He said it so casually, so matter-of-factly, that for a moment, Emily didn't process the words. She just stared at him, her mind a blank, gaping void of incomprehension.
"You... what?" she finally managed, her voice a hoarse, disbelieving croak. "But... you just said...!"
"I said it was a myth," Caelan corrected, a lazy, unconcerned shrug. "I didn't say I didn't have it. Myths are just stories that haven't been properly verified yet. I'm in the verification business."
He stopped pacing and turned to face her, a dangerous, reckless glint in his amber eyes. "And yes, I have it. Had it. Ditched it. The scroll was the real prize. The Heartstone was just... a distraction. A very shiny, very loud distraction." He tapped the scroll case. "This is quiet. This is powerful. This is the future. That rock is just... a rock."
"You... isn't that just a treasure map...?"
The feeling she got from it was, anyway. That he was mostly interested in getting to the sunken city to raid it.
