The office of Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin was an island of calm authority amid the storm of St. Petersburg. Sunlight filtered through tall windows, glinting off polished mahogany and the untouched silver tea set on his desk. Everything in the room — the measured silence, the scent of paper and polish — spoke of control.
On the desk before him lay a single folder. Inside: the decoded report from their Caucasian informant, "The Accountant." It detailed a Bolshevik tribunal that had condemned a man named Luka Mikeladze to death.
Colonel Sazonov, Stolypin's aide, stood at rigid attention across from him. "As you predicted, Your Excellency," he said, his voice steady. "It's all very convenient. This 'Soso' denounces a rival, Luka. We capture Luka. Then he holds a secret trial, executes him, and our own channels report the event back to us. It tightens his power and makes us his unwitting accomplice."
Stolypin steepled his fingers, the faintest trace of a smile ghosting across his lips. He looked less like a bureaucrat reviewing a file than a scholar admiring a fine piece of deception.
"And your impression, Colonel?" he asked quietly.
"The speed is suspicious," Sazonov replied. "A tribunal with high-level members like Shaumian and Kamo, complete with evidence and verdict, convened and finished within days? Impossible. It's a fabrication."
"Oh, undoubtedly," Stolypin said, amusement flickering in his tone. "It's fiction — but refined fiction. Our Soso is not merely a thug; he is an artist."
Sazonov frowned. "Then The Accountant is lying to us? His intelligence is compromised?"
Stolypin shook his head slowly, like a teacher correcting a bright but naïve student. "No. That's the brilliance of it. Our asset isn't lying — he's repeating a script. The lie itself is the message. This report isn't meant to inform us; it's meant to impress us. It's theater."
He rose and crossed to the large map of the empire that dominated one wall. His finger traced the ridges of the Caucasus. "This Soso knows we have an informant. And instead of hunting for the leak, he's using it. He's turned our spy into a telegraph line straight to my desk."
Stolypin studied the map with quiet fascination. "It's not fear. It's confidence. He wants us to see him. He's telling us a story — and he's given us his cast: himself, the strategist; Kamo, the sword; Shaumian, the conscience. He's handing us the outline of his command structure."
Sazonov's instincts took the obvious path. "Then we put them all under surveillance. Wait for them to slip."
"That," Stolypin said, turning, "is a policeman's answer. And I am not a policeman." His eyes gleamed. "Why waste time disproving his fiction when we can use it? Let him define his world — then turn it against him."
He lifted the folder lightly, as if it were fragile art. "We won't expose the lie. We'll make it real. We'll take Soso's story and give it the full weight of imperial law."
Sazonov's eyes widened as the implication settled.
"Consider his cast of characters," Stolypin went on. "Soso is a ghost — too cautious to touch directly. Kamo is a beast — strike him and you make a martyr. But Shaumian…" He said the name softly, almost with relish. "Shaumian is different. An intellectual. A writer. The ideological heart of their movement. Arresting him won't inspire rebellion — it will inspire doubt."
He leaned forward, the logic unfolding like a chess combination. "Soso's report names Shaumian as a judge on an illegal tribunal. That's all the evidence we need. We'll arrest him on that charge — conspiracy to commit the murder of Luka Mikeladze."
The perfection of it was stunning. He would use Jake's own invention as the cornerstone of a prosecution.
"Imagine," Stolypin said, his tone almost gentle. "Soso must either let his comrade hang for a crime that never happened or try to save him — and in doing so, confirm the very fiction he created. Whatever he does, he loses control."
He began to pace, the plan blooming fully in his mind. "And the news will spread. The underground will hear that the state knows their secrets — their tribunals, their judges, their names. They'll wonder who betrayed them. They'll turn on each other. Paranoia will do more damage than any police raid ever could."
He stopped, the idea complete. "He wanted to use us as his executioner. We'll use his lie to become his judge."
With that, Stolypin moved to the telegraph in the corner of his office. His dictation was calm and precise.
"To the Director of the Tbilisi Okhrana Directorate. Top priority. Locate and apprehend the Bolshevik agitator Stepan Shaumian. Use of the Special Operations Section is authorized. Subject to be taken alive. Charge: conspiracy to commit the extrajudicial murder of Luka Mikeladze. A full prosecutorial brief will follow. Acknowledge."
He signed the order, handed it to Sazonov, and watched as the man left to send it.
When the door closed, Stolypin lingered by the map again, gazing south toward the Caucasus.
The ghost in the mountains had played his move. It had been clever, perhaps brilliant. But now the board had shifted.
And Stolypin smiled — the small, satisfied smile of a man who had just seen the next move, several turns ahead.