, and did just that. Three arcs! Vorund hadn't mentioned that part. How long did this fucking bookworm need before he saw a crime taking place? Then he reminded himself, the man opposite him was not cut from his cloth. He'd never battered a man half to death with a paving stone when barely grown; never hunted and slaughtered others on suspicion of disloyalty, let alone proof. No, he was a man who believed in numbers and figures and the immutable truth they told. His evidence was far more solid than the gossip- and paranoia-fueled justifications of Kasoria's world... but fucked if it didn't move a lot slower.

That's the past. Focus on the present. The task at hand.

"Youse still think he has it?" His sudden statement almost made the bookkeeper flinch. "The money he took?"

"Um, well... I think so, yes. Probably in a bank, though. That much gold, it's, ah... kind of hard to shove it under a mattress."

Now Kasoria snorted, lip twitching for a moment in a smile. He scooped more stew into his mouth, not forgetting his appetite after the long journey. Besides, it was what was expected of him. A weary traveler, enjoying a meal after a long trek, seated opposite a stranger in a crowded cafe. Not eating, not drinking, just talking... that would have aroused undue notice, and Vorund had been very clear as to his instructions.

You're a ghost, Kas, he'd said, the night before he'd made arrangements to leave. No sign, no shadow, no name, no face. Just sort this shite out and come home.

"Aye, probably right. So, y'think he keeps records?"

"Oh, I know he does. All these transactions and little thefts and details... even a smart man like Mister Yancy couldn't hold them all in his head, not for three arcs! So there must be another set of books somewhere. A second ledger, just for his thieving." The younger man sighed and shook his head, picking nervously at the edge of his notebook. "But, alas, I haven't found it. And I've searched everywhere, when he and Pelham aren't there."

Kasoria was about to smile again, his mouth poised to twist in mirth at the clerk's balls, until he heard that second name. Pelham. A memory stirred, trying to dredge up a face with it. He frowned and tore his roll in half. That was his habit: eat the stew, drink the ale, mop up the bowl and plate with your bread. He'd been doing it for so long he didn't even see it as a habit. Just... how things were.

"Pelham?"

"Oh, he's head of security for the firm. Takes care of all the guards on the caravans, and he watches over Mister Yancy. He's... well... he reminds me a lot of you. Just bigger."

Francis almost flinched at the explosion of noise that erupted from Kasoria's mouth. Had to flick a few spots of half-chewed bread from his beard, too. The diminutive assassin's shoulders bobbed as he chuckled, wagging a finger at the accountant.

"Might jus' end up likin' youse, wee man. So, y'think he's got this ledger stashed somewhere else?"

"Aye, probably," Francis said, seeming to slip back into his childhood vernacular the more he associated with this man from the same streets, who'd never truly left them. "At his home, maybe?"

"Got a wife an' kids, right?"

"Yes, wife and a girl."

"Nah. Never bet a cunt like this that trusted 'is wife enough not t'nose about. Mistress?"

"Um... yes, yes, I think so."

Kasroai marveled at the man in front of him. He was selling his boss down the river (well, up the road, technically) to a grander master who could and would see the cunt dead for his larceny, yet admitting that he had a bit on the side was still hard for him. Loyalty as a strange thing. He'd never truly understand the nuances of it. As far as he was concerned, once your mind had turned from the side and aid of a man, that was it. Everything else might as well follow suit.

"Y'know where I can find her?"

Francis gave him an address and Kasoria logged it carefully away in his mind. Then the man cast a furtive gaze about and pulled something small and metal from his pocket. He slid it over to Kasoria, covering it with his hand as long as he could. Kasoria took it, and felt the ridges and shape of a key under his fingers.

"A copy, to the warehouse and offices. I had it made a few trials ago. In case you need to get inside."

Kasoria smiled again, and rose to his feet. A couple of coins tinkled down onto the table, more than enough to cover the meals. Francis started to rise but a single half-raised hand kept him in his seat.

"Stay put, looks better this way."

Francis looked over the man as he picked up his bag, that clanked and ground as if mortal, malicious devices were hidden inside. Along with clothes and soap, he assumed. The man was clearly a product of those gutters he knew as a boy. So many times, he'd seen his type, stalking the shadows and the taverns and the tunnels. Men who were barely a paper's width from the most hideous violence, at all times. He had no doubt this man was armed, and the more he looked and remembered, he was reminded of a story. A man in rags and stinking garments. A man who worked for all takers, and then over ten arcs ago, pledged his sword to Bangun Vorund alone.

A man no-one ever saw coming, until it was far too late.

He looked at this tired little man, bent from his age and travels, and he swallowed.

"What... What are you going to do?"

Kasoria smirked and paused before leaving. He had lodgings to acquire, and work to begin.

"Auditing. Don't leave for a while."

He turned on his heel and walked away. Francis swallowed again, parade of grisly images passing before his eyes. Stories he'd heard. Memories he couldn't scrub away. Only now it was Mister Yancy and Pelham who wore those glassy, still faces. All because of him going behind their backs and informing on them, to a man who'd built his empire on bodies as much as he had will and nels.

No, he reminded himself, coughing the brief blockage from his throat and returning to his notebook. They did this. He did this. The moment he stole from Mister Vorund.

Continued here

[Oberan]

Review Rewards

Kasroai -- Like Kasoria, but even more brutal

Points awarded: 10

Knowledge:

Deception: Hiding Embezzlement in a Blizzard of Paperwork
Detection: Guessing an Object By Feel of Its Shape
Detection: Recognizing a Familiar Street Name
Disguise: Just Another Traveler, Enjoying a Meal
Disguise: Leaving Separately, Avoiding Suspicion
Investigation: Inquiring About Potential Hiding Spots

Non-Skill Knowledge:
NPC Francis: Bookkeeper for Vorund Trading and Transport (Bolstrum Office)
NPC Francis: Doing the Right Thing, and Signing His Boss' Death Warrant
Location: Bolstrum, Booming Town South of Etzos
Location: Crosstown, Formerly a Bustling Town, Now Sacked By Invaders and Steadily Being Rebuilt
NPC Pelham: Former Etzos Scratcher, Now Bodyguard-Cum-Security for Yancy
NPC Yancy: Manager and Legal Counsel for Bolstrum Office of Vorund Trading and Transport
NPC Yancy: Thieving Bastard
NPC Vorund: Wants Yancy Dead, Quietly, And His Money Reclaimed

Magic: No magic exp

Other: N/A

Notes:
Real great tone setter, as to be expected. You wrote Yancy once instead of Francis, which confused me more than it should have, and you typo'd Kas' name once.

I honestly do like Francis a lot. Very straitlaced man, that one. Very, ehm, by the book, if you will. Excellent characterization, as always. Looking forward to reading the next part.

Your review request is here.
Please include the following stamp to your review request:

Code: Select all

[center][img]/gallery/image/15001/medium[/img][/center]

If you have any questions, comments or concerns in regards to this review, feel free to PM.