“And why would someone need a dispensation for”—he squinted at the page—“the keeping of an oath beyond the boundaries of the traditional territories?”
I sat up straighter. “What document is that?”
Graham emerged from the shelves holding a crumbling bundle of papers. “No idea. It’s quite faded.”
He carefully laid the document in front of me, and I leaned over.
The handwriting was faded, much too difficult to read, but some lines came through.
Dispensation granted for M. Wright so the connection might be maintained despite the scattering.
Those who fled.
The scattering.
“What does that mean?” Graham asked, reading over my shoulder. He was close enough that I could feel the heat of him, smell that cedar-and-whisky scent that always made my brain go slightly fuzzy. “What scattering?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “But look, it mentions a Wright. And connection. Someone was responsible for maintaining contact with people who had left.”
“Left where? Loren Brae?”
“I have no idea.” I set the document aside to keep it outside the stack. “But we’ll keep it out for now.”
“Here’s another one.” Graham had wandered back to the shelves and returned with a leather-bound ledger. “Membership records, I think. From the 1600s.”
He set it on the table, and we bent over it together, our heads almost touching, and it once again surprised me how his nearness calmed me as much as it excited me. Forcing myself to keep my thoughts on what we were doing, I scanned the ledger.
“There.” I pointed at an entry. “Wright, M. Listed under... I can’t read this heading. The ink’s too faded.”
“Something with book, I think.”
“Maybe.” I photographed the page with my phone, hoping better light might reveal more. “Let’s keep looking.”
We fell into a rhythm after that. Graham would pulldocuments from the shelves, scan them for the Wright name, and bring anything promising to the table. I’d examine them more closely, making notes, photographing pages, trying to build a history through the fragments we found. I made a list in my notebook, and then another list alongside it, drawing lines between what I hoped was a pattern that was emerging.
The Wright name appeared again and again. It was always connected to the Order and always seemed to carry a sense of importance about it. But the details were maddeningly vague.
“I keep finding references to Na Trì Banrigh.”
I looked up at Graham’s sound of confusion.
“The Three Queens.” I translated the Gaelic, frowning at a particularly damaged letter. “But so far there’s no explanation of what that means.”
“The Three Queens?”
“Listen to this.” I read aloud from the fragment. “‘The Keeper of Records shall serve as witness to the Clach na Fìrinn, maintaining the first light, and preserve connection with her sisters that the sacred trust might endure.’”
“Sisters?” Graham leaned over my shoulder again, and I absolutely did not notice how his chest nearly brushed my back. Okay, maybe I did. Slightly. I always just felt so small and protected when he leaned over me. “Like, actual sisters? Family?”
“Maybe? Hard to say. Look at this bit.” I pointed to the letter. “It talks about The Three Queens united and a family divided but not broken.” I shook my head. “It sounds like the Wright family split at some point. And someone—this Keeper of Records—was responsible for keeping them connected.”
“Connected to what?”
“To each other, maybe? To whatever they’d been protecting together?” I set down the letter and rubbed my eyes. “Maybe it’s these Three Queens?”
“Like actual royal queens?” Graham pondered and I just shrugged. I was tired from a long night of paging through boxes of books. “I keep hitting walls and I can’t quite make sense of it yet.”
Graham reached out and rubbed my shoulders, digging into my neck, and I almost purred at his touch. It took everything in my power not to dissolve into a puddle at his feet.
