15 #2
“The will was drafted shortly before her passing. It places custody of the estate with me until the household debts are settled.”
I took the document and unfolded it.
It was heavy vellum, worn by time. At the top ran the slanted, elegant signature of Elayne Valen, unmistakable in the firm strokes of the capital letters.
But scanning down the body of the text, I stopped short: the bottom edge of the principal leaf had been sliced cleanly away with an apothecary’s blade, right below the clause of temporary administration, and the final succession clauses had been replaced by a notary’s addendum dated three years after her death.
I held the document to the oil lamp.
In the upper left margin, visible only against the light, lay the embossed impression of Elayne’s personal seal: a watermark showing a seashell over three undulating lines.
The symbol of the western tides.
The confirmation sent a sharp jolt straight down my spine.
I looked at Maevra with unyielding coldness.
“This document is mutilated, Lady Valen.”
“It is an enforceable copy authorized by the local clerk—”
“It is no enforceable copy,” I cut in, tapping my forefinger against the severed cut at the base of the parchment.
“The primary clause naming the universal heirs by blood was cut away from the body of the deed. And under the charter of the Crown of Eryndor, no parcel of an estate chartered under bloodline rights may be alienated, mortgaged, or divided without the express, signed consent of the direct heir upon reaching majority.”
Maevra clamped her jaw so hard the cords in her neck stood out against the velvet collar.
“Elayne’s only direct descendant is an ailing girl, a Beta suffering from chronic fevers who lacks the legal capacity to administer a working estate. I have sustained this house with my own dowry while the Crown looked the other way.”
“A subject’s legal capacity is not decided by a woman eager to sell off common land,” I replied, dropping the parchment back onto the desk with a sharp crack.
“It is decided by a blood court before the sovereign. Until the complete, original will is produced before Asteria’s chancery, any contract of sale with Master Barel or any other buyer is declared void and punishable under charge of fraud against the Crown. ”
Clerk Vael recorded the ruling in his ledger with swift strokes of his quill, while Maevra gathered up the document with stiff fingers, choking down venomous fury that twitched the corners of her mouth.
“As the sovereign commands.”
“Now,” I said, rising and adjusting my sword belt, “we move to the dispensary.”
The apothecary store and the ground-floor pantries occupied a shadowed corridor connecting the entrance hall with the service yard.
The air hung heavy with the smell of cured meats, rancid lard, bin-stored grain, and the pungent scent of dried herbs strung from the ceiling beams: wild thyme, chamomile, rue, and bitter willow leaves.
Iven Ardel examined the shelves with the thoroughness of a seasoned hunter, unstopping ceramic jars, sniffing salves, and logging every compound into his calfskin-bound notebook.
Thorne walked two paces behind him, hand on his sword hilt, nudging wicker chests and wooden toolboxes with the toe of his boot.
The captain’s eyes caught on a small shelf tucked behind a sack of rye flour.
He reached out with suspicious haste, seizing a dark glass bottle sealed with brown wax. Before Iven could turn, Thorne began sliding his hand into the inner pocket of his wool cloak.
“Captain Thorne.” My voice cut through the narrow corridor like held thunder.
The officer froze in mid-motion, fingers still inside the cloak lining.
Slowly, he turned his head toward me.
“My lord?”
I closed the distance at a measured pace, stopping a hand’s breadth from his shoulder.
“Take your hand out of your cloak.”
Thorne swallowed. A flicker of defiance crossed his face before military discipline forced him to yield.
He drew his hand back slowly, holding the bottle between thumb and forefinger.
“It was only a discarded sample, my lord. Some leftover household tonic. I intended to inventory it later at the outer table so as not to delay Doctor Ardel’s work.”
“In this inspection, no samples are pocketed in private coats, Captain,” I said, holding out my gloved palm. “Hand it to Iven.”
Thorne gripped the bottle hard before laying it in my hand.
I passed the flask to the royal physician without taking my eyes off the officer.
“If I catch you removing another vial, a single scrap of parchment, or a pinch of powder without logging it in the Crown’s official record, I will march you back to Asteria on foot under guard of your own men. Am I clear?”
“Completely clear, my lord,” Thorne muttered through clenched teeth, snapping to attention with a stiffness brimmed with resentment.
Iven unstopped the flask with practiced skill, dipped a strip of test paper into the brown liquid, and brought it near the tallow candle.
The paper turned a leaden blue almost at once.
The physician glanced sidelong at me, brows lifting in an eloquent sign only I could read.
“Common low-grade suppressant, Darian,” Iven pronounced aloud, for every ear present. “Lead acetate, willow bark, and vegetable ash. The same adulterated filth poisoning half the tenant folk on this plateau. No prohibited alkaloids or inversion resins, but it is dangerous for human consumption.”
I looked at the empty shelf.
*She was taking this,* I thought, a bitter pang tightening in my chest. *Years spent poisoning her liver and glands in this house so no one would discover her blood.*
“Confiscate the entire lot, Iven,” I ordered. “Leave not a single bottle of this poison on the estate’s shelves. Let’s move to the yard. It’s time to examine the staff.”
The service yard was a rectangular paved court, hemmed in by the blank stone wall of the stables, the washhouse, and the rear facade of the manor house.
The north wind scoured the wet flagstones, kicking up curls of frost and swirling ash billowing from the kitchen chimney flues.
A dozen people stood lined up in a quiet, terrified row: plow hands in patched homespun, laundresses with raw hands red from freezing water, old Barek stooped and watchful, and Mina, the cook, compulsively wiping her palms against her twill apron.
At the end of the line, standing beside the jamb of the service door leading down to the cellar, stood a slender figure dressed in a skirt of coarse gray wool, a faded brown bodice, and a hemp apron knotted at the waist with a rough cord.
Her dark brown hair was bound in a tight braid against the nape of her neck, head bowed, eyes fixed on the mortar seams between the stones.
My chest seized with a sudden jolt, a dull blow that locked the air in my lungs for an entire heartbeat.
My primal wolf surged upright within my flesh, setting claws into my ribs with a silent howl that tightened around my throat.
I forced myself to breathe slowly, resting my left hand on my sword pommel to keep my composure from cracking.
I walked behind Iven as the royal physician set up his small wooden tripod and arranged porcelain plates, litmus reagents, and silver lancets across a folding table.
Thorne and two escort soldiers took positions flanking the line, watching the servants with hard stares.
Iven began the procedure with methodical calm.
He took a saliva sample with a glass rod, scraped the skin lightly behind each person’s earlobe to gather glandular secretions, and touched two drops of reagent to the plate.
One by one, the servants were pronounced healthy Betas or working Alphas with no scent anomalies.
Then came the cook, Mina, who submitted to the test trembling like an aspen leaf.
“Clean,” Iven said, noting her name in the ledger. “You may return inside.”
Then Iven gestured to the last figure in the line.
“Next.”
The girl took two steps forward.
She moved with deliberate slowness meant to suggest the frailty of an invalid, but beneath the coarse brown wool and humble posture, I recognized the wiry strength of her shoulders, the firm line of her neck, and the precise shape of her slender wrists.
*It’s her.*
There was no doubt in my mind.
She was the same woman who had danced in the Solstice Hall beneath a silver mask, the same who had moved through the citadel’s corridors with the lightness of a shadow, the same gray wolf who had cleared the palisade in the dead of winter night.
The air in the yard brought me her presence.
I drew a quiet, held breath, searching the wind for the heady burst of rain, warm stone, and night flower that had scorched my blood during the Winter Wheel.
Yet what reached my nostrils was entirely different:
She smelled of lye-washed cloth, holm-oak smoke, the fatigue of recent fever, and the harsh, bitter trace of ash soap.
The very same ash soap that had soaked the sleeves of the man’s doublet Iven tested in the east tower.
The Omega scent was muted, buried beneath a thin but effective layer of household suppressant that muffled her designation, passing her off as a Beta worn down by the plateau’s freeze.
Iven stepped toward her with lancet and glass rod.
“Name.”
The girl did not lift her face; she answered in a low voice, slightly raspy from disuse:
“Liora.”
“Are you kin or household staff, Liora?” Iven asked gently, his tone near compassionate.
“Working drudge in the kitchen and washhouse, sir,” she said, looking at no one.
Iven brought the rod to her neck, lightly touching the skin behind her left ear.
I tracked the physician’s fingers: his eyes widened by barely a fraction of a millimeter as he felt the inflamed swelling of the gland beneath the skin, yet his face remained blank as carved marble.
He set the sample onto the porcelain plate and added a drop of potash reagent.
The mixture clouded into a dull, muddy amber.
“Delayed reaction from seasonal fever and willow decoctions,” Iven pronounced, wiping the plate with a clean cloth. “Beta designation. Health status: moderate debility. No traces of combat alkaloids or unregulated resins.”