Sins of Greed - A Tale of Two Fools, Book One

Chapter 7 - The Syndicate

"As much as it troubles me to admit, we need martyrs. We need men and women who are devoted enough to our cause that they are willing to die for it. It's the only way that we will expose the madness of the Sovereign." 

"Are not you devoted, Rawlins?" she responded. 

He looked at her with determination and grit in his eyes. "There is nothing more that I would like than for the Gods to smile down on me, and they surely would if I gave my life and it meant furthering our purpose. Nothing would make me a happier man than that, Beyatris." 

After a brief pause, he continued. "I don't think that's what they have in store for me, however. I think my place is here, driving our efforts and leading our men. That is what I believe." 

Beyatris nodded, slowly. They were at her manse in Bidvale, which was quickly becoming an unofficial headquarters to their cause. "Well. I don't believe it would be hard to collect such men and women. There are many who believe in what you say, and I suspect there are just as many who burn with the same passion that you possess." 

Rawlins nodded a slow and regretful nod. He got up to leave. "Beyatris, as always I thank you for your hospitality. But I must be going." 

She nodded in return and walked him out of her estate.

Once he was outside, standing on the corner of a particularly elegant section of Bidvale's Merchants Circle, an area of the city where most of Bidvale and Lurinlia's business owners had their homes, he pulled up the hood on his brown cloak, put his head down, and walked in the direction of Hearthcradle, a predominantly residential district on Bidvale's East End. It was no more than a stones' throw away. 

Earlier that day, Penniless Piltin, a Bidvale beggar, had told Rawlins of something he might be interested in happening in Hearthcradle. 

The Syndicate, more particularly Rawlins himself, had created a vast network of spies and informants in Bidvale that was made up of hundreds upon hundreds of both beggars and children. Rawlins had eyes everywhere in the city. There were beggars on every corner, living under bridges, sleeping in back alleys. There were always children playing in the streets, watching and seeing things their parents would be too afraid or too bothered to pay attention to. Rawlins paid them out of his own pocket, a coin for any piece of information they could bring; but that wasn't much. Rawlins was not a man of wealth or of riches. He mainly kept his network of informants together the same way he built it; through trust. 

Rawlins was a peoples' man and a natural born leader; he knew how to get men and women to believe him and to like him. He knew how to spark interest in the human heart, and how to deaden it. He spoke well and he acted even better. His moral grounding was a steadfast, unwavering sense of good that was built through years upon years of witnessing all the evil in the world, and witnessing how much it pained him to watch. His heart was made of the truest and purest gold, gold that was refined and chipped away at by Rawlins himself as he raised himself, his parents dead when he hadn't even reached his fifth or sixth year, in the tough, poverty-stricken streets of Bidvale's poorest district, Rats Bend. People liked Rawlins because you couldn't dislike him. 

That was how Rawlins did what he did. 

As he was getting closer to Hearthcradle, he could already hear the commotion that Penniless Piltin told him he would find. People were bunched up in crowds in the street, muttering amongst themselves. 

Rawlins heard the slight whine in most of the voices that he had learned to watch for. Nervousness. These people were scared and nervous.

He kept walking, making his way through the crowds to see what was going on. The sea of people parted for him as if he was a giant shark swimming through clear blue waters and they were no more than little fish. 

At the forefront of the crowd, staring at, by all looks, a normal and regular house in a line of houses in Hearthcradle, Rawlins saw what Penniless Piltin said he would see. 

No more than six men, all wearing the dreaded WSD uniform, were tearing apart the house, turning it upside down. They were laughing and singing a boisterous tavern song as they utterly destroyed some unfortunate soul's livelihood.

                                       'O ye' smell of rum and whiskey dear' she said to me she did, 

                                        

                                        I said 'I'd rather smell of ye, so come uncork me lid!',

                                        She slapped me in the face and o' what a slap it was, 

                                        Me face was red, it hurt so bad, it nearly killed me buzz! 

                                        I slapped her rump, I grabbed her hand, I took her in me arms, 

                                       I said to her 'Come on wench, ye can't resist me charm!," 

                                       I hauled her up the stairs, me room was where I went, 

                                       And while she screamed and cried, I had her until I was content!

They sang it as if it was a harmless children's rhyme. Just another score in which the melody of the piece took over the words. Hurtful, biting words whos' meaning was deadened by the context in which they were sung. Rawlins was boiling with rage. He had to stop this. 

He would stop this. 

There was a very tall... man overseeing the men and directing them in their search. If that's what it was. 

Rawlins went to him. 

"You need to stop this." 

The man turned and looked at Rawlins. "Excuse me?" 

Rawlins did not back down. He never did. "What you're doing. You need to stop it. You're scaring all of these citizens. Your men are singing a filthy tavern song about rape. This is savage. You need to stop this."

The man just looked at him. A blank and flat look. "Citizen, we're here on orders from Director Sarvis. I am his Overseer, Kelek. There is legal business being done here, on royal decree." 

Rawlins made a sound under his breath that sounded almost like a growl. So this is Overseer Kelek, he thought to himself. Well, if he couldn't stop them, he would at least use this event to his, and his organization's, advantage. 

"Royal decree? Is our Sovereign behind this brutish act of calamity, then?" He was speaking loud enough now to be heard by all the citizens in their crowds outside. Intentionally. Most turned to look at him, giving him their undivided attention, his words connecting with their hearts and pulling on their emotions like a master puppeteer. 

Kelek cleared his throat. A much more ominous sound than it should have been, Rawlins thought to himself. "Come on, men. We have what we need. Let us get back to The Director." 

Much of the WSD guards were not happy with that. They were enjoying their ransacking just as much as a band of common thugs and bandits would. They showed their distaste with Rawlins as they walked by him, leaving Hearthcradle, by spitting on the ground next to his feet. One or two of them shoved him. Rawlins was as stoic as a warrior. 

He watched them go. After they'd left, the entire crowd of citizens was simply staring at Rawlins. He noticed the looks on the faces that were staring at him; questioning. These people were looking at him for answers and direction. 

With a simple and straight, "Well then. Have a good evening," Rawlins turned in the opposite direction that the WSD men went and left Hearthcradle. 

The people watched him go.