Mightiest of Swords (The Inkwell Trilogy Book 1) Read Free Page B

of relief before muttering, “Okay, what’s missing?” I thought about why I had originally come to my house: to fetch my quill.  The past few months had me especially on edge and increasingly paranoid.  Though I had no reason to, necessarily, feel that way I had the nagging feeling like my magic was being tracked—and magic work with the quill was untraceable. Thankfully, it was exactly where it should be. Whatever was missing had to be something in the open and obvious. The alcove was only about six feet high and 10 feet across. That means it would not be one of the many manuscripts lying dustily untouched on the shelves and floor. One more scan around the alcove and the realization slowly crept up, formed, and finally allowed me to recognize: I was missing the black pyramid.
    This perplexed me. My dad never told me what it was, only that it had to stay in the vault. I’m not even sure if he knew what it was. It was not a true pyramid, as it only had four sides. IT was about eight inches tall (though I never saw fit to measure it, heavy, and black. It looked to be basalt, as every time I looked it over it reminded me of something I’d seen in the lava fields of Hawaii. Obsidian, maybe? Because it was so tall, it stuck in my memory as something too sharp for decoration.  It was, however, peculiar, how the dust never seemed to settle on it like it had so much else in the alcove. I grabbed Shakespeare’s Quill, its inkwell and went back upstairs.
    I sat on the hardwood floor in the empty living room—still naked—staring at the lump of clothing and belongings. I examined the Post-It arrow, reset it, and saw that it always consistently pointed to the east each time I repositioned it. Hopefully, that magic would hold for just a little while longer. Something here lost me the strange black pyramid. What to blame?  Nearly an hour of pointless analysis, I felt a dull throb pulsated through my lower extremities, my ass began to ache. I tried a divining spell on the belongings, but came up with nothing. I took each Bic pen and examined them more closely. I removed the blue and black tabs from the ends, pulled the ink out of the cylinders and noticed nothing amiss. I looked at my Sharpies. It was because of the now-setting sun glaring through my living room window that I noticed something odd about the cap of the black Sharpie. At first, I thought these were just incidental marks I made from use, or maybe even teeth marks. In fact, these marks fine—as if made with a fine tipped instrument of some sort. There were small numbers and runes. I squinted and made out small patters with additional letters and runes. I recognized a couple words of gibberish that held no meaning to a logomancer—but all sorts of meaning, I’m sure, to an arithmancer.
    Chapter 2
                  “Someone has broken into our apartment and my house.” I was trying to quell the boiling vat of acid in my stomach and think levelly.
                  Joy’s dark eyes blinked at me blankly.  “What do you mean someone has broken in?” She was incredulous, but still spoke as if I might be pulling her leg.
                  “Has anyone else been here that we know of? There are only about four people in the world I talk to in a given day.  None of them would be the thief.  Or thieves.” I still needed to explain to Joy the events of my day. Until she knew the story, I tried to appear less indignant than I actually was.  I surmised that it wasn’t working, judging by Joy’s nervous laughter.
                  Joy and I shared the apartment. Joy’s name was on the lease, and in return, I paid for more than my fair share of the rent, utilities, food. The paranoia was a flowering weed that went back since my father was murdered. Ever since, I needed the anonymity, and she needed…mothering?  If nothing else, a friend.  And our fathers were murdered while together, so there was certainly a