I found myself amidst a party of several prospectors, surveying Sir Grayson’s property. Myself and the few other wealthy merchants and minor nobles I traveled with had been misled somewhat, as there was not one auction but two. Either Grayson or Griffenwald (no one was quite sure which) had come up with the idea of selling off their excess land to some would-be vassals, only for the other to swiftly catch wind of the plan and copy it to their own ends.

  As such, Grayson himself was prattling off promotion like a broken dam, constantly going on about how much richer his soil was compared to Griffenwald’s, how much finer the timber was, how this patch or that would be perfect for a cattle ranch or hemp field or a half dozen other uses.

  All the while, I kept to the back of the party with young Alfonse, who walked by my side tossing a small stone between his left hand and his right. Henrietta was away at a very similar function Sir Griffenwald was hosting at his estate, while Ana was arranging a secret meeting with her dear cousin.

  The estate itself was quite a bit varied, rolling hills occasionally bisected by small creeks, ponds, and well-trodden footpaths. I could tell it was recently cleared of forestry, as what grass did grow was fairly new, and the portions bordering the woodland were littered with freshly-cut treestumps.

  It was while passing by one of these boundaries between wild and tame that Alfonse tapped me on the wrist; when I turned my head, I saw a small party of Ostlander lumberjacks, hauling a cart of timber back towards town. They were watched by a Firman in a wide-brimmed hat, the hilt of his saber shining in the light of the lantern he held in his hand.

  I frowned at this, raising my hand to get Grayson’s attention. “You say a lot about the value of this land, good sir, but that begs the question; why do you seem so eager to sell it?”

  Grayson turned to me, his face contorting into a sneer. Being a vampire, he recognized me as such instantly, but he did not wish to out me as such in front of a party of mortals, for fear of outing himself along with me. I could tell this frustrated him to no end, and that he’d doubtless be penning a letter to his master on the issue in short order.

  For now, though, all we could do is trade barbs. “Why that’s quite simple, Mister Gelb; there simply isn’t enough labor to go around for me to work it all!”

  “Is that so? I have a hard time believing that, given how many Firmans are flocking across the sea looking for work here. Surely you could just put out a call for a few dozen more day-laborers in Bloemsport, could you not?”

  He scoffed, waving his hand. “Even so, an estate of this size would be such a headache to manage, especially when I’m so busy with my duties as Sir Bernard’s chief tax collector!”

  “Chief tax collector?” One of the other party members asked. “I thought that was Sir Griffenwald’s job.”

  Grayson just laughed. “Don’t be ridiculous! That squalid fool probably thinks two plus two equals seven. Now, since you’ve all had your tour of the grounds, how about we retire to my abode for a night of drinks and games?”

  There was a general assent to this offer, and we made our way back to Grayson’s overlarge brick manor house.

  Grayson’s dwelling was very well-lit for a vampire’s. It was sprawling, enough to get well-and-truly lost in, but where this may have lent it some degree of luxury, a skilled eye could tell it was built out of an incoherent series of additions and extensions, presumably dreamt up by a man whose means outran his taste. Almost all of our party congregated in his over-furnished parlor hall, which abutted his foyer at a truly alarming seventy-three degree angle.

  The wine was shit; cheap porter, by the smell of it. Grayson had an array of pretty young servants making sure everyone’s glass was always full of the stuff. I could tell from their gate and the foggy look in their eyes that most of them were his thralls.

  The man himself stood amidst a loose arch of couches, the center of our attention, laughing to himself as he misinterpreted treatises he’d read at the ladies. I pretended to take a sip of port, before doing everyone a favor by strolling up to him and pulling him aside.

  “I was thinking earlier about your comments, sir, regarding the sale of your property. Surely it wouldn’t be so difficult to hire an actuary or skilled merchant to take care of such matters for you?”

  Grayson scoffed, waving his hand dismissively at me. He wore a frilly red coat, his pallid skin almost matching the tone of his white powder whig. “Are you looking for a job, Mister Gelb? Because I already have a man for such things, and he’s perfectly adequate, thank you very much.”

  I smiled, putting my hands behind my back. “Well if that’s the case, then why hasn’t he found some way of cultivating so much of this land you’re holding onto? Even if you were planning on selling it off, surely demonstrating its high yields for a harvest or two would increase the value, no?”

  He squinted at me. “Well, Firman labor is expensive—”

  “—and Ostlander labor is hard to come by, yes. All the clans you haven’t brought to heel already avoid you like the plague, or else are up in arms against you. Still, surely a man as well off as yourself could afford such expenses, especially with the tremendous windfall all this land would earn you in the long run?”

  He rolled his eyes at that. “And why do you care, Gelb? You’re here to buy, are you not? My land is cheap, cheaper than any you’d find back across the sea!”

  I nodded. “The initial asking price is, yes. But what did you say the tax rate was again?”

  “Oh, I don’t know, twenty-five percent?”

  “Well, that’s rather high, obscenely so by frontier standards. Viscount Bloem must demand a lot of us, mustn’t he? All that coin does go straight to him, yes?”

  He grinned at me, wide and wicked, and I knew immediately he got my rather damning accusation. “Say, where’s that boy you were here with? Your cousin or what have you?”

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  I gave a tense smile, prepared to offer one of several canned lies I had prepared for just such a question, only to feel a tug on my right hand. I stepped aside, and there Alfonse was, looking innocent as Joanna in his spiffy mustard jacket. “Why, he’s right here! Must have been using the lavatory.”

  I leaned down for a spell, just enough for him to pretend to whisper something in my ear. “Yes, and it seems he’s feeling quite tired, and would very much like to retire to our room at the inn for the evening. Good night to you, Sir Grayson; I look forward to the auction tomorrow.”

  Grayson called out to me as we turned to leave, but I paid him little mind. “Yes, my auction, right? And not that bastard Griffenwald’s?”

  The din of conversation, and Grayson’s insufferable voice, went silent as the front door of his estate shut behind me. Beyond the glow of the manor’s lanterns, the night was pitch-black before us; Alfonse and I only needed to strut a couple hundred paces down the road towards New Charsburgh before we found a suitable bush to squat behind.

  “Alright then, what did you find?”

  Alfonse opened his jacket, and from the inside pockets he produced two full sheafs of parchment, doubtless looted from Grayson’s bedchamber and study. Alfonse, of course, was illiterate, so he didn’t know precisely what he was fetching, but I’d told him to cast a rather wide net.

  As I began picking through the documents, I could tell he hadn’t disappointed me.

  “Let’s see, we’ve got letters from about seven different paramours, three of whom seem to be expecting Grayson’s hand in marriage. Juicy, but not all that useful… A-ha, here’s a rather strongly-worded letter from one of Grayson’s creditors… and another… and another… and this one’s just a sum of his debt’s written in red ink… or is that dried blood?”

  I sorted all of those into their own pile; that answered the mystery of why Grayson was so eager to sell. He needed some quick cash to pay for how terribly he’d mismanaged his estate, lest he end up destitute or begging his dear sire for aid. And Dietrich Bloem did not seem the type of man to forgive such failures.

  “Hmm… He’s clearly planning on stealing most of the tax revenue those rubes back there will be paying him, too. If only I could expose this little conspiracy to Dietrich and give myself an in with him; the old bastard would recognize me on the spot…”

  As I pondered the possibilities, I noticed one document by Alfonse’s feet that I hadn’t read over yet. I took it in my hand, and saw it to be a contract of some sorts.

  A labor contract.

  For Grayson’s Ostlanders.

  I pocketed it for myself, then rose to my feet. “Collect yourself, young Alfonse. I know where we’re going next.”

  At that, we made immediately for the collection of squalid wooden shacks that sat in the shadow of Grayson’s estate.

  The Ostlander huts were long, short things built of simple timbers. The windows were dark and boarded shut, so I rapped on the doors of one with some trepidation.

  After hearing some heavy footfalls from within, the door opened just a crack, enough for me to make out the baggy eye of someone inside. “Yes?”

  I held my hands out. “I’m not with Grayson. I wish to speak with your leader.”

  “Leader… wait here.” There were more footfalls, and I overheard some of the Ostlander’s tongue, before the door opened completely.

  The Ostlander leader towered over me, and had clearly possessed a strength to rival even Ana’s at some point in the past, but however long she’d spent in Firman bondage had rendered her utterly haggard; she walked with a limp, bony limbs trembling as she stood.

  There was a heavy iron collar around her neck, carved with alchemical sigils. “What do you want, Firman?”

  I nodded my head in deference. “I was doing some… investigation of Bloem’s study, and I found something of great import to you. May I come in to discuss the matter further?”

  She sized me up for a moment, and looked to young Alfonse, who stood slightly behind me, holding my arm for support. “The boy stays outside. As a lookout.”

  I looked to Alfonse, and he nodded. “Of course,” I replied.

  She gestured for me to enter, then shut the door behind me.

  The hut was arranged like a barracks or boarding house, and was more crowded than both. Row after row of bunks, each one occupied by Ostlanders of all shapes and sizes, with children often sharing beds with their parents or siblings.

  The people still bore the intricate tattoos of their culture, but I saw that the younger they got, the fewer they had, until those teenaged and under had almost none at all. I could not tell if they simply hadn’t reached the age of majority for such things, or if their Firman masters were discouraging the practice.

  Nonetheless, their leader gestured for me to follow, into the corner of the barracks. Here sat the only bed that wasn’t a bunk, and a small tableside bureau overfilled with all manner of trinkets. I saw bone totems scattered among them, those strange artifacts I’d seen all the way back at Bruno’s pawn shop in Mainzburgh.

  “What have you found for us, Firman?” The old woman asked.

  I nodded, reaching into my jacket. “This is a contract. Your contract, to work Grayson’s fields.”

  I tried to hand it to her, but she waved me away. “Speaking your tongue and reading it are two very different matters, Firman. Just tell me what it says.”

  I blinked at this, but nodded my head. “The contract stipulates that all of you put yourself into debt of some hundred ducats, the price of becoming a legal subject of the Confederation of the Five Rivers. I’ve never heard of any Firman needing to pay such a price, of course, but I suppose you lot did something to piss him off.”

  She gave a humorless chuckle at that. “Lived on land he wanted, for the most part, and didn’t immediately kiss his feet when he came to take it. But go on.”

  “Well, the contract stipulates that your labor goes to paying off this debt. But based on your daily wage, and the rate of interest on the initial loan, you’re not liable to pay it off for the next two hundred years.”

  She looked at me with a frown, and I felt very foolish indeed. “Do you think any of this would be news to us, Firman? We couldn’t read that contract when we signed it, but we knew full well it was slavery by any other name.”

  I stepped closer to her, whispering. “I’m working with Ana, of the Wolf clan. You know her?”

  She nodded her head. “All of us do. I admire her bravery. She is going to die.”

  “She has designs on freeing your people. Grayson’s debts pass on to your children when you die. Surely a fighting chance at freedom is better than generations of bondage?”

  She sighed. “Some of the youths among us may agree, Firman. I will relay your message to them. But the fight went out of me a long time ago.” She pointed to the collar around her neck. “I was a Fian, a great warrior. I was given the gift of a beast-form, to defend my clan’s honor and go raiding. First other clans, then the Firmans when they arrived under the banner of Ansbach, may his ashes be scattered to the four winds.”

  I saw the runes inscribed on the collar shimmer in the low candlelight of the shack. “And that thing around your neck binds that form, prevents you from transforming.”

  She nodded. “I had a husband, once. He fought the Firmans alongside me, saw our home put to the torch, our cattle slaughtered, our people forced to surrender at the end of a bayonet. He refused to submit, refused to let them put that collar ‘round his neck.”

  “Where is he now? What happened to him?”

  The old woman stared at me, and the sadness in her eyes made me want to weep. “I don’t know.”