But I couldn’t afford to get arrogant.
Overconfidence was a quick path to a grave, and not just for me.
If I played this game too openly, if the royal family perceived me as a threat or a meddler undermining their ’sacred’ trial, the repercussions would be severe.
I, the people around me, and even my family, the Luthaires, could get implicated. And that was the best worst-case scenario. So I didn’t dare to imagine the worst.
"Sir Lumin," Vice Captain Elria broke the silence.
"What about them?" she asked, gesturing discreetly out the window.
I followed her gaze. The bandits from the ambush were still there, tied up and shivering in the cold, looking utterly pathetic.
"..." I squinted faintly, a plan crystallizing. "Let’s... Let’s leave them here."
Elria’s brow furrowed in confusion. "Leave them? They’re criminals."
"Exactly," I said, keeping my voice low. "They’re also free manpower. If the princess is clever enough to use them—offering a pardon in exchange for labor on the defenses, or using them as bait or scouts—it could give her a significant boost without breaking any rules. It turns a problem into a potential resource."
Elria was silent for a moment, then a slow nod of understanding, and perhaps a touch of admiration, dawned on her face. "That’s... surprisingly smart. Turning thorns into tools. It also provides aid without the appearance of direct intervention. I... I couldn’t have thought of it."
"You could if you thought about it a bit more," I replied, appearing modest. "Now, let’s return to the Keep. We have our own reports to make."
"Alright. I will be driving." She got out. "You should take a rest, Sir Lumin."
"Well, thank you." I didn’t reject the offer.
As the carriage pulled away, I took one last look at Oakhaven.
The pieces were in place: a ghost princess, a mute knight, a faded legend, and now a group of captive bandits. I had set the stage as best I could. The rest was up to them. And to whatever moves I and ’they’ would make from the shadows.
_____ ___ _
"..."
The scratch of the quill was the only sound in the small, dusty room the town elder had provided. Princess Aurelia was utterly absorbed in the town’s historical records, her brow furrowed in concentration as she cross-referenced crop yields with monster attack reports from years past.
Vance, however, found his attention wandering from the weekly militia reports in his hands. His gaze drifted to the window, through which he had seen Sir Lumin and the Vice-Captain depart not long ago.
’Senior Lumin has left by now,’ he thought. The memory of their mental conversation on the road surfaced.
<The first step to take control of the situation...> Lumin’s voice echoed in his mind, <...is not to bury yourself in paperwork. It’s to walk the ground. To see the problems with your own eyes, talk to the people living them. Paper lies most of the time. People, if you ask the right way, rarely do.>
Vance looked down at the dry, impersonal reports. They listed numbers: number of attacks, bushels of grain lost, feet of fence damaged. They didn’t capture the fear in the hunters’ eyes he’d seen in the infirmary, or the desperate plea he’d sensed from the elder.
Aurelia was trying to understand the *what* and the *when*. Lumin was telling them to understand the *how* and the *why*.
They were on the wrong path.
Closing the ledger with a soft thud, he stood up. Aurelia looked up, startled from her studies.
"Vance?"
He met her gaze and began to sign, his movements deliberate. <The reports can wait. We need to walk the town. We need to see the western fence, the storage barns. We need to speak to the hunters who were wounded. We need to understand this place, not just read about it.>
Aurelia’s eyes widened slightly, then she glanced down at the sprawling parchments before her. She was a scholar at heart, and her instinct was to master the theory before the practice. But she trusted Vance implicitly. After a moment, she nodded, a new resolve settling on her features.
"You’re right," she said, rising and smoothing her simple robes. "The books will be here tonight. The people’s problems won’t wait." She offered him a small, grateful smile. "Let’s go."
As they stepped out of the stuffy room and into the cold, biting air of Oakhaven, Vance felt a shift. They were moving from being passive observers to active investigators. Senior Lumin had given them the compass. Now, they had to start walking.
’But... where should we go first?’
The question echoed in Vance’s mind as he followed a step behind Princess Aurelia. Before he could settle on an answer, the town elder came bustling down the hallway toward them, his face a mask of fresh anxiety.
"Your Highness!" he exclaimed, wringing his hands. "Is something wrong? Are the accommodations not to your liking? Do you require anything? More ink? A warmer blanket?"
Vance saw the subtle shift in Aurelia’s posture—a slight stiffening of her shoulders, a barely perceptible intake of breath. She was uncomfortable with the obsequious treatment, with the fear and deference that her title inspired here. It created a wall between her and the very people she needed to understand.
She took a quick, steadying breath, and when she spoke, her voice was gentle but firm. "Elder, thank you for your concern. But please, treat me as you would any other person sent to assist you. You don’t have to show me any special courtesy. In fact," she added, her tone softening into a request, "it would help me do my job better if you would simply call me Auera."
The elder blinked, stunned into silence for a moment. The concept was clearly foreign to him. "I... I couldn’t possibly..."
"It would be a great help to me," Aurelia insisted, her smile genuine but persistent. "I am here to listen and to learn, not to be served. Now, if you’ll excuse us, we were just heading out to inspect the western fence line. The reports mentioned repeated breaches there."
The mention of a specific, tangible problem broke through the elder’s flustered state. "The... the western fence? Yes, of course. It’s a treacherous area. I shall send a guide."
"Please, give us someone who knows the area well, and who isn’t afraid to speak plainly," Aurelia finished, her request both an order and an invitation for honesty.
The elder, momentarily thrown by her directness, simply nodded. "Of course. At once, Your—" He caught himself, flustered. "At once, Miss Auera. Please wait for me at the entrance!"
He scurried off, leaving them in the quiet hallway. Aurelia let out a breath she seemed to have been holding, her shoulders relaxing slightly. She glanced at Vance, a flicker of uncertainty in her eyes, as if seeking confirmation that she had handled it correctly.
Vance gave her a single, firm nod. It was the right move. They needed a guide, but more than that, they needed to hear the unvarnished truth from someone who wouldn’t filter it through the lens of royalty.
As they walked toward the entrance to wait, Vance reflected on the moment. She had just taken her first real, independent action of the trial. It was a small thing, insisting on a name and a plain-spoken guide, but it was a crucial step. It was the first deliberate crack in the invisible wall her royal status built around her, a wall that separated her from the very reality she needed to grasp.
Senior Lumin and his wife had pointed them toward the truth on the ground. Now, Aurelia was beginning to understand that to reach it, she first had to step down from the pedestal.
The investigation was no longer just about inspecting a broken fence; it was about building a bridge, starting with a name and a request for honesty.
The true trial had finally begun.