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k_a_webb“Oh.” Lucille kept picking up files, trying not show her surprise. “I thought Sheepshank was almost totally free of counterfeits.”
“We were.” Peric sighed. “It’s a relatively recent problem, although it’s impossible to stop them entirely.”
“The Moonjumper connection seems more tenuous now.”
“I don’t know. There has to be a reason the Bureau’s book was taken, so it does need to be looked into, and the fact that both break-ins happened at the same time… I doubt it’s a coincidence.”
Lucille nodded, putting another pile of files onto the desk. “You’re probably right, but I can’t help hoping you aren’t.” She looked around the office, wondering exactly how many files Peric had, before bending down to pick up another few from close to the window. “The Council won’t be happy if they have to get involved with something on Quiar. They…” Shaking her head she trailed off, not wanting to say anything more.
“I know, Lucille.” Peric smiled at her as she looked over at him. “The first rule of being a Council Moonjumper is to not get involved, right?”
“It was the easiest rule to write and the hardest rule to follow, at least for anyone who actually makes real connections with the worlds they travel to.” She smiled back at Peric. “I’m not all that good at not getting involved.”
“That was obvious from the way you treated Aulus.”
“When I was studying to be a Moonjumper everything seemed so simple and I was so busy that I didn’t have time to make many connections.” Lucille used her free hand to push some papers into one of the files. “Now…” She shrugged. “I’m getting to know the people on the worlds I travel to, so the first rule isn’t as easy to follow as I always believed it would be. I probably should have left you to deal with this, but I couldn’t do that, not after how you helped me and I was worried about poor Aulus.”
“Do you know much about Quiaran magic?” Peric asked, sounding curious.
“I know as much as the Council knows. In order to travel here I had to pass an in depth test about the world, its geography, the races that live here, and the magic that each race has, and I’ve spent a lot of time writing about the world, because I want this to be one of my permanent worlds.”
“I’ve always wondered how much the Council does know about the worlds of the web. The fae obviously had records, because they made the worlds, but everything must have evolved over time.”
Looking over at Peric, Lucille tried to push the idea she’d just had to the back of her mind, watching as he put another pile of files on the desk, but it wasn’t that easy once she’d thought it. “When I come back,” she started, as the mouse looked over at her, “we could compare notes.”
“Wouldn’t you have to tell the Council anything you found out?”
“Yes, I would.” Lucille put the last of the files on the desk, knowing that meant that the hard part was next. “Is that a problem?”
“There are some things we’d rather the Council didn’t know, because…” Their eyes met and Peric shrugged, looking uncomfortable. “We don’t trust the Council and most of the time we don’t like them much either.”
“I’m the exception to the rule.”
“You’re a Council Moonjumper and that, well, makes you an enemy to some, others are more ambivalent, and you’re unlikely to find anyone here who would automatically be comfortable around you because of what you are.”
“Why did you help me?”
“It was the right thing to do.” Peric patted her hand with his paw. “It didn’t matter who you were, because no one, not even a Council Moonjumper, deserves to be abused by anyone.”
“Thank you.”
“You don’t need to thank me.”
“I do. From what you’ve said it’s pretty obvious that very few Quiarans would have helped me.” Lucille smiled at Peric. “I’m lucky that you were there, I’m lucky it was you and Bertram, and the timing was perfect for more than one reason.”
Bertram walking into the office, carrying several sheets of paper and a quill. “The list was up to date, Peric, and you’re welcome, Lucille. I think we were just as lucky it was you, because I’m almost certain most Council Moonjumpers would have followed the first rule.”
“They would have done.” Lucille looked at Bertram, smiling at him too, before turning back to Peric. “How are we going to do this?”
“Spread out the list and go through the piles of files, ticking each file off the list until we find out which ones are missing.” Peric took two quills off his desk, passing one of them to Lucille. “When we know which ones are missing we can write that information down and give it to the cornsnakes.” He glanced at the piles. “I was thinking that only one would be gone, but it does seem like we’re missing more than one, so once we know which ones are missing we can work out why they were taken.”
“Okay,” Lucille replied, watching as Bertram put each page of the list onto the floor before dipping her pen into the ink pot on Peric’s desk.
With her free hand she began working through the pile of files closest to her, focusing entirely on what she was doing because she knew getting the list right was important. It was the easy way to stop herself from worrying about what the Council would say when she told them what she’d been doing on Quiar. They weren’t going to be happy that she’d got involved in things that really didn’t affect her or them, but she couldn’t help thinking that the theft of the record book belonging to the Bureau was something that could affect them in the future and if that was connected with the theft of Peric’s files then everything she’d done had been for the Council’s benefit.
Sighing, Lucille moved files from the pile on Peric’s desk to another pile that they’d made of files that they’d checked off the list. It didn’t take as long to go though all of them as she’d anticipated, in part because there was three of them, and when they were finally done Peric wrote a list of all the files that were missing.
“This is really strange,” he said, tapping his pen on the desk as he looked at the list. “I can’t think why anyone would have taken these files.”
“How are the files normally organised?” Lucille asked.
“In date order, from when I took over this position to now, because it seemed the best way to organise them. Every file has the basic information about them written on the front.”
Lucille took a file off the top of the pile to have a look. “None of the files appeared to have been searched through, so I’m guessing the information you wrote onto the front of the file was all they needed to be able to work out which were the ones they wanted.”
Nodding, Peric looked down at the list of stolen files again. “Bertram, can you take the list to the cornsnakes while I look through the files?”
“Of course, Peric.” Bertram took the piece of paper off him. “I won’t be long. Do either of you want anything?”
Peric shook his head, looking distracted, while Lucille took a couple of moments to think. “I could do with a drink,” she replied, “if it’s not too much hassle.”
Bertram smiled at her. “Of course it’s not. You’ve been a great help.”
Lucille smiled back before following Peric into Bertram’s office. She couldn’t see anything in the room, but the mouse walked straight over to one of the walls and she could hear the drawer open even if she couldn’t see it. “I’m going to take all the files we need out of this cabinet, so it would be really helpful if you could hold them for me, Lucille.”
“Of course.”
As Peric took the first file out of the cabinet Lucille found herself staring at the air where it should have been. Moments later, appearing to have left the charm’s influence, she could see the file and took it gently from the mouse. Eleven files later the two of them were sat on the floor in Bertram’s office, the files between them, both studying them intensely.
“Sheepshank is a large town,” Peric said, jotting notes down on a piece of paper he’d taken from Bertram’s desk. “We have visitors every day of the week, coming here to sell to the local merchants or buy from them, because we are known for our charms. Then there are those who are inhabitants of this town who leave it to buy items from around the world and the web. In recent times we haven’t had many off world items, because it’s difficult to become a web merchant and we don’t have any visitors from off world.”
“The likelihood is that whoever stole the files is a local, because they knew exactly where to look, and they must have known or found out that both you and Bertram were out of the office.”
“Normally at least one of us is here, but because we had a recent note about unhappiness within the ranks of the seagulls we went out to see if we could find out anything more about the counterfeit enchantments.”
“Is it possible the note could have been to lure you out?”
“I doubt it very much.” Peric tapped his quill on the paper in front of him. “There may be guards who are help the counterfeiters, but I’ve worked with the sheep who sent me the note before and she is very against any counterfeits coming into Sheepshank. She’s related to the founders of the town, so it’s important to her. Her partner is a lovely cornsnake who I’ve never had any worries about.”
“That means that someone in the market might have passed on a message or someone in the town hall.”
“It seems unlikely that anyone in the town hall would, but I have enemies in the market so that’s a possibility.” Suddenly Peric smiled at Lucille. “I’m an idiot.”
“Why?”
“All of the cases involved people from the same neighbourhood.”
“Okay…” Lucille looked at Peric, realising that no matter how much the Council knew about Quiar there was always going to be things they didn’t know, because the worlds did evolve and so few Walkers ever wanted to visit the worlds with strange races. “Is that of help to you?”
“With the number of races we have here there are often groups who live in the same neighbourhood, so they don’t have to interact with anyone they don’t like when they aren’t in the market. The market is really the place where all the races in town mix. There are some mixed neighbourhoods, normally phyle based, and all of the people involved in these cases come from an avian neighbourhood I never would have thought had any connection with the counterfeits.”
“An avian neighbourhood seems unsurprising,” Bertram said as he walked into the office, making Lucille jump. “Sorry, Lucille. Here’s your drink.” He passed a mug to her and she sipped it, wondering what it was. “The cornsnakes have the list.”
“Look at which neighbourhood.”
Bertram looked down at the files. “Seriously…” He shook his head. “I never even would have thought of looking there for a counterfeiter.”
Mirrored from K. A. Jones Writing.
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Date: 2013-02-04 08:01 pm (UTC)That should say "were" above.
>>There may be guards who are help the counterfeiters<<
That should say either "who help the counterfeiters" or "are helping" above.
>> there was always going to be things they didn’t know <<
That should say "were" above.
Yay, the plot thickens!