Chapter 10

“Your mother knew my father.”

Lucian’s words remained between us long after he spoke. I stared at the leather case beneath his arm. The parchment connected two people who should never have shared a secret.

My mother had lived quietly in the Eastern Marches. King Alistair had ruled a kingdom that considered humans beneath its notice. What business could they have had with each other?

“I’ve answered your questions,” I said.

“No. You’ve avoided them.”

“Then ask better questions.”

His golden eyes narrowed. “You recognise the crest. You recognise your mother’s handwriting. And you know something about Solis that you’re determined to keep from me.”

“I know your father is dead, people accuse me instead of investigating, and Elder Vane wants to undermine you. Everything else is speculation.”

“Convenient.”

“Reality often is, when it disagrees with your suspicions.”

He placed the leather case on the table. “Did your mother ever tell you she knew the King?”

“No.”

That answer was true.

“Did she mention the crest?”

I remembered her warning whenever I approached the papers hidden beneath a floorboard. “No,” I said.

I kept my expression blank while questions crowded my mind. I dared not ask him yet.

Lucian studied me, then opened the door. “You’re going back to your cell.”

“You brought me here, showed me a document connecting my mother to your murdered father, and now you’re sending me away without an explanation?”

“I don’t owe you one.”

“You expect me to provide them, though.”

He stepped aside. “Whatever your mother knew about my father, someone went to considerable trouble to hide it. That makes it relevant to the investigation.”

“And if they were protecting someone?”

“Then they can explain themselves when I find them.”

“And if they were protecting me?”

For an instant, something changed in his expression. “Then they chose a remarkably ineffective method.”

The following morning, conversations stopped when I passed. Guards exchanged glances, and servants hurried away. Palace news travelled quickly, especially when it could become an accusation.

My escort brought me to a chamber adjoining the administrative wing. Cassian stood beside a narrow table, looking as though he hadn’t slept.

“Wait outside,” he ordered the guards.

When they withdrew, he pushed a stack of papers towards me. “The Council’s restrictions stand. Any examination of the King’s private documents must be witnessed by an authorised representative. Vane has also requested a formal review of the evidence against you.”

“Does that mean they’re going to execute me?”

“It means they want authority to decide what happens to you.”

“That sounds worse.”

“It could be.” He tapped the papers. “This is a list of documents removed from the King’s study after his death. Several items are missing from the official inventory. Some were moved before the guards secured the room; others are listed in the King’s register but cannot be found.”

“Could someone have moved them deliberately?”

“Of course.”

“Then why hasn’t the Council investigated?”

“Investigating missing documents is easier when they don’t threaten anyone important.”

The inventory listed treaties, land grants, and old disputes between human settlements and Lycan territories. Three documents had been moved from the royal archive within one week. Two were returned. The third had no recorded destination.

Its title had been partly crossed out.

“Who prepared this?”

“An archivist assigned to the King’s private collection.”

“Where is he?”

“Dead. Two days before the King was murdered. The official report says he fell down a staircase.”

“And you don’t believe it?”

“A man who spends his life with documents doesn’t usually forget how stairs work.”

I looked again at the damaged title. Beneath the crossed-out ink, I could make out the beginning of a word.

Sol—

I stopped.

Cassian noticed. “What is it?”

“The ink is damaged.”

“Show me.”

He studied the line, then watched my face. “You recognised something.”

“I recognised a damaged word.”

“Which word?”

“Does every conversation with you have to become an interrogation?”

“Only when you behave as though the paper has bitten you.”

He explained that the King had kept records predating the current Council, including agreements made before the Unification Laws and documents concerning territories missing from modern maps. He wanted me to examine the inventory because my knowledge of old treaties exceeded that of most people with access to the archive.

“Does Lucian know?”

“He authorised the examination.”

“Under Council supervision?”

“Not yet.”

“Then Elder Vane will love that distinction.”

“Vane can appreciate whatever he likes.”

Cassian’s expression sobered. “The Council is asking about the crest, where it came from, who recognised it, and whether it connects to the murder. Lucian told them no connection has been established.”

“Is that what he believes?”

“It’s what he can prove.”

I studied the inventory again. “Does Vane know about the parchment?”

Cassian went still. “What parchment?”

I had made a mistake.

“Elena,” he said quietly. “You’ve seen another document.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to.”

“I won’t tell you anything that could endanger someone until I know whom I can trust.”

“Someone?” His eyes sharpened, but he didn’t press me. “Whatever you found, someone else may know about it. Don’t assume the person asking questions wants the truth.”

Back in my cell, I arranged the clues into a pattern. Missing royal documents. A dead archivist. My mother’s handwriting in the King’s hidden parchment. A crest deliberately altered. They might be connected, or someone might have arranged them to make me believe they were.

I remembered the chest beneath the loose floorboard in my mother’s room: folded letters, old maps, and papers written in scripts I couldn’t read. One sheet bore the twin crescents and divided sun. When I reached for it, my mother had shouted, “Put it down.” She had never shouted at me before. Then she made me promise never to mention the papers again.

A guard brought my meal that afternoon. After he left, I noticed a folded scrap beneath the tray. Six words were written on it:

THE WALL WAS NOT THE ONLY ENTRANCE.

It could be a warning, threat, or bait. Someone had entered the King’s study unseen, hidden a parchment, and whispered Solis through the stone. Now they wanted me to know another entrance existed.

I hid the message beneath my mattress. Should I tell Lucian? He considered me a suspect, a problem, and possibly a key to a mystery he didn’t understand. Yet if the message was genuine, the hidden entrance might lead to evidence about his father’s murder. If it was a trap, he might be the only person with authority to investigate it.

A metallic scrape came from the wall behind my cot.

I held my breath.

The sound came again, followed by a faint click. A narrow seam appeared in the stone. I stepped back as the wall shifted just enough to reveal a dark gap.

Someone was breathing on the other side.

“Who’s there?” I whispered.

The breathing stopped.

Then a familiar voice emerged from the darkness, quiet and close.

“Still asking the wrong questions, Elena.”