POV: Magnus
I spent the morning in the guard barracks, questioning the six men who had failed to keep a single chained witch inside her cell. Their stories were consistent enough, all claiming a disturbance in the east wing had pulled two of them away, leaving the remaining four distracted by shouting they could hear echoing from the main corridor.
A disturbance. I had already heard whispers of Iris and Lyra arguing loudly over a missing necklace that night, a detail so trivial it barely seemed worth mentioning, and yet the timing bothered me more than I wanted to admit.
I found Iris in the garden that afternoon, sitting with her embroidery, her expression bored and unbothered by the chaos still gripping the household. "Tell me about the necklace," I said, stopping in front of her.
She
