The New World

by Matt Myklusch

  DeMayne turned away from her with a petulant groan. “I should have cut your throat. At least then I wouldn’t have to hear this. If it didn’t hurt so much to move, I’d kill you again.”

  Oblivia clutched his shoulder. “Listen to me. This is important. I may have been doing the wrong job, but I was good at it. Keeping secrets… learning secrets. Right up until the end.” She smiled a crooked smile. “I have an idea what’s kept you alive all these years. The Forever Stone. Isn’t that what you call it?” She ripped his shirt open, revealing the black stone pendant that hung around his neck. “There we are.”

  DeMayne’s eyes widened in terror. He tried to push Oblivia away, but he was too late. She had a tight grip on the stone and she wasn’t letting go. When he shoved her, she fell over on her side, and the chain around his neck snapped. Desperate, he lurched forward, grabbing for the stone. She held it out of his reach.

  Then she threw it away.

  DeMayne bleated out an anguished cry as the shiny black stone skipped across the floor. It bounced into the gear works, where it was promptly crushed in the teeth of the Clockwork Castle.

  “Forever isn’t what it used to be,” Oblivia said, triumphant.

  DeMayne whimpered. “No.”

  Whatever strength he had left seemed to leave his body all at once. He slumped down in a heap and looked up with the doomed eyes of a dead man. He looked so pathetic, Joey almost felt sorry for him. After that, things happened fast. His handsome face stretched tight, as if he were dehydrated, but it wasn’t water that he needed. He needed protection against the passage of time, and that protection had just been ground into dust. His skin shriveled and cracked as the weight of a thousand years caught up to him. Within seconds, he was a pile of bones, and then, he too was dust. Joey turned away as the last remnants of Ledger DeMayne disintegrated. When he looked back, there was nothing left but a pile of clothes.

  Nobody said anything for a few seconds.

  Allegra was the one to break the silence. “That was intense.”

  “Seriously,” Joey agreed. “Like the end of an Indiana Jones movie.”

  “I don’t know what that means,” Allegra replied.

  “I do,” Mr. Ivory said. “I’m just glad he didn’t go out like Raiders of the Lost Ark. That face-melting scene freaked me out as a kid. I don’t think I could handle seeing that in person. Not even with him.”

  “Quiet. She’s trying to talk,” Jack said, moving toward Oblivia.

  She reached out a frail hand, beckoning him to come closer. He knelt beside her as she struggled to undo a golden clasp that held her cloak around her neck. “Take this,” she said, pressing the clasp into Jack’s hands. “It… it belonged to your mother. When you see her, Jack… tell her I said I’m sorry.”

  “What are you talking about?” Jack looked up at the others. “She’s delirious.”

  “No,” Hypnova said. “She isn’t.”

  Jack scrunched up his face. “What do you mean?”

  “We can deal with that in a minute,” Shazad said. “Right now I need you to step back, Jack.”

  “What are you doing?” Jack asked.

  “I’ve had this thing five minutes, and already I’m on my second emergency.” Shazad pointed the wand at Oblivia.

  “PANACEA!”

  With that, Oblivia’s body lifted off the floor with a whoosh. She began to spin around, twirling in the air like a ballerina. As she turned, the crimson bloodstains faded from her robes, and color returned to her cheeks. Eventually, she stopped whirling and returned to the ground. When her feet touched down, she was dizzy at first, but she steadied herself. She stood tall, not hunched over like before. Oblivia poked at the spot on her chest where DeMayne had stabbed her with Hypnova’s blade. She was delighted to find there was no pain. She was healed.

  “Panacea?” Leanora repeated with a smile on her face.

  “I was thinking about those magic bandages you used on Joey last year,” Shazad explained. “I was wishing we had them with us now.”

  “They were in the bag Joey lost,” Janelle said.

  Joey grumbled. “Do we have to keep bringing that up?”

  “You did this?” Oblivia asked Shazad, surprised to see him holding the wand. “But I thought Joey—”

  “You missed a few things while you were dying,” Joey told Oblivia. “I’m out. Shazad’s the man now.”

  “He certainly is,” Oblivia agreed. “You saved me. Thank you.”

  “That’s what he does,” Leanora said, patting Shazad on the shoulder.

  “In that case, we’ve got a job for you,” Oblivia said. “There’s one more person who needs to be saved.”

  25 The Right Place at the Right Time

  “What’s this all about?” Joey asked Hypnova. “Does this have something to do with what Oblivia saw in your memory?”

  “It has everything to do with that,” Hypnova said. “It’s time.”

  “For what?” Jack asked.

  “Time to put things right,” Oblivia said. “I’m ashamed to say it’s long overdue. You have no idea how long.”

  “I don’t understand,” Leanora said. “What did you see?”

  “She saw the same thing you saw,” Hypnova said. “DeMayne’s final memory of the first Secreteer. Unlike you, Oblivia recognized the person under the hood. She knew her.”

  “She knew her?” Shazad asked. “Someone from a thousand years ago?”

  “It’s hard to believe, but it’s true,” Hypnova said. “The first Secreteer called herself Rasa. Tabula Rasa.”

  “What?” Jack said. “That can’t be… It doesn’t make any sense!”

  “What doesn’t make any sense?” Leanora asked. “Who’s Tabula Rasa? What kind of name is that?”

  “It’s a code name,” Hypnova said. “The name she chose when she first became a Secreteer.”

  “The name who chose?” Joey asked.

  “Jack’s mother.”

  “What are you saying?” Allegra asked. “Jack’s mother is the first Secreteer?”

  “How?” Skerren added, trying—and failing—to wrap his brain around the idea. “That doesn’t… How?!”

  “What is this?” Jack asked Hypnova. “My father told me my mom became a Secreteer a few years before they met. How could she have founded the Order a thousand years ago?”

  “This is the same Order that kicked her out?” Skerren asked.

  “It’s not possible,” Allegra said.

  “It may not be probable, but it is possible,” Hypnova said. “Anything’s possible. The people in this room know that better than most.”

  Jack rubbed his head. “I guess so, but—”

  “But nothing. This isn’t the first time your life has been upended by time travel,” Hypnova told Jack. “You think your mother died when the Rüstov first invaded Empire City.” She shook her head. “She didn’t die. She was lost.”

  “What’s the difference?” Jack asked.

  “I don’t know about you, but I’m lost,” Mr. Clear said.

  “Who are the Rüstov?” Mr. Ivory wanted to know.

  Hypnova ignored their chatter, keeping her focus on Jack. “Fifteen years ago, when the Rüstov armada invaded, a future version of you calling himself Revile came back in time to kill you as a baby. He wanted to erase himself from existence. You know this. What you don’t know is that your mother was with you when he attacked. It was the first time he had ever seen her, but he knew she was his mother. He told her who he was and what he was there to do. He told her all of it. As I’m sure you can imagine, it was hard for her to hear. She had already lost your father. Losing you would have been too much to bear.”

  Oblivia cringed in shame.

  “What did she do?” Jack asked Hypnova.

  “Your mother saved you. She stopped Revile. Not by fighting him. Just by being there. She hit him with something he’d never expected, something he’d never had before… a hug from his mother. That embrace bought precious seconds for other heroes
of the Imagine Nation to arrive and join the fight. After it was over, your mother was gone. Everyone assumed she died in the battle.”

  “Everyone assumed?” Jack repeated. “What do you mean assumed? Are you saying my mother’s alive?”

  “You have to understand, it was chaos after the invasion. There was so much death and destruction, so many people missing.… Nobody realized what really happened.”

  “What happened?” Jack asked, his voice going up an octave.

  “Revile was overloaded with temporal energy from his journey through time,” Hypnova explained. “When your mother embraced him, that energy was transferred to her. She became unstuck in time. Dislodged from her place in the natural order of things, she went rocketing back through the timestream. Her first stop was a thousand years ago, when Merlin and his allies were making plans to fight back against Ledger DeMayne and the emperor who tried to rid this world of magic. She was there for that battle, and when it was done, she helped Merlin hide this place away. She founded the Secreteers before vanishing back into the timestream once again.

  “Ever since then, she’s been bouncing back and forth in a state of temporal flux. Lost in time. Unable to stay in one place, she’s altered the course of history and glimpsed endless possible futures, all in an effort to create a timeline that could lead her back home. But she couldn’t do it alone.”

  Jack put his hands to his head, struggling to process everything he had just been told. A moment passed before he could speak. “Hypnova, I want to believe you, but… how could you possibly know all this?”

  “How do you think?” Hypnova replied. “Your mother told me, of course.”

  Once again, Jack was speechless. “She visited me after I was drummed out of the Order of Secreteers,” Hypnova explained. “When I was lost and in need of a new purpose. She has appeared throughout history, influencing events where she could, including a ‘chance encounter’ with a young man named Melvin Kamitsky.”

  “Melvin who?” Mr. Ivory said, tracking the conversation as best he could.

  “Redondo the Magnificent,” Shazad said. “Our mentor.”

  “Our friend,” Leanora added.

  “Jack’s mother introduced Redondo to magic and put him on his path, just as she put me on a path before I sought you out last year,” Hypnova said. “She didn’t tell me everything. Just enough to get us all in the right place at the right time. Once the spells that hid the Imagine Nation were broken, a window of opportunity would open up for her. This has been my mission. For me, this was never just about bringing the Imagine Nation back to the world. It was about bringing my friend back. My best friend. My sister. The family I chose. I orchestrated all this to give you two the time that was stolen from you.”

  “I… I don’t know what to say,” Jack said. “I came here hoping I could learn more about my mom. Can we really bring her back?”

  “I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you sooner,” Hypnova said. “This is your mother’s plan. You’ll have to take it up with her.”

  “How?” Jack said. “How does this work?”

  “Magic, of course,” Hypnova said. “I was hoping Joey would have enough energy left over to do the job, but it seems the wand has a new master now.”

  “You will help us, won’t you?” Oblivia asked Shazad. “It’s within your power?”

  “It’s more than that.” Shazad checked the power gauge on his arm, which was still in the 90 percent range. “After everything we’ve been through together, it’ll be my pleasure.”

  “I can’t believe this is happening.” Jack handed Shazad the golden clasp, full of hope. “Take this. Maybe if you have something that belonged to her, it’ll be easier for you to find her. Is that how it works, or am I just making things up?”

  “Let’s find out,” Shazad said. “Are you ready?”

  “Are you kidding? I’ve never been more ready for anything in my life.”

  Shazad held the clasp in an open palm, waved the wand over it, and cast what was arguably the longest anticipated and most deserving spell in the history of magic.

  26 The New World

  It was done.

  No more spells needed to be cast. The world had been changed forever. Magic was free, and the Invisible Hand was gone. There was no one left to hold it back. The Imagine Nation was free, and the Secreteers were through. No one would try to hide it away ever again. Everything was going to be different from now on.

  Joey and the others left the Clockwork Castle and headed back up to the tower. Oblivia led them up to the very top to get a proper look at the new world. Joey, Shazad, Leanora, and Janelle stood on a wide terrace, looking out at the beauty of the Imagine Nation. The rest of the group took in the view with them, except for Jack, who was off to the side, engaged in deep conversation with his mother. The two of them had talked the whole way up the tower and showed no signs of slowing down. Joey was happy for him. Everyone was. It was impossible not to be. After everything Jack’s family had been through, they deserved this moment. It was too much to hope for, but it was here just the same. The fact that it was impossible just made it that much better. Not unlike the view in front of Joey and his friends.

  “Look at that,” Joey said, marveling at the massive crystal mountain floating on the horizon. “It’s incredible.”

  “A world of pure imagination,” Shazad said.

  “I can’t believe we did it,” Leanora said. “We really did it.”

  “Wait until we show you around,” Allegra said. “You haven’t seen anything yet.”

  “Speaking of which,” Skerren said. “What next for all of you?”

  “I don’t know,” Joey said. “What do you guys usually do after you save the world?”

  “Personally, I like a big breakfast,” Skerren replied.

  Joey rubbed his empty stomach. “I am starving.”

  Skerren clapped his hands. “That settles it! You’ll be my guests at Castlevarren. We’ll have a feast to celebrate our victory and Jack’s family reunion. Everyone here will be guests of honor.”

  “I wish we could,” Janelle said. “As amazing as that sounds, and as much as I want to go explore Empire City, we have school in a couple of hours.”

  “School?” Joey was incredulous. “Are you kidding? I’m not going to class today.”

  “We have to go,” Janelle argued. “We’re not students anymore. We’re the new teachers. We have to tell everyone how the world works now.”

  “Can’t I take one day off?” Joey asked. “I did die, you know.”

  “For, like, a minute.” Janelle rolled her eyes. “Don’t make such a big deal out of it.” She punched him in the shoulder and smiled. “Come on, Joey. You can’t call in sick the first day on the job.”

  “Speaking of jobs, I think we’re out of one,” Mr. Clear said.

  “It’s for the best,” Leanora told him.

  “You could always work with us,” Janelle said. “Changing the world was just the beginning. We still have a lot of problems that need fixing. The polar ice caps in particular could use a man with your talents.”

  Mr. Clear smiled. “Count me in.”

  “Me too,” Mr. Ivory said. “You never know when you might need an ogre.”

  “You’re not an ogre.” Allegra patted him on the back. “Welcome to the superhero life.”

  “Superheroes?” Mr. Ivory said. “Really? Us?”

  “If you want to make a difference in the world,” Allegra said. “That’s all it takes to be a hero.”

  “I have a feeling we’re all going to be very busy,” Skerren said. “That Ledger DeMayne of yours was a liar, but he wasn’t wrong. You let magic back into the world, you have to take the bad with the good.”

  “I wonder what our families have been dealing with,” Shazad said. “There’s no telling what’s out there waiting for us.”

  “There never is,” Hypnova said. “There’s no telling what the future holds.”

  “Except you did know,” Joey said. “If this w
as all part of a plan… was it always going to happen this way?” He looked at Hypnova. “You sent us to the Imagine Nation on a day when you knew Jack, Skerren, and Allegra would be there to meet us. It wasn’t a coincidence. You let DeMayne keep his memory on the ship. You let Oblivia catch you.… You took a lot of risks, including me dying.”

  “Ugh.” Hypnova sighed. “You’re not going to let that go, are you?”

  “The point is, you knew it would work, because Jack’s mother saw it all in time.”

  “And it did work. What’s the problem?”

  “It’s not a problem. I’m just wondering… was it fate after all? Was it destiny?”

  “No,” Jack said, joining the group alongside his mother.

  She was dressed in a tan Secreteer’s cloak with the golden clasp that up until recently had been worn by Oblivia. It matched her golden hair, and Jack’s as well. It was obvious he was her son. He looked just like her, especially around the eyes. Jack was also nearly as tall as she was. Joey thought it must have been hard for Jack’s mother to see her son so big, but she didn’t seem bothered by it. She just looked happy to be home.

  “I keep telling you,” Jack continued. “We make our own destiny. You gotta trust me on this.”

  “But how do you explain—”

  “My son is right,” Jack’s mother said, cutting Joey off. “This isn’t fate. None of this was guaranteed. It took a lot of work for me to get back here, and I had a lot of help from all of you. This moment has been a thousand years in the making. You couldn’t just wave a magic wand and make it happen. Not like this. I showed Hypnova a vision of the future, but she had to believe in it. You all had to work to make it a reality. We have to fight for the future we want. That’s the way it is. That’s the way it’s always been.” She pulled Jack close to her. “Sometimes if you’re lucky, the future turns out to be everything you imagined it could be.”