[41st Year of Foresai, Middle Fire Month, Day 5]

The realization that she was not human had thrown everything into flux. Over the last thirteen days, she had slowly pieced the world back together, placing down concepts only after she had turned them in front of her mind’s eye. There were a few things that became immediately apparent: that humans were animals, crude spawn of fleshy wombs that had fashioned themselves supreme; that this supremacy was a delusion, that their Gods were not simply empty, but themselves inhuman; that they not only misunderstood the world but could not understand it. Renner could not decide on whether to lament this epitome or revel in it.

For everything he’s said to me, I ought to thank him. Thank you, Zanac, for dragging me to the mere. Thank you, Zanac, for cleansing its waters beforehand. Thank you, Zanac, for grabbing me by my nape and forcing my head down. Thank you, Zanac, for showing me my reflection for the first time.

Renner was sitting at her vanity, staring into her own eyes. Normally, this would have entailed the practice of facial expressions, delicately shaping her expression to deliver the ideal impression. She did none of that now. She was performing no act, drilling no muscles. For the first time, she looked at herself for no other reason than to look at herself.

I’m a beautiful thing, aren’t I?

Her face was not blank; rather, she was simply smiling. It was leisurely, an effortless expression of her joy. She let go, ceding control of her visage and letting her emotions drive it.

Pure catharsis. Clarity. Mirth. Ah, I oughtn’t to lose the rest of the day to myself; I’ve done that twice now. Somehow, for all the gazing at my mask, I never thought I would pick up the practice of catoptromancy. Ironic, no?

Renner cocked her head slightly, watching the subtle dance of her pupils. She was in one of those long afternoons that tended to vanish when not used productively, leaving only that hollow flavor of a day wasted. She had been wont to spend this time with afternoon teas, lunch-ins, and general attention from Climb, though often she found those precious activities interrupted by her father or duties of socialization with other highbloods. Climb was and always would be her capstone, but everything else had been caught in a general inversion, the value of such verbal gamesmanship plummeting through the floor. This had left her - as always - with a list of tasks, though they were nothing as certain as decoding a cypher or seeking a safehouse.

I’m absent a “what”, and absent a “why”. It’s as if I can only define myself in exclusionary terms. I am not human, yet I am not something from an adventurer’s tale. I have little to grip in such a gap.

Though she had decided on her inhumanity, what this meant practically was nebulous at best. She found cause to question not only her psychic make but her physical one as well. She had spent hours prodding and pinching herself, this to little end. Nominally, her body was the same sort of fleshy thing that the rest of mankind was, and if it wasn’t, she had little idea how she would ever get close enough to another to spot a contrast. That she had never been informed of any physical deformities seemed as evidence against this, though this brought Renner to the subject of her radiant beauty; though exceptional, it was by no means abnormal, and she was left with little recourse.

Perhaps the answer lies deeper in my blood. My father and mother, their patrilineal and matrilineal lines. Ah, that would likely be a more productive avenue. The question of my full-blooded sister remains, however, and of my supremacy relative to her. The route doesn’t seem fruitful, but it's not as if I have a richer vein to rip open.

Renner drew herself up from her vanity, stretched, and rebuilt her mask.

—

“Your Highness, how wonderful of you to drop by. Did you have anything new you wanted to read? Y’know, I just got in a copy of Lord Unuloupe’s new work.”

Renner loathed Yelta with a passion second only to Barbro.

“Thank you, but I must refuse.”

“Are you sure? It's the novelized sequel to ‘The Rye and the Wabe’. I had it on good authority that you liked that production. You might regret letting it slip, Your Highness.”

Did that gossip truly need to work its way to him?! That was over forty days prior - though it feels longer. Why didn’t you forget?

As a young child, books had been a welcome distraction from the confusing mental lapses those who surrounded her were subject to. The idea that she could gain knowledge both silently and in solace enthralled her, and Librarian Yelta had been happy to indulge her. After confirming the details with her other educators, and with a handful of lessons on the letters and their sounds, she was let loose into the canons of Re-Estize’s finest children’s authors at the young age of four. She burned through volume after volume, burrowing herself deeper into work in tandem with her growing frustrations at the odd inadequacies of her family at recognizing the truth of things; worse, at refusing to listen to her.

“You speak truly? Perhaps I’ll borrow it soon, though I do have other things of import to read first.”

“Now I really am wondering if you’re actually sure. You’ll want to borrow it fast, who knows how the maids will latch onto it once they hear about it. Had I another copy I would hold it for you, yet I only have one. You’d be surprised how difficult it was to acquire.”

Accept a no when I give it to you. You aren’t high-blooded, yet you have the gall to speak like that. How did you even enter our service? Were you such a superb educator that you smashed through the walls of Ro-Lante and the thick skulls of my contemporaries only to deny me the same elucidation you gave them?

From that age to around six months into her fifth year, the library was hallowed ground, a nook to bury herself in and forget her troubles and learn of new ones. This early love soon soured as she ran up against the walls of what and was not reading deemed fit for princesses; books other than fiction were often outright denied to her, and what was granted were codices on topics deemed feminine enough for a princess. Renner had learned a number of more advanced techniques from said compendia - poise for every particularity, from posture to pout - but this information was consumed all too swiftly as well. Every time Yelta smiled that gentle gaze of his, gently pushing her from histories or tratesies he deemed too advanced for her, her sanctuary was undone a little more. Within a month of meeting Climb, she realized her respite had proven false.

“Well, I wouldn’t speak to that matter. No, I’m simply in need of the genealogical records.”

“Oh? Why’s that?”

This had been made all the worse by her second brother’s near residence in the place. He had restrictions, yet they were shallow compared to the indignities forced upon Renner. He could read without limit, and from the conversations she had heard between the pair, he had even gone so far as to read dark-bestiaries and study monstrous-kins. She had watched as Zanac made the library his refuge, a permission she was denied again and again. The degree of shame and of horrid anger she grew in her heart towards her own sex as a result of this was overwhelming; it shredded her. When she pushed for permission to access the same texts as her brother, Yelta displayed a suffocating patronage, couching every no in assurances of her purity and innocence. No matter what arguments she stringed together, he remained firm that she was a princess and nothing more. Eventually, Renner tired, and simply gave up; she relegated herself to that image Yelta, her father, and every other figure of authority in her life wished her to have, and let her mouth not open on such matters evermore.

“Well, I want to see the lines of my families detailed for me to read. I know little beyond the basics of my House’s history.”

“And what’s inspiring you to do that now?”

Whom else among Valencia’s denizens would he dare speak to like that? I am royalty, I am fifth in line to the throne. Picture him questioning my brothers that way. Is he mad? This is why I always send Climb for such matters, but that’s not possible here; at least Yelta never questions him.

“Would you take issue if it was merely a flit?”

“Not at all! Let me retrieve Compendia Vaiself.”

That storybook for children? He must be mad! I want the actual history, not its malformed counterpart.

“Oh, I was in search of the full record, and perhaps the expanded genealogy too?”

“I don’t think you would like those. It’s all dry plodding on about ‘who begat who.’”

Oh and by-the-by, it’s “who begat whom.” Perhaps my country is innovative; while Baharuth is dastardly tossing shavings of its educated nobility into the civil service, Re-Estize has countered with the wonderful advancement of hiring illiterate librarians.

“I’m quite set on this. I feel I owe my predecessors a counting of their names, at least once.”

“Ah, there’s that Vaiself sense of duty. Your brother off in the borderlands slaking his blade on imperials, your two sisters doing their best for their husbands, and you with that deep respect for your elders and ancestors.”

“Eh? You use such romantic terms. Thank you, Yelta.”

“As always, providing service to Her Highness was never something I needed thanking for.”

“Well, I appreciate that.”

When I approach Zanac to secure a future for my puppy and I, I ought to make your hanging a condition of my bargain.

The librarian turned around and made for the deeper parts of the library, Renner tailing him. The space was expansive. Sitting at ground level on the south side of the palace, it stretched across two chambers, one large and one small, and an upper balcony connecting the larger of the two to the second story of Valencia proper. This was where the books open to other nobility without bespoke appointments were, those with city manors having been given perpetual invitations to the books stored there. Running reading groups was ostensibly a duty of the resident princess, and Renner had diligently performed in this role, organizing and selecting whatever books they actually possessed multiple copies of; as such, a small flock of noblewomen descended once a fortnight to discuss the latest works of fiction or stageplays that had captured the imaginations of the nobility, though the circumstances of the last few weeks had conspired to turn the group bimonthly.

That this place only ever serves as a place for palace guests to wet their whistle is perhaps the worst offense of Valencia. The very idea of locking a library behind a fortress wall is asinine. Knowledge is not something wasted on the city folk, it is something cherished by and dear to them. Imagine a dawn that falls on a Re-Estize with not one-in-one-hundred literate individuals, but one-in-ten. How much greater is the productive capacity? How valuable is the ability to craft instead of simply harvest? Even Baharuth lags in this; one grand library in Arwintar and nothing more. Picture one in every town, every way station along the highway. It needn’t be large, nor contain the greater works of our time, but the impact it would have. Pray tell, Chardelon, is this why you hate this place?

Large windows broke the space with the languid beams of the afternoon sun. The shelves were tall, though they only lined the room; its center was reserved for a number of sitting spaces at the expense of capacity. This was bad enough in her eyes, but the content of the shelves was no better, as the books here were the sort of cheap literary fodder that Renner disdained: dull tales of heroism or convoluted love plots. Renner held her tongue.

Perhaps I ought to be less ireful at this. This is just another aspect of mankind’s foolishness. How did I ever think myself a member of them?

Yelta and Renner passed into the second chamber. This was a far more cramped space, the second story lost in exchange for a much higher density of shelves. It was not possible for Renner and Yelta to walk abreast; instead, they slipped single file through the thin aisles of what she considered the actual store of books. Delving further into the grid, the pair wound until they found an earmarked space, the maze suddenly breaking into a square clearing four paces per side, with just enough space for a pair of chairs and low-slung table in its middle. Glass cabinetry held row after row of thick tomes, uniform sets of laws, royal decrees, and records of rule. Yelta drew his eyes ‘cross the cabinets, as did Renner, searching the titles for their books of interest.

Ought there to be a guard posted here? Someone could walk in off the palace lawn and find these. Do we possess such an indifference towards our own history? No, there needn’t be a guard here, these should be in a vault. Perhaps there are magical defenses; wards woven over a century ago? Perhaps that was the intention; unfulfilled promises of my forefathers.

Yelta snagged on himself, and with an upbeat grunt, spotted their quarry. It was a thick tome, sitting alongside other weighty documents on Re-Estize’s past - specifically in between the seizure of E-Rantel and the negotiated settlement with Re-Blumrushur and Re-Pespea. Withdrawing a keyring from his breast pocket, he fumbled through them to find the stout one required, before shoving it into the lock. Twisting it, he drew open the cabinet door and tipped out the book of interest, snatching the detailed house history in his dexter. Using his offhand to grab the second book - this one the spliced together genealogy records of several houses - he stacked them, batted off the dust, and presented them to Renner.

“Here you are, Your Highness.”

“Thank you, Yelta. If you wouldn’t mind, I’m going to sit right here.”

“Who am I to refuse your request? Though you may find better company out there.”

I’m not in the mood for company; in any case, I would be ill-equipped to handle it.

“It sounds nice, though I wouldn’t want to get distracted. Oh, actually, may I have those keys? I know these texts have a habit of referencing other things from our records, and I don’t want to inconvenience you with repeated summons to unlock other of these cabinets.”

Yelta cocked his head, eyes darting for a moment.

“Y’know, I think that would be fine. Here you go.”

Yelta dropped them into Renner’s hands

“Thank you.”

“Then I’ll leave you to it. Just let me know if you need anything, or if you want me to get you that book.”

Please just leave. The exit is only twenty paces behind.

“Thank you, I will.”

“Please, enjoy, Your Highness.”

Yelta turned and walked off, Renner releasing a chuff when it became clear she was truly absent his presence. She set down her books on the table, before plopping down herself on one of the chairs beside it. She tossed open the cover and began to read.

—

Ah, and thus she had met and married House Bolloupe’s count, only for him to die a year later, and then engaged with Valleon the First. So she was still young when that happened, widower tends to imply age. Well then that matter is settled.

Renner pressed the back of her neck, slowly rubbing back and forth. It had grown stiff over the last few hours; she had ignored it in the hopes that she would hit upon some grand realization before it bloomed into an outright headache. As the investigation went nowhere quickly, she slowly came to regret that decision, now being able to feel the beats of her heart as blips of pain in her temples. Now, her headache had broken a new threshold; she chose to sit back in her chair, crane her neck upward, and close her eyes.

This is fruitless. Any illegitimacies would have long since been struck and burned, and most everything else ill-fitting would have been left unpenned as well. The only relevant points feel like the illnesses they have been subject to, and if my mother being a feeblemind was something that could slip through blood, then it would make Lulara the same as I, which she isn't. Should I retrace the line of Kings? Worth a gander.

Her eyes still closed, she began to count the tree of kings, tallying the years of reign in her mind.

My father’s now four decades of reign as Ramposa III; thirteen years of Theiern II; nineteen years of Parheiln II; twenty seven years of Andrean III; eleven years of Ramposa II; eighteen years of Ramposa I, “The Mighty”; sixteen years of Parheiln I; nineteen years of Andrean II, “The Builder”; eight years of Theiern I; one year of Draelic I; one year of Illian I; nine years of Valleon I; and seventeen years of Andrean I, “The Dæmon Slayer.” To think that this Kingdom has stood for a hundred and ninety-nine years, almost two centuries to the dot.

What of the history before that? Four-hundred and twenty-three years after the coming of the Four… hm, likely the Six, no? Another point to investigate. “Dæmon Slayer,” a chance there’s something there? He made a pact with a dæmon, and then killed it, if I recall. I doubt it would be anything as simple as “Your third granddaughter eleven times removed will have the soul of a dæmon,” if I dare frame myself in such rote terms.

Renner opened her eyes, and returned to the house records splayed on the table in front of her. She pincered a large block of pages in her fingers, skipping to about halfway through the text, before more carefully searching for the relevant tale. The history was mostly constructed with anecdotes from the life of Andrean the First, the man who bore the Kingdom of Re-Estize into the world; it told of his adventures, his conquests, and his triumphs; of House Vaiself when it was not a royal house, but a line of witch hunters. Her eyes snagged on a passage, recognizing it as the account of Andrean’s encounter with an Archfield.

“...And it was thus that Andrean and his armies - which had been drawn from all the cities and lands and peoples over the hills and mountains - entered the city of Re-Estize, and it was thus that he fought its way to its core, slaying the fel armies of the Fourth Archfiend as he did so. At the center, he came upon the Fourth Archfiend, Dæmon of the Fourth Circle, Brog’Drukil. The baleful pit-spawn spake an edict that, after killing Andrean, he would lay waste to the armies of the Witch-Slayer, not simply those assembled before him, but all the cities and lands and peoples o'er the hills and mountains.”

“Andrean thus offered a pact; that for twenty years of his life, the pair would instead duel; if Andrean was to be defeated, then the line of Vaiself would fall into servitude under Brog’Drukil; if Brog’Drukil was to be defeated, that he would be vanquished to the pit eternally, and that his name and every edict he had spoken would lose all power when writ or spake. The dæmon gazed upon his yearling face and accepted his pact, and the pair waged a terrible battle, leading to the destruction of the city’s center, a great razing of the core in fel flames; the battle lasted from the dusk clear through to the dawn, and as the first rays of the sun’s light fell upon the world, they fell upon the blade of Andrean as he slaked it with the heart of Brog’Drukil, and it was thus that the Fourth Archfiend was defeated, and all the edicts, curses, and pacts he had formed were shattered but the one he had just entered.”

“And it was thus that Andrean the Witch-Slayer became Andrean the Dæmon-Slayer. Upon his victory, Andrean in his exhaustion withdrew his helm, and watched in amazement as it morphed in his hands - changing in both shape and color - into a crown of golden-white metal. He turned to the assemblage, the army he had forged from all the cities and lands and peoples o’er the hills and mountains, and proclaimed the founding of a Kingdom of Re-Estize, of which the city would become the capital, and upon the spot he stood would be shaped the palace from which he would rule. And it was thus that Andrean the Dæmon-Slayer became King Andrean the First, and it was thus that the dawn that marked the four hundredth and twenty-third year from the arrival of the Four that the founding of the Kingdom did come.”

Renner blinked a few times, then sighed. Dissatisfied, she closed the tome. Hours upon hours of investigation had yielded nothing; no sure leads as to her make, nor hints as to the cause of her being. Some low ire burnt in her heart, a growing resentment at her seeming lack of place in things. She considered surrendering the task entirely and sulking back to her room; though she was of half a mind to spring up and do just that, she kept herself in her chair, forcing a little patience from her exhausted form.

The tale would be boyish if it wasn’t the founding narrative of the Kingdom. Ah, but who says such things need not be? If it’s a world of menfolk, what stops their delusions from saturating their inkwells? Well, in any case, that left no room for favorable interpretation; every pact of his - minus the aging - was shattered. What a terrifying thing to sell, one’s own years. Wait, “yearling face?”

Renner reopened the book, fanning back to the page she had just left on. Her eyes darted to the source of her confusion, finding that the word was as she remembered it.

Was he not thirty-eight by then? In what world could that be called “yearling”? Perhaps it’s a play of words, a contrast to the later havoc wrecked upon him by the Archfiend? It feels too strange a turn-of-phrase. I don’t recall anything like that at any other point in the histories.

Renner rapped her fingers furtively against the arm of her chair, turning up from the book and staring into the distance. She waited for a time, yet couldn’t shake the taste those words had left in her mouth. She looked back to the book and flipped through a few pages, looking for anything akin to such words. She didn’t find anything. Shifting her gaze from that, and back to the genealogy records, she retraced the line of kings, stopping when she touched the name of Andrean the first. The count of his years of reign was written there, the word “seventeen” hovering next to his name on the page, both enveloped in a gilded box made from gold-speckled ink. The cause of his death was also recorded, simply stated as “felled in a duel with the enemies of the east.”

So, thirty-eight years of age, plus the seventeen years of rule - and I suppose the twenty he gave to the demon - and that totals to seventy-five. He was seventy-five, and yet the cause was a duel? Yes, he was a great hero, but I can’t imagine a man so spry at such an age. What sort of fool would he be to accept a duel? This reeks of an omission. If that’s the case, then there’s no chance it hasn’t been lost to time. I haven't the luck of the Greed Kings - or in this case, the Dæmon Gods - so this is outright lost. There don’t happen to be any notes, do there?

Renner flipped forward a page, then flipped back several times to a piece of harder parchment stock. The tome had been neatly divided into several sections, with several title pages and small cuts in the side of the parchment to identify them. Flipping to the end of Andrean’s account, she spotted a note scrawled in the white space below the final line on the page.

“Original records hall destroyed in the twenty-year reemergence of the Eastern Warlock. The war record, and tales of the Witchhunt, Battle of E-Rantel and others reconstructed from the writings of the Maiden of the West, the scraps of Bard Yilna’s account, the testimony of Rigrit Bers Caceru-”

Eh?! She was… no, I suppose she was alive back then. Still, what a wild thing to read.

“-who in addition relayed the testimony of his eminence Tsaindorcus=Vaision, and the assistance of the Slane Theocracy, who have refurnished the lost chronology of House Vaiself. This demands more comprehensive work, will update later - His Majesty Illian the First, First year of Jiyl, Lower Wind Month, day four.”

Oh my darling great-uncle, never had the time for that before your brother stabbed you in the back? I suppose the Black Night does have precedent. Anyway, I haven’t the faintest idea of who the Maiden of the West is, nor Tsaindorcus=Vaision. Associates of the Thirteen Heroes? Rigrit was counted among their number, so maybe. Yilna I know, the bard of my forefather. Do we have that account on hand?

Renner pushed herself off from the table, snatching the keys Yelta had left for her. She spied through the glass panes of the cabinets, looking for the writings of Bard Yilna. With the knowledge that the text was likely in tatters, she spotted a small wooden box on the bottom of one of the corner shelves. Unlocking that cabinet and retrieving the box, she opened it to reveal several sets of half-bound pages, many of which were burned.

This must be it. How frighteningly fragile these pages must be. I ought to be careful.

Returning to the table, Renner set down the box, before reaching in and gingerly retrieving a portion of pages bound only by a broken spine. The parchment was cracked, and she took care not to bend it. Slowly withdrawing and laying it on the table, she began to flip through page by page. The text was dense and penned in a far older style, and though she struggled to decipher it, she was eventually able to recognize the Archfiend’s tale. Tracing her hands gently above the page, she eventually found the original version of the line that had so troubled her.

“The dæmon bore o’er his yearling visage, the eve of his coming o’ age four years away, and accepted his pact.”

His coming of age… I’d hazard they’re referring to age twenty, not fourteen; he likely believed in the Six, no? So he was not thirty eight, but sixteen, and thus he gave away another twenty years of his life to the archfiend and fell dead with a cumulative fifty-three years on his body. I suppose that’s far more reasonable than the aforementioned total of seventy-five. An odd error; not a transposition, but the alteration of multiple digits. How does that happen? A lax scribe? Something like that. Ah, Chardelon-Dearest, this is pointless.

Renner gave a pensive smile, giggling lightly at her foolishness.

The very idea that my forefathers would nestle mention of sepulcher or sulfurous origin in the histories is absurd. Put another way, if other of my ancestors are as I am, wouldn’t they have hid as well? I do not shout myself, proclaim myself an anomaly or anathema through Valencia’s halls. What a twist, that the things which I agonize over are the same thing which I would hide from a future being of comparable make. Besides, if the authors can make an error as severe as crossing the age of the king, what hope do I have of finding anything accurate in these records? Slim to none. Now what? Ah, perhaps simple reading for pleasure.

Though she found the house canon childish, Renner was bored, and she thought it adequate to forgive herself a small indulgence. Of the narratives inked within, the narrative of the Witch Hunt had long been her favorite, the extended and arduous task of pinpointing its lair being genuinely entertaining to her, turning its exorcism into more of a payoff than a work of dull bladesmanship. Renner gingerly navigated herself to that portion of Yilna’s accounts, reading with a light smile on her face.

“...F'r the boy Andrean - who ne’er had seen a year more than ten fall o’er the world - didst track the wytch to its lair, and trapping it, slak'd his blade on its manxome form, stilling its living corse. And thus didst that boy, born late the coming of the Six by thirteen score and ten years, slayeth the wytch on this day, and thus didst he become Andrean the Wytch'r.”

Ah, that old style of prose is simply beautiful, isn’t it? To speak like that, I ought to try - wait, born three eighty-five years after?

Renner blinked, then double-took the page.

That was his birthday when I assumed he was thirty-eight when the founding of the Kingdom occured, yes, but he was sixteen. The records make it clear he slew the dæmon at age sixteen. Should not it be four seventeen? No… what? He was sixteen when he founded the Kingdom, itself four hundred twenty-three years after the coming of the Gods - well, “Gods” - which means he must have been born four hundred seven years after.

Renner turned up from the scraps of Yilna’s writing, trying to piece together any possible explanation. The date felt entirely unexplainable.

Somehow, despite him being less than half the age originally written, his birthday remained the same. How? Three ninety five, and yet ten years old. How is that possible? Have I made some critical error in my arithmetic? Not I, but the authors. The quantity is overwhelming. It’s as if… no, review. What of the passage in the later rewriting?

Renner shot her gaze to the restored house records, swiftly flipping through to seek the later telling of the same story. Arriving at it, her eyes darted across the page until she found the equivalent line.

“And thus did he slay the witch six years prior.” What? That’s an out and out discrepancy; completely dropping the year. Are the writings of Yilna embellished? Almost certainly, but he was the only first-hand account referenced here, sans the other four. I suppose killing an Archdemon at sixteen is far less likely than doing so with more experience. When King Illian rebuilt the record, he must have noticed this and thought it a lie, something to make the tale sound far greater than it actually was. After all, he did have the chronology given to him by… Slane, was it?

Renner paused, hanging on that last thought for a time. The flavor of the moment changed; no longer exasperated confusion, but a low unease. She began to sense that she was missing something important. Her hands still on the house records, she flipped back to the note left by her forefather.

What if he was born three eighty five years after the coming of the Six, and what if he was sixteen? It would mean the date of the kingdom’s founding was falsely ahead. It would not be four twenty-three, but four hundred and one. It would mean that the Dæmon Gods emerged not four-hundred twenty two years after the Six, but four hundred… four hundred exactly. One hundred and ninety-nine years since then. It would mean that it has not been six-hundred and twenty-three years since the coming of the Six Great Gods. It has been six-hundred. Six-hundred exactly.

She felt a chill run up her spine, itself triggering an involuntary shudder. Her mind began to crystalize, facts aligning one after another. Andrean the First had been born in the year three eighty five, founding the kingdom in the year four hundred one.

These are not errors, nor omissions, but redactions.

Her eyes slowly drifted to the burnt scraps of Bard Yilna’s writing.

The records that told otherwise were not simply caught in flame, but deliberately destroyed.

Then, back to the page with the scrawled note; records that were then replaced with false ones.

Records that were then replaced for… for the cause… of altering the date? Why?

The line seemed to float off the page. That baleful word, Slane, hung there with an import and a presence it had never done before.

All this at the behest of the Theocracy. The time from the coming of the Six. Not six hundred and twenty two, but six hundred exactly.

Her flesh puckered, goosebumps running the length of her form. Of all the realizations she thought were possible to come upon when she began this search, this was not one of them. She was terrified.

What could this possibly mean?