The auditors told the member cities about the collateral package on the sixty-first day.
They did it by letter and they sent the same letter to all seven chambers. Nothing in it threatened anybody and nothing in it asked for a dissolution.
It explained the auction procedure in nine steps and explained one consequence clearly. A city that leaves the confederation before the auction removes its own territory from the package.
That was true, it was checkable, and every council checked it inside four days.
Vasa verified the clause against the auction procedure herself before anybody voted. She found the letter accurate in every line and said so on the confederated channel.
Nobody in the confederacy asked her to soften that assessment at any point. A record keeper who edits a hostile document has stopped being worth reading.
The letter did not have to be a lie to be the most dangerous document of the season.
