The Cheshire plain was a study in muted greens and greys under a low, pregnant sky. The disused mine, marked only by a crumbling brick chimney and a rusted iron gate set into a grassy mound, looked less like a crime scene and more like a forgotten grave.
Local police had taped off the area, their hi-vis jackets a jarring splash of colour against the damp earth. A forensics van hummed nearby.
"Gate was already open when we arrived," the local DI said, a man named Harris with a weather-beaten face. "No forced entry. Looks like it's been used recently—footprints in the mud, fresh wheel ruts. Leads to a hoist down to the main gallery. Air's stale but breathable. We've not gone further than the landing."
Thorne peered into the black maw of the tunnel entrance. A cold, mineral-damp breath exhaled from the earth. "Any idea what's down there?"
"Records are patchy. Mine closed in 1898. Sold to a private buyer in 1923—a Lord Harrogate. Eccentric. Interested in 'permanent curation,' whatever that means. Family died out. Place fell to the Crown. Been nominally sealed since the fifties."
Elara stood at the threshold, her hand resting on the cold brick. The smell was distinctive: not just damp and rot, but the sharp, alkaline tang of rock salt, undercut with something else. A faint, sickly-sweet note she recognized from a hundred museum archives. The smell of slowly decaying organic matter in a sterile environment.
"It's a repository," she said quietly. "Salt mines are naturally stable. Constant low temperature, low humidity. Perfect for preservation. He's not just hiding things down there. He's curating them."
The descent in the rickety iron cage hoist was a journey into a silent, ancient darkness. The only sound was the groan of cables and the drip of water filtering through ancient rock. They emerged onto a rough-hewn stone landing, their torches cutting swathes through a blackness so complete it felt solid.
The main gallery stretched away, a cathedral carved from glittering, grey-white salt rock. Their lights caught million-year-old crystals, making the walls sparkle like a monstrous, frozen galaxy. But it was not empty.
Wooden crates, modern and sturdy, were stacked along one wall. A long trestle table stood in the centre, covered in a clean white cloth. On it lay an array of objects, neatly arranged as if for a museum display.
Thorne's torch beam swept over them. "Christ."
Elara moved forward, her heart a cold drum in her chest. This was the killer's study, his inner sanctum.
On the cloth were:
A small, perfectly preserved leper's clapper (13th century, her mind catalogued automatically). A set of lockpicks made of deer bone (likely Tudor). A priest's wooden communion cup, its rim stained dark. A stained leather pouch filled with what looked like dried, blackened peas. And at the centre, resting on a velvet pad, the missing seal from Finch's collection. A disc of pale stone, intricately carved with a labyrinth design. The Sigillum Secretum.
Each object was tagged with a small, typed card, just like Finch's collection. But these tags were different.
Elara leaned over the leper's clapper. The tag read: *"Instrument of Isolation. St. Giles, Norwich, 1349. Plague Year. Used to announce uncleanliness. The sound preceded 200+ deaths."*
The lockpicks: "Keys of Silence. Tower of London, 1555. Used by Fr. James Bell to escape interrogation. Recaptured. Executed."
Her blood ran cold. These weren't just artifacts. They were relics of failure. Tools used by victims or perpetrators in historical tragedies that had ended in death and silence.
"He's collecting the tools of lost causes," she breathed. "The props of crimes that were never solved, or escapes that failed, or punishments that were carried out. Each one a story that ended… definitively."
Thorne was examining the crates. He pried one open with a gloved hand. Inside, packed in more salt, were books. Dozens of them, bound in vellum and crumbling leather. He lifted one out. It was a ledger, written in a cramped, legal hand. The frontispiece read: *"Inquests into Unnatural Deaths, Parish of St. Boltoph, 1672-1690."*
"He's not just a collector," Thorne said, his voice echoing in the vast space. "He's an archivist. A bloody historian of murder."
"A historian with a thesis," Elara corrected, the full horror dawning. She pointed to the objects on the table. "He's not just interested in the crimes. He's interested in the tools and the silence. The clapper announced plague victims who were left to die. The lockpicks failed. The poison cup… it delivered a final sacrament that was also a death sentence. He's fetishizing the moment of irreversible conclusion."
She walked to the back of the gallery, where the darkness thickened. Her torch beam fell on something that wasn't rock or crate. It was a modern metal frame, like a room divider. Draped over it were garments.
A nun's wimple and habit, faded to yellow.
A jester's motley coat, bells still attached.
A Cavalier's leather buff-coat, scarred from battle.
A workhouse matron's severe, high-collared dress.
A costume rack.
"He doesn't just replicate the method," Elara said, her voice barely a whisper. "He replicates the identity. He wears the clothes. He becomes the leper, the priest, the jester, the soldier. He's not re-enacting history. He's embodying it."
A sudden, metallic clang reverberated through the gallery, shockingly loud. It came from the direction of the hoist.
Then, the lights went out.
Not just their torches—every glint of crystal, every reflection was swallowed by an absolute, suffocating blackness. Someone had killed the generator topside.
In the sudden, silent dark, other senses shrieked. The drip of water was a ticking clock. The smell of salt and decay was overwhelming. And then, a new sound. A soft, rhythmic scrape. Like a foot dragging on grit. It was close.
"Thorne," Elara hissed, frozen.
"Don't move." His voice was low, steady. She heard the rustle of his jacket, the click of his firearm being unclipped from its holster.
The scraping stopped. For a long moment, there was only the pounding of her own blood in her ears. Then, a voice. It was calm, cultured, and seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere in the echoing dark.
"Sic transit gloria mundi."
It was the same voice that had taunted Professor Finch on the phone. The voice of the man with the labyrinth-handled umbrella.
A beam of light sliced through the darkness, not from where they stood, but from the far end of the gallery. It was a focused, pencil-thin beam, illuminating a single spot on the salt wall. In that spot, pinned by a dagger of light, was a fresh piece of parchment.
The light held for three seconds. Then it vanished, leaving the afterimage burned into their retinas. The scraping sound resumed, moving away, faster now, fading into the depths of another tunnel.
Thorne was already moving, his own torch flickering back to life as he found the switch. He ran toward where the light had been, his weapon raised. Elara followed, her legs unsteady.
They found the parchment. It was fixed to the wall with a familiar-looking silver hat pin. The message was written in the same neat hand as the museum's invisible ink, but now in bold, black gallnut ink.
It was not in Latin. It was in English.
"Dr. Vance. You appreciate the collection. Good. The First Thread is the hardest to find. You have found mine. Now find hers. She waits in the choir, where the music ended. The bell tolls for the silent sister. Follow the salt."
Beneath the text was a small, meticulously drawn sketch: a simple bell tower, and beside it, not a cross, but a tiny, seven-circuit labyrinth.
"He's giving us the next victim," Thorne said, his face grim in the torchlight. "Before we even find the body."
Elara stared at the note, the academic part of her mind wrestling with the horror. The choir. The silent sister. The bell. It was another historical template. A nun. A bell tower. A fall? A silencing?
"He's not just telling us," she realized, the cold of the mine seeping into her bones. "He's testing us. He's giving us the clues to see if we're smart enough to stop him in time. This is all part of his… his exhibition."
The hoist machinery groaned to life above them; the local police had restored power. Light flooded back, harsh and artificial, making the salt crystals glitter like accusing eyes.
In the newfound light, Elara saw something she'd missed. On the floor beneath the parchment, where the killer's light had stood, was a small, deliberate pile of the same grey-white rock salt. And pressed into the top of it, like a fossil in snow, was a perfect, fresh footprint.
It was the print of a modern, expensive-looking rubber-soled walking boot.
Not a ghost from history. A man. Flesh and blood. And he had just invited them to the next act of his play.