Dust hangs in the clerk’s cramped office as Battista slips from shadow to shadow. Vey keeps by the door, quiet as a prayer, while the Traveling Bard watches the hall. The clerk stays hunched over his desk, busy with seals and tallies.
Battista lifts the captain’s token. It gives a low hum in his palm, and the clerk’s warding charm on the desk flickers once, then goes dull.
He reaches the ledger stack and finds the missing caravan list, tucked beneath a sheaf of tax marks and river permits. The final piece of evidence is here, close enough to touch.
Joren
Not now... someone touched the seal.
The clerk’s head starts to turn. Battista has only a heartbeat before the man sees the open ledger, the stolen token, and the truth all in one glance.
Battista
The list is the last piece.
Vey shifts at the doorway, ready to block it or bolt. Beyond the office, the path to the granary waits, and with this list in hand, Battista can bring the captain the evidence that finally binds Tranis to the fraud.
+ New Item Acquired
missing caravan list mark
undefined / undefined
The clerk jerks upright, and the desk charm flares back to life in a sickly blue pulse. A thin strip of wax on the ledger stack cracks open, and a hidden latch clicks somewhere under the papers.
Joren
No, no, not the records. You do not understand what is in the caravan list.
He snatches at the papers with one hand and, with the other, yanks a cord beneath the desk. The narrow office door shudders as a bar slides into place from the hall side, cutting off the easy route out.
Vey
Battista, he is not protecting accounts. He is protecting a name.
From the corridor, fast footsteps close in. The Traveling Bard stiffens at the threshold, while the clerk’s eyes lock on the missing caravan list mark as if it were a wound opening in front of him.
“Who are you protecting?”
SUCCESS (Great Persuasion, rolled +1)
Battista
Who are you protecting?
The clerk freezes. The panic on his face changes shape, from fear of punishment to fear of saying the wrong name.
Joren
Not the ledgers. The manor seal. Lord Tranis will burn this office before he lets that name be read aloud.
Vey’s gaze sharpens at the word. The Traveling Bard swallows hard in the doorway, while the clerk’s hand tightens around the missing caravan list mark as if it could still be hidden by force.
Vey
So he is here too, in the paper trail. Battista, that mark is the hook. It ties the clerk to Tranis’s private chain of orders.
Joren
If I name him, I am finished. If I stay silent, they already know.
His shoulders sag. He does not reach for the cord again. He looks straight at Battista, afraid, cornered, and strangely relieved to stop pretending.
Joren
It is for Tranis. And if you take that mark, he will know exactly who cut the thread.
“Speak plainly. What Was Tranis' orders?”
SUCCESS (Great Persuasion, rolled +1)
Battista
Say it plainly. What orders did Tranis give?
Joren
He ordered the caravan mark kept off the books, and the seal copied only for his private tally. No clerk, no captain, no witness was to read the route names aloud.
The clerk lifts the missing mark with two shaking fingers, not to hide it now, but to show where it was meant to sit. The little strip of proof trembles in the lamplight.
Vey
Private tally. So that is the chain. He was laundering routes through the caravans, then locking the names behind his own seal.
The Traveling Bard
And if anyone asked?
Joren
They were to be told it was damaged cargo record work, nothing more. But the true list, the one with the mark, went straight to Tranis.
He sets the mark into Battista's hand with a defeated breath, as if surrendering the last lie in the room.
Joren
Take it, then. If you mean to face him at the granary, you will need more than anger. You will need proof he cannot deny.
Quest Complete
Obtain the missing caravan list mark
Skill Upgrade: Persuasion Great→Superb