Abraham Dubois had found a way to make waiting expensive.
I respected that.
By the time his carriage arrived at the Sierra, Catington had already charged us for breakfast, water, docking extension, waste removal, an "aerial hull proximity assessment," and something called a temporary foreign rope certification.
The rope had never left the ship.
Apparently its existence near Catington required oversight.
I was beginning to understand why revolutions were so popular.
Xavier stood beside the gangplank reading the latest bill.
"This says we owe fourteen silver for an inspection they haven't done."
"Efficient."
"How?"
"They've removed the inconvenience of providing the service."
He glared at me.
I buttoned my coat.
Rex appeared from behind the mast.
His expression said no.
"Not today."
He walked toward me.
"No."
He kept walking.
Mira watched from atop a cargo crate, clearly delighted to see someone else lose an argument.
Xavier folded the bill.
"You're going back to Abraham?"
"Yes."
"To hear Marduk's debt?"
"Yes."
"And you're going to agree to whatever it is."
"No."
Xavier stared.
I adjusted one sleeve.
"I'm going to hear whatever it is, complain about it, insult the terms, renegotiate them, discover something he didn't intend to tell me, and then possibly agree."
"That was somehow less reassuring."
Rex stopped directly in front of me.
I put a hand against his forehead.
"Stay."
He pushed back.
"He doesn't like Abraham," Elisabeth said.
She was seated near the main cabin with two merchant ledgers open across her lap. Her poisoned right hand remained gloved; the left held a charcoal stick.
"Rex has never met Abraham."
"He disliked the messenger."
"Rex dislikes forms."
"So do you."
"Exactly. An animal of tremendous discernment."
Elisabeth made another mark in the ledger.
She had spent the previous night comparing our cargo valuation against three market price lists.
I had created a monster.
A financially literate one.
Far worse.
Xavier stepped closer.
"Raymond."
The tone changed.
I looked at him.
"If the debt involves us, you come back before saying yes."
There was the prince.
Not the boy from the island.
Not the student waiting for my answer.
Someone laying down a boundary.
Interesting.
"I am perfectly capable of negotiating—"
"That isn't what I said."
Silence.
Rex sat between us.
Xavier continued.
"You keep saying I'm supposed to make my own decisions."
"You are."
"Then stop making them for me before I hear the question."
Annoying.
Correct.
The two frequently travelled together.
"What if the service is urgent?"
"Then you can promise yourself."
"And if I need you?"
"Ask."
He held my eyes.
Simple word.
I disliked simple words.
They left fewer places to hide.
"Fine."
Elisabeth cleared her throat.
I turned.
She tapped her gloved hand against the ledger.
"Same rule."
"You're not part of the Academy arrangement."
"Which has never stopped you from borrowing my skills."
"That sounds accusatory."
"It was meant to."
I sighed.
"Fine. Nobody's name, body, poison, royal blood, miraculous recovery, questionable legal status, or charming personality will be pledged without consultation."
Xavier frowned.
"Charming personality?"
"Mine."
Elisabeth snorted.
The carriage driver coughed politely from the dock.
I stepped onto the gangplank.
Rex growled.
"Third bell," I told him.
His ears rose.
"No earlier."
I looked at Xavier.
"If he tries to leave the ship—"
"I know."
"Do you?"
"He nearly removed the quarantine gate yesterday."
"The hinge was structurally weak."
"He bit it."
"Structural criticism takes many forms."
I left before the conversation deteriorated into facts.
Abraham was not in the Founder's Tower.
This was the first thing that annoyed me.
The second was that I had climbed six flights of stairs before anyone mentioned it.
The white-coated woman from yesterday waited on the seventh-floor landing.
"Founder Dubois is below."
I looked down the stairs.
Then at her.
"You watched me climb."
"Yes."
"You could have said something."
"Yes."
"But you chose not to."
"Yes."
I stared.
She stared back.
I liked her immediately.
"Your name?"
"No."
"Everyone here is delightful."
She led me through a side passage I had not seen yesterday.
The corridor narrowed, leaving the polished administrative portions of Nexus behind. White marble became rough gray stone. Paint vanished. Pipes and mana conduits ran exposed along the ceiling.
We descended instead of climbed.
One floor.
Two.
Three.
The air grew colder.
Not subterranean.
We were inside the thick base of the Founder's Tower.
Eventually she stopped beside an iron door.
"No weapons."
"You took them yesterday."
"You acquired another knife."
I paused.
"How?"
"Your left sleeve hangs differently."
I removed the knife.
She held out her hand.
"Anything else?"
"No."
She waited.
I surrendered a wire garrote.
Her expression changed for the first time.
Very slightly.
"Interesting."
"Fishing equipment."
"There is no hook."
"Optimism."
She opened the door.
Abraham Dubois sat at a long table covered in dead children.
Not literally.
Records.
Photographs.
Test reports.
Medical charts.
Enrollment documents.
Failure notices.
For a moment, though, the distinction felt smaller than it should have.
Abraham looked up.
"You're late."
"Your building moved."
"You were told to come here."
"I was told Founder's Tower."
"We are in Founder's Tower."
"Technically, a coffin is still part of a house if you store it in the basement."
"We are not underground."
"Then you've somehow made daylight depressing. An achievement."
My guide closed the door behind me.
Abraham motioned toward the chair.
I remained standing.
"What is this?"
"The price."
There we were.
I looked over the documents again.
Thirty, perhaps forty files.
Different years.
Different handwriting.
Different colored seals.
"The letter?"
Abraham placed Marduk's opened letter on the table.
I resisted the urge to reach for it.
Barely.
"He gave you permission to show me?"
"No."
"Then we're improving."
"I am showing you the portion concerning you."
Abraham turned the last page around.
Marduk's handwriting crossed half of it.
I recognized every ugly slant.
Every impatient stroke.
The old man had always written as though ink had offended him personally.
Abraham covered most of the paragraph with one sheet of blank paper.
I stared at him.
"Childish."
"Necessary."
"According to?"
"Me."
"A terrifying legal standard."
Only four lines remained visible.
Marduk had written that if I reached Catington alive, Abraham was not to admit me out of friendship, pity, debt, or guilt.
Make him earn the door.
That sounded like Marduk.
The next line annoyed me more.
And give him the problem you were too frightened to solve properly.
I looked at Abraham.
His jaw tightened.
There.
The last visible sentence:
If the pattern is real, Raymond will find it. If it is not, he must be the one to tell you.
I read it again.
Then looked at the files.
"How flattering."
"You understand?"
"I understand that Marduk continued assigning homework after death."
Abraham removed his glasses.
"He believed someone has interfered with Nexus admissions."
"Believed?"
"He suspected it before leaving Catington."
"How long ago?"
"Years."
"And you haven't discovered whether he was right?"
"I discovered that institutional investigations are extraordinarily good at finding whatever allows the institution to continue functioning."
I smiled without humor.
"At last, something familiar."
Abraham opened the nearest file.
"Every year, Nexus receives several thousand applicants."
"How many accepted?"
"Usually between two hundred and sixty and three hundred."
"Depending on?"
"Deaths, withdrawals, scholarship budget, staff capacity, political pressure."
"One of those is unusually honest."
"Political pressure?"
"Deaths."
Fair.
He pushed four files toward me.
"Over the last six admission cycles, seventeen candidates demonstrated the same general anomaly."
"What anomaly?"
"They passed the preliminary intellectual screening. Passed initial health examination. Showed adequate or exceptional mana potential during registration."
"And then?"
"During final testing, their performance collapsed."
"That sounds remarkably ordinary."
"Individually, yes."
"Collectively?"
Abraham pointed.
"Look."
I sat.
The first candidate was a girl from Catington's southern mills.
Age sixteen.
No noble affiliation.
Scholarship recommendation from a municipal school.
High mathematics score.
Elemental affinity: fire.
Initial mana output: above average.
Final magical examination:
Channel instability. Severe loss of control. Disqualified on medical grounds.
Second candidate.
Merchant's son.
No guild sponsorship.
Air affinity.
Excellent written score.
Final magical examination:
Mana flow irregularity. Collapse during resonance test. Permanent restriction recommended.
Third.
Orphanage candidate.
Earth affinity.
Same progression.
Different wording.
Same ending.
I looked at Abraham.
"This proves nothing."
"I know."
"Then why are you looking at me like a priest presenting a miracle?"
"Keep reading."
Fourth file.
A noble boy.
House Verris.
Average academic score.
Mediocre mana control.
Failed first practical examination.
Then—
Reinstated.
Special review.
Accepted into the exact same cohort three days after one scholarship candidate had been medically removed.
I opened another file.
Another sponsored candidate entered after a disqualification.
Then another.
The pattern began to appear.
Chessmaster stirred.
I let it breathe.
Not open.
Breathe.
Dates sharpened.
Names.
Intervals.
Examiners.
Sponsors.
Vacated positions.
Replacement admissions.
Connections began to form.
Too quickly.
I forced myself to stop.
Abraham noticed.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"You closed the skill."
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because you arranged these files."
He frowned.
"Of course."
"You chose what I would see."
"I chose relevant cases."
"Same problem."
I pushed the files away.
"You're contaminating the board."
Abraham's eyes narrowed.
"Explain."
"If I look at forty cases selected because you believe they form a pattern, I am not investigating admissions. I am investigating your suspicion."
"A distinction without practical value."
"No. A very expensive distinction."
I tapped the records.
"You're showing me failures followed by politically connected replacements. Fine. That may be corruption."
"May?"
"It may also be confirmation bias wearing a founder's robe."
Abraham went still.
"You asked Marduk to investigate this?"
"He noticed it first."
"And what did he say?"
"That someone was selling failure."
Good phrase.
Very Marduk.
I resisted liking it.
"How?"
"He didn't know."
"Who?"
"He didn't know."
"What evidence?"
"These cases."
"Then he had suspicion."
"Yes."
"Not truth."
"Yes."
I leaned back.
"Wonderful. The dead man was capable of restraint."
Abraham ignored that.
"Will you do it?"
"Investigate?"
"Yes."
"From outside?"
"No."
There it was.
Abraham placed one document on the table.
An application sponsorship.
My name occupied the first line.
Raymond.
No surname.
Foreign applicant.
Sponsor:
Abraham Dubois.
I looked at him.
"You want me inside the admission process."
"Marduk did."
"Convenient."
"It also solves your problem."
"Which one?"
"You cannot enter Nexus without a recognized sponsor."
"Ah. Coercion."
"Transaction."
I smiled.
"We may become friends."
"No."
"Excellent start."
He slid the application closer.
"You take the normal examinations."
"No special scoring?"
"No."
"No examiner is told why I am there?"
"No."
"No protection if I offend someone important?"
"Certainly not."
"Now you're enjoying this."
"Deeply."
I picked up the sponsorship form.
"And in return I determine whether these failures are genuine."
"Not whether corruption exists."
That caught me.
I looked up.
Abraham's voice had changed.
"Bring me the truth. If the pattern is fraudulent, prove it. If the candidates genuinely failed, prove that. If the Academy's process is incompetent rather than corrupt, tell me that too."
"Even if the answer embarrasses you."
"Especially then."
Interesting.
I looked toward the files.
"Why not use your own investigators?"
"I did."
"And?"
"One found nothing. One found procedural negligence. One accused two examiners and later withdrew his report."
"Why?"
"He resigned."
"Before or after becoming richer?"
Abraham did not answer.
That answered enough.
"One disappeared?" I asked.
A pause.
"No."
Not the pause I expected.
There was something else.
I filed it.
"Who knows you're reopening this?"
"No one."
"Bad answer."
"Why?"
"Because if there is corruption, secrecy protects us. If there isn't, secrecy means I cannot tell whether you're using me to attack a political enemy."
Abraham almost smiled.
"You really are Marduk's student."
"Stop insulting me."
"I meant it as praise."
"Worse."
He pushed a second document toward me.
It contained names of the current admissions council.
Nine members.
Two academy deans.
One guild representative.
One Crown observer.
One religious assessor.
Three faculty examiners.
And Abraham.
"You sit on the board."
"I do not score candidates."
"But you certify the final list."
"Yes."
"Meaning if this has happened for years—"
"I signed the results."
Silence.
There it was.
Not just institutional guilt.
Personal.
I looked again at his burned left hand.
He saw me.
Did not hide it.
"You ignored Marduk."
Abraham's face hardened.
"I disagreed with Marduk."
"Politicians have better verbs than criminals."
"I was trying to protect this Academy."
"From what?"
"Him."
That was unexpected.
I waited.
Abraham looked at the closed portion of Marduk's letter.
"You imagine your teacher as a difficult old man who hid information."
"That's because he was a difficult old man who hid information."
"You did not know him here."
"Clearly."
"He did not ask questions gently."
"I noticed."
"When Marduk believed corruption existed, he treated everyone connected to the process as guilty until they proved otherwise."
"That sounds unhealthy."
"He threatened a dean."
"Only one?"
"He broke the man's arm."
"Ah."
"He broke into restricted records. Stole evidence. Accused a Crown official without proof and nearly caused Nexus to lose its charter."
I considered.
"Very energetic."
"I stopped him."
"How?"
Abraham's left hand closed.
There.
Again.
Not yet.
"I stopped him."
"That was not an answer."
"It is the only one you receive today."
I studied him.
Chessmaster whispered possibilities.
Duel.
Seal.
Alchemical accident.
Betrayal.
Arrest.
Marduk wounded Abraham.
Abraham wounded Marduk.
None confirmed.
I let them remain where they belonged.
Speculation.
"When did he leave Catington?"
"Shortly after."
"Because of you?"
Abraham said nothing.
I laughed softly.
"You see, Abraham, silence is a fascinating thing. People believe it conceals information. Usually it only marks the exact place where the information is buried."
"I'm aware."
"Then stop making graves."
His eyes went cold.
For a second, the room felt smaller.
Mana moved somewhere around him.
Not enough to attack.
Enough to remind me that the elderly man across the table had not founded Nexus by being good with minutes.
Rex would have disliked this room.
I missed him suddenly.
Unfortunate.
I placed the candidate files back in order.
"I'll investigate."
Abraham's pressure disappeared.
"Conditions?"
He knew me already.
"Several."
"Of course."
"First, Xavier is not part of the debt."
"He isn't."
"If he chooses to apply, he does so independently."
"Agreed."
"Second, Elisabeth is not evidence, bait, medical material, or leverage."
Abraham frowned.
"I have never met her."
"You're having an excellent day, then."
"Agreed."
"Third, you do not give me your preferred suspect."
"I have none."
I stared.
He corrected himself.
"I have several."
"Better."
"You don't want them?"
"Not until I have my own."
Abraham nodded.
"Fourth?"
"If I discover a candidate is in danger, protecting Nexus's reputation becomes irrelevant."
"That is not your decision."
"It becomes mine the instant you ask me to participate."
"We have procedures."
"Procedures are wonderful. They create paperwork for explaining preventable tragedies."
His jaw moved.
I continued.
"If someone is actually being harmed, I intervene."
"And compromise the investigation?"
"Yes."
"That could allow whoever is responsible to disappear."
"Then I'll find them later."
"You may lose the only chance."
"And someone may lose more than an admission."
Abraham watched me for a long time.
Marduk had probably had this argument with him before.
I could almost feel the dead old bastard enjoying the repetition.
Finally Abraham said, "Agreed."
Interesting.
He had yielded too quickly.
"Why?"
"Because that was the answer Marduk never gave me."
I said nothing.
Abraham looked toward the candidate files.
"He would have sacrificed one student to prove the mechanism."
That sat badly.
Not because I disbelieved it.
Because I could believe it.
Marduk had loved me.
In his way.
He had also been capable of brutal arithmetic.
The island had taught me that.
Perhaps I had learned too much of it.
I thought of Xavier in the mud flats.
Elisabeth offering her own hand for testing rather than letting me decide.
Delo trapped during the trial.
Veys's broken spear in the Sierra's rail.
People had a stubborn habit of refusing to remain numbers.
Good.
I tapped the table.
"I'm not Marduk."
"No."
Abraham's answer came quietly.
"For which I am beginning to be grateful."
I disliked how much that affected me.
So I changed the subject.
"The journal."
Abraham leaned back.
"No."
"You knew the question."
"Yes."
"Then we are progressing."
"You agreed to the service. That does not purchase every answer."
"Very well. One."
"No."
"One question."
"You have asked fourteen since entering."
"Those were conversation."
Abraham rubbed the bridge of his nose.
I smiled.
"Does Les Manigances du Diable exist?"
His hand stopped.
Not White Sage.
Not the coordinates.
The journal.
He looked at Marduk's letter.
Then at me.
And for the first time since I had met him, Abraham Dubois looked as though lying would cost him more than telling the truth.
"Yes."
One word.
No thunder.
No system notification.
No hidden chamber opening beneath our feet.
Still, my pulse changed.
The journal existed.
Marduk had not invented it to torment me.
Well.
He had probably also intended to torment me.
But it existed.
"You've seen it."
Abraham's eyes sharpened.
"That was not your question."
"You answered with your face."
"I am going to regret sponsoring you."
"Almost certainly."
"When?"
"Years ago."
"How many?"
"Raymond."
"What was in it?"
"No."
"Did you read all of it?"
"No."
"Why?"
"No."
"Where is it?"
Abraham smiled.
Not kindly.
There was the founder again.
"Tomorrow."
I stared at him.
"That word is becoming grounds for violence."
"Then pass the entrance examinations quickly."
"You know where it is."
He gathered the files.
"Your assumption."
"No. Your mistake."
He stopped.
"If you had never seen it, you would say you don't know. Instead, every time I ask where it is, you postpone the answer."
Abraham placed the files inside a leather case.
"You are confusing refusal with knowledge."
"Occupational hazard."
"Then recover."
I stood.
The cane clicked against the floor.
"White Sage?"
"No."
"Is that a denial of being White Sage or a refusal to discuss the name?"
"Yes."
I laughed.
There were moments when I genuinely liked him.
This was becoming dangerous.
He handed me the sponsorship paper.
"Present yourself at West Admissions tomorrow before first bell."
"Tomorrow?"
"The final foreign applicant session begins then."
"I thought admission season was almost closed."
"It is."
"So Marduk's recommendation arrives exactly in time."
"Yes."
"I hate coincidences."
"So did he."
I reached the door.
"Raymond."
I looked back.
Abraham placed one hand on the oldest file.
"Your investigation begins when the examinations begin. Until then, do not contact any of the former candidates."
"Why?"
"Because one of them is dead."
I waited.
"And?"
"One vanished."
"And?"
Abraham looked at the file beneath his hand.
"One works here."
That changed the room.
"Name?"
"No."
"You brought me all the way here to tell me not to investigate something and then placed that sentence at the end?"
"Yes."
I stared.
"You knew Marduk too long."
For once, Abraham smiled.
---
The carriage took me back downhill.
I did not enjoy the view.
I had four names memorized.
Seventeen anomalous failures.
Six years.
Politically connected replacements.
Three previous investigations.
One resignation.
One former failed candidate currently inside Nexus.
And Abraham's signature at the bottom of every final admissions list.
Chessmaster wanted structure.
I gave it paper instead.
The Blacklist opened across my knee.
NEXUS ADMISSIONS — PROVISIONAL FILE
Confirmed:
— Abraham sponsors my application.
— Marduk explicitly requested that I investigate a possible admissions pattern.
— 17 candidates suffered unexplained performance collapse after strong preliminary results.
— Some resulting vacancies were filled by sponsored candidates.
— Abraham certified the final admission lists.
— At least one former failed candidate is currently employed by Nexus.
Probable:
— Manipulation may occur during later examination stages.
— Political or financial advantage may influence replacement selection.
— Abraham possesses more information than provided.
Speculation:
— One or more examiners are compromised.
— Admissions council member involved.
— Guild or noble family purchasing positions.
— Medical failures intentionally induced.
I stared at the final line.
That was the dangerous one.
It felt right.
Which meant it deserved suspicion.
I underlined SPECULATION twice.
Chessmaster pulsed behind my eyes.
The page seemed to separate in my memory.
Solid facts held their weight.
Probabilities shifted.
Speculation became almost translucent.
Pain followed.
A needle driven behind my right eye.
I shut the book.
"Enough."
The driver looked back.
"Sir?"
"Not you."
He wisely faced forward.
I pressed two fingers against my temple.
Blacklist Registry was changing.
Slowly.
Not because Gaia had decided I deserved a reward.
Because I was forcing a habit into the skill.
Evidence before pattern.
Pattern before conclusion.
Marduk would have hated the caution.
Another reason to keep it.
---
Xavier was waiting when I returned.
Of course.
He stood at the top of the gangplank.
Rex beside him.
Elisabeth behind both.
I checked the sky.
"Third bell hasn't rung."
Xavier shrugged.
"He started getting unreasonable early."
Rex walked straight toward me and smelled every part of my coat.
"He didn't poison me."
Rex continued.
"Probably."
Xavier's expression sharpened.
"What did you agree to?"
No greeting.
Good.
I handed him Abraham's sponsorship form.
He read it.
"You're applying."
"Yes."
"We knew that."
"Now the bureaucracy agrees."
"What's the service?"
I told them.
Not everything Abraham had said.
Every relevant part.
Seventeen candidates.
Collapsed performance.
Replacement admissions.
Possible manipulation.
Marduk's request.
Abraham's condition.
Xavier's face darkened.
"He wants you to investigate while taking the exams."
"Yes."
"That's insane."
"Moderately."
"You'll have to watch the candidates, examiners, tests, and still pass."
"Yes."
"You're injured."
"Less than last week."
"That is not the same as healthy."
Elisabeth spoke from behind him.
"And the journal?"
I looked at her.
"It exists."
She stopped.
Xavier stopped too.
That was the information that mattered.
"Marduk's journal?" Xavier asked.
"Yes."
"Abraham admitted it?"
"Yes."
"Where?"
"I don't know."
Elisabeth studied my face.
"He wouldn't tell you."
"Correct."
"No," she said. "Different."
I raised an eyebrow.
"He knows."
I smiled.
"My influence on you has become alarming."
She ignored that.
"What else?"
"One former failed candidate works inside Nexus."
Xavier looked toward the distant academy towers.
"Could be our witness."
"Could be the person helping manipulate the trials."
"Could be neither," Elisabeth said.
I looked at her.
She shrugged.
"You keep saying not to classify too early."
There are few experiences more irritating than being educated by your own advice.
"Precisely."
Xavier handed back the sponsorship form.
"Am I applying?"
"I don't know."
He frowned.
"You don't?"
"You told me not to decide for you."
Silence.
Elisabeth smiled.
Xavier looked at the document again.
Then toward Nexus.
For several seconds, the prince underneath all the dirt and training showed itself.
Not arrogance.
Expectation.
He had been educated his entire childhood to occupy important rooms.
Then the island had reduced him to mud, hunger, grief, and survival.
Nexus offered a different battlefield.
Whether he wanted it was his decision.
"I'll apply," he said.
"Why?"
"To see if I can pass without your name."
Good answer.
"Then find your own sponsor."
His face fell.
"What?"
"You heard me."
"Abraham can sponsor me."
"Yes."
"And?"
"And then your first act of independence would be borrowing my relationship."
Xavier stared.
"You are unbelievable."
"I've been told."
"How am I supposed to find a sponsor in a city where I know nobody?"
I looked toward Catington.
Markets.
Guilds.
Officials.
Criminal threads.
Merchants.
Hundreds of potential doors.
"I suspect you'll think of something."
"You could help."
"I could."
He waited.
I said nothing.
He swore and walked away.
Elisabeth watched him go.
"That was mean."
"It was educational."
"You enjoyed it."
"Those categories overlap."
She looked at the sponsorship paper.
"And me?"
"You're not taking the examinations tomorrow."
Her expression hardened.
I held up one hand.
"That is medical, not paternal."
"Explain."
"You climbed three flights yesterday and your venom output doubled. A physical entrance examination would be idiotic right now."
"I could do the written sections."
"Yes."
She waited.
I hated what came next.
"So if you want to apply when your condition is stable, we discuss it."
Her expression softened by a fraction.
"Discuss."
"Yes."
"Not decide."
"Yes."
"Good."
She turned away.
I exhaled.
Rex looked at me.
"Don't."
He sneezed.
I went to the cabin.
Someone had pushed a packet beneath the door.
Academy seal.
West Admissions.
My name.
I opened it.
Candidate number.
Schedule.
Rules.
Required clothing.
Prohibited equipment.
Six pages detailing penalties for cheating.
I was touched by their optimism.
Then a smaller sheet fell onto the desk.
Not official stationery.
Old paper.
Different ink.
A copy of one of Abraham's admission files.
Eighteen years old.
Older than the pattern he had claimed to be showing me.
I read the candidate's initial results.
Excellent.
Scholarship applicant.
No sponsor.
Final examination:
Magical instability. Disqualified.
Below it:
Appeal denied by Founder's authority.
Signature:
Abraham Dubois.
I stared at the date.
Eighteen years.
Not six.
Abraham had lied by omission.
Nothing unusual there.
Then I noticed the handwritten note in the margin.
The script was ugly.
Familiar.
Marduk.
Only four words.
You know this is false.
My smile disappeared.
On the back, someone had written another message in fresh ink.
Not Marduk.
Not Abraham.
Three words.
ASK WHO SURVIVED.
No signature.
I looked toward the city through the cabin window.
Someone knew about Abraham's files.
Someone knew about Marduk's accusation.
And someone knew those documents were now in my hands.
The Academy had not even tested me yet.
Already, someone was grading the investigation.