September 23rd through 26th (Sailing Home)
While returning to Nassau we used the time to delve into the spoils of the stolen desk. I swear it wasn't a foolhardy measure. We took precautions. Set up wards, scanned the items with our various Mage Sights, adorned various supernal protections, even made sure all the investigations took place within the captain's quarters so as to protect the crew. Even with all that, the most important thing we learned of course was that, just about no one among us knew what they were doing. We'd started with the chained Bible you see and the bloody thing was trapped from the get go. Oh we opened the lock without issue mind you, but the following lightning bolt that shot out caught most off guard. Santiago was still healing from the battle and so the shock overtook him and knocked him unconscious. Ezra made the proper decision to remove himself and the captain from the investigation until we knew what we were dealing with. Melchior wished to be on the cusp of knowledge and was much harder to deter and in usual style distracting and often annoying without offering much in the way of help aside from writing things down. Normally I'd say this would be fine, except the tome was nothing less than a dangerous grimoire belonging to Inquisitor Juan de Madrid himself. Most books within it contained a painstakingly created spell constrained within paintings at the front. Most potent in their own ways, but a few were right dangerous to those of us being nosy. One converted the light in the room to heat and scorched everything that was laying about. a minor inconvenience to me though Melchior had some minor issues with it and finally decided to wait outside. The second put that to shame by releasing a lightning bolt strong enough to blow a hole the size of a person in the cabin. If I hadn't realized what was happening as the spell formed, I may likely would not be here writing this. Thankfully I was the only person around so the damage was only superficial. The most important bit of this is that the spells within the grimoire, contained vile magic. Spells tainted and corrupted. Yet an inquisitor knew them well enough to inscribe them within his own Bible no less. The term hypocrite is too light for this heresy. Given the damage done, I refused to look at the final hung spell in the book. No sense in pushing my luck any further. At least, not yet.
In addition to the Bible, the Inquisitor's weapon was within the desk. The weapon itself was of great quality but rather ordinary in all other facets. I say this merely pointing out that it was ornamented as much as one might expect from the Inquisition's higher officers. At least, this was the case until we looked at the ammunition. The bullets were of make unknown to me. Not iron, and not lead but of a material I'd never seen. A perfectly spherical mirror but the reflections were all wrong. Melchior called it an antimonium , the antithesis of matter and reality as sleepers know it. This shouldn't exist and yet we have five rounds of it. The depth of depravity that the Inquisition is falling to has no bounds. And yet I cannot help but wonder what would happen should the sleeper side of the organization learned of the Supernal side. The idea reminds me of Cane and Abel but