Soap
One couldn't tell the putrid stench of death apart from the fragrance of rosmary and oranges. The royal bathroom was richly decorated with exotic plants, copper spouts and ceramic tiles with wonderful floral motifs. Tiles that were not only slippery from all the soap foam that is a usual sight for any public bathroom, but sticky from the recently clotted blood. In the centre of thermae's tepidarium lied the body of Clenius Salonnar, owner of the Regius Bathroom of Foenar.
Of course, the only royal thing about the thermae was its name. In a kingdom where the king was no richer than a spice merchant, there was no problem in naming you business "royal" - not even if you were the owner of such a fine establishment as a slaughterhouse, or a piggery. And naming a bathroom after the king was considered as paying a respectful tribute to him - a royalty that was more of a representative of all the different tradesmen, merchant guilds, cartels, bankers and ordinary herb vendors than a true king of royal blood. But the king was not what Antistia Vedrix was thinking of. Currently, she was trying to figure out why would somebody suffocate Clenius using Niverian soap, that even the king would not be able to afford.
- Come on, Tisa, it'su clearly one of those cartel fights. There was a struggle, that vulg grabbed the soap - hey, they were in the Regius Bathroom, for sake of Ignus - so, he grabbed that soap, and forced it down his gutter. Isn't that hard, aye? Let's get out of here.
Porcum Callum was rather athletic, of average height, with awfully rubbery voice. Also, he had a name that suited his hygiene habits well-enough. Porc might have been the filthiest person in Foenar, and definitely the most disgusting in Foenar's City watch.
Also, he didn't seem to be fond of bathrooms.
- Ah, Porc, damn, shut up and look around. Even if you're right - and you're not, we still have a killer on the run.
- A sangi cartel killer, that is.
- Just, shut up, will you?
The pair spent the next several minutes trying to get the soap out of Salonnar's throat. The murder happened no more than six hours ago, yet the stench was as of three-days old battlefield. It didn't help when they removed the soap - now Clenius' last breakfast was also added to the bizarre mix of oranges and rotting flesh. It also attracted the scavengers.
- Ah, bloody... damn... rats!
Antistia was unimpressed by Porcum's desperate attempts to get rid of the rats.
- Stop cussing, and come for a moment. Do you see the stamp on the soap?
- Yes, bloody Niverian stamp. As if we didn't know already.
- We didn't, Callum. We needed to be sure.
- Now you're bloody sure. Aren't you? Come on, let's get out and leave that old trickster to the doctors and mages.
Tisa looked Porc straight in the eyes. It didn't take more than a second for him to understand the exact meaning of this gesture. He felt as if his mother was shouting at him, only that Antistia Vendrix didn't need to shout. She only needed to speak as calmly as possible.
- Porc, are you that irresponsible? How, in all fires of our world, did you manage to get into the City Watch?
- I guess that the criteria were...
- Don't you try to laugh it off! We have a killer, a killer with a message, and he's not one of those bloody cartel hoodlums trying to make a living by bashing the life out of their rivals. Not to mention that Clenius didn't really have any rivals - he was in the soap business, yes, but he was buying from the Cartel, not trying to rival them!
Porcum was unimpressed:
- Call it what you want, it's still a bloody cartel murder to me. Could be anything, he could have decided to stop paying them.
- Stop paying them? Porc, his whole business relied on the Cartel! No soap - no foam - no public bathroom. Where he would've been buying soap, if not from the Cartel?
Porc heaved his shoulders.
- Don't know. The port, out of town. Or he could have made his own.
Tisa sighted. Porc was not only filthy, he clearly couldn't differantiate between the fine soaps of the cartel, with their secret recipes, and a home-brewed soap. Even if the brewer was Clenius Salonnar.
- What about the soap, then?
- What about the soap?
- Why use the most expensive soap that is out there?
- I don't know, maybe because it was the nearest object?
- Look aroun, Porc. Tell me what you see.
Porcum took a quick glimpse.
- I don't know... towels... and napkins. Some soap.
- Any Niverian soap?
Porcum was confused. And Antistia realized that he couldn't differentiate between Niverian soap, and Luxetflamian soap.
- It's blue.
- Well, there is no blue soap here.
- Exactly. And you know why? Because it's too expensive even for Clenius Salonnar to afford it. Why would they use it to murder somebody, be it Clenius?
- I don't know, damn it. They were trying to send a message, I don't know.
Tisa looked him into the eyes again. She had a thin smile on her face, and seemed to be thrilled by this new riddle.
- And that's what I've been trying to tell you for the last half an hour, you half-wit vulg. And that's what we should find out. Come on, let's go to the cartel.
While they were leaving, one could clearly hear Porcum fussing how they could've leaved this "fine establishment" earlier.
