“My mother managed the estate after my grandfather’s death,” she said. “The water debt was inherited, not created.”
Serast looked down at the ledger.
“Inherited debt remains debt.”
Brinna swallowed. “Yes.”
Her hands shook. The whole room saw.
She survived the trial technically.
But she stepped back looking as if the court had taken something from under her skin.
Tavi was called next.
House Rennic was named. Military lineage. Border service. Burial pensions.
A petitioner read that House Rennic had profited from dead men. That Tavi had been entered into the Trials because marriage was cheaper than continuing pension obligations to widows and orphans tied to old campaigns.
Tavi’s face went hard.
“My house honors its dead,” she said. Her voice was rough. “If the crown thinks honoring them is expensive, perhaps it should stop sending men to die cheaply.”
The chamber went still.
Serast made a note.
Tavi’s jaw flexed, but she did not look away.
She passed.
The court had heard her anger. That was enough for them to store it.
Yselle stepped forward.
House Marrow was read with formal precision.
Then the ledger opened.
No male heir. Her mother’s long stewardship. Her father’s death when Yselle was twelve. The banking consortium tied to three stronger houses. The river estates. The textile contracts. The fact that Marrow holdings would be absorbed if Yselle failed before final selection.
The room listened differently for Yselle.
Not with pity. With appetite.
Yselle answered with brilliance.
“My mother preserved the estate through twelve years of council obstruction,” she said when Serast questioned Marrow’s female stewardship. “If the council finds that remarkable, it may be because remarkable competence looks unusual when men are used to inheriting credit for women’s work.”
A ripple moved through the gallery.
She turned debt into liquidity. Exposure into strategic positioning. No male heir into proof that Marrow daughters had been trained for consequence rather than decoration.
But Sabine saw the cost.
Yselle’s throat moved once. Her hands stayed white-knuckled at her sides. Her breathing hitched fractionally when the banking houses were named.
She passed.
