I met up with Calmar in his study. After I’d woken up, I had written down a list of all the people I’d gotten quests for at the auction. It was a little over twenty people, thanks to some overheard conversations, and I wanted a little more information on them. After my talk with Greg, things didn’t seem as binary as I first thought.

  Calmar’s face as he read the list told me that it might be a bigger issue than I thought.

  “Dani… where did you get this list?” He asked, setting it down in front of him. He was sitting behind the desk, dressed in a red doublet with a white sleeved shirt. Despite what Grimoire had said the night before, he looked wide awake and ready to work.

  “Last night, when I went to an auction.” I admitted. “I went outside the gate into the slums to see where I’d… woken up. And to visit the tavern.”

  Cal pinched the bridge of his nose, “Please tell me it wasn’t the slave auction run by the Polstead Consortium.”

  “The what?” I asked.

  “They are a group of merchants who primarily trade in slaves and restricted goods.” He said as he leaned back in his chair. “One of their caravans is stuck in the city until the swarm ends.”

  “Then probably.” I said, looking at the list he’d set down, “So, how many from the caravan are on that list?”

  “No idea.” Cal said, picking up the list to look through it again. “I recognize a few of the names, mostly sons or daughters of families in the area. Amelia Harper is Graham Harper’s third daughter, not surprised you saw her. James Donnor, Qin Yan, and Silvia Grim are all merchants who directly compete with our business interests. Goldman Trell is the person who runs the caravan and usually sells off their goods.”

  I frowned and he waved his hand at me, “Not just people, Dani. They also handle explosives, exotic weapons, and have a wide information network. You can buy information on any city in Etesian and the Harnell Reach mountains through them.”

  “So, important people.” I observed.

  He slumped in his chair and sighed, “Yes, Dani. Very important.”

  “What about the other names?” I asked, leaning over the desk to look at the list.

  “No idea.” Cal grabbed the sheet and scanned it another time. “If I were to guess, likely merchants, farmers, or some families chamberlain.”

  I started to pace in front of his desk, tapping my finger against my chin. Would it be worth it to dig deeper into them? What am I looking for with this? It was a good question that I didn’t have an answer for.

  The door swung open and Porter stormed in. He started right for me, point a finger at me, “You! Did you do it?!”

  I stumbled back, bumping into the desk, “Ow, what? What are you talking about?”

  “Calm down Porter!” Calmar slammed his hand on his desk, standing up to look Porter in the eye.

  Porter stopped and looked at Cal. He took a breath and walked to a chair, turning it to face us as he took a seat. “Where were you last night?”

  I looked at Cal, who nodded. “I was at a slave auction.”

  He put his hands in his face and groaned. “Damn it.” He looked over to Cal, “There was a massacre over by the warehouses. It’s where last night’s auction was held. Around a dozen bodies.”

  They both stared at me, “It wasn’t me! Everyone was fine when I left!”

  “What were you doing there?” Porter asked.

  “I wanted to see how the slaves were kept and see what kind of people would buy others with those collars.” I said. “I also bought two slaves.”

  “You what?!” They both shouted.

  “What?!” I asked as I backed up from the desk.

  “Where are they?!” Cal shouted, genuine anger in his voice.

  “I released them.” I pulled the collars from the Spatial Closet and dropped them on the desk. “Offered them jobs, but they weren’t interested.”

  “Fuck.” Porter sighed, “We’ll need to get ready, the guards will probably be by soon.”

  Calmar stared at the collars on his desk, face twisted in disgust. “Get those out of my sight.”

  I put them back into my storage closet. “I figured leaving them around wasn’t a good idea, so I kept them.”

  He took a deep breath and stared up at the ceiling, eyes closed. “Dani…” He shook his head and bent down, pulling a bottle from the desk and pouring himself a glass. “What did they look like?”

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  I thought back to last night, “Uh, boy with white hair a little shorter than me and a tall guy with a scar on his face and fucked up hands. The boy was Adelhard and the other one was an Enchanter named Bosco.”

  “They must not have been fucked up too much if he got to that many people.” Porter muttered, shaking his head.

  “It was the boy, probably.” I said, taking a seat in one of the chairs closer to Calmar’s desk. They both looked at me skeptically, so I sighed and continued. “Most of his information came up as unknown, despite the auctioneer claiming he was a street rat. Scan also shows me total levels, and ninety is a little high for a street rat.”

  “Ninety?” Calmar looked stunned.

  “Core blinded fools were keeping a chimera when they thought they had a mouse.” Porter mumbled to no one specifically. “How much did you spend?”

  “More than I wanted to, but some dick running a brothel wanted the clearly underage boy for reasons I’m sure I can guess, but don’t want to know.” I said, mouth set in a grim line as I looked between Porter and Calmar. “Sixteen thousand for the boy and five hundred for the enchanter.”

  Calmar groaned, “Oh, that’s bad. Porter, go tell Grimoire that any guard needs a warrant before stepping on the premises.” Porter got up and headed out the door closing it behind him. Then Cal turned towards me, “And now we get to talk about slave law so you can understand how badly you just fucked up.”

  “Excuse me?” I said, confused because Cal usually didn’t raise is voice like that at me.

  “No, I won’t excuse you.” He stood, hands on the desk, “I’ve been lenient about all of this, Dani. I have done my best to ignore the differences, tried to be understanding. But this is a basic law anywhere slavery is legal.”

  Taking a deep breath, he stepped from behind the desk, leaving the glass and bottle where he’d set it. Uh oh. He’s not drinking, that can’t be good. “Alright, so explain it to me. Please.”

  That seemed to shave some of the edge out of Calmar’s posture as he stood in front of his desk, gathering himself to speak. “Well, to start, the slave trade is heavily regulated. Every transaction is verified by three different organizations: The Merchant’s Council, the Gilded, and The Duke’s Treasury. Additionally, every collar is tracked through dozens of different enchantments, spells, and identification runes.”

  I nodded, following along so far.

  He reached back and took a sip from his glass before continuing. “The relevant bit of law here involves the culpability of those who purchase slaves and their actions. General wisdom is that everyone is responsible for their own actions, but when it comes to slaves that isn’t true. You can’t hold someone accountable for something they are magically compelled to do, can you?”

  It was a rhetorical question, but I shook my head anyway. “No, they’re not in control of themselves.”

  “Exactly.” He crossed his arms and started to pace. “And by that logic, that would make anyone who owned the slave, or had the capability of ordering them to action, responsible for the actions of the slave. By that argument, slaves are not responsible for their own actions.”

  “Okay… But I have the collars. They aren’t slaves anymore.” I responded.

  “Except… they are.” Calmar said, stopping in front of me. “Dani, if they’re registered with any of those organizations, they will be counted as slaves until you go and fix it. If they are caught, they will be returned to you, and you will cover any costs accrued. You will be responsible for any crimes they commit.”

  “What?!” I shouted, angry at how stupid it all was. “I set them free, what happens after is on them not me.”

  “And how will anyone know you set them free?!” Calmar said, pointing a finger at me, stabbing into my chest with it every few words. He stepped back, “This kind of thing is so common, it’s in half the romance novels on your bookshelf.”

  I blinked, thinking about the books on the shelf in my room. I still hadn’t worked through half of them, even though Speedreading was at Tier 1. “I… haven’t read a lot of them. They seemed… weird.”

  Calmar barked out a laugh, “Well… you aren’t wrong.” He shook his head and sighed, taking up his glass again and take a drink.

  We stood there, in silence for a little over a minute, both of us trying to come up with something to say. I gave up trying to think of something clever and just asked, “So, how bad is this? Really.”

  He ran his hand through his hair and let out a long breath that puffed his cheeks out slightly, “Bad. Not as bad as Paige’s situation, but it’ll hurt the Rosecrest reputation. With the right effort, it can be presented as you being naive, maybe lie a little and say the boy tricked you.” As he talked through it, he started nodding, “Yea, say he promised to teach you a skill or something if you let him go. That one’s even believable with how much you’ve been training.”

  I blinked, “You think they’ll believe me?”

  He looked at me, “You? No, probably not. If we have Deacon act as your representative though…”

  I… hadn’t considered that. “Think he’d do it?”

  “Let’s go ask him.” Calmar said, finishing the drink before heading for the door.

  When we got close to the room Deacon had claimed, we slowed down as we heard something unfamiliar. There was a soft melody, barely audible at first but growing slowly but steadily in volume as we got closer. The gently plucking of strings seemed to blanket the hall in a relaxed rhythm that, despite how pleasant it sounded, I could tell was only four different notes being played in sequence.

  That didn’t make it any less enjoyable.

  At the entrance to the room, I started to recognize the song as one I’d heard when Deacon and I had left the theater. At the wake for the girl that had been found. It wasn’t as raw, somehow, as what the other musicians had been playing though. More measured and relaxed.

  And it all stopped when Cal knocked on the door. “Deacon. Sorry to interrupt, but it’s important.”

  There was an audible sigh from the other side of the door and a few moments later Deacon opened it. He had one hand on the door and the other holding guitar. It was the first time I’d seen him with them both so he looked weird. Despite how late in the morning it was, he looked like he’d just come out of a shower and hadn’t bothered to put a shirt on. Calmar actually flushed and I raised an eyebrow without saying anything.

  “Dani. Cal.” He said looking at both of us. His gaze settled on me and he sighed, “So, what’d she fuck up?”

  I frowned, but Calmar spoke first, “We’ll be getting guards soon asking about a homicide by the slave auction.”

  Deacon blinked a few times. He looked me up and down, “Did you do it?” When I responded with an unamused stare he held his hands up, “Just asking, okay. Let me get a shirt on and we can go over-”

  There was a loud pounding on the front door. “Never mind, I’ll figure it out as we go.” Deacon said, ducking back into his room. That left me and Cal heading for the front, trying to figure out how to handle it.