Carefully, she pulled Elka out from beneath her mother’s body and helped her sit upright.

Elka offered no resistance. She just stared ahead blankly. Her hands would not stop shaking. Blood soaked every inch of her clothing.

Neither of them spoke for a long time and the silence was tense.

When Elka finally found her voice, it sounded hollow and distant, as though the words belonged to someone else.

"They knew," she whispered. Her gaze remained fixed on nothing. "They knew I sent the letter."

Mara looked at the two ruined bodies lying on the floor and let out a long breath. "We need to act fast," she said quietly. "Before anyone comes looking for them."

They worked through the rest of the night in grim silence.

They wrapped both bodies in old sailcloth, dragging them out the back door and behind the cottage. Then they began cleaning. They scrubbed the floors and walls until the water in the buckets turned dark red again and again. Elka burned her blood-soaked clothes and every rag they had used in the hearth, standing in front of the fire and watching the flames consume every trace of what had happened. The smell of smoke and scorched fabric filled the cottage, clinging to the air long after the last scraps had turned to ash.

Then came the final and hardest step. Mara called in a favor from an old fisherman who lived farther down the coast. In exchange for a heavy pouch of coins and his silence, he allowed them to use his boat for the night.

They rowed far beyond the reef, where the dark sea stretched endlessly in every direction. The only sounds were the rhythmic splash of the oars and the distant crash of waves against the rocks behind them.

The journey out to sea felt endless.

They rowed until the coastline was barely visible in the distance. Elka sat at the back of the boat, staring at the two wrapped shapes lying at her feet. Her shoulder and collarbone ached with every movement, but the physical pain was nothing compared to the cold dread sitting in her stomach.

Elka had tied heavy stones around her father’s ankles and chest before doing the same to her mother.

When they finally pushed the bodies overboard, Elka watched them sink into the black water until they disappeared completely.

Even as the bodies vanished beneath the waves, a deep unease settled over her.

"What if they rise?" she whispered, her voice barely audible over the sound of the waves. "What if the currents bring them back to shore?"

"Then we pray no one connects them to you." Mara said.

Elka stared at the dark water where her parents had disappeared. She knew Ragnar would likely believe her story. It was the people in the town she was worried about.

She had worked so hard to build a quiet, peaceful life here. If even a single body washed ashore and someone linked it back to her, she would forever be known as the woman who murdered her own parents. The whispers would follow her for the rest of her life. "Murderer." "Dangerous."

She didn’t want to be feared.

She just wanted to be left alone.

As they rowed back toward the coast, Elka hugged her arms tightly around herself. The weight of what she had done pressed down on her heavier than any stone they had used.

Her parents were gone. But the fear that they might still destroy her life from beyond the grave remained.

They returned the boat before dawn.

Back in her cottage, Elka scrubbed her hands raw several times, convinced she could still smell blood on her skin no matter how often she washed. She could still feel her father’s hands around her throat, like he was still trying to strangle her.

But it was now all in her imagination

They were gone.

The people who had controlled her life, sold her to the queen for power, beaten her, and tried to drag her back into their ruin, were finally gone. No one else was coming for her.

She was free. Finally, truly free.

The next morning, just noon, the sound of multiple horses approaching made both women freeze.

Elka was still scrubbing at the last stubborn bloodstain on the floor when Mara glanced out the window. Her expression immediately tightened.

"Soldiers," she said quietly. "At least nine of them."

Elka slowly rose to her feet, her entire body still aching terribly. Her shoulder and collarbone wounds had been bandaged by Mara, and dark bruises had formed across her face, ribs, and arms. Every movement sent sharp pains through her body.

Outside, the horses came to a halt.

The soldiers dismounted and approached the cottage. Their captain stepped through the broken door that they were still yet to fix and immediately took in the scene before him—the shattered door hanging crooked on its hinges and Elka’s visibly battered condition.

His eyes lingered on her bruised face, bandaged shoulder, and bloodshot eyes.

"The king received your letter," he said and those words alone was all it took to deflate the tension in the air. "His Majesty sent us to Dunharbor to locate Lord Nereth and Lady Laena, but despite thoroughly searching the village, we were unable to find them. We suspect they have already fled the area." They had ridden straight here the moment they realized that continuing the search in Dunharbor would be nothing more than a waste of time. "Have you by any chance had any contact with them recently?"

Elka didn’t think twice before recounting the violent confrontation she had with her parents.

"They came the night before. My father broke the door down and tried to kill me. He said I had betrayed them by sending that letter. I killed him during the struggle. My mother came in right after and attacked me. I killed her too."

The captain raised an eyebrow.

"And where are the bodies?"

Elka met his gaze directly. "We dumped them in the sea. Far past the reef. I weighed them down with stones to make them sink faster."

A heavy silence filled the room at her admission and at how calmly she described doing something so violent.

In truth, however, her body was still in shock, unable to fully comprehend the extent of what she had done.

This was nothing like when she had started the war between her father and Rycoff. It was nothing like when she had tried to kill Azul.

This was different.

This was worse.

She had killed two people and watched their bodies disappear beneath the sea.

Perhaps in a few days she would return to her normal state of mind. Perhaps the reality of it would finally catch up to her. But she doubted she would ever be able to muster even the slightest amount of remorse for what she had done.

Her parents had been awful people. They had earned their deaths.

The captain stared at her for a long moment, clearly surprised by her honesty.

One of the younger soldiers that followed him shifted uncomfortably, glancing away, but the captain remained calm. He studied the broken door, and Elka’s injuries once more.

Finally, he gave a slow nod.

"We’ll still need to take a full written statement from you and everyone involved in this," he said. "His Majesty will want to know exactly what transpired."

He paused briefly before adding, "But from what I can see here, you had every reason to defend yourself. His majesty will likely be pleased to hear they’re dead. They were traitors. You may have saved us the trouble of executing them."