Valerius snatches for the ledger, knuckles white, trying to drag it into his cloak before the names can be seen again.
Tancred du Forietan
He means to hide it.
The parchment scrapes the stone. Frost spiders wider across the lower line of names, as if the ruin itself resists him.
Captain Valerius
Do not look at that page any longer.
His voice breaks on the last word. Tancred stands between the basin and the captain, the open ledger trembling in the cold light.
Captain Valerius
If this reaches the Order, it burns everything.
A wet whisper threads through the reliquary walls, and the shadow at the threshold lengthens, listening.