Elena returned to the archive the following morning with fresh eyes and renewed determination, and it was there, buried beneath decades of unrelated correspondence, that she found the document that finally illuminated the deeper story Garrick's letter had hinted toward.
"Logan," she called out, her voice carrying barely contained urgency. "You need to see this immediately."
He crossed the room quickly, and Elena held out a thick bundle of letters, their seals broken long ago, the handwriting alternating between two distinct styles across multiple pages of careful correspondence.
"These span nearly two years," Elena explained, "letters exchanged directly between my father and yours. Not simply the single diplomatic record we found yesterday, but an ongoing, detailed correspondence reveal
