When Duke Avren Lior dies, his will contains one baffling clause: his entire estate goes to whoever can finish reading his private diary. Simple enough — except the diary is enchanted. It fights being read. Pages go blank mid-sentence, rewrite themselves overnight, and one reader was found wandering the gardens unable to remember her own name. The duke's nephew, Lord Matthen, stands to inherit by default if no one completes the task within a year, and he's content to wait. The only person making progress is Yara, a junior scribe from the royal archives with no magical training and no idea why the diary tolerates her. Matthen offers her a deal: read it together — if the diary names him heir, they split the fortune. If it doesn't, she keeps everything and he walks. A generous offer from a man she doesn't trust. Because every page she turns reveals another secret about the Lior family, and Matthen is either helping her or making sure he's there when she finds the one secret that matters.