Dollars and Dominoes

The "Evil-Wizard-Sheriff" Ratcliff discovers the joy of 'the consequences of his own actions' and finds he doesn't like them. A surprise visit from the Steward of Trade raises the stakes.

Previously in this story arc;

The Nook-Veizla

And if you’re new to this substack;

The Godswood Chronicle

Dollars and Dominoes

Sheriff Ratcliff massaged his temples. The tightness in his head had accumulated at an alarming rate over the past three days. The king’s guard had come down on the second day to chase away the protestors, but the tanners had returned the following day. This time they brought wagons to block the streets, interfering with the king’s guard's ability to navigate their horses. The outside street in front of the Exchequer was under siege by angry craftsmen.

He had been smoking tanbâku far more often than his usual habit, and with that had come a deep aching tension that ran like wildfire in his head. The leaf had also ceased to calm his nerves, and he was now chasing the calm it had once gifted him.

A thump came from one of the street side windows of his second story office, signifying another rotten vegetable had been tossed by the protestors and exploded on impact. Those were always the most difficult to get cleaned.

He had given up hope of having clean windows before this protest was resolved.

While he had expected blowback from his decision to take Tessa Bracken into custody, he hadn’t expected to become the focal point of all the rage and frustration built up in the Tanners guild towards the crown. He doubted many in the crowd even knew Jake or Tessa, but all present had a tale of being taken advantage of or exploited by predatory noblemen. The story of an “innocent tanner’s wife” being kidnapped by the “evil wizard-sheriff of Rundell” had ripped through the town with a level of ferocity that had taken even the House of Lords by surprise.

Plus… no one likes the tax collector.

There had already been several Tanners taken into custody for breaking the law and resorting to violence when confronting the city watch.

They were being smarter on the fourth day of protests, having learned their lesson about what the crown was prepared to do in the face of violent action against its officers. Ratcliff had seen Jake Bracken take a truncheon to the face from a mounted king's guard. But he was back on the protest line the next day, the bright welt on his face made him look even more like an angry carrot than he was before. Only this time he wasn’t throwing punches, only produce. [1]

1 - Tragically, there was no law against throwing spoiled vegetables.
But the house of lords being what they were, it wouldn’t be long before there was.
Lord Tehasrôh had taken a keen interest in the protest.

Ratcliff had to keep his windows closed, lest the smell of the decay get into his office. Or worse, rotten vegetable juice get onto his giant trove of official documents and books. He had dozens of investigations and audits underway, and an errant moldy squash could bring about the end of a line of enquiry very quickly.

He had hired a wizard to ward the windows on day two, to ensure that they didn’t get broken by accident. The wizard had assured him that the wards should be able to deflect a brick for at least a couple weeks - unless the protestors resorted to throwing magical bricks. Saying this, the wizard had laughed at his own joke.

Ratcliff seriously contemplated the probability of magical bricks crashing through his windows and exhaled a giant cloud of smoke that slowly floated to the ceiling of his unventilated office. There was a growing haze up there he had never seen before, having always opened a window when smoking. He wondered what that was going to do to him in the long term.

A knock on the door brought him out of his noisy reverie.

“Come in,” he said aloud. His voice didn’t have it’s usual gusto. He hadn’t been sleeping well.

Treyvon opened the door, entered and gave a brisk salute. Ratcliff had noticed that Treyvon had adopted an even stiffer and more formal approach to greeting Ratcliff since word of the “abduction” had started circulating. He wasn’t surprised - his office was never a popular one, but now its unpopularity had climbed to unforeseen heights. He doubted Treyvon regarded his position as nearly as prestigious as he had last week.

“My Lord, Lord Mathieus and his companion have requested an audience with you,” Treyvon said stiffly. Ratcliff imagined that Trevyon had both sat on and swallowed a broomstick this morning to achieve such rigidity in his posture and tone.

“Show them up Trevyon, thank you,” Ratcliff said, suppressing a groan on hearing Lord Mathieus’ name.

Treyvon gave a disapproving look at the hanging cloud of tanbâku smoke before departing. Ratcliff snorted and went to pack his pipe with more of the dried leaf, expecting this upcoming meeting to be one that fell under the category of “frustrating.” Bad enough that the Tanner’s guild had decided to make him a scapegoat for all their ill treatment, that he was being condescended to by his chief clerk, and also yelled at by the captain of the watch for putting his men in danger… now the Steward of Markets and Trade was coming for a visit.

Why he was here seemed pretty clear. Ratcliff had inadvertently disrupted the local leather trade. During the war, when the army's need for leather goods was at an all time high. He had no doubt that Lords Vygore and Tehasrôh would be paying him a visit soon as well.

He closed his eyes as he lit the pipe, taking in a deep breath of the smoke, holding it in as long as he could.

He heard the door open, quickly followed by a cough.

“By Odin, Ratcliff. I’d tell you to open a window but clearly that’s not a good idea right now,” Lord Mathieus said, his naturally booming voice both amused and annoyed. He coughed again, and Ratcliff opened his eyes to see the Lord waving his hand back and forth against the oppressive cloud of tanbâku smoke. His efforts made no difference.

Mathieus was an elderly man in his mid sixties, dressed in a fine blue-purple suit with his black coat of office on. This was… an official visit.

Ratcliff’s eyes fell to the shorter man beside the towering Mathieus, and Ratcliff felt his left eyebrow crawl up his forehead with a mind of its own. Also elderly, the man was dressed in a simple clerk’s outfit with a traveller’s hat and a book satchel over one shoulder. The man gave a tight smile seeing Ratcliff’s expression.

He was not a clerk.

“Lord Sael,” Ratcliff said cautiously, his concerns of a challenging meeting escalating significantly, “I… to what do I owe this… honour?”

Lord Sael laughed quietly at Ratcliff’s choice of words.

“Sael is fine. I am a Lord by technicality only and owe no fealty to the word,” Sael said in his quiet dry tone. [2]

2 - While he was technically a Lord, the King only appointed him to make it abundantly clear to all the other Lords of the realm they couldn’t tell Sael what to do.

This was to protect the Lords, not Sael.
Specifically, to protect the Lords FROM Sael.

Lord Mathieus snorted at his companion’s words, “I always wondered why the King bothered to gift you that title. It’s not like you’ll ever deign to sit in the house to do something as trivial as trying to administer this powder keg of a city.”

Sael seemed to seriously consider this polite jab before responding, “Oh, I administer it in my own way.” Lord Mathieus guffawed at this reply.

“Ratcliff. What the hell were you thinking, abducting a Tanner’s wife? Do you not know how tense things are out there right now?” Lord Mathieus said, turning his gaze upon Ratcliff. He didn’t like Mathieus’ tone - as Sheriff, he didn’t report to anyone but the King. No member of the House of Lords had jurisdiction or oversight over his office and duties.

“My duties, -Mathieus-,” Ratcliff said coldly, intentionally neglecting the man’s title. “Tessa Iatrsdottir was taken into custody as part of an ongoing investigation, well within my rights and powers as the -Sheriff- of Rundell AND within the scope of Whaelen’s law. Whatever protectiveness you feel towards the Tanner’s Guild isn’t my concern, and as far as I can tell, their need to protest outside my office has more to do with how -you- haven’t been protecting them against Vygore and Tehasrôh’s economic predation.”

Lord Mathieus looked taken aback at Ratcliff’s ferocious response. “Now Sheriff… I understand you’re within your *legal* rights to take anyone into custody…”

“I’m glad you understand that,” Ratcliff said coldly, interrupting him.

Patiently, Lord Mathieus continued, “But you know as well as I do that your use of Whaelen’s law as justification for taking Jake Bracken’s wife into custody was a stretch, and against the intent of the amendment of 995. I don’t think anyone at the time thought that an officer of the law would take away a man’s wife like that.”

Ratcliff laughed, and it was a dark one.

“Yes, I’m not surprised that the House of Lords couldn’t imagine that that law would have unforeseen consequences. Like the consequences that lead to the 995 amendment in the first place. And I didn’t take Jake Bracken’s *wife*. I took Tessa Iatrsdottir, mother of the criminal known as Iatr Pieterson who owes the crown some two hundred and fifty gold crowns for damages he and his partner in crime, Klem, have committed. Exactly as *your stupid law* is written. The fact that the House of Lords didn’t seem to care about the fate of women when they got around to their amendment isn’t *my problem.* Maybe this time around, you’ll fix your mistake. My. Lord.”

The silence that followed Ratcliff’s outburst was only punctuated by the sounds of burning tanbâku leaves as he took a long drag on his pipe, while staring the Steward of Markets and Trade in the eyes. He slowly breathed out the smoke, imagining himself to be a dragon threatening fire upon the intruders to his cave. The smoke lingered in front of him menacingly.

Lord Mathieus had the decency to look somewhat embarrassed.

“The law is written precisely as your predecessor intended…” Lord Mathieus said weakly.

Ratcliff snorted.

“My predecessor? The one who ran an embezzlement scheme, yet was allowed to retire to the countryside rather than face prosecution for his ‘light treason?’” he replied scornfully.

Sael laughed. It sounded genuine.

“Oh, you are delightful. I see why the King appointed you to this position now. I thought you were just an unlucky entitled Lordling’s brat,” Sael said with an odd warmth to his tone.

Ratcliff paused before replying, having momentarily forgotten that the other man was in the room. Sael had that effect on people. Vanishing unexpectedly while still being there right in front of you. As if your attention just slid off him and onto the surroundings instead.

“Well he is a Lordling’s brat…” muttered Lord Mathieus, sounding as the common folk would say, ‘butt hurt.’

Ratcliff ignored Mathieus and eyed Sael. “I imagine that description of me is a common enough one, and one I don’t feel a need to dispute. People will think what they want and I learned a long time ago not to worry myself about the foolish stories of others.”

Sael nodded approvingly, “That’s a good attitude to hold when dealing with an angry mob of protestors outside your office, but a dangerous habit to fall into considering the risks those stories pose if you’re not careful. I wouldn’t want to see you stabbed to death in an alleyway by a pack of angry leatherworkers.”

Ratcliff pursed his lips, and took a moment to take another pull from his pipe to consider that. [3]

3 - Stories can be dangerous for your health when people use them to incite a mob.

“Please stop that,” Lord Mathieus said with a sigh and a cough as Ratcliff blew out another cloud of smoke.

“No.”

“Lord Mathieus, I think this has probably been enough time for a dramatic and frustrated exit from the Sheriff’s office to occur. I appreciate the escort and think it’s time I sit down with the Sheriff to discuss this matter further,” Sael said patiently.

Lord Mathieus looked down at the smaller man and nodded. “Good, I’ll leave you to knock some sense into him, before he starts a riot or some other bull shit that we need to clean up.”

Ratcliff smiled grimly at this statement, considering how close he’d come to doing exactly that four days earlier. He was mildly concerned that statement might prove unfortunately prophetic with how his luck had been unfolding lately. He locked eyes with Sael, feeling apprehension now that the facade of Mathieus’ visit was coming to a close.

The door shut behind Mathieus as the Lord slammed it with gratuitous loudness, yelling something about entitled foolish brats and overzealous public servants exceeding their authority. Ratcliff had to give it to the man, he was a rather excellent character actor and was playing the part of an angry politician well. Ratcliff imagined that his staff was cringing away from the Lord and would have completely forgotten that Mathieus hadn’t arrived alone.

He turned his gaze on Sael, who looked at him with an amused expression.

Sael reached slowly into his satchel and pulled out a long dark crystal roughly two hands breadth in height. Ratcliff tensed, not knowing what was about to happen, but all Sael did was flick it twice with his finger. A high frequency hum emanated from the crystal, and Ratcliff felt a pulse of magic sweep out of it and across the room. The room seemed to become pressurised and it felt like his ears were going to pop.

He noticed that the smoke had been pushed to the ceiling away from the crystal. The sounds of the protest outside receded to a distant murmur and took on a canned quality. For the first time in days, his office was mostly quiet again. He felt his body relax, and he took a deep breath in this unexpected moment.

“You… aren’t a wizard are you?” Sael asked while putting away the crystal in his satchel.

Ratcliff sighed, and gestured to the chair in front of him. Sael sat down with an unusual smoothness and grace for a man in his late fifties. Though that was by appearance only. Sael had existed for as long as Ratcliff could remember and looked much the same as he remembered when Ratcliff was but an “entitled lordling’s brat.”

“No. My sister is. She gifted me this ring in case I needed it to protect myself,” Ratcliff said, holding up his finger with the magic ring he had worn for nearly fifteen years.

Sael nodded, “I thought as much. So you’re what… an adept? Gifted? A mutt?”

Ratcliff hated that word. “I’m a mutt.”

Sael smiled at his reaction, “There is no shame in being a Mutt. Well… except for maybe the unfortunate common name. I believe the wizards call your kind a ‘Thaumosens’ if that makes you feel any better. After all, most common folk have no concept or capacity to interact with magic at all, and mystical items are mere dead weight in their hands. You, on the other hand…”

“Yes, because I come from money and power, I’m gifted with hand me down wizardry. I’m very privileged.” Ratcliff said, a little sarcastically. He had, over the course of his life, gotten tired of being told how ‘good he had it.’

Sael raised his finger and waved it disapprovingly, “No one likes someone who is bitter about their privileges. It means that they’re wasted on you, and should be passed on to someone who would be grateful for them.”

Ratcliff sighed, knowing the old man was right, but still annoyed about it. Also, if Sael was saying your privileges should be passed on to someone else, this shouldn’t be dismissed as merely an idle threat. Sael was one of the only people in the kingdom who might be able to make that really happen.

“I’ve had a lot of people over my life tell me that my privileges are wasted on me, so if it’s all the same to you…” Ratcliff said before he took another pull on his pipe. It was empty. He looked at it with annoyance and a certain amount of trepidation. He had been smoking very hard lately.

Sael noticed the look and chuckled, “Be careful with that. I’ve seen many a Lord pay a fatal price because they allowed that to take possession of them.”

“I’m sure you didn’t come here to lecture me on my smoking habits or find out the truth of the evil wizard-sheriff of Rundell,” Ratcliff said with a sigh as he put down the pipe.

“No… I did not. Tell me of your investigation,” Sael said, his tone switching to one that was hard and firm.

Ratcliff nodded. He’d expected something like this.

“Well… it all began with a horse.”

---

Sael sat considering Ratcliff’s tale of disappearing bailiffs & inspectors, fey horse abductors, murder dogs and chaotic street children. He didn’t interrupt Ratcliff’s story, even as it progressed into the increasingly absurd and complex. Ratcliff imagined that many stories Sael heard over his career were likely far stranger than the one Ratcliff had just told.

“Does the King know of this?” Sael eventually asked.

Ratcliff shook his head. “Not yet, I was trying to find answers before informing him.”

“I think it would be wise of you to tell him that his city is on a path to bankruptcy and that you suspect the fey are orchestrating a campaign to inflict economic catastrophe on us all,” Sael said.

“I don’t *know* that’s what they’re doing. I just know that *what* they’re doing is pushing us in that direction. What *they* think they’re doing could be something worse, for all I know,” Ratcliff said, eyeing his pipe with a mix of loathing and longing. This last month had been a trying one for him, and it felt good to tell someone of his suspicions in full.

Sael nodded to this. “Yes, I can see how you’d be careful around sounding the alarm without knowing what the crisis is. How… long do we have?”

Ratcliff shrugged, “A couple months? A year? It depends on if they continue to pick off my bailiffs at the same rate or if they speed it up. Or if they orchestrate some attack on the docks or caravan routes. Things could escalate rather quickly. I can’t train bailiffs fast enough, and Rorrick has utterly failed at uncovering any trace of who is arranging the kidnappings.”

Sael sighed, “I’m afraid this isn’t Rorrick’s failure but mine. Prince Sylvanus has proven far more… creative an adversary than his predecessor. I must be getting old, I never imagined that he would aim to undermine us in such a manner - it’s not very Sidhe-like. It shows his superior understanding of us as a people that he would seek to destroy us through our purses.” The old man laughed ruefully.4

4 - Prince Sylvanus was ‘the new guy’ in charge of the Sidhe army, following his return from exile some five years prior.

‘The new guy’ ironically referring to someone who was older than Sael and Ratcliff combined.

Sylvanus had proven to be just as clever and ruthless as he had been prior to his exile. But under the rule of Queen Salizera, who showed far less concern with ‘restraint’ or ‘honour’ than her father had shown, his skills were really beginning to shine.

When Sael’s gaze returned to Ratcliff, it was appraising.

“You have my apologies for not noticing this before now, Sheriff Ratcliff. You have uncovered a plot that my more seasoned agents have failed to take note of. The Exchequer has been an institution operating in the background, with public disdain for a long time. Quietly doing its job and ensuring that we all have enough money to keep the city operating. This is the first time in my memory that its survival as an organisation has become such an… issue for the crown,” the old man paused to consider his next words.

“I think… it’s possible you may be right that the Exchequer isn’t the primary target, but it *is* likely a secondary target of some other plot. Sowing chaos in Rundell city has long been a goal of Prince Sylvanus’, and I wouldn’t put it past him to consider bankrupting us as a viable strategy to undermine our war effort against his people. Armies are far more difficult to control when the soldiers haven’t been paid for months. But…” the old man trailed off.

Ratcliff felt his eyebrow raise, “But… what?”

“There is something you should see,” Sael said, his eyes the colour and tone of steel as he looked at Ratcliff.

---

He was annoyed at the old man when Sael escorted Ratcliff down to the basement of the Exchequer, where old tax documentation was kept in the Archives behind a locked door. Ratcliff was certain he was the only one who had a key to that room, but of course the old man pulled out a key and unlocked the archives right in front of him, probably just to prove a point.

Sael led him down the stacks of shelves, lined with boxes of papers, and rolled up scrolls of ancient records. Ratcliff held the lantern as they walked through the ancient room, though he felt certain that Sael had no need of the light. Ratcliff did though.

The archives were a massive room, and they walked for some time down rows and rows of shelves, ultimately arriving at the back corner of the room where a series of ancient wooden shelves created a boxed alcove that blocked the view of the rest of the room.

Sael walked up to one of the shelves and pointed at a torch set in a decorative wall sconce off to the side. The torch was constructed from wrought iron and had a metal basket at its top.

“Pull on that torch. Firmly, but not too hard. Towards you and down, like a lever,” he said.

Ratcliff looked at the torch. It looked like all the others he’d seen down here. He walked up to it, grabbing it and pulled it just as Sael instructed. The torch slid forward and the bottom of it slid into a groove in the wall. He heard a soft click come from the shelf in front of Sael. Nothing happened.

“And…?” Ratcliff said. He had been expecting something more dramatic.

Sael reached out and grabbed the right edge of the shelf and pulled. The shelf, comically larger than the old man, slid out gracefully like a well oiled door. The wall behind it slid with the shelf, demonstrating it to be a thin facade of wood, painted expertly to look like real stone. The illusion was excellent.

Ratcliff was certain he had even stood before this same shelf and never noticed.

Sael saw his expression and winked, gesturing to the dark, narrow hallway on the other side.

“Step into my office, Sheriff,” he said with a grin.

Ratcliff looked at the tiny corridor and then back at the old man suspiciously.

“You’re not going to murder me and toss me down a dark hole are you?” Ratcliff asked, semi-sincerely.

Sael grinned wider, “Not today.”

Editor’s Note;

I’m honestly surprised that I’m done this chapter early, and am feeling wildly productive about it. I’m nearing the home stretch of organizing a community gathering for the 6th, and feel that I still have a ton of work left to do before the event is ready to fly.

Well it’s ready to fly now - but the wings feel like they’re held together by duct-tape - so my fear of “everything is going to explode in my face” hasn’t subsided.

Honestly, it probably won’t until the event is over and no one has sued me for negligence. Oh the joys of community organizing. Throw your credibility and money on the line and get paid in compliments.

The compliments are nice though.

I used to host some pretty raucous house parties at the community house I lived at for 12 years, known as the “Zen Den.” We developed quite the following, and many people told me over the years that “these were the only parties they ever went to anymore.”

I’m pretty sure they only came for the 5 hours of professional DJs, a raucous dance floor, improv comedy shenanigans, an arborist-truck supply of firewood, and a roast chicken that came out of the oven at midnight.

They were, objectively, pretty great parties.

I have fond memories of the day I put a bunch of sparklers in the chicken and presented it to my roommate like it was a birthday cake, while 40 people sang him happy birthday. Or tried. A lot of people were dying with laughter and couldn’t quite get out the words.

But all things pass, and even the Zen Den didn’t survive the pandemic.

Le sigh. So many beautiful things in this world were wiped out because of how we handled that ‘event.’ It created a perfect case study of the consequences of “fear based leadership” and what that manifests in the world.

Division, confusion, and entropy.

We’re in our rebuilding era now, and this weekend marks the first “re-union party” of the Zen Den, now held at a community hall instead of a house. Hopefully we can capture some of that old magic, and maybe spin a new and better tale to pass down to our children.

With chicken, of course.

Gotta have the right priorities.

Robin George

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