Edmund slowly closed his fingers around the compass, allowing its familiar weight to settle into his palm. His expression remained composed, but his thoughts were focused on the implications of what had happened.
The ancient records had repeatedly warned that certain objects were connected to events whose significance could only be understood when the appropriate conditions returned.
If the compass was one of those objects, then its awakening might be evidence that the conditions described in those records were finally beginning to reappear.
He could not yet determine whether the compass had detected the return of Qi itself, the location where the phenomenon had originated, or some other event connected to the changes occurring throughout the world.
However, the direction in which the needle pointed was too consistent to ignore, and the timing of its awakening was far too suspicious to dismiss as coincidence.
