The Battle of Harmingsdown: Chapter 3

The Moulde Family carriage, jet black and topped with black plumed feathers, wound its way out of the Squatling district thorough the smog-roofed streets of Brackenburg towards City Hall, temporary home of the Board of Generals among several other official war offices. It was also one of several recruitment stations in the city.

The carriage was slowed to an unsteady crawl as they neared the City Hall. The streets of Brackenburg were filled with citizenry, far more than Edmund had ever seen. Granted, he could count the number of times he had gone into Brackenburg on one hand, but while the streets had been busy on those previous occasions, movement had been possible. Now, the carriage hobbled through the throngs as young men and women teamed like a rolling ocean.

Edmund’s nose pressed to the glass window as he scanned the sea of laborer’s caps, servant’s bonnets, and the rare silk bowler or top hat to mark the magnanimous few who were there by duty or choice, rather than necessity. Here and there in the throngs, men and women with large bull-horns shouted beneath the flag of Britannia, decrying the latest crime the Spanish people had wrought on the land. Cheers and fists were thrown into the air with every patriotic proclamation.

Edmund watched and learned.

Finally, the carriage stopped. When the door opened, a torrent of chatter washed into the open carriage like a tidal wave. Busy as it was, the citizens of Brackenburg knew their place, and still held true to the laws of society and propriety. The carriage — and by association, Edmund — was given a generous half-foot of space where no one jostled him nor shouted in his ear. It was enough space for Edmund to collect his bag and begin his ascent to the doors of the City Hall.

Poets, Literary scholars, and other Thematicists might note the process by which Edmund climbed the steps of City Hall. In his older age, Edmund had become no more naturally noticeable than in his youth, and as he stepped away from the carriage and its silver crest, Edmund’s shield of nobility began to fade.

Half-way up the steps, people no longer gave him a wide berth. Another quarter of the way, and he was bumped and jostled as much as anyone. By the time he reached the top of the steps, Edmund had been completely consumed by the populous and transformed into just another face in the crowd.

Edmund, not yet aware of the thematic significance of this moment, cared only for reaching the long desk that had been set at the top of the steps. It was large enough to seat seven men, each scribbling constantly on pieces of paper as men and boys shouted at them, eager to join up for King and Country.¹

Edmund shuffled towards the man seated at the far edge, a — Edmund glanced at his shoulders — Sergeant. “Name?” the Sergeant barked over the roar as Edmund approached. He didn’t even look up from the papers in front of him as his pen flew like a fish across the pages.

“Master Edmund Moulde.” Edmund hoped the Sergeant could hear him over the teeming masses.

The Sergeant nodded, turning the page and writing on the other side. “And are–you–of–sound–mind–and–body,–here–under–no–duress,–willing–and–able–to–take–the–King’s–Sovereign–in–solemn–oath–to–protect–the–country–against–all–foreign–enemies–at–home–and–abroad?”

“Yes,” Edmund said.

“Army–or–Navy?”

“I am joining the Army Bureaucratic Corps,” Edmund admitted. “I spoke with General Ramsbutt about serving as a clerk.”

The Sergeant — who still hadn’t looked up from his paperwork — finished writing on the paper, tore it in two, and shoved one half into a locked wooden box. Pulling a small coin out of a sagging leather bag, he folded the other half of the paper over it and handed the both to Edmund. “Take–this–enlistment–slip–and–shilling–you–are–now–a–member–of–the–King’s–army. Go–inside–and–follow–the–queue–to–the–Medical–Testing–station. Next!”

Taking the paper and coin, Edmund joined the steadily growing queue that slowly snaked inside.

Edmund had never been inside the Brackenburg City Hall. His first foray into local government had been his first year at Grimm’s, when he entered the Mothburn Town Hall to accuse one of his fellow gentry of being a murderer. The conversation had ended with Edmund’s arrest, and had soured Edmund on the concept of elected officials in general.

The Brackenburg City Hall was darker than Mothburn’s and full of granite instead of marble. The architectural style was paradoxically newer, having been built in what a hundred years earlier was considered the modern style, instead of what in the modern era was considered classical. The furniture was hard wood with a pitch black stain, upholstered in thin silk instead of rich leather. The gas-lights along the wall hissed, while the giant chandelier cast flickering candle-light over the curving ceiling.

For want of anything better to do, Edmund studied the decor as he followed the line of enlistees down the left hallway towards a large conference room. Inside, a team of doctors poked and prodded hopeful volunteers who were quickly learning that the rank “private” was a misnomer at best.

A stern woman with a clipboard stood next to the door, holding out her hand. Edmund graciously tipped her with the shilling the Sergeant had given him. She handed it back with one hand while snatching his slip of paper with the other.

“Private Mauve,” the woman glanced at the paper before handing it back. “Take off your clothes and put them in this bin. Before we begin the testing that will discern your suitability to serve in the Kings Army, is there anything you wish to tell me?”

“It’s Moulde,” Edmund corrected as he began to disrobe.

“We have an ointment. Move along to the first Doctor. Next!”

Edmund appreciated the efficiency of it all. Each doctor was performing one single medical test before sending their patient on to the next. It was exactly the same as mass-production. Edmund began to wonder if this was a great new method of medicine, while a poem took shape in his mind: A bevy of men all young and crude / yet fresh of face and clean of chin, / Subjected to but one machine; / A Conveyor belt in which they’re queued.

The first doctor was an old woman who peered at Edmund’s naked body from behind thick coke-bottle glasses. She demanded he detail his diet in a voice designed to bend steel. She asked how he took his tea. She asked if he had been sick recently. Those questions answered and scribbled on his slip of paper, she pushed him deeper into the room.

The next doctor didn’t say a word. Instead, she set to work prodding a Edmund with metal utensils, squeezing his biceps with clamps and swatting his thighs with wooden rods. Her grunts and mutterings as she jabbed at his ribs and limbs were alternately dismissive and appreciative, and Edmund couldn’t decide which were the more disconcerting.

Edmund noted each prod; pain was a subject of fascination for him, and after being beaten up during his first year at Grimm’s, he had constructed a scientific model of the process. Now, under the care of an expert, he knew exactly what each jab and poke was doing to his body. Every pain was a message, telling Edmund precisely what the doctor was looking for.

If she had pressed harder, she would be looking for early signs of jaundice, but at that strength she may have just wanted to test reflexes. That stung worse than it should have for muscle mass…tensile strength perhaps? That is an odd place to poke someone…cysts on the hip? They are concerned about Oberthal’s Disease. I will have to inform our Hospital to stock up on bismuth and chromium…

The third doctor asked him more questions about his family life, history of medical conditions, and known allergies or chronic ailments. He looked gratified every time Edmund confessed ignorance, obviously preferring the cadets who knew it was not their place to know anything about their own medical condition.

The fourth doctor resumed the beating the second doctor had administered, obviously dissatisfied with the results. He ordered Edmund to jump up and down, touch his toes, swing his arms, and similar physical pantomimes.

At the other end of the testing room, a young male clerk took Edmund’s paper, glanced at it before stamping the bottom with green ink, and handed the it back with a small glass vial full of pale pink.

“Report to the Quartermaster for your equipment, Lieutenant Mauve,” he said, “and here’s your ointment.”

Following the winding queue, Edmund found the Quartermaster hurriedly throwing bags, uniforms, helmets, and boots at everyone who stepped through his door. After a glance at Edmund’s paper, he vanished into the store-room only to return with a small satchel full of paper, a vest with pockets, seven different types of pens, an emergency ink-supply, a stamp-kit, a magnifying glass, and an officer’s sash; all of which the Quartermaster recited off to Edmund as he handed each item over. “Anything goes missing,” he snarled, rubbing his chin with the back of his hand, “I’ll take it out of yer hide, sir.”

Edmund left the Quartermaster’s office and rejoined the queue, which led to a small room where everyone was getting dressed. With no better option, Edmund did the same.

His uniform didn’t fit well, but Edmund was used to poorly fitted clothing, so he spent little time adjusting and tugging at the alternately too tight and too loose fabric. The officer’s sash hung off his thin body and the epaulets were too small for his shoulders. The boots were loose, but a few crumpled up pieces of paper provided the support he needed. His Lieutenant’s shako, topped with a white cotton bobble, slipped down over his eyes unless he set it perfectly vertical on his skull.

The whole process had taken almost five hours. It hadn’t been a particularly uncomfortable process; certainly less harrowing than his testing to get into Grimm’s.

Perhaps tis true there is nothing more different / than butterflies from pupated caterpillar / yet they must take a week to grow and reach their end, / while hours enough to conveyor boy to soldier. Not his best work, but suitable. At the start of the day he had been Master Edmund Moulde. Now, he was dressed in a military uniform, one Lieutenant Edmund Mauve.

He glanced again at his enlistment papers — yes, Mauve.

Edmund took a deep breath. He could correct that mistake later. It was time to report for duty.

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From this point forward, great caution must be taken by every historian and scholar of Edmund’s life.

It is an oft repeated truism that History as a science is largely concerned with births, deaths, marriages, and wars. This is true, primarily because these are the events which are most heavily documented.

The Founding Families understood the importance of accurate documentation of births,² deaths,³ and marriages.⁴

Because of the importance this bureaucracy holds over the day-to-day lives of the upper-class, wars — responsible for a full half of the deaths of the aristocracy⁵ — were made as bureaucratic as possible. Reports, filings, receipts, observations, all filled out in triplicate and sent across the world to ensure that everyone knew exactly who was winning, and, independently, who was still alive.

This means that wars have the greatest number of primary sources out of all possible historical events.

What demands great caution, however, is the simple fact that from this moment forward, Edmund was a member of the ABCs. Not because he was bad at the job; indeed, as his later life proved, he was likely too good at it.

For example: it is an accepted fact that Edmund was assigned as an ABC clerk under Brigadier McNaymare, head of the Logistical Administrative Legion in Brackenburg. The reason we know this is because of a request form accepted, signed, and filed by the ABC offices in Brackenburg; a file that Edmund personally handled.

The most fanciful of music-hall historians proclaim Edmund’s entire history in the army is suspect, as every surviving piece of paper could easily have been manufactured or altered by Edmund’s own hand. However, we do have the benefit of newspapers, eye-witness accounts, and third-party personal correspondence which Edmund could not have forged.⁶

As such, the time between the one documented instance of a Lieutenant Mauve attempting to enter the General’s Club, and Edmund’s Military Tribunal and subsequent resignation from service, can never be more than speculation.

What follows, therefore, is what many consider to be the most likely series of events:

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The front room of the LAL Offices had once been a simple conference room, designed to hold meetings of great consequence but little glamour. Now, maps of Brackenburg and its districts had been attached to the walls along with a giant map of the continents that covered the entirety of the large central table. Piles of papers lay stacked all around the room. At the back of the room proudly hung the flag of the Britannian Empire.

In front of this flag sat a man. He was tall and thin, slim of shoulder and firm of jaw. His hair was jet black and pulled tight under his tall shako. His chest was full, covered by a deep blue coatee, and his officer’s sash was decorated with a single badge that marked his regiment. His piercing blue eyes stabbed through Edmund like a bayonet, his mouth pursed into the perfect shape of sober professionalism.

For a moment, neither of them spoke. Not even when the man’s eyebrow raised like he was sighting down a rifle.

“Well?” the man finally snapped, pulling the trigger.

“I’m reporting for duty,” he said.

“Do I look like a Brigadier to you?” the man fired again.

“No,” Edmund admitted. He didn’t know what Brigadiers looked like par se, but he figured they didn’t wear Major’s pips and stripes.

“If I am not the Brigadier, you are not very well reporting to the Brigadier for duty, are you?”

“No.” The logic was unassailable.

“No, sir!” the Major snapped. “You will address me as Major Schtillhart until such time as we are friends, at which point you may address me as Major. I assure you, Lieutenant, we will never be friends. Understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

Major Schtillhart reached out his hand. Not willing to make the same mistake with the shilling again, Edmund sorted through his possible reactions; the Major was not offering to shake nor requesting Edmund hand over his bag to take to his room. By process of elimination, he decided to hand over his enlistment papers just before the Major exploded again.

Major Schtillhart’s eyes darted up and down the half-sheet of paper. “Ah. Lieutenant Edmund Mauve.”

“Moulde, sir,” Edmund corrected, reflexively.

“This paper says you are a Lieutenant. Is that true?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And this paper says your name is Edmund Mauve, is that true?”

“No, sir.”

“Then this paper, is wrong, is it? This paper which says you are a Lieutenant? Maybe your name is Mauve, but you’re really a Major? A Colonel? A General?”

“No, sir.”

“No! And do you know why you are not a Major, Lieutenant? Do you know why you are a Lieutenant? Because that is what it says on your official enlistment papers! Am I clear?”

Edmund was surprised to note that his heart was beating heavily. His hands were clammy, his breath shallow. Curious as to the cause of these symptoms, Edmund sorted through the conversation until he found the moment that set his heart racing.

He wasn’t surprised when he found it. In his youth, the idea of having his family name stripped from him would have been a horrific torment. Now, at the ripe old age of seventeen, it was merely heart-breaking, having every piece of Moulde stripped away from him. He knew who he was, and to have the family name of Moulde lost to him, even for only a short war, was affecting him.

“I asked you a question, soldier!”

“Yes, sir,” Edmund nodded.

“Do you know what Logistics are, Lieutenant Mauve?” Schtillhart asked.

“The art and science of organization and implementation of a complex —”

“Logistics is victory, Lieutenant!” Schtillhart pointed a finger at the maps adorning the walls. “If we lose the war, it will be because a General didn’t have the proper facts. It will be because our soldiers didn’t have the right tools for the job. It will be because supplies that were needed, were also absent. And likewise,” something dark and red flared in the Major’s eyes, “if we win the war, it will be because of us! Guns need bullets, soldiers need food and clothing, Generals need information, factories need materials, hospitals need supplies, and we,” the Major drew himself up even taller, “we make sure they get it!”

Edmund watched while the burning fire in Major Schtillhart’s eyes slowly faded. He recognized the flame; he had seen similar passion from his cousins when they talked about claiming the Moulde Fortune for their own, or standing astride the corpses of their defeated enemies.

The light dimmed only slightly as Schtillhart cleared his throat. “You are technically a Lieutenant, Lieutenant Mauve,” Schtillhart continued. “You are technically part of the Army Bureaucratic Corps. You are technically allowed to observe the LAL’s correspondence and operate with the full confidence and discretion of the Board of Generals, which is comprised of all seventeen Marshal Generals, fifty-three Generals, and seventy-nine Brigadiers in the King’s standing army.”

His gaze locked with Edmunds. “I, however, have no such confidence in you. Have you read the rules and regulations?” Major Schtillhart asked.

“No,” Edmund admitted.

“Do you have any education at all?”

“Quite a lot.” He didn’t list what, both because his natural instincts as a Moulde kept him from sharing more information than was strictly necessary, and because the Major hadn’t asked.

“Your office is in Filing Room B. That’s in the basement, third door on the left from the north staircase. The other filing rooms are off limits, as you have not been cleared for any of them. Your job is to collect every letter, report, and file we give you. If we give you a report, you sign it to show that we read it. You do not read it. Just sign it and stamp it with an official LAL stamp. Green ink. After you have signed everything, you will file everything in its proper place. Am I clear?”

“Yes sir.” Edmund wondered where the proper places were. He would have to look for them. “When shall I report to the Brigadier?”

“Did I give you leave to ask me a question, Lieutenant?”

Any further shouting as a result of Edmund’s response was avoided by the LAL office doors opening, and the entrance of Brigadier McNaymare himself.

There are two kinds of high-ranking officer. The first is the rotund and boisterous kind, full of pith, vim, and jolly-good what-ho. They are drawn to mutton-chops, both on their cheeks and on their plates, and are never far from either a pipe or a dashing good spot of strong sweet tea. To them, war is a sport,⁷ and they treat it with respect, studying tactics and strategy with the detached philosophy of a patriot. General Ramsbutt was one of these.

Brigadier Ambrose McNaymare XVII was the other kind of officer. His nickname among the troops was Old Lockjaw, a title of fear earned after a drunken bar-brawl that resulted in six broken hands and series of regretful apologies to the bartender. His hands were permanently held behind his back, save when he was sitting and they rested in front of him like tiger’s paws, ready to pounce on anything that drew too close. His nose was sharp, his eyes clear, and his lip spouted the traditional tightly-cropped mustache, as jet black as the ink on a execution notice. Inevitably, these officers carry a riding crop, which is often more feared than the most saliva-flecked barbarian’s claymore. For these officers, war is not a sport, it is an art.

“Aye?” the Brigadier’s ice-cold gaze skewered Edmund in the chest. It is a credit to Edmund’s familiarity with such stares that he paused only a moment before drawing himself upright.

“I am Lieutenant Edmund —”

“Major Schtillhart!” the Brigadier shouted, “Who’s this?”

Major Schtillhart stood up from his desk, saluting with a perfectly straight back. “Lieutenant Mauve, sir,” the Major barked. “New secretary from the Army Beuracratic Corps, sir.”

“Ach, is that right?” Brigadier McNaymare advanced on Edmund, his boots striking the wooden floor like the drums of a firing squad. “Lieutenant Mauve, is it?”

Already Edmund was beginning to recognize the life-blood of the military. While previous scholars and strategists had each expressed their own theories, Edmund knew that their work was composed of data from the past. From this interaction between Major and Brigadier alone, Edmund was realizing the fuel of the army wasn’t discipline, duty, or patriotism. The fuel of this army was tension.

It was there in the Brigadier’s shoulders, his voice, and his eyes. It held Major Schtillhart as still and straight as a puppet-string, held taught by the presence of a Brigadier’s epaulet. I can study this.

“Speak when you are spoken to, Lieutenant!”

“Yes, sir.” Tension needed a metric, which requires a scale of measurement. Let Tension be measured in “tauts.” Let one taut be equal to the amount of force needed to cause one meter of sheep-wool string of diameter one millimeter to break…

“I am Brigadier McNaymare, Division Leader o’ the Logistical Administrative Legion!” McNaymare whipped his riding crop around to his front, waving it under Edmund’s nose. “If ye do ye’r work, carry ye’rself with pride, an jump when we tell ye te, then I’ll no throw ye out on ye’r arse. Aye?”

Yes, sir." …but mental and physical tension have different manifestations; let the conversion rate between physical and mental tension be a ratio of…say four to one…“From one to four, / and four to one; / It takes no more / to change tension.”

A poem about tapestries wove itself together in Edmund’s head alongside mathematical formulae for discerning the amount of tension in a taught string or flexed muscle. For not the last time, Edmund found his thoughts drifting to Moulde Hall, yearning for his cherished Library. He thought of Aoide, still and patient in her alcove on the bottom floor, waiting for Edmund to return and let her live once more to speak and sing and dance on the myriad strings that pulled her this way and that.

“Right.” The Brigadier nodded and turned to Major Schtillhart with his hands clasped expectantly behind his back. “Major? What is the situation?”

“All within expectations, sir,” Major Schtillhart held out a small sheaf of papers. “Recruitment reports from South and West Brackenburg have met their numbers. There is a private message from Lt. General Chidesdale, and three requests for your presence at local gatherings.”

…while the build up of tension on the physical plane appears standard…“Here and there / and gone again;”… mental tension manifests as a logarithmic function of both physical and mental influences… “Function defined: / the letter ’n’”

“Ach,” the Brigadier muttered, snatching the papers away. “Nothing from Lord Poppowick? Send a letter te the Office in Whitberry, and demand an update on their stores. Do ye hear me, Lieutenant?”

“Sorry, sir?” Edmund broke free from the taut strands of his mind.

“Handle this, Major,” McNaymare swished his riding crop like a saber. “I’ll be in my office, accepting no interruptions.”

“Yes, sir,” Major Schtillhart snapped off a salute as crisp as a calligraphic signature. “Have you made a decision regarding the —”

“I dinna make decisions on rumors, Major,” McNaymare glared. “An I dinna aim te start now.” His piece said, the door to his office slammed shut behind him.

Now that the Brigadier had left the room, the tension left the Major’s spine and flowed into his arms and neck, the most important person in the room held aloft by strings of tension. “You heard the Brigadier! Write a letter to the LAL offices in Whitberry, and demand an update on any and all warehouse stores, paying particular attention to wood, iron, and coke stores. Get moving, Lieutenant! There are papers to be filed and distributed waiting for you downstairs! If I have to remind you again, you’ll wish I hadn’t! Move!”

When the door was closed behind him, Edmund found his heart beating afresh. He wouldn’t dare have spoken to a Moulde like that. The pains of having lost his family name burned bright in his chest.

It would be an easy fix. He was a member of the ABCs now, and several floors below was a room filled with the official files of the military. Surely, it was but the work of a moment and a stroke of a pen to fix the problem, and then let Major Schtillhart try and yell at him!

But in the back of Edmund’s mind, a new and curious thought was taking hold. By complete accident, the army may have bestowed upon him a brilliant gift. Edmund had learned many things during his time at Grimm’s, the most pertinent being that if they didn’t see you, if they didn’t know who you really were, they couldn’t stop you.

Eager to test his possible newfound abilities, Edmund walked down the stairs, not towards the basement, but out into Brackenburg towards the General’s Club.

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The General’s Club still stands at 68 Book street, not five blocks from the Old City Hall, in what was at the time the trendiest part of Brackenburg. Built as a gambling hall for one of the more open-minded Mayors of recent history, the General’s Club was purchased by General Rommingsblat two years after its opening and re-purposed into an exclusive club.

For those who have ever been to a Gentleman’s Social Club, little needs to be explained. These institutions are, to a one, full of large rooms of old wealthy men seeking refuge from the daily grind of talking with other men while sitting in large comfy chairs and smoking pipes or sipping gin, by seeking out the sanctity of a Gentleman’s Club to relax by chatting with other men sitting in large comfy chairs and smoking cigars or sipping brandy. Games such as pool and gambling are optional, though generally encouraged.

What made the General’s Club revolutionary at the time was its insistence that all of its members held military rank of at least Brigadier, whether legitimate or honorary. This resulted in hundreds of aristocrats experiencing something they never had before; prohibition. This exclusivity made the General’s Club the single most coveted membership in generations, and within a year the purchasing of military commissions sky-rocketed until Brackenburg had more Generals and Brigadiers per-capita than any other city in the Kingdom.

Edmund had never been in a social club before, though he was not unprepared. After all, for almost ten years he had been a Moulde, trained by intent and circumstance in all manner of savoir-faire and etiquette; the consequences of scandal were too great for Edmund to be anything less than an expert.

Unfortunately, his training regarding the etiquette of social clubs had been largely ignored, as the Founding Families found the concept of a club morally repugnant.⁸ It is possible that, if Edmund had been educated on proper social club behavior, he would never have dared enter the General’s Club in the first place.

Since he was ignorant, however, he didn’t even pause as he calmly walked through the General’s Club doors and into the main sitting room.⁹

He only had a moment to look around before a hand landed on his shoulder.

“Excuse me!” the hand turned Edmund around to face a thin man dressed in a white coat and tie. “I am afraid, that the General’s Club is for members only, Lieutenant.”

“Am I a member?” Edmund asked. He didn’t know how one became a member, but he was a Moulde, and as such had received countless letters inviting him to any number of social functions, clubs, and secret societies across the country.

“As you are neither a General nor a Brigadier, I can safely say you are not. May I have your name, please?”

“What for?”

The man sneered, hoisting a thick notepad in front of Edmund’s gaze. “All of our members’ expected guests are here on this list. If you have been invited, your name will be here. Now, may I have your name?”

Fascinating. Edmund stared into the man’s eyes. He was obviously the club’s front-of-house man and didn’t realize he was sneering at one of the most important and powerful heirs in the whole of Brackenburg. As far as the man knew, he was only looking at a young upstart Lieutenant who thought that he belonged somewhere he self-evidently did not.

What is a Moulde if no one can see them? What power does a Moulde have if their name is hidden? In this moment I am not a Moulde. If I am not a Moulde, I must be something else.

“My name is Mauve,” he said, delighted at his successful experiment. “Edmund Mauve. I am trying to report to Brigadier McNaymare, head of the Logistics Administrative Legion.”

“If he were here,” the man’s sneer became condescending, rather than cruel. “I would not divulge such private information to anyone who was neither invited, expected, nor a member. Might I suggest that, in the future, you look for him in his office, rather than charging in where you are not allowed? Generals take a dim view of pluck like that, Lieutenant. Now, if you please.”

Edmund didn’t bother to resist as the man shoved Edmund unceremoniously towards the door. He was too busy reveling in his success, victory echoing in his soul.

Edmund was invisible.

Not literally, of course, the head-man’s forceful shove had proven that. He hadn’t even been overlooked, as was his natural tendency. Somehow, he had acquired a particular form of invisibility such that the head-man didn’t see Edmund, but instead saw his uniform.

As far as the world was concerned, Edmund was not a Moulde, for what Moulde would ever be a Lieutenant? Scandal was no longer a concern, for how could a Lieutenant have any connection to that ancient and venerated family? As long as he wore the uniform, his fundamental nature as a Moulde would hereafter be irrelevant. Even General Ramsbutt knew Edmund Moulde was a lieutenant, not Edmund Mauve.

Ask anyone, and Edmund was still at Moulde Hall, doing all the things the landed gentry is expected to do during Wartime. If anyone ever asked why he never seemed to be present at social functions, balls, or volunteering at local dives like the other peers, his reclusive eccentricity was a ready-made excuse.

No one would ever expect where he really was. No one would expect what he was really doing. No one would look for him under the City Hall in Filing Room B, pen in hand and filing cabinets at the ready to twist and turn and manipulate the war until the Mouldes came out on top.

And if no one could see him, no one could stop him. Edmund had already won!

While this event may seem quite banal, given the exciting and action-filled adventures studious historians of Edmund’s life are used to, it must be said that this moment gave Edmund one of his greatest insights into the human mind: the clothes make the man.

It is important to note this now, as the saying’s literal validity became even more apparent later in Edmund’s military career.

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Filing Room B was easy enough for Edmund to find; every staircase he found, he went down until there were no more staircases. Then, he looked behind every door that wasn’t locked until he found the room filled with old desks, cabinets, shelves, and half-open safes with bound papers and folders covering every surface. A sagging desk with a dusty chair sat in the middle of the room.

One of the first things Edmund had ever learned was the importance of proper function. Whatever the world demanded could not be delivered if function was not proper. A broken watch could not tell time. A weakened family could not protect their own.

A filing system in disarray was no better than a heap of discarded paper.

For Edmund’s plan to work, he needed a place from which he could manipulate the entirety of the war. A spider at the center of an invisible web of red tape, crafting opportunities and the like for his family to capitalize on. Filling Room B could become that very place, but at the moment…Edmund stared at the room. This will take a while.

He was not incorrect. After five hours of sorting, shifting, moving, adjusting, and refiling, Edmund had gotten no further than a quarter of the way through the disorganized mass of paper.

This was only partially due to the room’s disarray; every page was a new facet through which Edmund could see the inner workings of the military. The Nine Founding Families were famed for their detailed procedures involving letters, and the Military was just as thorough. Edmund was a quick study, however, and before long he had a solid grasp of ABC procedure without ever once opening the Book of ABC Rules and Regulations he had found squashed between two filing cabinets.

When he thought to look at his ever-wound watch, it was well after dinner. He hadn’t even learned where the mess hall was.

Edmund heaved a sigh. It was frustrating¹⁰ that every time he found opportunity, he was almost immediately stymied. He wanted to be working diligently at his filing, learning the ins and outs of military logistics and sorting out exactly how he would use the war to provide for his family. Instead, he was cleaning up.

Not a few seconds later, there was a polite knock on the door.

Edmund turned to see a soldier squeeze his massive frame through the doorway. He was a Sergeant, according to his shoulders, and he was carrying a small tray of what Edmund would later recognize as the traditional Military Tea: a cup of tea that was a few steps up from water, a sandwich that was mostly damp bread, and a single biscuit that could double as a paperweight in an emergency.

Edmund stared as the soldier set the tiny tray on the single open space on the desk. “It is tea-time, Sir,” the man rumbled, his voice shaking the poorly-built shelves. “I do not believe Sir has eaten.”

At the mention of food, Edmund’s attention shifted from his beating heart to his aching stomach. As he ate the bland sandwich and drank the cool tea, the Sergeant’s shovel-like hands clasped in front of him. “I have been assigned to be Sir’s aide-de-camp, sir. I will take care of any personal affairs that need addressing, allowing Sir to focus on Sir’s responsibilities.”

“Lieutenants don’t get aides-de-camp, Sergeant,” Edmund wiped a speck of tea from his lips.

“With all due respect to Sir, members of the Nine Founding Families do. Would Sir like me to prepare sleeping arrangements?”

“I have a great deal of filing still to do,” Edmund said. “And once I am finished, I imagine I will spend most of my time here.”

Ung gave a short bow, his uniform straining at the seams before audibly relaxing as he straightened. Edmund watched as his ex-butler-now-aide-de-camp squeezed back through the doorway, only to return less than ten minutes later with a thin metal bedframe tucked under his arm. Hoisting files and cabinets about, Ung set up a tiny bed for Edmund in the corner, complete with mattress and even an extra sheet. Once he finished, he bowed once more and vanished through the doorway to return when Edmund needed him.¹¹

Edmund felt his chest relax. Ung hadn’t left him, he had followed him. Edmund was a quarter of the way through Filing Room B; he had made progress. He may have been delayed, but every obstacle in his path was surmountable.

Rolling up his sleeves, Edmund launched himself back at the piles of files with renewed vigor. He didn’t stop until almost two hours before dawn with a little more than half of the room organized.

After Ung dressed him for bed, he fell asleep with notebook and pen in hand, ready to scribe any thoughts that struck him during his four-hour rest. His last thoughts before sleep overtook him were optimistic ones.

During his first year at Grimm’s, he had learned a valuable lesson. When trying to change the world, it is best to do so invisibly. If those with power see you, they will try and stop you. There was a great deal of future ahead of him, and Edmund knew there would be many peers and landed gentry who would try to stop him from rebuilding the Moulde Family Estate to its former glory.

Here, in the warm embrace of Filing Room B, he would be truly invisible. Lieutenant Mauve, a simple pen-pusher, without the visible power of a General or Brigadier. Who would pay attention to him? Who would imagine that this humble clerk gripped the tiller of the army in his hands?

No one. He was a shadow in the dark, able to protect and support his family as he never could before. His brain gleefully whirled through the thousands of ways his new position as a clerk in the ABCs would help the Moulde Family. He would have access to letters, reports, filings of all kinds, and with a bit of clandestine espionage, he would be able to set up the Moulde Family for successes for years to come.

After all, War was a very profitable business for those who knew how to monopolize on opportunity, and as a Clerk, Edmund would know before anyone else. And as invisible as he was, as far as Edmund could see, no one could stop him.

This was, of course, precisely wrong.