Chapter 10 - GRANDPA HAD ALREADY CAUGHT HER
The full letter was not a will.
Not a deed.
Not a trust instruction.
It had no magical legal power.
It was worse for Morgause because it was simple.
Dad had seen her.
He had understood.
And he had written it down before he died.
Eluned,
You never have to earn dinner in this family.
You never have to earn the right to see clearly.
On Sunday I came to Morgause’s house and found your glasses on top of the refrigerator. You were cleaning Cerys’s boots while your dinner sat untouched.
I stopped reading.
Naomi waited.
I continued.
Dad wrote that he asked Morgause why.
She told him:
“Eluned needs to learn that family help is not free.”
He wrote:
That frightened me because you are six.
Then:
I gave you your glasses and food. You were afraid I would make Morgause angry. I should have understood sooner that this was not one bad afternoon.
There.
He had seen prior signs.
Eluned clearing Cerys’s place while Cerys was told to sit.
Eluned carrying shoes.
Eluned waiting in the kitchen while others began dessert.
Morgause calling normal accommodations “special treatment.”
Dad admitted:
I thought it was sibling resentment between adults. I should have asked what it looked like to you.
Then:
I confronted Morgause. She promised me she would never again make you earn food, take your glasses, or make you perform Cerys’s personal chores.
There.
The promise.
Then:
She also promised to tell your father herself before his trip ended. I no longer trust that she will.
My chest tightened.
Dad had planned to call me.
Then:
I have written Quillon separately and spoken to Naomi about making sure this does not disappear if I am not here to say it.
There.
Then the most painful line:
If your father seems not to know, that is because I failed to reach him, not because he agreed.
I covered my face.
Eluned had spent four months believing I knew.
Dad had anticipated exactly that possibility.
Then:
Please do not blame Cerys. Children should not have to carry adults’ pride for them.
And finally:
You are not a burden. You are a child. Those are not the same thing.
Signed:
Grandpa Alaric.
The estate also held Dad’s attorney note.
Not privileged anymore under the executor’s limited authorization concerning child safety and letter disposition.
Dad had told Naomi:
“If Morgause keeps caring for Eluned, Quillon needs to know what I saw.”
He intended to speak to me the next morning.
He died that night.
Not a conspiracy.
Not a convenient murder.
A failing heart.
Then what happened after death?
Probate inventory logs showed Morgause entered Dad’s study before the formal inventory began.
She said she was searching for his insurance binder.
A building hallway camera showed her leaving with a canvas document pouch.
Later she returned with it.
Could the letter have been inside?
Unknown.
Then her own text to her friend two days after death:
I found Dad’s ridiculous note to Eluned. I cannot let Quillon read this right now. He will destroy the family.
There.
No ambiguity.
She hid it.
For four months.
Why keep it instead of destroy it?
Her later testimony:
“I could not throw away Dad’s last words.”
That was human.
Then:
“I kept telling myself I would give it to Quillon when everyone calmed down.”
She never did.
Instead she continued caring for Eluned twice after Dad died.
And on the night of the family dinner:
She broke the child’s glasses.
Made her polish Cerys’s shoes.
Delayed her meal.
The exact things Dad had demanded she stop.
That was the central secret.
Morgause did not misunderstand what she was doing.
Grandpa had confronted her months earlier.
She had promised to stop.
May you like
She hid the letter that would have told me.
Then repeated the behavior after the only witness she feared was gone.
