Yet.
The library is quieter at midday. Most students are in classes or claiming lunch spots.
Julian's at the same corner table. But this time he's surrounded by significantly more books. Texts spread across two tables, notes covering every available surface.
He looks up when I approach. Disheveled. Coffee cups multiplying. Eyes bright with discovery.
"You didn't sleep?" I sit down beside him. Unlike Julian, I slept more soundly than I have since I arrived at Elderwood.
"I kept finding more." He gestures at the controlled chaos around him. "Elowen, she was a student here." He's already pulling documents, dates from the 1880s. “Asha Rowan enrolled at Elderwood Academy in 1885. She studied for three years." He shows me registration papers. Her signature matches the handwriting I know from Mira's old recipe cards.
My great-great-grandmother walked through these halls.
"She received the highest marks in scent-based herbal applications." Julian's flipping through records with barely contained excitement. "Granted special research privileges, which was unusual for omegas at the time. Faculty notes describe her as exceptional and innovative."
Reading over his shoulder, her name appears again and again in academic contexts.
"Mira never mentioned this."
"Perhaps she didn't know." Julian opens another book. "Or perhaps what happened next made the family want to forget."
He slides a journal across the table. Old leather binding, pages yellowed with age.
"Asha kept research journals. The academy archived them when she left."
When she left.
Her handwriting fills the margins, notes on scent-binding techniques, observations about plant compound interactions, questions she was pursuing.
Then I find an entry dated 1887:
The academy values my knowledge but questions my methods. They appreciate scent-based medicine when it produces resultsbut resist when I suggest it deserves equal standing with heat-based preparations. Professor Whitmore says I am innovative but unconventional. I believe he means it as a compliment and as criticism.
My chest tightens.
"Keep reading," Julian says.
Faculty meeting minutes from 1888. Formal, dry, bureaucratic.
Discussion regarding Asha Rowan's proposed research into scent-binding techniques for medicinal compounds. Motion to approve denied. Concerns raised about 'unorthodox methodology' and 'lack of traditional precedent.' Vote: 8-2 against approval.
They rejected her.
She wanted to research the very methods I use now, and they said no.
Julian found more. A personal letter, archived in student correspondence records.
My dearest friend will understand. I have met someone. An alpha from the highland territories. His pack does not attend Elderwood, but he came to town for trade. When I showed him my work, he saw value, not strangeness. When I told him the academy denied my research proposal, he asked why I would stay where my gifts are questioned. I had no answer that satisfied either of us.
Tears sting my eyes. She didn't only leave for love.
She left because they wouldn't let her work.
"There's one more." Julian slides the final document forward. Academy departure record, dated late 1888.
Asha Rowan withdrew from studies, final term. Reason given: personal circumstances. Note added by Dean Hartwell: "Significant loss to our herbal research program. Her unconventional approaches, while not yet accepted by faculty consensus, showed remarkable promise."
Too little acknowledgment, too late.
