Chapter 377: The Royal Records

Chapter 377: Chapter 111: The Royal Records

The heavy iron doors of the temple chamber groaned inward, shattering the tense silence that had hung over Aurora’s cot.

Outside, the sharp clatter of iron-shod hooves against the cobbled courtyard signaled the arrival of the Silvercrest courier. Henrik stepped into the doorway first, his hand on his hilt, clearing the path for two armed sanctum guards bearing a heavy, iron-bound records chest.

They set the chest down upon the central marble slab with a dull, ringing thud that echoed off the high stone arches.

Vance stepped away from Aurora’s bedside, his boots clicking against the flagstones. His stoic posture held, but his fingers twitched as he produced a heavy brass key from beneath his tunic. Across the room, Sonia remained near the cot, her eyes darting between the dying light of the Heart Stone and the royal chest. Beside her, Ramon stood pinned near the threshold, his broad shoulders tense, watching Vance with an unreadable, hawk-like intensity.

“The royal vault ledgers from the year of the border skirmish,” Vance said softly, inserting the key into the central lock.

The mechanism turned with a heavy, dry snap.

Dane didn’t let go of Destiny’s hand. His grip was warm and rough, a solid anchor against the cold air seeping through the high windows. He pulled her slightly behind his shoulder, keeping himself between her and the king.

Vance lifted the heavy lid, pulling out three thick ledgers wrapped in faded indigo cloth to protect the parchment from light and dampness. He selected the oldest volume at the bottom. Its spine was warped, its leather corners smoothed down by decades of administrative handling.

With a small bone knife, Vance sliced through the faded wax seal bearing the crown’s crest. A faint cloud of dry dust and ancient ink rose into the chill air.

“Find the transport from the night of the border incident,” Marcus commanded, stepping up to the edge of the marble slab. His tall frame cast a long shadow across the open book. “Third watch. Before the storm broke.”

Vance wetted his thumb and began turning the heavy, cream-colored pages. The rhythmic, dry rasp of paper turning was the only sound left in the room, save for the steady, shallow breathing of the sleeping princess on the nearby cot.

Cramped, precise handwriting filled the leaves in dense columns: dates, grain taxes, wagon manifests, territorial border patrols, and official seals stamped in burgundy wax.

Vance’s thumb froze.

“Here,” he murmured.

The room closed in instantly. Marcus took a half-step forward. Dane leaned over the stone slab, his posture rigid. Standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Dane, Destiny strained to see over his arm, but from her angle, the cramped script looked like nothing more than dark, jagged scratches against yellowed paper.

“Read it,” Dane demanded, his voice low and uncompromising.

Vance took a slow breath, his tone dropping into the flat, monotone pitch used by royal archivists, though a slight tremor betrayed him.

“‘Royal escort dispatched from Silvercrest at the fourth hour,'” Vance read slowly. “‘One infant recovered from the northern woodland perimeter following the carriage wreckage. Female. No identifying family records attached.'”

Destiny’s breath caught in her throat.

One infant recovered.

Marcus leaned over the central binding, his finger pointing directly to the adjacent column.

“And the border patrol manifest from the outer check station? The wagon that left the estate?”

Vance’s eyes shifted across the seam to the secondary log.

“The transport record states that one child was expected to be delivered to the high citadel. The recovery log states one child was found in the woods.”

He paused, resting his palms flat on either side of the open book.

He looked up, his grey eyes locking onto Destiny’s face.

“That doesn’t prove they are the same child. A child expected and a child recovered in the same sector could be coincidence. The logs do not explicitly tie the entries together.”

“They don’t have to.”

Ramon’s deep voice cut through the room from the shadow of the doorway.

Vance’s head snapped toward the former Alpha.

Ramon took two slow steps forward, his gaze fixed on the bottom line of the page.

“Look at the recovery ledger notes. The physical manifest. Royal archivists don’t just write ‘infant.’ They record property.”

Vance lowered his eyes back to the parchment, his thumb tracing a line of smaller, hurried script squeezed into the lower margin. As he read it, the color drained from his face.

“‘Infant wrapped in silk overlay,'” Vance read, his voice barely above a whisper. “‘Crest of the high bloodline embroidered in silver thread. Found alongside an iron-and-stone relic.'”

A suffocating silence descended on the vault.

Destiny instinctively touched her belt pouch, where the fragment of the ancient swaddling cloth and the stone markings were kept. The proof wasn’t just a coincidence of timing. The child found in the dirt beneath the northern pines was carrying the royal crest and the relic, the very relic that had just saved Aurora’s life.

“If Destiny was the child recovered from the woods,” Marcus said, his voice dropping to a dangerous register as he glared at Vance, “then who was brought to Silvercrest and raised in your nursery?”

Vance didn’t answer.

He turned the leaf with agonized precision.

The following pages were stained. Old water damage had bled into the upper margins, causing the ink to run in long smudges. Several entries were partially obscured by dark seals that had fused the parchment near the binding.

“There should be a receipt of custody,” Vance insisted, his fingers searching down the damaged margin, his nail catching on a crust of dried wax. “If a child was brought into the citadel that night, the house master and the attending lord signed for the delivery.”

“Find the signature,” Dane ordered, stepping closer to the table.

Vance turned one more leaf, his eyes scanning the cramped side channels.

He stopped at a smeared entry near the bottom of the page, where a dark crimson mark sat beside a jagged line of handwriting.

“The receipt is here,” Vance said, his voice tight. “It records the custody transfer of the child delivered to the citadel… but the signing lord isn’t from Silvercrest.”

Marcus leaned down, his eyes narrowing.

“Whose seal is that?”

Vance traced the dark wax.

“It belongs to the outer territory border garrison. Lord Vane’s house.”

He looked up, his eyes wide with a sudden, horrifying realization.

“The signature acknowledging receipt of the infant was witnessed by Ramon’s late father.”

Sonia gasped, her head turning sharply toward Ramon.

Ramon didn’t flinch, though his jaw clenched tightly, the only sign that the blow had landed.

“My father was commander of the perimeter watch that winter,” Ramon said quietly. “If he signed that ledger, it means the child brought to the citadel didn’t come from the wrecked royal carriage. She was delivered directly from the border garrison.”

The realization hit Destiny like a physical blow, making the room tilt beneath her feet.

The carriage hadn’t simply crashed. The records proved two distinct transactions: one royal child carrying the relic was lost in the woods and recovered by chance, Destiny. And another child, brought from an outer garrison under a falsified order, was handed over to the royal nursery to take her place, Aurora.

“You knew,” Marcus whispered, his voice laced with venom as he stepped toward Vance. “You knew the child in your nursery didn’t match the recovery record.”

“I did not!” Vance snapped, slamming his hands onto the marble slab, though his pale skin lied for him. “The records were sealed during the border war! The citadel was in chaos. My wife was dying, the borders were collapsing! I was handed a child with a royal seal and told she had survived the attack!”

“And you never checked the vault?” Dane challenged, his voice cold. “Or did you suspect the truth the moment she failed to manifest the crescent mark, and chose to keep quiet to protect your throne?”

Vance closed his eyes, unable to meet Dane’s glare.

The silence that followed was his answer.

Dane turned back to Destiny, his hand tightening around hers.

“We have what we came for. The logs prove you carried the royal crest and the relic. You owe this king nothing.”

“Wait,” Destiny said, her voice cutting through the confrontation.

She stepped past Dane, approaching the stone slab. She looked down at the dark ink, at the names of dead scribes and forged custody receipts that had dictated the last eighteen years of her life.

The ledger answered how she had ended up in the forest. It proved her blood.

But as she looked back toward the cot where Aurora lay unconscious, her breathing stabilized only by the stone tied to Destiny’s bloodline, a new, darker question opened beneath them.

If Aurora was the child brought from the border garrison, whose daughter was she? And why had someone gone to such terrifying lengths to swap a royal heir for a child carrying a deadly, dormant curse?

Destiny looked Vance straight in the eye.

“The record proves I am the child from the perimeter. But we aren’t closing this book. Not until we find out who ordered the swap.”