“How may I help you?” The woman asked, she was older, and had long black hair pulled into a bun. She looked bored as she peered over her glasses at us.

“Does this library have any old journals that may have been donated here at some point?” I asked her.

“How old?” Was her response.

“We aren’t sure, not exactly ancient, but historic would probably describe it okay I think? We don’t know who the author is either.” I explained.

“You’re looking for something specific then? Go upstairs, and towards the back you’ll find another counter. The staff there should be able to help you, if it’s as old as you’re making it out to be it’ll be in our archives, and they’re the ones with access to it.” She pointed to the stairs off to the left, then resumed looking into her computer.

“Thank you.” I said, Duncan already started walking away toward the stairs. He beat me to the counter, and was already speaking to the clerk by the time I caught up.

“Erm, yea we’re looking for a really old journal. Probably with bad handwriting. We don’t know what’s in it or who wrote it but we know its from 3384 Pinewood Drive.” Duncan was trying and failing to explain. The older man lifted an eyebrow.

“The castle at the top of the hill on the north side of town.” I attempted to clarify.

“Oh that place. Yea I think we have some books stored. Why? You doing research on spooky castles or somethin’?” He said as he started messing with his keys.

“You could say that.” I muttered.

“Gotcha, I’ll be right back dudes.” He unlocked the door behind him and disappeared beyond it. The man looked older than my own father, but talked and carried himself like a teenager. I looked to Duncan, who shrugged. After two or three minutes of Duncan and I chatting idly Liam and Lacey approached, presumably waiting for the man to come back to help find some newspapers. When the man did come back, he returned with a stack of books and laid them out on the counter in front of us.

“Now, since these are archived you can’t check them out, but you’re free to read them at those tables over there.” We nodded and looked over them. Three looked to be normal books, but the other two caught our attention. One looked identical to the first journal that we had found, and the other was the same, only ‘THE HERMIT’ was surprisingly clearly written on the inside of the cover in faded ink. We took the two back to a table and conversed about them for a bit.

“Great, so we found them, but we have to memorize them here and now pretty much.” I sighed and put my head in my hands while one of Duncan’s found my shoulder.

“Hey man it’s alright. We’ll think of something…” He comforted. “Let’s just take a look.” He said as he grabbed one. I grabbed the one with ‘the hermit’ written inside. I was unable to read most of it, but flipping through revealed pictures. There was a picture of the hermit’s key, and the fool’s. There was a drawing of a spikey ball that I assumed was the mist. There was a scribble of the black mass that I had seen in the hallway. My eyes were wide as I flipped through. I stopped at that page and passed it to Duncan, who was focused on his own journal. His attention averted to the page I showed him and his eyes also bulged. He hastily took it from my hands, and adopted a concentrated expression as he read. He said nothing as he closed the book. He pulled his backpack onto his lap and rustled for a few of the journals he brought with them. He also grabbed a pen.

“Duncan what are you doing?” I asked, bewildered.

“Shh.” He answered sharply as he opened the books he brought one by one, before he decided on the second of the three. He opened the hermit book again, and every now again started scribbling in the journal in his lap. This is when Liam and Lacey walked over to us.

“Have you guys found anything?” Lacey asked as they sat across from us. I nodded.

“What about you?” I asked. Liam was the one to answer.

“Nothing, he isn’t really able to find anything without any dates or names.”

“Try Stanley Thorne.” Duncan said suddenly, still scribbling, “I saw it mentioned a few times in this journal.” He paused to point to the new journal that he wasn’t currently working with. “Has some dates too but I’d start with just the name if I were you.”

“Right.” Liam got back up and went to the counter once again.

“What are you doing?” Lacey asked in Duncan’s direction. I answered for him.

“He’s not telling…” I said, right as he set them both down.

“Sorry, I had an idea. I didn’t want to forget something it mentioned.” Was all he said. He gestured to the hermit journal. “I’m pretty sure this one is directed towards all of us. It hasn’t mentioned any of the cards aside from the hermit, and it’s written more like a guide. We were supposed to find this first, if I had to guess...”

“I am back, with a lot of paper.” Liam called from where he was walking back over with a stack of newspaper.

“We can talk about the new journals later, let’s look over the newspapers first.” Duncan redirected our attention. We all picked up a different newspaper. Eventually Paisley and Sophie came over, they couldn’t find the book but settled for a different book on herbs for Sophie to learn about. After what felt like a long time, we learned all we could from the newspapers, and all agreed that people from back then were incredibly nosey and judgemental of Stanley “JOwner” Thorne. Sophie was getting antsy though, so we finally decided to take pictures of important or hard to remember newspaper snippets, and took a few notes. Before we stacked the newspapers back up to bring them to the counter. Duncan also grabbed the library’s journals to return after putting his own back into the bag. Seeing the look on my face, he smiled sweetly.

“We can just come back later man, don’t worry about em they aren’t going anywhere.” He said as he walked back to the counter. The clerk offered us a quick thanks and wished us luck on our ‘project’ before we left. We all talked over what we found on our way home.

“Poor Stanley. Alone his entire life after his parents died, then everyone continued thinking he was crazy all the way till he died as a lonely old man...” Lacey trailed off.

“No wonder there are so many journals and secrets. My guy had a lot of free time on his hands.” Liam added. I noticed Duncan had been quiet the whole time, and was still spacing out. I nudged him with my elbow. He jerked, startled, and turned to me with an expression I could only describe as vaguely nervous.

“You okay?” I asked quietly to avoid the other’s attention.

“Hm? Yea. Just peachy.” He obviously bluffed.

“You’re lying. People only say peachy when they are lying or being sarcastic. Either way you aren’t telling the truth.” I nudged him again.

“Really man I’ll be fine, don’t worry about it.” He must’ve been nervous about whatever was in that journal being in our house.

“Hey, it’s gonna be okay as long as we all stick together.” I told him confidently. He responded with a slow nod and eventually a smile.

“Right.” We both joined the conversation with everyone again after that, and he stopped his fidgeting for the most part.

We eventually made our way back home, and let the dog out one more time before going inside for a bit of a late lunch. The rain was still going strong by this time. This time I helped with lunch by making my tea again, which was hit all round of course. Everything was normal, and pleasant, but after we ate we sat around the dining room table and got back to work. Lacey and Paisley were discussing theories on what truly happened to Stanley, Sophie was sitting on Liam’s lap as he tried to help her translate the plant book, Duncan had his nose in his journal, and he spoke with me about what he was thinking from time to time.

“I dunno, something isn’t right about our tarot cards I think…” This got everyone’s attention. Duncan kind of ducks back a bit under everyone’s attention, he shook it off and continued. “I think everyone’s is spot-on except for Owen’s, just to clarify.” He said.

“How so?” Paisley asked.

“I dunno, I was just thinking… In the riddle it said the Hermit passed his words to the Fool, right?” I nodded. “Well if you look into the meaning of the Hermit, it says the Hermit is alone and wise, and he sets out to share his wisdom, basically. I’m not saying Owen’s not smart, but in this case, he knows only as much as we do. Owen also isn’t alone AND some of this happened because he didn’t share his ‘wisdom’ in the first place.” He gestured to me several times, then continued. “But I do know who IS alone, wise, and has taught me specifically everything that we all know now. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I’m the only one who can read this easily…”

“The Hermit is Stanley, then.” Paisley finished.

“That explains why he’s always talking to the fool. He knew the whole time… What reminded you of all that anyway?” I said, leaning towards him to take a peek at the journal in his hands. I saw it just before he quickly pushed it into his own chest. I wasn’t sure what I was expecting to see from a journal that I couldn’t understand, but an illustration in old ink of a key with a feather on it was not what I was expecting… Duncan can’t draw really anything very well, so unless he’s been practicing without my knowledge, this was the library’s journal...