As Keyla traversed the back alleys and side streets on the way back to Auldavulin’s, her thoughts kept returning to the burning sensation that had emanated from her pocket earlier.

What, exactly, had happened: Had that heat been related to her slowing down as she plummeted from the second story window toward the cobblestone yard below? That would mean magick was involved, and magick meant danger to a street rat.

She gulped, and her hand went to her pocket to ensure the Diary was still there. She didn’t dare remove it until she was safe within the walls of Auldavulin’s, but her paranoia pushed her to keep confirming its presence.

What of the mans’ voice she had heard while inside? It had sounded distant, though not like a shout. Keyla knew beyond a doubt that she’d never heard that tone of voice before, but couldn’t shake the feeling that it was somehow familiar to her.

She warred with her inner self as she darted from shadow to shadow, taking notice of guard patrols but little else. Why had she trusted the voice? True, it had been right, but that was only obvious after the fact. Was it tied somehow to the magick of the book? Whose voice was it?

Her hand clutched the book through the fabric of her pants again. It seemed to be calling to her.

The scent of jasmine and clove reached her nose as she brought her hand up to scratch it. Right, the perfume! The servant had called out to Mrs. Teknar when he’d approached the office, even though it had been a man who was studying there before. It was likely due to the scent hanging freshly in the air.

Keyla knew a part of her had simply wanted to enjoy the luxury of smelling like a real lady, but she’d been concerned about Shadow. If he was a tracking dog, she didn’t want to leave a trail back to her. By wearing the perfume, any trail out the back window of the house would smell like Mrs. Teknar. As much as she wanted to secure the book inside Auldavulin’s as she arrived, she stopped short of her sewer entrance and emptied her pockets onto the stone ledge next to it.

She would need to risk a few minutes to wash herself and her clothes free of the scent before she entered the pipe to return home. That way, the trail would end cold at Ryk River.

Hesitation froze her in place as she began to step away from the book. Surely, she shouldn’t risk separating herself from it, not when she was so close to completing her task.

Keyla pushed the doubt away. It would be a few feet from her as she soaked, and she would maintain a grip to the stone ledge, ready to heave herself out of the water and grab the books if anyone approached.

Keyla kept her eyes on the stack next to her lock-pick folder as she lowered herself into the water. She floated there a time, alternating hands on the stone ledge to ensure both could wash the scent away. The book almost sang in her head, begging her to climb out of the river and read it.

Almost unwilling to look away, she forced herself to close her eyes and dunk her head beneath the river’s surface, running her free hand through her hair to let the water’s scent permeate it. Keyla used the motion as she popped her head back up to lift herself up and over the ledge and paused there to listen for unexpected sounds.

She waited, listening, until she was able to shake her hands relatively dry, then picked up the stack of diaries and lock-picks and ducked into the sewer pipe.

Keyla sighed with relief as she locked the hatch in place, sealing her safely inside Auldavulin’s. She reached for the lamp and matches next to it, grateful that she’d remembered to leave them there. It would be a number of hours before the sun came up, and longer still before any of its rays penetrated the dirty windows of the distillery.

She turned the valve to release some of the gas and lit the small pipe above the cannister before replacing the glass cover. She stripped out of her wet clothing and hung it over a pipe jutting out of a copper still beside her bed and sat down, eager to look at her treasures.

Keyla smiled. She’d managed to break into a house of a wealthy merchant in the Upper Ward, locate and steal what the fat priest had commissioned her to acquire, and come away with a golden pocket watch on top of it. The rags that formed her bed soaked up the remaining water that still clung to her skin as she sat down and crossed her legs. She dragged the lamp closer, then picked up Margaan’s Diary.

The book seemed to sigh with relief as she opened it to the first page.

I’m not sure I agree with her plan, but I can’t yet bring myself to oppose her. My wife has always been strong willed and confident, and it is true that she is often right. But this time, I can’t shake a nagging suspicion that her desired end does not justify the means.

Keyla’s eyes widened. The text had not been produced by a printing press, as all the copies of Selah’s Diary were- it was hand written, and the ink was faded with age. Was she holding Margaan’s actual diary? She flipped the cover closed and looked more closely at it. The leather was cracked and worn, suggesting its age. She opened it again, fanning through the pages. They were yellowed from time, and seemed to be a different material than the pages of the few books she’d read. She turned back to the first page.

She won’t hear me, however. Why would she seek to deny all people access to this magick we’ve discovered? It should be available for all. It’s a part of nature, a part of us. Why should only people voted responsible enough be taught its secrets? Who are we to decide those people? I am conflicted. I am vexed.

This was not the voice of Margaan the way the church portrayed him. He was evil incarnate, set on the destruction of society! She turned the page.

We are one under the sun and moon, however. We must stay united. I will continue to support her, as she has always supported me. She is the senator, after all. I may be a philosopher and a teacher, but it is she who holds the respect of the city and power with the laws of our lands.

A wave of emotion surged through Keyla’s chest, startling her. Did the church have it all wrong, about Margaan? Is that why the book was banned?

Keyla closed the book and dropped it to the floor, then moved herself over to rags that were dry and curled up on her side. She needed to sleep, wake, and deliver the book so she could collect her pay. These thoughts would not put food in her belly, but the priest’s coin would.

She closed her eyes and tried to calm her mind, but soon found her attention longing for the book once more. No! Simple is Survival.

Minutes passed and Keyla tossed and turned. With a growl of frustration she leaned up and picked up the Diary again, flipping to the last few pages.

I have not the words to elucidate the rage Selah fuels in me. What she preaches as order and structure for society is nothing but a forced hierarchy from poverty to wealth, of societal slavery! To limit magick in such a way, to make its use legally punishable by law for the poor and downtrodden, or at-risk citizens, is a cruelty against nature. This magick is part of us, but she would refuse people access to it based on their place in society. Narn damn her!

And so it comes to this. This divide, this chasm between us yawning ever wider these past months, which fills now with the fires of disgust and revulsion. I love her, I can never deny that, but she would deny people what should be theirs by virtue of life itself, for the ease of maintaining order in the kingdom. Even writing this I want to scream.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

Keyla’s mouth had gone dry. She felt nervous as she read, as if she would be caught at any moment for learning something she shouldn’t.

Day after day she sends soldiers against my fellows, her former friends, we who have built a resistance against her tyranny. We who are so few, now. They call me a monster, but who made me this way? Who slaughtered our friends for wanting what is rightfully theirs, and forced me to dig deep into these magicks to fuel their lifeless bodies such that they may continue to serve the cause?

Who betrayed the sacred bond between us when she pushed her twisted, demented plan for the organization of this magick into law?

Yet I am the monster. I, who fight for the right of all peoples to harness the magick that exists in us all.

So be it. If that is what it takes, I will pay that price. I will be this monster. Selah must be forced to see reason; to see what she is doing to society. She can still right this wrong, I have to believe that. I have to…

Keyla sat for a long time, just staring at the last page of Margaan’s diary. Emotions roiled within her that she didn’t understand. She felt for Margaan, but Selah had saved them all, hadn’t she? She had committed sins so that Keyla and her fellow citizens wouldn’t have to, and banished a monster from the realm. This is what everybody in Ryk had been taught for generations. Selah burned in Narn’s ninth hell even now, for them all. For her.

Keyla shivered and blinked, realizing that while her lamp had gone at some point, the room was no longer dark. The sun was up. It was time to get dressed, and collect her payment.

|||||||||||||||

The church loomed before her as Keyla looked up at its’ spires. As one of the tallest buildings outside the noble district in Ryk, it was hard not to be impressed. The stone was thick and white, though not shiny like the marble inside.

Keyla walked up the steps, pressing a hand to the pocket that contained the Margaan’s Diary. She wished she had more time. She wanted to read more of it, to understand what really happened. She had always taken what was written in Selah’s Diary as the truth of what had happened - always looked up to Selah and praised her for her sacrifice.

Yet last night, all of that had been thrown into question. Her stomach was in knots as she entered the church and turned toward the priest’s office. She knocked on the thick oaken door.

“Enter”, she heard the large man say from inside.

Opening the door she saw him seated behind his desk as a servant girl, who had been kneeling next to him, stood. The woman quickly excused herself and Keyla approached the priest.

“I have the Diary you wanted,” she said simply, pulling it from her pocket. She didn’t want to give it to him.

The priest’s eyes lit up and he smiled, holding out his hand across the desk.

“What about my payment?” she asked, holding the book to her chest. The urge to keep the book, to turn around and leave with it, was powerful. The diary seemed to hum in her mind.

“Ah, yes, of course, child.”

The fat priest reached into a drawer in his desk and pulled out the same coinpurse Keyla had seen a week before. He set it on the desk and patted the top.

“As promised. Now, if you please?” He held out his hand once more.

Keyla pushed back her emotions as though swallowing bile down her throat, placed the book in his hands and then quickly reached for the sack of coins. She pulled it to her and clutched it tightly.

The priest didn’t take notice as his eyes were fixed on the diary.

“You’ve no idea, child, what disaster this would have wrought, had it remained in the hands of the citizens,” he said distractedly, leafing through the pages.

Keyla remained silent, unsure of what to say. Would Selah be proud of her for turning this over? She desperately wanted to read the rest of the diary, and compare it with Selah’s.

Biting her lip to help focus her thoughts, she turned to leave. The priest didn’t acknowledge her. As she reached his door, she glanced back at him overt her shoulder.

He placed the diary on a shelf in a cabinet behind his desk, then locked it.

Keyla left before he turned back around.

She stared at the pavement as she walked back to Auldavulin’s with her hands stuffed in her pockets. The hum she kept hearing from the book seemed to turn sad and became faint the further away she got from it. She was imagining it, of course, but she longed to hold the diary again, as though it were a precious memento of a loved one, the memory of whom had begun to fade.

“You have returned!”

What? Keyla stopped and looked over to see a blind beggar sitting against the walls of an empty factory building. She’d walked all the way back to her neighborhood.

“I’m sorry, what?” she asked.

The old man smiled. “You have returned to us. Thank you,” he said.

“I think you have me confused with somebody else, I’ve never met you before.”

“Of course you haven’t,” the thin, ragged man said with a laugh. “That wouldn’t make any sense at all. I wasn’t there, after all. I’ve only ever been here! But you’re here now, too, and I’m grateful. Everybody will be, when word spreads.”

“Um. Alright then, mister. You have a good day, now.”

Keyla shook her head as she walked away. The poor man was both homeless and blind. Surely anybody would eventually lose their minds having to live that way. Something about his enthusiasm and conviction made her uncomfortable.

Back at Auldavulin’s she split her coins up into nine separate piles of nine coins each. She kept the pile of silver coins out to spend on food and whatever else she would want in the coming days. The remaining gold coins she hid in various spots throughout the distillery.

It helped calm her mind to focus on the task, but when she was done her thoughts returned to Margaan.

While Keyla had never smoked dream-leaf, but she had seen the effects it had on those who did, when it was denied them. She felt that way as she considered how much she wanted to finish reading the diary. Her body almost seemed to itch with desire, and she hugged her arms to herself to try and shake the feeling.

Perhaps she could steal it back? She’d seen where he locked it away in his office, after all.

The priest would immediately know it was her, though. She was the only one, other than him, who knew about the book.

That wasn’t true, though! Mr. Teknar knew about it, and the priest had found out it was in his possession, so why couldn’t he find out the priest had taken it?

Keyla ran over to the loose floorboard beside her bed and pried it open. She set the board aside and reached in to pull out the golden pocket watch.

She would have to hold on to this for a long time before she’d safely be able to fence it. Perhaps it could be of better use to her in another way, and sooner?

If she could sneak into the priest’s office at night when he and the other church staff were away, she could leave this behind - perhaps on the floor, as if dropped when fleeing the scene. It would throw suspicion off of her, and onto Mr. Teknar.

It could work, and it would put the book back in her hands. She could use one of the empty journals she’d taken and copy it all down. Maybe she could even get hired to re-steal the Diary further down the road, since she’d done it once before?

|||||||||||||||

Night couldn’t arrive quickly enough for Keyla. Despite not sleeping the night before, she spent most of the day planning, practially bouncing around the distillery as she tried to think through every scenario.

The church was in a much more populated district than the Upper Ward, and even at night, the guards would be patrolling it far more regularly. The main doors, however, remained unlocked. There were always a couple of nuns who took confession late into the evening, and remained to clean the and polish the marble until dawn. It was a habit to leave the doors open, should any other citizen wish for a late night confession.

She’d have to stick to the shadows and slip in without the guards noticing her, but it would help that the main doors should be unlocked.

The challenge, then, would be breaking into the priest’s office without being seen by the nuns. There was no easy way to note the schedule of the women inside, the way she had watched the Teknar house night after night to decide on the best time to break in. She would be noticed, and remembered, if she tried spending entire nights in the church watching the nuns.

There was also the risk that the Father Chantol would move the book from the cabinet he’d placed it in that morning. If that happened, she feared she’d never find it. That thought made her chest ache and she hugged herself again.

She would do it tonight. She would adjust to whatever transpired in the moment, and make quick decisions. She’d done well with her close encounters these past couple of days. She could do it again. Not without rest, however.

Keyla couldn’t remember laying down to sleep, excited, as many times as she had this past week. She smiled as she closed her eyes.

When she jerked awake for the third time with the memory of smelling burning flesh still fresh in her mind, it was dark. She shuddered a final time, forcing the fires of her dreams from her mind, and felt around for the loose floorboard. Prying it open, she pulled out the pocket watch and stood.

As her lamp had burned through the remaining gas in it’s cannister the night before, she felt her way over to the still where she’d hung her clothes to dry. The were cool and still a little bit damp, but they would do. She shivered as she dressed. She also gathered up her hair and put on the runner’s cap. It wouldn’t hurt to be mistaken as a boy in the darkness.

Shoving the watch into her pocket she moved back over to her bed, and felt around until she was able to grab her lock-pick folder. She knocked over the pile of silver coins, having forgotten that it was sitting next to her bed.

Nine hells.

Keyla sighed. She’d deal with it in the morning. She made her way over to the hatch in the floor, climbed down into the sewer, then walked out into the night.