The next afternoon finds you walking again to the second, smaller Taxation Office building in Ganz. After a fine morning catching up with merchants' gossip as you wander the stalls - there is a glut of pepper on the market, Lord Gristol ordered all the blacksmiths in a thirty mile stretch of land to his castle for some vanity project, the price of beer is high this summer - you made sure you were quite fresh and did a little soul-searching.
No matter how pretty and smart she is, Genevieve is
not someone you want to... Urk. To r-romance right now. The thought makes you pause and tap your foot anxiously no matter when it comes up. What does romance even involve, anyway? The books and poetry you remember conjure up images of moonlit walks in flower gardens, mad rides across the countryside to resist the clutches of duty and fate... That honestly doesn't sound fun at all. But books are
built for drama. Surely real romance isn't the same. There's far, far, far too much to do anyway!
She will make a fine friend, even if she has her own duty and course of life separate from your industry-bringing destiny. You can't remember anything about a Casinet family, so perhaps she's not a noble, but she is clearly capable, and she is a tax collector. That is the kind of person it could be incredibly handy to be on good terms with.
And you liked her fashion sense and cutting sarcasm. What, you don't have to have only cold-blooded political reasons to do something, do you? No. You don't. You're allowed to just
like her, much as it makes the political instincts in you twitch as you worry whether your judgment is correct.
That decided, you finish your walk to find a scene of utter chaos. Chairs and desks overturned, papers flying or lying everywhere! Small furry things running around and climbing and making unsettling
growling and screaming noises, guttural and threatening! Screaming bureaucrats backed into a corner, defending themselves from something a tenth their size with thrown scrolls! An old man wielding his cane like a sword, whacking at the hissing creatures!
Genevieve and two semi-composed bureaucrats shout orders in the middle of it all - "No no, stick to the wall-" "-Going to
bite me, could be rabid or-" "Get the broom and hold the cage open-"
And in the center of it all a very fat man in garishly orange robes, shouting... "NOOOOOOO my badgers!"
But you? You stand there, stupefied at the chaos, unable to even process the absurdity playing out before your eyes. That is, until one of the small furry things darts at you causing you to
jump and squeal dodge out of the way and call out in warning as it dashes past you towards the relative freedom of the city streets.
"
Looka! She's just scared, the city will eat her alive!"
You draw your dagger at this point, more because it feels like you're supposed to than any real idea of what to do with it.
Genevieve shouts, "SHUT THE DOOR!" But the robed man has seen you draw iron and lunges towards you. "-You,
don't hurt my badgers!"
He runs right into you, eyes wide and wild, and after a moment of confused grappling at a practical wall of robe-covered flesh, you're lying in a heap on the street, and four more of the blasted demonspawn animals run past you and out into the city, yipping and growling as loud as ever.
Ten minutes and quite a lot of shouting later, there are five empty cages (fairly nice ones, with food bowls and some bedding built in) sitting on the street, and Mr. Maximilian Ambrosius is blubbering at some of the city watchmen about the rest of his 'precious little lovelies lost in the scary city', and you're helping set everything right by collecting up all the papers and righting furniture with Genevieve.
(It occurs to you for a brief moment that now would be an excellent opportunity to do some skulduggery, if you were a nefarious sort with the tax office as a target.)
"
Terribly sorry about this, you know. It's not like I planned it." Genevieve's hair is ruffled, a few strands loosened in the chaos.
"I know. What even are those things, though?"
"'Badgers', apparently. I don't know all the details but apparently they're from somewhere past Ionia, maybe somewhere Erdish? He declared them as exotic beasts worth a lot of money, but couldn't sell them or maybe just got attached and decided he wanted to keep the little monsters and was trying to argue that he should get his tariff back - you don't
do that - nevermind that he's not even in the right
city -
ugh."
You shake your head. "Trying to go back on his taxes? Is he mad, greedy, or stupid?"
"Or all three."
"Or all three," you nod.
"I'm leaning 'mad', personally. He- Well, you saw him."
You suddenly realize that you're sitting on the side of the road together, and immediately begin overthinking. You're trying to be
friendly only, yes, so this is fine, it's not like you're touching her hand or gazing longingly into her eyes or anything.
"Are you
quite sure you're alright, Harold?"
"-Ah, yes. Just thinking. Should I go? You must have a lot of cleaning up to do."
She squints at you, and then decisively intones, "Do not go. I am taking the rest of today off and there is nothing they can do about it. We were going to spend time together, yes? The tax collector and the diligent steward, getting to know each other and enjoying intellectual stimulation."
Was there a bit of a lilt on 'stimulation', a teasing note in that little half-raised eyebrow and the slight quirking of the corners of her mouth? Or did you imagine it?
"Yes. A
friendly outing. I'm curious how you've been, even if we only met in passing."
She tilts her head slightly with a little frown. (Does she look a little disappointed at your emphasis on 'friendly'? You aren't sure. Why are you still thinking about it like this when you've
told yourself no romance? Bah, traitorous mind.)
"Nesiwald was the easiest part of the Rostwald to resolve thanks to your thorough report. I presume you aren't in that small village entirely by choice..."
You wince. "Could we not talk about that? Sorry."
She
huffs in annoyance, pouting slightly. It's surprisingly cute. "If we are to get to know each other and become friends, we have to start somewhere."
"...Alright, just, later. It's fairly serious conversation. Please?"
With a sudden decisive look in her eye and a sharp nod, "Alright. I'll be back in a minute. Let's go for a walk, hm?"
You compose yourself, watching the weird merchant blubbering about his 'badgers' to the city watch, who mostly just look annoyed. She re-emerges with a small bag, pointing one direction down the street. You fall into step with her a bit hesitantly.
"I'm not going to bite, you know. I
did want to talk with you."
"Why? And where to?"
"Isn't that a bit unfair? You want to talk to
me too. There's a fairly nice cafe two streets over and I
need their pastries after that debacle."
"Ah, sure, sorry. Understandable. Pastries are very distracting... Does that sort of thing happen
often?"
"No. Well, not
animals. The worst I've seen before today was a knight who - Hm. Perhaps I shouldn't say that bit. I'll leave this mystery knight's name a mystery as well. Anyway, on the one hand, he was a
knight - paragon of martial excellence, hero of the realm. Someone deserving respect and deference. But he was just so - so -
annoying."
"Knights can be like that. Especially when it comes to taxes. Not all of them, but people vary, you know?"
"I do know. You sound like you're speaking from experience, know many knights, do you?"
You don't really want to talk about it, but you'll have to get it over with sooner or later. "Yeah, I knew some knights."
"Sorry, sorry, I shouldn't poke at you. It's just - I think I know some things about you, but I don't know if you know I know, and it's making me want to make sure you know what I know. You know?"
"...I think so?"
She flushes slightly. "Yes. Ahem. Anyway. Somewhere less crowded and quiet, you said? The cafe is that. What's a safe topic while we walk there-"
"I'm a little curious what the day-to-day of a tax collector is like, but if you don't want to talk about work..."
"No, no, that's fine. It's really just checking that everything is in order and not letting overblown merchants get too puffy or confuse the boys with spears about what they owe. I can't collect taxes from
noble houses, obviously, there's a wholly separate system for that. We just handle the lands that aren't managed by a lord. What about you, what brings you to Ganz?"
"Opportunity. The army needs arms, some of the locals were heading here to join as well, and I happened to have a lot of iron, so I put two and two together and came along. I've been shopping too, and getting to know those smiths, and I had some other little things to take care of."
"Do you like the towers? Everyone new in the city comments on them. I think every city ought to have something unique..."
"They're impressive. I know tall spires like that are very hard to make consistently. I read a book about it once, distributing the weight is delicate business."
"Title?"
"
Methods of Spire Construction, by Lord Belmis Hannart. Subtitle,
Spear of Stone and Timber Reaching for the Sky."
She writes it down. "And is it a good read?"
"He is a bit poetic and long-winded about it all, but it was interesting. Not quite an academic tome that lays out all the details, but there were a lot of sketches and examples - even Lumerian and Gastonian architecture."
"Ooh, foreign architecture, I will have to look for a copy some time."
You make small talk about what's nice and not so nice about the city as you walk the streets and find a place at the cafe, and you find the knots in your belly slowly unwinding as you settle in to a comfortable conversation about the books you've read, making several suggestions to each other. Genevieve is a fan of travelogues, it seems.
You both order food at a cafe that lives up to the 'comfy and quiet' promise Genevieve made you, and you think about how you will deal with the topic of your family, banishment, and plans for the future that is sure to come up now that you're in a place suited for a more serious conversation. The Codex Crystal is obviously a secret, but the rest of it? It might be painful or just a bit too soon to tell her everything here and now. What attitude will you take towards it?
[ ] You kind of deserve it, and are just looking to move forward and make up for your disgrace now.
[ ] If you hadn't had a sword pressed into your hand this wouldn't have happened!
[ ] You miss your family most of all. Hopefully you can go back to them some day.
[ ] Since you have grand plans for the future, in some ways this is a blessing in disguise, an opportunity.
[ ] You'd rather not talk about it past the bare minimum, to be honest.
