Mention the name of Kurt Lentham around the Headquarters of the Constabulary and you would see a good amount of head shaking and mumbling. The words that were mentioned most of all would be "damn shame."
For someone who was a "damn shame," Lent had made it up the ladder fairly quickly. He had been an older recruit, well into his thirties at the beginning of this year. People, back then, would whisper about all the loss that this man had suffered, losing family to Audmathus, to the Flux, to the Baie. One wife, three children, and his parents before that. He had been no great adminerer of Bromn, so when created, the Constabulary seemed like an excellent place for him. People said that he just wanted to prevent what happened to him from happening to anyone else, that he was a good man. Secretly, some might comment that he had a death wish, for this was a man who truly had lost everything.
It wasn't long before he had a chance to prove it. Constable Lentham fought brilliantly at the Battle of Haberdasher's Row. He fought like a man possessed, perhaps like, yes, a man who intended to die. And die he almost did. The healers were barely able to pull him back. When they did, he wasn't quite the same. Gone were most of his memories, along with them that tortured drive. In the meantime, however, he had become something of a folk hero, a Myrken Boy who so many people knew, who fought with such valor in the name of law and order. There was always a good head on his shoulders. He had always been smart, even though he had been born dirt poor. Reading and writing had been learned by marrying up, out of love, into a merchant family. Moreover, the new personality he had awoken with, easy-going and pleasant, yet somewhat biting and humorous, was actually preferred by many civilians who had known him. This, alongside with all the other factors, had gotten him a promotion. Now he spent almost every waking hour working or patrolling, even if he was a bit lax about the whole thing. What else did he have to do? And the drinking? Well, there had been YEARS of drinking before this, after one loss or another. Whatever he put in his body now served to do very little to affect his judgment.
None of that forgives the fact that Detective Constable Kurt Lentham was sitting in front of the High Constable's desk, his partner, young Constable Charles McCoy, beside him, waiting for Cinnabar to return. Well THAT would be forgivable. Lent's feet up on the High Constable's desk, even as his partner watched nervously, that was the problem.