Read Chapter 6: The Dead Donor

The knock came at half past nine, a polite, insistent rap that Eliza had learned to associate with college porters. She opened her door to find a stout man in a black gown, his face professionally blank.

“Dr. Hart? I’m sorry to disturb you. It’s Dr. Marcus. He’s been found in his rooms. Dead.”

The words landed like stones in still water. Eliza’s fingers tightened on the doorframe. “Dead? How?”

“The Master is asking for those who knew him. There’s a gathering in the Senior Common Room. If you wouldn't mind…”

She followed him through the cobbled quadrangle, the night air sharp with the smell of wet stone. Lights burned in the SCR windows, and through the leaded glass she could see a cluster of dark shapes—fellows, porters, a man in a police uniform she recognized from the Bodleian three days ago. Of course. The same officer who had escorted Marcus out. The circle was closing.

Inside, the room smelled of beeswax and whisky. The Master, a thin, grey man with the nervous energy of a sparrow, was speaking in hushed tones to the policeman. Julian stood near the fireplace, his silhouette rigid, a glass of sherry untouched in his hand. He saw her, and something flickered in his eyes—not surprise, but a grim acknowledgment.

“Eliza,” he said, his voice low enough for only her to hear. “You shouldn’t be here.”

“I was summoned. What happened?”

“He hanged himself.” Julian’s jaw tightened. “In his rooms. The porter found him this morning when he didn’t come down for breakfast.”

A suicide. Clean. Convenient. The thought was uncharitable, but it swam up from the dark water of her suspicion. Marcus had been expelled for “unbecoming conduct,” whatever that meant. He’d been publicly destroyed. And now he was dead.

“Where are his rooms?” she asked.

“Cardinal’s Quad, second stair. Don’t-” He reached for her arm as she moved toward the door, but she shook him off.

“I need to see.”

The porter led her up the narrow, creaking stairs to a set of oak-panelled rooms that smelled of old tobacco and dust. The door to the sitting room stood open, and inside, a constable was making notes. The room was tidy, almost unnaturally so. Books shelved in perfect rows. A decanter of whisky on the sideboard, one glass, empty. A desk by the window, its surface bare except for a single sheet of paper covered in tight, black handwriting.

The suicide note, she assumed. She didn’t read it. Instead, her eyes swept the room for detail, for the thing that was out of place. The photograph frames on the mantelpiece. The college crest above the door. The wardrobe, its doors ajar, revealing a rail of black gowns and tweed jackets.

And then she saw it. On the bedside table, a small leather box, overturned and empty. Its velvet lining was molded into a circular impression, just wide enough for a signet ring.

The owl ring. It was gone.

“Where’s his personal effects?” she asked the constable, her voice steady despite the hammering in her chest.

“Already logged, miss. The coroner will take them.”

“The ring he wore. On his right hand. Was it there?”

The constable frowned. “I didn’t see a ring. Just the note and-” He gestured to the desk. “That.”

Eliza crossed to the desk and looked down at the note. It was a confession. Of course it was. Written in Marcus’s cramped hand, it admitted to falsifying research, to embezzling society funds, to “unworthy dealings that have brought shame to the house of my kin.” It read like a Victorian melodrama, stilted and theatrical. It read like a script.

“He didn’t write this,” she said quietly.

“Miss?” The constable looked up.

“Nothing. The handwriting—it’s his, but it’s wrong. The slant is different. Like he was copying his own hand.”

She left without another word, her mind racing. Julian was waiting at the bottom of the stairs, his face unreadable in the lamplight.

“The ring,” she said, her voice barely a whisper. “The owl ring. It’s missing. It was on his hand when he was expelled. I saw it. And now it’s gone.”

Julian’s face went very still. “You’re certain?”

“I’ve seen it twice. Once on him. Once in a photograph. Someone took it before the police arrived. Someone who wanted to make sure Marcus couldn’t speak from the grave.”

Julian was silent for a long moment. Then he took her elbow and steered her toward the dark, empty cloisters, away from the lights and the officials and the whispering.

“Marcus was trying to blackmail us,” he said, his voice flat. “The council discovered it two days ago. He had letters, receipts. Proof that certain members had used the society’s connections for personal gain. He was going to sell them. To the press, to the university, to anyone who’d pay.”

Eliza stopped walking. “And you expelled him. You destroyed him. And then he dies, supposedly by his own hand, the morning after you and the council have their little chat. Does that seem convenient to you?”

“It seems like the work of someone who wanted to close the book on a very messy chapter.” Julian’s eyes met hers, and there was something raw in them, something that looked almost like fear. “But there’s more, Eliza. The note—the one on his desk—it mentions a vault. A box. He says he left certain documents in safekeeping, to be released in the event of his death.”

“Then he wasn’t planning to die alone. He was planning insurance.”

“And someone found it before it could do its work.” Julian’s voice dropped even lower. “I need to know who got to him first. And I can’t trust the council. I can’t trust the police. The only person I can trust is someone the Archai didn’t choose. Someone who came to us carrying her own secrets and learned to see through the fine words.”

He stepped closer, and the lamplight caught the sharp angles of his face. He was beautiful and dangerous, and she knew she was being played. But she also knew the owl ring had been on Marcus’s hand, and now it was gone.

“Help me,” Julian said. “Help me find out who killed him. Before they decide you’re the next loose thread.”

The words hung in the cold, silent air. Behind them, in Cardinal’s Quad, Marcus’s rooms lay dark, the lies already settling around them like dust.

“Why should I?” she asked.

“Because,” Julian said, and his voice cracked on the word, “the ring wasn’t the only thing taken. Marcus was my friend. And I think I killed him. I voted for his expulsion. If I’d stood against it, he’d still be alive. Help me find the truth, Eliza. Or help me bury it. But don’t walk away and pretend this doesn’t touch you, because it does. It already does.”

She looked at him—this brilliant, compromised man who wore his guilt like a tailored coat. She thought of Tom, vanished and wearing the same ring. She thought of her mother, and the photograph, and the face she couldn’t quite place.

“Show me the vault,” she said.