71 – The Letter

Marion had forgotten all about the letter in his jacket pocket until the middle of his second class of the morning. He ran back to go get it before lunch. Thankfully, it was still there.

At Curry Favor, he gingerly unfolded it in front of Ray and Savannah, but it appeared to be just a boring letter to someone else in the department.

“We’re gonna die just like him, before we ever figure out where Master Archidemus is.” Ray mused. The other two were too exhausted from recent happenings to reply. They just looked at Ray like don’t be like that.

“I guess it just fell off his desk. Maybe during the fight…I dunno.” Marion said summarily, starting to fold the letter up slowly in disappointment.

“Wait a minute.” Savannah took the paper and surveyed it. “What if there’s more to this letter than meets the eye? I mean, it was the only outstanding thing we found in the room. We should inspect it more carefully.”

Ray nodded, “Invis-a-ink. Master Caruthers was into codes and stuff. I might’ve taken a class from him the future.”

“Invis-a-ink? I think I heard about that. Would you know how to reveal it?” asked Marion.

“Not exactly,” replied Ray.

“No, but I think I can figure it out,” said Savannah, “I’ve been meaning to learn.”

Marion and Savannah left so fast, Ray was still in mid-bite. He shoveled down a few more scoops and then clambered out of the booth.

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72 – A Hunch

Outside the girls’ dorm, Marion and Ray waited, looking very out-of-place. When Savannah emerged, they asked to see what she went in to get.

“I gotta hunch,” she said, in a nonchalant way that gave the boys a whole lotta hope they were gonna discover a hidden message!

At the library, they reserved a private study room, and Savannah started rifling through a smaller book she checked out, entitled, The Colors Of Life. Then, she revealed a new type of card from her pocket the boys had never seen before. They snapped to attention, “What’s that?!”

“It’s a chromacard. I had to steal –well, let’s say borrow it- from my roommate cause I don’t have one. Ugh, I really need to get one. They’re so cool.”

“What do they do?”

“They basically shoot different colors of light, but I’m not sure how.”

“And you’re saying a certain color will show the writing?” Marion was catching on.

“Invis-a-ink can be made in different ways and is revealed only by certain types of light.”

Savannah and Marion looked at Ray with surprise.

“What? You’re not the only people who study.”

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73 – The Chromacard

As Savannah attempted to produce different types of color with the chromacard, Ray stood by, marveling at her. Marion, meanwhile, caught up on the news.

“So how exactly is this supposed to work?” Ray put the question to Savannah.

“I think you speak the language of a certain place and the card will shoot out the most common color of that place. Well, at least that’s one way to use it.”

“Are you holding the card right?” Ray searched the book.

“Hmmm. Maybe not.”

“Guuuys, this is craaazy.” Marion only spoke loud enough for himself to hear.

“Yeah, maybe hold it like that!”

“Okay, yeah, that might work.”

“Guys! You gotta come see this.” Marion increased his volume.

“One sec, Marion.” Savannah was trying to focus.

“We’ll be right there, Mare.”

“You guys, they’re in Scrimwither’s hospital room!”

Savannah and Ray dropped everything and ran to have a look.

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74 – A Helpless Patient?

What Savannah saw made her sick to her stomach: a helpless patient with severe burns covering his body and face. She thought she might never cardcast again.

“Wow!” said Marion. “You really messed him up!”

Ray put his hand on Savannah’s shoulder, saying quite perfunctorily, “Well, remember he was gonna kill us.”

Savannah looked away from the screen. She paced the room with her hand covering her mouth, but the boys watched on.

Scrimwither couldn’t speak and he was hooked up to various life-support units and monitoring equipment, but it appeared he would live.

“Holy guacamole. I wonder what he’s gonna have to say when he wakes up.” Marion provided a running commentary that Savannah could do without.

“Alright. I’m gettin’ back to this letter. I can’t look at that. I don’t even want to think about that,” she said.

Ray hopped up, “I’ll help you.”

“I’m gonna keep watching this to catch every detail I can that might help us.” Marion proffered. Secretly, he debated whether he could ever unleash a fireball upon a person if it would lead to that: a twisted and tortured human in a hospital bed. Could he really be a master cardlanger otherwise?

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75 – Cracking The Code

Savannah succeeded in getting through all the colors of the rainbow… and then some.

A southern Mongolian dialect shone the burnt yellow of the Gobi Desert.

The language of the Atlantisians, of course, ran blue.

She even called forth a dangerous UV light with Quechua.

But nothing revealed any other writing than that boring letter. The whole group moped in dejection. It had been hours.

Savannah propped up her head in her hands to keep it from crashing down on the table. Perhaps because of boredom, exhaustion, frustration, or a mixture of the three, she started to whisper the words of the letter to herself.

The news report had ended and the boys reminisced about the battle.

“Better him than us.” Marion looked for confirmation in Ray’s eyes.

“Yeah. Thanks for saving me, dude. I saw you leap off the desk!”

“Oh, right! Haha. Well, it didn’t work, did it? Savannah saved us both.”

Ray glanced back at Savannah. Was she speaking French? But then returned his focus to Marion, “When are we gonna be able to blast some badies like that?”

“I dunno man. Do you think you could do that to someone?”

“In a life or death fight, maybe, yeah.”

“I can’t believe I did it.” Savannah said.

“We can’t either. How you didn’t kill us all with that, I’ll never know.”

“No, no, no, you idiots,” Savannah corrected, “I think I figured it out!”

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76 – How Did You Do It?

As the boys dashed over, Savannah repeated herself, “I think I figured it out!”

“Well, what does it say?”

“I don’t know. The writing changed back too quickly. I only got the first couple words, but the letter was changing. It was like transforming before my eyes! It was insane!”

“Well, how did you do it?”

“I don’t know. I was just reading it to myself.”

“Well, read it again!”

The boy’s watched the letter like cats outside a mouse hole as Savannah read it through again.

Nothing happened.

“Ughhh!” The group sighed a deep, communal sigh and everybody went back to their respective corners. Marion fell backwards over the side of the couch and Ray slid from leaning against the wall to sitting on the floor. Savannah finally just let her head crash down onto the table. THUD!

A minute later, Ray’s quizzical voice pierced the disheartened atmosphere, “Savannah?”

“What?” She almost didn’t want to answer.

“A moment ago it sounded like you were speaking French.”

Savannah sat bolt upright.

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77 – Master Caruthers, Steganographer And Wordscurist

Earlier, when Savannah sank into despair, almost giving up, she unconsciously began to read the contents of the letter over and over again. She had been studying so much French recently that without even knowing it, her brain had playfully begun translating the letter into French and her lips simply followed. Ray noticed this happen, but Savannah didn’t. When the words on the paper began to transmute themselves, right in front of her, she didn’t realize right away that the French language was the key!

Master Caruthers was an expert in steganography, but the three did not know this. He pioneered the art of wordscuring at the Academy. That is, the method of hiding written words within other written words, the former of which can only be revealed by speaking the right language or spell.

That makes finding a wordscured message quite tricky. First, you would have to be able, somehow, to identify the unassuming cover-up message. Second, you would have to know what to say to reveal the hidden message. Savannah believed there might be some secret message encoded within the letter, but she stumbled into the key completely on accident!

Further unbeknownst to the three, was the fact that Master Caruthers commanded French fluently. He intended to send the letter to a close friend and confidant, who similarly, commanded French, but who was also privy to Master Caruthers’ experiments in wordscuring.

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78 – The Art Of Wordscuring

So how did Master Caruthers pull this off? Let me give you a crash course in wordscuring.

Instructions For Wordscuring

1. Speak your secret message at a piece of wordscure parchment in any language.
2. Write a trick message on the top of the parchment in a different language. (This hides and encodes the secret message.)
3. Translate the trick message written on the parchment into the language the secret message was spoken in, to reveal the hidden message.

*Note: wordscure parchement will start absorbing the first words it hears. Moreover, a message recorded by the listening paper will stay good only as long as the condition of the paper stays good. In other words, the message will deteriorate as the paper deteriorates.

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79 – This Letter Is Not A Test

When Savannah started to translate the letter into French, it appeared the English words were burning away, yet there was no fire, and in their place appeared French words: the hidden message!

The hidden French message remained clear and bright as long as Savannah maintained the pace and accuracy of her translation. If she slowed her pace too much or her translation faltered, the French words faded and the English ones returned.

In time, Savannah had the entire secret message shining brightly for all to see, but only she could read it. The boys didn’t know French. “What does it say?” They asked.

Savannah cautiously translated to English, “This letter is not another test, my friend. I have learned something that might save M.A. and our school and for that I must die. The Finders are holding him beyond the badlands.”

The French words began to disappear and no translation of the English words could bring them back again.

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80 – You’re Not Coming Home

“Well, that settles it. I know where that is, but I never dared to go there before.” Marion said.

“What’s it like?” asked Savannah.

“It’s like a maze of rocky canyons. I think a lot of battles happened there in the past. It kind of like separates where the Extinctors live from us.”

“But the letter says Master Archidemus is beyond that place,” Ray reminded the group.

“Right.” affirmed Marion. The group paused and then Marion speculated, “The Finders must have a base somewhere beyond the badlands.”

The group regarded each other with seriousness. They had reached a turning point in their investigations. Now, they actually had something to go on, some idea of where to go first.

“I suggest,” said Marion with an air of formality, “that we mobilize over Spring Break.”

“That gives us just another week or so to train,” observed Savannah.

“And,” Marion pointed out, “You’ll have to tell your parents you’re not coming home.”

“On Spring Break you mean?” clarified Ray. “We’re not gonna like die out there and never come-”

“Oh, yeah. Sorry. Well, that’s possible. But yeah, I meant to say Spring Break. Should have added that. Yep.” Marion’s air of formality broke down as the other shook their heads.

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