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Closing her eyes, Claire allowed herself a few more moments of holding onto the grief, facing it, not avoiding it any longer. Now though, it felt a bit lighter as new threads of love and understanding wove through it. Now, she was determined that Winona’s sacrifice would not be made in vain. That she would see through what Winona had started, uncover the corruption, and help her people, both the Elves and the Fae, emerge from the shadows. If she was successful, then everything she had gone through, that Winona had sacrificed, would be worth it? Right?
Shaking herself off, she released the grief for now. She would never put it down completely but she could let go of it for now. Focusing on the last part of the letter, Claire looked around the room. Her mother had written that this room would have everything she needed but the room was mainly empty minus the stacks of books and wall of weapons. Claire approached the wall of weapons first. Most she recognized from Malcolm’s training although all were in various states of disuse. Some were so rusty she worried they would crumble if she picked them up. Her magic was quiet as she looked them over, not drawn to any of them like she was to the daggers that hung on her hips.
She approached the stacks of books next. Some stacks looked like someone had taken entire library shelves and deposited them here. Others were open as if someone had been in the middle of reading them. There were smaller stacks like what would have been stacked on a desk. As she looked closer at the titles, she realized they were all books either about the Elves and Fae or written by them.
Understanding dawned as Claire trailed her hands over the bindings of the books. “You took the books,” she said into the empty room.
The Academy had taken the books from the shelves and guarded them here in this room. The Academy had violated its neutrality long before it sided with Claire and made her Champion of the Realm, something she still needed to figure out what that totally meant.
Maybe there was some helpful information in the books? Claire scanned the titles briefly. They looked mainly like textbooks and books about Fae and Elven culture. None of the titles jumped out at Claire as helpful for their current situation with the Council or had anything to do with Champions. While there was probably a lot of good information in the books, Claire had a feeling this wasn’t what her mother meant when she said everything she needed was in this room. The problem was that other than the books and weapons, the large room was empty. How could a room have everything she needed when it was mainly empty?
Winona had said that one of her clearest visions was Claire reading that letter so she had to have meant that the room contained everything Claire would need when she wrote that in as one of the last lines or why waste space writing it down? Was it another riddle? Claire was growing a bit tired from all the riddles. This whole thing could be done much faster if people just said what they meant.
It felt like the room waited with bated breath as Claire tried to figure out what her mother meant. Her thoughts raced through her mind until her magic sparked in response. She wanted to smack her forehead when she remembered something. The Academy was sentient because it was imbued with magic from the time of its construction. It was able to carry out tasks like send Claire a letter of invitation and remove the books during the Great War. It carried out the basic function of a school without needing directions.
What if the room had everything she needed becausethe Academy could get it if she asked?
She could ask and should ask so many different questions but before she asked any, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. One question plagued her more than all the rest, and everything with her mother had her wanting the answer more than anything. Being here and now in this room, she might actually get the answer. With her eyes still closed, she spoke the question out into the room.
“Who at the Academy betrayed and killed my mother?”
The question echoed out into the empty room and she waited. Nothing happened. Maybe she had misunderstood the room’s abilities? Her magic danced in her center again, the thread of the Academy’s magic particularly restless. Maybe…
She pulled on the Academy’s magic, weaving a thread around her throat, forming her intention. This time when she asked the question, she released the magic into the words causing her voice to boom into the room. Claire startled but remained steady, repeating the question clearly.
Stones grated and ground together as the wall on the far side of the room folded back exposing a small office. Claire raised an eyebrow but hurried over. The office appeared empty and Claire cast a bit of her magic into her Energy Reading ability to confirm. The magic came back easily this time, no one was there.
Claire placed a careful hand on the stones that had shifted away and gingerly stepped into the room. The stones didn’t move to close behind her right away and Claire let out a sigh of relief. She could probably ask the Academy to simply open the room back up again but didn’t relish the idea of another closed in space.
The office was small but cluttered. Claire realized that there was no other visible entrance other than the open wall that Claire had come through. Did whoever this office belong to also come through the Postulationem Room? Did everyone know about the Postulationem room? Or only a few? If they didn’t come through the room, then were they also able to ask the Academy for entrance? Or was the other entrance into the room concealed by magic from the other side? Claire’s head spun with all of the questions.
Claire almost hit her hip on the desk as she tried to get through the wall. No one would place the desk against the entrance so there had to be a different magical way to get into the room. Whoever’s office it was, they went to a lot of trouble to keeping it a secret.
Claire scanned over the office quickly. The desk and chair took up most of the room with a map of the Unitam Realm on the far wall. She walked closer to the map, studying it. The territories were broken up by black lines and different dots marked portal locations. The dots were different colors so did that mean the portals were different? Or were they portals whoever it was had used before? The rest of the map held no more clues except for four X’s in the Elven, Fae, Dragon Mountains, and Witches’ territories. All the old fairy tales that Claire had read had said that X marked the spot so she made a mental note of all four locations before turning to examine the desk.
She looked over the desk carefully. Whoever owned the desk kept it very neat and tidy. Maybe they were just like that as a person or maybe it was a defensive measure to prevent anyone from finding something. There were no papers on the desk except for a few blank ones with a quill next to them. She took a step closer to make sure the papers were blank and the tip of her shoe hit something on the ground.
Frowning, she bent over and retrieved the journal on the floor. It had been under the desk like someone had knocked it off in a hurry. She opened it up to the first page. It looked like a task list? The entries were neat and well documented with a line of dates corresponding to the entries. The dates went back to the middle of the Great War and started there. She skimmed over the journal entries, making sure she wasn’t missing any of the larger pieces before she dove into the details.
At the end of the Great War, the handwriting changed. The lines became harsher as if someone was digging the quill into the paper and leaving jagged marks at the ends of some letters. It was like the writer was so angry he was lashing out at anything and everything around him.
Claire went back to the journal entries at the time that the handwriting changed, looking for the event that set the writer off. The journal entries started mentioning the Council and shared details of the jobs the Council was asking the writer to do. The journal entries didn’t go much longer after the handwriting changed although they do provide a short but clear record of the tasks. Apparently whoever this journal belonged to was being asked to smuggle Fortis out of the Elven Forest among collecting other things, although at a quick glance Claire couldn’t find what.
She didn’t want to linger too long in the room in case the writer of the journal came back. One entry after the handwriting changed noted that the writer told the Council that he had smuggled less Fortis than he actually did. The writer noted that “he would need the extra he smuggled out with her instructions, so he could end the spineless Council like the cowardly Elves and Fae.”
Claire’s eyebrows went up. Whoever this was had a strong hatred for both the Council and the Elves and Fae. So why help the Council then? And who had given him instructions on how to get the Fortis out of the Elven Forest? She flipped over the last few pages quickly. The entries start to contain information about the ingredients he’s compiling for the Council’s ultimate weapon. Whoever wrote this was careful not to write the names of the ingredients down. Instead, they just used letters to label the ingredients.
There were four letters used to label them and Claire glanced over at the map. Four X’s and four ingredients. Coincidence? Probably not. The last journal entry notes that the final ingredients were found in the Fae lands. “They’ve put it off long enough. The Council will have to provide the necessary resources if they want their ultimate weapon. The Fae Lands will be a dangerous trip but if I’m meant to die then so be it. All I can hope for is that it’s not till I avenge them.”
Claire frowned but the rest of the pages were blank. This journal held some of the answers and definitely proved the Council’s involvement but it didn’t shed much light into who the journal belonged to. Claire flipped through the earlier pages in the journal, freezing when the pages stopped as if by magic. Dark swirls of dread and nerves danced in her stomach. She knew that this page contained the answer. The answer to the original question Claire had asked the Postulationem Room.
She almost didn’t want to read the words on the page but she forced her eyes on them. She had asked the question. She couldn’t be scared of the answer now. There was a single lone entry on the page, as if the writer didn’t want to write anything else after this.
As instructed by the Council, the Queen of Elves is dead. Unable to secure the child.
The world dropped out from under Claire’s feet and she stumbled into the table, catching the corner with her hip. The owner of this journal killed her mother.
She flipped through the rest of the pages, quickly trying to see if any identifying details of who the journal belonged to jumped out at her on the page but there was nothing. She flipped back to the page.The Queen of Elves is dead. Unable to secure the child.She was that child. If that person had been able to ‘secure’ her…
