“Avery—” she stutters. “How—”
I leave the kitchens before she can finish.
I reach the Nest quickly. Leaning against Silas’s office door, I wait for the teller to return. After a few moments, he rounds the corner in a collared shirt and wool pants.
“Lunch?” I ask.
He stops. “What has happened to you?”
“I’ll let you infer.”
Silas stares, shaking his head. Then he is trundling toward me, unlocking his office, and shooing me inside.
I start pulling out the jams and cheeses and bread. “Do you have a knife and some plates?”
The halfling circles the room to take out utensils from his cabinet and joins me at the table. After several beats of quiet save for the scraping of metal, he asks: “Can you speak of it?”
I shake my head, scrutinizing the seeds of the raspberry jam that stick in the divots of the grainy bread.
“You are still woven with the oath.”
I look up. “Woven?”
“The oath—the Reign magic. It needs matter to weave into, as it cannot exist on its own. All oaths are a finesse of Reign work.”
“Even oaths sworn to Illusion?”
He nods. “That’s why every blood oath uses an enchanted item to seal the ritual. Every oath is Reign magic, even to the other Houses.”
Stunned, I put the bread down. “Why tell me this?”
Silas sighs. “Is there anything I can do to ease the pain?”
“My injuries are healing.”
“I meant from the fallout of whatever has happened.”
“I want what the halflings have,” I say. “The contract that stops your relatives from inheriting your unpaid debt.”
“There is no such thing.”
“Then how is it done? How have the halflings stopped debt from accumulating?”
Silas slathers more bread with jam, finishing off one slice, then another. “There’s no way to stop the inheritance of debt directly, but there’s a way to assuage the balance, sometimes pay it off entirely, but only after their life ends.”
“What do you mean?”
“Halflings set aside some of their income that, once deposited, cannot be withdrawn in their lifetime. It can only be used by the beneficiaries on their account to pay off the debt after their death.”
“A savings account for coin that will never enter your pocket, only the pockets of those you’ve left behind?”
“A risk that many faeries cannot afford.”
“One that they do not know about.”
“This is true.” He nods. “Most halflings maintain a savings balance similar to their debt. Part of the account must go to family, but the rest can go to anyone.”
“Let me open one.”
