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Chapter 57

Nora

Edmund’s body was tied to the flaying tree.

The one where Sigismund Rydder had been tied after trying to flee. And had been commanded to lash himself to death. Nora knew her family’s history. Her grandmother meant Edmund’s body as a clear warning to any knights who might dare to defy her.

But Nora wasn’t a knight. She could do whatever she wanted. And historically, she always had.

“Alaric is alive.” Nora had known that once, apparently. But Lotte had been forced to remind her since their grandmother had stripped her memories, along with everything else she’d forgotten from the day of the election party. It was strange, having to trust someone else’s mind more than her own. But she’d been right, Modesty had tried to kill her. Had killed Constance.

She turned away from the window from where she could see Edmund. There was no count yet on how many others were dead. On both sides.

Nora knew there had been finely clad bodies lying on the floor of the Clandestine Court alongside the Grims. There would be wealthy empires whose heirs had died last night. Or been turned to stone. And thanks to Nora’s cocktail shaker turned luster, there were criminals roaming the streets.

The riots, the city had recovered from swiftly. This was a blow it would take longer to come back from. But through it all, the Holtzfall mansion stood untouched.

“So you’re both telling me that I’ve been running around the city trying to find a way to reach Isengrim,” Nora said to Theo and Lotte, “and we had a bargaining line open all this time.” They were we now. The way that she and August had become too. Nearly dying together tended to do that.

“That’s really your takeaway in all this?” Theo leaned back against the window frame in the turret room of the mansion. The wear of battle hung heavy on him. The battle against the Grims at the Clandestine Court last night. As well as the secret battle that had been waging between his two loyalties. Nora felt a fierce protectiveness rise in her toward him. Theo and Alaric had spent their lives saving her. It was time for her to keep up the Holtzfall’s side of the oath made a thousand year ago.

“What were you expecting?” Nora asked. “Did you want me to throw a fit?” She understood why Theo had been afraid to tell her. She was a Holtzfall first. Maybe there had been a time, when things were simpler, she might have felt betrayed by this. She might have blamed him for the Grims in the factory. But loyalty and family were complicated. The maze trial had proven that.

Besides, it wasn’t as if she was proud of everything she had ever done.

“As long as we’re all sharing our secrets, I should tell you.” Nora turned to Lotte, who was half-collapsed on the window seat next to Theo. “I sold the information about your father to Oskar Wallen. So do you want me to apologize out loud or do you already know that I feel guilty about that with your Holtzfall gift and we can move on?”

Lotte blinked in the beginnings of the daylight leaking through the window. “We can move on.” Nora tried to hide her relief at Lotte’s words. “Although, you should probably know Oskar Wallen sent someone to kill me.”

“Why would he do that?” Nora leaned forward sharply.

Lotte managed to shrug, lying down, but there was a challenge in her eyes. “I was hoping you could tell me. He seemed to think my blood would free the knights from their oath.”

Nora hesitated. She knew they were sharing secrets, but this one was bigger than just hers. “The story of Hartwin Rydder,” Nora said carefully, “is that when he pledged his sword to Honor Holtzfall, he swore that Rydders would serve Holtzfalls until one of our bloodlines ended. That’s not exactly true.” The words of the oath were written in ancient Gamanix on Hartwin Rydder’s sword, hanging up in her grandmother’s office. Nora’s ancient languages were rusty, but it roughly translated to, “ The Rydder oath will protect the Holtzfall bloodline until the day our bloodlines are bound. Should mingled blood be spilled, the oath will be broken. ” Nora quoted from memory.

“That’s what Edmund was raving about.” Theo pushed himself away from the window, suddenly alert. “Saying that the oath was broken.”

“Because my mother is a Holtzfall and my father is a knight.”

“Then why didn’t it work?” Theo’s eyes went out the window again, to where Edmund’s body was tied to the tree.

Dozens of possible answers came to Nora at once. Ancient magics were strange, perhaps the blood had to be shed with Hartwin’s sword. Or on the same place where the oath was made. Or perhaps Oskar knew more than she did and the child of mixed blood had to be killed. But she gave the only true answer she could. “I’m not sure.” And then she added, “And I also don’t know why Oskar Wallen might care to liberate our knights for the Grims.” She drew herself up straight. “But I do know I’m not letting Alaric die. If they want a ring so badly, we’ll give them a ring.”

“I don’t think even you can make Modesty give up one of her rings.” Theo’s smile was rueful but resigned. “She’d admit to murdering Constance first.”

“I know,” Nora said. “But the rings on Modesty’s hands aren’t the only ones we have.”