She leaned forward until her forehead touched the hearth's warm headstones.

"Oh, Chap," she whispered. "What would you do?"

He'd rebelled against his kin, the Fay, not only to save her life, but to do what he knew was right for those he watched over. In becoming an outcast among his kind, even an enemy to them, he found the courage to bear that sacrifice.

Wynn gazed into the hearth's low embers.

If—when—she ever saw Chap again, how could she look him in the eyes unless she found the same in herself?

Chapter 6

At midmorning Rodian stepped from the city ministry hall overlooking the bay with two addresses in hand: one for Selwyn Midton's shop and the other for the man's home. He'd heard of charges filed against an illicit moneylender but never connected this to either deceased sage.

Once mounted upon Snowbird, Rodian turned eastward through thr city.

The inner business district was closest to the royal grounds. He passed one small bank with polished granite steps and a fine inn of massive size called the Russet Palace. Visiting merchants and even the wealthier ones of Calm Seatt often retained residency there for a whole season. He should've been relieved to have uncovered anything besides the guild itself to investigate, but instinct told him to focus on the contents of those missing folios.

And yet Duchess Reine had asked him to follow other leads.

He passed through the merchant district's fringe, filled with respectable and utilitarian shops for basic necessities. Then he slowed to carefully guide Snowbird through a bustling open-air market.

Why were the royals, the duchess included, protecting the sages and their project? He still remembered going before her inquest tribunal in the main hall of the greatest of the three castles. At first he hadn't cared for the arrangement.

The royals of old had established a rule for all citizens to be held accountable in like fashion. Legal proceedings were always held at the city's high court, prosecuted by the high advocate of the people. It wasn't proper for any royal family member to be given exception to the rule of law.

But later Rodian had also broken the law—twice.

Upon his first interview with Duchess Reine Faunier-Âreskynna, he noted how much she differed from those of the royal bloodline. Her brother and sister by marriage, Prince Leäfrich and Princess Âthelthryth, remained close at her side. Prince Leäfrich's displeasure over Rodian's questions was politely plain.

Unlike the duchess's chestnut hair, dark eyes, and small stature, all Âreskynna were tall with sandy hair and an aquamarine gaze. Their irises shone like a disturbingly still sea under a clear sky.

The duchess initially struck Rodian as a shattered woman. Only later did he come to know her as strong-willed, private, and protective of her new family. All she told him of the night's boat ride was that she'd turned to peer through the dark toward the distant docks. Being a Faunier and an inlander, she was accustomed to wide-open plains and lush woods, and had never learned to swim. Nor did she know anything of sailing. Getting so far from shore made her nervous.

When she turned back, Prince Freädherich, third in line to the throne, was gone. She hadn't even heard a splash.

Duchess Reine passed that night in panic and anguish over her vanished husband as she drifted alone until dawn in Beranlômr Bay. A spotty tale at best—perhaps too much so to be a lie—and more than this had left Rodian puzzled.

The royal family's belief that the duchess had no part in the prince's disappearance remained absolute. Later he began to share that belief, though he never came to fully understand why. It took time to uncover the few pieces he learned of Prince Freädherich and the Âreskynna as a whole.

From questioning dockhands, and any crew and ship out and about at the time, to finding those who knew scant bits of the prince's past, n.

On two previous occasions he'd been spotted too late slipping away in a small boat. The first time, in his youth, he'd made it to the open sea before anyone knew and was later caught by panicked Weardas upon a Malourné naval vessel. Then, a year before he married Reine, he returned alone along the shore, escorted by a trio of dwarven thänæ. His boat was later found adrift and undamaged.

And one night Rodian had listened to the sketchy rumors of an elder seafarer.

The old man spent his days selling his services for mending fishing nets. He said Prince Freädherich wasn't the only Âreskynna to exhibit such strange behavior. Others as far back as the king's great-grandmother were known for a silent and unexplained fascination with the sea.

The royals of Malourné were benevolent, and despite Rodian's ambition he took pride in serving them and his people. He'd heard occasional stories in taverns and common houses of the cursed monarchs of Malourné, but he gave them no credence. Folktales abounded in any country, and his faith in the Blessed Trinity of Sentience taught him better than to believe nonsense that defied reason. When his inquiries ran dry and nothing more concrete could be learned, faith was all he had left to lean on.

And he broke the law for the first time.

He should've gone straight to the high advocate, before the court, reported that his investigation was complete, and testified before the inquest tribunal. Instead he went to Duchess Reine.

Rodian told her he couldn't clear her of suspicion, but that he also believed she had nothing to do with whatever happened on the boat. Princess Âthelthryth was present, quiet and watchful, but open relief filled her aquamarine eyes. When he related tales of the Âreskynna and the sea, neither the princess nor the duchess said a word.

At the inquest's closing session, before the tribunal and high advocate, he reported that no evidence of a crime could be found. Not truly a lie, but then he'd said nothing about the "curse."

Unsubstantiated or not, withholding this was the second time Rodian broke the law. And the very act forced him to remember the day of his acceptance into the Shyldfälches, as well as his promotion to captain, when he'd stood before the high advocate with his sword hand upon an old wooden box.

Within that vessel was the Éa-bêch—Malourné's first book of the law. Over centuries, the rules and regulations of society had grown until they filled a small library. But the Éa-bêch was still the core of it all. Rodian swore by it to uphold the law of the people, for the people.

When Rodian left the inquest that final day, his sword hand ached.

Moral reasoning had told him no good could come from repeating rumors at the inquest. But truth meant everything to him, by both his faith and his duty. He went to temple that same night and prayed—not for forgiveness of the omission, but for relief from doubt in his reasoned decision.

"If he comes back, I wasn't hereig I wasne."

The old woman scoffed, but pocketed the coin as she shuffled on.

Rodian mounted and headed northwest. Strangely, Selwyn Midton's home was a good distance from his shop and the Graylands Empire. And he hadn't been to work in two days.

Eventually Rodian entered a residential sector where the main businesses consisted of food carts, eateries, or bread and vegetable stalls—all the things sought on a daily basis near homes. He was surrounded by small, modest houses, but all well kept, as if the inhabitants took pride in their neighborhood. The farther west he traveled, the larger the domiciles became, until he pulled up Snowbird before a two-story stone house crafted in the cottage style, with a wrought-iron fence across its front. He double-checked the address as he dismounted.

How could a Graylands Empire moneylender afford a home like this? Such parasites fared better than those they fed upon—but not this much better.