Chapter 5: The Stairs

The Riverbend delegation was waiting in the great hall at eight in the morning, and half the castle had come down to see it.

Academy delegates stood along the pillars.

Clerks, scribes and two reporters from the capital paper crowded the landing, pretending to read.

I came down the main stair with Beryl on my left and Alaric one step behind my right shoulder.

He had said he would stay out of this, and he had meant it.

He was only there.

My father stood at the bottom of the stair in his green sash.

His hair had gone gray at the temples.

He still held his chin up, the way he did before a crowd, and he was smiling at the room.

Then he looked up and saw me.

The smile stayed on his mouth, but the color left his face.

"Thea," he said.

It came out of him without any thought at all.

The hall went very quiet.

I stopped three steps above him.

"I go by Astrid Giffard now," I said. "I'm the royal medical investigator."

"Investigator." He swallowed and tried to find his footing. "Forgive me. For a moment you looked like someone I lost."

"You lost a daughter."

"I buried a daughter," he said, louder, for the room. "Thirteen years ago, my first child drowned at our own festival. I mourn her every day."

"And I'm told you've come to this castle to accuse a decent young man of a crime with her name on it. You are taking advantage of a grieving father."

"I came to ask for the truth," I said.

A woman moved out from behind him, in a pale blue dress, her hands twisting a handkerchief.

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