Shyla examined the room. There were no symbols or markings on the walls or floor, no switches or even cracks. Everyone waited for her. But she saw nothing. After another frustrated angle, she remembered. Shyla needed to see with the power of The Eyes. Gathering her will, she added…heat…to her gaze and scanned the walls.

Yellow symbols glowed—one on each wall, five total.

“Do you see them?” she asked, digging into her pack for a piece of chalk.

“Them?” Jayden asked.

She swept a hand out. “The glyphs?”

“No.”

The rest shook their heads.

“I do.” The others watched her as she traced them with the chalk. When she finished all of them, she relaxed and the glow faded. The white chalk marks stood out clearly against the reddish-brown walls. The curved graphics tugged at her memories. She’d seen these before.

“That was…interesting,” Aphra said. She moved closer to study one. “This is familiar.”

Shyla joined her. “I thought so, too.”

“These crossed and hooked lines remind me of Wequain’s reign. It’s part of his crest. He had everything branded with his crest.”

“Even his family and servants,” Shyla said, then tapped the middle of her forehead. “Right here.”

“That’s horrible.” Jaft rubbed his arms.

“Hence the moniker, Wequain the Horrible.” The king had done a few other notable things as well. “He also started using osmium as currency. And—” She stared at the symbol as its meaning clicked in her head.

“And?” Jaft prompted.

“And it’s the number three!”

“Great. How does that help us?”

“Patience, Jaft.” Shyla examined the others. “Here are numbers one, two, four, and five.”

“It’s a code. Get the right combination and…something happens,” Aphra said.

“Something good or something bad?” Jayden asked, no doubt remembering his near miss with the blade.

“It’s usually a surprise.”

“Fun.” Jaft’s dry tone indicated he thought the opposite.

“There are one hundred and twenty combinations with five numbers if you don’t repeat a number,” Vashi said. “But if you do, then it’s in the thousands. If the code is longer than five digits, then the possible combinations can be in the millions.”

Shyla flipped between being impressed by Vashi’s math skills and despairing over the sheer number of possibilities.

“Vashi was in charge of our treasury and ensuring we had enough supplies,” Jayden said.

While interesting, it wasn’t helping. Shyla concentrated on the glyphs. The numbers weren’t in order on the walls either from left to right or right to left. Only Tamburah would be able to see them, so why not make it simple?

Since she needed magic to find them, Shyla guessed she needed to use her power to…what? Touch them? It’d be a start.

“I’m going to try pressing them from one to five in ascending order. You need to leave the room just in case there’s a bad surprise,” Shyla said.