With the spy safe and recovering in his office in the castle, Ean made haste to the bookstore. The shades on the windows were drawn so there would be no going in the front door like a customer. He slipped into the shadows and made his way to the back entrance, glancing over his shoulder to ensure he hadn't been spotted. Three sharp knocks on the top left corner of the door let Samuel know it was him.

Samuel unlocked the door to let him in. "You look, and smell, like you need a bath," he said, wrinkling his nose.

Ean looked himself over in the light of the kitchen. He was covered in road grime, blood, and sooty residue from the mushroom spore explosion.

"And some dinner. But that can wait. I'm uninjured, but I had to make a daring escape with one of my spies. The good news is, I re-established my network and obtained proof Brindle is preparing to go to war. That's not the best part."

Ean pulled the medallion from his coin purse.

"I ran into a local militia group – twice. The first time they were collecting a 'road tax'. When the leader saw the two-headed medallion, he told me they had killed the Spymaster of Brindle just as the 'Man In The Purple Hat' requested."

"The second time, they had captured my spy from South Brindle, who had traveled to North Brindle to learn about a secret army, and then tried to sneak through West Brindle. They released him when I flashed him the medallion again. The leader said he didn't know the spy was 'one of ours'."

"Sounds too coincidental running into them twice," Samuel said, knitting his brow. "Also, very odd that a militia would be allowed to roam so freely without a connection to the emperor's advisors or the military."

"Fortunately, I won't be running into them again to question them," Ean replied. "They departed with enough food and alcohol to party for a month… and I sort of nearly blew up the Brindle guards at the bridge when I escaped with the spy."

Samuel glowered at Ean. "You triggered an international incident and your first instinct was to come here?"

"Not exactly. And I used the back door and secret knock," Ean answered sheepishly while pointing at the door. "First, I went to Lila's and spooked her into fleeing Argonia. Then I took the spy to my office in the castle. And then, I came here."

Samuel rushed around dimming lights and peeking out the windows. "Oh, so I'm the fourth big mistake you've made today?"

Ean's mouth dropped. He struggled to speak before reconsidering. Finally, his head dropped. "You're right. I screwed up and I've put multiple lives in danger. But, I saved the life of a spy with intimate knowledge about the Brindle military."

"Did you encounter the Man In The Purple Hat during your trip? Does he know of your existence?"

"No. I'm not sure he exists as more than an urban legend used to justify their actions."

"Not that I'm unhappy to see you, but you know how tightly I keep my true identity concealed." Samuel's words lacked warmth to back his expressed sentiment. "What possessed you to come here after all you've done?"

Ean retrieved the message from the North Brindle spy. "I came because I desperately need your help to decrypt this message. It holds information about a secret army the king needs to know about."

Samuel pinched his thumb and index finger together and held them up to his eye. "You were this close to getting thrown out for good. Let's see the message."

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"I tried every cipher you've taught me and when I started doing frequency analysis, it felt like the encrypted letters were representing different plaintext letters. How is that possible?" Ean asked.

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Samuel stroked his chin. "Many ciphers can be modified by using a keyword. Take the Caesar Cipher. Instead of using a numeric offset that's the same for every letter in a message, you choose a word like SECRET. To encrypt or decrypt the first letter, you align your ciphertext alphabet with the letter S of the plaintext alphabet. For the second letter, you align the ciphertext alphabet with E. You do this for each letter in the keyword and repeat the process until the entire message is finished. With five unique letters in the keyword, you end up with five different offsets."

"Without the keyword, it sounds impossible to decrypt."

"There are mathematical attacks you can use but advanced math was never a strong suit of mine." Samuel held the message up to the light. "Hmm. I'm not seeing any pinpricks or traces of a watermark. Did you find any codebooks in your master's office that might contain the keyword?"

"No, but surely the spy in North Brindle has heard about his death and wouldn't expect me to know it. My gut tells me there's something about the parchment. Why write on the side with the letterhead fragment and have to squeeze the letters together?"

Samuel smacked his forehead. "I'm getting slow in my old age. The letterhead fragment is the clue. The keyword must be 'Brindle'. The spy would also use one of the easiest keyword-based ciphers - like the Vigenere Square. You're going to need a full parchment sheet for this one."

Ean laid a clean sheet of parchment on the table.

"Along the left margin, write the alphabet vertically in a column of bold letters. Do the same along the top edge in a row to create a coordinate system of letters."

Using heavy pen strokes, Ean wrote the two lines of alphabet letters.

"Now, on the first row write the alphabet again so the A aligns with the A of the column alphabet. On the second row, write the alphabet starting with B and placing the A under the Z column. Repeat shifting the alphabet one character until the last row starts with Z under the A column heading.

Trying not to rush and to write legible letters, Ean wrote out twenty-six lines of the alphabet, shifted by one letter each time.

"Next, apply the keyword to the column row and run your finger from the letter B down the column until you find the row with the letter T, the first letter in the ciphertext."

"That matches the row coordinate for S. Now if I find R in the column heading and go down to V, that's an E." Ean decrypted the first word as 'secret'. When he finished decrypting the entire message, he and Samuel were left trembling. The message was already a day old. If he had lingered in Brindle longer or gone to bed, the kingdom would have even less time to prepare.

He and Samuel raced to the castle.

Decrypted_Message-10 added to Inventory

QUEST COMPLETED: Q-026 Decrypt Encrypted_Message-09

REWARD: +1 XP (20/24)

SKILL UNLOCKED: Vigenere Square (1/3)

LOG ENTRY UPDATED: Spycraft - Ciphers

QUEST ACCEPTED: Q-027 Deliver Decrypted_Message-09 to the king

QFK: Using the Activity Page for the Vigenere Square, decipher the message to find out what Ean and Samuel are about to deliver to the king

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* * *

The poor king's attendant on night duty at the castle probably expected another quiet, boring evening. Instead, he was physically dragged to the king's private office, where he nervously announced Ean and Samuel's arrival and request for an audience.

"Thank you. You may go attendant." The king waited for the attendant to leave and close the door. "Spymaster Fleming…" The king's voice trailed off as he turned to Samuel, his voice shifting from annoyance to warmth. "And is that my old friend Samuel?" he asked with a wide grin.

Ean and Samuel bowed. "Begging your forgiveness for the intrusion at this late hour, but I have time-sensitive intelligence," Ean stated as he handed the decrypted message to the king.

"Secret army ready for castle assault in one week." The king turned his worried face to Ean. "Have you confirmed this?"

"Yes, your highness. From multiple sources inside the Empire of Brindle."

The king poked his head out the door and shouted. "All attendants to me. Now!"

The king's bellow shattered the castle's tranquility. Doors burst open as royal attendants materialized from every corner and rushed to the king's office.

"I'm assigning all of you a quest to find my council members and tell them to meet here in thirty minutes."

A nervous attendant spoke up, his voice squeaking. "Sire, many of the older members have retired for the evening." His eyes pleading for understanding for the abuse they would receive for waking them.

Ean had never seen the king angry, let alone furious. "THEN WAKE THEM UP. I don't care if they arrive naked, they will be here thirty minutes from now!"

As the attendants rushed off, a guard approached. "Master Fleming, you have two visitors in your office. They asked to speak with you immediately."

The king waved them off. "Go. Be prepared to fully brief the council in twenty-nine minutes."

Ean and Samuel bowed and then scurried off to his former master's office. With everything that had happened today, Ean's heart was racing in anticipation and worry. Who were these visitors and what additional bad news were they sure to be bringing with them?