As we approached, it flipped open on its own, the glow strengthening.
“We try to not touch it with our hands,” Finn explained softly, “lest the oils hurt the pages more than they already have.”
I approached the pedestal slowly, my shoulders tensing as I sensed the power emanating from the book. The inner light softly illuminated words written in flowing black script that shimmered atop pale cream paper. As I started to read, it made no sense. It felt off, like a tune played slightly off key but you couldn’t quite put your finger on how to correct it. I couldn’t explain it, just knew there was a wrongness present. When I got to the end of the segment on the page, it flipped over automatically. The more I read, the more the wrongness presented itself, my shoulders tightening even further.
I pulled back to look questioningly at Finn. “Is it missing a page?”
Finn shrugged. “I’ve gotten the sense over the years that it may be incomplete. But it’s all we have to work with.”
I went back to the beginning of the passage and started reading again. The lines were oddly spaced throughout the page, as though parts had been removed. Random words were obscured with a faint flicker of flame-colored light, as though whoever had written it had dropped ink blots in just the wrong places.
“What word is this?” I pointed at one of the ones under the ink blots, careful not to touch the page. The more I stared at the ink blot, the more it pulsed with a suppressed heat.
Finn came up alongside me, his shoulder brushing my arm as he bent down to look closer. “It is a little hard to read, but I think it’spower.”
A little hard to read? Were we looking at the same thing? I squinted at it, and if I narrowed my eyes and turned my head at the right angle, I could see the vaguest form of “power” written there. It still didn’t seem right, but this was my first time viewing it. Finn had significantly more experience with it, so I was sure he knew better than I did.
Right?
I started reading it through for a third time.
When power and earth at once combine,
There shall come the true bloodline.
Hold true, hold on, hold in faith,
For one shall come, the name Orlaith.
With thunderous cry, she’ll do what must:
Rejoin the peoples, build the trust.
Only with her voice will light reign bright,
To heal her land, her people’s plight.
Do not confront the foes of dark,
Until Orlaith has found her spark.
Okay, well that one was pretty on the nose direction-wise: No one should do anything until Orlaith—me, supposedly—showed up,did some things, and found my “spark,” whatever the hell that meant.
I continued reading.
The one who came before grows weary,
Soul’s blinding light answers the query.
When darkness blots out the sun,
Her story has only just begun.
There was one of those random spacing sections, then it continued on with:
Orlaith comes when the sun goes dark,
Arriving home to find love’s mark.
