Now that everything with the Council was over, the only thing left to take care of was making sure all Silver Cane’s victims would be alright. Which started with the one who’d indirectly brought me into the whole mess: Sour Sweet.
Sour was a Free Mind right around Kukri’s age, though she was a lot thinner and had a lot of wiry muscles from long plantation shifts. She currently was disguising herself as a pegasus, but I’d also seen her as a unicorn, gryphon, zebra, and a couple of hybrids. The only shape I hadn’t seen her in yet was her natural one. She didn’t seem anywhere near as comfortable in her changeling shape as Kukri was.
That wasn’t the only difference between her and my apprentice, either. “So why’re you shelling out to get me a new apartment?” I probably should’ve been offended by the cynical suspicion in her voice, but considering everything she’d been through in the past couple months I couldn’t really blame her. Maybe that was why she was avoiding any of the weird verbal quirks that gave away Free Minds too.
I gave her a straight answer. “I helped set the place up, but the money for it’s coming from Silver Cane.” The Council seized all her assets once their investigation confirmed everything I’d accused her of, and a lot more. How exactly all her money and property would get split up was still being argued over by just about everyone, but there was general agreement that everyone she’d enslaved on the plantation deserved some kind of compensation. If whatever share Sour got didn’t quite cover the rent, school, and monthly stipend I’d set up for her ... well, it wasn’t like I couldn’t afford to make up the difference.
“Oh. Well, thanks anyway.” Sour paced around the room, slowly taking in her new surroundings. I wasn’t springing for a ridiculous luxury apartment, but it was a pretty nice space, especially for a young mare all on her own. “So what’s the catch? Do I do your chores, clean your tower, or are you some kind of filly-fiddler?”
“No catch,” I assured her, doing my best to ignore the last accusation. “You said you didn’t have any family left, and I didn’t go to all the trouble of rescuing you from slavery just to put you out on the street.” A homeless child with no family in Freeport would probably end up stumbling into some new form of trouble just as bad as what I’d rescued her from.
“Oh.” Her eyes narrowed. “I get it. Playing up the big heroine image, right? Not only did you free the slaves, but you also helped them with a safe house and setting up a new life. That’s the sort of good press you can’t buy.”
I shrugged. “That’s not the reason I’m helping you, but I’d be lying if I said it never occurred to me.” Celestia had taught me that going out and publicly performing good deeds was the best way to earn a good reputation. Plus I had a feeling Sour would trust my charity a lot more if she could find a slight hint of the cynical motivation behind it.
“Right.” She paced the room a bit longer, then flopped down onto a cheap but comfortable couch. “So ... what happens now?”
“You’ll be restarting school next week,” I explained. “Puzzle will have someone come by and check on you every few days. He’ll also be keeping an ear to the ground for any families that might be interested in adoption.”
“I’ll pass on that.” Sour scoffed and shook her head. I saw no reason to argue the point with her: at thirteen she was old enough to make an adoption hard to pull off if she wasn’t on board with it. I had plenty of experience with bad family situations, after all. As long as she wasn’t having trouble managing on her own, I wasn’t going to push the issue.
Instead, I moved on to a happier topic. “I’m sure your friends will be happy to know you’re back safe and sound. I know Sunny Flare was worried.”
That was when Sour said just about the last thing I’d expected to hear. “Who’s Sunny Flare?”
A couple of follow-up questions confirmed it: Sour Sweet had no idea who Sunny Flare was, and it wasn’t a case of Sunny using an alias or something like that. Sunny Flare had lied to me about knowing her.
Maybe it should’ve been obvious in hindsight: Sunny’s family was comfortably upper class while Sour had been living in Sandy Shores. At the time I hadn’t questioned it. Sour went to an expensive school, and what reason would Sunny have to lie to me?
My first instinct had been to confront Sunny about it, but I quickly realized that would probably be pointless. There weren’t any good reasons I could think of for her to lie to me of her own volition, and considering the huge amount of political fallout that lie produced, it smelled like a setup. Considering her father was a high-ranking member of one of Freeport’s oldest, largest, and most connected mercenary groups...
The Freeport front office for the Free Companions looked like a mad mixture of a dozen different styles and influences. Except ... unlike a lot of the mansions of Freeport’s nouveau riche, the Free Companions made it work. Underneath the facade of chaos, there’d obviously been a very good architect putting everything together in a way where all the disparate parts complemented each other. It only looked like chaos if you weren’t paying attention.
Though several guards in fancy uniforms with big floppy hats noticed me, none of them got in my way or challenged me. Most of them probably assumed the Archmagus of Freeport was here on important business, or else they just saw how pissed off I looked and made sure they stayed out of my way. It wasn’t too hard to find General Platinum’s office since it was right off the main hall displaying all the Companions’ trophies.
That was when I finally hit a roadblock, in the form of a sharply dressed young hippogryph secretary with a not-quite concealed crossbow hidden under his desk. He didn’t point the weapon in my direction or anything stupid like that, but it was a pretty safe bet that if he felt the need he could bring it to bear quickly. Or have some other nasty surprise waiting. If the crossbow wasn’t perfectly concealed it might be a distraction meant to take my attention off the real threat.
The secretary looked up at me with the same blankly polite look every administrative assistant seemed to master at some point. “Archmagus Shimmer, how can I—”
I wasn’t in the mood to waste any time with pleasantries. “Is General Platinum in?”
“Yes, but—”
I didn’t wait for him to finish the sentence before I stomped up to the door. Maybe I should’ve been polite about it and waited for her—I knew from past experience that secretaries did not like it when someone bulled past them—but I’d been lied to and manipulated, and if it wasn’t Platinum’s direct fault one of her employees was still responsible. The social niceties had gone out the window a while ago.
General Platinum Peacock was at her desk going over paperwork when I barged in. She was a hippogryph maybe a couple of years younger than my parents, with a coat and feathers that matched her name. She’d set her hat to the side and taken off her elaborate uniform coat in favor of something more comfortable, but she still wore her basket-hilted broadsword at her side. She immediately looked up from her papers when I smacked open the door, but despite the subtle tension in her shoulders her golden eyes remained calm. “Archmagus. Welcome to my private office. How can I—”
I got straight to the point. “Why did you tell Sunny Flare to lie to me?”
Her eyes immediately flicked to her assistant. “Arrow, close the door and put up the privacy wards.” She didn’t say anything until he’d shut and locked the door, and I felt a ripple of magic settle over the room. “So you did work it out. I suppose it was inevitable, especially when you’re such close friends with Puzzle. If you don’t mind my asking, what gave it away?”
I took a seat, though I kept my eyes on Platinum the whole time. “Sunny told me she was friends with Sour Sweet, but when I mentioned her name to Sour she’d never heard of her before. It was a bit of an obvious lie in hindsight, but nobody expects to get played by a thirteen year old, and kids being in danger is the sort of thing that’d make me act before I dug too deep. Considering everything that spiraled out of that lie, I didn't believe for a second it was something Sunny came up with on her own. Someone told her to do it.”
Platinum spread her forelimbs open. “And the most obvious suspects for who would put her up to the job are either her parents or me. A largely academic difference, considering if her parents did it they would be acting on my orders. You’re right—I told her to lie to you. When I told her it would be her first real job as an aspiring member of the Companions, she buried any doubts and followed orders. I assure you, it was for a good cause.”
I scowled at her and crossed my forelegs over my chest. “This better be good. If you think I’m going to overlook all the dirty business you’ve gotten up to just because you claim it’s for some nebulous greater good...”
Platinum closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Simply put, I wanted to pin Silver to the wall for what she was doing, but I couldn't do it myself or act through any obvious proxies. I needed a third party to discover what she was up to and bring it to the Council. You’re one of the few in Freeport with the power to take Silver down and the passion to push the issue.”
That wasn’t the worst answer, but it still left me with a lot of questions. “Why couldn’t you do it yourself? Or at least just sit down and have an honest conversation with me? Way more honest than telling a kid to lie to me, and a lot more reliable than indirectly pointing me in that general direction in the hopes that I would end up doing what you wanted.”
“I don’t like all the subterfuge any more than you do.” Platinum sighed and slowly opened one of the drawers on her desk. “But I’ve had to do a lot of things I’m not wild about since I started wearing one of these.” She slowly pulled out a very familiar silver mask, then set it down on the desk in front of me.
Platinum was on the Council. That ... did explain a few things. “Let me guess, you were the one in the room who seemed to be backing me up?”
She nodded, a hint of a smile on her beak. “For what it’s worth, you played your part brilliantly. Shattering Silver’s mask was a nice dramatic touch, even if the Council is a bit annoyed they’ll have to replace it.”
It wasn’t hard to connect all the dots now that I had the missing pieces of the puzzle. “So you had me dig up all the information on Silver Cane's slave plantations because if you revealed it yourself it would look too much like a political power play. And let me guess: you lied to me about it so there wouldn't be any risk of me mentioning who hired me or figuring out the political angle? The best way to make sure I come across as authentic is to keep me in the dark about the big picture.”
“Exactly,” Platinum confirmed. “I needed you to come charging into the Council full of moral indignation and righteous anger, not calm and politically calculating. Otherwise Silver's allies would have caught onto what we were up to and she might’ve gotten away with everything. I regret lying to you, but if things hadn’t gone to plan I and all of Silver’s victims would regret that a lot more.”
The more I thought about it, the more aspects of her plan I figured out. “The Council was working on next year's budget when I showed up. I have a feeling that wasn’t a coincidence.”
Platinum nodded. “It wasn’t. The annual budget meetings are always contentious. We can set laws and policies as much as we want, but how well they’re enforced depends a lot on where the ducats go. Everything Silver did was wildly illegal, but she got away with it because the Council is very comfortable not funding any internal investigations of its own members. In better times the Masks would keep tabs on all of us to make sure we weren’t blatantly corrupt, but now that Cold controls them...” She sighed and shook her head. “Between the ones who didn’t want their dirty secrets found and the ones who feared Cold would use them to blackmail other members of the Council, is it any surprise we defunded that particular organization? The same has been the case for many other laws and reforms.”
I grimaced. “He can’t repeal all the laws that get in his way, but if he eliminates the budget for whoever’s in charge enforcing those laws they basically stop existing. I’m guessing he can get a majority on the Council for those sorts of budget cuts?”
Platinum sighed. “Between the likes of Silver who see an opportunity for profit when the law isn’t enforced and other members of the Council who benefit from those budget cuts, he succeeds more than he should. Whenever he slashes the budget for a regulatory agency, the money gets split up into pet projects of half the Council.”
I almost smiled as it all came into focus. “But now Silver’s out of the Council, which takes away one of Cold’s main allies. And after the scandal, I’m going to bet that whoever replaces her will be someone with a squeaky clean reputation. You’ll have a much easier time arguing for more funding for all those agencies now that you’ve replaced Cold’s ally with one of your own. Not to mention all the fence-sitters will see that the Council needs to put their own house in order.”
“Exactly.” Platinum counted off her points on her talons. “As for the replacement, we would need someone with quite a few special qualities. Incorruptibility is a must, so ideally we want someone with both a strong reputation and the rare combination of independent wealth without a hint of greed. Ideally someone young and passionate, because this could be a long and difficult fight. And, of course, they need to occupy a place of substantial enough power and accomplishment to actually deserve a place on the Council.” She turned to me and smiled. “Someone like you.”
“Me?!” Well. Huh. I hadn’t been expecting that.
“Of course.” From the way she said it, you’d think it was the most obvious thing in the world. “You’re powerful, wealthy, and have consistently shown dedication towards helping everyone in Freeport, even the poorest citizens. It’s hard to think of someone better qualified to help us restore Freeport to Torch’s vision for it. Considering Chainbreaker chose you, you’re the closest thing he has to a living heir.”
I opened my mouth, but she lifted up a talon to cut me off. “And yes, if you want the position, you’re sure to get it. Your star’s been climbing high for the last few years, and quite frankly, even the ones who don’t like you have been so scared since you got Chainbreaker that they’ll probably vote for you just to feel safer. Given the sword’s history, most of the Council will feel a lot better if Chainbreaker’s wielder is part of the regime. Right now half of them are scared you’ll go from removing one corrupt member of the Council to purging the whole thing. The best way to stop you from conducting a coup is to bring you in.”
I scoffed at that. “Does anyone seriously think I’m planning a coup?”
“It doesn’t matter if you’re actively planning it. You have Chainbreaker, money, and some powerful connections. Not to mention you beat Blackfyre, and while you’re not the youngest Archmagus in history you’re pretty close to it. If you and Puzzle started seriously planning to overthrow the Council and you leveraged your relationship with Celestia...” Platinum shrugged. “I’d give you a decent chance of succeeding if you get backing from the Clans and the Free Companions. Your apprentice is a Doo, so you have an in there. As for the Companions ... well, I wouldn’t support a coup at this time, but if it came down to a civil war where I had to pick either you or Cold...”
“I’m not interested,” I growled. “Northmarch was enough war for me.”
“Do you think it matters whether you’re interested?” Platinum shot back. “The mere fact that the potential exists is enough to make the Council nervous. Hopefully enough that we can work together to make peaceful reform happen within the Council.”
That ... was a lot to think about. I’d had a few childish fantasies of setting myself up as the Princess of Freeport early on, but I’d left those behind once I grew up a bit. I’d never been all that wild about the Council, but I’d been focused on dealing with smaller problems I could handle on my own. This would mean operating on a completely different level. Not to mention being one member of a thirteen-person council instead of making my own decisions.
I had a lot of questions, but there was one really important one. “There’s something I’ve been wondering about, Platinum. The timing on all of this was just a little too perfect for me to believe you didn’t plan it that way from the start. The Council doesn't want to vote for a new budget without full membership, and this way there's not enough time for Cold and anyone else on his side to recover from the scandal. You get to hand-pick someone on your side of things and use that push through the budget you want. Am I right?”
She nodded. “That was the general idea. If Puzzle’s investigation hadn’t pointed you towards Silver in time, I would’ve dropped a few more hints.”
“About that...” I fixed her with a withering glare. “How long did you leave Sour Sweet and everyone else locked up in slavery and suffering just to get the timing right?”
She flinched, her ears wilting against her skull. “A couple of months.” She got up from her seat. “I don’t like it, but I had to do it that way. Everything had to be timed just right, or it would’ve ended with Silver sweeping the whole thing under the rug, or Cold just replacing her with someone else every bit as corrupt as she was. Without the budget forcing the matter, he could’ve delayed things long enough for the scandal to blow over. We needed to hit them and hit them hard before they regained their balance. I only had one chance to shift the balance of the Council, and I couldn't blow it.”
“Even if that meant letting children be enslaved for months?” I shot back. “Give me a good reason to not remove two members of the Council instead of just one.”
She sighed and started rubbing her beak. “I didn’t like it. I mean...” Her wings flicked a couple times. “You have no idea how hard it was to sit next to Silver at every Council meeting, when all I wanted to do was throttle her. But ... one lesson I learned as a general and carried into my Council career, you have to look at the big picture. Sometimes that means sitting back and waiting for the right time, even if your instincts are screaming at you to do something as soon as possible. If I screwed this up because I got impatient, then Silver would’ve gotten away with everything. The Council would sweep the scandal under the rug, and she’d make a few token reforms while still keeping all her workers in virtual slavery.”
“Okay, so you had your reasons.” My eyes narrowed. “Not saying I don’t appreciate your motives and goals, but I can’t help thinking there had to be a solution that didn’t involve leaving children enslaved for months.”
“I won’t say it’s impossible,” Platinum conceded, “but there’s a big gap between platitudes that there has to be a better way and a concrete plan of action. I spent a lot of time considering different plans and scenarios before I decided on my course of action. I don’t like that I left children under Silver Cane’s control, and I was sorely tempted to just order the Free Companions to attack her holding and free everyone. However, then this story would’ve ended with the Council ordering me to pay reparations to Silver Cane and debating whether I still deserved my seat.”
“And your seat on the Council is more important than doing the right thing?” I snarled.
She scoffed. “Do you honestly think Freeport would be better off with another of Cold’s corrupt flunkies on the Council instead of me? Yes, Sour and the others would’ve been freed, but Silver would just replace them with new slaves, and probably re-enslave as many of them as she could find. Instead of debating about how we need to hold ourselves accountable, the Council would double down on cronyism. We wouldn’t see any reforms like increased funding for a lot of our regulatory agencies or shifting the condottieri contracts in Sandy Shores to mercenary companies that aren’t hopelessly corrupt. I know you probably think I’m heartless when you want to save everyone, but every general knows you have to decide on what constitutes acceptable losses and collateral damage on the road to victory.”
“Children being enslaved is not an acceptable loss,” I growled.
“Even if a few months of suffering for them ensures that we can not only destroy Silver’s operation, but all the other plantation owners doing the same?” Platinum shot back. “Not to mention all the other dirty business we’ll put an end to by actually enforcing all the regulations we have on the books. And with the Free Companions managing Sandy Shores now, we’ll cut the crime rate in half inside six months and clean out all the worst gangs and cabals.”
It was hard to miss one really important fact underneath all that blustering. “So in the middle of all your talk about anti-corruption reforms, you made sure to give yourself a nice little kickback by ensuring the Free Companions got that contract? You’re not doing a great job of convincing me you’re better than the rest.”
Platinum slammed her talons down on her desk, leaving shallow scratches in the hardwood. “Stop acting like I’m just as bad as Cold! I’m not looking to make money or set myself up as the head of a corrupt oligarchy! I put the Companions in charge because they’re all accountable to me and I’ll make sure they do the job properly. Do you have any idea how bad things have gotten thanks to Cold, all the things I’m fighting against?! Safety inspection budgets being stripped down to nothing, posts being filled by the rich and powerful's nieces and nephews, hideously over-budget public works projects Cold keeps funded to buy votes—I could go on and on.” She clenched her talons. “And need I mention what Cold pulled against your friend Puzzle and the people that got hurt by that? I assure you, that’s not the first time he’s abused his office to settle a personal grudge.”
I wasn’t going to back down. “So what’s your solution to all that nastiness, to play just as dirty as he does? Is it okay to be corrupt as long as you win?”
Platinum sighed and shook her head. “If you want to win a political conflict, you have to play politics. Who should we have given the Sandy Shores contract to? The Doos have too many mercantile interests to be objective, and the clans have always turned their noses up at grunt work with no glory or honor. The same goes for the True Heirs, and the Blood Stripes would address the crime problem by slaughtering a few gangs to serve as an example. Sometimes there are no perfect solutions. Who do you think should run Sandy Shores if not the Companions?”
That ... was a question I didn’t really have a good answer to. I had a good working relationship with the clans, but I’d never heard of them doing law enforcement before. I tried to come up with a good answer, but the only thing I could come up with was overhauling Freeport completely to remove mercenaries from the equation. Eventually I went with the best answer I had. “I don't know. I don’t have all the answers, but I don’t think it’s right for you to profit off of this.”
Platinum shrugged. “If the Companions do the job, my troops deserve to get paid. Would it make you feel better if I gave my share of the signing bonus and contract pay to charity?”
I shook my head. “It’d be a nice gesture, but it doesn’t really fix the problem. I don’t like the way the Council operates, even the better members of it like you. I won’t be part of it, and I won’t endorse the things it does because let’s be real: that’s what happens if I join. I know how much the Council hates open dissent within the ranks. If I join, you’ll expect me to back the Council’s party line in public.”
Platinum sighed and shook her head. “Sunset, please reconsider. The Council needs you. Freeport needs you.” She walked over to her window, staring out over the city. “The list of people who qualify for a spot on the Council is small, and the list of people I would be proud to sit by is even smaller. The only one besides you that I can think of is Puzzle, and Cold will use up all the political capital he can muster to keep that from happening. That was going to be a key part of my strategy for getting you in, actually: have Cold burn out all his old favors and call in debts stopping Puzzle so he doesn’t have anything left to fight me.”
I wasn’t buying it. “I’m not interested in hiding behind a mask and working in the shadows, not to mention putting my stamp of approval on everything the Council does. Honestly, all this political skullduggery sounds like something Puzzle would be a lot better at than I ever would. Why not just get him in?”
Platinum snorted. “You say that as if it would be so easy. Don’t get me wrong, I agree that he would be a wonderful asset to the Council and probably scarily good at playing all the dirty political games, but Cold and his faction will never let it happen. He’s too dangerous to them, and Cold hates him besides. Really, if I could get both you and him on the Council someday I would be thrilled.” She took a seat and set her talons on her desk. “And I understand how much you hate all the dirty games we have to play for political reasons. That’s why I want you on the Council in the first place: we need someone who’s not afraid to call us out on that kind of thing.”
“Yes, you do.” I stood up. “But if I want that job, it’s only one I can do by being part of the Council. Once I’m part of the process, I’ll be just as tainted by politics as the rest of you. Like, just to bring up a totally random example, I might not risk exposing your corruption if it cost me a political ally.”
“How much do you expect to accomplish by standing outside of the process?” Platinum shot back. “Yes, you’ll have to play politics and make a few compromises to get things done, but the part you seem to be overlooking is that you’ll get things done. Yes, not all the changes you want will happen overnight, but they’ll happen a lot faster with you in the Council than they will with you sitting on the sidelines doing nothing.”
“I’ve accomplished plenty as the Archmagus of Freeport.” I countered. “How much time would I have to take away from that work to sit around in a dark room, hiding behind a mask and playing cloak-and-dagger political games?”
“You fix the little problems,” Platinum answered. “Shutting down one corrupt plantation, where the Council can change laws and policies to end corruption entirely. And if you need to spend a few days as the Archmagus, have a proxy stand in and vote for you. It’s what I do if the Companions need their general.”
“And just how many principles will I have to compromise to get things done? If you compromise too many of them, eventually you’ll have nothing left to stand for.”
Platinum sighed and shook her head, letting a bit of scorn slip into her voice. “In that case, I hope that your principles make you happy while you’re sitting on the sidelines watching Freeport and the Council slide into decadence and decay. The next time children get enslaved because a reform bill didn’t make it through the Council, you can tell all those children that your own pride and sense of integrity was more important than keeping them free.”
“It’s not about pride!” I snapped at her, rising to my hooves. “I think we’re done here.”
I was about to head out the door when Platinum called out after me. “Wait!” Against my better judgment, I did. “Just ... think about it for a couple days. Talk it over with Puzzle, and everyone else close to you. This is a big decision. You don’t want to do something you’ll end up regretting later. Think it over.”
Tempting as it was to tell her to take that offer and shove it straight up her own rump, she wasn’t exactly wrong. Even if I knew she was hoping Puzzle, Celestia, Strumming, Kukri, or someone else would talk me into helping her ... well if all of them thought I was making a mistake, maybe I should take a second look at my decision. I was still righteously pissed at Silver, Platinum, and the Council in general. I had good reasons to be mad at them, but anger wasn’t the best emotional state to be in for making rational decisions.
Still, I didn’t want to let Platinum think she’d won. “I’ll think about it.”
Puzzle’s new house was a lot nicer than the pretty simple one he’d had before the trip to Northmarch. Between his old residence getting burned down while his lieutenants were fighting over who got to run his organization and Strumming moving in with him, he had good reasons to upgrade. He’d also asked me to set up the wards for his new place.
Puzzle’s new house wasn’t huge, but there was more than enough room for him, Strumming, and any potential expansion. It did beg the question of whether they would get married, but I really didn’t care one way or the other. Their relationship was their business. I didn’t even understand why they were a couple in the first place, so how could I say they were doing something wrong with their relationship? They both seemed happy, and that was good enough for me.
Strumming answered the door, an open bag of chips tucked under one wing. “Hey, Bacon. How's things?”
I sighed and stepped inside. The new house was still mostly unfurnished, but Puzzle had at least gotten a few comfortable couches. The one I flopped onto certainly felt nice after everything I’d gone through. “It’s been a day.”
“The whole week has been rather exhausting,” Puzzle agreed as he stepped into what I assumed was going to eventually be the living room. “What’s happened now? Did Silver find some way to escape the noose despite all the proof we had for the Council? Did Cold or one of the other members of the Council try to retaliate against you?”
“Nothing like that.” I snorted and shook my head. “Besides, isn’t it your job to know about those kinds of things and warn me about them ahead of time?”
“Normally,” Puzzle agreed. “However, this one has spent the last couple hours locked in a debate whose acrimony is matched only by it’s utter pettiness.”
Strumming snorted. “Sorry, bug boy, but I’m exercising a veto on that recliner. Don’t you know anything about color coordination? It’s gonna look completely out of place. What was wrong with the teal one anyway?”
“The teal one looks less comfortable,” Puzzle shot back. “This one is going to sit in that chair every single evening it’s home. It wants to enjoy where it sits. Also, it suspects that you’re biased towards teal.”
“It’s not biased when it’s objectively the best color ever,” Strumming countered. She turned to me. “See what I have to deal with? Trust me, backstabbing political drama is gonna be a nice break from the Great Sofa Wars.”
“Right.” On top of wanting to resolve the whole problem with Platinum, now I wanted to move on before one of them got the bright idea of asking me to make a decision about which chair Puzzle should get. “So, it’s not a problem with Cold or Silver, but it does tie back into everything going on with the Council.” I quickly caught them up with everything that had happened, from when I’d learned about Sunny lying to me to leaving Platinum’s office.
Puzzle took a seat on one of the couches he’d arguing with Strumming about, and by the time he finished I could tell he wasn’t happy with me. The first words out of his mouth confirmed it. “Shimmer-mare, you need to reconsider this.”
I’d been expecting him to not agree with me, but it still annoyed me. “If you can think of one good reason for me to take the offer, go for it.”
“How about the fact that you could change Freeport for the better?” he immediately answered.
Not this again... “I think I’ve been very thorough when it comes to explaining my reasons for wanting nothing to do with the Council, especially not being a member of it.”
Puzzle closed his eyes and took a deep breath. I knew it bothered him when I just outright ignored what he thought was perfectly logical advice. “Alright then, let's take this another route. What’s your long-term plan for fixing Freeport?
I could already guess where he was going with this and let out a frustrated sigh. “I don’t have all the answers. I just know getting involved in a corrupt system and compromising my principles isn’t the best way to do it.”
Puzzle pressed the attack. “So you don’t like the current obvious plan that’s presented itself to you and would be incredibly simple to implement. Very well then, what do you want to do? Do you have any plans? Any ideas? Do you even have a plan for how to make a plan? A basic starting concept to begin building off of?”
I had a few ideas, but nothing close to the sort of detailed plan he would want. “I figured we would work together on that.”
“Isn’t part of working together on a plan listening to this one?” Puzzle countered. “Because if you want this one’s input on how to fix Freeport, then it thinks getting on the Council is a very good first step. Does this one even need to go through the list of very good reasons for you to be on the Council? On top of the changes you’d be able to spearhead and policies you could shape, it would also let you keep an eye on what they're doing.” He frowned at me. “Not to mention that if working with the Council is entirely off the table, then we need to seriously talk about what our plan is going to be. Removing the Council from power is an entirely different proposition from reforming them.”
I sighed and tried to keep a hold on my fraying patience. I really wasn’t in the mood for one of Puzzle’s ‘Listen to this one because it is smarter than you and knows better’ lectures. “Look, I am listening to you. If I didn’t want your opinion, I wouldn’t have asked for it.”
“Did you want to hear this one’s opinion before making a decision, or did you just want it to validate the choice you’d already made?”
That probably hit a bit closer to the truth than I would’ve liked. “Maybe. It’s ... I just don’t like how the Council operates. Even the good guys on it are way too used to playing dirty.”
“Of course you don’t.” Puzzle shifted a bit closer to me. “This one doesn’t either. Anything that most everyone agrees about gets done quickly. The stuff we don’t agree about... Well, that’s where the politics come in. It becomes necessary to make deals, politically maneuver your opponents, set traps—whatever it takes to push through the politics you think are best. And at the end of the day, you can either try and push through what you think will help people or you can surrender the game to the likes of Silver and Cold. Because this one can assure you they will love it if you stay out of the game and give them unfettered access to the levers of power.”
He made it all sound so easy... “And if I play the game just as dirty as they do, what makes me better than them?”
Strumming scoffed. “Last time I checked, you weren’t starting street wars just to get a little petty revenge against an old rival or enslaving children just to help your farm’s bottom line. I don’t think you should be worried about being as bad as they are.”
Puzzle nodded. “If you have doubts about whether you’re doing good, this one can easily show you a couple dozen children who have a future thanks to you.”
“That’s true,” I conceded. “But what has me worried is that if I join the Council, how long will it take me to start acting like Platinum and saying I need to leave those kids locked up for the greater good and my political interests?”
Puzzle sighed and shook his head. “You keep coming back to that. This one knows you don’t want to hear it, but maybe she’s not completely wrong. We all make compromises. How long have you been affiliated with an information broker who has, let’s be very clear, a mixed history at best? In the past this one has worked for some very unpleasant individuals. The Ephemera-mare was an outright monster.”
“There’s a difference between what you did in the past and what Platinum’s doing right now,” I answered. “The thing with Ephemera was years before I ever met you. You know what you did back then was a bad call, and you nearly got yourself killed making it right. Platinum ... I won’t say she has no regrets, but if she could do it all over again she wouldn’t change a thing.”
Puzzle frowned. “This one thinks that might be an unfair assumption. That said, every situation is different. If you were given the same problem as Platinum, this one suspects you would have come up with a different solution. This one can think of a couple. Perhaps that would have ended better than what Platinum did, perhaps not. It’s easy to second-guess a general’s decisions with the benefit of hindsight, or to say that there had to be a better way when you weren’t making the decision and can’t even say for sure what that better way is.”
“She called it ‘acceptable losses’,” I snapped. “Children being enslaved is never an acceptable loss. See, what really bugs me is that she didn’t try to find a better solution, and from what you’ve said she’s probably one of the best members of the Council.”
“This one thinks that perhaps you’re making the perfect the enemy of the good,” Puzzle answered, almost infuriatingly calm. “This one is less than happy with Platinum’s decision, but our ideals and goals align. Yes, the Council is corrupt, but that means someone needs to set an example of what it should be. Not to mention be the backer for future councilors who can uphold a higher standard.” A scowl briefly tugged at his lips. “This one knows it would have fought for better people if it could have gotten onto the Council.”
Something clicked into place for me. “That’s what this is really about, isn’t it? You want a seat on the Council, but since Cold will make sure that never happens ... well we both know I’d ask you for advice all the time. Is it really about me being a good pick for the Council, or do you just want to use me as a mouthpiece?”
Puzzle groaned and ran a hoof down his face. “This one would be lying if it said it didn’t think it could get you to pursue some of its goals on the Council. After all, we both want many of the same things. However, this is about more than either of us, or our personal desires. The Council needs new voices, ones that stand for everything we’ve fought for. The unfortunate truth is that as long as Cold is on the Council, this one will never get a seat. You can.”
I crossed my forelegs over my chest. “Well I don't want a seat at the table.”
Puzzle let out a very loud, resigned sigh. “You’re about to make a huge mistake. We’ll all regret it if you turn down Platinum's offer.”
I snorted and shook my head. “I won’t.”
Strumming set her bag of chips aside and planted herself in between us. “Okay, hold on you two, lemme see if I got this figured out: Bug Boy wants a seat at the table where all the important decisions get made, and Bacon doesn't want to compromise her personal integrity to get that seat. Is that right?”
I shrugged. “Sounds right to me.”
Puzzle nodded. “That is the irony life has thrown at us, yes.”
That’s when Strumming started doing something that ... well for anyone else it would’ve been weird, but for Strumming it wasn’t all that odd. She started giggling like someone had just told her the funniest joke in the world.
Puzzle stared at his cackling girlfriend for several seconds. “Now this one is just a little scared. You don’t want to know what she was thinking last time this one heard that giggle.”
I braced myself for something crazy. “This is gonna be interesting.”
Strumming finally stopped laughing, though she was still grinning like a madmare. “Oh yeah. While you two were busy arguing, I figured out how to solve it. Makes you both happy, and I guarantee you Cold is gonna be pissed.”
Strumming laid out her plan.
By the time she was done, I was grinning almost as much as she was. “That’s simple, but really devious. I like it.”
Puzzle looked every bit as happy as I felt. “This one can’t wait to see Cold’s face. This one will kiss you if it gives him an aneurysm.”
Strumming bowed. “Thank you, thank you, I’m here all week.”