The talk with Torik and Paros proved as unhelpful as the soldiers back home. Their recollection matched perfectly. House Ortega had handled security, the monastery provided storage, gold exchanged hands, everyone parted satisfied.
Vencian found himself questioning the visit to this place.
Am I following the wrong lead?
He shook his head. No. I learned a few things. And Abbot Sebastian left on pilgrimage—right before my father's arrest? That can't be coincidence.
He didn't fully trust Abbot Matthias's words. Since arriving in this world, he had been led by others—Vencian's memories, Moses's investigation, his mother's words. He couldn't keep relying on it.
Then there was Lumea's claim that Vencian had stayed at this monastery for a night while returning from the academy. But Matthias's response suggested otherwise. It wasn't that the Abbot was necessarily lying about his stay—Vencian just couldn't find a reason why he would.
This raised two possibilities. Either she's lying or Vencian lied to her.
If Lumea lied purposefully... His stomach tightened. What if she figured out I'm not Vencian and threw that question to trap me?
But if Vencian had lied to her, that raised another question. Where had he really gone? Why lie about his destination?
The uncertainty gnawed at him. Every lead seemed to spawn three more questions.
Vencian called a nearby monk.
"Tell Abbot Matthias I want to use the monastery's Gramox to send a letter to my house."
The monk nodded and departed. As Vencian waited, his thoughts turned to the Gramox itself. The device represented one of the few mechanical marvels that made communication across vast distances possible without relying on mounted messengers or carrier pigeons.
It consisted of paired mechanical systems connected by sealed conduits filled with a rare catalyst medium. When a letter was fed into the sender, clockwork mechanisms would scan each line and convert the text into coded pulses. These traveled through the transmission line to reproduce an identical copy at the receiving end.
The technology carried a price that only noble houses, wealthy monasteries, and important cities could afford. For those who could manage the expense, the Gramox transformed communication from days or weeks into mere hours.
"Young lord," Talor called out, pulling him from his thoughts. "The other monks don't know much either. Only that Abbot Sebastian will travel through Mount Kael in Faeleiara all the way to Draal."
Vencian's eyes sharpened. Mount Kael housed the Sanctuary of the Dawn—where pilgrims claimed an angel of the True Light had once appeared at sunrise. The mountain-top chapel drew thousands each year along the Trail of Morningstar, seeking the spiritual enlightenment the dawn light was said to grant.
Draal held the Cathedral of the Luminous Star, built around what believers called a fallen star that had guided the True Light to humanity. An island cathedral beyond the Painted Forest.
It was one of the most revered pilgrimage routes in the kingdom.
"I see. Good work, both of you. Have you eaten anything?"
"No, sir. Thanks to a certain someone," Larik said in an annoyed tone. Talor rolled his eyes.
"Go grab something to eat. I'll do the same once this letter's sent."
"When are we leaving, sir?"
Vencian glanced through the window. The stone walls seemed to trap the cold, and what little light remained outside had taken on that grey quality that meant night wasn't far off. Wind rattled the shutters with increasing force.
"Dawn, assuming this weather breaks." He'd already spoken with the abbot about staying the night. "Ask the monks for your rooms."
He dismissed them both.
A few minutes later, the monk returned looking slightly apologetic for the delay. Vencian followed him through corridors that felt colder than the main halls, their footsteps echoing off stone that seemed to absorb what little warmth the scattered torches provided.
The Gramox chamber was smaller than he'd expected—a cramped room dominated by an intricate mechanical device that resembled a fusion of clockwork and printing press. Brass fittings gleamed despite the dim candlelight, and the complex array of gears and scanning mechanisms looked expensive enough to bankrupt a lesser noble house.
The sealed metal conduit disappeared through the stone wall, connecting to its paired receiver somewhere back at House Vicorra's estate. Assuming it actually works, Luke thought, eyeing the mechanical marvel with the skepticism of someone who'd grown up with instant messaging.
He picked up the goose quill from the inkwell beside the Gramox. The letter took more thought than he'd expected—asking Mother to send someone to track Sebastian's trail. Politely, of course, since direct orders to the family matriarch tended to backfire spectacularly.
After the ink dried, he positioned the parchment against the Gramox's scanning surface. The mechanism responded with surprising fluidity. Brass components slid into alignment, gears engaged as he turned the activation lever. The scanning carriage began its work, translating his words into encoded pulses that would travel through the sealed conduit to House Vicorra's estate.
With a final click, the machine confirmed the letter had been sent.
He asked the monk to guide him to his room and requested food be brought there later.
The room was sufficient. Maybe not what the original Vencian would have preferred, but for someone like Luke who was used to cramped spaces, it felt luxurious. That odd sensation of being observed prickled at the edge of his awareness again, but he dismissed it as exhaustion. Just tired nerves acting up.
He threw himself on the bed, exhaustion finally catching up with him.
It's still better than the apartment miss Pualis brokered for me.
A bitter chuckle escaped when he remembered that barely livable space—the peeling wallpaper, the persistent smell of dampness that no amount of cleaning could eliminate. The contrast felt surreal.
And with that memory came others he'd been avoiding since arriving in this world. Not because he missed anyone—there was no one left to miss. Not because he feared them, exactly.
It was because when he remembered, the uncertainty returned with crushing weight.
Vencian stared at the room ceiling. In the flickering candlelight, he remembered the glare of his old world's failures.
I don't want to be that failure again.
But what was his actual track record?
A day of asking obvious questions, following leads that went nowhere, collecting contradictions he couldn't resolve. The monks knew nothing useful. The timeline didn't match. Sebastian's departure might mean everything or nothing. Even his own memories—Vencian's memories—were unreliable fragments that abandoned him whenever he needed them most.
For the first time in a while, he truly felt alone.
"What if I've just traded one kind of failure for another?"
He let out a self-mocking laugh at his own question and shook his head, deciding to rise and remove the cloak he'd forgotten to take off since arriving at the monastery.
However, at that moment, a voice drifted from his left—soft, feminine, yet unmistakably firm.
"You didn't."
Goosebumps erupted across his skin. His entire body recoiled instinctively, muscles tensing as he spun toward the source of the voice. In one fluid motion born of pure panic, he threw himself backward across the narrow bed.
His heart hammered against his ribs as his eyes swept the shadows, searching for the speaker who had materialized from nowhere in what should have been an empty, secured room.