Spoils of War

"What key?" Kingsley asked.

"Cohen left an inconspicuous notch on the edge of the recess at Node Seven."

Cassandra took the Silver Compass out of her inner pocket. The compass needle slowly turned once inside the carriage, then stopped pointing southeast—the direction of the Jordan Valley.

"The shape of that notch was exactly the same as the Diamond-shaped Gem symbol on the back of the Philosopher's Stone Mark III phone. When I aimed the Silver Compass at the notch, the compass picked up an extremely faint signal from somewhere on the European continent. That signal pointed to the same place as Cohen's triple-encrypted coordinates."

The carriage fell silent for a moment. The Thestral carriage jolted gently in the air currents, and the halo of the storm lantern swayed a few times over the carriage walls before steadying again.

"In other words," Kingsley said slowly, "what Cohen left at Node Seven wasn't just his Soul Patch. He also left a clue leading to some location he had preset in advance. That location may contain all the original research materials he accumulated while working at the Bureau of Artifact Research."

"Or it may contain his body." Cassandra put the Silver Compass back into her inner pocket. "He embedded his soul into Node Seven, but his body couldn't have vanished into thin air. If his body is still preserved somewhere, that place should be where the coordinates point."

Vivi looked out the window at the gradually approaching coastline of the European continent, replaying every detail of the moment when she had touched Cohen's patch at Node Seven.

That encrypted coordinate information glowed faintly in the depths of her consciousness, like a seed wrapped in layer upon layer of packaging. She knew there was something inside, but for the time being, she could not