The Wen's senior retainer was a drunk, which Rat learned courtesy of an overworked barmaid, a small patch of coin, and more than a little resentment.
Apparently, he was also a handsy drunk.
It didn't take any encouragement or effort on Rat's part for him to overindulge. Within an hour, he was swaying and slurring, eyes glassy and cheeks red. Laughing at everything and friends with anyone who so much as looked at him,
All Rat had to do was slide into his sightline and wait.
It didn't even take ten minutes. The retainer stumbled away from his current friends when he realized Rat had an empty pint in front of him.
"My friend!" His eyes were unnaturally bright from the alcohol, his movements lethargic and energetic at the same time. He leaned over Rat, where he was seated, and then kept going until he was slumped over the spy, his arm around his shoulders and his rancid breath right in Rat's face.
The spy managed to keep his grimace hidden. "Hello, friend."
"Your cups are empty, friend." His spittle landed on Rat's face as he spoke.
"It is, friend." Rat shook the empty pint. "A tragedy. We should fix it."
It would have been too obvious for anyone sober, but the retainer had to blink as few times as he parsed it out. "Oh! Yes! Another round, barmaid!"
She didn't look happy at his call, but she delivered two fresh pints with foam sliding down the sides. She rolled her eyes at the retainer when he reached for her, and Rat twisted in his chair, knocking the retainer back just far enough that he couldn't grab her.
She shot him a grateful look and disappeared into the crowd while the retainer was still catching his balance.
"Sorry, friend." Rat aimed big, guileless eyes at him.
The retainer caved like an unsupported mine shaft. "Forgiven, friend!" Rat held out an arm for support as the retainer slid into a chair and then caught him again when he nearly slid out of it.
It took all of a few minutes to get him talking, and then he just didn't stop. He didn't stop until it was technically the next day, and Rat carried him back to his room, where he passed out.
Rat spent most of the day washing the smell off and then wandered back to the pub that night and ran into him again.
A single mention that he was looking for a new assignment, and the next day, the Wen's head retainer took him to the Wen Manor.
Two days later, he was in the Yangs.
Unfortunately, that was where the easy stuff ended.
He was in front of Lady Yang within an hour, and the head of the Yang family was just as imposing as the rumors said. Her eyes were hard and dark and searching.
Unfortunately for her, Rat had been facing down terrifying people for forty-odd years now, and even if she could scare him, he was at least good enough to hide it. It was almost anticlimactic; she was clearly busy, and the entire conversation was short and simple. She wanted to know why he wanted to serve her family, but she didn't really care. She wanted to know where he was from and why he was looking for a change, but again, she didn't really care, and Rat was a skilled liar.
Enough that she dismissed him less than half an hour after he'd entered with instructions to get new uniforms with the proper crest and report to the Yang's head retainer. He had a room in the guard's quarters and a new wardrobe by the end of the day.
Not bad for three days' work.
In the meantime, rumors were flying about the charges the High Court had publicly announced against Zhao Mingzhe. Rat had sent Yuze a carefully coded note about his location, but it would be a day or two before Yuze could send a message back without the High Court finding out.
The Camelia itself was in an uproar. There hadn't been such a high-ranking officer accused of treason in hundreds of years, and while Mingzhe might have been disliked by the majority of the nobility that he held to such high, rigid standards, he was apparently well-liked by the lower ranks. The Yangs had doubled the guard on their manor since the High Court always had a policy of disclosing where charges originated to anyone who asked. It hadn't even taken an hour after the announcement before someone had been in their office with questions.
Lady Yang hadn't left the manor since the day of the announcement either. There'd been a constant crowd on the street outside the manor, some friendly, some not.
The Yang Manor was understandably on edge, and it was a tense atmosphere that Rat thrived in.
His first day was just a tour, trailing after the head retainer who managed to add a story about the glory of the Yangs to every single thing he pointed out.
They were certainly a family that was proud of themselves.
And they kept extensive recordings of their own deeds. Rat had to fight to stay awake after the first hour.
They were too smart to give him access to everything immediately, but while the Yangs were smart enough to be suspicious of everyone and everything…not everyone who worked for them was the same.
Rat went through his normal duty shift, still mostly familiarization, and then spent his downtime in the common area set aside for the guards, introducing himself to everyone who came through.
Most of them were friednly enough, a few were too standofish to get anything useful from, but it didn't take long for Rat to identify the weakpoints in the guard coverage, a few illicit relationships, including one of the maids who was sleeping with the oldest Yang son whenever his wife wasn't looking, and the ringleaders of two different blackmarket supply lines.
It wasn't anything shocking; large, noble families and estates usually came with a few, and the Camelia saw enough valuables move through that it was almost more surprising that he'd only found two.
So far.
His best opportunity came that evening, sitting around the dinner table with a handful of guards. One of them was pale and clammy and miserable.
Rat volunteered to take his night shift and sent him off to the healers with the head guard's approval. The head retainer had gone to sleep hours before, so there was no one to make a fuss about a new guard being left on his own.
And then Rat had unsupervised access to the lower levels of the manor, the same place where Yuze and Kai Low had found the books.
~ tbc