Henri's mind was working rapidly now, and he found himself reaching for the cup his father had poured him as his mouth went dry. The cool, crisp pear wine helped him to swallow the bitter truths he saw in the fragmented slips of paper, but they did nothing to put his heart at ease with the news.
"Who is Eleanor Blackwell?" Henri asked, frowning at one of the slips of paper. "I don't recognize the name."
"I don't blame you for that, I didn't either," Thibert said, leaning back in his chair as he watched his son running through the same sets of questions he had a few hours ago. "I had to ask an archivist. She's a cousin of Rhys Blackwell's, not part of the direct line. By rights, she renounced her surname when she entered the Confessor's convent in DuCoumont. Yet the person who sent the message named her 'Confessor Eleanor Blackwell'..."
