Page 94 of Legacy Ascended

I read the third one. Then I read it again.

A portion of the material had already been removed before the inventory began.

"What does that mean?"

"Removed by whom?" Jon asks.

"It doesn't say."

"To where?"

"It doesn't say that either."

The custodian comes around the desk and reads the entry herself.

"I've run this collection for seventeen years," she says. "I'd have told you that inventory was complete. I've told the Council it was."

"But it isn't."

"No."

Freya goes back to the first sheet and starts reading from the top.

"It doesn't tell us what's missing," Jon says.

"No," the custodian says.

"Or why it was removed."

"No."

"Or whether it would change anything we've read today."

"No."

I look at the line again. "But nobody can say this is the complete record."

The custodian looks at me.

"Not anymore."

"I want that in writing."

"The sheet?"

"No. From you. That we found this today and what it means for the inventory."

She considers that for a moment. "All right."

She goes back to her desk. While she writes, Freya is still reading the receiving papers and Jon goes back to the inventory. I sit there looking at the same four lines.

Ten minutes later, the custodian brings the visit record over and reads it to us before she signs it. It identifies the intake sheet and records that material had been removed before the inventory began. It also records that the archive cannot determine from the surviving receiving papers what was removed, who removed it, or where it went. She adds our request for the Luftemilen account books so we can check for a second seal matrix.

"You'll get a copy before you leave," she says. "I'm sending one to the Council tonight."

At the door, the clerk reads every page of our notes while we wait. Freya stands beside me quietly counting off what she wants to request next on her fingers. Account books. Receiving papers. Catalogue records.

"Was it what you wanted?" Jon asks.