Chapter 9

“Ask Elena what Solis means.”

The whisper died behind the wall.

Neither Lucian nor I moved. The King’s study seemed to hold its breath around us. Beyond the tall windows, a bell sounded once, then twice, and silence returned.

Lucian crossed the room and pressed his palm against the stone where the voice had come from. “Move away from the wall.”

I obeyed reluctantly, not because I trusted him, but because I had no wish to be caught between a hidden passage and a prince looking for another reason to blame me.

He traced the stonework, pressing one block, then another. Nothing happened.

“Someone was there,” I said.

“I heard the voice.”

“Good. I was worried your hearing had suffered along with your shoulder.”

He pressed a narrow carving near the floor. The stone shifted slightly.

“There,” I said.

A faint click sounded inside the wall. Lucian drew his dagger.

“Stay behind me.”

He tried the carving again, then the stones beside it. The wall remained shut. Whatever mechanism he had triggered had either jammed or required something else.

“Look for anything out of place,” he ordered.

I searched the shelves, scanning old books and sealed scrolls. Dust covered the wood except for a clean, narrow space between two volumes. I pointed out the gap.

“I negotiated seven minutes in the archive, not a position as your servant.”

“You’ll have your seven minutes when I know this room is secure.”

He reached into the gap and withdrew a small silver ring. Its crest showed two overlapping crescents around a divided sun.

The room seemed to tilt.

I knew that symbol from papers my mother had hidden beneath the false bottom of a wooden chest. Some things are safer when they remain unnamed, Elena.

“You recognise it,” Lucian said.

“No.”

“You answered too quickly.”

“Would you prefer I take time to invent a better lie?”

“I prefer the truth.”

“Then you should have chosen a different prisoner.”

He held the ring between us. “Two crescents. A divided sun. Does it mean anything?”

A second object lay on the desk: another ring, this one bearing the royal seal. Lucian placed it beside the first.

“These were found in my father’s study,” he said. “Someone knows this room well enough to move through it unseen. A voice tells me to question you about a name you claim not to recognise. You expect me to believe this is coincidence?”

Footsteps sounded outside. Three measured knocks followed.

“Enter,” Lucian called.

Cassian came in with two guards. His eyes moved from Lucian’s bandaged shoulder to the disturbed wall.

“We heard someone inside it,” Lucian explained. “There may be a concealed passage.”

Cassian ordered the guards to search the corridor, adjoining rooms, servants’ stairs, and every access point to the study. Then he turned to Lucian.

“The High Council has convened. Elder Vane requested an emergency hearing. He says your investigation has been compromised.”

“The elder is waiting,” Cassian said. “Refusing to attend will give him more leverage.”

Lucian looked at me. “She comes with us.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Because if someone is using you against me, I want to see how.”

“And if you’re using me?”

“Then you should be afraid.”

The Council chamber was built from black stone, its seats arranged in a crescent beneath the Crescent Pack insignia. Elder Vane sat at the centre, silver-haired and immaculate, his pale eyes settling on me as though I were an animal brought into a respectable room.

“You have kept the Council waiting, Prince Lucian.”

“I was investigating my father’s murder.”

“An investigation that has become personal,” Vane replied. He listed the human-made dagger, the missing ledger evidence, the murdered servant, and my presence in the King’s study. He omitted my abduction and the attempt on my life.

“The prisoner was attacked while we followed a lead,” Lucian said. “Suspicion is not proof.”

“Then let the investigation proceed under proper supervision,” Vane replied. He demanded supervised questioning, a Council representative for any examination of the King’s papers, and an end to private meetings.

Lucian’s jaw tightened. Refusing would give Vane an excuse to challenge his judgement while the kingdom was unstable.

“Fine,” Lucian said at last. “Questioning will be supervised. One Council representative may observe the examination of the King’s papers. But the Council will not direct the investigation. Interfering with evidence or Commander Cassian’s duties will be treated as obstruction.”

Vane accepted the restrictions with a faint smile. He had wanted leverage, and now he had some.

Vane’s restrictions were explicit: no archive access without a Council witness, not even the seven minutes Lucian had promised me. Lucian’s expression hardened, but he did not challenge the order again. The delay felt deliberate. Someone had brought us to the edge of a discovery, then placed the Council between us and the records that might explain it. The ruling left us fewer answers.

When the hearing ended, Cassian caught up with me in the corridor. “Vane rarely accuses anyone without deciding what he hopes to gain.”

“Does he believe I killed the King?”

“I don’t know. I have opinions, but none is useful without evidence. Tell me this: did you recognise the crest?”

“I’ve seen something similar in my mother’s papers.”

“Did she explain it?”

“No.”

“Lucian will ask again. Vane may too, and he won’t be patient.”

I understood the warning.

Before midnight, I was taken to a small chamber beside the royal study. Lucian waited at a table with the silver ring and an old parchment. My seven minutes in the archive remained unfulfilled; the Council’s restrictions had already made access more complicated.

The parchment’s edges were brittle, and moisture had damaged much of the writing. A cracked royal seal marked one corner. Then I saw the handwriting: the long curve of the E, the sharp angle of the V, and the strokes crossed twice.

My mother’s.

Lucian watched me. “Do you recognise it?”

“No.”

“This was concealed inside the wall behind my father’s study. Cassian found it after the mechanism opened.”

“Perhaps someone copied her handwriting.”

“Why would anyone do that?”

“To deceive you.”

“And why involve you?”

“Ask the person whispering through your walls.”

Lucian pointed to a faint impression beneath the damaged seal. Two crescents and a divided sun had been pressed into the paper. A dark line crossed the crest, erasing only the sun.

“Your mother knew my father,” he said.

“I don’t know.”

“Then we’ll find out.”

He slipped the parchment into a leather case and turned toward the door. I had come to the Citadel carrying peace terms. Now I was trapped in a murder investigation that seemed to know my family better than I did.

The whisper returned to my thoughts. It had not said, Find out what Solis means. It had said, Ask Elena what Solis means.

Someone believed I knew the answer.

And if that person had arranged for us to find this document, the danger was no longer simply that Lucian might discover my mother’s secret.

The danger was that someone else had decided I should discover it too,someone who knew exactly where to place the truth, and exactly how much of it to let me see.