"I assume you are eager to know about the way of Anie's passing," the grim man said.
He had not touched his tea, and from this, Ted could safely assume that the man had been touched himself, perhaps by the death itself, or perhaps because of the mere mention of addiction. While alcoholism was nominally different from chewing enough corna to convulse and die, it shared the same mechanism. One had to escape life. Other people had to, at least, while Ted had the guts to live in the real world and make it a bearable and sometimes even pleasant place to exist in.
"Of course," he said with a hushed voice.
To maintain the illusion of proper gendered behavior being enforced in his manor, he had sent Eknie away for a moment. The men were talking, or so the city watch fellow probably thought. In reality, Eknie would receive a briefing before sundown.
"The death would have been shocking without the details, and this?" Ted shook his head. "I am heartbroken, to say the least."
"You are known for your charitable nature, cor Tobias. You could not have known."
From this alone, Ted could guess that he was not on the list of suspects.
"Perhaps I have too much of that faith in others," he sighed. "Tell me, what was the cause of her death? The corna? Something else?"
"Sometimes, when…dear seeds of thunder, I have a hard time talking about it. Sometimes, a seizure can cause a fracture bad enough that the damage done will be quicker and, hopefully, less painful than dying of other related causes. When a person's neck twists enough or they get entangled in something that causes them to be too stiff…"
The voice of the man faded away.
Ted knew that this could potentially be absolute horse manure, provoked by his spells. The medical field did not exactly think that these cases were worth their undivided attention. Corna users had been of the higher social circles. That had been the old tradition, but nowadays, with more of the stuff being produced up north in the tropical areas and some in the area surrounding Neul as well, the habit had become despicable, low class, the lifestyle of the cheap and the easy. There was also more information about the risks involved, partially thanks to the work of Doctor Ingram, whose knowledge had accelerated the understanding of herbs in such an amount that some rarities had become household names.
"That's…actually, don't tell me more. I have to try to be functional, no matter what. I will have the wellbeing of an entire union of professionals on my shoulders." Ted cracked his voice on purpose and turned away to seem like the kind of manly man who did not want to show any softness or weakness. "I can't break down, you see, Mr. Ivarn."
Mr. Ivarn, the sad-faced man of the city watch, looked at him, with eyes full of compassion.
This pity enraged Ted further, motivating him to get something tangible out of this inane show.
"Have you heard of the Society?" he asked, pulling himself across the table, trying to make Mr. Ivarn see how much he needed support and validation.
"Whispers and rumors, but nothing more," the man said.
That was when Ted unloaded all what could be considered juicy gossip about the magnificent opulence that this cult provided for its supporters. He pulled out swatches of the fabric Amy had used on the robes. He showed the flyers to Mr. Ivarn and bragged about the artist who had completed all the fancy drawings during a night of insomnia, and also about how handsome the payment had been.
The bad mood of the city watch fellow quickly disappeared. Apparently Ted's explanations seemed trustworthy, but certainly, it was the mystery that had Mr. Ivan hooked. After all, part of his job was to be intrigued enough to solve different puzzles. He was not the common man in a black coat, he was mentally so fit compared to his colleagues, yet all humans could be fooled with enough charisma and the right reputation.
"And that is why we need to keep a low profile," Ted said, sighing again and finally leaning back in his chair.
He knew that from this angle, he looked very handsome, pleasing to the air. He pinched the bridge of his nose and stretched his other arm high up in the air.
"I think there really is something…someone does not want any meteorologists investigating the abnormal storms." He gave Mr. Ivarn a knowing look. "I wonder why. But in any case, the fact that even the professionals are suffering financially means that we are but one step away from finding their bodies in gutters."
This, of course, was an absolute load of horse manure with absolute certainty. No one was bothering the meteorologists. In reality, that profession was doing well, those men and women lived in lavish houses by the sea, as Ted had found in his investigations. However, none of these fine people objected to getting more support.
The whole scheme was so absurd that it definitely worked on those prone to excessively imaginative thoughts and daydreaming.
Mr. Ivarn caressed his mustache, apparently neck deep in some pretentious mental patterns he used to prop up his self-esteem. Ted hated this man. He hated everyone so blissfully unaware of such intellectual pride. People in general were so full of faulty premises and cognitive bias that sometimes Ted just wanted to shoot every last idiot who opened up to him and dared to make him think about stuck-up morons like Mr. Ivarn here.
"Can I join?" the man asked with a sheepish expression on his face. "I have…I am in a sort of intellectual void right now. My wife, as much as I love her, she is the most down-to-earth person I have met…both in good, and in bad as well, and sometimes…oh, you know, cor Tobias, women, am I right?"
Cor Tobias did not know. He considered both genders to be equally capable of monstrous stupidity.