Something in the way he said it made the air feel thinner.
“Yes.” Jack didn’t elaborate.
The Archivist took a single step forward.
The temperature dropped again.
Madelaine felt it in her bones and resisted every screaming impulse to move back a step.Don’t speak.
“The Paladin Courier,” the Archivist said, “is always precise.”
Another step. “Always punctual.” He moved closer. “Always…singular.”
Jack straightened his posture. “Singular has more than one meaning,” he responded.
Madelaine’s throat tightened. The Archivist of Silence still hadn’t looked at her. Not directly. Perhaps evenhewas not allowed to acknowledge her, though they were well within the depths of the space on Malvoraxis Veil where he had absolute dominion.
“Are you one with the Paladin Courier?” the Archivist asked, his voice slightly lower, as if it were secret information.
So secret that Madelaine had not expected the question. What didthatmean?Onewith the Paladin Courier? She had not prepped Jack for that phrase because she didn’t know what it meant. She was silently flailing within herself, trying not to make any sound.
Madelaine briefly pressed her eyelids closed and willed Jack to give the correct answer, whatever the right answer might be. She wasn’t certain.
Was this the reason they had to get married? Was this the reason she’d had to bring not only a trusted male to speak for her on this dark, malevolent planet, but a husband? Together, they were united as one in matrimony. Was that the key?
Her eyes opened again, but she forced herself to stare ahead and not at either man.
“Yes. I am one with the Paladin Courier,” Jack stated in a clear, unequivocal voice after barely a pause.
The Archivist of Silence nodded. “Then we may proceed to the next step.”
Jack didn’t slouch or look relieved. He said, “I carry the authorization.”
A beat of silence. “Show the proof of your authorization.”
Jack reached slowly into his jacket, every movement deliberate, visible. He withdrew the token—the marker, the smooth black stone—and held it out.
The Archivist regarded it. Then his hand lifted, his long fingers, pale against the dark, accepted the token. He turned it over once in his palm. Then twice.
“The path you travel was foretold,” the Archivist murmured.
Not to Jack. Not exactly. Madelaine’s heart pounded wildly in her chest.
He knows. He knows that I am the Paladin Courier. He must.
“The Paladin Courier would come,” the Archivist continued. “Bearing silence. Bearing purpose. Providing a token. Exhibiting a singleness, a oneness that would allow the transaction to proceed.”
A pause.
Long enough to break someone weaker.
Jack’s voice cut clean through it.
“Yes. As required, I am here as representative for the designation of the Paladin Courier.”
The Archivist went still.
Completely still.
