Apocalypse: Fairy System by Macronomicon (fox in socks read aloud txt) 📕

“You should’ve thought twice about fucking me over,” Jeb said. “I won’t be accepting apologies, Mr. Grenore.”

“Fine by me. Now that our business is settled, get out of my office.”

Now to get my payment through other means.

In order to raise his Myst, Jeb needed to take something from the businessman that packed a lot of emotional energy and intangible value. Something painful, which would diminish his Impact over the course of his lifetime.

Jeb had just the thing in mind.

“Just a moment. Zlesk, I’m still working on picking up your written language. Do you think you could read this aloud for me?” Jeb asked, offering Zlesk the first letter.

“Now? Can’t it wa—”

Jeb shoved it into the sheriff’s hand. “Just read it.”

He turned to Garland. “I find a lot of people don’t consider the value of trust as much as they should. It’s a valuable currency, you know. Hard to earn, easy to lose.”

“Is this real?” Zlesk asked, glancing at Jeb.

“Oh yeah.” Jeb grinned.

Zlesk cleared his throat. “Grenore. I do not care about your mewling protestations. The situation favors us. The Stitch has dropped a veritable fortress in the form of the Split Mountains between you and your beloved mines. A fortress I own.”

“BLACKMAIL!” Garland shouted at the top of his lungs, leaping to his feet.

“Blackmail is the threat of exposing damaging information in exchange for money. I never threatened to release this information,” Jeb said. “Not blackmail. Punishment.”

“YOU!”

“Sit your ass down,” Vresh said, shoving the keegan back into his seat. “I want to see where this goes.”

Zlesk glanced nervously at the imperial enforcer and kept going.

“I know how far you’ve overreached with your new mine. I heard it straight from your foreman’s mouth before I broke his jaw. I have you by the balls, and you can do nothing to change it short of paying us our due. If you want your shiny new lenses back, you will give us no less than two thousand bulbs in imperial marks…

“However, I’m nothing if not understanding and generous. If you can convince me to accept collateral of equal value, we will allow your workers to return to the mines, such that you can gather the money needed to appease us.”

“That’s stolen! He stole that from me!” the keegan shouted, growing desperate. “He made it up! It means nothing!”

Jeb caught it when Vresh’s ear twitched.

Jeb adopted a playful voice. “You know, I’m pretty sure I saw your men hauling lenses into the warehouse under the office a week ago, the day I returned your daughter…. What’s the round trip to and from your land? Three, five days?” Jeb gasped. “That must mean that a couple days before, they got past Svek’s men somehow! Did they already have the collateral? Hmm…”

“Don’t! I’ll pay! I’ll pay you, just stop!” Grenore said, struggling to reach Jeb as the imperial enforcer held him in place with an iron grip. Beside him, Seraine Grenore’s eyes were slowly growing wider, and Jeb could see the connections slowly forming in her mind.

Jeb felt a deep pang of guilt for pulling the rug out from under a nice girl, but she wanted control over her fate, not blissful ignorance. So, painful or not, Jeb was going to deliver.

“Oh, look at this other letter I found in Svek Pederson’s personal effects!” Jeb said, pulling out the second letter.

He handed it to Zlesk.

Zlesk read over it once, and glanced at Seraine. “Do you think perhaps we should read this some—”

“Read it,” Seraine said. The keegan girl was standing now, trembling like a leaf, but her voice was resolute.

Vresh nodded.

“No! Don’t re—”

The enforcer clapped a hand over Grenore’s mouth, silencing him. “Read it,” she said.

“Okay then.” Zlesk cleared his throat.

“The collateral will be visiting the Ironseed property on the edge of town on the fourteenth. I’ll make sure her guard is otherwise occupied. If I find any harm has come to her, I will rain down such destruction upon you that your ancestors will feel it.”

“You realize they were probably gonna harm her, then blackmail you with this letter, right?” Jeb asked.

Vresh removed her hand from the guy’s face.

“It wasn’t me!” he said, causing the Truthseeker in Vresh’s ear to twitch. “Someone else could have done it!”

Jeb and the imperial enforcer shared a glance, the same thought going through their heads: This guy’s lost it.

Jeb spotted a stack of papers on Grenore’s desk, and sent out a thin thread of Myst, snatching one up and bringing it to his hands. Vresh tensed up for a moment, watching the strand of Myst.

She can see Myst. Good to know.

“It kinda looks like your handwriting,” Jeb said, scanning the paper. “I mean, I can’t read but… Zlesk, does this look like the same handwriting?”

“I think you’ve made your point,” Zlesk said, folding the two letters and putting them in his pocket.

“Nah, I got one more thing,” Jeb said, glancing at the bodyguard trying to remain inconspicuous in the corner.

“Hey, Mr. Bodyguard. Were you the one who was supposed to watch Seraine that day? If so, what exactly happened that separated you from her?”

The hulking melas turned a lighter shade of orange and glanced at Vresh before pressing himself farther back into the corner, seemingly unwilling to say anything at all.

“Enough,” Vresh said, drawing the attention of everyone.

“I am the law here, not you,” she said. “I will sort this out, and you will leave. Your role here is over.”

“Sure.” Jeb shrugged. “I got what I needed.” He glanced over at Seraine. “Ms. Grenore, you chose a painful truth, but I believe you’ll come out stronger for it. I wish you luck in taking the reins of your destiny, and if you ever need help, visit me. I will hear