The cartographer's temple appeared three days later, rising from the hills like something out of a forgotten age.
It wasn't a temple in the religious sense. No priests, no altars, no prayers. Just stone and knowledge, a place where maps were made and kept, where the roads and rivers and borders of the world were documented with painstaking care. My uncle had brought me here once, when I was twelve. He'd wanted me to understand that cartography wasn't just about drawing lines on parchment. It was about understanding how the world connected, how one place led to another, how power and trade and violence all moved along the same routes.
I'd never forgotten it.
The building was old, grey stone worn smooth by centuries of wind and weather. Narrow windows, thick walls, a heavy wooden door carved with symbols I'd never learned to read. A handful of scholars moved between the buildings, robes dark against the pale stone, their faces turned down toward books or scrolls.
"This is where your uncle trained?" Maer asked, looking up at the main tower.
"Yes. He spent ten years here before he went north to Droupet." I dismounted and handed my reins to Joss. "I need to speak with the keeper. See if they have any updated maps of the trade routes near Cerasis."
"You think the maps will show something the folio doesn't?" Sael asked.
"I think the maps will show me where things are moving. If the raids are coordinated, if there's profit behind them, then there has to be a pattern. Routes that are targeted more than others. Shipments that go missing at specific points." I glanced at him. "The folio has the names. The maps will show me the network."
Sael nodded slowly. "I'll wait here with the men."
"I'll come with you," Maer said.
I didn't argue. We walked toward the entrance together, boots crunching on gravel, the air cool and still.
The interior was exactly as I remembered. High ceilings, stone floors, rows of shelves filled with rolled maps and bound volumes. The air smelled of old parchment and ink and something else, something faintly herbal that I couldn't place. A woman stood at a tall desk near the center of the room, copying something from one map to another with careful, precise strokes.
She looked up when we entered.
"Help you?" she asked.
"I'm looking for the keeper," I said.
"You found her." She set down her pen and studied me. Mid-forties, maybe, with grey streaking through dark hair pulled back in a tight braid. Sharp eyes, sharper than the scholars I'd seen outside. "What do you need?"
"Trade route maps. Southern borderlands to Cerasis. Anything from the last five years."
"That's a lot of territory. What are you looking for?"
"Patterns. Disruptions. Places where shipments go missing more often than they should."
The keeper's expression shifted, something between interest and caution. "You're investigating the raids."
"Yes."
"Warden?" She glanced at the insignia on my coat.
"Captain Ryn Halvar. Out of Droupet."
"Droupet." She tilted her head. "You related to Garren Halvar?"
My chest tightened. "He's my uncle."
A smile flickered across her face, brief but genuine. "He trained here. Good man. Brilliant cartographer. He wrote to me a few months back, said his niece was compiling evidence about the border situation." She gestured toward the back of the room. "Come on. I'll show you what I have."
We followed her through the rows of shelves to a large table in the corner. She pulled out several rolled maps and spread them across the surface, weighing down the corners with smooth stones.
"These are the main trade routes," she said, tracing a finger along the lines. "North road here, south road here. Smaller routes branching off toward the interior. You see this?" She tapped a section of the map where several routes converged. "This is a key junction. Three routes meet here, which makes it valuable for trade. It's also where the most disruptions have occurred in the last two years."
I leaned closer, studying the area. It was maybe a week's ride from Cerasis, close enough to the capital that it should've been protected by garrison patrols. But the keeper had marked it with small red dots, each one representing a reported incident.
There were dozens.
"What kind of disruptions?" I asked.
"Missing shipments, mostly. Merchants who set out and never arrived. A few burned supply carts. One entire caravan disappeared last spring. Forty people, gone without a trace." She pulled out another map, this one more detailed, showing the surrounding terrain. "This area here, it's heavily forested. Easy to ambush travelers. Hard to track anyone who knows the land."
"And the garrison?"
"Undermanned. They send patrols when they can, but it's not enough. By the time they arrive, the raiders are gone."
I traced the routes with my finger, following them south toward Cerasis. The pattern was clear. Shipments were being targeted at key points, places where they were vulnerable and far from help. But it wasn't random. The attacks were too consistent, too well-timed.
Someone was coordinating this. Someone who knew the routes, knew when shipments were moving, knew exactly where to strike.
"Do you have records of which merchants were targeted?" I asked.
"Some. Not all of them reported the losses officially. Can't blame them. Reporting means questions, and questions mean delays, and delays cost money." She pulled out a ledger and flipped through the pages. "But I keep track of what I hear. Rumors, mostly. Complaints from traders who pass through."
I scanned the ledger. Names, dates, locations. And there, near the bottom of one page, a single notation that made my breath catch.
Payment disputes. Rothera involvement suspected.
"This," I said, pointing. "What does this mean?"
The keeper leaned over to look. "Ah. That was a merchant who came through last year. Said he'd been hired to move grain north, payment arranged through a broker. But when the shipment was raided, the broker claimed the merchant had violated the contract by taking the wrong route. Refused to pay. The merchant said the broker had insisted on that route, said it was safer. He thought it was a setup."
"Did he name the broker?"
"No. But he said the broker worked for a southern house. Big operation. Mercantile."
"Rothera."
She nodded slowly. "That was the implication, yes. But no proof. Just suspicion."
I straightened, my mind racing. If Rothera was using brokers to set up merchants, to arrange shipments along specific routes and then ensure those shipments were raided, then they weren't just profiting from the chaos. They were creating it.
"Can I copy this?" I asked, gesturing to the map.
"You can take it. I have others." She rolled up the map and handed it to me. "If you're going to Cerasis with this, Captain, be careful. Houses like Rothera don't like being exposed. They have reach. Resources. And they're very good at making problems disappear."
"I'm not a problem," I said. "I'm a reckoning."
She smiled, sharp and approving. "Good. We need more of those."
***
I spent the next hour in the temple's scriptorium, copying sections of the ledger into my journal. Names, dates, patterns. Maer sat beside me, quiet and watchful, occasionally glancing at the pages I was writing.
"You think this is enough?" he asked eventually.
"It's more than I had yesterday. But no, it's not enough. Not yet." I finished the last entry and closed the journal. "I need testimony. Witnesses who can confirm Rothera's involvement. Merchants who were targeted. Brokers who were pressured."
"And if you can't find them?"
"Then I'll find the Cast-Runner. If he's moving payments for Rothera, he'll know who's giving the orders. And he'll know where the money's going."
Maer was quiet for a moment. Then he said, "You ever think about what happens after?"
"After what?"
"After you deliver the folio. After the Crown acts, if they act. What do you do then?"
I looked at him. At the concern in his eyes, the way his hand rested on the table between us, close but not touching.
"I go back to Droupet," I said. "Back to the Wardens. There's always more work."
"Always more work," he repeated softly. "No rest. No life outside of duty."
"That is my life."
"It doesn't have to be."
I stood, gathering my journal and the rolled map. "Yes, it does."
He caught my wrist, gentle but firm. "Ryn. Look at me."
I did. Against my better judgment, I did.
"You're allowed to want more than this," he said. "You're allowed to want something for yourself. Not just duty. Not just responsibility. Something that's yours."
"I don't have room for that."
"You could. If you let yourself."
The words hung between us, heavy and impossible. I thought about my uncle, about the years he'd spent alone in Droupet, mapping roads for other people to travel while he stayed behind. I thought about my parents, dead on a trade route they'd believed was safe. I thought about Harven, buried beneath stones on a road I'd led him down.
"I can't," I said quietly. "Not yet. Maybe not ever."
"Why?"
"Because if I stop, if I let myself want things, I'll lose focus. And if I lose focus, people die. It's that simple."
Maer's grip loosened, but he didn't let go. "It's not simple, Ryn. It's just what you've told yourself."
Maybe he was right. Maybe I'd been carrying the weight so long I didn't know how to set it down anymore.
But that didn't change anything.
I pulled my hand free, carefully, and walked toward the door. Maer followed, and we left the temple in silence.
***
Outside, Joss was waiting with the horses. Sael stood nearby, speaking in low tones with one of his men. They both looked up when we emerged.
"Find what you needed?" Joss asked.
"Yes." I secured the map to my saddlebags and swung up onto my horse. "We're two weeks out from Cerasis. Maybe less if we push."
"We pushing?"
"We're pushing."
Sael stepped forward. "Captain, the men need rest. We've been riding hard for days."
"They can rest in Cerasis."
"If they collapse before we get there, we won't have an escort at all."
I looked at him, at the calculated concern in his expression. He wasn't wrong. But I also didn't care.
"One day," I said. "We camp early today, leave late tomorrow. That's all I'm offering."
Sael nodded. "That's fair."
We rode out, the temple disappearing behind us as the road curved south. The sun was high and warm, the air smelling of grass and distant rain. For a few hours, it almost felt peaceful.
Then Joss rode up beside me.
"Ryn," he said quietly. "We're being followed."
I didn't react. Didn't turn to look. "How long?"
"Since we left the temple. Maybe before. Two riders, staying back in the trees. They're good, but not good enough."
"Sael's men?"
"I counted. Everyone's accounted for."
I exhaled slowly. "How do you want to handle it?"
"We could set a trap. Send someone back to circle around, catch them between us."
"No. If they're watching, they're reporting. I want to know who they're reporting to."
"Then we let them follow?"
"For now. But keep eyes on them. If they get closer, we move."
Joss nodded and dropped back to ride with Maer. I saw them exchange words, saw Maer glance toward the tree line without making it obvious.
Good. He was learning.
I rode on, the map secure in my saddlebags, the token warm in my pocket, and the weight of unseen eyes pressing against my back.
Two weeks to Cerasis.
Two weeks to find answers.
Two weeks to survive.