It was rusted through, the metal flaking at the edges. He looked around the overgrown grass beside the mill and found a short iron pole half buried in the ground. He pulled it free, wedged it through the lock and leaned his weight into it.
The lock snapped off with very little resistance.
"That was anticlimactic." Cherry remarked.
"What were you expecting?" Shen Yu said, and pushed the door open.
The storage unit was small and dark. It smelled of dust and old wood. Along the far wall, stacked neatly and deliberately, were several crates. On top of the first one was a folded piece of paper.
Shen Yu picked it up and read it.
It was a ledger. Months of stolen goods itemized carefully, dates and amounts and territories, and at the top in clear deliberate handwriting was a name.
Fenric Delwyn.
Shen Yu looked at it for a long moment.
Four months. They had spent four months building this. Constructing a paper version of Fenric, detailed enough to convince a territory lord and a court.
They had been thorough.
He would give them that.
He folded the paper carefully and put it in his coat pocket.
"Do you have something to write with?" he asked.
"I am a falcon." Cherry said.
Shen Yu looked at her.
"A falcon that can unlock information about every territory in Ramon but has no writing instrument?"
Cherry paused, scoffing lightly.
A small glowing quill materialized in the air beside him.
"Thank you," Shen Yu said.
"You are insufferable. Next time bring your own pen, I don't do freebies." Cherry said pleasantly.
Shen Yu pulled the ledger back out, found a flat surface, and began to make corrections. It was methodical work. Careful work. Everywhere Fenric Delwyn appeared, a new name took its place.
Dorin.
He worked in silence. Cherry watched from the doorway, her white feathers bright against the dim morning outside.
"They will surely notice." she said after a while. "When they come to retrieve this before the raid."
"I know." Shen Yu did not look up. "That is the point. When they open this tomorrow morning and find their own name staring back at them, they will panic. Panicked people make mistakes."
"And you will be watching?"
"From a distance of course." he said. "With my healing ability, a new name, and absolutely no involvement in any border raid."
Cherry was quiet for a moment.
"You are quite calm about all of this."
Shen Yu finished the last correction and folded the ledger back exactly as he had found it. He placed it on top of the crate in the same position, at the same angle.
"In my previous life." he said, straightening up, "the only person I was ever truly cruel to was myself." He turned toward the door. "I have decided not to make that mistake again."
He stepped back out into the morning sun. Cherry returning to his shoulder without being asked.
They walked back toward town in silence for a moment.
"Cherry."
"Yes?"
"After this is handled." Shen Yu said, "tell me more about Raizel Cain."
Cherry's blue eyes brightened considerably.
"I thought you would never ask!"
"Raizel Cain," Cherry began, hopping slightly on Shen Yu's shoulder to adjust her balance as he walked, "is the most powerful being in Ramon. He is a dragon. The last of the ancient bloodline and king of all beast kind."
"What does he look like?"
"Tall. Dark haired. The kind of face that makes people forget what they were saying mid sentence." Cherry paused. "Not that looks are relevant to your survival."
"I am trying to recognise him if I see him."
"You will know him by his presence before you know him by his face," Cherry said, which Shen Yu found entirely unhelpful. "He carries a weight that most people feel before they see him. Humans who encounter him often cannot explain why they were unsettled."
"Where does he live?"
"He does not have a fixed territory the way the other beast lords do. He moves. He appears where he is needed and disappears when he is done." Cherry tilted her head. "He is not easy to find."
"And his personality?"
"Distant. He speaks very little with humans. He has no particular interest in them."
Shen Yu was quiet for a moment.
"That is not very useful, Cherry."
"It is sufficient," Cherry said firmly. "You are not looking for Raizel Cain right now. You are looking to survive chapter three. One thing at a time."
Shen Yu considered this.
"Fine."
They had reached the main street again. The bread smell from the bakery was still doing its best.
Shen Yu stopped walking.
"I have not eaten since I arrived."
"Technically Fenric ate last night."
"I was not here last night."
Cherry considered this logic and found she could not argue with it.
"The bakery is good," she offered. "Second best in the territory."
"What is the first?"
"A place you cannot afford."
Shen Yu reached into his coat pocket and counted the coins without taking them out.
"Bakery it is," he said, and walked toward it.
The bakery was warm and smelled considerably better on the inside than it did from the street.
A stout woman with flour on her apron was pulling a tray from the oven when Shen Yu walked in. She glanced up, then did a small double take.
"Fenric? You are up early."
Shen Yu had not considered that Fenric would be a regular here. He filed that information away quickly.
"Couldn't sleep," he said.
The woman clicked her tongue sympathetically.
"Those friends of yours keeping you up again? Dorin came in yesterday asking if I had seen you." She set the tray down and waved her hand. "That boy makes me nervous. Shifty eyes."
"You're very perceptive." Shen Yu trailed, his eyes on the bread.
"Well. A lot of folks come in and out of the bakery. Would you not find it odd if I wasn't?"
Shen Yu nodded. Best to go along with whatever she said so she wouldn't ask other questions.
"It's on the house. Today's breakfast is special."