Mwqa-mqbrh-alfysbwk-qiwdz

Layla smiled, closed the journal, and whispered the real message aloud:

She reversed each pair: mw → wm, qa → aq, mb → bm, qr → rq, h a → ah, lf → fl, ys → sy, bw → wb, kq → qk, iw → wi, dz → zd. mwqa-mqbrh-alfysbwk-qiwdz

She stepped back. “What if it’s a known key?” She typed the string into her computer’s frequency analyzer. It suggested a with the key “help.” She tried it: Layla smiled, closed the journal, and whispered the