Page 121 of A House of Gold
I startin the section Nat showed me during my first week, the ledgers, those meticulous records of every deal he's made, every soul he's collected, every debt Croesus has claimed.
I pull the ledger marked though the present and flip to the entries around my grandmother's contract date, the page I memorized without even trying from the first time I found it. Not for any reason than it makes me feel closer to Gramms for just a second.
I return the ledger and move deeper into the library, following the call numbers Nat mentioned weeks ago. The restricted section isn't locked, Croesus gave me access to most of the house, but it's clearly separated. Darker. Older. The books here don't have neat labels or organized shelving.
They're piled. Stacked. Hidden.
I start pulling volumes at random, scanning tables of contents, looking for anything about the first falling or the word morningstar. Most are in languages I can't read, ancient script that hurts to look at too long. But some are in English, or have been translated.
I find references to Lucifer. To the originalf fall. To the Morningstar's punishment.
But nothing about missing souls. Nothing about bloodlines. Nothing that explains what my grandmother was actually looking for.
I'm about to give up when I find it.
Not a book. A folder. Plain brown leather, stuffed behind a row of grimoires, like someone hid it there and forgot about it.
Or like someone wanted it found by the right person.
I pull it out, open it carefully. Inside are papers, handwritten notes in my grandmother's precise script. Photocopies of old contracts. Newspaper clippings about deaths ruled as natural causes. And a list.
A long list of names.
Each one has a date beside it. A location. A note about angelic bloodline heritage. And a status: MISSING.
I count them. Forty-seven names. Forty-seven people who made deals with the seven houses over the last hundred years. Forty-seven people who should have been collected when their contracts ended.
But weren't.
My hand shakes as I flip through the pages. The notes are sparse but telling:
"Contract fulfilled but soul never collected. House of Fury confirmed no retrieval."
"Subject disappeared three days before collection date. No body found. Bloodline: 6th generation, House of Ruin."
"Natural death reported, but soul not in House of Gold's vault. Croesus unaware of discrepancy until inquiry."
And at the bottom of the last page, in my grandmother's handwriting:
"Pattern confirmed. All missing souls are angel-bloodlines. All descendants of original contracts 300+ years ago. Someone is collecting them before the houses can. Purpose unknown. Danger level: EXTREME. If you're reading this, I'm dead. Don't trust anyone. Not even–"
The sentence cuts off. Like she was interrupted. Or like she couldn't bring herself to finish it.
My throat is tight. My hands won't stop shaking. Goosebumps break out along my arms.
Forty-seven missing souls. All angel-blooded. All collected by someone, or something, before the houses could claim them.
And my grandmother figured it out. Tracked them. Documented them.
Six months before she died.
"Find something interesting?"
I spin around so fast, I nearly drop the folder. Croesus is standing at the entrance to the restricted section, dressed now, his gold eyes pointed in my direction. His expression is carefully neutral, but through the binding I feel his concern. His curiosity.
His fear.
"How long have you been there?" I ask.
