Lady Cassandra Vexmoor’s Notes on the Murder in Nyelath’s Grace

Introduction: An Outsider in Chains

We were seized the moment we arrived, manacled like criminals, accused of conspiring in the murder of High Priestess Arilshae. How typical — outsiders always bear the brunt of suspicion when a people cannot face the rot within their own walls.

Yes, well, one can hardly blame them. Nobles do the same in Leilon — scapegoats are simply more convenient when they lack names that matter.

— Annotation

The Council of Tides

The chamber radiated ceremony, lantern-jellies swaying in orbs of glass, but its grandeur was fractured by absence. The empty chair of Arilshae was more eloquent than any accusation. Nimrath Oceanforge thundered like a soldier with too much power and too little imagination. Nyrae wrapped her prejudice in the cloak of harmony.

Only Shyk spoke plainly in our defense, and only Hunter had the courage to cut through the posturing, rejecting Nimrath’s demand for magical shackles of obedience. Their words spared us hours of wasted ritual.

Hunter’s speech was inspired, yes — though I do wish he’d stop smirking every time someone agrees with him. One day it will backfire, and I will be the one to say ‘I told you so.

— Annotation

The Sanctum of the High Priestess

Arilshae’s sanctum was a hollow pearl, her body a vision of still grace marred by the knife in her back. Evidence was scattered like shells at low tide: forged sahuagin runes, a memory pearl with a lullaby, and traces of costly ink that had no business in such crude forgery.

It was clear even to me that this was a staging. The killer wanted blame to fall upon the sahuagin, but lacked the scholarship to copy their tongue convincingly.

Honestly, the Pearlguard should be ashamed — if a priest of Moradin can spot the mistakes, then any apprentice with a lexicon could as well.

— Annotation

The Mythal and Its Keeper

Sythar Alcarin presides over the mythal like a book over a nervous scribe: rigid, essential, yet fragile in his pride. His apprentices confirm the lattice logs, his demeanor confirms only that he is difficult to like. Still, he is not the murderer — his temper nearly incinerated Veylan before our eyes, but the protections of the mythal betray no conspiracy, only arrogance.

We learned the truth of the protections: no equal may strike another, but blood may always strike blood. Arilshae’s murder required kinship — though she denied children in all her centuries.

Which means she lied. And that, more than any rune or record, unsettles me most of all.

— Annotation

The Archives

The Council keeps meticulous records, etched in shell and sealed in resin. There we unearthed the cracks: arguments redacted, ages obscured, meetings scrubbed “for harmony.” Nyrae’s hand is all over the alterations.

The records of Arilshae’s two-year abdication, centuries ago, are the most damning. A lullaby, a gap, and the whispered truth of a child. It is the only explanation the mythal allows: blood unshielded from blood.

I dislike the simplicity of it. Mysteries that resolve into family scandals are hardly mysteries at all. Still, truth has an ugly habit of being banal.

— Annotation

The False Arrest

Shaelira, half-sahuagin, dragged in as spectacle. A scapegoat paraded for the crowd, necklace and amulet waved like proof. She shouted her hatred of Arilshae — but hatred is not the same as guilt. Cassandra Vexmoor knows the difference.

I nearly called Nimrath a racist thug to his face. I should have. He would have proven me right in a heartbeat.

— Annotation

The Kelp Gardens

Raelunai Zsvael was next — defensive, evasive, and exhausted. Their hands stained with ink raised suspicion, but even dolphins mocked the idea of their guilt. Spilled ink, spilled tempers, but not blood. The gardens themselves hum with desperation, kelp failing, coral dying. Desperation drives politics, but not daggers.

Though Shyk is still convinced otherwise. Priests do so hate being wrong.

— Annotation

Closing Thoughts

The Council is younger than it pretends. The records do not align. The mythal whispers of bloodlines and betrayal. And always, the empty chair of Arilshae glares down upon us.

It will not forgive silence.