Chapter 31
Alina
It had been three years since I married Jack—a choice I never intended to make, yet somehow still did. Our lives were consumed by research, our days swallowed by the search for the ancient Sun and Moon Daggers.
Weeks blurred together in an endless loop of dusty pages and feverish note-taking. Jack was relentless in his pursuit, poring over books and manuscripts late into every night. His focus was admirable—admirable, and all-consuming.
Our sex life, however, was a barren stretch of mediocrity.
Jack clung to the same dull rhythm, always confined to the monotony of a missionary.
He never dared explore, never wondered what it might feel like to ignite something primal.
When I tried to guide him into something new, I nearly fell asleep from the effort—disappointed, untouched, uninspired.
Still, I smothered him in praise. I whispered admiration like a spell in the bedroom, kitchen, and every corner of our too-quiet home. And it worked. His eyes lit up with every compliment, his smile softening my numbness.
But it wasn’t real.
The hobbled old man, whom I’d come to call the Scholar, warned me never to hurt Jack. So, I fed his ego to protect myself. I became fluent in false enthusiasm, a master of staged affection—anything to avoid provoking the wrath of whatever power lingered behind Jack’s connection to that man.
The truth? Everything about this marriage drained me.
Worse still, Jack remained a closed door. Withdrawn and secretive—unless buried in his research. I asked about his childhood, gently, then directly. But he never opened up.
He told me he was an orphan. Abandoned on the street with no one. That was it—a single hollow sentence. No stories. No scars. No history. Just silence.
Jack was a shadow. And I was married to a mystery I never truly understood.
I threw myself into the hunt for the daggers to keep from being frustrated. I buried my soul in dusty texts, vanished into libraries, and prowled obscure bookshops and whisper-filled cafés. I chased every rumor, clung to every scrap of lore. And every lead turned to dust in my hands.
I was tired, disheartened, and beginning to wonder if this quest had been nothing more than a mirage leading me deeper into ruin.
One damp afternoon in Vancouver, as the gray sky pressed low and the air smelled of salt and pavement, I trudged through the city streets, lost in thought. That was when I saw him.
Lee.
He looked suspicious and tightly wound, swaying slightly like he’d spent most of the day nursing something strong in a glass.
“Hello, Alina,” he said, his tone cool. “How’s the little dagger quest going?”
I unloaded my despair about the dead ends, the lies, the mounting hopelessness. To my surprise, he listened.
“There’s a shop,” he finally said. “Quill & Codex Antiquarium. They specialize in the kinds of things most people think are myths. A friend of mine runs it. He deals in rare, ancient texts and artifacts. If anyone knows something, he will.”
But just as he finished speaking, his gaze shifted past me. His pupils widened with something close to terror.
I turned on instinct, heart hammering.
Nothing.
Just an empty street. A rusted bike was chained to a post. A dog barking somewhere in the distance.
“What was it?” I asked, my voice tight. “What did you see?”
He paused—too long.
Then said, quietly, “Nothing.”
He scribbled down directions and fled, his footsteps echoing in retreat.
I followed his lead to the Antiquarium. The shop was exactly as expected—dim, quiet, drenched in old paper and time. But the man inside gave me nothing. No answers. No secrets. No hope.
Just more silence.
Outside the Quill & Codex Antiquarium, a man stepped into my path.
He looked like he had been plucked straight from the ruins of a dig site—dusty clothes, a smudged face, boots caked in mud.
An older man with thick white hair and eyes that had seen too much.
He stood out starkly against the city’s polished noise and neon blur.
In his hands was a worn package.
“Are you Alina Tocino?” he asked, his voice thick with an Eastern European accent.
Startled, I hesitated. “Yes. Do I know you?”
He shook his head. “No. But I have something for you.”
He extended the bundle, parchment wrapped in aged string. His hands trembled slightly.
“I believe this will lead you to one of the daggers you seek.”
My breath caught. A chill passed over my skin. Was this the figure Lee had glimpsed? And why was a stranger delivering clues to me now, after years of dead ends?
I opened the package reverently. Inside were yellowed maps, brittle letters, and handwritten documents—weathered and fragile, yet undeniably potent. They referenced a place I knew only in myth: Eyjafjallajokull.
Before I could speak, thank him, ask who he was—he was gone.
He had vanished into a thicket of bumbling tourists, swallowed by the crowd.
They moved like puppets with slack limbs and blank faces, stumbling like some strange current had rippled through them.
The man slipped between them, fading with each step until he rounded the corner and disappeared entirely, leaving only the faint echo of his presence behind.
The bundle in my hands pulsed with a strange, almost sentient energy. My skin prickled, and my hair stood on end.
Clutching the papers, I turned and ran.
I had to find Jack.
We were going to Iceland.
The first dagger—my destiny—awaited.
“Jack, my love!” I shouted as I threw open the door, breathless and urgent. I charged through our apartment, a chaotic shrine of old-world charm and cluttered modernity.
I tossed my backpack onto the antique couch—a once-luxurious velvet relic now frayed and faded by time.
Surrounding it were mismatched chairs—some sleek and plastic, others ornate and wooden, salvaged from forgotten parlors.
A towering bookshelf of repurposed crates groaned beneath the weight of too many books.
The walls were a collage of the past and present—vintage black-and-white portraits mingled with vivid, hand-painted posters.
“Jack!” I called, nearly tripping over a pile of open tomes. “I have news!”
“In here, Alina!” came his voice from the bedroom.
I darted in. Like the living room, the bedroom was an eccentric blend of eras.
Our four-poster bed’s centerpiece stood regal beneath swaths of mosquito netting, buried under a mountain of quilts.
Two desks flanked the small room. One held an old manual typewriter, its keys worn to near nothing.
The other was a battlefield of papers, dusty books, and a sputtering portable computer with a flickering green screen.
A gilt-framed mirror above it reflected our madness.
The air was thick with incense and parchment. Jack sat hunched over the desk, glasses sliding down his nose, hair in glorious disarray. He looked up, blinking.
“What have you got there?” he asked, peering through his lenses at the bundle in my hands.
“The dagger!” I gasped, holding it out like a sacred relic. “Or at least one of them—I know where to find it!”
Jack’s brows knitted in confusion. He reached for the bundle. “Let me see.”
I all but excitedly exploded, spreading the maps and letters across his desk. “It’s all here. Look—Eyjafjallajokull. Iceland.”
Jack’s eyes scanned the documents, flicking from one to the next, his lips pursed in scholarly concentration. I fought the urge to shout. How could he read so slowly when the truth screamed from the pages?
Finally, his gaze snapped to mine, bright with something like awe.
“I think you’re right, Alina.”
I beamed. “So? When do we leave?”
“To Iceland?” he repeated, a note of hesitation creeping into his voice. “We can’t just jump on a plane and start digging. There are procedures… permits… logistics—”
I clenched my jaw. “I know all that. But are you in?”
A beat passed—then Jack surged up from his chair, swept me into his arms, and spun me in a dizzying circle. His laughter rang through the cluttered room.
“This is incredible!” he cried. “This could be it! All our work—finally paying off!”
For a moment, I let myself believe in its magic. In the rush. In us.
Securing the permits took several long months, but they were finally in our hands. Elated and anxious, Jack and I boarded the flight to Iceland.
Our destination was remote—a modest excavation site tucked into the windswept expanse of Eyjafjallajokull.
The landscape greeted us with a silence so absolute it bordered on sacred.
An oppressive chill pressed against my skin, carried by a mist that hung low and thick over the land.
The horizon stretched endlessly, cloaked in muted grays and shadowed blues.
Aside from the occasional cry of migrating birds overhead, the world felt abandoned.
The dig site revealed itself only by a few small flags fluttering in the tall grass.
At its center lay a timeworn crater, its contours softened by centuries of erosion and cruel weather.
Earth and dust had gathered like ash in its basin, cloaking history beneath a silent shroud.
Shards of ancient pottery and splintered tools littered the rim, relics whispering secrets in forgotten tongues.
We worked in near silence beneath the wan Icelandic sun, the only sounds the scrape of our trowels and the wind’s low moan. Jack and I labored side by side, fingers raw, breaths fogging the cold air as we hunted the one artifact that had haunted our dreams—the legendary Sun Dagger.
By evening, exhaustion had set in. My limbs ached. My spirit frayed. Another fruitless day—so it seemed.
But then, as twilight brushed the sky with lavender and fire, my trowel struck something solid. Not rock. Not bone. Something smooth.
My pulse surged.
I dropped to my knees and brushed away the dirt with trembling fingers. Inch by inch, the shape emerged—golden, gleaming faintly beneath layers of earth. It was a ceremonial dagger, commanding, even in ruin.