Chương 198

Orion masked his surprise with a grunt, turning around to hide his expression from Selene.

"I imagine you already know everything?" he asked. She slipped past him, her grey cloak swishing, and it was obvious she was dressed for an outing. Despite all his years in this world, interacting with energies and monsters that should have by all rights not existed, foresight was still the thing he most struggled to understand. Still, he knew better than to act the fool, so once he'd gathered himself, he gave Selene a meaningful look to prompt her to explain.

"I had to wait for the threads of fate to settle," she murmured, pulling back her hood. Her silver eyes were dim, the usual foresight-glow subdued by exhaustion.

"Whatever it is that you did changed several things, but I was able to follow your shadow into the refugee camp."

"Is it that momentous?" he asked in surprise as he closed the door. It wasn't that he didn't consider eliminating a spy from a foreign power hellbent on undermining Cyril to be important, but he hadn't expected that to ripple so much.

"You still don't get it," she shook her head.

"None of this was supposed to happen. The mere fact that the Sanctum is aware of the threat changes everything, and the more of them are unearthed before it's too late, the more the future will change." Orion sighed and sat back down.

"Alcmene wants me to infiltrate Norman Nethergard's operation. We suspect he's using the refugees as cover for more unsavory actions, though the specifics of what that might be are still unknown."

"He is," Selene confirmed, though her brow furrowed in frustration.

"I can tell there is much to be found there, but he also must have a decent supply of the Silence, because his personal thread is almost invisible."

"Sorry," Pauline interrupted, looking between them with a confused expression.

"I'm not an expert in foresight, so I might be missing something. How is it that you can see the camp but not him? Is it proximity to the Silence? But wouldn't such a hole make it even more noticeable?" Those were good questions. Orion had mostly given up on understanding the precise mechanics of foresight for now, deciding that he could do that once his Traits had grown enough to make it possible, but he still looked to Selene to see if she would answer. She hummed, closing her eyes.

"Think of it like this. You are on a small boat, navigating choppy seas, and looking for buoys. Sometimes, when the waves move just right, you can find them pretty easily, especially if a gust of wind lifts them higher. Other times, it might take a while to spot them. The sea isn't stopping anytime soon, and your ship isn't cooperating. Trying to foresee the Silence is like that. Even if you know something should be there, you aren't looking at an empty spot. The sea of fate still howls all around you."

That was pretty good? It still sounds very wishy-washy, but I can see why she was able to follow the threads to the Horned Lake yet couldn't predict how the battle would turn out, even after replaying different versions of it in her mind. Pauline gave a thoughtful scratch to her chin before shrugging.

"I guess. We'll have to trust that you know what you're doing." Selene appeared to appreciate that, giving a tentative smile, and Orion took the opportunity to steer the conversation back to the original topic.

"From what I've been able to learn, Norman took over managing the southern camps a year ago. It's a low-margin, high-stress contract, so no one else bid against him. Feeding and housing thousands of displaced people costs a fortune, and the Sanctum pays just enough to make it possible."

"So why do it?" Pauline asked.

"Greed drives these men. Where is the profit?"

"The profit isn't in taking care of the refugees," Orion said, tapping a map of the southern sector.

"It's in the supply lines. Wagons coming and going constantly mean security has to be relaxed, and no one examines a humanitarian convoy with the same scrutiny as a merchant caravan. If I wanted to smuggle materials into Silverpeak, I wouldn't use a smuggler's methods, as they'd be hard to access and their quantities would be limited. I'd hide them under blankets and grain sacks meant for the poor."

"So we need to find their depots and examine the ledgers for discrepancies. It shouldn't be too difficult if we can access them, though it might take some time, and that way we'll have a solid reason to call the authorities," Pauline said.

"If it were that easy, Alcmene would have just sent her people to do it," Orion countered.

"Norman is supposedly pretty smart; his books will be perfect. We need to see what's actually happening on the ground. We need to find the leak in the system." This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it He grabbed his lab coat and shrugged it on.

"We're going in as volunteers. No one questions free labor, and once we've blended in, we'll be able to find all the proof we need."

"Not alone, you aren't." An imperious voice echoed from the hallway. Orion winced. He turned as the apartment door opened and Asteria walked in. She was the only other person who wouldn't have been stopped by the wards from overhearing the conversation, and judging by her expression, she wasn't exactly thrilled by what she'd heard. Beyond that, she looked exhausted.

Her Veil Priestess robes remained spotless thanks to their heavy enchantments, but she had ink stains on her fingers, and her hair was pulled back in a messy bun, all signs of another long shift in the Deep Labs analyzing the Silence. Still, her eyes were sharp, and he had no doubt she already had a pretty good idea of what was happening.

"Mom," Orion started, "I was just—""I know what you were just," Asteria cut him off.

"Alcmene told me that she deputized you." She said the word like it was a slur.

"I should lock you in your room until you're thirty, given the amount of trouble you seem to get into when left on your own."

"But you won't," Orion said softly.

"Because you understand we have to do this. It's too risky to ignore, and Elder Alcmene is right. A direct attack by her forces would cause every other agent to go into hiding. We need to uncover more of the network before she can step in." Asteria sighed, rubbing her temples.

"You haven't exactly done your best to keep things low-key, you know?" she asked, but held up a hand to stop his complaint.

"But I understand what you mean. No, I won't stop you, no matter how much I might want to. I took you into a military campaign; it would be hypocritical of me to make a fuss now." Orion opened his mouth, but was once again stopped by her raised finger.

"But, and there is a but, you won't be going with just Pauline and Selene for backup. I heard what happened in the factory, and the fact that none of you have any actual skill in healing beyond the basic is frankly too reckless for me to fully process." This time, he kept his mouth shut, knowing she wasn't finished yet. Asteria telekinetically opened the door, revealing a young woman behind it. Orion's eyebrows rose when he saw it was Elara, who had been busy cooking his breakfast over the past few weeks.

Still, she was one of Asteria's senior apprentices, a skilled potion-maker and combat healer who had been part of the support team during the campaign in the Belt and had flown alongside him during the return trip. She was a few years older than he, with serious brown eyes and a no-nonsense attitude that rivaled his mother's, and just because she was often assigned more menial tasks didn't mean her skills were any lesser, especially when it came to healing.

"Elara is coming with you," Asteria stated.

"She needs field hours for her Mastery anyway, and you need someone who can actually handle wounds and sickness beyond a cold. Plus, having a legitimate Healer gives your 'volunteer' story credibility." Having been completely steamrolled, Orion smiled wrily.

"Welcome to the team." The refugee camp south of Silverpeak wasn't the mess of tents and badly washed people he recalled from his last visit. From the air, as they approached on brooms, it looked unexpectedly orderly. Rows of white tents were arranged in neat grids. Gravel paths kept the mud away. There were communal kitchens venting steam, and a large central plaza where children played.

"It's clean," Pauline murmured, sounding suspicious.

"That would be the reason no one looked into this guy," Orion deduced as they touched down near the main gate.

"If the camp was a squalid mess, Mayor Lucina would be up in arms. Complaints would be filed with the Sanctum, and Inspectors would come. But this? This looks like a success story." The guards beyond the gate were no longer the city militia that had occasionally patrolled, but private contractors dressed in the green and gold livery of the Nethergard family. They thoroughly checked Elara's Healer credentials but only gave a quick glance to Orion, Pauline, or Selene once they were vouched for as assistants.

"Lord Nethergard runs a tight ship," the guard captain said, handing Elara's papers back.

"We appreciate the help. The flux-fever has been spiking lately." Inside, the sense of order persisted. The refugees appeared well-fed. They had blankets. Water cisterns were evenly spaced and looked well-maintained.

"It's too perfect," Orion grumbled, oddly annoyed that someone capable of doing such good work was wasting their talent working for the enemy. Is it just greed that drives him? Maybe envy of his Magistra sister? Anger toward the Sanctum as a whole for not allowing him to fulfill his potential because of his gender? Perhaps he was blending his own experiences into the situation, but it didn't seem so far-fetched to Orion that someone could grow to resent the coven, given its gender discrimination.

They spent the first few hours acting in their roles. Elara took charge of the triage tent, treating minor injuries and handing out potions gracefully. Orion and the others levitated the crates of supplies Asteria had given them and distributed water, using the chance to observe. The mana density was normal throughout the area. No signs of the Silence could be detected, neither in the water nor on people, and no magical arrays were concealed in the tent poles.

Feeling like he was beginning to doubt his own judgment of the situation, Orion moved toward an elderly man sitting alone by a fire pit.

"Excuse me, elder," Orion said politely while offering a fresh loaf of bread.

"We're new volunteers. Is everything alright here? Do you receive enough supplies?" The man took the bread with a grateful nod.

"Oh, yes. The Nethergards are a manna. Before they took over, we were eating gruel and sleeping in the mud, but we've been warm and safe ever since."

"Have you noticed anything strange?" Orion asked softly, only daring to say so because he had checked the elder and found nothing unusual.

"Wagons moving at night? People getting strangely sick?" The man shook his head.

"Only the usual fevers you'd expect from a place like this. No, lad, nothing strange has happened, as far as I know." Orion moved on. He asked a mother washing clothes and a group of men playing dice. The answer, as it turned out, was always the same: that everything was much better now and that they had enough.

"Another dead end," Pauline muttered as they regrouped near the water tanks.

"Whatever he's doing, he's not doing it to them. Or at least, they don't know it."

"He's bought himself a perfect cover," Orion said, looking at the neatly organized rows of tents.

"It's brilliant. Who would suspect the man who saved the refugees? Who would look for a smuggler in a place of charity?" He looked toward the southern edge of the camp, the only spot where a few of the older tents still stood, and the ground turned to mud.

"I asked about it. It's the expansion zone," Elara noted, following his gaze.

"For the new arrivals who haven't been processed yet."

"Or for the people who don't fit into this perfect picture," Orion corrected.

"If there's a crack in the facade, it'll be down there."