Page 46 of Saving Her Dragon

The Ribbon: Highly personal to Sydney.

The Tie Tack: Deeply connected to Carrick and Alastair's heritage.

The Pen: Infused with Ginnie’s Necromantic energy.

If Ginnie's theory was right, Garrett's subconscious wasn't hunting for legendary artifacts or weapons of war; it was seeking the everyday objects that carried the deepest, most concentrated spiritual signatures of the people who loved him.

"Where did you stash them, Garrett?" Grey asked, his legendary focus locking onto his brother. "If your subconscious is filing them away, they have to be somewhere on this property. The creek bank? The attic?"

"I don't know," Garrett muttered, his hands gripping the edge of the counter. "The camera logs showed I never left the bed last night. If I took Ginnie's pen, I don't know when the hell I did it."

"Let me find out," Ginnie said, stepping forward.

She didn't need an elaborate ritual or a dangerous summoning circle. She knew the exact, intimate frequency of her own fountain pen. Pulling a small, elegant silver pendulum from her pocket, suspended by a delicate silk thread, Ginnie held it directly over the center of the kitchen island. Closing her eyes, she murmured a low, rhythmic command, calling to the displaced object through the Law of Correspondence.

Everyone watched the silver charm with bated breath.

Ginnie expected the pendulum to twitch, to swing outward, pointing its silver tip toward the bedroom upstairs, the mudroom closet, or out the window toward the dark tree line of the creek bed. She was sure it would point her in the right direction.

So, they waited… And waited… And just when Ginnie thought it wasn’t going to work, the pendulum began to spin.

Gaining velocity rapidly, the silver weight blurred as a high-pitched hum filled the quiet kitchen. Then, with a sudden, violent jerk, it stopped. The pendulum shot out parallel to the island. Floating perfectly straight, it was as rigid as an arrow shot straight from her heart.

Following the invisible line, Ginnie gasped. It pointed directly at Garrett’s chest.

Frowning, she blinked, then shifted her hand two inches to the left, trying to clear the spatial variable. The pendulum instantly corrected, swinging back with a hard, magnetic snap.

It wasn't pointing at Garrett’s bedroom. It wasn't pointing at his clothes or his boots.

The tracker was pointing directly at Garrett himself.

The kitchen froze.

The pendulum remained completely rigid, its silver point indicating Garrett’s chest like a compass needle locked onto magnetic north.

"It's not on me," Garrett said, his voice flat as he immediately began patting down his pockets. Pulling them inside out, he dropped a few coins and a receipt on the counter. Unbuttoning his cuffs, he held out his arms as Grey and Carrick stepped forward, running a quick, systematic physical search of his clothes.

They found nothing. No silver pen. No hidden compartment.

Ginnie let the pendulum drop, took a deep breath, and reset the thread. She repeated the Mystical command, calling out to the silver and the ink of the pen. The pendulum began to spin, blurred, and snapped hard into the exact same trajectory. Garrett.

Dr. Darcy Thorntree leaned over the island, her brow furrowed. "Could the Tracking Spell be reading simple contamination? He's spent the last two hours analyzing files with you. He touched the pen. He touched the maps."

"Possibly," Ginnie admitted, keeping the alternative explanation tucked in the forefront of her mind. "Residual energetic transfer can confuse a low-level locator."

Adjusting her grip on the silk thread, Ginnie shifted the phonetic cadence of her Spell. She altered the parameters, commanding the Magic to explicitly distinguish between Garrett's organic physical body and the misplaced fountain pen's specific resonance.

The pendulum began to behave strangely. It no longer pointed at Garrett’s chest. It started to vibrate violently, the tip twitching in a tiny, rapid arc. It looked like a compass needle caught between two competing poles. The silver tip wasn't trying to terminate at his body– it looked like it wanted to pass through him.

Ginnie's eyes snapped open wide, a cold realization washing over her features. "He's not the destination."

Carrick moved closer to his Mate. "Then what the hell is he?"

"He's in the way," Ginnie whispered. "The Spell is trying to trace the pen's energy somewhere else entirely, but Garrett's unique Magical signature is sitting directly between me and the destination. It’s blocking the path."

A heavy, unnatural silence descended on the room.

Garrett stared down at his own chest. "The pen passed through me?"