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Sooty’s cheeks turned a faint shade of pink, and he kicked at another cobblestone. “Yeah, well. I figured you’d want to know, is all. Since we’re trying to solve a mystery and all.”
“Thank you, Sooty. I appreciate you telling me.” She looped her arm through his, giving him a playful shake. “And I appreciate everything you’ve been doing to help. You’re a quick study, that’s for sure.”
“Yeah, well. You’re a good teacher, I guess.”
When they reached the professor’s office, the door was already ajar, and a faint, musty scent wafted out into the hall. They exchanged a glance and then stepped inside.
The office was a glorious disaster, with stacks of ancient tomes and scrolls teetering precariously on every available surface. The air was thick with the smell of old parchment and ink, and Hali felt a pang of nostalgia for the long hours she used to spend in the library when she was a student.
“Professor Thornsley?” she called, peering over the stacks. “Are you all right?”
With a muffled grunt, the professor emerged from behind a particularly large pile, a broad grin on his face. “Miss Brightminer! And Mr. Spriggins, I presume? Please, come in, come in. I have the most marvelous discovery to show you.”
He gestured for them to gather around his desk, and with great care, unrolled a massive piece of parchment that was nearly as old as he was. The surface was covered in intricate diagrams, with strange runes and symbols woven throughout.
Hali’s eyes widened as she peered at the parchment. “This is Ignan! Where did you find this?”
“It’s a rubbing, you see, from a carving that was unearthed by the primordial scholars many centuries ago. The original is, alas, long gone, but copies such as these have been passed down through the ages. The inscription is thought to be a cipher of some sort, but the key to unlocking its secrets—the cipher key for it, that is—has been lost to time.”
Hali’s hands trembled as she traced the strange, angular symbols. “I recognize a few of these from my other research, but . . . but it’s not enough. Without the full key, it’s all just gibberish.”
“Indeed. However, there are whispers, my dear, that a newer cipher key was created only a few dozen years ago to match the original. A way to unlock the secrets of the ignean script once more. If the Obsidian Circle is searching for the same thing, then it is all the more reason for us to find it first.”
Hali’s mind raced as she made the connection. The frivolous spells in the grimoire—useless at first glance, just as intended—must have been carefully crafted to capture the same cipher key as the original. The weight of that revelation settled on her shoulders, threatening to crush her. If the Obsidian Circle had gone to such lengths to obtain the cipher key, it meant the knowledge it unlocked was incredibly dangerous in the wrong hands. But even more worrisome was the thought that they might have already succeeded.
But there was no time to dwell on what might have been. The grimoire was gone, lost to the Obsidian Circle, and there was no telling what havoc they might wreak with the knowledge it contained. Hali’s shoulders slumped in defeat as she turned back to the parchment, the Ignan script dancing before her eyes.
“If only we had the cipher key,” she said, more to herself than to the professor. “Then we might stand a chance at unraveling this.”
A lump formed in her throat, the same one that had been there ever since she’d woken to find the grimoire missing. She felt raw, exposed, the wound of Osric’s betrayal still fresh and stinging. She had let herself trust him, had let herself care, and he had repaid her by shattering that fragile bond.
But she was tired of feeling sorry for herself, of nursing her wounded pride. She was a solver of puzzles, a seeker of truths, and she would not rest until she had unraveled this mystery, with or without Osric’s help.
As she stared at the strange symbols on the parchment, a memory tugged at the edges of her mind. A memory of a late night in the shop, the grimoire spread out before her, the coded message taunting her with its secrets. She had been so desperate to unlock its meaning, so determined that she had almost overlooked the clues that were right in front of her.
“Hang on a minute,” Sooty said, clearing his throat.
Hali’s head snapped up, and she realized that she had been tracing the same rune on the parchment over and over, lost in thought. “What is it, Sooty?”
He set his thick notebook on the desk with a soft thud, and there was a hint of pride in his usually nonchalant demeanor. “So, um. I mighta, uh, done a thing.”
“What thing?” Hali asked, her curiosity piqued despite herself.
Sooty pushed the notebook toward her, and she saw that the pages were covered in the same strange symbols from the grimoire, painstakingly copied over and over. “I, uh, I took the liberty of copying the book for myself. Figured I’d try my hand at deciphering it, too.”
Hali’s heart stopped. She stared at the notebook, then at Sooty, then back at the notebook, her mind whirling with possibilities. He had copied the entire grimoire. Every coded message, every maddeningly vague spell, all of it. The key to unlocking the cipher.
Sooty shifted uncomfortably under her gaze, his usual scowl firmly in place. “I know, I know. I shoulda told you before. But it was your grimoire, and I figured you should be the one to decipher it, not me.”
Hali’s eyes stung with tears, and she wrapped her arms around the young gnome in a fierce hug. “Sooty, you brilliant, brilliant boy. You just might have saved us, after all.”
Chapter
Fourteen
Jagged obsidian crunched beneath Osric’s boots as he trudged alongside Agnith, Aunir, Valthrun, Fyra, and Thelara, the searing heat of Jötuneld’s volcanic fields a withering caress on his bare shoulders. Thick plumes of steam hissed from fissures in the earth’s crust all around them, and in the distance, the molten glow of the caldera lit the night sky. It was a harsh, unforgiving landscape, but one that felt strangely like home to Osric, with its raw, primal power.
A harsh caw echoed overhead, and Osric looked up to see a trio of obsidian-winged ravens circling high above, silhouetted against the fiery glow of the caldera. He shuddered, and he couldn’t help but be reminded of the omen of death and rebirth that the ravens portended.
