The Thieves Guild
by Jake Kerr.
Episode 57:
The Missing Books.
Despite his best efforts, Rafe could find no more books with maps.
There were dozens, perhaps hundreds of books that he had yet to crack open, but all of the
books that were of a larger size or appeared that they would contain the type of pages to
include a map were either on other subjects or were damaged.
The number of damaged books broke Rafe's heart.
Over time, it became clear that someone or some group had made a concerted
effort to eradicate the entire history of Ness before the move from the
old quarter to the current makeup of the city.
Even some of the books that covered the migration were damaged, and that led Rafe to focus
on that important moment in Ness history.
He narrowed down his immediate studies to three books.
Two were heavily damaged, while the third was a book that was the longer history of
Ness with the parts about the Magic Guild ripped out.
Rafe's hope was that the book would contain valuable insight due to the censors
assuming it had already been excised of content they didn't like when they
opened the book and saw pages missing.
With each page, he realized his hope had borne fruit.
The book, while far from going into great detail, laid out the causes of what it
called the Great Migration. The initial cause was simple to
understand: the city had simply over-farmed the Golden Fields and turned
them into the current Ash Fields. But the following chapters astonished Rafe.
The initial idea of relocating only the Harvest Guild across the river
was dismissed. The guilds felt that the city needed to sever itself from its trading
past, and that meant abandoning the trade route, the Magic Guild Tower, and
killing the current Harvest House.
It was to be a clean break.
Rafe went to the other two books, and as he expected, the only remaining pages in them
discussed over-farming and the death of the Golden Fields.
Turning back to the only book he had found with details of the city's history before
its current settling north of the river, Rafe read closely.
Rubbing his eyes, Rafe looked out a window and was shocked to see that it was deep
into the night. He had learned a lot about the move across the river, but the most
important lesson was that the move was marked by a multi-year civil war
between the various guilds.
Harvest House was presumably made out of a living tree, and it was killed as a
lesson to the Harvest Guild. The Night Tower was burned to the ground, rebuilt in
stone and then partially destroyed again.
The Gateway, which was presumably a large gate south of the river that no longer
existed, was permanently closed. A smaller bridge across the
Great River that was used by the Harvest Guild to start what was now the Silo
District was also destroyed.
The whole wave of violence was shockingly familiar.
The Magic Guild was eradicated, and that led to the Merchant Guild and the
Craft Guild joining forces to run Ness.
The Knight Guild stood aside, and the Harvest Guild was overrun.
"That is exactly what is happening today," Rafe thought.
He stood up and went off in search of the deputy guild master.
Allard was pacing in his office, which was little more than a room with a bare desk
and uncomfortable chairs. "Rafe, this is very important.
How did the civil war end?" "There is not much.
The Harvest Guild finally agreed to the wisdom of the move to the north of the river, and everyone ended up
happy."
Rafe tried to think if he had missed anything, but he was sure he had not.
"History is written by the victors,"
Allard muttered. "What is that?" Rafe asked. "Nothing.
It is a saying of the Outlanders."
Allard sat down at his desk, where he looked completely out of place.
"It is likely that the Harvest Guild stopped fighting in return for some guarantee of
their standing. Otherwise, today, Ness would be run by the Merchant and Craft Guilds."
"That's true." Rafe scratched his head.
"They built a new Harvest House. That was probably a requirement as well."
"Yes, that makes sense. The Harvest Guild is powerful, Rafe.
Do not forget that. They control the food for the entire city, and they are the largest guild in
terms of numbers."
Rafe thought of the recent Founder's Day guild master meeting.
"Maybe the requirement that if there are two votes against something, it would not pass
was the guarantee that the Harvest Guild was looking for."
Allard's eyes went wide. "Of course. That's the key to everything.
Two votes were what saved the Harvest Guild centuries ago, and that is what saved them
today."
Allard ran his hand over his bald head.
"That means that the Thieves Guild was created solely to establish the peace for all these years.
But why thieves? It is an odd choice for a symbolic guild to keep the
peace."
Allard looked at Rafe. "Was there any mention of our guild?"
Rafe shook his head. "None. There were mentions of the destruction of the Magic Guild, but nothing
about the thieves." "There is a missing piece."
Allard stood up. "You need to find it, Rafe.
I don't know what it will tell us, but it is important."
Allard dismissed Rafe, and Rafe returned to the library.
He had considered going to bed, as he was weary from hours of study, but
Allard's comments gave Rafe pause.
Rafe had been so interested in the history of Ness and finding maps and learning about
everything that he didn't know that he had not spent any time looking for resources about his
own guild. He didn't remember seeing any.
So despite his weariness, he started browsing the stacks.
Hours later, and almost delirious with exhaustion, Rafe could not believe the
results of his search. He had combed every shelf and spine of every
book.
There was not a single volume about the Thieves Guild in the entire
library.