Chapter Twelve #2
Inside of the glass dome were circular rings of bookshelves, beginning with the least rare books on the outside and becoming increasingly more delicate in nature as the center approached.
A wooden table was at the heart of the room, large enough for two or three people depending on how close one minded sitting.
It was almost always unoccupied. Only when Alexander was present at the castle, documenting his travels to the continents where he compiled research about the rise and fall of the Olympi, did any other Skiathan dare enter through the spelled door.
Breaking the wax seal on a single piece of parchment Alexander had given Thalia, she unfolded the letter. There were no words, only a combination of numbers and characters.
Φτερ0704
With the tip of her dagger, Thalia pricked her pointer finger, letting a bead of blood bubble out.
She reached her hand toward the door of the glass dome, running her finger over a silver bar that locked the door shut with a crimson smear.
It was a safeguard against potential intruders, only those deemed worthy of entering were allowed, the intention of why a person needed entry ingrained in their very blood.
Three clicks signalled the locks had unlatched and Thalia pushed the door in, hurrying past to not let the outside elements trickle into the dome.
When the door shut behind her, a silver-blue light buzzed around the seal, locking her temporarily inside.
She inhaled deeply, her lungs adjusting to the change in pressure and dip in humidity.
The sound of rustling pages echoed against the glass. Someone was already here.
Stepping lightly through the stacks, Thalia drew a second dagger from her sheath.
Even though the wards protected this room against sinister intentions, she couldn’t be too safe.
Every ward, every spell, had a loophole.
It would be just her luck that a nefarious person chose today to disrupt the balance.
Perhaps it was Sebastian—finally out for vengeance against her, or reaching for power he did not deserve.
More rationally it would be the library’s curator, though Thalia swore she saw Kinna returning a stack of books to the shelves near the entrance.
“Why are you creeping through the stacks holding two daggers, Thalia? Is something wrong?” Thalia jumped at the sound of her sister’s voice. Of all the people she expected to be sitting in here, Dafne was at the bottom of the list.
“I heard noises and I thought there might be an intruder. No one ever comes in here.” Thalia resheathed both her daggers and pulled out the now crumpled piece of parchment that listed the journal’s log identification.
“You are in here, so clearly some people do.” Her sister tapped her fingers against a tattered journal she held in her lap while her psychí, shrunken to the black cat form, circled near her legs.
“I am on official business for Alexander.” Thalia held up the piece of paper. “Apparently something important is in one of his journals here.”
“And that is the same reason I am here.” Dafne held up a similar piece of parchment, extending it toward Thalia. The combinations on the letter were inked in the same script as hers.
Δελφ0327
Δελφ1259
“Where did you get this?” Thalia questioned moving closer to pluck the letter out of her sister’s spindly hands.
“Dimitris asked me to help him. Apparently these journals are in the Koreátos Glóssa and I had mentioned to him on the ship that I was fluent.” Dafne cocked her head toward the table, where a second book lay open.
No one had asked Thalia if she knew the Koreátos Glóssa, as if she too was not from where the ancient language first took its roots.
A language that had slowly faded from existence over the years since the Grechi rose to power.
It was rare for anyone alive today to be able to read it, let alone speak it, but their parents had taught them before they were sent to Delphine.
Both Dafne and Thalia continued their learnings while serving on Delphine, despite protests from the head priestess.
Unlike the Elliniká Glóssa, the language of Thalia’s ancestors was not banned under penalty of death, merely washed away like a changing tide, deemed unusable in their craft.
Pulling out the empty chair across from Dafne, Thalia slid down, flipping the journal around.
Her fingers traced the lines of the open page where the words depicted Ander’s time in Hespali, his aunt’s kingdom.
Most of it seemed normal, boring even, describing the trade routes that Avra brokered and records of ships that made port there.
Most of it except one line, scribbled in barely legible ink, blurred by the smudge of a hand or worn over time.
You will find it there, hidden deep within the mazes of the Port of Hespali.
Thalia turned back a few pages, then forward, scanning for any other mention of a maze, or what it might be. There was nothing, no trace of a connecting phrase or description.
“Am I reading this incorrectly?” she whispered to herself, though Dafne responded.
“No, I have translated the entire journal and there is not one other mention of a maze, nor of a hidden object. It’s strange too—the inflection of this script is similar but doesn’t match the other journals. Someone else wrote this particular line.”
That wasn’t possible. The assortment of journals that were kept in this part of the restricted section were Alexander’s and his alone.
Every other book was written with that same harsh curve of his script and was bound with the same leather and black singed combination on the spine.
From what Thalia knew, she was the only one that resided in Skiatha that studied the Koreátos Glóssa, and it was very clearly printed with those distinct characters.
“Maybe something startled Alexander as he was writing, or perhaps he just had too much to drink and confused some of the characters or the order. Did you have a chance to look through the other journal?” she asked Dafne, who proceeded to slide the other book across the table.
Dafne sighed, twisting her mouth to the side.
“There’s nothing of interest in that one either.
It is just notes about the King of the Olympi, Zeus.
It details out his powers, where his temple used to be.
I’m not sure how that is connected at all. ”
“No—it doesn’t appear to be.” Closing the book, Thalia went in search of her own assigned combination.
Hours went by scanning every stack in the crystal dome, coughing every time she pulled one out, scattering dust about, but the particular journal Alexander had sent her to retrieve did not seem to exist in any of the nine circular rings of shelves.
Tomorrow she would return and comb through each and every journal once more, just in case she’d missed it or reversed the order of the combination.
The warded room did not let you leave with any of the originals—unless of course you were Alexander, but there would be no need for him to send her to transcribe a version if he already had it.
It had to be here.