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Then Talia opened the final archive.
The royal identifier.
I watched Anik’s face.
Nothing happened at first.
He read the access history.
One query.
Then another.
Then another.
His finger stopped on the third line. He did not turn the page. He read it a second time, then a third, and his thumb pressed flat against the edge of the display as though he might erase it by touch.
“Where did you get this?”
Talia looked at the screen. “That identifier?”
“Yes.”
“Archived reproductive-access records. Six years ago.”
Anik did not move. His shoulders stayed level. Only his hand shifted, one finger drawing a slow line down the margin of the access log, and when he reached the credential string he stopped there, and his nail left a pale mark on the screen’s surface.
Talia’s voice became more cautious. “You know whose it is.”
His gaze stayed on the screen. “I know the credential.”
The words came out slower than his others, each one given its own space, and I felt something cold settle beneath my ribs.
Talia glanced at me, then back at him. “One of your brothers.”
Anik finally looked at her. “It belongs to the royal secondary line.”
“Which means one of your brothers used it.”
“It means one of them had access through that credential.”
Not quite an answer. Not yet.
“Which one?” Talia asked.
Silence. He did not answer.
Instead, he stepped closer to the display. “Show me the full trail.”
Talia pulled the sequence up one screen at a time.
Access log, reproductive archives. The same credential, six times in two days.
Biological manifests. Sample counts, transfer dates, destination codes
Archive reconciliation reports. Three of them, each marked REVIEWED and filed under a different protocol number.
The note fragments. DISCREPANCY CONFIRMED on the first page. REPEAT PATTERN on the third.
