Page 102 of Legacy Elite

"Seven when the woman registered her," Hess says.

"But the form's five months after the house fell."

"Five months after."

"So she was six when it happened."

"Yes," Hess says. "Six when it happened, seven by the time anybody wrote her down."

"And everyone in that house died."

"Everyone on that page," Hess says, "except her."

"And somebody put her in a cart or a boat or on a road, and took her four hundred miles, and wrote a fake name on a form, and then lived quietly with her in one town for years so nobody would look twice."

Hess doesn't answer that, because there isn't an answer.

"Do we know her name?" I ask.

"Not from these," Faris says. "The inventory gives her position in the family. Not a name."

"Why not?"

"Because," Faris says carefully, "the man writing that page had already been instructed what the House was going to be called from that point forward, which was nothing."

Right. Of course. Even the paperwork.

They start on consequences before I've finished looking at the list.

That's the part I'll remember. I'm sitting there with my hands either side of the words about a six-year-old girl, and around me the meeting simply changes subject.

Recognition. Whether descent confirmed by historical standard triggers any obligation on the Council. Whether House status can be dormant and then not-dormant. Precedent, of which there is none. Hess saying something about a legal office. Falken saying something about a session.

And then, "There will have to be a property review."

I come back into the room.

"Lufgard," I say.

Falken doesn't flinch. "Among a great many other things."

"And Luftis."

"Miss Miller—"

"It's built on the estate. You've all said it. Faris said it in a lecture." I gesture at the enlargements. "That's her family's land. And now you've got a piece of paper saying I'm what's left of her."

"Descent is not ownership," Falken says. "I need you to hold those apart in your head, because a great many people will deliberately collapse them in front of you." He's not unkind about it. "There are two centuries of transfers, statutes, charters and Council instruments between that inventory and this building. Some may be sound and some may not. Working that out is a task for lawyers and it will take years, not weeks. What changed this morning is only that the question is real instead of hypothetical."

Then Jon speaks for the first time.

"Chancellor."

Everyone looks down the table.

"Before this goes any further," Jon says, "somebody should say on the record that four days ago a person entered Jessica's bedroom."

The temperature in the room drops.