Page 25 of Daughter of the Ninth Line: Part Two

“The Third Line are beastmasters. I absolutely know what it’s like to be fetched like a stick.” He snorted loudly, and it echoed around the library. “My father has a lion companion, and once, when I went out in the woods without telling my mother, Lazlo came and collected me, carrying me by the scruff of my neck like an errant cub.”

I shuddered. That would’ve been horrifying. “Fair.” I looked over at the hounds. “You guys are terrifying enough, but I’m glad you aren’t lions.” I pulled out a chair and sat across from him. “What can I do for you, Hayle?”

His lids dropped, and he looked at me with so much heat, my body flushed. It was the exact same expression as he’d had on his face in my dream last night. My mouth went dry, and I crossed my legs, pressing my thighs together.

Sucking in a deep breath, he closed his eyes. When he opened them again, the heat was gone, and he cleared his throat. “While I was in Fortaare, I found myself in the library at the Hall of Ebrus.”

I’d heard about the library at the Hall of Ebrus. It was a giant, cavernous space, with shelves that went right to the ceiling and endless rooms of knowledge. I dreamed of going there one day, just to soak in the knowledge, right down into my bones. “Well, I’m jealous, but I’m not sure what that has to do with me.”

Hayle’s jaw clenched. “While I was researching, I found the account about your mother’s death.”

My blood froze in my veins. I waited for the disdain, the hatred, that had poured from my father all these years to spill out from between Hayle’s lips. I tried not to flinch as he covered my hand with his own.

“Avalon, you were three. There is no way that was your fault. It was a terrible accident, and the word of a distraught lady’s maid trying to save her own skin shouldn’t cloak you with such sadness. You were a baby. It wasnotyour fault. Do you hear me? No matter what anyone else has told you, it was not your fault.”

I was shaking my head, but he squeezed my hand. She’d just fallen off the cliff. My brother Kian had told me that over and over as I’d grown up, but the insidious words of my father were strong. When your only remaining parent hated you so much that he did terrible things to you, you tended to believe his words.

I cleared my throat. “Thank you for your kind words?—”

Hayle shook his head. “Not kind words. The truth. Not the venom of a grieving family, or a distraught husband, or a scared servant. The words of an impartial party. It was not your fault.”

Nodding, I stood. “Thank you. I should go.” My words were rushed, but my heart was pounding.

But Hayle didn’t let me go. “We aren’t done, Avalon. Sit down.” He tugged my hand, but his voice softened. “Please. I won’t mention your mother again.”

Sucking in oxygen until my lungs felt like they’d explode, I sat down again.

Hayle didn’t wait, nor apologize. “I’d been thinking about your words, about the powers of the Lower Lines dwindling. Did you know that until five generations ago, your family never gave birth to female children? They were notoriously all males, and it was a sign of a strong bloodline. Then Ellanora Halhed was born. They treated her like a jewel in their crown, and by all accounts, she was beautiful.”

I snorted. Apparently, it wasn’t only our powers that had dwindled then.

Hayle continued. “She was also extremely powerful. She saw visions—more than just immediate futures, far into the unknown. She was revered and coveted. She had requests for her hand in marriage from the First Line all the way down to the Twelfth. Everyone wanted her in their Line.”

Ellanora was barely a scratched name in our family bible. I’d never heard all this before.

“Then she disappeared. They investigated, assuming a spurned consort captured her and murdered her in a fit of jealousy, or that her visions sent her crazy and she threw herself from a cliff.” He winced. “Her body was never found. A month later, there was the First Line uprising, and they killed off the Second Line, and a missing woman from the Ninth Line got lost in the insanity that followed.”

What did that evenmean?This was centuries ago—what did it even matter anymore?

Hayle grabbed a folder from in front of him. “From that point on, the Ninth Line continued to have sons, but they were interspersed with daughters. Their powers dwindled, but as you said, so did a lot of the Lower Lines, and it was so gradual, no one really noticed. They likely believed the old accounts were exaggerated, until your magic is as it stands now.”

He meant almost non-existent.

“But while I was researching, I found this. It had been sent directly to the Hall of Ebrus library, and they figured it had gotten caught up in the uprising chaos and was sent before Ellanora went missing. I’m not so sure.”

He pushed a piece of parchment over to me. On it was beautiful, flowing handwriting.

The Ninth. The Ninth. The Ninth.

Well, that made no sense. “So she did actually go insane?”

Hayle shrugged. “Perhaps. But look at the date.”

Up in the corner, in a tiny, neat script, was the very date of the uprising. She’d sent this letter on the day that the First Line murdered the Second Line and secured their power. She had to have been alive then.

I shook my head. “It’s nonsense, Hayle. It means nothing. She could have just picked that day and dated it wrong.”

He grabbed another book and dragged it between us. “This is your official Ancestral Lineage. This is Ellanora Halhed.” He pointed to the middle of the parchment. “Let’s call her the First Daughter of the Ninth Line.” He pointed down to the next row. “Her brother’s daughter would be the Second.”

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