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Ella was already at her laptop, typing rapidly. ‘Okay, let's see... a coven traditionally consists of thirteen members. That's a common number associated with superstition.’
Ripley noted it. ‘Okay, and what about death in tarot? Isn’t there a death card in tarot or something?’
Ella adjusted her search and quickly scanned the top few results. ‘The Death card in tarot doesn't actually signify physical death. It's more about transformation, the end of something, a significant change.’
‘No one cares about that,’ Ripley said. ‘What number is it?’
Ella snapped her fingers. ‘Thirteen.’
‘Damn it, the answer to every riddle is a number, but what’s the connection?’
Ella's gaze remained locked on the computer screen, her mind a whirlwind of thoughts and theories. ‘Remember, our guy is reasonably smart, but if he wanted his victims to solve these riddles, he wouldn’t throw in symbolism or superstition. I think these riddles are supposed to be solvable at a glance.’
‘It's a game for him, Dark. He's turning their deaths into a puzzle, a riddle. He wants to engage them, involve them in their own demise. It's a sick form of control.’
Ella thought about it but had to disagree. If this killer simply wanted to get revenge on people who’d tormented him, there’d be no need for riddles. They were surplus to requirement, therefore, they were a crucial part of his fantasy, something that appealed to his sense of conquest.
‘Next riddle, the one he left at James Gorton’s house. In a clock’s face, where hands unite. Thrice six they mark, in day or night.’
‘It’s talking about time, specifically when the hands of a clock align. That would be midnight or noon, right? So, twelve.’
‘Twelve,’ Ella said. ‘So, seven, thirteen and twelve.’
‘Means nothing.’
Ella pulled the first riddle closer, the one from Mark Jensen’s office. ‘So, the answer to Mark’s riddle is seven, and then there’s this heap of crap below it.’
TLLA TL HA AOL JYFZAHS WVUK ALU WT AVUPNOA VY FVB DPSS KPL.
‘Well, you said it’s a cipher, right?’ asked Ripley.
‘Yeah,’ Ella said, catching onto her partner’s train of thought. ‘And ciphers need a key.’
Ripley leaned over and tapped the paper with her pen. ‘Maybe seven unlocks this message.’
Ella pulled all of the riddles closer, inspecting the coded messages one by one.
TLLA TL HA AOL JYFZAHS WVUK ALU WT AVUPNOA VY FVB DPSS KPL.
ZRRG ZR NG GUR PRZRGREL VA PYRNEIVRJ CNEX GRA CZ GBAVTUG BE LBH JVYY QVR.
EWWL EW SL LZW YSJSYWK TQ LZW GDV TJAUC KLGJW LWF HE LGFAYZL GJ QGM OADD VAW.
Ella's eyes narrowed as she examined the jumbled letters of each message. Immediately, a pattern emerged, a consistent structure in the chaos.
Each of the coded messages contained a similar composition: the first four words and the last four words mirrored each other in length.
‘This can't be a coincidence,’ Ella muttered, her mind rushing to connect the dots.
Ripley leaned in, ‘What are you thinking?’
Ella tapped the first jumbled string from Mark Jensen's riddle. ‘The first four words in each riddle are all the same length. So are the last four.’ Ella's eyes darted between the cryptic strings of letters and the riddles they accompanied. She felt a rush of adrenaline as the pieces of the puzzle started to align in her mind. ‘It's a simple replacement cipher,’ she realized aloud. ‘Each letter in these strings must be replaced by another letter.
‘The numbers,’ Ripley said. ‘Try Mark’s riddle. Use the number seven as the key.’
It had been years since Ella had solved a replacement cipher. She mostly did it as a kid out of boredom.
‘Bear with me,’ Ella said. ‘So, we shift the alphabet by seven letters.’
