The amount of nobles they’d encountered on this trip was already pretty high. It proved that the count was just going to keep getting higher when they’d figured out the next clue.
It wasn’t Zulana that greeted them; a servant came by, gathered what little things they had, explained what rooms it would be brought to, then guided the four of them through the estate. He entered a room and briefly talked to whoever was inside before gesturing for them to come in.
Zulana, initially, only looked up for a moment. “Eldest Stone, Stone twins—” She realized who had trailed along behind them and, almost reluctantly, got up and bowed. “Prince Tavin. You’ll have to excuse me, I wasn’t expecting you to come…”
“It doesn’t matter,” Tavin assured her distantly. His eyes were wandering around the room; all the scattered research notes and framed certificates proving they were in the study of one of Seothia’s most brilliant minds. “We’re just glad you were willing to let us stay here for a night or two.”
“I’d be able to give you a much better stay than anyone else in town would,” she remarked. She gestured to a couple of seats and sat back down. “We don’t have a lot up here, after all, and we’re not used to having many visitors. Soon you’ll be on your way again, won’t you?”
Lydia nodded. “We’ve just got to figure out where this is supposed to lead us. I don’t suppose you’ve got any idea of what it might be?” The clue they’d found in the forest ended up bringing them to an old book with a picture of an oasis; it was captioned with ‘where myth is made but none shall live.’ None of the Stones were very familiar with Tratae so they didn’t know where it might be, but the overseer of the region might. She handed a copy of the picture and the original clue to Zulana.
“I was wondering what could’ve made you decide to come to a place like this. There’s hardly anything worth exploring here. This certainly sheds some light on that mystery…” She looked them both over with a thoughtful expression. “Unfortunately, I can’t easily come up with an idea of where it might be, at least not any more than all the other oases. With a bit of work and perhaps some help I might be able to give you a more specific direction, though.”
“I’ll help,” Lydia offered.
“We can see if we can figure out anything together, too,” Henry decided. “Divide and conquer.”
“I brought along some of the other artifacts,” Tim said. “Maybe we’ll be able to use them to figure out where we’re supposed to go next.”
“Just don’t get into any trouble.” She trusted them not to do anything destructive, but for the sake of someone else being there kind of needed to say it.
The three boys all nodded and left.
“It’s been a while since I’ve seen you, Lydia,” Zulana said after a moment. The only time she stopped looking at the picture was to get a book from the shelf; there were plenty of pictures in it, likely a record of the territory’s geography. “Quite some time ago, indeed. Wasn’t it back when the king called us all together?”
“I wasn’t there,” Lydia mumbled. “I had to help watch Natheniel and Tavin…”
“I could’ve sworn I saw you before we all left.”
“You couldn’t—”
Zulana put a finger to her lips then mouthed the words play along. She was looking behind Lydia.
“I guess we did come back before the meeting was technically over…” Lydia said slowly. She didn’t know what the intention of it was supposed to be but she knew she shouldn’t ask about it now. She decided to try her luck in a different way. “You don’t usually like holding a casual conversation—you say what you need to and go on with your day. Why are you doing this now..?”
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It took Zulana a minute to say anything and, when she did, the vague sense of welcoming that was in her tone was gone. “All three of them are eavesdropping little bastards, you know.”
“What?”
“Those sons of yours were waiting outside. They needed to get out of the way before we could have a proper chat, so I went along with something so they’d think it wasn’t worth wasting their time.”
“How did you know—”
“There’s a window behind you. One of my servants was standing nearby and gestured to tell me they were still there. He just told me that they left.” Zulana leaned back in her chair. “I hope this isn’t normal behavior for them… and if it isn’t, I’m awfully curious to know what you did.”
Lydia thought back to the forest but ultimately shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. We’re here to figure out where our next stop might be and that’s it. We’ll be back on our way as soon as we know where we’re going.”
Yet in spite of, or perhaps because of, Lydia’s clear hesitance to think any more on the matter, Zulana continued to talk. “We actually haven’t talked to each other in about fifteen years. I’m going to be honest, in the time we all traveled back together, you were the center of speculation. We were conflicted—half of us thought you were trying to repay something and the other half thought you were just stupid. I had assumed, at least, that you would’ve accepted most of the offers the king gave to you.”
“Helping out a friend was all that I needed. All of that was him trying to compensate for something that really wasn’t a problem.”
“Andrew… he would be a baron if anyone cared to attach titles to his name, wouldn’t he? A noble with hardly any influence, only the land around his estate to his name… yet somehow, his daughter, hardly capable of fitting into the standard of nobility at all, befriends the king and finds herself becoming the mother of the prince. If a family could go from poverty to nobility simply by being related to the queen’s adoptive father, imagine what it could’ve done for the Stones. That seems like a kind of offer that shouldn’t be passed up.”
“I really don’t get why you’re bringing this all up. It doesn’t involve you.”
“I just can’t help but think out loud… like what she said about them. Haven’t you thought about it? The fact that, even if this was real, they still wouldn’t be with you…”
Lydia, almost desperately, said, “Can we just focus on this? If you’re not going to help then I’m going to go back to the boys and try to figure it out with them. I don’t care for what you have to say.”
Zulana smirked. “It’s getting closer to that time, you know. You’re going to have to make a decision sooner or later…”
…
All of that ended up being for nothing when Zulana eventually announced that she wasn’t able to determine anything about the photo. Lydia went to the room she’d be staying without thinking to check on the boys. She just kept staring at the photo and the clue, no idea what they were supposed to do with it.
She jumped when the door swung open. Despite seeing that they were happy, she couldn’t help but ask, “Did you blow something up?”
“Surprisingly no!” Tim replied enthusiastically. He came further in to show her what he’d accomplished. “I was able to combine the ring from Palus and the trinket from the archives. It brings up a different picture than usual, and it doesn’t change with temperature, but it’s kind of blurry. I think that if we attach the clue from the forest here, then it’ll be able to give us a clearer idea of where we’re supposed to be going.”
“And what’s the chance that something’s going to get set on fire if we test that theory in here?” Lydia prompted.
“None of these should even be able to start a fire. If it does, Henry has some water we can use to put it out.”
She cautiously handed the clue over to him and he immediately started messing around with it again. “How’d you figure out you were supposed to put them together like that?”
Tim looked ready to give a passionate speech before Henry walked up and said, “You’re not going to be able to understand whatever explanation he ends up coming up with. I didn’t understand what he was doing and I was watching him do it.”
Tim, however, chose to ignore him after realizing that Lydia still wanted to hear it anyway. “There’s these tiny hooks here and here. They don’t directly attach to each other, at least not immediately, but after a while I was able to mess around with it long enough that I could get them to stay together. I’ve just got to figure out where this is supposed to attach and how to get it on there…”