The library was eerily silent, the scent of old parchment and candle wax thick in the air. Rows upon rows of towering bookshelves loomed around me, the dim glow of enchanted lanterns casting flickering shadows across the ancient stone walls.
I sat at one of the long wooden tables, a single piece of parchment spread before me. The riddle.
I had written it down, but no matter how many times I read the words, I couldn’t grasp its full meaning.
Whispers from the ancient Willow’s boughs,
In a cavern’s shadow where history allows.
By the moonlit lake, reflections guide,
Symbols hidden in ripples, where secrets abide.
Guardians of the night, statues stand tall,
Midnight echoes in the pack’s sacred hall.
Within the ancient forest, the howls reveal,
A path to follow, a destiny to unseal.
At the mountaintop ruins where stars align,
Celestial convergence, a gateway to find.
Decipher these riddles, a cosmic quest,
To the Moonlit Nexus, where the Keystone rests.
I tapped my fingers against the wooden table, frustration creeping up my spine. The words made sense on their own, but strung together like this, they were maddening.
Was it a set of instructions? A pron
I let out a slow, exhausted sigh. “WASTAFE
“Still trying to figure it out?”
Or just another layer of deception meant to throw us off?
it mean?” I muttered under my breath, my voice barely above a whisper.
I jumped at the sudden voice, my head snapping up to see Isaiah and Austin standing in the doorway.
Isaiah’s expression was unreadable, his sharp silver eyes flickering to the parchment in front of me. Austin, on the other hand, looked smug as he strode toward the table.
“You’ve been at this all morning, haven’t you?” Austin pulled out a chair and sat next to me, glancing at the riddle with mild curiosity.
I didn’t bother denying it. “It doesn’t make sense.” I admitted, rubbing my temple. “I feel like I’m looking at a puzzle with half the pieces missing.
Isaiah walked over and sat across from me, his gaze serious. “It’s ment to be vague. If it was easy, someone else would have found
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the Keystone by now.”
That didn’t make me feel any better. “I thought maybe breaking it down line by line would help, but…”
“But it’s just words,” Isaiah finished for me, leaning back slightly in his chair.
Austin hummed thoughtfully, resting his chin on his hand. “Maybe its not supposed to be literal. Could be symbolic.”
I let out an exhausted sigh. “Then we’re even more lost than before.”
A tense silence fell between us as we stared at the parchment, as if sheer willpower could force the riddle to reveal its secrets. But the ink remained unchanged, the words just as cryptic as before.
Austin, always the one to break uncomfortable silences, tapped his fingers against the wooden table. “Alright. Let’s go through it again. First line–Whispers from the ancient Willow’s boughs.‘ That could an… what? A talking tree?”
7
I shot him a dry look. “Thanks, that’s helpful.”
He grinned. “Just trying to lighten the mood.”
Isaiah ignored him, his brows furrowing. “It could mean an actual willow tree… or a place named after one.”
I nodded slowly. “That’s what I was thinking, but there are a lot of old trees out there.”
Austin shrugged. “Okay, next part–‘In a cavern’s shadow where history allows.‘ A cave, obviously.”
“But which cave?” I asked, exasperated. “There are thousands of caves in the world.”
“Maybe one tied to our history?” Isaiah suggested. “The Children of the Eclipse, the Umbrakin, the first wolves–there has to be a
connection.”
I frowned, chewing on that thought. It made sense, but it still wasn’t specific enough to be useful.
Austin drummed his fingers on the table. “And then there’s ‘By the moonlit lake, reflections guide.“” He whistled. “That sounds poetic as hell, but what does it even mean?”
“Maybe something only visible under the full moon?” I guessed, my mind already trying to picture a hidden clue lurking beneath
the water’s surface.
Isaiah exhaled sharply. “If that’s the case, we won’t know until we find the right lake.”
I clenched my jaw, staring down at the parchment. My frustration mounted with every passing second.
This wasn’t getting us anywhere.
“We’re missing something,” I muttered. “There has to be a pattern we aren’t seeing.”
Austin leaned back in his chair, arms crossed behind his head. “Or maybe it’s just a wild goose chase.”
Isaiah shot him a sharp look. “We don’t have the luxury of thinking that way.”
Austin held up his hands. “Itey, I’m just saying what if the riddle is meant to confuse us? What if the real answer isn’t in the words, but in something else?”
I frowned, considering his words. “Like what?”
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Austin shrugged. “I dunno. Maybe we’re supposed to find something hidden between the lines.”
Isaiah’s expression remained unreadable. “Or maybe it’s a test. A way to prove we’re worthy of the Keystone.”
That thought sent a chill down my spine.
If this was a test, then we were failing it miserably.
I rubbed my hands over my face and exhaled. “We’re not going to figure this out in one night.”
Austin sighed dramatically. “Well, that’s depressing.”
Isaiah stood and stretched his arms. “Then let’s take a break. Overthinking won’t help us.”
I hesitated, glancing back at the parchment. The ink almost seemed to taunt me, the words refusing to yield their secrets.
A cavern, a willow, a moonlit lake, statues, ruins, a pack’s sacred hall
What did it all mean?
My instincts told me there was something important here, something hidden beneath the surface of these words.
I just had to find it.
Austin pushed away from the table, standing up and stretching. “Come on, Silver Wolf, let’s go do something that doesn’t involve staring at cryptic poetry.”
I rolled my eyes, but a small smile tugged at my lips. Silver Wolf. They had started calling me that more often. I wasn’t sure if it was a nickname, a title, or something else entirely–but it felt right.
Isaiah gave me a knowing look. “We’ll come back to it.”
I nodded, pushing my chair back. “Yeah. We will,”
As I followed them out of the library, I couldn’t shake the feeling that the answer was just within words, waiting to be found.
-hidden somewhere in the
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