What if it holds answers?
“Serena!” Jovi called, startling me.
I dropped the diary back in the drawer, shutting it hastily.
“Sorry,” I replied, joining them in the next room. I instantly realized that we’d hit the jackpot. The room we’d entered was small, and every available surface was covered in shelves with cardboard and metal cylinders. In the middle of the room was a desk, covered with a large, hand-drawn map.
Jovi and Field were poring over it, and I joined them, my interest spiking even further as I read the inscription on the top of the map, labeled ‘Eritopia’.
“Here we are, I think.” Field pointed out to a mark on the map, labeled ‘Wolstone House,’ with a small, architecturally correct layout of the building we were in. I could even see the greenhouse, and the markings of where the lawn ended and the swamps began. I looked to see what surrounded us, which was mostly as I’d seen—swamps, more swamps and then jungle.
“‘Storm Hounds,’” Jovi read out, pointing at small markings that were dotted along the swamps. “That doesn’t sound too good—what are storm hounds?”
“Not sure I want to know,” I murmured.
I focused my attentions on the two cities, or villages, marked out on the map—one to the east and one to the west, just as Field had mentioned. They didn’t look very large, but each was surrounded by rings marked in red ink.
“Does that mean danger or something?” Jovi asked, tracing his finger along the lines.
“Or it’s where a territory has been reduced,” Field remarked. “Maybe the cities were once much larger than they are now.”
“There are no pathways shown,” noted Jovi. “When we leave, we’ll have to cross through the jungle for miles before we reach any kind of civilization.”
“And we don’t know how safe they are,” Field remarked. “What I saw were walled cities—I could hardly see inside them. Like I said, not inviting.”
“Well, if this area’s as dangerous as the Druid said it is, maybe that’s not surprising. We don’t know what they’re trying to keep out,” I replied.
“Maybe they’re keeping out the Druid,” Jovi speculated.
“All that for one Druid?” I asked—it didn’t seem likely to me. He might have been powerful, but walls so high that even Field hadn’t been able to see into them seemed a bit like overkill.
“Don’t underestimate him,” Field warned me. “We don’t know anything yet—let’s make sure we stay on guard.”
“He knows a lot about us,” Jovi mused. “I mean, if it’s so dangerous to leave the house, how did he get to us? He knew what GASP was, knew about our kind—he knew I was a werewolf, and didn’t seem surprised by your presence.” He turned to Field. “He’s way ahead of us.”
“Then that’s something we need to remedy,” Field replied. “Start checking all the maps. What we need is a bigger one, one that will show us where we are in relation to the fae stars.”
I started pulling down the largest maps I could see, sliding their heavy paper out of the cylindrical containers and laying them down flat wherever there was space. Many of them were useless, either replicas of the one we’d just found, or of entirely different places, their annotations written in languages I couldn’t understand. We even found a few of Earth—America, Africa, Europe—old maps that must have been from centuries ago, detailing countries with old names that were no longer in existence.
“I think we have to assume that whoever lived here before was just a collector,” I stated eventually, feeling like I’d looked at hundreds of maps that were no use to us whatsoever. The sky was also darkening. We’d opened a window to let in some air—not that it helped much since it was so humid. The sky was red and gold, the sun setting rapidly, leaving the swamps covered in darkness, and only the tips of the mountains and highest reaches of the jungle were still bathed in light.
“When do you think we go down for dinner?” Jovi asked, following my gaze out of the window.
“Not sure. Maybe we’ll be called?” I speculated.
Both of them looked at me.
“What?” I replied. “He seems old-fashioned, don’t you think? Inviting us to ‘dine’ with him—it seems like whatever he is, he’s also under the pretense of being a gentleman.”
Jovi guffawed. “A gentleman? I’m leaning toward serial killer if anything,” he replied, looking at me in disbelief.
“I actually think Serena’s right,” Field added. “I think if we join him tonight, and try to keep our manners in check”—he looked pointedly at Jovi—“then we might get some of the answers we need.”