Page 121 of Mercy Written in Blood

"Anything useful?"

"One image."

Haruki answered immediately.

"Send it."

The photograph arrived seconds later. He opened it. Unlike the others, this one had captured almost the entire western wall before the fire — burnt shelving, collapsed beams, broken pottery, and high above everything else, another lotus. Smaller. Almost hidden. Painted above a doorway they had never reached.

Haruki enlarged it. Below the flower were four characters, too blurred to read.

"Damn."

He zoomed further. The image dissolved into pixels. Nothing. The doorway had existed. The attackers had reached them before anyone explored it.

"What was through there?" he murmured.

The question remained unanswered. He looked again at the white lotus. Eight petals. Always eight. Never seven. Never nine. Intentional. Everything about it had been intentional.

Behind him, Reina entered quietly.

"You're still here."

"So are you."

She looked at the photograph.

"The flower again."

"Yes."

"You're obsessed."

"Interested."

"You've been staring at the same picture for twenty minutes."

Haruki didn't deny it. Reina folded her arms.

"So?"

"So what?"

"What now?"

Haruki looked towards the evidence tables.

"We keep building our own archive."

"And?"

"We recover every surviving photograph."

"And?"

"We interview anyone the Accord hasn't frightened into silence."

Reina nodded.