The ledger remains open on the scarred table, its coded names swimming beneath blue lamplight. Thava keeps Garrick’s gun trained on Vane, while rain whispers above the safehouse.
Vane
Wait. This mark beside the names is not a payment seal. It means witness, concealed and still breathing.
Vane leans closer without touching the page. His expression tightens as he follows the faint symbol through several entries, then stops at a familiar route notation.
Vane
The witness is hidden at the old sanctuary, the place where you were found after the ambush. Someone there knows what Garrick buried.
Vane
But the second stroke changes everything. The sanctuary is being watched. Not openly, not by ordinary patrols. They are waiting for the witness to lead them to you.
Beyond the barred door, footsteps pass through the cooper’s yard and fade. Kael remains behind near the market approach, while Vane stands alone before Thava’s drawn weapon.
Vane
If we go there, we may find the truth. We may also deliver the witness straight into the Inquisitor’s hands.
✓ Quest Accepted
Secure the concealed witness
“"I killed the previous High Inquisitor and Garrick. Who else would be hunting us?"”
SUCCESS (Superb Willpower, rolled -3)
Thava Tymont
I killed the previous High Inquisitor and Garrick. Who else would be hunting us?
Vane
The Inquisitor’s successor, if one has been appointed. Also the archive wardens, the paid informants, and anyone named in these margins.
Vane points to a column of cramped symbols. Several names are circled in black wax, while a fresh smear marks the route from the old sanctuary to the market.
Vane
The black seals belong to the Continuance Office. They preserve the old orders and eliminate witnesses who might expose them. They know your face now.
A floorboard creaks beneath Thava’s weight. The sound carries through the quiet safehouse, and Vane’s eyes snap toward the barred door before returning to the ledger.
Vane
That was not the rain. We have answers, but our shelter is compromised. The sanctuary is watched, and now this place may be watched too.
The concrete truth settles with the ledger’s open pages: the Continuance Office is hunting them, and Thava’s brief loss of silence has alerted whoever listens beyond the walls.
“Hid the ledger and escape with Vane to find how we can locate the survivor without getting caught”
SUCCESS (Legendary Stealth, rolled +1)
Thava closes the ledger, wraps it in oilcloth, and slides it beneath a loose floorboard beside the table. Dust and straw conceal the disturbed seam.
Vane
Good. If they search us, they will find an empty table and two frightened men, not the proof that condemns them.
Vane snuffs one lamp, then lifts a wall hanging to reveal a cramped servants’ passage. Cold rain-air flows through the hidden gap.
Thava Tymont
The ledger is hidden. The sanctuary is watched.
Vane
We leave by the apothecary’s drain and circle through the dye quarter. No direct road, no repeated shadow, no names spoken aloud.
Thava keeps Garrick’s gun close and follows Vane into the passage. Behind them, the safehouse settles into darkness as the barred door remains undisturbed.
Vane
The survivor may still be hidden at the old sanctuary. We will locate them from outside the watch, learn who protects them, and bring them out quietly.