Riona had smuggled them out, not as artifacts, but as evidence —proof that a person had lived, loved, and mattered, even after their home vanished from every map.
If you’d told me a month ago that I’d spend a rainy Tuesday afternoon digging through Professor Riona’s dusty filing cabinets, I would have laughed. Dr. Riona—ancient history, tweed blazers, and a glare that could curdle milk—was the last person on campus I’d associate with the word “treasure.” professor riona’s treasure
: Is she a participant or merely a facilitator of the journey? Riona had smuggled them out, not as artifacts,
Inside: letters. Dozens of them, handwritten in a language I didn’t recognize at first. Old Ottoman Turkish, it turned out. And tucked at the bottom, a cracked leather pouch containing a single silver ring and a pressed yellow flower, dried to parchment. Riona—ancient history, tweed blazers, and a glare that
She hadn't been hiding secrets from the world. She had been saving them for someone who would listen. And as I picked up the quill from her desk, dipping it into the inkwell, I realized the hunt wasn't over.
Behind a locked drawer in her oak desk, wrapped in faded velvet, was a small iron chest. No bigger than a shoebox. No jewels, no gold coins, no ancient crown.