Kyrie Ironhowl's Arc

Chapter 5 of 13

Kyrie left the registry office and descended to the main floor of the competition hall. The building had wings she'd never needed to explore before — storage rooms, judge's chambers, administrative offices. If the noble competitor had entered this competition through influence rather than skill, there would be records. Payment receipts, sponsorship letters, anything that proved they'd bought their way in. She needed proof before she could expose them, and that meant finding where the competition organizers kept their private files. She found the records annex at the rear of the hall, a timber cabin built into the stone structure like an afterthought. The door was solid oak with an intricate lock, the kind that took time and skill to pick. Kyrie knelt and pulled her tools from her vest, working the pins carefully. The lock gave with a soft click. Inside, wooden shelves lined the walls, stacked with leather binders and dusty files. She scanned the labels until she found the current year's entries, pulled the binder down, and flipped to the noble's name. There it was — a sponsorship letter from the house, a waiver of standard workshop verification, and a payment receipt three times the normal entry fee. She photographed each page with steady hands. Then the door opened behind her. A competition official stood in the doorway, eyes wide, hand already moving toward the whistle at his belt. Kyrie didn't run. She closed the binder, slid it back onto the shelf, and met his gaze. "I have proof one of your competitors bought their entry," she said. "You can throw me out, or you can look at what I found." He hesitated, hand still on the whistle. Then he stepped inside and shut the door.