Chương 68: The Face of Evil

Even a day after absorbing the journal, Lira's mood remained foul. She sat behind her desk, staring at an open book without actually reading it, her thoughts repeatedly drifting back toward Sergeant Salvek and the ugly contents of his private records. The man apparently considered himself clever. Much of the journal had been written using a cipher. Sadly for him, it was one of the most common substitution ciphers on the continent, a code so overused that it barely registered to Lira's book absorption spell.

The spell absorbed knowledge, not language, after all. As long as Lira could understand what was written, the meaning would simply arrive inside her mind. And unfortunately for him, Lira had learned how to break similar ciphers when she was nine years old, so she didn't need to spend hours decoding it to reveal every ugly detail in perfect clarity. The journal painted a picture of a man far worse than the stern military instructor most people saw.

There was the expected corruption as a matter of course, things like intimidation of merchants, protection money extracted from craftsmen, evidence that vanished whenever the wrong noble became involved, and enough bribery to make half the city guard wealthy, but none of that particularly shocked Lira. She had spent too many years in Halthar to be surprised by run-of-the-mill corruption. She knew Pallen paid someone to look the other way in most of his dealings. It was ugly, but it was also ordinary.

What truly sickened her was something Salvek repeatedly referred to as "mud fishing." The phrase alone made her skin crawl. According to the journal, Salvek maintained a small network led by one of his trusted lieutenants, a man named Thadwick. Their task was simple: they searched for vulnerable girls, either homeless girls, runaways, orphans, or daughters of struggling farmers from nearby villages and communes. They weren't too picky.

Anyone desperate enough to accept a warm meal, a clean bed, and a promise of opportunity qualified. The girls would be brought into the city and housed temporarily in rented properties near the poorer districts. There they would be bathed, fed, and dressed in respectable clothing. Once prepared, they would be quietly offered to wealthy clients looking for companionship. Salvek described the entire operation with the detached efficiency of a merchant discussing grain shipments.

Depending on the girls' level of cooperation, some girls earned money, some were thrown back to the street, and some disappeared. The journal never bothered explaining what happened to those who disappeared, but Lira didn't need it to. She had spent enough of her childhood around criminals to understand exactly what those missing details implied. The worst part was how easily she could imagine herself among them.

If Pallen hadn't taken her in, if she had spent the winter on the streets, someone like Salvec could have approached her with a loaf of bread and a place to sleep. Unfortunately, the journal only became worse from there. Buried among the records of bribery and trafficking was the answer to Lira's divination question. What happened to the missing maids? According to Salvek's notes, the prince's appetite for flesh had started years ago.

At first, the girls came from the mud fishing operation after a lesser noble introduced Kavard to the place. Salvek was happy with the connection, strengthening the bond between him and the royal heir. His first investment wasn't as fruitful as he had hoped. Training Aric in sword fighting wasn't enough for his ambition, especially when Salvek had estimated that the second prince wasn't the kind of man to murder his own brother for the throne.

The sergeant wrote about Kavard almost proudly, describing how exposure to such indulgences had helped him gain confidence and experience. So after that, the first prince decided that he was a grown man and could catch his own fish. That was a quote in the journal. Lira's blood boiled just remembering it. Mara had been the first. The prince apparently maintained an interest in her for several months before she became pregnant. That was when panic set in. As the heir, a pregnancy created political complications.

Kavard ran to Salvek, and Salvek sent Thadwick. After that, a small bribe to Hesta falsified the records, and Mara was gone. There was only a short note stating that the matter had been resolved. Lira was disgusted by the nonchalance. Amelia's entry was somehow even shorter. The prince became bored. That was the entire explanation. The prince lost interest, and shortly afterward, she vanished too. Carry's fate was worse still. Somehow, the girl had realized what was happening and attempted to flee.

Thadwick and his goons were sent after her, and eventually she was found. The final note mentioned a shallow grave somewhere beyond the capital's outskirts before moving on to unrelated business as though nothing of importance had occurred. What truly disturbed Lira wasn't the crimes themselves. It was the complete absence of remorse. Nowhere in the journal did Salvek consider himself a villain. In his own mind, he was solving problems, offering services to important people, and maintaining order.

The girls were tools, inconveniences, or loose ends. From the journal, she could feel that Salvek believed himself honorable. He even dared to call himself a knight on multiple occasions. Lira hated him. She hated him as much as she hated the man who killed her father, but even still, he couldn't have done what he was doing alone. Thadwick was doing the dirty work for him, Prince Kavard was using the service without a shred of guilt, and Hesta was covering for them afterward.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Salvek might have been the architect, but monsters like him never operated alone. As if the thought of the woman had somehow summoned her, the library doors suddenly slammed open. Lira looked up from her desk just in time to see Hesta storming inside. The older maid immediately spotted her and marched across the room, her face red with anger.

"Where is she?" Hesta demanded. Lira slowly lowered her book.

"What do you mean?"

"The girl. Maren." Hesta practically shouted the name.

"Where is she?" Spittle flew from the older woman's mouth and struck Lira's cheek. Lira stared at her for several seconds before calmly wiping her face with a handkerchief.

"Back off." Something in Lira's voice, or perhaps something in her eyes, made Hesta hesitate. The older woman actually took a step backward before remembering who she thought she was.

"Watch your tone, young miss," Hesta snapped.

"I can have you fired."

"No, you can't."

"What?"

"You can't fire me." Lira folded her hands atop the desk.

"You aren't Celene. You aren't Dalwin. Frankly, even Berem in the stables has more authority over palace staff than you do." Hesta stared at her in disbelief.

"What is the meaning of this?"

"The meaning," Lira replied, "is that I am the library caretaker. I answer only to the lord steward. The next one could be Dalwin, maybe Harwin, or possibly Celene. But never you." For a moment, Hesta seemed completely speechless. Then her face twisted with outrage.

"I'll tell the guards you're hiding a fugitive." Lira frowned.

"Is that what this is about? They already searched the library."

"I saw you meeting Celene in the kitchens."

"She is one of my superiors."

"The library is the only place large enough to hide the girl."

"And yet no girl was found." Hesta's jaw clenched.

"Then you won't mind if I search it myself." Lira slowly rose from her chair and stepped away from the desk. She deliberately placed herself between Hesta and the staircase leading upward. That was all it took. Hesta immediately shoved past her and hurried toward the stairs. Lira almost smiled. So predictable. Normally, Lira would have ignored the woman entirely. Petty people often destroyed themselves without assistance. After reading Salvek's journal, however, ignoring Hesta no longer felt appropriate.

Lira followed her upstairs at a leisurely pace. As she climbed the stairs, she began hearing the sound of doors slamming, furniture scraping, and dust covers being ripped away. Lira grimaced when she heard the crash of books hitting the floor. Hesta was tearing through the upper library. She really must be desperate to find Maren. Is she in trouble for sending the wrong girl, someone who fought back? Maybe.

Lira wandered after her until she reached one of the darker corridors, and there she heard the head maid muttering to herself.

"How dare she fight back? How dare she run away?" she grumbled as she slammed a door open.

"And she was asking for it! Otherwise, why do all that makeup?" Those words sealed Hesta's fate in Lira's eyes. She slipped a folded, ink-soaked sheet of paper from her apron pocket. She had originally prepared it as ammunition for her nearly useless ink projectile spell. That day, it had a different purpose.

"Pika. Asatan. Farshum." The dark sheet slowly unfolded and twisted beneath her control. Within moments, a crude origami mouse sat in her palm. Controlling it was difficult. Far more difficult than making a paper crane fly. The little construct twitched awkwardly as she guided it across the floor, but the darkness concealed most of its flaws. The fake rodent scurried down the corridor and vanished into a specific room. Lira waited for a second, then made sure that the book she was aiming for was still there.

"Ladar. Linasara. Oshkan. Cognar. Turat." A single book was highlighted by her divination. Using the rodent, she pushed it out of the stack, and several volumes crashed to the floor. Hesta's reaction was immediate. For a brief moment, she looked directly at Lira with a triumphant expression. She thought she had found Maren. The older maid rushed into the room. Instead, she found only a small mouse that darted beneath a shelf in reaction to her appearance.

More importantly, among the scattered books on the ground was an old tome with a hollowed-out center and a dagger inside it. The glint of gold was unmistakable to the head maid. Lira remained perfectly still. As she watched, Hesta quickly snatched the book from the floor. She closed it, hiding what was inside, and a second later shoved it beneath her apron. Lira pretended not to notice anything. She entered the room moments later, wearing her most innocent expression.

"What was that noise?" she asked. Hesta nearly jumped, her eyes wide.

"You have a rodent problem in this filthy library," she snapped.

"Do I?"

"Yes," said the head maid as she pushed past Lira.

"Where are you going?" Lira asked.

"She clearly isn't here." The anger had largely drained from Hesta's voice. Now she sounded distracted. Lira watched her disappear down the staircase and out of the library. Only once she was gone did Lira allow herself to smile. The golden dagger wasn't actually a dagger at all. It was a royal seal. Even Pallen, a master forger and one of the most influential criminals in Halthar, had refused to get near it. Possessing such an object could destroy lives.

Lira knew planting temptation in front of Hesta was a gamble. The woman might take it directly to Prince Kavard, or she might even panic and throw it away. But Lira had known Hesta for months now, and she liked the odds of the head maid doing something stupid.