Julian’s thumb pressed the purple light flat against the red carbon paper.
Under the three-hundred-and-sixty-five nanometer beam, the carmine-red ink didn’t look like ordinary pigment. It glowed with a vicious, oily fluorescence, sitting on top of the rag paper fibers like dried arterial blood.
“Read it, Julian,” Elena whispered, stepping closer to his shoulder. “What did they do to Clara?”
Julian didn’t answer right away. His proofreader’s eye was already tearing the document apart, dissecting the margins, the legal clauses, and the embossed notary seals.
The document was bound in triplicate carbon paper, stamped at the top with a double-headed eagle clutching a notary seal:
MUNICIPAL NOTARY CONSORTIUM OF NEW MARROW BIFURCATION SUBPOENA & JURISDICTIONAL TRANSFER #RS-2025-0412 DATE OF INCIDENT: MAY 14, 2025 // 02:14 AM SECTOR: OLD FERRY BRIDGE RULE ZONE (ROUTE 04)
Julian swallowed hard, his throat dry as chalk.
“May fourteenth,” Julian said, his voice flat and hard. “Six months ago. The night the university shuttle crashed into the river fog on the Old Ferry Bridge.”
