Chapter 14 - The Last Enemy
Lady Ysabet had not appeared in the court records for eighteen years.
That was the first problem.
The second was that every document mentioning her had been removed from the royal archives, including the marriage records of the eastern provinces and the military registers from the year Seraphine vanished.
Halven remembered the name.
“Ysabet was Celestine’s older sister,” he said. “She lived beyond the mountains and had a claim to the throne through their father.”
“Why would she want the crown?” Aldric asked.
“Because Celestine inherited it instead.”
Maribel, still under guard, looked toward the window. “Ysabet believed Celestine stole her birthright.”
“Did she work with Varron?” Rovan asked.
“She funded him.”
The court had expected the trial to end with Varron’s arrest. Instead, the kingdom learned that the conspiracy reached beyond the palace and into a rival branch of the royal family.
Two days later, a messenger arrived from the mountain border carrying a sealed letter.
The sender was Lady Ysabet.
She requested a meeting with Princess Seraphine.
Elara refused at first. She had spent her life running from unknown dangers. She had no desire to walk willingly toward another one. But the letter contained a drawing of the same sun-shaped mark beneath her throat.
I know why the locket was made, it read. I know which child wore the red ribbon and which wore the blue. I know who ordered Celestine’s death. Come to the old observatory, or the evidence will disappear with me.
King Aldric wanted to send an army.
Elara chose a smaller group: Captain Rovan, Doctor Halven, Tomas, Lysa, and Maribel under guard.
“Why bring the queen?” Rovan asked.
“Because she knows Ysabet.”
“She also betrayed you.”
“Exactly.”
The old observatory stood on a mountain ridge above the clouds. By the time they reached it, snow had begun to fall. A woman waited beneath the stone archway.
Lady Ysabet was tall and silver-haired, dressed in a dark blue cloak. She wore no royal jewels, but the men behind her carried the banners of the eastern provinces.
“You came,” she said.
Elara stepped forward. “You asked for me.”
Ysabet studied her face. “You have Celestine’s eyes.”
“You knew my mother.”
“I knew her before she became queen. We were sisters.”
“And you helped destroy her.”
Ysabet’s expression did not change. “I helped create the conditions that allowed her enemies to destroy her. There is a difference, but not enough of one to save me.”
Maribel spoke from behind the guards. “You funded Varron’s coup.”
“I funded a plan to remove Aldric from the throne.”
“The plan included killing a woman and stealing her children.”
“Varron added those parts after I withdrew.”
“You never warned Celestine.”
“She would not have listened. She loved Aldric.”
Elara felt anger rise. “You are both speaking as though the children were pieces on a board.”
Ysabet looked at her. “That is what royal families do when they are afraid of losing power.”
“I was not raised royal.”
“That may be why you still have a chance to change it.”
The observatory contained a circular room with a ceiling open to the sky. In the center stood a stone table covered with papers. Ysabet placed a small wooden case on it.
“Inside is the missing page from the birth record.”
Elara did not touch it. “Why give it to me?”
“Because Varron failed. Because Maribel is ready to confess. Because the king is too old to lead a war against his own family. And because I am dying.”
Halven approached her. “How long?”
“Weeks, perhaps.”
“You could have sent the evidence years ago.”
“I was afraid.”
Elara heard the word and thought of Maribel.
Every person who had shaped her life had used fear to excuse silence.
“Open the case,” Ysabet said.
The missing page named the woman who had taken Solenne from the palace.
Orla Dane.
But the page contained a second entry.
Orla had not acted alone. She had been ordered by Lady Ysabet to remove the child and hide her from Varron.
“You took my sister,” Elara said.
“I saved her from the men who would have killed her.”
“You abandoned her in an orphanage.”
“I paid the headmistress to protect her. I sent letters. Varron intercepted them.”
“Why did you never reveal yourself?”
Ysabet looked toward Lysa. “Because I feared that if I brought her into the open, Varron would use her against Celestine’s memory. I thought I could defeat him first.”
“But you failed.”
“Yes.”
Lysa stepped forward. “Were you the woman who sang to me?”
Ysabet’s face crumbled.
“Sometimes.”
The child studied her. “Why did you not take me home?”
Ysabet knelt. “Because I did not know where home was anymore.”
Lysa did not embrace her. She simply stood close enough that their shadows touched.
Outside, horns sounded from the mountain road.
Rovan rushed to the window.
“Riders.”
Ysabet’s men moved toward their weapons.
“Varron’s supporters?” Aldric asked.
“No,” Rovan said. “The royal banners.”
King Aldric had come after all.
He entered the observatory with a company of guards, saw Ysabet, and drew his sword.
“You,” he said.
Ysabet did not move.
“I have come for the women who destroyed my family.”
Elara stepped between them. “Then you will have to arrest your wife, her sister, the chancellor, and perhaps yourself.”
The king’s sword lowered slightly.
“The truth is not a single villain,” she continued. “It is every choice that let the next lie survive.”
Aldric looked at the missing page.
Ysabet handed him the documents. “Your daughter is right.”
The king’s face hardened. “Do not speak as though you have earned the right to teach her.”
“I have not.”
The room shook.
An explosion sounded below the ridge.
Snow and stone burst through the lower windows. One of Ysabet’s men shouted that the mountain road had been attacked.
Varron’s remaining soldiers had followed them.
The observatory became a battlefield. Rovan organized the defenders while Aldric protected the children. Maribel stood beside Elara, wielding a sword taken from a fallen guard.
“I never thought I would fight beside you,” Elara said.
“Neither did I.”
“If we survive, you will stand trial.”
“I know.”
They fought back-to-back as the enemy entered through the shattered windows. Ysabet ordered her men to protect Lysa. Tomas carried messages between the guards.
At the height of the battle, a masked soldier reached the stone table and seized the birth records. Elara pursued him onto the observatory roof.
The wind nearly knocked her down. The soldier ran toward the ridge.
Elara caught his cloak.
He turned and struck her across the face.
She fell beside the edge.
The soldier raised a dagger.
Then Lysa screamed from the doorway.
“Stop hurting my sister!”
The masked man froze.
Elara saw his eyes.
He was not Varron’s soldier.
He was a palace guard wearing the king’s colors.
“Who sent you?” she demanded.
The man backed away. “The queen.”
“Which queen?”
He looked toward Maribel.
“The dead one.”
Before Elara could question him, the soldier stepped backward into the snow and vanished over the ridge.
The birth records remained in Elara’s hands.
But inside the missing page, a fresh line had been written in red ink.
The queen who died was not Celestine.
Elara read the sentence aloud. The ink looked fresh, yet the paper had been hidden inside the birth record for years. Someone had written the words recently, using the old page as a final message.
“The guard wanted us to follow him,” Rovan said.
“Or to fear someone who cannot answer,” Aldric replied.
Ysabet stepped from the observatory doorway. “There is one person who can answer.”
Maribel looked at her. “You know where she is.”
“I know where Varron took her.”
Elara turned sharply. “My mother?”
Ysabet nodded. “Celestine did not die in the palace. Varron replaced her body with Beatrice’s. I learned the truth years later, but by then I had lost the courage to return.”
“You knew she lived?” Aldric asked.
“I knew she might.”
“Where?”
Ysabet pointed beyond the ridge, toward a distant line of bells hidden among the mountains.
“The monastery of Saint Orien.”
Elara looked at the royal family gathered in the damaged observatory. Every person had carried a fragment of the truth. Now, for the first time, those fragments formed a path.
The path was dangerous, but it was no longer hidden. That alone made it different from every road Elara had traveled before.
“We go there,” she said.
The king reached for her hand. “Together.”
This time, she let him hold it.
For a moment, Elara could hear nothing but the wind. Then Lysa reached for her hand, and the simple touch brought the world back.
May you like
“We will find her,” Lysa said.
Elara looked at the words again. “Yes. We will.”
