The Dragon Warlord's Silent Bride

DIANA’S POV

The first three false deliveries had involved a dead man, an injured man, and a soldier who had been somewhere else entirely. The fourth receipt belonged to a living clerk who had been exactly where the document claimed.

Diana disliked the receipt immediately. The clerk had done nothing to deserve it.

The difference mattered.

The Citadel did not know what the junction looked like now.

The ward-signal network had carried only broad facts: West Rime was under pressure, North Spur was under attack, and the junction had reported an engineering emergency. Later, another signal confirmed enemy contact there as well.

Detailed field reports would arrive when they arrived.

Diana could do nothing about the distance.

She could keep working on the records already inside Blackharrow.

She sat in the larger audit room with Master Enric Marlon, Alma, two Command Logistics clerks, a Ward Artificer, and enough old transport records to make the windows feel decorative.

Before Raigoro left, Daric had widened the authorized audit to include the recent repair histories of West Rime, North Spur, and the junction connecting them.

Diana did not have current ward strengths or deployment records.

She did not need them.

The repair shipments were already in Blackharrow’s own archives.

The first pages were unhelpful.

So were the next twenty.

Diana rubbed chalk from the side of her hand and opened another folder.

Alma placed tea beside her.

Diana reached for the next page instead.

”You cannot drink that after it becomes paper.”

Diana took the cup.

Master Marlon looked toward Alma.

”Does that work?”

”Occasionally.”

Diana ignored both.

The junction maintenance records were more complicated than the family-relief cases that had brought her into the sabotage investigation.

Diana did not know which bracket held what, how much insulation a conduit needed, or why one repair used sixteen fittings while another used twenty-four. So she stopped trying to know the engineering and looked instead for disagreement in the dates, quantities, routes, names, weights, and returns.

The same method that had found six miners whose profession Diana did not understand well enough to rescue.

One shipment from four months earlier contained reinforced conduit brackets, anchor collars, insulating sleeves, structural plates, and mounting bolts.

Destination:

the lesser West Rime-North Spur junction.

The shipment had passed through Northline Provisioning Exchange.

Of course.

Diana checked the receiving record.

The receiving record showed everything delivered with no shortage noted. The officer existed, his rank was correct, and his duty record placed him at the junction that week.

There was no easy mistake to find.

Diana almost put it aside.

Then the transport invoice bothered her.

She did not know why at first. The page simply looked too small for several crates of heavy forged metal, especially when the transport invoice charged by freight weight.

Diana compared the number with another shipment of the same bracket type.

The first comparison used a different route but carried a similar quantity at a much heavier recorded weight. Diana pulled a third shipment and found the same pattern.

The junction shipment weighed far less.

Diana wrote: WHY IS THIS ONE SO LIGHT?

The Command Logistics clerk pulled the manifests toward him.

He did not answer immediately.

First he checked carrier class.

Then crate count.

Then whether the freight had been split across multiple wagons.

”It wasn’t.”

Diana pointed toward the comparable shipment.

The clerk looked at both weights again.

Master Marlon asked, ”Packaging?”

”Not enough to explain this.”

The Ward Artificer reached for the specification ledger.

”If these quantities are correct, this shipment is too light.”

He gave Diana the standard weight per reinforced bracket.

Diana calculated.

He calculated separately.

Their totals agreed.

Twenty-four reinforced brackets alone should have accounted for much more of the listed freight.

They still had plates, collars, bolts, and insulation to explain.

The artificer found the standard conduit bracket, which was lighter and similar in size but not approved for the junction’s pressure classification.

The last detailed engineering note received before Raigoro left West Rime had reported visible supports that did not match expected dimensions.

Nothing in the note proved they belonged to this shipment.

The possibility was now too dangerous to ignore.

Diana kept working.

They checked the rest of the freight rather than stopping at the first promising answer.

Brackets alone did not explain the missing weight.

Some of the listed structural plates should have added more.

The discrepancy crossed multiple heavy components.

The shipment had carried something to the junction.

It had simply not carried everything the receipt said it did.

Diana pulled a dispatch sheet toward her.

She wrote:

JUNCTION REPAIR SHIPMENT FREIGHT WEIGHT CANNOT CONTAIN LISTED REINFORCED HARDWARE.

Then:

FIELD REPORT OF UNDERSIZED SUPPORTS MAY CONNECT.

She paused.

Her office did not command battlefield movement.

So she finished:

URGENT STRUCTURAL VERIFICATION RECOMMENDED BEFORE CONCENTRATED TROOP OR WAGON LOAD.

Diana read it.

The logistics clerk read it too.

”That is what the records support.”

Good.

Diana took it to Daric.

Daric read the message standing beside the Citadel relay table.

He did not ask Diana to explain the arithmetic again.

Daric checked the attached manifests against the latest signal summary from the north.

JUNCTION: ENEMY CONTACT.

”Horse relay is too slow.”

Diana looked at him.

Daric turned to the Dragon Host duty officer.

”What do we have ready at the Citadel?”

”One reserve pair cleared for emergency courier or extraction. Another is on southern patrol.”

”I want the reserve pair.”

The officer hesitated.

”If Command needs them here...”

”Then I will regret this professionally.”

He handed over Diana’s sealed warning.

”Direct to the Grand Duke’s field command at the junction. No administrative stops. No return message required before they rest.”

The officer nodded and left.

Diana looked at Daric.

He said, ”Do not look pleased.”

She was not.

Daric continued.

”I have just removed one Dragon Host pair from Citadel readiness because your freight invoice frightened me.”

Diana wrote: GOOD.

”That was not encouragement.”

She knew.

Ordinary paperwork did not justify spending a Dragon Host pair.

A warning that several companies might be preparing to march over deliberately weakened infrastructure did.

Diana followed as far as the upper court.

The Dragon Host pair launched into the winter dark with the sealed warning secured to the field officer.

They would still need hours, and weather or battle could slow them further. Raigoro might already have crossed the junction before they arrived.

Diana could do nothing about that now.

She watched the dragons disappear north.

The warning was finally moving faster than a horse.

Whether it was moving fast enough was another question.