The whispers of foul winds ahead first reached Duke Luca through the pages of Karnaca's worst newspaper, the Serkonos Sun. Luca had a servant leave each of the major newspapers outside his door each morning, and although some, like the Karnaca Gazette that the prior duke had subscribed to, were respectable, the quality of journalism across them was inconsistent at best. By the time you worked your way down to the Serkonos Sun, you were liable to find more baseless character assassinations and sensationalized nonsense among its pages than actual snippets of news.
Naturally, when Luca picked it up to read a headline that declared DUKE LUCA CONSORTS WITH SMUGGLERS?, his first instinct was to wonder which bastard of a journalist had decided to concoct something so utterly ludicrous.
His second instinct was to grab his short sword and summon his coachman to take a trip down to the Sun's offices.
As Luca rode through the city, the reinforced glass of the carriage walls served as a constant reminder of one of the most painfully lingering issues in Karnaca—the bloodflies. After taking over from the first Luca, he had finally acknowledged it for the epidemic it was and re-funded the smoke-flashing crews to fight the infestation. They had put a dent in the burgeoning growth of bloodfly populations, but the city was still far from eradicating the insects, and progress seemed to be slowing. That was one of the reasons his aides had barred him from the open-air carriage that he wanted, even though there weren't many bloodflies out in the open air. The other was the vigilante problem. Although their attacks had principally been focused on the gangs, the lingering influence of the Crown Killer made some of his associates feel that Luca's status could turn him into a target. The strengthened glass, which had been modified and improved by Kirin Jindosh when the inventor was still alive, would easily deter arrows and bolts and would purportedly stop even bullets in their tracks. The latter had luckily not yet been organically field-tested.
The carriage rumbled to a stop outside of a ramshackle building, identified not by lettering but by the outline of a sun on the shop board, faded yellow paint flaking between the lines. The coachman came around to the side to let Luca out of the carriage. Another unnecessary gesture, but Luca put up with a number of such inconveniences so that his aides would cede the most important arguments to him. In this case, it was his insistence on travelling without bodyguards. Luca felt that it was important not to seem afraid of his own people for a number of reasons—asserting his companionship with the civilians, promoting a sense that he could defend himself, minimizing paranoia about gangs and vigilantes—the list went on.
And of course, there was his most private reason, which was the model set by the Empress. If she could tip the scales that balanced the entire empire with her blade, then he could at least follow her example in defending himself. He liked to think that she saw more strength in him than in the governors of the other Isles, and perhaps that could help curry the aid that she had continued to offer Serkonos. Fanciful thinking, perhaps. But in any scenario, the blade at his side gave him a surge of confidence as he stepped inside the doorway of the Sun.
Luca was greeted by the clattering of presses and the thick smell of ink but not by any acknowledgement. The writers and printers working and scribbling away didn't seem to be paying any attention to the front door. He cleared his throat emphatically, and a couple of people looked up.
"Oy, it's the duke," said one of the men. Luca sighed inwardly. One downside of not being a tyrant was that, in the absence of fear, it was all too easy to lose respect.
A woman emerged out of the back of the shop, twirling a pen in her hand. "Duke Abele, is it?" The slightest hint of a smirk seemed to cross her face. "Did you take interest in our smuggling feature?"
"Indeed," responded Luca curtly. "And I would like to inquire as to your sources for that particular story." By now, all the other faces in the shop were watching with interest.
The woman—probably the editor—smiled. "Of course! Anything for the Duke of Serkonos." She gestured towards the open doorway behind her. "Take a seat."
Entering the editor's office, Luca noted how different it was from his own. Although his attention to detail meant he had higher stacks of paper at his own desk than the prior duke had ever accumulated, his office, attached to his bedroom, was still largely spacious and clear. This was cramped and messy, clippings strewn about the floor and pinned to walls with what seemed to be complete abandon. Luca looked warily at the clotted ink stains on the open seat across from the editor's desk, not entirely convinced that they were all dry.
The editor entered after him and closed the door behind them before taking a seat in her own chair. At her beckoning, Luca finally sat as well. "Not often that I have a member of polite society sitting across from me," she remarked, "and even less often that it's Duke Abele himself. So pleased to know that you read our paper."
"You and I both know that I haven't come to exchange pleasantries," Luca replied. "I know your news to be prone to exaggeration, but the anonymous story you printed about me this morning was completely baseless. So my question is this—was this faulty news from an unreliable source, or did this lovely little fictionalization occur on an editorial level?"
"Neither, actually, Your Grace." The addition of the proper honorific in the editor's careless tone only made Luca more suspicious that he was being subtly mocked. "It may surprise you to learn that our source for this particular story was actually among the most reliable we've ever used."
"Care to disclose it, then?" Luca prompted.
The editor began to ruffle through papers at her desk. "His name escapes me. Butcher Lunt? Belcher Lester?" She seized upon a newspaper clipping. "No, here it is. Beecher Lowe." She turned the paper to orient towards Luca and slid it across the desk to him and no doubt saw his eyes flick instantly towards the name of the newspaper stamped at the top of the cutout. "And yes, that is the Karnaca Gazette. Lowe's regular employer."
Luca could hardly contain his disbelief as he took the clipping into his own hands. "Why would a writer for the Gazette come to you with a story?"
"Because the Gazette wouldn't take it." The editor shrugged. "'Journalistic standards,' so to speak. Now, Your Grace, I wouldn't wish to imply that my own paper's editorial caliber is subpar in any way. But as Lowe told it, the Gazette had no real reason to deny his story. His own sourcing was no less thorough than usual. They simply didn't believe it."
"And you do?" asked Luca, looking back up at her.
"My job isn't to believe or not believe. You can leave that to the overseers and the heretics. I'm simply here to report the news as I see fit. In this case, I saw fit. If it offended you to see any less-than-stellar press regarding Your Grace, I can only apologize. But it seems to me that you've supported the free press in recent years. I don't believe you're the same man now who once expended effort into controlling the printed narrative about himself."
She meant this sentence figuratively, Luca was sure, but it was still one of the kind of statements that he often encountered that made him uncomfortable. He stood up. "I have no interest in censoring true stories. Narratives that are entirely concocted, however, benefit no one." He waved the clipping before tucking it into his pocket. "If you don't mind, I'll be taking this. And I believe I'll be paying a visit to one Beecher Lowe."