“That’s good.” Honestly, I didn’t really care. The item in question had been a concentration-based shielding focus. Completely useless in a combat situation, but for some reason Light duellists love the things. My mind was still on Chalice.

“Well, in the meantime, I’ve sure you’ll be glad to hear that I’ve finally heard back about that archaeological project of yours.”

“Archaeological . . . ?”

“The rubbings?”

“Oh, right.” All of a sudden I was paying attention. I’d forgotten about those notes of Vari’s. “How did it go?”

“Well, it took some time.” Lensman sounded entertained. “You certainly picked a puzzler. Where did you dig them up, anyway?”

“Can’t really discuss it, sorry.” I knew that Lensman would assume that meant it was Council-related. “If you wanted somewhere more secure . . .”

“No, no, nothing sensitive about the information.” I heard the rustling of papers in the background. Lensman doesn’t like using computers—like a lot of mages, he’s the old-fashioned type. “So, the long and the short of it is that the inscriptions are almost certainly Heraclian.”

“As in the philosopher?”

“Not Heraclitus, Heraclian.”

“Okay, I have no idea what that means.”

“Yes, obscure, isn’t it? They were a mage tradition dating back to the Byzantines. Heavy associations with magical creatures. It looks as though those rubbings were taken from a storage device of some kind. Probably their version of a Minkowski box.”

“Any idea what was inside it?”

“No, it seems that whoever took those rubbings left the box sealed.”

“You said they ‘were’ a mage tradition,” I said. “Don’t suppose there’s any chance they’re still around?”

“Unfortunately not. Apparently they got a bit too close to magical creatures for their own good. Came under vampiric control and the Council had to wipe them out in the vampire wars.”

“Anything else in the notes? Where it came from, what it could be used for?”

“Sorry. We were lucky to get this much really.”

Damn it. “Well, thanks.”

I hung up and put the phone on the desk, staring down at it. I tried to puzzle out what all that meant and came up with nothing. Magical creatures in our world have been declining for centuries. Most of the types the Heraclians had been in contact with would probably be extinct by now. What would Richard want with relics of extinct magical creatures? It could mean anything, or nothing . . . and without more information, there was no way to know which. Another dead end.

I leant back, closing my eyes with a sigh. Ever since I saw Richard last year, I’d had a sense of doom. As though I were stumbling around in the dark, blind and clumsy, while Richard was looking down on me from some place of power. He hadn’t contacted me since last year, yet wherever I went and whatever I did, I could feel his presence like a silent shadow. Worst of all, no matter what we did to move against him, I couldn’t shake the creeping feeling that Richard knew exactly what we were doing and wasn’t responding in kind for the simple reason that nothing that I or Anne or Vari or Luna could do was the slightest threat.