“And my brother is a part of it. The rogue hunters, or the Circle, or whatever, want me and my brother to destroy the world.”
“World might be too literal,” Ace pointed out. “It might refer more to society as we know it. They want our current, galeon-run society destroyed so they can return to something more similar to what existed before to the phaanons and galeons spilled into this world with their magic.”
Familiar bonded immortals were held above those without magic, despite being the minority. Maybe humans were sick of it. Maybe answering to pureblood immortal galeon monarchs stirred more than irritability and disgust. It created a rebellion.
Or at least an attempt at one.
“They’re not just rogue hunters. They’re rebels. They’re trying to overthrow the king and queen,” I said. “Is there a section with translations?”
He flipped forward. Half the pages were torn out.
“Check the table of contents?” I suggested.
He flipped back to the front. Sure enough, the missing pages correlated with the section on translations.
“Phaan.” Ace snapped the book shut and shoved it back on the shelf.
“I guess that would be too easy to have the code breaker,” I mused. “We need to find those translations.”
“Or we could just find someone who knows the language.”
“Like whom?” I asked.
“Orion probably knows it,” Ace said, gaze narrowing. “He’s educated.”
“That’s a big stretch, Wolfy.”
Ace just shook his head. “Let’s keep looking. Maybe we’ll find something else.”
26
There were no more hidden gems in the Vitor library, but we spent another day looking before admitting defeat and heading back to Perga. We cut through the forbidden forest again, living off the land and staying in hunting lodges along the way.
Now, only a few drunken songs away from Perga, tightness grew around my chest. Usually when I drew close to home, I looked forward to seeing Paul and Sley.
Now?
Now, heaviness hung on my heart and made my feet feel ten times as heavy.
Eventually, I’d have to face my brother, but I didn’t want that to be tonight.
Were any of my brother’s actions redeeming?
He wanted to kill Ace. He failed to tell me my life was in danger. There was no coming back from that.
I stomped past the old oak with the large burnt branch. Something in my brain misfired and I stumbled to a halt.
“Everything okay?” Ace asked.
“The tunnel.”
Ace scrunched up his face and looked around.
“When Sley and I were investigating the thefts of the town’s communal winter supplies, we found a tunnel leading from the storage building to this tree.” I pointed aggressively at the oak tree. Not fair. It wasn’t the tree’s fault.
I stomped over to where the hidden trap door lay in the moss and reached down. Brushing the dirt away, I found the latch and heaved open the door. Moss and dirt poured into the entrance of the tunnel. If it hadn’t rained so prolifically lately, I would’ve stood in a massive dust cloud. Instead, the dirt just plopped to the ground.
“The Broken Tongue.” Ace pointed at the door.
