Blinking in disbelief, Arinel straightened up and turned to Dineira, her voice barely above a whisper.

"What is this?"

Dineira crossed her arms, a smile of triumph peeking out in slivers from behind her grille.

"This—" She tapped her finger on the beaker, sending a dull chime of leather on glass rippling through the silence, "—is what has kept the truth about Greeneyes a secret for all this time."

Dineira gestured for Arinel and Jerald to resume their seats, elaborating as she cleared away the experiment, leaving only the beaker.

"With Lattis from Rutgarth trickling into every smithy in Latakia throughout two centuries, you'd think there were bound to be incidents of Greeneyes transforming that would expose their true nature. But there were none."

Dineira's none coincided with the clunk of the dragon blood bottle on the shelf. Once she had stashed the remaining items in the nearest gaps she could find, she plonked herself down in her chair, her hands clasped loosely on the table.

"By painstakingly ′reading' every eye that had fallen into our hands, the Library curators discovered that some of their owners had transformed by accident at least once while they were alive. Yet, most curiously, when this happens, more often than not the Greeneye's memory does not survive intact."

"Meya woke up and remembered nothing of the past few days. She didn't even seem to notice the days in between had been lost."

Draken's voice echoed in Arinel's head, and her heart quickened as realization began to dawn on her. Both Meya and Coris had been—and still were—suffering from lapses in memory of the Kidnapping, which shouldn't be flimsily explained away as just the result of trauma and denial. And this could very well be the answer they sought.

"So, we studied the eyes of Greeneyes who were held captive in Rutgarth before the Fall." Dineira's animated chatter slowed as she rifled through half-unfurled rolls of parchment, peering at their contents, too distracted to register Arinel's intense focus on her,

"We found that those Greeneyes saw the blacksmiths religiously avoiding all skin contact with the mixture of their blood and Lattis. They must have discovered some danger in it—is our hypothesis. As alchemist, my job is to prove it."

Halfway through her third pile, Dineira indulged in a little gasp of triumph, then tugged out a piece of used parchment, which she handed to Arinel.

Apart from its corners, the parchment was almost flat, both faces crammed to the margins with slanted text interspersed by diagrams and formulas, written in black ink which had yet to lose its luster. At the header was the thesis's title in large print:

On the Effects of Lattis on Greeneye Blood

Arinel's eyes meandered impatiently through the rolling paragraphs. Fortunately, Dineira saved her from further trouble with a brief summary.

"I propose that when dragons or Greeneyes are attacked with Lattis, as an instinctive reaction, their blood synthesizes a potent amnesiac, which targets memories of dragons in the human brain."

Dineira touched feather-light, ginger fingers to the side of the beaker, even as she was wearing thick gloves, and the reason behind her uneasiness became clear when she continued,

"This amnesiac is absorbed through the skin, and could linger in the brain for years. Even decades. Greeneyes, being mostly human, are also affected by this substance."

Arinel stared at the tepid, seemingly innocuous mixture before her, then pressed a fingertip to the glass. The beaker was lukewarm to the touch, proof of the rigorous reaction which had been frothing underneath the beguilingly calm surface.

She couldn't help wondering how Dineira had arrived at her conclusion. Was it simply drawn from observation of ancient Greeneye memories? Or did she prove it using living humans and Greeneyes?

It was still too early for her to pin Dineira for anything, but Lady Jaise would never allow that, would she?

Meanwhile, Dineira chattered on, oblivious of her concerns,

"Of course, it isn't foolproof. I reckon there were more than a few folks who took the secret to their graves. For fear of being thought a lunatic! Even now, there definitely are people walking around knowing Greeneyes are dragons! (I mean, your Lord Coris is living proof!). But I'm sure it does help thin the herd. Just enough for survivors to be too few and far between to be believed."

Arinel nodded. Dineira's take was largely similar to hers. Yet, it was what comes after that matters.

"What will you do with these findings?" She challenged, her voice quiet as her hidden, narrowed eyes scrutinized the dragon expert from beneath her mask. Dineira churned her lips, laced fingers wiggling absently as her gaze traversed her mediocre lab.

"The decision isn't mine." She confessed, her rotund frame seeming to deflate in a long sigh, her cherubic lips unfurling a bitter smile, "We alchemists are funded by the manor. But I'm commissioned by Lady Jaise to conduct my Greeneye experiments. I'm sworn to secrecy, and obliged to hand over my findings. My involvement ends when the Lady is satisfied."

"And what do you think Lady Jaise would do with it?" Arinel pressed on. Dineira heaved another sigh and cocked her head with a shrug,

"Well, I suppose she could use it to cleanse the heads of people who have witnessed Greeneyes transforming. For the good of both sides, you know."

Arinel narrowed her eyes to slits. Dineira didn't seem that interested about what would become of her discoveries. Yet, she was more bothered when reminded that her achievements could never come to light as her own. Had she realized beforehand it was to be thankless, classified work, Arinel doubted Dineira would have accepted it.

A series of ginger knocks came from the open door, reminding the three of them of the temporarily forgotten outside world.

Arinel whipped around to find a masked young man perhaps slightly younger than her, garbed in a simple woolen tunic and patched trousers. He seemed startled to stone by her and Jerald's audience, his loose fist still held aloft beside the door, his mouth ajar in mid-speech. Dineira sprang up from her seat.

"Ah, Ethren! You're early." She called with a great deal more heartiness than was necessary, as if to spook away the dead air. She gathered the boy's bony shoulders in one wobbling arm and swept him inside, shining Arinel and Jerald an apologetic smile as they approached, "He's one of my volunteer test subjects. We're deciding how often he should sell blood."

With a gentle hand on his arm, Dineira guided Ethren towards the side-door, calling over her shoulder at her earlier guests.

"We'll be a while. Feel free to have a look around. Biscuits and tea on the shelf somewhere, so help yourself!"

Dineira paused to grab a quill and a spare parchment before hurrying in after Ethren. The door had barely closed behind them when Arinel sprang up and rounded on Jerald, her long pent-up temper exploding in a fierce hiss.

"You've never told me about Dineira, Sir Bayne! Nor has Grandmother!" She whirled away in disgust, slamming her palms on the cluttered table. Her face downcast and her breathing ragged, she leaned heavily down on her jittery arms, her voice choked with angry tears as she lamented,

"I could've had Bishop Riddell introduce me as Arinel had I known. We could have talked about Mother!"

A resounding blow from Arinel's fist sent Dineira's papers tumbling down in sheaves. Fatherly instinct had Jerald reaching towards Arinel as she stood huddled, her face hidden behind crooked, trembling fingers. Yet, just as swiftly, propriety held him back.

Curling back his half-outstretched fingers, Jerald withdrew his arm back to his side without so much as a rustle of his cloak. His gaze fixed at his little Lady's feet, he bowed deeply.

"My Lady, I am terribly sorry." He beseeched, his voice trembling slightly as he strained against the whirlpool of resurrected grief within him,

"I've refrained from mentioning Dineira because she isn't fond of your mother. Even as they worked side by side, they were never close. I reckoned it would only bring you unnecessary pain."

Arinel perked up, her delicate figure, which often belied her fiery temper, taut with apprehension.

"Why? What has Mother done wrong?" She demanded, shrill and harsh, ready to defend the memory of her beloved mother. Just as Jerald and Gretella had predicted. Jerald shook his head with a resigned sigh. However much he longed to shield his Lady, he had no choice but to oblige.

"She existed, that was all." Arinel was visibly thrown back by his brusque, bitter quip. Jerald made an effort to soften his tone as he went on, tamping down his stirring past resentments,

"Erina was a mere peasant maid, yet Tyberne was more generous with his teachings to her than Dineira, his apprentice. He saw potential in her, he was impressed by her eagerness to learn, and he took pity on her circumstances."

Jerald raised his gaze. What little he could see of Arinel behind the grille over her mouth remained pale. Yet, learning her mother was not fully to blame, she seemed to have relaxed greatly. He cocked his head towards the sidedoor, which thankfully was still emitting muffled voices—mostly Dineira's.

"You have seen Dineira with Diamat. She's an only daughter. The jewel of her father's eyes. Descended from a long line of distinguished alchemists. She didn't take well to being seconded by a lowly servant girl."

Arinel couldn't help glancing at the closed door. It was astonishing to fathom; the resentment and envy such a bubbly, chatty personality could temper within. And though she knew it was something Mother could not have helped, it pained her nonetheless to learn Mother wasn't ubiquitously liked. Jerald was wise to have kept it secret from her, she grudgingly admitted to herself.

Meanwhile, Jerald lowered himself back to his chair with a labored sigh.

"It is, of course, no fault of Erina's. Nor Dineira's. They were young." He slid up his mask to allow his cheeks a feel of the late morning air, his gaze lost far in the past. "Tyberne was supposed to be the wisest one. He should've foreseen it."

Arinel allowed her numb knees to buckle and slumped back on her chair. Pale sunlight from the window behind Dineira's study desk scored a blinding white glint on the amnesiac beaker. She drew it before her, staring morosely down at its unyielding black depths.

"This could have been Mother." She muttered, her hands trembling as she turned the beaker slowly around,

"This could have been Mother telling all this to me. Wearing alchemist robes. Working in her own lab. Writing her own treatises."

As she glanced about the chaotic lab, Arinel saw a faceless woman gliding gracefully about the shelves. The longer she looked, the more vivid the mirage became. There she was bent over the distilling set, one eye on the flowing hourglass. Then she was sitting behind the study desk, fighting her rolling parchment as she scribbled away under the watchful light of the midnight oil. The lab itself had become clean and organized.

So much that she had been. So much that she would never be. So much that Arinel would never know. If only Tyberne had called Dineira instead of Mother in to assist him with his experiments that night, all this would have been the present.

Arinel's heart writhed with shame at the unbidden, selfish thought. Yet, it was impossible to get rid of. Slowly, soundlessly, like a wall besieged by vines, she crumbled in her chair, resting her forehead on the table edge, staring unseeing at the wooden floorboards. That was when she spotted a sharp-edged patch of yellow amidst the polished brown.

Arinel sprang up and pushed aside her chair, then fell down on all fours. By the time Jerald knelt down beside her, she was already wrist-deep in the loose floorboard. Without a word, he pulled on the jutting edge, and Arinel tugged the papers free in one piece, albeit with some unavoidable crinkles.

Arinel brushed away the smattering of dirt and dust, and words were gradually revealed:

Enhanced Synthesis of Sweet Oil of Vitriol, and its Application in Medicine: A Treatise.

Below the title, lines of text and intricate drawings rolled on. Faint bells were sounding in her head as she saw but did not read. Jerald retrieved the papers from her frozen fingers. She hadn't resisted, yet still the papers crackled; his hands were shaking.

"Erina's handwriting." He whispered, his voice trembling with boiling grief, and Arinel's dawning realization was confirmed. "This was the thesis they were working on when they died. Spirits and vitriol. To create a sleeping draught for surgery."

"And they succeeded."

Arinel interjected. She heard a rustle as Jerald whirled abruptly to her, and she turned to face him back, forcing words through her constricted, powder-dry throat,

"Mother looked as if she were asleep, all the while they were cutting me out of her."

Clamping her shivering hands on her wobbling knees, Arinel straightened to her feet and turned to face the side-door once more. Dineira's giggling voice slithered through the wood, like the malevolent hiss of a viper. Arinel felt her insides burn as if doused in its poison as she whispered just as venomously.

"What if she actually was asleep?"