Library

Chapter 36 | Ravinica

Chapter 36

Ravinica

I WAS GETTING CLOSER to a breakthrough. I could feel it.

I stood over the table late at night, poring over tomes and record books with Magnus, who did his own research and wrote down notes.

Mimir Tomes was unnervingly quiet this time of night. Only a single candle gave the two of us enough light to do our research.

To my right, three books were open. To my left, I had started to sketch out a vast family tree with a pencil. The tree was growing by the day, and now I had two separate pieces of paper taped together to continue it.

I hummed to myself, sifting through a few more pages, until I found another name I'd seen mentioned numerous times. It was one of my great-great-great grandparents on my mother's side.

Trying to trace the family history of Lindi Foradeen—my mother—through her paternal bloodline had proven fruitless. Ma's father, Foras Grundan, got me nowhere. I had wasted over a week of nightly meetings in Mimir Tomes trying to grasp a thread that seemingly didn't exist.

Of course, I didn't know my father. That side of the family was impossible to trace.

It was only once I started reconciling consensus records on my mom's mother that I started to get anywhere. And then I fell into a flow, with patterns and histories coming to light that had me excited.

Now, I felt I was reaching the end. I only needed to find information on a few blank names in my hierarchy tree for me to create and understand the wider implications of my family heritage.

Then I will know who was responsible for the horrible things done to my family. I had already registered a few shocking tidbits: a great aunt burned at the stake for being a witch nearly five-hundred years ago; a great grandmother eight generations back who fought in a civil war, was raped, and left for dead.

The tree went back tens of generations. I didn't need to know everyone—just the people who connected to my mother through biological means.

My journey began before my family had arrived in Iceland and helped build Selby Village. Before that, my mother's kin had been in Norway. Before Norway, it got a bit hazy, but they'd been there long enough that I didn't need to go back much further.

Plus, I could compare class notes from History & Tomes—about the renowned legend of the King Who Saw, King Dannon—and dates started to match up.

I read in my book to the right, traced a finger down my yellow notepad to the left, and found an entry I had been missing. "Here we go," I murmured to myself, bending down and writing a name.

Magnus glanced over at me, hearing me speak for the first time in hours. "Found something, silvermoon?"

I nodded. "More names. I'm getting close."

"You still haven't told me what you're looking for, after all these weeks together."

I looked over at him. "Neither have you."

He grunted. "Touché."

Magnus and I were working alone, together. There was a big difference between that and working in unison. We weren't building or searching for the same thing.

I felt a sense of longing for the pale man, with his mysteries so plainly spoken on his skin for all to see.

That being said, after the Lunar Night with Grim, our red-hot tryst, and then our dangerous escape from the Torfens, I'd had enough of men for the time being. I wasn't sure I could handle much more. And I still hadn't unpacked that night entirely, either.

After that night, the next evening I spent studying with Randi for an upcoming test in Runeshaping Basics. I still couldn't do a damn thing to prove my magic, and it was starting to worry me. Midterms were coming up, and even though they weren't technically in the middle of the term, they were important.

Failing those tests would only show I wasn't making the necessary improvements that would allow me to stay after this term was over.

The night after studying, I came back to Mimir Tomes to resume my research. Magnus chastised me for not showing up the prior two nights, and his sullen attitude only made me smile, realizing he had missed me. He wouldn't admit it, but his expression told the truth: Now that he had me researching with him, he didn't want to go back to being alone in Mimir Tomes.

I was more energized now to move forward than ever before. More hopeful about finding a true answer to my generations-old problems. I still didn't know too much about my family heritage on the whole, yet it was the people around my family that interested me.

It was the "friends" and "allies" of my ancestors who would be the ones tarnishing and destroying our family bloodline.

Early on, I noticed my research kept bringing me back to the King Who Saw. I had a pretty firm understanding of his history with the Deceiver in Gold, Lord Talasin, thanks to my history class with Hersir Thorvi. I knew King Dannon and Lord Talasin had been allied through a marriage between Dannon and Talasin's sister, Lady Amisara.

At some point, a great backstabbing happened between the two lords, with the elves betraying the humans and bringing mass destruction to our people.

That was all well and good. I knew that part. What was interesting to me, however, and beneficial to what I was learning, was how all the other players in both lords' courts interacted and played the game.

The kingdoms, after all, were not simply led by two men. There were countless dukes, noblemen and women, lords and ladies, who made up the armies and alliances with those two leaders. Diving into the histories and record books had shown me how those names connected.

I kept running into a few names that surrounded my family's line. My mother's kinfolk went all the way back to those medieval days. The women in those days hadn't been any special ladies or queens, yet they had been servants, workers, and maids of the court.

That discovery in itself had been groundbreaking.

There was still a blind spot in my research, however. I could only go so far back before the histories cut off. I didn't know where my people before the King Who Saw and Deceiver in Gold came from.

As it stood, there seemed to be a four or five families ingrained in my family's story during those times. They were friends, comrades, and even rivals at court. Maids who wanted better positioning, and would stoop to subterfuge and betrayal to get it over my family. Servants who wanted lateral movement from the sculleries to the lords' chambers, and weren't above besmirching and lying to get it.

The histories left out many specific stories, yet they alluded to a lot of goings-on during those days. Now, I had started to trace the families associated with my own, working forward to present times.

It was a big zigzag: I started in the present, working my way back to my medieval family line. Then I found the families associated with my ancestors. Finally, I worked my way forward, back to the present.

Once I had these last few names, I would understand their motivations better based on what their families had done. My work would be complete. And I'll finally be able to exact justice.

It was hard work, reconciling all this. One misstep or wrong name could send me spiraling off in the wrong direction for days.

Luckily, Magnus kept me focused. When I asked how his research was going that night, he told me he was almost finished.

"I'm getting close to figuring out what I want to know," he said, cryptically.

"Same. Shouldn't be too many more days now," I replied. "Maybe we'll figure it out on the same day. Wouldn't that be something?"

He grunted.

I looked over at him. "Will you ever tell me what it is you've found? I'm dying to know."

"Maybe once I find it, silvermoon."

I smiled softly. That was the best I could hope for. Magnus Feldraug was reserved, distant, and emotionless. Unlike my situation with Grim, I couldn't expect some grand gesture in order to get what I wanted.

I couldn't deny the pull I felt toward the mysterious man, either. It carved just as deeply into me as the one I felt for my huge protector and, in a way, for Arne Gornhodr.

"Hm."

I glanced over at Magnus when he hummed.

"Time to go," he said, checking a clock on the wall. "We're overstayed our welcome."

"Shit."

A few minutes later, we were outside, on the ground level of Mimir Tomes. I craned my neck and gazed up at the third story from which we had climbed. I had become so familiar with it over the past few weeks.

Is it the records room I've become familiar with? I gazed over at the handsome profile of Magnus. Or the man I've been sharing my time with in there?

A speck of sadness hit me in the gut. Regardless if it was the man or the mission driving me, I was starting to strangely feel like I didn't want it to end. Once we figure out our respective stories, does that mean everything will be over between us? Will we go back to being distant acquaintances, only interacting during our sparring sessions in Combat & Strategy?

It was hard to see us as anything other than that. Even now, we weren't particularly close. We weren't hovering over each other's shoulder, prying for answers, getting comfortable with each other. We were supportive, and that was all there was between us.

Right? Or am I missing something that's transpiring between us? Have I been wasting time in Mimir Tomes, when I could have been pursuing something more important than what's on the page, standing right beside me this entire time in flesh, blood, and ink?

Irrespective of our circumstance, there was one fact that remained: The closer I got to figuring out my family history, the more hesitant and uncertain I felt about finishing my research.

Comments

0 Comments
Best Newest

Contents
Settings
  • T
  • T
  • T
  • T
Font

Welcome to FullEpub

Create or log into your account to access terrific novels and protect your data

Don’t Have an account?
Click above to create an account.

lf you continue, you are agreeing to the
Terms Of Use and Privacy Policy.