“Can never be too careful.” Deneya hoisted a folio in the air. “I found it.”
“You did.” Vi carefully grabbed the time-worn folio from Deneya’s hands. She opened it on the table, pulling out the papers one by one.
“Don’t get your hopes up. There’s not much there about the theft of the royal treasure.” Deneya leaned on the back of one of the chairs. “All the names have been redacted.”
She wasn’t wrong, of course. Four lone sheets of paper were all that remained recorded of the greatest heist in the history of the Solaris Empire.
“Why would they blot them out?”
“I have a theory. Here, look at this one.” Deneya held up a sheet of paper. She pointed to one of the names that had been poorly inked away. The pen scribbles were hasty, and only covered half of the letters.
A—la
“Whose name does that look like to you?” Deneya asked with a grin.
“Adela.” The ink in the books had been too faded to be recent. The person who made those notations to find the crown’s location wasn’t Victor. “She was the one searching for the crown and who ultimately stole it.”
“That’s my theory. Also why they blotted out all other references of her name.”
“Men and their superstitions,” Vi muttered. She remembered how just the whispered name “Adela” had been considered bad luck in Norin.
“My bet would be pride for this one. Losing your family’s heirlooms and treasure is one thing… letting your father be murdered by that same thief and then having her slip through your grasp? Too much for a young, budding Emperor to handle.”
“Do you know what happened to the rest of the records?”
“If there were more, they’re long gone. It’s a miracle I could find these.”
“Thank you for your hard work.” Vi paused her reading to look Deneya in the eye when she gave her thanks. Having another set of eyes on everything she was piecing together—another set of hands to double the work—was invaluable.
“I am in Lumeria’s Order of Shadows.” Deneya smiled gleefully. “Collecting information like this is my job. The Queen will be all too happy if it’s also information on the bane of the seas.”
“Adela,” Vi whispered. She lifted another sheet of paper. “The thief fled to the coast. The treasure was never recovered.” Setting down the paper, Vi quickly went to the shelves underneath the windows in the back of the room. Vi had grown tired of constantly going back and forth to the library, so she’d been ferrying books back and forth for weeks now in secret.
“You’re amassing a little library,” Deneya observed.
“I’ve had a lot of time to read lately,” Vi murmured. She’d discovered reading to be different than she remembered—especially when it came to histories. She read both the black ink of the wordsandthe white space between them. There were phantom memories within her; sections of her subconscious remembered past worlds and connected them in ways that should be impossible.
Likely, the memories weren’t her own at all. They were Yargen’s. But that was a truth Vi left in uncharted territory, for now. Taavin was right: they had enough to worry about.
“Here it is.” Vi located the book she was looking for and crossed back to Deneya, handing it over.
“The Imperial Summer Palace in Oparium.” Deneya opened to the middle and was greeted by blueprints that were now familiar to Vi. “Architectural drawings?”
“Yes, I had to get into the Imperial archives for this one… Unlike my other stolen books, I’ll need to return this soon. But for now, look at the foreword.” Vi’s mind was moving so fast her mouth could barely keep up. “The date, specifically.”
“Construction began in 308.” Deneya glanced up at her. Vi held out the paper she’d been reading. “The theft was in 307.” Comprehension lit up Deneya’s face.
“The theft of the Imperial jewels that dated back into antiquity was in 307. King Romulin Solaris was murdered the same year, leaving Tiberus Solaris to become King. Then, the man who was to declare himself Emperor the very next year decided to make his first act as a ruler building a summer home?”
“Young men are fickle creatures.”
“You know Tiberus,” Vi said seriously. “He wouldn’t let Adela’s transgressions go.”
“Then what do you think it is?”
“The manor is a front for something, I’d bet.”
“A front for what?”
