The dwarf nodded at us, then turned and walked down the hallway and around the corner, presumably going back to his office.

   “Am I the only one who thought that was odd?” I asked. “It almost seemed like he was about to crack a genuine smile there for a second.”

   Finn shook his head. “Honestly, I can’t tell around here anymore. Up is down, and down is sideways, with all the new security measures and changes. Anyway, let’s go see what Dad left us.”

   We stepped into the vault. The last time I’d been in here, the space had been in ruins, since I’d used my Ice and Stone magic to collapse the ceiling on top of Deirdre and Rodrigo Santos, the professional thief who’d been helping her. But the piles of rocky rubble were long gone, as was all the gray marble dust, shattered lengths of silverstone rebar, and other debris. The area looked pristine, and the rows of safety-deposit boxes gleamed as though they had all just been shined by hand. Maybe they had been, given Mosley’s attention to detail.

   “This way,” Finn said.

   He led me to the back left corner of the vault. All the boxes were marked with small black numbers, and Fletcher’s box—1300—was the center box in a row of three across and three down. Nine boxes total, set off by themselves from all the others.

   Finn held the key out to me. “You found it, so you do the honors.”

   After Tucker had taunted me with the knowledge that my mother had been part of the Circle, I’d gone to Blue Ridge Cemetery to dig up her grave to see if Fletcher might have left a clue for me there, as he had in Deirdre’s empty casket. I’d found the safety-deposit box key buried in the dirt in my mother’s grave and had been wondering about it ever since.

   But now that we were finally going to open the box, doubt filled me, along with more than a little worry about what we’d find inside. What horrible secrets had Fletcher discovered about my mother? What hard truths about her had he hidden away for all these years? And how much would they hurt me now?

   “Gin?” Finn was still holding out the key to me. “Are you okay?”

   I blew out a breath. “Yeah. Let’s do this.”

   Before I could think about it any longer, I took the key from him, slid it into the slot on the front of the box, and turned it. The lock clicked open, and I grabbed the handle and slid the safety-deposit box out of the wall. I carried the long, rectangular container to a waist-high table at this end of the vault and set it down there. Finn nodded at me, and I slowly lifted the lid of the box to reveal . . .

   A single sheet of paper.

   I frowned. Not what I was expecting. Not at all. Given all the photos and broken mementos that Fletcher had packed into the box in Deirdre’s casket, I’d assumed that this box would be filled to the brim with information too. But maybe the old man hadn’t had time to find out everything about my mother and the Circle. Maybe he’d just left behind a list of the members’ names. That would be more than enough for me to start tracking down Tucker and all the others, however many of them there were.

   Heart pounding, I reached for the paper. My fingers were trembling so badly that it took me three tries before I was finally able to grab hold and lift it out of the box. Finn moved to stand beside me, and I held the paper up where we could both see it to find . . .

   A rectangle drawn on the sheet.

   That was it. That was all. Just a large, simple rectangle drawn on a plain white sheet of paper.

   I turned it over, hoping that something was written on the back. A note, a phone number, an address. But nothing was there. I held it up to the light, thinking that maybe there was a rune, watermark, or some other faint symbol that I hadn’t noticed yet. Still nothing. Desperate, I stared at the front again, but it was the same as before.

   Nothing—there was nothing here. Fletcher hadn’t left me any clues about my mother, Tucker, or the Circle. Not a single one.

   Once again, I had zip. Zilch. Zero. Nada. A whole big fat lot of nothing. More damn nothing than ever before.

   “That’s it?” I growled. “That’s all there is? You’ve got to be kidding me!”

   Disgusted, I tossed the paper down onto the table. The single sheet zipped across the smooth metal surface, floated through the air, and landed right in front of those rows of safety-deposit boxes. The whole bank of them looked like a doughnut now that Fletcher’s box was missing from the center. I glared at the paper, wondering if the old man was somehow mocking me from the great beyond. That’s certainly how it felt.

   Finn walked over and retrieved the wayward statio­nery from the floor, setting it back down on the table. He cleared his throat, breaking the tense, angry silence. “I know you’re disappointed. I am too. I expected there to be more in the box.”

   “But?”

   He shrugged. “But maybe Dad just didn’t have time to put any info in the box. You know how many hidey-holes he had in his office and all over town. Hard to keep track of them all, much less what he put inside each one. Or maybe he just didn’t have any information about your mother and the Circle to share. He’s gone now, so we’ll never know for sure.”

   Disappointment burned in my heart, charring all my earlier hope to brittle black ash. “No, I guess we never will.”

   I glared at the paper again, equal parts angry and frustrated. Part of me wanted to snatch up the sheet, rip it to shreds, and throw the whole mess into the closest trash can. Instead, I reached out, carefully folded it up, and slid it inside my jacket pocket. Maybe it was silly, but I was going to keep the sheet, if only for the simple reason that Fletcher had scribbled on it.

   Finn cleared his throat again. “I know you’re disappointed.”

   “But?”

   “But there’s something else I need to talk to you about.”

   He hesitated, then reached into his suit jacket and drew out a thick wad of papers, which he laid on the table in between us.