Chapter 230: Who paid him? (1) [BONUS]

The Reaper returned that evening, as he had every evening since Encrid woke.

He settled into the chair beside the bed, resting his hands on his knees. The lamp on the table cast a warm light across the room, while the quiet sounds of the house drifted in from beyond the door. Somewhere nearby, Sera was reading aloud to someone who never answered her. Encrid suspected she was reading to Pudding again.

He had spent most of the day thinking about the conversation he needed to have. Now that the Reaper was here, he found himself wishing he could put it off for another day.

He could not afford to.

"I need to ask you something," Encrid said. "About your daughter."

The Reaper turned his eyes toward him and waited.

"Ask."

"When I gave you those papers, I told you the Star Guide had been paid to interfere with her awakening. I asked you to find out who had paid him." Encrid paused briefly. "Did you manage to learn anything?"

"I asked him."

"What did he say?"

The Reaper glanced at the lamp. Its flame shifted slightly, disturbed by a draft coming through the window.

"He said a man approached him eleven years ago. The man wore an ordinary coat and had an unremarkable face. He brought a large quantity of gold and a set of instructions for the awakening. There were only a few changes to the original procedure, small alterations to the pattern that would have seemed harmless to anyone who did not understand their purpose."

A child’s body was still pure, and their Star Energy channels had not yet begun to narrow or become obstructed. If a Star Guide carefully circulated Star Energy through those channels before the child’s awakening, it could clear them and help the child immensely in the future. When the time came to awaken their Star, their body would be better prepared to receive and circulate Star Energy.

It was a well-known practice among those who could afford a skilled Star Guide, and the Reaper had wanted the same advantage for his daughter. He had believed that preparing her body early would give her a better foundation for cultivation and allow her to go further than she otherwise might have.

He had never imagined that his attempt to secure her future would become a curse that followed her for the rest of her life.

"The Star Guide claimed he did not know what those changes would do. I believe him. He was not clever enough to devise something like that on his own."

"And the man who paid him?"

"Gone. The name he gave was false, and the lodging he used burned down the following winter. The Star Guide could not describe his face in any useful detail." The Reaper’s expression remained unchanged. "I have spent a year searching for him. I have found nothing. Not a single lead worth following."

Encrid nodded. That was more or less what he had expected.

"Then stop looking for him."

The Reaper’s eyes sharpened.

"He was a messenger," Encrid explained. "He carried the gold and delivered the instructions, but he wasn’t the one who decided to do it. Finding him might tell you who hired him, but it would not necessarily lead you to the person responsible. He could have been working for an intermediary who was working for someone else."

"Then who should I look for?"

"I’ve been thinking about that since I woke up. I want to talk through what I’ve worked out, if you don’t mind."

The Reaper inclined his head, giving him permission to continue.

"The man who paid the Star Guide knew three things. First, he knew you had a daughter. Second, he knew you were looking for a star guide. Not just the year or the season, but the timing closely enough to arrange everything beforehand. And third, he knew which Star Guide you had chosen."

Encrid shifted slightly against his pillows, careful not to put pressure on his healing wounds.

"How many people knew all three things eleven years ago?"

The Reaper did not answer immediately.

His face remained calm, but something changed in his eyes. He seemed to be going through old memories, considering each person who had been present at the time and the extent of what they had known.

Encrid waited.

"Seven," the Reaper said at last.

"Including you?"

"Including me. And the Star Guide himself."

"That leaves five others."

"Yes. Five others who knew about my daughter and were aware of the arrangements for her awakening. All of them were with me at the time."

"Are they still with you?"

The Reaper fell silent.

This time, the pause lasted much longer. His gaze lowered slightly, although his hands remained resting on his knees. Encrid watched him work through the answer, understanding what it meant before the Reaper finally spoke.

"Yes."

Encrid did not need to say anything more.

The numbers were simple enough. Seven people had known. One was the father, and another was the Star Guide who had accepted the gold. That left five people who had been close enough to the Reaper to know the details, people who had remained with him through the eleven years that followed.

One of them had betrayed him.

The Reaper sat motionless, his hands resting in the same position as before. His expression had not changed, and he made no attempt to conceal his thoughts because there was nothing on his face to conceal.

Yet the flame in the lamp stopped moving.

The draft from the window seemed to disappear, and the air in the room grew so still that Encrid became aware of his own breathing.

For a moment, it felt as though the entire room had fallen silent with the man sitting beside his bed.

"Who paid him?" the Reaper asked.

His voice was quiet, but Encrid could hear the weight behind the question.

"I don’t know who gave the order," Encrid replied. "But I think I know who they worked for."

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