Christopher Byford - Den of Smoke - Absolutely gripping fantasy page turner filled with magic and betrayal

A foreman waved to the management upon noticing he was being watched. Jack acknowledged with a dip of the head.

‘Cole.’

‘Yes, boss?’ he said, up to his wrists in suds.

‘Finish that up and lace your boots. You’re with me today. I’ve got something for you to get stuck into.’

* * *

Papers were stacked in uneven piles, some bleeding into others. Just from a glance Cole felt his stomach fall through the floor. Purchase orders, receipts, inventories, and scores of what else almost mocked him in intimidation. The mass was a complex collection with no attempt of organization, or at least not one that met normal conventions. Cole guessed things were just piled up on top of one another. Never had he been in the presence of such a fiasco.

‘This is your attempt at bookkeeping?’ he asked, aghast.

‘Not mine. Ralust has a very unique way of filing. Or he did, until he just gave up and began tossing things in here.’ Jack flicked a roll-up from one side of his mouth to the other. ‘I’m assuming as much at least. I won’t pretend to know the intricate details of you numbers people. I just know what I see and what I see is that substantial pile being messy.’

‘What do you want me to do?’

‘I thought that would be obvious.’ Jack grinned, removing his cigarette and letting the ash drift to the floor. ‘ Un-mess it.’

‘You sure know how to force a heart attack on me. Don’t need a weapon to do so, I tell you that much.’ Cole began to sieve through the first pieces of paper within his reach. ‘Invoices. IOUs. There’s plenty here that doesn’t match convention. It’ll take me …’

‘How long do you need?’

Cole, still feeling traumatized, flatly responded. ‘The end of time itself by the looks of this.’

‘You have three days,’ Jack compromised, or at least, it was a compromise to him.

‘Wonderful.’

‘Call me if there’s anything that you need.’ Jack corrected himself: ‘Actually, make it Alvina or Blake. Best to call one of those two. I’ll be busy.’

‘Wait, is this safe?’ Cole asked.

‘Nothing we do is strictly safe, Little Fish …’

‘No, I mean this record keeping. Anybody could read it.’

‘The written word is easily accessible to most with working eyes. That’s sort of its point of being.’

‘That’s not what I’m getting at. Do you want me to encode it? Make it so that only we can tell the coming and goings, just in case the worst should happen?’

‘You can do that, can you?’

‘Yeah. It’ll take me a little longer but in this line of work it would be good –’ Cole hesitated to find the correct word, awkwardly grinning as he did so ‘– er … insurance ?’

Jack entwined his arms, reciprocating the expression and cocking a brow. ‘Insurance, huh? And who would be able to decode it?’

‘Myself. You. Whoever you wanted that we taught the cypher to.’

Jackdaw frowned at the term, clearly attempting to pair it with its meaning. Cole witnessed the struggle and offered the solution.

‘Cypher. The key.’

‘Just us will be fine. Do whatever you need to do.’

‘I’ll probably need an extra day,’ Cole bargained, lifting a stack of loose papers from the desk chair. They slid under their own weight, noisily scattering about at his feet.

‘Nice try but you still have three ,’ Jackdaw answered.

* * *

In those three days, Cole set himself to work and did so every minute he was able to. He ate at the desk, clearing a space to work with his master ledger and a space for a plate and cup. These areas were not compromised with loose papers, maintaining a working area that prevented confusion and further clutter. Firstly he sorted each item by date, then type, then attempted to bind it all together in whatever logic could be mustered from it all. He slept around five hours a night, and spend at least fifteen working away at the task at hand.

As gruelling as a routine as this was, progress was being made. A comprehensive list of the Jackrabbits’ dealings was coming to light, something that the law would kill for. Acquisition by theft was numerous. Embezzlement was dotted here and there. Bribery of many local officials – and some regional – made a good part of expenditures, the trade-off being acquisition of goods, some small and others in impressive scores. Recorded stock was all over the place, with goods going this way and that, sometimes sold, sometimes vanishing into the air and marked as a loss.

But as much of a picture this was creating, there were a couple of curiosities Cole stumbled upon. They were things that merited deeper investigation and so, he chased the paper trail only to be sent in loops and eventual dead ends. Cole decided that the best course of action was just to come out and ask about them to the ones who would best know.

* * *

‘There he is. The numbers man. Good thing you’re not at the table. I would have to accuse you of counting cards.’ Blake tilted his chair back, his chips considerably lower than any others on the table. He swigged a mouthful of beer despite his slur indicating he should show restraint. He always drank whenever the group played cards, smoked like a bonfire too. Sadly, displacing his attention into these vices caused plenty of overzealous bluffs, which even a blind man could identify. Not that the others complained of course. Taking Blake’s money never got old. The day he caught on to this would be the day their fun was ruined.

‘Lucky for both of us I won’t be winning your money by the fistful. It seems like everyone else at the table is doing it for me,’ Cole jabbed.

‘He’s not wrong there.’ Alvina snickered, taunting the winnings she had alleviated from him.

Jack placed his cards face down on the veneer. ‘Are you thinking of joining us or is there something you want to ask about that there stack of papers under your arm?’

‘I’ve got most of this in order but there’s a discrepancy that needs sorting. I was hoping somebody could clear it up for me.’

‘Go on.’ Jack sipped from a glass.

Cole cleared his throat loudly. ‘Large sums of monies are shifting back and forth with constant losses. All of these share something in common. Manifests, notes, they all loop back to the same thing.’

‘What’s the point?’ Blake asked, failing to look up from his cards. He was already forty bucks in the hole and the last thing he wanted was to be put off whilst attempting to bluff his way out.

‘The point is, some of these are initialled with D.K. So my question is …’ he placed the stack of paperwork and the completed, encoded ledger on the table, loudly and with purpose ‘… who exactly is Donovan Kane ?’

All three lowered their cards in unison.

‘Want to field this one, boss?’ Blakestone folded his hand and anxiously vacated his seat to fetch himself a smoke. He could bleed money some other time. Alvina felt it fit to follow. Suddenly, her throat had become dry and booze within reach wouldn’t have sated it.

‘Sit, Cole,’ Jackdaw insisted, waving at the still-warm chair. Complying, Cole did so. ‘How did you come about that name?’

‘Handwritten letter dictating a telegram. Telephone message here referring to a date that I traced to an inventory slip with the initials on. That date would be tomorrow. It looks like an invitation of sorts with your name on it.’

Jack took the paperwork as his own and surveyed it with the utmost scrutiny. Unfortunately it was true. What was worse was that this slip-up was in his own handwriting. It was quite unusual for him to be so sloppy.

‘It’s a name you don’t want to become accustomed to,’ he added with determination.