“Stay safe, Sorrel.”
“Don’t worry. I’m being careful.” Mostly. I’d taken a risk in the graveyard, but to preserve both of our lives, it had to be done. Ori worried enough about me already.
I hung up and returned the keys to Mrs. Finnegan. Despite the energy bars, exhaustion rippled through me. It had been the longest day, and now the spirit raising was a mess. I winced. Maybe helping Ranth get back to wherever he came from would also help me find the Sisters of Luce. I should have asked Harold about the Sisters. I realized I hadn’t asked Ranth the most important question.
“What did you promise Harold?”
“To make sure you didn’t die, I asked him to transfer some of my energy to you.”
“That doesn’t come without a price. What was it?” I crossed my arms.
He rubbed the scar on his neck. “I promised I would let him know before I returned to the Garden. But he amended the curse—that I wasn’t expecting. When he split the curse, some piece of him must have been involved.”
“You didn’t need to do that. I wasn’t going to die. Doesn’t having him know where you are, and when you’re going to return, potentially endanger the Trees?”
“It was a risk I had to take.”
The words unsaid echoed in my head.To save you.
I liked to be the one to do the saving. Muttering a fountain of floral expletives, I took out my copper key. Home was where I needed to be.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
My phone rang as we walked in. I put Ori on speaker. “Hey, that was fast. Did you find them?” I asked as I set my messenger bag down on the kitchen table.
“Not yet, but I found something else. You know those pictures you took of the book?”
“Yep.” I pulled salad greens out of the fridge.
“They match something on Pinterest. I haven’t been able to track down the original source, but the caption says it’s the Spell Book of Jarthrush.”
I exchanged glances with Ranth. He shook his head. “But they weren’t spells.”
“It’s Pinterest. That could mean the pinner labeled it like, ‘look: spell book, cool.’”
I laughed. Ori disliked posting stuff on Pinterest without noting the source. She used it to trace images, but it killed small parts of her to click and see no documentation. However, she was incredible at finding things online. “I assume you found it then?” I opened the waxed cotton and arranged greens in a bowl.
“Yup. Jarthrush was a medieval philosopher known for his poetry, and scholars think the verses hide a key. The ‘incantation’ is everynthword, which changes by page. In the photos, the instruction strip is at the bottom, but you have to use a second key from his other writings. Classic cryptology where one pattern unlocks the real text. At least, that’s what the internet says. I mocked one up for you.”
My cell dinged with an incoming photo, and I held it up for Ranth. “Okay, I see it now. Simple and obvious. How could I have missed it before?”
“Not simple if you didn’t have the whole picture. Besides, you weren’t looking for it.”
“Right, that makes me feel marginally better. Thanks.” Ranth plucked a leaf of lettuce from the bowl and popped it in his mouth.
I set the phone on the counter. “The book is not all I found. I was cross-photo searching the amulet, and I got an image match on something similar. Same deal though, no source. The caption says its Etruscan garnet. But get this, it’s in the Egyptian Museum in San Jose. There’s no photo on their website, but I assume that’s the same one. I figured it’s worth a shot to try to get a picture, right?”
“Definitely.”
“Hang on, Freddie’s on the other line.” Ori put me on hold. Freddie had come into my friend circle by accident. He’d been a friend of a friend of Rose’s, who’d helped us find a mysterious book collector in possession of a demon reference book I needed. Freddie could creep you out if you didn’t understand him. Whenhe’d found the person in question, I’d offered to pay him, but instead he’d asked to have dinner with me. I’d made it clear it wasn’t a date, but over dinner, I’d discovered he loved gaming and puzzles—and he was a little lonely. I’d invited him to try our gaming group, and it turned out he was a brilliant strategist and had a crush on me.
Ranth was leaning against the door frame with his arms crossed, watching me finish the salad with chickpeas, sweet potatoes, and leftover quinoa, with an herb dressing of oil and fresh lemon.
I offered him a salad bowl. “Hungry?” My voice was hushed because we were still on speaker, even if we were on hold.
His attention moved from my eyes to my lips, sending a flutter through me as he grasped the bowl. I turned away and grabbed my own salad. My heart was bouncing around ridiculously.
Skirting him, I went to the table. “We should eat, then reset the wards, so one of us can get some sleep.” I set the phone down beside the bowl and sat down.
