At the time, I was rather preoccupied by my draconian arrest. How is it that the more laws made for the greater good, the greater the prisons swell? These two fops—their comical arguing and tragic story captured my interest.

Apparently they’d staked out what they thought was an appraisal loft. Under an assumption that the lavishly garbed old man was the owner, one night they made their entry. Much to their misfortune, the old man was guarded by a colossal dog. To add to their dilemma, the Metropolitan Ward was at the doorstep in a time unseen before by either crook. Naturally, once in the Ward’s custody they received a volley of new bumps and bruises. Worst yet, they broke into a loft that wasn’t meant to appraise coin and old silverware.

Any committed burglar would suffer a vicious dog to score a worthy prize, but as they took turns being mauled, they noticed no hanging scales or appraisal-loft displays of any kind. The poor fools—out-of-work botanists the moment our land cracked down on a growing list of herbs said to degrade the fiber of the working class—had broken into a bungalow of a Scepter, and the valuables they saw being carried in were gifts to congratulate him on his landslide victory over his mysteriously vanished competitor. In numerous portraits, their would-be victim loomed over them imperiously, or so they described when not choking one another.

Paying attention to the happenings of the city, getting in tune with Nilghorde’s heartbeat, led to future successes. Failing to do so led to gallows and grain ships. When I confirmed who the old man was, reality washed over them. That was the reason why the Ward had made it in record time—hell, for all we know, homing pigeons fly to their stations when men of monetary or political importance are in distress.

As I have said, the statues at Do-Gooder’s Row back in those days were three-quarters built, which meant the Conqueror’s macho quest, over somewhere closer to twenty. Once he’d declared peace in Rehleia, he was, and is, henceforth called The Municipal One.

The Municipal One brought about such wonderful things as new roads, new heroes, and a sea of graves as the goodhearted had a chicken in every pot. With all this came the new laws. Burglary soon came with a life sentence—said to serve as a deterrent, but around the Municipal Dungeon’s twelfth or fifteenth grant for another sub-level, the deterrent speeches ceased in the public square. The two who loped into one of the many homes owned by a man such as Scepter Macudden…well, they didn’t face a life sentence. They faced what was reserved for unrepentant blasphemers, murderers of the rich, and the rarity: a convicted necromancer.