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“Nothing I care to share with you, or anyone save the next Chronicler.”
“You’re talking about Rodero.”
“Of course I’m talking about Rodero. I’m also talking about a number of other things.”
Mikkel's attention swung to me, then back to Demetrius. “What has the she-wolf told you?”
“Nothing. Your reaction makes me curious, though, Mikkel. What doyouthink she’s told me?”
Mikkel snorted and pointed at the door. “I will make arrangements. We will leave immediately. The sooner you are out of my territory, the happier we will both be. I have no time for your mischief, AmberHowl. You are a pup among Elders, and you would do well to remember there is history you do not appreciate.”
Demetrius stood and tugged his suit coat straight. “No, Mikkel, I appreciate the history. That’s why I don’t care.”
Page of Many Colors
“Holy…” I whispered.
The Archives were…large. And not devoid of other people. There were half a dozen wolves working at desks over manuscripts like something out of a human monastery circa 900AD.
After a three-hour ferry ride through rough arctic seas to a remote, arctic island so far north it was perpetual night in May, then a trek from the small dock across wind and blowing snow, to find adoorin the side of a hill that led down a narrow stairway into anything bigger than a root cellar left me reeling.
Demetrius entered the main central room. “Archivists. Not Chroniclers. Scribes, if you will. Not members of any pack. They work on creating the duplicate copies given to Chroniclers, as well as maintaining and updating translations, and guarding the Archives themselves. They answer to the Chronicler.”
I managed a stunned nod.
Demetrius raised his voice to address the Archivists. “This is Winter, Rodero of SilverPaw’s daughter, currently known as Summer of AmberHowl.”
Nods. Everyone here was up to date on every scrap of gossip and drama the werewolf world could supply. The Archivists turned curious attention onto me. I tried not to do my best stunned deer impression.
Demetrius showed them the relic, explaining the brief history we had of it, then repeated exactly what he said in Old Norse. None of the Archivists had seen anything like it. Then Demetrius looked at me.
I looked back at him.
“Where do you want to start?” Demetrius asked, passing the box to me.
“The Collections. Specifically, the sixth and seventh centuries, or any epics of that time. I’ve read the most recent five hundred years, I never ran into any mentions of or references to cloth collars, or any sort of collar that seemed to have any meaning beyond its obvious material value.”
“We don’t know the pendant came from a collar,” Searle said.
True. Hamid had said blue-shelled limpets could be found in Europe, including Norway. Limpets were starvation food. Limpets never let go. “Or references to blue-shell limpets.”
Blank looks.
“I don’t know the word for that,” Demetrius said.
I had a picture saved on my phone. A few Archivists madehmmmnoises.
“You recognize them?” I asked hopefully.
One said something I didn’t catch, but another Archivist translated to another, who told us, “There are references to limpets in a number of primary records from northern Europe and the Nordic regions around 700 AD to 800AD, and then disappeared. It’s a curiosity. Nobody knows why.”
“That sounds like the place to begin, then,” Searle said.
“I’m not sure there’s a word forlimpet, but I’m fairly sure I know a good word forseashell.” Demetrius rolled up his sleeves. “Let’s get to work.”
Werewolves had livedside by side with humans our entire existence, and the vast majority of our history had always been entwined with human history. Our own scholarship had never been seen as necessary, nor really even possible, due to how we lived in secret. There had never been history books or essays written by our own historians. We had stacks of primary sources, that we carefully translated so the knowledge wouldn’t be lost if a language died, but no one had ever studied those sources. Or if they had, they’d never published their findings.
Finding records of the pendant didn’t prove to be a massive undertaking. For all that werewolves were meticulous in recording births, deaths, and packs, and there weremanyrecords, it was also relative to the era. The Collections of the time were nothing like the more modern Collections. Paper of any type and ink had been rare and expensive, while literacy had been limited. So it was easy to identify what documents to prioritize based on simply looking at them. It only took a few hours to skim the small collection of relevant documents from the “limpet era.” The Archivists already knew where to find them, as the limpets had been a curiosity among Archivists for generations.
