Callum by Melissa Schroeder

hang on your every word.”
    “I don’t have the time to accommodate blushing young men. I’ll be right with you.” He stepped through a door which she assumed was the loo, but a moment later he returned with a security box. Unless he kept a safe next to the toilet, she assumed it was a storage room of some sort.
    “Gregory knows nothing about this. As I said last night, neither does the rest of the staff. Remember, you are researching something valuable to my family. I want to make sure that no one knows anything outside of this room—save my cousins.”
    She nodded in understanding and fought down the guilt. She was being devious, something she had never done in her career, but she knew there would be some way to protect the family. There had to be some way to keep their name out of the press.
    He unlocked the box, pulled up the top, and produced a small, brown leather book. It looked ordinary by most standards, weathered by time, but commonplace all the same. He handed it to her. The moment she held it, a tremor went through her. The reaction was nothing new for her. At the start of a new project or find, she found herself behaving like this. But the feeling was sharper this time, almost painful.
    “It was found in an abandoned home near Inverness. The family is rumored to have been witches. As far as I can tell, there are no descendants.”
    That bit of information had her excitement surging as she opened the book. The pages were yellowed from time, the words faded, some smudged. He was right about the code as she immediately picked up on Old English, Latin, and possibly Old French on the first page. The date read seventeen ninety-five.
    “It’s in surprisingly good condition if the date is correct.”
    Callum nodded. “I did have a lab test it. I’ve a feeling the family kept it well hidden and safe for years considering the dates span a couple of hundred years.”
    “Is there something in particular I should be looking for?”
    “Come again?” he asked, a hint of wariness in his voice.
    It was odd. Well, the whole situation was odd in that there were so many restrictions. She understood it to an extent, but she sensed there was something else, something more he was hiding.
    What was she thinking? Of course he was. But what was the question. Just why did he need all the security? It went beyond the normal procedures. What she needed was more information to root out his secrets.
    “Is there something in particular I should be searching for? Something you want to know?”
    “Truthfully, we couldn’t make anything out of it. We could only translate parts of it, and what little we did decipher made no sense. Angus thought your background in Egypt—especially pertaining to hieroglyphs—would be beneficial. Combining your expertise with dead languages, the code breaking skills would work well.”
    She nodded as she carefully turned the pages and studied the text. Of course a family of witches would be secretive. Their kind had been hunted for centuries, blamed for everything from boils to plagues. This had been the only way to keep a record of their family and not be killed.
    There were at least three other dead languages, and none of it made much sense together. She knew she would have her work cut out for her.
    “I’ve got some work to do, so I will leave you to it.”
    He gestured to her desk, and while she knew she needed to work, she felt a pang of loss. With another nod, she got down to work.
     
* * * *
     
    After returning to her room late that afternoon, Phoebe slid off her pumps and moaned with relief. She’d give anything to have a good pair of boots and some thick socks on her feet. Her arch was throbbing, and she sat down to massage it, closing her eyes as some of the pain diminished. She hated when she had to dress in what she termed her “professional office outfit.” Not one of the suits she’d bought in the past few years had fit. They were always too long, too bulky, too blah.
    Her