Finally he called the Seneschal to his office one morning. “What I most need to know now,” he said, “is the limit of the bones’ knowledge. I have talked to others who knew my parents, and they remember things that seem to corroborate what the bones hinted. But can bones know more than the people who bore them?”

“No one knows for sure,” the Seneschal said. “I have not known them to convey anything beyond the lifetime of the flesh.”

“What I say now must stay between us for the time,” Kieri said.

“Of course, sire.”

“My sister’s bones hinted at treachery, treachery somehow related to our mother’s death—and that means treachery related to my captivity as well. I think my sister believed the Lady complicit in this.”

“The Lady!” The Seneschal’s eyes widened.

“And the thought of it made me sick,” Kieri said; even now his stomach cramped as he spoke of it. “I have talked, as I said, to others who were here at that time. I am not so sure who it was—but I am increasingly sure that treachery was involved. There was, at the least, tension between the Lady and my—our—mother. Someone else could have exploited that. Human or elf, but elf, I fear, is more likely.”

“Not a random attack by brigands?”

“No,” Kieri said. “By several accounts, she expected an elven escort on the journey—refused a human retinue—and as a full elf should have been able to enter the elvenhome with me if danger threatened. As well, she was skilled with weapons—she would not have been easy to take down. Yet she had no elven escort—they did not arrive when expected, and she chose to leave without them. A Squire who mentioned treachery at the time was soon thrown from her horse and killed. So treachery seems likely—but my sister’s suspicion of our grandmother could be based on as little as a minor argument she overheard.”

“Your sister lived to adulthood,” the Seneschal said. “She could have heard more than you, firsthand, from those who knew your mother and the Lady.”

“My father’s bones have indicated no such suspicion,” Kieri said. “Would he not have known more?”

“Not … necessarily.” The Seneschal frowned. “Knowledge can pass from mother to daughter, or father to son, through bone and blood. Your sister might have some awareness of what your mother knew, from before your sister’s birth.”

“How is that possible?”

“I don’t know.” The Seneschal spread his hands. “In the old days, the old humans believed such was possible. That was one reason for raising the bones and honoring them. They had true wisdom that their descendants might share, at least in part. Certain knowledge and certain skills passed mother to daughter and father to son. Parrions, they called those.”

Kieri thought of something else. “Did you ever hear rumor that the Lady was unhappy at her daughter’s wedding a human? At the need to reintroduce taig-sense into the royal family?”

“No … though elves have always acted as if it were a greater honor to the king your father than to your mother. But I thought that natural.” The Seneschal paused, then went on. “Sir King, will you ask the Lady of these things?”