“Surely someone would remember if Royalty still existed back then,” Aiden reasoned, raising an eyebrow.
“Sir Barnaby Albus II remembers. That’s why the white raven is waiting for him!”
If the white raven was waiting for Sir Barnaby Albus II, then those were two different people with two different codenames. Barnaby was Darren Howe, sowhowas the white raven? He’d assumed it was another codename for Darren at first… which would make Darren the supposed current heir, but that didn’t seem likely anymore.
Sara went to the altar and took the sword from the man’s hand, pointing it at Aiden. “Aiden Kesley! Don’t be a fool. The bad men just made everyone believe their story.”
That must’ve been some very powerful bad men.The kind who also had influence and money to fake autopsies, investigation reports and overrule laws to let murderers live.
So, if Aiden took Sara’s story at face value, then Darren Howe’s trial kind of made sense, didn’t it? After all, if Sara’s hideout was the target of whoever was pulling the strings and Darren knew how to get to it, then that had to be why they’d kept him alive despite his crime.
A really bad feeling clutched Aiden’s stomach.What was going on, really?What had he gotten himself into?
Everything he knew jumbled together into one big mess of half-truths, lies and riddles, and he had no idea where to even begin untangling it. The more he tried, the more his head felt like it was going to explode, like his skull was too small to keep his overworked brain in place.
“Sara, who were these bad men?” he asked, deciding to figure that out first. If he knew who the ‘bad men’ were, maybe that would shed some light on all the other questions he had.
“Sir Barnaby Albus II didn’t show you the letters?”
She had to be referring to the encrypted correspondence. “He didn’t have time to… teach me how to read them,” he said, forcing a smile he hoped could fool the AI. “Do you know what the secret codes are?”
Sara gave him an ear-wide grin and planted her hands on her hips. “Of course. I helped with them both!”
Good, he was finally making some progress. “Can you tell me what they are about then?”
“Hmm… Only after you become a knight and promise to help Sir Barnaby Albus II bring the heir here.”
Aiden huffed in exasperation but let himself be ‘knighted’ by the little girl, promising he would assist Sir Barnaby Albus II in his task. After another hour of back-and-forth and promises that he would fulfill his knightly duty and not disappoint Sara, he finally extracted the information he needed and bid the raven-haired girl goodbye.
As instructed, he found the cyphers inside the framed picture of a golden retriever sitting on the shelf above the desk. It quickly became evident that the correspondence between PDL and GN Riley was not about monetary machinations as he had suspected might be the case, but something far graver—the assassination of the Valrais bloodline that had taken placetwenty years ago. Just like Sara had said.
The majority of the letters were from the years leading up to the attempt and discussed the preparations Riley would need to make so that PDL could eliminatethe royals, though toward the end of the pile, Aiden started seeing mentions of MDL, who seemed to have overtaken PDL’s side of the correspondence. Judging by the content of the last two letters, both dated about a week after the hit, the assassination had only partially succeeded as the younger of the two Valrais kids had somehow escaped.
This was the heir Sara had mentioned then. The one who Darren had to bring here.
Aiden let out a low grunt and massaged his temples. This was crazy. He’d never heard of the Valrais family, nor did he know of any such assassinations of royalty taking place twenty years ago. There were a bunch of conspiracies floating around, of course, but he’d never dug deeper or cared to know the specifics. The assassination letters seemed authentic though; they were even watermarked with a vaguely familiar-looking seal of a tall black triangular obelisk and three golden ones surrounding its peak. He tried to place it, because he was sure that he’d seen it somewhere recently, this combination of colors and shapes, but it eluded him no matter how hard he racked his brain. If only he had access to the internet, he could’ve looked up both the supposed royals and that seal, but, alas, that was currently impossible.
Seeing as he wasn’t going to crack who MDL and GN Riley were, Aiden moved onto the second folder. It had fewer letters, primarily a back-and-forth between Lu and white raven about the child-survivor leaving Earth and obtaining a new ID. There was one vague mention of the Valrais Legacy Sara had brought up earlier, but no details as to what it was exactly.
Feeling a renewed wave of irritation, Aiden went back to Sara’s VR. He wasn’t leaving with nothing but more questions; he was getting to the bottom of this.
“Hello, Sir Kesley!” Sara greeted him, beaming at him as soon as the VR materialized. Rather than the hill, this time Aiden found himself sitting in the gazebo in the back garden.
“Hi, Sara.” He considered how to word his request. “Can you prove that the letters’ contents are authentic? I’ve been banging my head against the wall for the past hour, but without internet access, I can’t even do basic research! The things that are in there are…impossible. We are talking about the assassination of Royals I’ve never heard of and then mass-media manipulation of records about them. Frankly, I don’t believe that’s even achievable.” He paused and exhaled, trying to calm his nerves. “This is too crazy. And I fail to see what it has to do with Darren Howe killing my fiancée! Or her supposed attempt to kidnap him.”
“Who’s Darren Howe?” Sara asked, tapping her fingers against her chin.
Aiden barely managed not to roll his eyes.Right, he had to use Darren’s silly codename.“No one. I meant to say Sir Barnaby Albus II.”
Sara’s smile changed into a scowl that made his hackles rise. “Someone tried to kidnap him?”
“That’s what he claims. I have no idea why, which is the reason I came here in the first place. But this is getting more and more ridiculous by the minute.” He didn’t want to take it out on the AI, but his brain was going to short-circuit if this carried on. He needed the answers, and he needed themnow.
“I can tell you why! It’s because Sir Barnaby Albus II can find the heir. The bad men must’ve figured that out and gone after him.”
Aiden groaned, tired of going in circles. It felt like he was dealing with a child more so than with an advanced AI and it was grating on him.Why would her creators design her this way?
Taking a deep breath, he summarized, “So Sir Barnaby Albus II can find the surviving Valrais heir, and that’s somehow bad for the bad men? Whoever they are.”
