✦Dolly✦
No one spoke for a few seconds. The words stayed burned into the cloth, dark and ugly, as if they were waiting for us to understand them faster than we could.
Arthur Crowe’s blood remains tied to Vaelyra. The gate must not be protected by the line that made it!
I stared at the name until my eyes started to hurt.
Arthur Crowe.
I had never heard it before, but Riven clearly had. He sat down in the chair I had pushed toward him. One hand gripped the edge of the table, while his face had gone pale. Not from pain, though, this was about Arthur.
“You know that name,” I said. Riven looked at me, then at the cloth.
“Yes,” my father stepped closer to the table, the ring still wrapped in the cloth in his hand.
“Who is he?” Riven dragged in a careful breath.
“Arthur Crowe was one of
