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“Erik?” Narza leaned forward. “What’s happened?”
“Allow me to speak slower. You knew. Thorvald. Had. A bastard.”
“Erik,” Maelstrom warned.
I ignored him and peered over the glassy surface. “Tell me the truth, Narza. Did you aid my father in shielding Bonekeeper, his folk, and his mother from ever breaching the Ever?”
For a dozen heartbeats, she was silent. Almost frozen. Her voice was hollow when she spoke. “I don’t know.”
More than one gasp wisped at my back. Even Tavish wore a bit of distress on his features.
My chest cinched. “All this time, you could’ve told me. You’re just like him, keeping secrets, lies, like you wanted me to fail.”
“You don’t understand,” Narza snapped. “I-I say I don’t know because Icannotrecall, only that I know there was something I did to aid the last Ever King. Many, many turns ago. Something was done to protect the Ever, but . . . it has been washed of my memories.”
“Washed of your memories.” I wanted to lash out, draw blood, anything before the rage building took over. “How convenient.”
“No, it is not,” Narza insisted. “Whatever I did brought consequences. No doubt, an agreement between myself and Thorvald was made that would rid me of memories of what I had done. But a sea witch voice always leaves remnants behind. To my bones, I always knew something was there that involved the Ever King; I simply could not recall it.”
“Erik,” Maelstrom whispered. “In binding agreements where blood is signed, much like the bond she made with the earth fae, it could’ve been a stipulation that Narza would need to ward her own memories against the spell.”
I narrowed my eyes at the cove. We didn’t have much time before the connection would fade. “You would agree to literally forgetting a spell?”
She hesitated. “To agree to such a thing, I would’ve needed to believe there was great risk involved should anyone but the king know.”
He feared me. Perhaps Larsson had been correct in assuming Thorvald would’ve done everything to keep his blood thieving out of the Ever.
“It has been like a memory I cannot draw from the shadows,” Narza said. “But the unknown, the feeling, is why I never trusted Thorvald fully. It is why I demanded the heartbond for Oline.”
“Explain.”
“I thought it would protect Oline from whatever secrets he kept in his past, whatever secrets I had aided in hiding. I never—” Narza released a rough breath. “I never imagined he would use her boy to break the bond for him. The heartbond was crafted to shield her, to shield you both, and he still found a way to destroy it.”
“You must cease blaming yourself,” Maelstrom said, soft and tender.
Through the ripples, Narza straightened. “Tell me what has brought this on. I am not lying to you, perhaps I should’ve told youthere was something in my past I could not recall, but I swear to you, I did not think it would be connected to this. In truth, I have not thought of it since Thorvald died.”
A gentle hand curled around my arm. Livia stood beside me in the water. She said nothing; she didn’t need to, so long as she was there.
I hurried through Larsson’s confession, his belief Thorvald shunned his firstborn out of fear of his dark blood magic. I pressed about the strength of such wards, the crown, the edges of the kingdom, the elven mystery to sea folk, I pressed it all.
Narza held a hand over her mouth. “It’s . . . it’s possible, Erik. But a warding spell of such magnitude would cause a great strain.”
“You fevered near the Otherworld for months,” Maelstrom whispered. “Two turns before the Ever King came for Oline, remember?”
“It is so disorienting. I hardly recall even those months. It . . . it could be related.” Narza rubbed her brow but lifted weary eyes. “I am a fool, Grandson. I never wanted to bring you harm, but I have played so many roles in your suffering.”
“Then help us now,” I said, harsh as the sharpest wind. “By taking our bond and slaughtering his own mother, he insists all those blood wards are gone.”
“There are certain spells that unravel others, like a rope fraying,” Tavish said. “But to keep such wards frayed, it calls for death, blood, and sacrifice. I mean, it constantly calls for it. I’ve no doubt they were killing for turns, Erik, all to keep the blood wards from closing again.”
“It was the darkening,” I said. “An imprint of dark magic left behind as they slaughtered their way through the Ever.”
“How did it unravel?” Livia asked.
“Thorvald’s death.” I let out a sigh. “That was the first bend. Then after he killed his mother, the wards keeping him from the Ever broke. No one here knew of him, he could start anew, begin his schemes.”
“He would’ve told the truth to Fione.” Tait frowned. “She wouldbe as bitter as Bonekeeper. Remember what you did as soon as we returned from the battle?”
