Valerius snatches for the ledger, knuckles white, trying to drag it into his cloak before the names can be seen again.
Tancred du Forgietan
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.
“Is Valerius hiding something about the Order that would cause discord within?”
YES (VeryLikely, rolled 68)
Tancred du Forgietan
The ink is not just ink. It is a list of names of the Order's own commanders, all marked for the same ritual I was meant to endure.
Captain Valerius
You see it now, do you not. The Order does not just hunt the dead, Tancred. They harvest them to keep the high seats filled.
Captain Valerius
If he knows the truth, he will never stop until he burns the Order to the ground, and I cannot let him die for it.
“I look to Captain Valerius, "Valerius, Thou hath my word, unless thine order seeks to stop my vengeance against those who hath wronged me, I shall not seek their ruin. We must discover what ties our bonds and if it can be severed."”
SUCCESS (Legendary Diplomacy, rolled +0)
Tancred du Forgietan
Valerius, you have my word. If your Order does not bar my vengeance against those who wronged me, I do not seek its ruin. We should find what binds us, and whether it can be severed.
Captain Valerius
A hard bargain, but a fair one. I would rather be hunted by my own conscience than by another lie.
Captain Valerius
He says it cleanly. No boasting, no plea for mercy. That kind of honesty is rare enough to trust, for now.
Captain Valerius
This ledger is not a list of the dead alone, it is a roster of service. Names are moved, erased, passed along. The Order keeps its ranks by theft.
Captain Valerius
And if the shadow at the threshold is listening, let it hear this. I am done protecting men who build thrones from graves.
Captain Valerius
Help me read the last page. If there is a chain behind these names, I want its first link.
“I help Valerius read the last page. Trying to examine the words as close as I can to find the truth within the ledger and its contents.”
SUCCESS (Great Investigation, rolled -2)
Tancred leans over the open ledger with Valerius, tracing the final page line by line. The names shift in the pale light, and one entry at the edge of the page resolves into the first link, a commander transferred, then quietly erased.
Tancred du Forgietan
There. The hand that starts the chain is not buried, it is hidden in plain sight.
His finger catches on a smear of shimmering ink, and the page gives off a bitter frost that bites through the glove. The cold takes a shallow cut from his knuckle where the parchment edge flares hard as glass.
Captain Valerius
A first link. Then this was never drift, it was ordered removal.
Beneath the names, a copied note appears in the margins, a routing mark tied to the border hospice. The shadow at the threshold stirs, and the draft snuffs the ruin's stale air into a chill that brushes the ledger open wider.
Captain Valerius
Read it again. If that mark leads to a house, I want the door before it knows we are coming.
Tancred sees the chain clearly now, but the frost has crept far enough to stain the page blue-black around the name, as if the ledger resents being understood.
✓ Quest Accepted
Uncover the Order's corruption
✓ Quest Accepted
Identify the house behind the routing mark
“I will search the list of names and cross-reference it with the sigils of the houses. Are there any connected directly together?”
SUCCESS (Great Investigation, rolled +2)
Tancred works the final page against the stone, matching each erased name to the old house marks in the margins. Several entries knot together at once, commander to hospice, hospice to border registry, then to a crest scraped into the ink like a bruise.
Tancred du Forgietan
The routing is not random. It is a chain.
The names line up with du Morvannoux, then Batory, then a third seal half buried under frost, the same hand moving through them all. The ledger does not merely record corruption, it maps it.
Tancred du Forgietan
There. These sigils touch the same names.
Valerius pulls back a fraction, as if the page has started to stink. Outside the ruin, the draft tightens, and the shadow at the threshold leans closer into the doorway to hear the truth.
Captain Valerius
That route points to the hospice house. Whoever marked this chain wanted the removals hidden under charity.
The frost on the ledger spreads over the linked names, but the connection is already clear, and the house behind the routing mark is no longer a mystery.
Quest Complete
Identify the house behind the routing mark
Quest Complete
Uncover the Order's corruption