The hearing room is still as a nailed coffin. Master Pellin stands by the corridor light, his face drawn hard, the red clerical seal laid bare in the clerk’s ink-stained hand. Brother Osric holds the packet open before the table, and the Clerk keeps writing, fast and pale.
Master Pellin
There. Read it all, if you mean to judge me. Let the room hear what was done in my office.
Brother Osric
Then hear it plainly. Northmere, Willowford, the ledgers, the hush money, the false routing. This is no rumor. This is the chain.
The Clerk’s quill scratches harder. Pellin’s jaw tightens, but he does not step away. The truth sits between the men like a blade laid on cloth.
Master Pellin
If I fall, I do not fall alone.
Brother Osric
Master Pellin has confessed the approval of the transfers. By record and seal, the fault reaches beyond one chamber.
All eyes turn to Bren Riverglade. The packet, the seal, the clerk’s fresh record, all of it waits on his next word, his next witness, his next choice.
“"The evidence is entered into the record and we have Master Pellin's statement. The Temple authority may pass judgment. I will not."”
SUCCESS (Legendary Willpower, rolled +0)
Bren lowers his hand from the packet, and the room seems to exhale with him. His refusal to judge is not weakness here, only finality. The record is complete, the statement stands, and the Temple now owns the weight of it.
Brother Osric
Then I close the hearing as entered. Judgment is deferred to higher authority.
The Clerk
It is entered. Fully.
The Clerk draws one hard line beneath the last words, then caps the wax with trembling care. Pellin’s mouth tightens, but his shoulders slacken a fraction, as if the room has at last said what it meant to say.
Master Pellin
So be it. Let the Temple read my ruin for itself.
Brother Osric gathers the ledger, the Willowford letter, the Lord Mayor’s note, and the red clerical seal into one secured packet. He sets it aside like a burden that is no longer theirs to carry alone.
No one moves to argue. The chamber’s harsh light falls on ink, wax, and folded proof, while the corridor beyond waits in silence. The matter is no longer secret, only unfinished.
The chamber held its breath as Osric sealed the packet of evidence.
Master Pellin
So be it. Let the Temple judge its own wounds.
Bren Riverglade
I have said my piece. The rest is yours.
Brother Osric
Then this hearing is closed.
Pellin stood rigid, already ruined, while the Clerk gathered the record with shaking hands.
Bren Riverglade left the town while the Temple turned inward on itself. Behind him, the evidence was locked away and the first hard questions had begun. What came next belonged to priests, clerks, and the slow mercy of consequence.