“Dear Aroth, I beseech your help, for I’m distraught. With my son’s death I now face the unpleasant truth that my lineage is dead. I must therefore confess a secret I had thought to take to my grave: my granddaughter, Janel, is not my blood.”

I shook my head. “That’s a lie. You’re making this up—”

He turned the paper around so I saw the writing on the page and, worse, saw it matched Jarin’s handwriting. “I’m not. I found this among my father’s papers years ago. It’s a fascinating read.”

“Oh, I just love a good family scandal,” Darzin said, leaning back in his chair. “Please, keep going. I want all the details. Actually, let’s do one better—” He grabbed the paper from Sir Oreth.

“Hey!”

“Since I don’t know the names involved, it would be much harder to claim I’m making it all up, wouldn’t it?”

“Darzin, you ass,” Senera muttered under her breath.

Darzin just grinned. “I had always suspected. I loved my daughter-in-law, but I’m not a fool. After she tried for so long to bear a child without success, how could I ignore when she returned from their district tour with a babe Frena had never carried? She never produced milk for Janel. She never lost her maidenly figure. I knew my son had had difficulties giving Frena a child. I knew of their longing. So I didn’t question too much such a miraculous birth. They loved her, as did I.”

I felt dizzy and faint. The entire table had stopped talking to each other; they were all listening to Darzin’s reading. “Please stop.”

But Darzin didn’t stop. “But there can be no denying the child is not Joratese. I have been forced to go to House D’Mon—” Darzin paused. “Oh, hey, that’s me. Anyway, House D’Mon, accepting their outrageous fees—it’s true, we are expensive—to make sure the girl has proper horse markings. The cost left us in poor sorts when the Hellmarch came, and little in our coffers to help with the recovery after. Thus, I throw myself on your mercy and offer a possible solution. Though she’s of common blood, Janel is comely. She’d make your youngest son a fine wife. Thus, would Tolamer continue to be ruled by noble blood, as is right and proper. Signed with greatest respect, Jarin Theranon.”

“No,” I said. I felt a flustered sense of panic. Yes, I knew my grandfather had arranged the marriage with Sir Oreth. Yet he hadn’t protested when I’d announced I’d wanted nothing more to do with the idea. My grandfather had never treated me as anything other than his grandchild. He had never treated me as less.

It couldn’t be true.