God's Gone AWOL

[2] There's a Locket in my Pocket!

R&F's Cupboard of Perfectly Legal Things saw so many bizarre and magical items come and go over the past few hundred years, how could Frances not be able to analyze what was something of interest and what was not? One brown eyeball, magnified by three different layers of glass, examined the details carved into the brass with a focused intimacy. To them, it was as if the locket was a piece of text, with mystery written all over it.

Under the table's bright golden light, Atticus found he could see the details of the locket properly. Even without Frances' magnifying glass, it was easy to see that this was no ordinary piece of jewelry. The Latin words around the rim were harmless and inconspicuous. They were only there to praise God (hallelujah). But carved on the front was an artistically decorated version of something typically kept in its simplest form: an angelic sigil —not something designed just for show.

"This belonged to Haniel. I can confirm that," Frances said quietly, tracing a gloved finger over the grooves in the brass, "But I'm not sure what the energy coming from inside is supposed to be. It's not the photograph,"

They continued to poke, prod, and pry at it for some time. But there was no change or further indication of anything else remarkable. Atticus started to wonder if it wasn't just some trinket forged by its previous owner just for novelty purposes. After all, he had his own fair share of little worldly possessions, the little token chained around Atticus' neck was proof of that.

"Nothing I do seems to be able to activate anything." Frances knocked the locket against the wooden table a couple of times, "Atticus, could you do your glowy-eyes thing and see what happens?"

"Are you asking me to pass some divine energy into it?"

"Is that what you do?"

Atticus took the locket, folding it between his hands. Frances watched in silence as he held it for a moment. He wasn't sure how much energy to give the little thing in case there was truly something sinister inside, such as a trap set by its late owner. There was also the potential reality that nothing would happen at all, and that the smell both himself and Bentley had detected was merely leftover from Haniel before he had passed away. But no matter what the outcome, Atticus was too deep into his curiosity and couldn't back away now.

A quick burst of golden light flashed through Atticus' eyes and a channel of divine energy flowed through his fingertips into the cool metal. Then, with a slight clicking sound, another compartment in the locket popped open.

Frances leaned over the angel's shoulder to peek at it. There weren't any photographs inside this half of the locket. In fact, there wasn't anything. It was completely empty except for the series of detailed markings carved into the inner surface.

"It looks like it's meant to contain something, yeah?" Said Frances, pulling it back under the magnifying glass, "I wonder what,"

Back under the proper lighting, the markings were much easier for the angel to see. After a moment of observing, Atticus finally realized something. They weren't just for decoration. The markings were actually a bunch of different wardings and spells. There were dozens of them, layered on top of each other, intertwining, covering every millimeter of available surface area. He could make out the detailed lines of an anti-tracking ward, a balancing spell, and about as many different types of suppression seals one could imagine. With magic like this, there was no room for error. Whoever had designed this particular part of the locket must have spent hours carving each little detail, struggling to make it absolutely perfect.

And the longer Atticus looked, the more he felt there was something familiar about these particular wardings. Although the pattern in which they were all clumped together was different, he suddenly realized he had seen this arrangement somewhere before. Very recently.