Journal Entry, Dated 08/03

Jasmine

Metadata

Reference Number: BICI/SSP/CRJ0703/007

Title: Journal Entry, Dated 08/03

Author: Jasmine

Date: Written approximately 08/03, Year 5607 A. o. W.

Extent: One journal entry, fourteen pages long

08/03

I feel as though I’ve lived three days in the past 12 hours. I don’t know if I’ll be able to write everything down before I have to sleep, but I’ll try.

…Nico’s staring at me. He watches me write on occasion, but only when we’ve made camp for the night and he’s cooking something that doesn’t require constant vigilance. Those moments are passive observation. Now, after stealing a glance at him, I see a clear curiosity in his eyes. It doesn’t feel as irritating as I’d expected. I suppose I’ve grown used to him watching me. 

We’re sharing a room. There are two beds, two desks, and two dressers, though we really only needed the beds and a single desk. Nico lays on the bed he’s claimed for himself, his head propped by his folded arm, while I’m posted at “my” desk. 

Apparently we lucked out. Usually people are stuck three to a room. 

…Nico’s laughing. “How do you write so fast?” he’s saying.

I don’t know. I just do.

He’s out of bed. Now he’s leaning over me. His hand is on the back of my chair. “Wait, you’re writing exactly what I say?” Another laugh. “Oh, wow. You are! How do you do that?”

I have a good memory. Do you not remember what people tell you?

“Not their exact words! Haha, I barely remember what I say once I’m done saying it!”

I thought everyone was like this. 

“You really are special, Jasmine.” His voice is warm. His hand finds my shoulder and squeezes it. 

Nico…

“You’re amazing.”

Am I supposed to thank you for the compliment?

“For the truth, you mean?”

I feel… strangely vulnerable. With you reading all of my thoughts like this.

“You can trust me.”

I just…

Oh.

He just pulled away, moving back towards his bed. “Well, I’m going to sleep! I’ll let you finish your writing.”

He’s in bed now, curled up as usual. Though he doesn’t truly fall asleep until he rolls over at least once.

And there’s the roll.

He was so close. His touch was nearly blazing. I can still feel the ghost of his hand on my shoulder, even now. It… it makes me…

Anyways…

I do trust him, at least when it comes to keeping us both alive on the road. But to read my every thought? No one ever reads my journal entries but me. Not my parents. Not Spica. Not even Blossom.

Physical proximity has forced us to be more open than I’ve been with nearly anyone else. I’ve changed clothes in front of him just as he has in front of me, though we still try to give each other whatever shade of privacy we can. All I’ve ever seen of him that I can remember is the smooth skin of his back. If one of us bathes in a creek or pond, the other sits on the shore, their back turned to keep watch on our surroundings. Yet the thought of Nico reading my journal leaves me feeling so much more exposed than my nudity ever has. 

I’m not opposed to the idea, though, of him reading my journal. That shocks me more than any potential look. Any potential touch.

But enough about that. 

About today’s events…

We reached the Hall of Kindling and Charcoal’s entrance this morning. The remaining hike was uneventful, a fact I was grateful for. 

The Hall is the biggest building I’ve ever seen. It towered over us. But where the volcano is mostly gentle slopes and craggy rocks, the Hall is all made of straight lines and sharp spires. Every part of it is white marble and dusty orange stone — a more refined, and more violent, version of the mountain it sits on. 

We stared at the sharp lines His Eternal Warmth’s sigil carved into the front entrance’s double doors. I was unsurprised to see the sigil, considering where I was, but my eye was soon drawn to the carvings that sat just above the doors, inlaid into the building itself.

Nico followed my gaze, and answered a question I had yet to ask. “It’s a representation of His Eternal Warmth’s origin story. See?” He pointed at the leftmost image. “There’s His Eternal Warmth, standing all alone. And as you go,” he paused, his finger slowly starting to move, “The story progresses. There He is, forging the sun. There He is, forging life. And there He is at the end… giving the scholars and the archivists here the tools to create and care for the stories they think matter.”

Stories they think matter — his phrasing stuck out to me. “You really didn’t like your time here, did you?” 

Nico gave his best approximation of a scowl. When he attempts the expression, his face moves the way it’s supposed to. His nose scrunches, his eyebrows tilt down, and he frowns. But he always puffs his cheeks out, making his round face even rounder. Between that and his bright eyes, the end result isn’t irritation, but something closer to a petulant child denied a toy.

…Reading that back makes my words sound far more insulting than I meant. If you ever do read this, Nico, I meant it as an observation. I hope you’d find it funny instead of offensive.

“Even when I was all alone in my village, it was better than being here. There are three kinds of people who live in the Hall: archivists, who maintain the original records kept here, researchers, who study the old texts and supposedly craft new texts based off what they see here and throughout the world, and all the Undying Embers who mostly exist to ferry supplies up the mountain and protect researchers when they go out into the field. It’s a waste of time, if you ask me. Why go out into the world if you’re only looking for evidence to support an idea you already have, while ignoring everything else?” 

I failed to see the purpose of any of this. But it’s what I’ve always said: I’m not the religious sort. 

“I once babysat a couple of scholars as they went to the western coastline to research the people there. They wanted to examine the people who lived against the border of Nothingness,” Nico continued.

“Where’d they go?” Likely to one of the villages far north of mine. These I knew independently of my map. The fishers always insisted that of all the villages on the western coast, our fish were the biggest and the best.

“Westward Wind. It’s on the shoreline, just southwest of the mountain’s base. The researchers spent the entire journey down wondering how close they could get to the water before Nothingness swallowed them whole. I nearly defected right then and there!” 

His words made me pause. He may not have defected from the Embers while he was stationed here, but what would the researchers say? Or the other Embers stationed here? 

Was he in danger here?

Nico went to push open the door, seemingly free of the thoughts that worried me. “Wait, Nico,” I said, prompting him to pause and look back at me with curiosity. “What if someone recognizes you?”

Nico laughed. “Oh, that won’t be a problem at all. Everyone here is so up their own asses that they’ll never give me a second glance. And any Ember who could is so disconnected from the rest of the world that they wouldn’t know whether I’m wanted. We’ll be just fine.”

I still wasn’t entirely reassured, but this was the only lead we had. I didn’t have much of a choice other than to accept his optimism. “Okay… but if anything changes, you lay low. I’ll get what we need from here.”

His grin blazed. “Deal!” 

The building felt even more massive inside than it appeared outside. The entrance hallway alone was big enough to hold half of Seabreeze Shoal. Beneath our feet was a grand red carpet with no end. Countless doors peeled off the hallway. Above us criss-crossed a series of staircases. Grand tapestries hung off every wall, all displaying something related to His Eternal Warmth. His Sigil. His likeness. His Hammer and His forge. 

I kept my hand around the biggest shell of Blossom’s necklace, still tapping against my collarbone with every other step, as we went forward. I hoped some of her curiosity would bleed into me. She said that stories lived in the gaps we often overlooked, and she loved stories almost as much as she loved her songs. I never felt the same. When I spot a gap, all I see is something to fill up and move on from.

But finding and getting this Sigil isn’t a gap to fill. It’s a mystery to solve. If I was going to solve it, then I needed her help, in whatever form it still existed.

I thought of her favorite song, and let its familiar melody ring in my mind. I can nearly hear it again as I write this. Maybe once I’m done writing, I’ll try my hand at a few more lyrics, provided it’s not too late. 

Soon after, we noticed signs plastered on many of the doors around us. We stopped to read over one. Fortunately for us, it advertised the exact trial we were here to sneak around, and provided instructions for the entire Hall to follow.

To pause three days’ worth of activities to watch one man’s humiliation? Egregious. 

Nico rapped the paper with his knuckle. “The trial is starting in half an hour. We’re right on time. And if everyone’s there… then they won’t be paying attention to us.”

I read over the sign again. “It doesn’t say why he’s on trial. Did you hear why?”

“I don’t know the specifics, but I heard he’s on trial for heresy.”

We appeared to be alone, but I dropped my voice to a whisper regardless. I wasn’t sure how well sound traveled here, and I didn’t need to make us targets this early into our stay. “Heresy, huh? How does that work in a place dedicated to finding knowledge?”

“What a god-king finds heretical and what His, hmm, fervent followers find heretical, may be two completely different things. You’d have to be the Flame-Feeder or delusional to think those are one and the same.”

“I have a bad feeling about this trial.”

“You have a bad feeling about everything.”

“Okay, but I have a really bad feeling about this trial.”

Nico grinned. “Then best to check it out, right?”

We soon encountered a scholar who was more than happy to escort a couple of lost guests to the auditorium the Hall had converted into a trial room. It seemed well equipped for the purpose. We slipped easily into a couple of chairs amongst the dozens of rows that led down to the stage in the center of the room. We looked down at a podium, and a table and chair that was boxed in from every side by thick wood. A miniature prison. Off to the right of the stage were a couple of long tables, but ones that allowed whoever was supposed to sit within their full freedom of movement.

The seats around the auditorium were half-full, but the stage was completely empty.

Once we sat down, Nico leaned towards me and dropped his voice to a whisper. “All the better to make our daring escape.”

“I thought we were watching the trial today,” I whispered back. 

“We are, don’t worry! We’ll do our recon tonight. Once we have a better idea about where we need to go, then we can make our daring escape.”

That’s when I realized he was telling me a joke. I’m still no good at realizing what is and isn’t one of his jokes.

“…Alright.” 

Before long, the room was packed full of people. That made the few rows at the front, kept deliberately empty, all the more stark. Even after a dozen people in robes that alternated between red and black filed onto the stage and sat at the long tables off to the side, those seats remained empty. 

Most people seemed older than us, but the ones on stage clearly were; the youngest among them looked to be in their fifties. I’m not sure if people here age the way they do in Seabreeze Shoal, but that’s at least the age they would be back there. The person at the very end of the table took out a notebook and a quill, prepared to start writing.

“The ones in red are archivists,” Nico whispered to me. “The ones in black? Researchers.”

“I see.”

His voice dropped to barely more than a breath. I felt his words against my ear more than I heard them. “And the whole bunch of them, if you ask me? Nothing more than an endless circlejerk.”

“What’s a circlejerk,” I whispered back.

Nico pulled away with a sudden lurch, barely stifling the squeak that escaped him. It took all of his self-control not to burst out laughing. I was curious to know the answer, but another person stepped onto the stage, and once she did, the entire room went silent. I turned my attention away from Nico and towards the stage. 

I’ll ask him what that means later.

The person who commanded the room’s attention was an older woman, probably in her late seventies. She had a fierce face, with heavy eyebrows and even heavier bags under her green eyes. Her hair, which was probably once fully blonde but was now mostly gray, was gathered in a tight bun at the bottom of her neck. And unlike the other scholars here, her black robes were covered in red gems, threaded together to look like flames licking at her waist. She wore a long red stole with heavy-looking black stones embedded in each tail, carved in the shape of His Eternal Warmth’s Sigil.

Having finally recovered, Nico started to whisper something to me, but the woman’s booming voice drowned him out.

“Scholars, Undying Embers, and guests alike — welcome to the Hall of Kindling and Charcoal. We are honored to have you here.”

Her eyes swept the rows of seats. She passed over us as though we were nothing; instead her gaze lingered on the rows of empty seats. Something flickered in her expression, though I was too far away to tell what it could be. 

It’s already been so long, and yet I’ve barely gotten to the trial…  I’ll summarize this next part. I want to get to what happened after.

She introduced herself as Scritta, the head of the Hall. She thanked us again for taking vigil over this moment with her, whatever that meant. Then she ordered the person on trial to come out. Two Undying Embers escorted out an older man, clad in an ivory and brown robe, and without the stoles that the other scholars wore. He had dark skin and his chin was covered in a thick beard, far longer than the few close-cut curls that stuck out from beneath his swooping hat. What struck me about him were his eyes; they were a deep brown, and despite his situation, they sparked with life. If this was a ploy to break this man’s spirit, they’d have to try harder than they were. 

This was P. I. Inkwell. The man on trial for heresy.

The Embers practically shoved him into the chair on the stage. Once he was locked in place, the trial officially began. 

If proven guilty by a trial of his peers, he would be exiled from the Hall for life and stripped of his title as a researcher. Immediately after that, Scritta spent an hour and a half droning on about the Hall’s holy work. I listened, bored out of my mind. Nico fell asleep. 

Despite her several speeches, Scritta never explained what crime Inkwell had supposedly committed. I gathered that he must have mistranslated an old legend, which then sparked the heresy accusations, but I fail to see why any of this matters. If he’s awful at his job, just destroy his shitty draft and make him re-translate the work. Give him manual labor as a punishment. 

Inkwell spent the trial begging Scritta to reconsider her decision. He denied any wrongdoing. Many people refused to look at him whenever he spoke. I even felt embarrassed for the man. I had only just arrived here, but the conclusion was obvious. No amount of protesting would prove his innocence. The trial had barely begun, and it was clear that everyone already had a verdict in mind. This was nothing more than a stupid, elaborate performance. 

What I didn’t understand was who exactly this performance was for. Maybe for whoever was meant to occupy all those empty seats at the front.

At the end of the day, once we were all freed from this torment, the Embers escorted Inkwell back to his quarters. Scritta reminded everyone that no one, not even the people who brought him meals, was to listen to his sacrilege. Then we were dismissed. 

I shook Nico awake; he bolted up with a start. “What did I miss?”

“The entire trial.”

Nico stretched in his seat. “Eh. There’s always tomorrow. C’mon, let’s get dinner! I’m starving. Follow me — I’d never forget the way to a good meal.”

“The food is good here?”

Nico paused. “Good point. I take that back — I’d never forget the way to a mediocre meal.”

I kept close to Nico as we walked through the Hall. We hadn’t gotten very far before an Undying Ember approached us. “Dinner is about to start. Do you need help getting to the dining quarters?” she asked.

I tensed up, but Nico didn’t blink. “I know the way. Thanks, though,” he said, every bit the impersonal distance he had never once offered me.

The Ember nodded and walked away. People weren’t paying much attention to us, but I kept my voice low anyways. “She didn’t recognize you at all.”

“I was a very boring Ember,” Nico whispered back.

The food was mediocre; mostly overcooked crab, stale bread, and bland vegetables. What Nico made on the road was far better; a fact he repeated more than once. We ate quickly and left even faster. The night was only so long, and our only guess as to where the Sigil was located was that it was likely in some restricted section. It was a good start, but it left us with more issues: one, that there were multiple locked restricted sections, and two, that Nico had no idea which of the dozens of smaller libraries within the building the restricted sections were in. 

The first floor was mostly that big auditorium, breakout rooms, and the dining quarters, with a few small libraries scattered in-between. The second floor held most of the books, held in the bulk of the Hall’s libraries.

We searched through several rooms before we found anything useful. One of the libraries had an imposing, locked door at the back of the room. Over it hung a huge sign: RESTRICTED SECTION. PLEASE SEE THIS COLLECTION’S ARCHIVIST FOR MORE DETAILS.

So we did, and while the archivist wasn’t allowed to tell us what was in the restricted section — apparently, that information is confidential, and only members of the Hall are allowed to know — it was a definite start. Now we just needed a way to get inside. 

“I have an idea. We’ll have to wait until a little later, though. Trust me?” Nico asked. 

What else could I say, except yes?

Once night fell, the Hall went silent. Braziers dimly lit the hallway, hanging between dark doors and guiding our way down the empty hallways. Most scholars lived in quarters on the third floor, and were likely winding down for the night. 

“Then why is our room on the first floor?” I asked him.

Nico shrugged. “If I had to guess, it makes it easier for guests to get everywhere they actually need to go.”

Fair enough.

Nico led us through another empty hallway, though he moved with clear purpose. I wasn’t sure where exactly he was headed to, though I barely knew where we were within the Hall; everything looked the same to me, especially in the dim light. He seemed to read my mind. “So we know where at least one restricted section is. The problem is that we don’t have a way to get in. And if I had to guess, there’s one place that’s most likely to have a key.”

“Which is?” I asked.

Nico laughed. “You’ll see soon, my friend.”

That made me pause. I’ve only ever had one friend. I had thought of us as traveling companions before. But thinking of Nico as my friend is… 

Nice.

And he’s a good friend to have. He’s caring and clever, and increasingly I find him far more amusing than annoying. I’m not sure what exactly he sees in me, but I was never sure what Spica liked about me, either.

We soon reached the end of a hall, where Nico finally came to a stop. “Ta-da!” he said, waving his hands at a lone door. There was no light seeping out from underneath, and the candles lit on each side of the door were far too dim for me to make out the name on the brass plate.

“What is this?”

Nico tossed a grin back at me. I could tell from the curve of his cheek, illuminated by what little light there was. “Scritta’s office!”

I tensed up. “Shouldn’t this be guarded?”

He tried the doorknob. It jiggled, but didn’t open. “Who would even guard a door that’s already locked — an Undying Ember? She’d never agree.”

“If it’s locked, how are we supposed to get in?”

Nico wiggled his fingers and winked. “I have a spell for this!”

“You’re telling me there’s Ember magic to unlock a door, and you couldn’t use it on the restricted section?”

“This lock is far easier to break. If I had a hairpin, I could just use that. Since I don’t, my arcane Ember magic will have to do. Keep watch for me?” 

“We’ll hear someone coming before we see them,” I said, but turned around anyway. The hallway was completely empty. The more I looked around, the stranger I found the emptiness. Shouldn’t there be some kind of activity, at least behind all of these closed doors? I struggled to believe that every scholar here was already in their room, asleep. It was late, but not that late.

Behind me, Nico rustled the lock around. I had no idea how his magic worked, but I wasn’t particularly inclined to ask. I could feel the strange itch of magic already, and it took most of my self-control not to step away with a shiver.

Thankfully, after a few minutes the magic faded, followed by a metal click and a soft, “Aha!” I turned around to see Nico holding the lock the same way kids hold their first fish back in Seabreeze Shoal, beaming with pride.

I thought briefly of Blossom. She wore a similar expression all the time. Anything could inspire it: a piece of seaglass that washed up on the shore, recounting a new song that had somehow worked its way into her mind, or even the sight of those annoying fucking seagulls…

She’d never wear that expression again. 

I missed her horribly. It felt as though my chest had been carved open. Even now, the hurt pulses within me. The shock of her death had left me empty, but the shock has long since faded, and what I’m left with is often worse. All I had left of her was her necklace and my memories. Whoever comes out of the forge in one year, five years, ten years — that person may share my sister’s soul, but they won’t be my sister.

I pushed past Nico and went inside; he hurried after me with a small sound of surprise. The room was dark, but not for long. I felt a twinge of magic as Nico summoned a small fire into his cupped palm.

Scritta’s office was a mess. The bookcases lining the wall were messily arranged, with books stacked on top of one another horizontally. A few lay abandoned on the floor. Papers spilled off the edges of her desk. A statue of His Eternal Warmth stood in the corner, His haughty expression seeming to cast judgement on the scene before Him. Though obsidian, the lava that covered His skin looked so realistic, as though it’d catch fire once more at any moment. He may as well have been in the room with us. 

I hated looking at Him. His people had killed my sister, but what did He care? She was some stupid little girl, and I, her stupid, meaningless sister. 

I couldn’t help myself. I shoved the statue. It wobbled dangerously, but didn’t fall over.

Nico grabbed my wrist with the hand that wasn’t holding the flame. “What are you doing!?” he whispered harshly. “If that thing falls over, the entire Hall will hear!”

He was right. I took a deep breath and forced myself to calm down. We were here for a reason, and throwing a temper tantrum wasn’t going to help us.

Nico eyed me cautiously for a few more moments. Eventually, he let me go. “Better?”

I felt like a fool. “Sorry.”

He smiled, something small and genuine. “Mad at Him, huh? I was, too. Spent years unable to look at His face.”

“And now?” I asked.

He approached the statue. It was far taller than him; I wondered if it was true to our god-king’s actual height. Nico had to raise himself to the tips of his toes to rest his palm on the statue’s cheek.

“I think He’s kind of cute… in the right lighting.” Nico laughed, and his gentle touch turned condescending as he patted His Eternal Warmth’s cheek. He turned away from the statue, the matter forgotten. “Now! I’ll take the bookshelves. You take the desk.”

I nodded, and we set to work. Nico lit a couple of candles on the desk with his fire, then extinguished the one he held. With any hope, we wouldn’t be here long enough for anyone to notice. As Nico rummaged around, my attention was drawn to the small trash can under Scritta’s desk, full of crumpled pieces of paper. 

I picked one up and smoothed it out. It was a letter, it looked like, written in cramped, messy handwriting. It was addressed to someone named Fir. I picked up another letter. Like the first, it was also addressed to Fir, and only half-written. The third, fourth, and fifth pieces of paper were no different. 

Clearly Scritta had some issue with this Fir.

“Who’s Fir?” I asked.

“The Flame-Feeder. Why?” Nico asked.

In retrospect, it makes sense. Of course the Head of the Hall would be in close contact with the Flame-Feeder.

“She’s thrown away several drafts addressed to the Flame-Feeder. Several of them talk about showing her the proper way to enact justice. Are they in some sort of political squabble?”

Nico giggled. “What difference is there between the political and the personal, if the person you’re politicking against is your ex-lover?”

Something clicked in my mind. If Scritta was the Flame-Feeder’s ex-lover, then Scritta knows the Flame-Feeder well. And something in here — a record, or an old missive, something — might give me a hint about why she had to kill Blossom. I abandoned the letters in the trash; what good would a breakup letter be? I dug through her desk, not caring what I moved around.

This wasn’t useless, like knocking over a statue. This had a purpose. I could find a better lead than some old Sigil.

“Hey, hey! Be careful!” Nico warned, moving over to me. He snatched my wrist once more, trying to get me to stop, but I ripped myself out of his grasp and kept searching. 

“I’m not making any noise!” I whispered to him.

“Yeah, but you’re making a mess! We don’t want her to know we were here!” 

“You slept through the trial, so you couldn’t see her, I did. She’s too busy to notice anything’s off here. By the time she does, we’ll already be gone. Besides, if she knows the Flame-Feeder’s secrets, then she might know Blossom’s killer. I can’t waste this chance.”

“They broke up a decade ago, Jasmine! You’re not going to find anything here!” he whisper-shouted at me.

“You don’t know that!” I shouted.

Nico groaned, but he cut himself off. “Warmth above and below, you’re going to send the whole Hall after us! Look, Jasmine. We’ll find the truth behind Blossom’s death. I promise. Just… not here.”

That didn’t stop my search. I had to keep looking. If I let this opportunity go, then how could I live with myself? 

That’s when my fingers brushed against a strange material. I picked up the item, and found myself looking at a leather-bound journal. At least, I thought it was leather, though it felt unlike any leather I had ever touched before. I opened the cover, but the yellowed pages within were so aged that I could barely read the faded ink. This must have been written centuries ago.

Nico leaned over my shoulder to look, completely silent. I tried to turn a page, only for it to crumble away beneath my fingertips. I carefully shut it. This book, whatever it was about, wasn’t what I was looking for.

It also shook me out of my stupor. I reached into the desk, but nothing else of note remained. 

Nico wore a complicated expression as he looked at the journal. Wordlessly, I handed it to him, and realized that I couldn’t read him at all as he gripped the cover tightly. 

“Are you… okay?” I asked.

“I’m fine,” Nico said. “I just…” he looked down at the journal, and I could finally read something on his face. He looked lost.

“I don’t know what this is,” he finished.

That explained it. He wasn’t used to not knowing something.

He set the book aside. “Have you checked there? Carefully?” he asked, pointing to a drawer on the side of Scritta’s desk. I shook my head and leaned down to open it. Within the wood panel was a small box labeled ‘keys.’ 

We opened the box. Every key was labeled. We sorted through keys for offices, for the backrooms that people used to transport goods around, and lastly… snagged the master key for the entire building.

We went back not long after, though not without Nico casting one last, lingering look back at the journal.

I asked him again if he was alright, or if the journal was anything special. 

“I thought it was, but…” he shook his head. “I don’t think it is at all. Just some old relic.”

I hadn’t learned anything useful, but at least we had a way forward.

That had to count for something.