Delivering Your Own Damnation

“I said nothing in response. I couldn’t believe Philip the Fool. Was he supposed to be the guy who makes me a master at the street hustling game? I can still remember how proud (and stupid) he looked. He was not in his typical stage clothes. For the Knave Meetings, he always sported a flamboyantly red cape in the fashion of the King’s. To add to the satire, he crowned his curly red hair with a broken jug. He had found his ticket to immortality via being a footnote in royal history, and he wasn’t going to scalp it.

“‘Look, Philip, there is something I need to tell you. I think I was followed to---’

“He served me a dismissive wave and edited the ending to my confession. ‘It doesn’t matter, Garland. What I need you to do is put on that suit you were going to use to deliver the notice of extortion and, instead, deliver Sir Pelican this letter,’ Philip the Fool said and pulled out the written message in question.

“I slipped him a frown and picked the letter, which was stamped with his own wax seal, out of his hand. I had only one thing to say to him about the matter. ‘When?’



“The next day I headed towards Sir Pelican’s residence clad in my black blackmail suit for my noon meeting. I did, of course, side-step into an alleyway to open the letter before completing the delivery. Philip the Fool’s note to Sir Pelican stated the following communication:

“‘Dear Sir Pelican,

The honorable yet bloated scholars once mused that the only things outnumbering the ears on the walls are the mouths upon the streets. I have been informed through venues, which are optioned by my own devices and must be left unexplored in this polite introduction, that there is an apostate amiss.

I believe, for a quaint retribution on your part, I can provide you with an able body that will distort what the walls hear and sew shut what the streets boom. The recommended servant of whom I suggest is the very messenger before you. His name is Garland, and you have probably already started to ponder his origins by his unique yet dog-eared appearance. Your assumptions relating to that pondering are not incorrect, and, because of such validation, you will no doubt come to the same conclusion that I also wield: your conspiracy cannot be better served.

The fore mentioned retribution I request is not to be counted by the clinks of coins or by land markers staked out. I believe you to be wise along with being educated, and, by default, you are well aware of the grave difference between the two possessions. That said, a night, particularly a night willing to betray the golden moon, should not be trusted. By issuing me payment of the information Garland reaps for you, protection of a thousand cloaked daggers against lines of rusting armor will safeguard your nightly watch.

I thank you in advance for your consideration and for the attention you have already lent this letter. If you should find this proposition promising, send back a confirming reply using your routine messenger, not Garland.

Sincerely at your service,

Philip the Fool


P.S.: You, no doubt, have noted the sour look upon the face of Garland. Being of value of which I have boasted in this letter, he has secretly read this communication before delivering it to you and has resealed the message with a mock seal.’

“And just like that, Philip the Fool had sold me to Sir Pelican.