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k_a_webbPart 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 4, continued
Part 5
Part 5, continued
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8
Part 8, continued
Part 8, second continuation
Part 8, third continuation
Stepping into the guard house once more Peric was swamped with the feeling he really wasn’t cut out for attempting to find a group of criminals in a city like Seahorse Port. As he kept telling everyone the arrest of Dubrana had been entirely due to luck and the fact he kept more than one set of records. Being somewhere he’d never been before, with no idea of how anything worked, he was totally off balance. Glancing behind him at Bertram and Lucille he shook his head. They would be more use than he was, because Lucille was an absolute outsider and he already knew how easy it was to talk to someone like her about anything, and Bertram was so adaptable that he was already comfortable with the city.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” Lucille asked, startling Peric.
“I don’t think so,” he replied, glancing over his shoulder at her again. Every time he thought he was used to her she surprised him again. “Right now this is all too much and I don’t know how to adapt.”
“Adapting to situations is something I was taught to do. If I hadn’t been able to then I would have been an utterly useless Moonjumper and one of the things the Council most appreciates about me is my adaptability. That’s why they approve my visits to Quiar, even though I think they’re terrified of this world more than almost any of the others.”
“Why are they scared of Quiar?”
“They know next to nothing about what Quiar has become. You’ve had Moonjumpers visit before, but they haven’t been able to take anything useful back to the Council. None of them have been accepted by you, in part due to the first rule and in part because they didn’t want to, so I think they’re hoping that I might be able to teach them about Quiar and its races.”
“Is that what you want to do?”
“I don’t know, Peric. The more I connect with the people here, like you, Bertram, and Sini, the less I feel connected to the Council. My problem is how I make the two things work together, because I need to seem connected to the Council in order to keep my tattoos.”
Peric nodded, wondering how he would have coped if he found himself in the same situation. “It may be that you can’t,” he said, trying to be diplomatic about it. “The Council, to me, seems to be a group of disinterested control freaks who want to have total ownership of the Web even though they can’t be bothered to connect with anyone. From what you’ve said I can’t even see how they connect with their Moonjumpers, because it seems like there are layers of hierarchy between you and them.”
“That is true, but…” Lucille sounded thoughtful. “I’m one of the few Moonjumpers who can travel to every world of the Web and that gives me an interesting place in the hierarchy. I have a mentor who’s teaching me how to be a good Moonjumper, because learning about the worlds and being good at the job are two very different things. He isn’t on the Council, even though he’s about thirty years older than me, while passing my thirty-fifth exam automatically gave me a place.”
Peric turned to look at Lucille, unable to believe what he’d heard. “You’re on the Council? You’re a Councillor on the Council of the Moonjumpers?”
“I didn’t take thirty-five exams to become a Councillor, Peric. I took them because I wanted to be a Moonjumper. The place on the Council, I thought, was an added bonus, but it isn’t.” Lucille sounded disappointed. “They give the best Moonjumpers a position to appear to be listening to the voice of the people who travel the worlds. It’s a sham and if I was on any other world I wouldn’t be able to admit that, because the Council have their spies almost everywhere. Here I can talk about things I never could before.” She smiled. “It’s been good for me to be here. I feel almost free for the first time since I realised the position I had worked so hard to put myself in didn’t mean anything.”
Reaching out a paw, Peric gently took hold of Lucille’s hand, feeling even more sorry for the Moonjumper than he had before. “Are you in contact with the Council now?”
“Yes.” Lucille sighed. “We’re given a crystal for emergency contact and I had to contact them for two reasons. The first is the possibility of counterfeits being imported to other worlds. I wanted to let the other Moonjumpers know more than anything, because they’re the ones who’re going to have to deal with it. The other is that I knew I was going to be here for a lot longer than I planned, so I had to let them know where I would be. I’ve told them as little about you and Bertram as I can, without seeming to be withholding information, but if the Council have heard my reports I’m guessing they think you’re withholding information from me. I doubt they even know what’s going on. Their PAs will, my mentor will, and all of the Moonjumpers will, so everyone is on alert until I let them know we’ve sorted things here.”
“I’m glad you’ve been in contact. At least we won’t be swamped with Moonjumpers who think you’ve been kidnapped or murdered.” Peric smiled at her. “However if someone is after the Moonjumpers that crystal might not be safe.”
“I know.” Lucille squeezed Peric’s paw. “I think it would be best if you look after it for me, just in case.”
“Won’t they try to get in contact with you?”
“No, because they know that they might put me in danger if they initiate contact. They’ll wait for me to get in contact with them at a safe time.”
“Then I’ll be happy to look after your crystal.”
***
Durai stepped into the guardhouse ready for his shift, knowing that he would come face to face with a Moonjumper. What he didn’t imagine was that she would be standing there, talking to a mouse, with two birds close by. One he knew was the chimera Sini, who he admired for her love of Seahorse Port and the work she did to inform them of anything that might help with the investigations when she heard it. Their eyes met for a moment. She nodded, telling him in one movement that they were good people, which helped him decide the approach he was going to take.
Quietly, not wanting to startle anyone, Durai closed the distance between him and the Moonjumper. She was the one who was going to change Seahorse Port. “Are you busy?” he asked, in a break in the conversation.
“Not really,” she replied, turning to look at him, and he was almost surprised by the smile she gave him. “You’re one of the night watch?”
“I am.” Durai wasn’t entirely sure how to greet a Moonjumper, so he just bowed his head in a gesture of respect. “My name is Durai and I’m in charge of the group of twelve raccoons who make up the night watch.”
“I’m Lucille and my companions are Peric and Bertram of Sheepshank.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you all.” Having heard of both the Sheepshankians he bowed his head first to Peric and then to Bertram. “If you’d come through to my office then we can discuss what we have learnt and how to move forward.”
Feeling a little more comfortable Durai lead the group through the building to his office, which was plain but all he really needed considering the work he did. Three files held information on cases the night watch had worked on or were working on, including the counterfeits case, and on his desk was the file Hereward had left for him that Peric had brought from Sheepshank.
“I hear the raven Dubrana gave you a codename for her contact,” Durai said as he sat in his chair, and gestured for his guests to do the same.
“She did,” Peric said, nodding. “Apparently he was Snow Cloud, but we don’t know how honest she was being with us.”
“We all know it was likely she lied to you, but I do believe they may be using codenames. Unfortunately we have very little information on the counterfeiters here. Every time we get a lead we’re one step behind, which is more annoying than unexpected, and the best we’ve been able to do is gather rumours in the hope that we might get a break.” Durai looked in the file. “Your imports were happening at night?”
“Yes, but Sheepshank doesn’t have any nocturnal races. The entire town goes to sleep at night, so it was logical for them to work then, but here…” Peric trailed off, shaking his head. “Seahorse Port never stops. Something is happening here day and night, so I’m not sure how much help that’s going to be.”
Nodding, Durai picked up a quill, dipped it in ink, and pulled his notebook closer to him. “What we do know is that Dubrana had to be getting her stock from somewhere. It’s possible they were coming from here and if that is the case then there will be someone in this city who was shipping charms to her, so they will be working at night. That information gives us a starting point we never had before. She used seagulls to do the dirty work?”
“Possibly.”
“What we were thinking might have happened,” Lucille said, drawing Durai’s attention to her, “was that someone slipped some counterfeits into normal imports from Seahorse Port, so the seagulls had no idea what they were doing. I don’t doubt that at least a couple of them knew exactly what they were doing and chose to import counterfeits, but I can’t see it being as many as Dubrana would have needed to flood Sheepshank with them the way she did, and if that is the case…”
“We need to begin looking at the exporters and those in charge of making certain all exports are both legal and complete.” Durai smiled. “You have already been a great help. This is much more than we had before.”
“From there,” Peric said, running his paw over his leg in a movement Durai had seen before, and the raccoon passed him an old quill that he could tap while he thought, “we need to work out how they’re getting into Seahorse Port.”
Durai nodded again, scribbling a couple of notes down. “I’ll get half of my raccoons working on the exporting side. I’m pretty certain that exports would be going out to other towns, so I’ll send out some messages to my fellow guards and see what’s happening.” He looked up again. “The other half I’ll get working on a lead we received last night, which I don’t think is anywhere near as useful as yours is going to be.”
“If you don’t mind me asking, what is the lead?” Lucille asked.
“Someone came in with information on a possible counterfeit artifact. We’ve checked out a couple before, but so far there’s no evidence that someone has managed to counterfeit artifacts.” Durai sighed. “It’s bad enough that they’re hurting people with counterfeit charms.”
“I agree.” Peric tapped his pen on the desk. “We will do what we can and pass on any information we have to either you or Hereward.”
“You’re staying at the Sleeping Chimera, aren’t you?”
“Yes, we are.”
“Then give anything you hear, any ideas you have, to Meriwether. He’ll pass it on to us.” Durai smiled. “Meriwether, and Sini, are well known informants, but no one dares to take either of them on because they know they’ll have half of Seahorse Port after them. It might be good to have people who have no connections both to listen to people talk and maybe tempt the counterfeiters into doing something stupid.”
Peric sighed. Of course they were bait. Exactly what he wanted to be in a city where his empathy was almost overwhelming him and he only had two known allies. There was Meriwether and Sini, but he didn’t want to rely on either of them until he was sure of them. He looked over at Bertram, who shrugged, and then at Lucille, who’s eyes were full of sympathy. Somehow she knew what he was feeling in the same way that Bertram did and once again he was grateful for both of them, especially the Moonjumper.
“Tonight the only thing I want to do is sleep in a bed,” he said. “We’ve been sleeping on the ground for the last few days and it wasn’t the best way of getting a good night’s sleep.”
The raccoon, Durai, nodded. “I’ve had to do that a few times and I know the feeling well. It will, of course, be best for the three of you to work during the day, so sleeping tonight is the best thing for you to do. Hereward will let you know if we find anything and if you want to talk to me again then sunset is definitely the best time to do it.”
Standing, Peric passed the quill back to Durai. “I hope your investigations go well.”
“Thank you.” Durai also stood. “I hope the same.”
***
Even though Peric did want to put an end to the counterfeiters he wasn’t certain he actually wanted to find any new information. He still yearned for Sheepshank, where he knew what to expect, instead of being in a city he didn’t understand. Lucille and Bertram seemed to enjoy being in Seahorse Port and he was happy for them, wishing he could adapt to new things in the same way.
“If we head to the charm maker first,” Sini said, as they left the room, “hopefully we can get something for Peric to help with his empathy problem, then we can head back to the Sleeping Chimera.”
“I don’t know.” Peric said, worried more about the cost of having a charm made for him than he was of his empathy problem.
“Peric, you need something,” Lucille replied. “Even if it does get easier to deal with it’s best to have something in case the counterfeiters know exactly how they can hurt you the most. Neither Bertram or I have a strong ability that can be used the way yours can.”
Looking at Lucille, Peric found himself nodding. “Fine, we’ll see if we can get a charm made, but only because I hadn’t thought that someone would use my empathy to hurt me.”
“You’re doing the right thing,” Sini said, leading them out of the guard house and down a street they’d never been down before. “When the counterfeiters realise what you’re doing here they will do everything they can to make certain you can’t investigate them.”
Mirrored from K. A. Jones Writing.
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Date: 2013-03-07 01:00 pm (UTC)ETA: Ah, no. Sadly you do not have a tag for The Case of the Counterfeit Enchantments and only for "the world walkers" as a whole. Oh well, it was worth a try! ;-p
Hmm...
Date: 2013-03-09 06:44 am (UTC)Feedback
Date: 2013-03-09 06:45 am (UTC)It sounds like they've got a good plan on pursuing the crimes here.