“They’re not my ghosts.” The guards dragged her away, suppressors grinding against her wrists, while Szymon lingered in the doorway to savor the ruin. “Enjoy your fifteen days, Orłowski,” he crowed, his eyes glittering. “Perhaps you’ll find a way to make a Dissonant’s ‘grief’ look like innocence. The Ministry awaits your miracle.” He gave a theatrical bow, then strode off, the clack of his polished boots echoing his self-satisfaction. Fifteen days. The council wasn't just tightening the screws; they were bringing down a hydraulic press. Zofia Niemczyk was already marked for pacification, and my assignment was simply to rubber-stamp the death order. My hands balled into fists, shards of glass crunching under my boots. *They’re not my ghosts.* The words gnawed at me. She hadn’t been expressing personal anguish during the outburst. It had been a controlled, surgical strike that somehow spared me, a feat that defied every established tenet of Dissonant behavior. It also suggested a source of her power that wasn’t tied to her own emotional state, but to something external. Something she was *reacting* to, not generating. I spent the rest of the day in a tiled administrative room, staring at records that might as well have been blank. The official reports on Zofia’s past were a meticulously curated fiction. Every alleged Resonance incident, every reported extortion, every accusation of brutality was logged with clinical precision, yet offered no explanation for *why*. No motive, no context, just a relentless litany of her supposed monstrous acts. Her personal history was redacted, her family records sealed, her childhood a blank slate. It was a perfect, impenetrable narrative designed to justify her pacification, devoid of any humanizing detail. “Useless,” I muttered, tossing a data slate onto the desk. It clattered against another, filled with similar non-information. They wanted me to confirm their story, not investigate my own. Fine. I’d play their game, but by my own rules. My credentials might have been a joke to Szymon, but they still granted basic access to city transaction relays. I couldn't breach central records, but ledgers leave ink. I started by cross-referencing public records of ‘Shrike’ incidents with transaction logs, a tedious process of sifting through thousands of data points, fueled by caffeine and pure spite. Most reports painted a picture of direct intimidation: businesses suddenly ‘donating’ to local charities, shopkeepers finding their accounts mysteriously lighter after a visit from one of Zofia’s enforcers. But the records I found were… different. The funds weren’t flowing into personal accounts or obvious criminal enterprises. Instead, they were routed through a series of shell corporations, fiscal mazes better suited to corporate evasion than alley shakedowns. First came Głęboki Port Holding, ostensibly a shipping logistics firm without hulls. Then Cicha Przystań Investments, real estate with no lots. Finally, Żywa Woda Solutions, a phantom tech firm. Small, consistent payments trickled out of each, aimed toward a single, anonymous beneficiary. Someone was using Zofia’s feared reputation to generate funds, but the money was going somewhere else entirely. This intricate web led me, not to opulent mansions or criminal hideouts, but to the forgotten corners of Wislany. Specifically, to the Ostrów district. The Conclave avoided Ostrów entirely, preferring to let its self-governed chaos fester rather than risk an open clash. It was Zofia’s domain, a place where Resonance therapists like me were about as welcome as a tax collector at a smuggler’s convention. The air thickened with the scent of fried pierogi and stale beer as I stepped out of the autotaxi, the drone of its engine quickly swallowed by the rumble of passing trams and the cacophony of street vendors. The polished glass of the Institute gave way to mismatched brick, peeling lime, and soot-streaked mortar. The district was alive, pulsing with a raw energy that felt a million miles from the sterile halls I’d just left. My slate had pointed me to Ulica Błotna 17, a narrow alley weaving between leaning tenements where the wire transfers finally terminated. Number seventeen was a nondescript three-story block with pitted masonry and boarded sills. Yet over the clatter of iron wheels on cobblestones came a light, sudden chime: children laughing, bright and careless. My hand hung before the gouged oak door. Children, hidden in her territory? None of the reports mentioned dependants. Before I could knock, a shadow detached itself from the deeper shadows of a nearby archway. Then another. And another. Three figures, burly and silent, emerged from the gloom, their faces hard, their eyes narrowed. One of them, carrying an iron pipe wrench across his forearm, stepped forward and tapped the gray slate poking from my coat. “Lost, Konklawe?” the man rasped, his voice like gravel. The other two fanned out, cutting off my retreat. “This ain’t your territory. Best turn around.” I considered talking my way out, but the glint in their eyes told me words wouldn’t suffice. They saw the Conclave, they saw a threat, and they were ready to defend. Before I could offer a grin, the man slammed the wrench into the rotten fence beside me, splintering spruce palings across the walk. “Looks like you wandered into a cul-de-sac,” he said, teeth bared. “And out here, the district belongs to Zofia.”

A Trail of Breadcrumbs and Złoty