CHAPTER 8
THE KING'S brOKEN TRUST
The attack was small.
Too small.
Aldric knew immediately.
Someone wasn't trying to conquer the palace.
They were testing its defenses.
"Who ordered the attack?" he demanded.
The guards brought in a captured soldier.
The man refused to speak.
Elena approached.
Aldric stopped her.
"No."
"I can hear memories."
"You don't know what that power might do to you."
"Then help me control it."
He hesitated.
Finally, he nodded.
Elena touched the soldier's hand.
The world disappeared.
She saw Varian.
She saw the soldier receiving orders.
But the face of the person giving those orders remained hidden.
Then she saw something else.
A hidden chamber beneath Moonstone Hall.
Aldric pulled Elena away.
She collapsed against him.
"What did you see?"
"The chamber."
His expression changed.
"What chamber?"
"Beneath the palace."
Aldric went silent.
"I've searched this palace for twenty years."
"Then you were searching the wrong places."
They found the entrance behind the throne.
Inside were dozens of old documents.
One contained a royal family tree.
The heir's name had been erased.
But beneath it was another name.
The Keeper of the First Blood.
Elena touched the page.
The ink changed.
A message appeared.
When the heir returns, the crown must choose between blood and power.
Aldric looked at Elena.
"What does that mean?"
"I don't know."
A sound echoed behind them.
Footsteps.
They turned.
Varian stood at the entrance.
"You should have left the past buried."
Aldric drew his sword.
"You knew."
Varian smiled.
"I knew everything."