“Nyzith strands.”
Alaric searched the air. “Where do you see them?”
“Right in front of us.”
They must have come here to help me find Elariya. She was my tracker. The ring wouldn’t have wanted me to lose her. Neither would destiny.
The dancing strands thickened into a dark mass of gunmetal, then something dropped from the center of the spiral.
It was a book. A heavy thudechoed through the roomas it hit the floor.
I went rigid. I knew that book.
Leather-bound, worn at the edges, with symbols etched into the cover that had faded with age but never lost their meaning.
It was my father's book. We kept it on the ship.
He’d enchanted it many years ago to show you the path to what you wanted most.
The Nyzith strands suddenly dissolved into nothing, and the wind died as quickly as it had come.
I crossed the room and picked up the book, my fingers tracing the familiar grooves in the leather.
"But it's just a spellbook," Alaric said from behind me, his tone skeptical. "That won't find her. None of the spells have been able to find her so far.”
"Nyzith strands don't appear randomly," I muttered. "Remember, they appear when the ring's magic is allowed to guide me." I turned the book over in my hands, feeling the hum of power beneath the leather. "When destiny has a hand in something."
"Destiny." Alaric came closer. “Holy fuck. What kind of magic did Father use to enchant the book?”
I smiled. “A touch of destiny.”
We both looked at each other.
“Destiny exists outside time,” Alaric surmised.
“And outside of Elariya's spell.”
Eagerly, I opened the book. As soon as I did, it reacted. Pages flipped rapidly, edges glowed, and the air around it shimmered.
On the blank parchment, a map formed.
I’d used this book many times before to go off on an array of adventures. But this was the first time the map had glowed silver, pulsing like light.
“You can see that, right?” I asked.
“I see it.” Alaric nodded slowly, his gaze never leaving the map.
At its center, a single point of light twinkled.
It was…
Her.
The word Crookwood spelled out around the twinkling point.
“That’s where she is.”
No sooner had I spoken than a cloud of darkness formed around the words, then erased Elariya’s light.
