The Grave of Lies — Part 3
Viktor had buried an empty coffin. Now the son he had mourned was standing in front of him, holding the reason someone wanted him dead.
Mara pushed open the storehouse door. Daylight reached across the stone floor of the abandoned monastery, stopping at a battered wooden table. Elin followed her sister inside.
A young man stepped out of the shadows.
“Father.”
Viktor froze. Adrian’s face was pale, his coat dusty, but his voice was unmistakable. Viktor took one step toward him. Relief came first. Then the memory of standing beside a coffin, believing there would never be another conversation.
“Why are you letting me mourn you?”
Adrian looked down at the leather-bound ledger in his hand. He placed it on the table.
“Konrad had the granary set on fire. I was inside.”
Viktor’s jaw tightened. Behind him, Mara stood perfectly still.
Adrian opened the book and pointed to a row of figures. Several entries had been crossed out and rewritten.
“Because I discovered the tax money he had stolen.”
Then iron scraped against wood.
Outside, someone slid the bolt across the closed door.
Adrian turned toward the sound.
The door would not open
Mara reached it first. She pulled the handle, then pressed her shoulder against the wood. The door moved barely an inch before the iron caught.
“Stay away from the entrance,” she said.
Elin stepped toward Adrian. He closed the ledger, keeping one hand firmly on its cover.
Viktor faced the door. “Who is out there?”
For a moment, only the wind answered. Then came the sound of boots on stone.
“My lord?”
Viktor recognized Bram’s voice.
“Open this door.”
A pause. The bolt scraped back. When the door swung inward, Bram stood on the threshold, his hand clear of his sword. His eyes went straight to Adrian.
The guard’s face drained of color.
“You are alive.”
“As you can see,” Viktor said. “Why did you lock us in?”
Bram looked from him to Mara. “I was told to secure the building before making the arrest. I didn’t know you were inside.”
An order in Viktor’s name
“Whose arrest?” Viktor asked.
Bram unfolded a parchment.
“Mara’s. For abducting your son and concealing him here.”
Elin moved in front of her sister before she could think. Mara gently touched her arm, but did not step forward.
Adrian spoke from beside the table. “She didn’t abduct me. She kept me alive.”
Bram looked at the young man, then at the order. Whatever certainty had brought him to the monastery was slipping away.
Viktor held out his hand. “Give me that.”
The guard obeyed.
The parchment named the monastery storehouse. It named Mara. It instructed Bram to secure the entrance, take her into custody, and return with Adrian.
At the bottom was Viktor’s name.
Beneath it, pressed into red wax, was the raven of his house.
“Who gave you this?”
“A messenger caught me outside the chapel. He said you had sent new instructions. Konrad remained there with another guard while I came here.”
Viktor read the order again. Someone had known where they were going. Someone had known Adrian was alive. And someone had expected Bram to trust a seal more than the people standing before him.
“I gave no such order.”
The mark in the wax
Bram stared at him. “But your seal—”
Viktor raised his right hand. The raven signet caught the window light.
Elin leaned closer to the parchment. She studied the bird in the wax, then looked at the ring.
“The wing,” she said quietly.
Viktor turned the parchment toward the light.
There was a small break along one wing of the stamped raven. The bird on the ring he wore was whole.
For the first time since hearing the bolt, Mara let out a breath.
The order had not come from Viktor’s hand.
But whoever had made it possessed something far more dangerous than a forged signature: a seal that his own guards would obey.
Viktor folded the parchment carefully.
“No one is taking Mara anywhere.”
Bram stepped aside, leaving the doorway clear. Adrian gathered the ledger against his chest.
They had found the stolen taxes. They had found the son who was supposed to be dead. Now they had to find the person giving orders in his father’s name.
And Viktor knew there had once been another raven ring.
To be continued in Part 4.