The Seradin Private Clinic stood beyond the north gate of the marquess's estate.
Despite its name, it was closer to a warehouse than a hospital.
White walls, narrow windows, a heavy door. And four private soldiers standing before it.
The moment he dismounted, Rowan began by counting.
"Four in sight."
"And out of sight?"
"One on the roof. Two by the stables behind the building."
Mira looked up at the clinic.
"I can't tell whether they're guarding the sick or keeping them from leaving."
"It could be both."
Kael looked at the inscription above the door. The crests of House Seradin and the Temple's healing emblem had been carved there together.
Money and miracles. When the two hung from the same door, it was usually the people inside who became expensive.
[Seradin Private Clinic]
[Surface Purpose: Medical Support for House Seradin Employees and Partner Trading Companies]
[Actual Functions: Medicine Storage, Sale of Treatment Priority, Debt Offsets]
[Recent Intake: 5 Bottles of Fever-Reducing Distillate]
Five bottles.
It matched the records. Some of the fourteen bottles were here.
The clinic door opened. Ramun Kael emerged. His face was as pale as ever.
"You've come."
"I was invited."
"I heard you called it a trap."
"Was I wrong?"
Without answering, Ramun stepped aside.
"See for yourself."
Kael went inside. The clinic was clean. Too clean.
There was no dust on the floor, and the bedclothes were white. It looked like a room arranged to show people what sick patients looked like.
Mira said quietly,
"The smell is strange."
"Isn't it medicine?"
Rowan asked.
"It is medicine, but there isn't much of a human smell."
Rowan swept his gaze across the beds at the end of the corridor, then gave the smallest nod.
"This feels less like a clinic and more like a well-scrubbed evidence storage room."
Mira looked at him.
"Sir, the way you speak is starting to sound more and more like the young master's."
"Is that disgraceful?"
"No. It means it's dangerous. Every word turns straight into a ledger."
Rowan considered that for a moment before replying.
"Then I will speak carefully. This is a well-scrubbed evidence storage room."
"That wasn't careful at all."
Kael felt it too. Moans, coughs, wet cloths, the warmth of people who had been lying in bed for a long time. There was too little of all that here.
Three beds stood along one side of the corridor. Two were empty. A bandaged man lay in the third. The instant he saw Kael's group, he shut his eyes.
Pretending to sleep.
That reaction was a ledger too.
The patients here were less people receiving treatment than proof that the clinic was operating.
Ramun said,
"This is a private treatment facility managed by House Seradin. There is no obligation to disclose its affairs."
"But you summoned me."
"At Lord Viktor's wish."
"Is that wish in a ledger too?"
"Most wishes remain in a ledger."
Ramun answered briefly.
Kael found that manner of speaking unsettling. Ramun knew what he was conveying.
"Fever-Reducing Distillate."
Kael said.
"Five bottles came here."
Ramun did not deny it at once.
"According to the records."
"Good. Then let's start with the records."
The records room was at the end of the corridor. A Temple seal had been affixed to its door.
Mira narrowed her eyes.
"Another Temple seal."
Rowan asked, "Is it a good thing when a private clinic has a Temple seal on it?"
"It's the worst. The private operation can earn the money, while the responsibility hides behind the Temple."
Ramun pretended not to hear and opened the door.
Thin ledgers lined the shelves inside.
Treatment recipient lists. Medicine usage records. Donation ledgers. Debt-offset lists.
Kael stopped at the last title.
"Debt offsets."
Ramun said,
"It is a system for those who cannot pay their treatment costs."
"A nice phrase."
"Many people receive help through it."
"Help always has a price."
Kael opened the ledger.
[Sale of Treatment Priority]
[Eligible Parties: Families of Seradin Employees, Partner Trading Companies, Junior Officials of the Military Supply Office]
[Fever-Reducing Distillate Used: 1 Bottle]
One bottle. Of the five, only one had actually been used.
"The other four."
Ramun said,
"In storage."
"Where?"
"In refrigerator No. 2."
Mira turned her head.
"Not a cold vault, but a refrigerator?"
"It is clinic terminology."
"Merchants usually use words like that when they're changing prices."
Ramun did not answer.
Kael turned the page.
Five bottles of Fever-Reducing Distillate. Received. One used. Four in storage.
But the Eye of Settlement saw another line.
[Reserved for Release]
[Quantity: 4 Bottles]
[Purpose: Treatment Priority Auction]
[Scheduled Time: Tonight]
Kael did not smile.
"They aren't in storage. You were planning to sell them tonight."
Mira peered into the ledger. "To whom?"
[Expected Bidders: Hyrun Medicinal Trading Company, Representative of the Bracken Barony]
Bracken. The name tied to Ria's marriage proposal. It was not a coincidence.
Medicine, marriage proposals, debt. Seradin was placing human weakness and shortages of goods on the same ledger.
"The Bracken Barony."
When Kael spoke the name, Mira's face hardened. "It reaches that far?"
"Yes."
Rowan said quietly,
"Did they tie Lady Ria's name to a medicine ledger?"
"Not directly. That's worse."
Kael closed the ledger.
"When the price of medicine rises, more houses fail to repay their debts. Then marriage proposals and guardianship contracts become cheaper."
Mira bit her lip.
"The more people are sick, the cheaper marriage proposals get."
"That's this clinic's ledger."
Ramun remained silent.
Silence was not a denial.
Kael looked at him.
"What did Viktor want to show me here?"
"How much the young master can read."
"And?"
"How far you can move after reading it."
It was honest.
"Why are you so honest?"
"Lord Viktor does the lying."
Mira blinked.
Ramun's expression did not change.
"I usually convey things."
Ramun was dangerous. He knew the boundary between an order and something that was not an order.
Kael looked at the records again.
Four of the five bottles were to be auctioned tonight. Two had gone to the Temple. Seven were headed toward the Eastern Border Outpost.
Those seven were the problem.
If they had already gone toward the outpost, they could save people. But if Seradin had sent them, they were unlikely to be there only for treatment.
Kael turned the page.
[Supply Shipment to the Eastern Border Outpost]
[Fever-Reducing Distillate: 7 Bottles]
[Condition: Treatment Priority List Attached]
Kael's hand stopped.
A treatment priority list.
If illness spread through the outpost, everyone needed medicine. But a ledger had been attached to decide who would be saved first.
It resembled the work Kael had done in the Treasury Office in his past life.
[List Criteria: Sponsoring House, Guarantee Potential, Future Employment Value]
Rowan asked quietly,
"What does it say?"
"They put price tags on the soldiers."
"On soldiers?"
"To decide who gets the medicine first."
Rowan said nothing for a long time.
He was a knight. On the battlefield, people decided whom to send forward first. But a ledger before sick soldiers was something else.
"That isn't a battlefield."
"No."
Kael said quietly,
"It's a ledger."
And a ledger killed for longer.
[Unpaid Survival Cost]
[Target: 312 Soldiers of the Eastern Border Outpost]
[Individual List Available for Review]
Kael stopped breathing.
An individual list.
Until now, the Eye of Settlement had mostly shown the flow of money, supplies, and rights. It had never displayed names directly.
Kael instinctively wanted to close his eyes.
Closing them would make this no different from his past life.
[Aren Molt]
[Age: 19]
[Condition: Expected to Develop a Fever]
[Survival Cost: 0.03 Bottle of Fever-Reducing Distillate, Water for 2 Days, Rest for 1 Day]
[High Probability of Death if Preservation Fails]
The next name.
[Derek Houn]
[Age: 27]
[Dependent Family Members: 3]
[Survival Cost: 0.04 Bottle of Fever-Reducing Distillate]
The next.
[Milas Penn]
[Age: 16]
[Suspected Conscription Age Falsification]
Kael's fingertips grew cold. Sixteen. Only four years older than Ian.
In his past life, Ian had left home at fifteen. The records had called him `Auxiliary Transport Personnel.` Even after he died, his name had appeared late on the casualty list.
Auxiliary Transport Personnel. Words that made a child into something other than a child.
The list tried to continue appearing. Names, ages, costs, deaths.
Kael braced a hand on the desk.
His temples burned as though they were on fire.
Mira asked urgently, "Kael?"
Rowan stepped forward.
"Young Master."
Even Ramun's expression changed.
"Do not overexert yourself."
Kael steadied his breathing.
Do not overexert yourself. Someone had said that in his past life too. Right after that, he cut the allocation again.
Others had paid the price for him not overexerting himself.
Not this time.
"Edric."
Edric came forward at once.
"Yes."
"Record this."
"What should I record?"
"A treatment priority list is attached to the supplies headed for the Eastern Border Outpost. That list determines priority not by severity of illness, but by sponsoring house, guarantee potential, and future employment value."
Edric's face hardened. His pen did not stop.
"And send the seven bottles of Fever-Reducing Distillate to the outpost immediately, but destroy the treatment priority list. The criterion is severity of illness."
Ramun said,
"You do not have the authority to do that."
"Then write a confirmation of no authority."
Ramun stopped.
Kael looked at him.
"The Seradin clinic set the survival priority of soldiers according to sponsoring house and employment value, then refused Riorden's demand for redistribution based on severity of illness. Should I write that?"
Ramun did not answer.
This was Viktor's board. But the moment it was made public, the cost would change.
"That wording requires Lord Viktor's confirmation."
"Good. Get it confirmed."
"That is difficult at the moment."
"Then a confirmation of deferral."
Ramun's eyes narrowed just a little.
"You are quite fond of confirmations, Young Master."
"No."
Kael said coldly,
"You people do too many things you don't want confirmed."
Silence fell for a moment.
Mira said quietly, "We've sealed the four bottles, and we can stop the four here at the clinic too. But if the seven headed for the outpost are already moving..."
"Then we catch them."
"How?"
Kael read the last line of the transport record.
[Transport Route: Northeastern Supply Road]
[Intermediate Stop: Revan Bridge Checkpoint]
[Expected Arrival: 2 Days from Now]
It was not too late yet.
"Revan Bridge."
Rowan reacted at once. "With two horses, I can reach it before tonight."
"Can you go?"
"I can."
"Not alone."
Mira said,
"Words alone won't get through at the checkpoint. We need documents."
Edric tore off a sheet from the record and held it out.
"I can make it into a temporary preservation request."
Kael nodded.
"Rowan, go to Revan Bridge. Edric, draft the preservation request. Mira, verify the Hyrun transport seal."
"What about you, Kael?"
Mira asked.
Kael looked at the clinic ledger. "I will lock down the four bottles left here."
"You said it was a trap."
"Exactly why."
Kael looked at Ramun.
"Before the trap's door closes, we have to drive in the nails from the inside."
Ramun smiled faintly.
"I see why Lord Viktor likes you, Young Master."
"That's a loss."
"It will likely become a greater loss soon."
"For whom?"
Ramun did not answer.
What mattered now was not Ramun's true intentions.
The transport route, the checkpoint, the Fever-Reducing Distillate. And the names of three hundred and twelve people.
[Unpaid Survival Cost]
[Remaining Targets: 312 People]
[Time Remaining for Emergency Recovery: 1 Day 11 Hours]
Time was running out.
It felt as though he could hear the sound of an hourglass in the Treasury Office of his past life. But this was not a conference room.
The decision was already made.
"Move."
Kael said.
Rowan bowed at once.
"Just give the order."
"It's not an order."
Kael closed the ledger.
"It's a bill."
He looked at the door to refrigerator No. 2, still unopened.
"Before those who borrowed repay what they owe, we save the living first."