I've come to the conclusion that what I'm doing is very, very weird.

I'm not talking about being a Thief-Lord, or being responsible for territory in the city of Harael. For the most part, that's pretty straightforward management stuff - providing protection, collecting rent, managing debts, giving tenants helpful reminders when debts become due, stealing what I'm owed if a debt remains unpaid for too long, things like that. It can be interesting, even fun at times, but it can be boring as well. If done properly it can even be extremely lucrative, as I've learned recently. However, it is rarely ever what might be considered 'weird'.

And I'm not talking about how hard I push myself either, or the inventive burglaries I perpetrate upon neighboring Lords for the sake of my reputation. Thievery is simply the way things are done in Harael - our own special brand of politics, law, order, and justice all wrapped up in one. Of course, that by itself could be considered weird if you were from someplace that didn't acknowledge Thieves Rule, or if you'd never heard of a benevolent kleptocracy before. Even so, what I'm doing wouldn't be any more weird than any of the other Lords who govern this city. In fact, if there were a Haraelian Lord who wasn't a burglar, or pickpocket, or semi-respectable thief of some other variety, well, people might think them a little odd.

I'm not even talking about journal writing, something required of all Lords upon reaching their thirtieth year. That's barely weird at all. It's the law, in fact, something I figure was introduced long ago to encourage literacy among the nobility, or possibly to preserve information about our history. I'm still not exactly sure why it's an actual law - nobody's ever come by Tucat Keep to confirm there's a completed journal with the name 'Vincent Tucat' on the spine. For all I know, nobody ever will.

And while I'm perhaps overdoing it a little, this being my third journal in just over a year, I wouldn't go so far as to say that my frantic writing pace is 'weird' either, nor is my particular style of journal keeping. True, most Lords don't write anecdotal journals like I do, storytelling and whatnot, but that's not what I'm talking about when I use the word 'weird'.

What I'm talking about is this - what I'm doing right now. This prologue-ish narrative . . . thing.

It's weird.

I'm not sure why I do it, actually. Dad didn't do it. Dad started by jumping right into the story, grabbing you by the collar and yanking you in, usually right when he was in the middle of doing something exciting. You opened the first page, you read the first sentence or so, and an eye-blink later, you discovered that a few hours had whizzed by.

How I seem to start is with this odd bit at the front of the book that isn't storytelling at all. It's sort of an 'oh-look-I'm-talking-directly-to-you' diary kind of thing, one that doesn't even really seem to accomplish much. Who am I even talking to, anyway?

There has to be a reason for it though, doesn't there? I mean, I've done it twice already, and from the looks of it I'll be doing it a third time, despite all the reasons not to do it at all.

It's self-indulgent for one thing. For another, it's kind of irresponsible storytelling. I mean, think about it - I could be completely ruining this tale for you right at this very moment, simply by causing you to realize that I'm alive and well and writing all about it. If there are dangerous, scary bits, maybe you're not going to be as concerned. Obviously I live through it, right? I mean, really . . . what a giveaway.

So why do I do it? What reason could I possibly have? What purpose does it serve?

See? It's weird.

Perhaps I now consider it tradition. It's how I started my first journal, back when I hadn't really known what I was doing. Maybe I still don't really know what I'm doing, come to think of it. The last several paragraphs would seem to support that conclusion.

It could also be superstition, like I'm afraid to do it any differently just because my previous two attempts happened to work out the way I wanted them to. Whatever the reason, I guess I end up doing this weird bit of writing because I need to.

Or rather, I want to. A crucial distinction, really.

Need and want are very easy things to confuse, and I make it a point to be especially cognizant of the difference between the two.

See, if you want something that you know will lead to problems, you can always decide it isn't worth the trouble. Or, if you want it bad enough, you can scoff at trouble and go after what you want, problems be damned.

Now on the other hand, if you need something that will lead to problems, well . . . not much you can do, is there? You're going to have problems, plain and simple. They're unavoidable. You need that certain something, after all, and the problems associated with it are just something you'll end up having to deal with.

The point is that with 'want', you have a choice. With 'need', you don't.

Take my friendship with Theodore Haundsing for example. We've been best friends for fifteen years, but, thanks to an ingenious idea of ours, we've spent more than half of that time publicly pretending to be bitter enemies. You know, yelling obscenities at one another, staging squabbles in the street, things like that. It's very useful, of course. From time to time one of us overhears details of some Lord plotting against the other, and that sort of information is invaluable to a successful Haraelian Lord. It's not ever been something we need to do, but it's what we want to do.

And then two years ago some young thug, hoping to impress Lord Haundsing enough to land a job in his service, surprised me from behind one night, dragged me into an alley, and attempted to rough me up.

He'd heard the rumors about me and Theo, and figured that assaulting me would be the surest way to win favor with the Haundsing household. I won't bore you with the details, but suffice it to say that this fellow's plan didn't work out like he'd hoped it might, although I suspect that he learned a valuable lesson about underestimating well dressed Lords with slight builds. I did also try to teach him something about the value of a rear naked choke hold, but unfortunately he decided to pass out near the end of that particular lesson, so I don't know how much of it he was able to retain.

The point is that once it happened, Theo and I had a choice. We could stop what we'd been doing, useful though it was, in the hopes of avoiding misunderstandings like that one. Or, we could keep it up, knowing that unfortunate things like that might happen from time to time.

Though the incident troubled him, we both decided it was worth the risk to continue. I want to help Theo, just as he wants to help me.

Now, if for some reason I needed to help make Theo safer, I wouldn't have had that choice. Those sorts of unfortunate misunderstandings would simply happen, and we'd have no say in the matter.

Another good example of this sort of thing might be my relationship with Talia, my keepmistress. Simply put, I want to pursue her romantically. Easy enough thing to understand - she's smart, fun, athletic, graceful, and is quite simply the paragon of feminine beauty. I've always found her attractive, and only recently discovered that she'd been harboring feelings for me as well. However, due to a colossal romantic blunder on my part, I quickly learned that if I 'wanted' a relationship with her, I'd 'need' to woo her in thoughtful, imaginative ways until her romantic 'needs' are met. Or, at the very least, until she figures I've learned my lesson.

Now, in the above example, I 'need' to woo her, thus have no choice in the matter . . . except that it's really based on something I 'want'. So, in essence, if I want this particular something, I'll need to do something else. And of course, the only reason I 'need' to do this in the first place is because of her 'needs', which are more like her 'wants' when you stop and think about it, because-

You know, maybe that's not such a good example after all. I'm still trying to figure that whole thing out myself, actually. What's another example I can use instead?

Ah, I know a good one.

Let's say you're the Prince of a large city named Harael.

Your job is to keep things in the city running smoothly. It's a good thing - you want that. Some might argue that you need it, but whatever . . . that's not my point.

To keep the city running smoothly you need to maintain balance and stability, find ways to manage the hundreds upon hundreds of Lords who govern territory within the city. Lives literally hang on your smallest decisions, and the slightest wrong move on your part could have consequences far beyond what you'd anticipated.

Now, as part of maintaining balance and order, you find yourself maneuvering people into certain situations. These situations can be anything in nature; economic, political, personal, you name it. In each case, you are fairly certain you know how they'll react, because you're well informed enough to know what they need, or at least what they want. You use this knowledge to channel their actions, arranging things so that just by doing what they want to do they're helping you out in some way. The ways you can do this are as varied as the people you're dealing with. You can ask an honest man to do something for the good of the city, knowing he'll probably end up doing it. You can ask a contrary man to perform some action, knowing that he'll likely do the exact opposite. You can even do things like reward Lords for certain behavior, or perhaps withhold things you know a Lord needs, or wants, and tell them what they'll need to do in exchange for them.

Let me give you an example of that last one.

Let's say there's a certain Lord you have a particular interest in manipulating into helping you. Understandable, really - he's a smart and clever Lord, daring and capable, one who has more natural cunning than a sack full of weasels. Let's call this dashing fellow 'Vincent'.

Now, back when this Lord was a mere boy he and his family contracted a disease called rose blight, so called because of the rose-shaped 'blooms' of infection that appear on the skin. He was lucky enough to survive the affliction (if one could call such a thing 'luck'), though it rendered him sterile and left his body littered with scars. His mother, father, and sister were not so fortunate, all dying before his eyes within the first few months of the two-year quarantine that you, as Prince, had arranged for him and his family.

Now, as Prince, let's say you have access to all kinds of choice tidbits of information. One of these little tidbits concerns this Lord. See, instead of contracting this rare disease by natural means, you have information that suggests his family was deliberately infected, and were, in essence, murdered. You may not know why, or you may know the whole story . . . that doesn't matter. The point is, you know what happened, and you know who's responsible.

So, let's say that one day you decide to drop a hint about this information into Vincent's ear, and then you tell him something you hope he might do for you. You step back, and you watch him work his magic on your behalf. Chances are he'll end up doing it - if he 'wants' this, then he 'needs' to do this, right? How simple is that?

The real problem is that, sometimes, things concerning 'want' and 'need' aren't quite that simple and straightforward. And, since I appear to be so full of them today, let me provide you with yet another example.

Let's say that this particularly dashing Lord who's under the Prince's thumb doesn't care for the idea of this information being constantly dangled in front of him. What if he wants this information so desperately that no longer feels like a 'want' at this point? What if it feels like a need, like he'll die without it?

What if he's willing to risk everything he has just to get this information? Really, what might someone like that do in this sort of situation?

Well, maybe he gets it in his head that he should find out a few things that the Prince wants, or needs, and starts messing around with them. Maybe he finds a way to take the information by force, or by cunning. Maybe he makes the Prince regret ever coming into contact with this information in the first place. Maybe he goes berserk while eating pancakes one morning, grabs the nearest sharp, pointy thing he can find and gets arrested for attempted regicide.

Perhaps he does all of these things. Perhaps he does something else entirely. Who can say? After all, we're talking about a smart, cunning, unpredictable Lord . . . one who has reached the limits of his patience, and who might be willing to risk everything to get what he wants.

Or needs. I haven't quite figured out which it is yet.

It's a difficult sort of situation to be in the middle of if you happened to be a Prince, I would imagine. A situation like that could easily spin out of control, and cause all kinds of stuff to go horribly, horribly wrong. Things could become very weird, very quickly.

For example . . .