Page 41 of Mercy Written in Blood
The cover lifted less than a centimetre. Dust loosened from the hinge. Kameda stopped, waited. Nothing crumbled. She raised it further, and the leather gave a faint sound, somewhere between a sigh and a crack. Haruki found himself holding his breath.
The first page was protected by a sheet of thin, darkened paper, its edges fused slightly to the cover. Kameda worked slowly, separating them millimetre by millimetre. Professor Takeda stood beside her with a light angled across the surface. Endo prepared the camera. Minamoto remained at the far side of the table — he had moved away, though Haruki had not noticed when.
Kameda lifted the protective sheet. Writing appeared beneath it: dense vertical lines, dark brown ink, the characters small and controlled, each one formed with extraordinary precision.
Takeda leaned closer.
"Classical script."
"Can you read it?" Haruki asked.
"Some."
Minamoto did not move.
"Read the first line," he said.
Takeda glanced at him.
"You can see it from there."
"Read it."
The request sounded almost like an order. Takeda lowered her eyes to the page.
"On the fourteenth day of the sixth month…"
She stopped.
"What?" Haruki asked.
"The next section is damaged."
Kameda adjusted the light. Takeda continued.
"…the patient presented with fever, pallor and inability to retain blood."
Endo looked up.
"Vampire."
"Possibly," Takeda said.
She read further.
"Pulse irregular. Skin cold. Reaction to sunlight unusually severe despite previous tolerance."
Haruki frowned.
"That sounds like a medical record."
"It is," Kameda said.
Minamoto's voice came from across the table.
"Who wrote it?"
Takeda scanned the next lines.
