“You’re a warlock,” Danny remarked scathingly. “Aren’t creepy places kind of your thing?”
“What if there are skeletons down there?” Marcus peeped.
“As if we haven’t faced worse things,” Kallie grumbled.
“You could make them dance!” Danny offered.
I shook my head. “Come on.”
I started down the narrow stairs, and the others followed. We entered a small room with a low ceiling below the deck of the boat. The others spread throughout the cabin while I felt my way around. There was an old table against one wall, with a rickety chair that seemed like it would break if anyone sat on it, along with worn old hammocks that the crew must’ve slept in.
Marcus opened a crate and tossed the top aside. “I found maps!”
He spread the maps across the table, while the rest of us gathered around.
“Any indication of where Yuto went?” I asked.
“Ugh, no!” Marcus gave a frustrated grunt, then kicked the chair. The leg snapped, and the whole thing crumbled to the floor.
Kallie ignored him— she was still looking around. I heard her pause nearby, and she said, “Hey, guys, help me move these crates.”
The three of us rushed over. Oberi helped push aside crates to reveal what Kallie had found. My hands roamed over the top of a solid wooden trunk. Holding my breath, I opened the top, and my Air magic rushed forward to rustle stacks of papers.
Kallie flipped through the first stack. “It looks like employment records. They’re dated in the mid-1860s, which was the same time as Yuto’s voyage. The crew must’ve picked up odd jobs along the way to fund their voyage whenever they made port.”
“Then these records could tell us exactly where they went.” I grabbed a stack of files and dropped them in Marcus’ arms, then shoved another stack at Danny. “Let’s get to work.”
My friends spread their files over the table and started shuffling through them. Kallie muttered names under her breath as she skimmed the records, but she grew increasingly frustrated as she moved from one file to the next without finding anything useful.
“This is just a bunch of names. A list of all the people who sailed with Yuto,” Marcus complained. “I don’t see actual locations listed?—”
“Hold on,” Kallie interrupted, halting us all in our tracks. “I found a labor agreement with Yuto’s name on it, and it’s signed by someone named Vincenzo Fillipo. We’ve heard that name before.”
Marcus swallowed audibly. “That’s the guy whose name was on the mausoleum at the Institute, where we found the entrance to the Infernal Underground. He was the doctor who built the asylum and performed the first patient experiments on Darke Island.”
My stomach clenched. I had hoped we were done with Darke Island for good, but it seemed all the keys tied back there somehow.
Kallie flipped through more papers. “Marcus is right! We’ve been assuming that Yuto took the Astromancer key somewhere else, since he sailed separately from Amalie, but Darke Island makes sense. They must’ve agreed to leave the keys there because it was neutral territory, and the site of the Elven Gate. They were on a mission to unite all the keys and take them back to Darke Island, which means that has to be where we’ll find the Astromancer key!”
I didn’t like where this was going. “Are we sure about this? If Yuto and Amalie both made it to Darke Island, how’d he get here in Kinpago, but Amalie and Dante ended up executed?”
Kallie paused to skim the records. “Because they weren’t there at the same time. These employment records end in 1866, but Amalie didn’t reach Darke Island until 1867. Once Yuto finished his job hiding the Astromancer key on Darke Island, he left for Kinpago to start searching for the Elementai key before Amalie arrived on Darke Island later on. They were supposed to meet up here once she hid the merfolk key, but Amalie never made it.”
I racked my brain, trying to recall what we’d learned about Darke Island’s history, but there were so many dates to remember. “So what was Yuto doing working for Doctor Fillipo? He must’ve been there around the time the asylum was built. Are we sure he was on Amalie’s side? Could Yuto have been a double agent who handed the Astromancer key over to this evil doctor?”
Marcus tapped his fingers on the table. “The asylum was built in the 1850s, so it would’ve been standing by the time Yuto arrived. But if you recall from the records we found in death row, the Institute’s first cellblock was built in the 1860s and finished shortly before Amalie arrived. That puts Yuto on Darke Island when the first cellblock was being built. But you make a good point, Charlie. What was Yuto doing working with Doctor Fillipo, and did it have anything to do with the key?”
Kallie skimmed the documents further. “The records state Yuto’s position as lead architect."
“Lead architect on what?” Marcus asked.
Papers rustled in Danny’s hands. “On this, I would think. These sketches look a whole lot like blueprints.”
Danny slapped a page on the table, causing Marcus and Kallie to gasp in unison.
Even Oberi took a breath beside me, like he was stunned. Oh… I should’ve realized.
“By the gods. I don’t know how we didn’t see this before,” Kallie breathed. “Charlie, they’re drawings of the Institute’s sigil. A key with a star at the end of it, surrounded by a winged serpent in the shape of an infinity symbol.”
