With Dwayne right on luz heels, Dana crept up to the second floor of the Royal Secretary’s Office then paused to listen.

  Soft creaks from above.

  Muffled laughter from down the hall.

  Heavy clanks from below.

  The creaking likely came from the Royal Secretary’s apartment, where she and her head clerk were “taking lunch.” The laughing likely indicated a small number of assistant secretaries gathering in one of their offices. The clanking was the printing press.

  No one had had noticed lu or Dwayne.

  “Which door?” Dana asked.

  Without answering, Dwayne pushed past luz, and, before Dana could stop him, tried to open one of the locked doors.

  “Stop, stop, stop!” Lu hauled Dwayne away from it. “He could be in there.”

  “I know but…” Dwayne sighed. “I apologize. Can you open it?”

  “Yes.”

  After luz lockpicks had Thadden’s office door unlocked in two breaths - somehow this place had worse security than the Royal Sorcerer’s Office’s two people and a door - Dana opened it up and bowed. “Milord.”

  “Thank you.” Dwayne went straight for Thadden’s bookshelf. “Find out what he’s up to,” he said, his fingers already sliding across the book spines.

  Which begged the question, what was he looking for? Unfortunately, Inge, a mere hired hand, wouldn’t pry, so Dana walked over to Thadden’s desk.

  One look at the intra-office memorandums strewn all over the baron’s desk, the pile of receipts stuffed into his drawers, and the neat stack of notes detailing weekly meetings with the Crown Princess told Dana exactly who Baron Otto Thadden was: an unorganized, lazy minor noble who was disdained by his equals, paranoid about money, and humored by his superiors. Rifling through the mess took some time, but it soon yielded a result: a large print order for a pamphlet.

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  Lu read the summary and hissed. This would spark a riot. “Milord, I found something.” Dana walked over to Dwayne with the order in hand. “This baron of yours is planning to call you out as a fraud.”

  “He’s not mine,” Dwayne said through gritted teeth, his eyes on Thadden’s wall of certifications. “And is that all?”

  “This is serious…” Dana finally saw what Dwayne what looking at: a royal permit to Acquire and Sell Human Goods.

  “How did I not see this earlier?” Dwayne asked.

  Despite his question being obviously rhetorical, Dana responded. “You didn’t know?”

  “I knew he owned a slave.” Dwayne touched the most prominent signature on the permit: Crown Princess Anne’s. “But I didn’t know he traded them.”

  Notably, there was one other name on the certificate: Sir Wyatt Stelfox. The Stelfoxes had just been forced, by way of strikes, to pay their miners more and to them slaves seemed like a cheaper alternative. That probably wasn’t true. True, slaves didn’t take wages, but the security precautions required to keep lossage to a minimum did. Many an azade mine in Vanuria had failed because of that.

  “Even if he did sell Akunna’s contract to me,” Dwayne’s voice was hollow, “he’d just buy another one.”

  “Does that matter?” asked Dana.

  Dwayne directed a cold stare in luz direction. “Of course, you don’t care. It doesn’t affect you.”

  Lunar Circle Agent Dana disagreed, but Inge only shrugged. “You really should look at this.”

  “Right.” Dwayne took the print order and read it. “‘Dwayne Kalan: Genius or Fraud?’ Ah, I see.” He tossed it back onto the desk. “I’ll have my steward look into it.”

  Dana let the pitch of Inge’s voice rise. “Won’t this wreck your reputation?”

  “As a Wesen adopted by the worst Royal Sorcerer in history, I doubt it. Besides,” Dwayne gave lu a look, “why do you care?”

  Inge didn’t. “I just want to get paid.”

  Dwayne laughed. “Mei will make sure of that. I’m surprised requests to hire her haven’t buried Sanford.”

  Most likely any such requests were being suppressed by the local Tuquese head of intelligence who wouldn’t want Mei’s weapon to gain any more notoriety, but that was neither here nor there.

  “As you say, milord.”

  Dwayne rolled his eyes. “We’re done here. Go get paid. I have to go to class, which is all I’m good for apparently.”