Torvald was already in the outer hall when they arrived, his face a mask of grim readiness.
He had the intercepted documents spread across the long table, weighted at the corners with a pewter cup, a heavy iron candlestick, and the solid weight of his own forearm.
Three of the elders were with him. Bronn, Ketil, who said little and missed nothing, and Aldric, whose opinions arrived loudly and were occasionally worth hearing.
They looked up when Ivar entered, the scent of damp wool and old ink hanging heavy in the air. Their eyes moved briefly to Matilda at his shoulder, a silent acknowledgement of her place at his side. Nobody said a word about it.
"Tell me," Ivar said.
Torvald straightened.
"The chain is clean. Callum's personal seal on the payment orders, nae a copy, nae a forgery. I've compared it against authenticated documents from the Crown's own records." He laid a blunt finger on the relevant page. "The amounts match the mercenaries we ken were hired fer the harbor fire. The dates put the payments two weeks before the fair."
He paused, his gaze darkening. "There's a second letter, instructions fer the attack, written in Callum's own hand. He named two of the men we captured. Both deceased now, which is convenient fer him, but the letter predates their deaths."
The room went cold. The quiet was heavy, smelling of woodsmoke and the threat of steel.
"It's enough," Bronn said after a long moment. "Fer a proper hearing."
"Aye," Ivar said, his jaw tight. "If we get it tae a proper hearing."
"That's the difficulty," Torvald said, his voice low. "Private exposure gains us naething. We send this tae the Crown quietly, Callum denies it, claims the documents are fabricated, and we're back tae rumor against rumor. Except now Henry's already written his account, and it paints us poorly." He looked at Ivar. "We need a forum. Witnesses who cannae be dismissed."
Ivar moved to the table. He looked at the documents without touching them, following the trail of betrayal Torvald had laid out.
Aldric began to speak, something about sending word to Harald or Erik, bringing the strength of the other lairds, but Ivar wasn't listening.
His focus was entirely on Matilda.
She had moved to the opposite side of the table. Her finger was tracing the red wax of the seal, her touch light, almost reverent.
"A gathering, organized by the laird at his castle," she said.
The room shifted. Aldric stopped talking mid-sentence.
"Public," she continued, not looking up, though her voice filled every corner of the stone hall. "On Mull's ground, with the royal observers present. Ye present the evidence openly, before theCrown's own men, where Callum cannae deny it in private and the report that goes south has tae include what was shown."
She looked up, her amber eyes burning with a sudden, sharp clarity. "He's been feeding rumor because rumor lives in shadow. Bring it intae the open and there's nowhere fer it tae go."
Silence followed her words, thick and contemplative.
"If the Crown's men see the evidence themselves," Torvald said slowly, a spark of hope in his eyes, "they cannae report that it was kept from them."
"And if Callum moves against us at the gathering," Ivar said, his eyes locked on hers.
"Then he daes it in front of witnesses." She set the letter down, the movement final. "Which is the last thing a man who's been working in shadows wants."
Ivar looked at her across the table. The tension between them was electric. A recognition of her sharp mind and her quiet, steady courage. She looked back at him, waiting for him to catch up.
He looked at Torvald, who was half smiling.
"She's right," Bronn said, with the bluntness of a man old enough to have stopped softening his opinions for anyone. "It'sthe only move that clears the name and forces the Crown's hand at the same time."
"Aye," Ivar said, the word a vow. "It is."
He caught Matilda's eye. The corner of her mouth moved. A ghost of a smile, and she looked back at the documents.
They spent the next hour working through the shape of it. The timing, the format, the guest list. Matilda asked questions that were specific and useful. She didn't perform her usefulness, she was simplythere, an anchor in the storm.