Chapter 2
Elodie did not have a broken bone.
Brother Caldus, the castle healer, examined her twice.
Then a third time because Gideon insisted.
A dark bruise spread along her left shoulder.
A red mark crossed one cheek from the blanket edge.
Nothing more.
Maeve’s shoulder was dislocated.
Caldus set it while she bit through folded leather and cursed every saint she could remember.
Then he wrapped her arm to her chest and ordered rest.
Maeve ignored the order.
She sat beside Elodie’s cradle in Gideon’s private solar while guards filled the corridor.
Gideon stood at the window.
Not the tower window.
This one looked over the inner courtyard.
He had not put Elodie down for more than a few minutes since the fall.
Now the baby slept.
One hand curled around his finger.
Captain Rowan entered.
“No sign of Orren.”
Gideon did not turn.
“How far?”
“Tracks split at south bridge. One horse continued east. Another set headed into pine road.”
“A decoy?”
“Likely.”
“Who helped him?”
“We don’t know.”
Gideon looked at Rowan.
“No. We don’t know yet.”
The difference mattered.
Then Rowan placed a leather ledger on the table.
“Found in kennel loft.”
Maeve leaned.
Gideon opened.
Not feed records.
Commands.
Pages of whistle marks.
One long.
Two short.
Three descending.
Finger one.
Finger two.
Closed fist.
Palm down.
Beside each:
HEEL.
HOLD.
DRAG.
GUARD.
RELEASE.
SILENCE.
TRACK CLOTH.
CORNER.
FEIGN LUNGE.
Maeve felt sick.
Feigned lunge.
Not simply attack.
Performance.
Gideon turned pages.
Names.
Servants.
Dates.
Perrin — cellar.
Lysa — west kitchen.
Tomas — stable.
Marek — gatehouse.
Brother Alden — archive.
Some names crossed out.
Others marked:
COMPLIANT AFTER.
Rowan whispered:
“God.”
Maeve knew most.
Perrin left Blackthorn after “hound attack.”
Lysa refused to speak of it.
Tomas lost two fingers.
Marek vanished into a monastery.
Brother Alden died.
Officially a fall from archive ladder.
Maeve said:
“Morcant was used to frighten people.”
Gideon nodded.
“And silence them.”
Rowan turned another page.
“Elodie.”
Fresh ink.
E — BLUE CLOTH.
TOWER.
DRAG TO WINDOW.
S HOLD.
O BACK.
S.
Sabine?
O.
Orren?
Maybe.
Maeve stared.
There was no instruction:
throw.
The hound was supposed to drag Elodie to the window.
Then Sabine would hold?
What was final intended story?
Gideon read aloud.
“Drag to window.”
Then:
“S hold.”
Maeve said:
“She pulled Elodie free.”
“Then threw her.”
So the hound created the scene.
Sabine completed.
Then Rowan found another notation:
WITNESS BELOW — CLEAR.
Maeve looked.
“What?”
Rowan’s face tightened.
“Someone expected lower balcony empty.”
Maeve had been there because laundry run changed.
Usually that corridor was swept at noon and empty.
Why changed?
The laundress had fever.
Maeve took route.
Chance.
Again.
Gideon looked at her.
“You were not supposed to be there.”
“No.”
“And Elodie was not supposed to live.”
No one answered.
Then Sabine.
She remained in the east chapel chamber under guard.
Not dungeon.
Gideon refused to let servants say prisoner yet.
“Until charges are formal,” he said.
Maybe law mattered.
Maybe blood.
He had not decided.
He entered chamber alone except Rowan standing outside.
Maeve waited with Elodie.
Later Gideon told them the conversation.
Sabine began:
“You have always believed Father wanted you to inherit.”
Gideon said:
“He named me.”
“After four other children died.”
There.
Gideon asked:
“What last three heirs?”
Sabine corrected:
“Three after Edric.”
Edric.
Their oldest brother.
Died age nine of fever.
Then Leona, a cousin named provisional heir when disease nearly killed Gideon as infant.
Died in riding accident at twelve.
Then infant Tomas, son of their uncle.
Died in cradle.
Then Isolde, daughter of Aunt Maren.
Fell from west stair.
The family line narrowed.
Eventually Gideon.
Sabine.
Now Elodie.
Gideon asked:
“Are you saying they were murdered?”
Sabine said:
“I’m saying Blackthorn has never let inheritance happen by accident.”
That phrasing chilled.
Who?
She refused.
Then Gideon placed whistle on table.
“You trained Morcant.”
“With Orren.”
“Why?”
“To keep control.”
“Of servants?”
“Of information.”
“Why Elodie?”
Sabine looked away.
Gideon asked again.
“Why my daughter?”
Sabine said:
“Because you were changing the charter.”
There.
Gideon had indeed begun revising Blackthorn’s succession charter.
Old law allowed closest adult blood relative to act as full regent and control estates if heir under seven.
If Gideon died while Elodie was an infant, Sabine—his sister—would become regent.
She would control Blackthorn lands, mines, soldiers, taxes, and marriage alliances until Elodie came of age.
But Gideon no longer trusted the old rule.
Not because of Sabine.
Because he wanted a council regency.
No single person.
He had asked Brother Alden, before Alden’s death, to research precedent.
Then Alden fell from archive ladder.
Gideon had assumed accident.
Now.
Sabine knew.
“How?”
She answered:
“Alden told Orren.”
“Why?”
“Because Orren supplied archive keys.”
So Alden discovered something.
Then Gideon asked:
“You killed Alden?”
Sabine said:
“No.”
“Did Orren?”
“I don’t know.”
“You expect me to believe you trained a hound with him for years and don’t know?”
Sabine’s voice rose.
“The hound was not made to kill.”
That was important.
Gideon froze.
“What?”
“Morcant was trained to intimidate. To drag cloth. Block doors. Corner people. Hold them until someone arrived.”
“Then why has blood been spilled?”
“Because fear does not stay controlled.”
Maeve thought of Tomas’s fingers.
Sabine continued.
“Orren started using harsher commands.”
“For whom?”
Silence.
Then:
“Who is above you?”
Sabine looked at him.
Not answer.
Gideon saw.
There was someone.
Maybe family.
Maybe council.
Then:
“Did they order Elodie’s death?”
Sabine said:
“No.”
Gideon stared.
“I did.”
That confession hit.
Not full.
But enough.
“Why?”
“Because if you changed the charter, I lost regency.”
There.
Power.
But Sabine added:
“And because regency is the only thing keeping Blackthorn from being taken apart by men you trust.”
Gideon almost laughed.
“You murdered my daughter to save her inheritance?”
“I tried to remove the piece that would trigger the council seizure.”
That made no sense.
Sabine explained.
If Elodie died while Gideon lived, Gideon’s heir became Sabine under old charter.
If Gideon then died later, Sabine inherited outright rather than serving regency.
No council.
No vulnerable child.
No marriage bargaining.
No outside guardian.
She would own Blackthorn cleanly.
“You planned my death too?”
Sabine said:
“No.”
“Then why ‘if you died later’?”
“Everyone dies.”
Cowardly.
Maybe true.
Then Gideon asked:
“Were you leaving the window expecting Maeve?”
“No.”
“Did you see her?”
“Yes.”
“Why throw anyway?”
Sabine cried for first time.
“Because Morcant failed to make it look fatal.”
There.
The hound had grabbed blanket but not harmed Elodie enough.
Sabine faced collapsing plan.
She chose.
Then lied.
Same pattern.
Gideon asked:
“Why not stop?”
Sabine whispered:
“Because Orren would have known I stopped.”
There.
Fear of Orren.
Or whoever behind.
Then:
“What would Orren do?”
“Tell the Crown.”
Rowan later said that line changed everything.
Not king directly perhaps.
Blackthorn owed military levy to Duke Carrow, the Crown’s regional lord.
If secret charter research revealed illegal mining revenues? Need deeper.
Sabine said Blackthorn’s old regency system hid a second charter.
A private compact from fifty years ago.
When an heir under seven inherited, three neighboring lords gained “temporary guardianship rights” over Blackthorn’s silver mines.
Those rights had never been exercised because adult heirs succeeded.
If Elodie became lady while a child, council guardianship could trigger claims.
Gideon’s revised charter sought to block.
Alden found original compact.
Then died.
Sabine believed Duke Carrow’s agents wanted Elodie alive but Gideon dead, so they could seize regency rights.
Sabine chose opposite:
Elodie dead, Gideon alive, Sabine next heir.
Keep Blackthorn inside family.
Gideon stared.
“So you murdered my daughter to prevent other men using her.”
Sabine whispered:
“Yes.”
No moral sense.
But power logic.
Then Gideon asked:
“Did Orren work for Carrow?”
Sabine said:
“He worked for whoever paid.”
There.
Kennelmaster as broker.
He trained hound for Sabine.
Sold information to Carrow.
Perhaps committed older attacks.
Then Gideon left.
He returned to solar white-faced.
He told Maeve and Rowan enough.
Maeve asked:
“Do you believe her?”
Gideon said:
“I believe the parts we can test.”
Good.
Then archive.
Brother Alden’s death.
The official record.
Rowan brought.
He fell from ladder after midnight.
Neck broken.
No witness.
Morcant found outside archive door.
Sabine said hound escaped.
Kennel ledger:
ALDEN — ARCHIVE.
GUARD.
SILENCE.
O HANDLE.
Orren handle.
Not kill necessarily.
Orren was assigned.
Then Rowan found another note tucked into ledger binding.
A scrap in Alden’s handwriting.
If I die, the second charter is not in the archive.
Gideon stared.
Then:
Maren knows where Father hid it.
Aunt Maren.
Mother of Isolde.
Supposedly dead fifteen years.
Except Maeve knew something.
She had served in lower kitchens as child.
Once, years ago, she heard old housekeeper say:
Lady Maren did not die at Blackthorn.
She left.
Official record said fever.
What if alive?
Then gate guard entered.
“My lord.”
A rider had returned.
Not Orren.
A young boy from south village.
He carried a message tied beneath saddle.
No seal.
One sentence.
If Gideon wants the truth about the hound, bring the silver whistle to Saint Orla’s ruined priory before moonrise.
Signed:
M.
Maren?
Maybe.
Or trap.
Gideon looked at whistle.
Then at Elodie.
Maeve said:
“You cannot go alone.”
Rowan agreed.
Gideon said:
“I’m not taking Elodie.”
Of course.
Maeve tightened good arm around sling.
“I meant you.”
He almost smiled.
Then another thought.
Who stays with Elodie?
Not Sabine.
Not ordinary nursery.
Trust shattered.
Maeve said:
“She stays with me.”
Rowan objected:
“You’re injured.”
“I caught her one-armed enough.”
Gideon looked.
Then nodded.
Not because servant duty.
Because Maeve had become the only person in castle whose presence at the right place had disrupted a murder.
That made her valuable.
Also vulnerable.
Gideon handed her the whistle.
Then reconsidered.
No.
He kept.
Morcant was locked in old stone kennel under double guard.
But if another whistle existed?
Likely.
The ledger showed commands.
Not unique instrument.
Sabine’s silver whistle was proof, not exclusive control.
Gideon ordered every guard searched.
Every servant questioned.
All whistles, pipes, bird calls, silver tubes surrendered.
By sunset they found four.
Two hunting.
One shepherd.
One identical to Sabine’s.
Hidden in kennelmaster Orren’s room.
On its chain hung a small iron tag.
Stamped:
C.
Not Carrow necessarily.
Could be.
Could be someone else.
Rowan looked at Gideon.
“The hound had more than one master.”
Gideon stared.
That was the real beginning.
Not whether Sabine commanded Morcant.
May you like
She did.
The question was how many people had been commanding the castle for years through fear, false accidents, and a beast everyone had mistaken for evil.
