“I understand. No more secrets, I promise. You’re right. We’re a team, in this battle and all others.” I repeated her words, then made an X over my heart so that she would realize how serious I was. “If it makes you feel better, I’ll tell you about the artifacts I’ve swapped out so far and where I’ve hidden them.”
Babs tried to keep a stern look fixed on her face, but her eye brightened, and her lips twitched up into a smile. “Really? That would be amazing! Tell me everything.”
And just like that, all was forgiven, and Babs and I were a true team again.
I spent the next several minutes walking up and down the aisles, pointing out my fake artifacts on the shelves. For once, Babs stayed quiet and listened, as if she was taking mental notes about the items and their supposed powers. I moved through the final aisle, and we wound up in front of the black Chloris box where we had started.
“Aphrodite’s Cuff, Hermes’s Sandals, Thrud’s Necklace, Benzaiten’s Ring, Hephaestus’s Apron, and Veritas’s Diary.” Babs ticked off the artifacts one by one. “You’ve got quite a stockpile.”
“Do you think I have enough artifacts? If the worst happens and Covington somehow breaks into the Bunker?”
Her green eye narrowed in thought. “Well, most of those artifacts offer some sort of protection from magic, so that’s a good start. I don’t know if you have enough, but if nothing else, you’ve given yourself and the rest of the Midgard a fighting chance. That’s all anyone can do. Even a Spartan like you, Rory.”
Her words actually made me feel a little bit better, like I wasn’t outright stealing the artifacts as much as I was borrowing them and doing my best to prepare for a potential attack.
Voices sounded in the hallway, along with footsteps. The rest of my friends were here, and it was time for the briefing, so I slid Babs into her scabbard, and we left the shelves.
Ian, Zoe, and Mateo stepped into the briefing room, sporting their usual bags and weapons. Takeda entered a moment later, still wearing the gray tracksuit and the silver whistle around his neck that he’d had on in gym class earlier. Next came Aunt Rachel in her white chef’s jacket. And finally, Professor Dalaja brought up the rear, carrying her own bag, which was shaped like a hardcover book with handles attached to it.
We took our seats at the briefing table, and I propped Babs up in the chair next to mine. Professor Dalaja put her book bag on the table and rummaged around inside before coming up with a flash drive, which was also shaped like a book. Dalaja handed the flash drive to Mateo, who plugged it into his laptop and started typing.
Takeda looked at all of us, a serious expression on his face. “Professor Dalaja has located another Chloris box.”
Dalaja got to her feet and nodded at Mateo. He hit a few final buttons on his laptop, and several photos popped up on the wall monitors, showing the outside of a very familiar building.
“Hey,” I said. “That’s the Cormac Museum. That’s where we found the black Chloris box during the Fall Costume Ball.”
Dalaja nodded. “I know. And thanks to your friend Daphne’s computer program, I got an email alert this morning saying that the museum had recently acquired another box that was very similar to the black one. Of course, the museum curators thought the black Chloris box was just a pretty box. They didn’t realize what was inside it, or they never would have put it on display and risked it getting stolen. And now it looks like they’ve stumbled across another box. Apparently, they bought this one at an estate sale a few weeks ago.”
She picked up what looked like a TV remote from the table and hit a button on it. The photos of the outside of the Cormac Museum vanished, replaced by ones showing the inside. “Here it is.”
Dalaja hit another button, and a picture of the artifact appeared on the center monitor. The box was a pure, beautiful, gleaming white, as though it had been carved out of a single, luminous pearl. Silver vines and thorns ran across the top of the white box, just as they did on the other two Chloris boxes I’d seen, but the jeweled flowers were different. Instead of rubies or pieces of jet, several emeralds glittered on the surface, although they were still shaped like hearts, just like the gems on the other boxes.
“That doesn’t look like the other two boxes,” I said. “The black Chloris box and the red one were mirror images of each other, only with the colors reversed. This box is different.”
Professor Dalaja nodded. “Yes, the colors of the stone and the jewels are different on this box, but the silver vines and thorns and the heart-shaped flowers are exactly the same, which definitely marks it as a Chloris box. Given the differences in the stone and the jewels, it’s possible that this white box doesn’t contain red narcissus seeds or have anything to do with the Narcissus Heart, like the red and black boxes do. Chloris was the Greek goddess of all flowers, not just the red narcissi. This white box could contain seeds for some other kind of flower, or maybe even several different kinds of flowers, or something else entirely.”
“But it is a Chloris box, so we have to find out what’s inside it,” Takeda said. “And the only way to do that is to look in the box ourselves. Even if it doesn’t contain red narcissus seeds, it could still be dangerous. We don’t know all the details of Covington’s plot. He might need other types of seeds besides the ones he already has.”
“So what’s your plan?” Aunt Rachel asked.
“We’re going to follow the general blueprint from our training mission last night but with a few adjustments,” Takeda replied. “Team Midgard will sneak into the Cormac Museum, just like we infiltrated the Library of Antiquities last night.”
“And then?” Zoe asked.
Takeda looked at her. “And then we’ll steal the white Chloris box and leave a fake behind in its place.”
I sucked in a breath. Steal an artifact and leave a fake behind? That was exactly what I had been doing. My stomach twisted with worry. Had Takeda realized that I’d replaced some of the artifacts in the Bunker? Did he know that I’d taken the Narcissus Heart out of the black Chloris box and hidden it elsewhere?
Takeda must have heard my sharp intake of breath. He glanced at me, and I sucked in another breath, waiting for him to accuse me of stealing artifacts. But after a moment, he moved on and looked at everyone around the table again.
“We don’t know what’s inside the white Chloris box, but given everything that’s happened over the past few weeks, we should bring the artifact here for safekeeping,” Takeda said. “I don’t want to leave it sitting in a museum where Covington might be able to get to it.”
“But why leave a fake box behind in its place? Unless…” Ian’s eyes narrowed. “You want to use the box as bait. To draw out Covington and Drake.”
His older brother’s name came out as a low, angry growl. Ian’s gaze was fixed on the white Chloris box on the monitor, but he was sitting tall and stiff in his chair, and his hands were curled into fists on top of the table. The last time we had battled the Reapers, Drake had shoved his sword into Ian’s stomach. Drake had been trying to hurt me, but he hadn’t cared that he almost killed his brother instead.
Takeda nodded. “It’s the same principle as our training mission. We’ll watch the artifact and capture the Reapers when they show up to steal it. Of course, we don’t know when or even if Covington will learn about this new Chloris box, but once we replace the real artifact with a fake, I’ll post Protectorate guards around the museum. That way, if Covington does show up, the guards can capture him and Drake.”
“When are we doing this?” Ian growled again.
“Tonight,” Takeda said. “As soon as the museum closes for the evening. I don’t want to waste a single day getting to that box. I would go right now and get it myself, but Covington might have spies on the museum staff, and I don’t want anyone to know that we’re switching the real box for a fake.”
I winced and glanced at Babs, who arched her eyebrow at me in return. More worry surged through me, along with more than a little guilt, but I pushed down the emot
ions. Even if I wanted to tell the others that I had swapped out some of the artifacts in the Bunker, I couldn’t confess it to them right now. They would focus on that, instead of what we needed to do in order to get the white Chloris box before Covington did. No, this mission was more important than easing my own guilty conscience, and I wasn’t going to do anything to distract my friends from it.
Dalaja passed the remote to Takeda, who punched some more buttons, calling up the museum’s blueprints. He pointed out some weak spots in the security system, and everyone else chimed in, throwing out ideas about how we could best break into the museum. Eventually, Zoe got up from the table and went over to her desk, sorting through her supplies and gathering up everything she would need in order to make the fake artifact.
I listened to the others, really, I did, but my gaze kept going back to that photo of the white Chloris box on the monitor. I wondered what horrors it contained. More red narcissus seeds? Or something worse? Something even more powerful, like the Narcissus Heart?
I shivered, looked away from the photo, and focused on Takeda again, but my stomach kept twisting itself into tighter and tighter knots.
Maybe it was my paranoia working overtime, but I had a bad, bad feeling that we were going to find out exactly how dangerous this new Chloris box was tonight.
Chapter Five
By the time we finished prepping for the mission, it was after seven o’clock, and time to go the Cormac Museum, which had closed for the night. We grabbed our usual supplies and weapons, then left the briefing room.
We walked down a hallway that led to the back of the Bunker. A door marked Stairs was set into the wall, but instead of opening it, Takeda went over to a bookcase and pressed a silver button on the side. A green light flashed, scanning his thumb, and a moment later, the case creaked back, revealing a secret entrance.
Takeda stepped through the opening, followed by Mateo, Zoe, Professor Dalaja, and Aunt Rachel. Ian and I were the last to enter, and the door swung shut and locked behind us. Lights automatically clicked on in the ceiling, banishing the unrelenting blackness and revealing a long stone passageway with tunnels branching off either side.
We walked along the passageway until we reached a large junction where five tunnels met, forming the heart of the underground labyrinth. Each one of the five tunnels led to a different building on the main quad aboveground—English-history, math-science, the dining hall, the gym, and the library, which we had just left.
The others headed toward the gym tunnel, but I lagged behind, my gaze flicking to a light switch on the wall, and then a spot a few steps away from it that was down next to the ground. My gaze traced over the gray stones, but that section of the wall looked the same as the last time that I had checked it a few days ago, and I was the only one who gave it a second glance.
Then again, I was the only one who knew that the Narcissus Heart was hidden here.
When Zoe and I had mapped the tunnels a few weeks ago, we’d come across a pile of loose bricks that looked like they had been chipped out of the wall. At first, I hadn’t thought anything of the bricks, or the hollow space in the wall behind them, but when I had decided to hide the Narcissus Heart, the secret space had seemed like the perfect spot.
Besides Team Midgard, no one else supposedly knew about the tunnels, which meant that no one else would be roaming around down here, and it had seemed like the safest place to stash the Narcissus Heart. Unlike the other artifacts that I’d stolen, I wasn’t going to be foolish enough to simply bury the Narcissus Heart in my jewelry box in my bedroom and not expect anyone to find it there, especially not someone as smart, devious, and cunning as Covington.
I tensed, wondering if someone might notice the faint gaps in between some of the bricks, or the crumbled bits of dried mortar that littered the ground, but my friends walked by without a second glance, even Zoe, who had stumbled over the loose stones in the first place. I let out a soft, relieved breath and hurried after them.
Takeda led us through the gym tunnel, which opened up into his office, since he was one of the academy’s gym coaches. From there, we headed outside to the parking lot behind the building. A white van with the words Pork Pit Catering on the side was sitting in the lot, and we climbed inside.
Takeda slid into the driver’s seat, while Aunt Rachel got in on the passenger’s side. Mateo perched in a chair in front of a desk filled with monitors and other computer equipment that was bolted to one of the van walls. Ian and Zoe sat on the floor next to him, while Professor Dalaja and I took the two seats in the very back of the vehicle.
Takeda cranked the engine and steered out of the parking lot. No one spoke on the ride to the museum, although Takeda tuned the radio to his favorite classical music station.
Thirty minutes later, we reached the Cormac Museum. Takeda parked the van at the far end of one of the lots that flanked the building, and I peered through the windshield. In the distance, I could see the glass doors that served as the museum’s main entrance. They were closed and locked for the night, along with the rest of the building.
Takeda turned around in his seat. “Mateo, you’re up.”
Mateo cracked his knuckles, stretched out his arms, and pulled his laptop closer. Then he bent over the device and started typing, his fingers dancing over the keys. Lines of computer code appeared on the monitors on the desk, zipping by too fast for me to read. I wouldn’t have understood them, anyway. The only thing I liked to do with computers was shop for new mystery books, movies, and TV shows.
A few minutes later, Mateo stabbed a final key. “Got it!” he said in a triumphant voice.
The computer codes on the monitors vanished, replaced by images of both the outside and the inside of the Cormac Museum. The landscaped grounds, the glass doors, the spacious rooms and their exhibits. My gaze moved from one screen to the next, but everything looked normal.
“I’ve hacked into the security system,” Mateo said. “Just give me a few minutes to record and loop some footage, and then you guys can sneak inside and do your thing.” He leaned forward and started typing again.
Zoe reached into her black backpack and pulled out a plastic case full of earbuds. She passed them out, and we all slid them into our ears and did sound checks to make sure that the devices were working.
Zoe also made sure that she had her lockpick gun and other gadgets in her bag, along with the fake white Chloris box that she had created. Takeda and Aunt Rachel examined their swords, and Ian and I checked our weapons as well. He was carrying his battle ax, along with some daggers on his belt, while I had Babs and her scabbard hooked to my own belt.
We’d changed clothes before we’d left the Bunker, and Zoe, Ian, and I were dressed all in black, just like we had been during last night’s training mission. So were Takeda and Aunt Rachel, although Mateo and Professor Dalaja were still wearing their regular clothes.
“All right, guys.” Mateo stopped typing. “I’ve looped the security-camera footage, so if the guard inside checks the feed, all he will see is empty rooms, instead of the three of you sneaking around.”
Takeda looked at Zoe, Ian, and me. “You guys find the Chloris box, replace it with the fake, and leave. Remember that one guard patrols the inside of the museum, checking on the rooms and exhibits. Don’t let him see you. Rachel and I will take up positions outside the building and keep an eye on the two guards who patrol the grounds. Dalaja, you’ll stay here in the van with Mateo and help him monitor everything.”
We all nodded.
I opened one of the back doors so that Zoe and Ian could climb out of the van. I followed them and shut the door behind us, while Takeda and Aunt Rachel got out of the front of the vehicle. Then we split up. Takeda and Aunt Rachel darted to the left, crossed the parking lot, and vanished into the trees that surrounded the museum, while Zoe, Ian, and I went right and hurried over to a set of glass double doors that served as one of the museum’s side entrances.
It took us less than a minute to reach the door
s. I slid Babs out of her scabbard, while Ian raised his ax. Then we flanked Zoe, who slid her backpack off her shoulders and pulled out her lockpick gun.
While Zoe used her gadget on the doors, my gaze cut left and right, taking in everything around us. Beside me, Ian did the same thing.
In many ways, the exterior of the Cormac Museum was just like the Library of Antiquities. Manicured lawns dotted with towering trees and thick bushes surrounded the building, while stone paths curled through the grass, many of them lined with black wrought-iron benches and streetlights. Given how cold it was, no one was walking along the paths or lounging on the benches, even though the streetlights’ warm, golden glows created a picturesque scene—along with plenty of dark, sinister shadows.
I peered into the inky shadows that pooled around the trees and bushes. I didn’t see anything except the branches waving and the leaves quivering in the gusty breeze, but I couldn’t help but feel like Covington and Drake were out there somewhere, watching us. Or maybe I was just being superstitious again. Still, every time it seemed like we were a step ahead of the Reapers, we found out the hard way that we were actually three steps behind. Takeda and Professor Dalaja didn’t think that Covington knew about this new Chloris box yet, since the museum had just put it on display today, but I was willing to bet that he did.
I just hoped we’d get to the artifact first.
“And…open sesame!” Zoe said in a proud voice.
“Already?” Ian asked.
“Yep.” She slid her lockpick gun into her backpack, zipped it up, and hoisted it onto her shoulders. “This lock was a piece of cake compared with the ones at the Library of Antiquities. You would think the museum would have better security, given all the artifacts inside.”
I grimaced. A piece of cake? Mateo had said that last night, right before we all got mock-killed. Even if I wasn’t superstitious, Zoe’s words still would have made worry bubble up in my stomach. Because if we could break into the museum this easily, then so could Covington and Drake. But I didn’t share my concern with my friends as Zoe opened the door and stepped inside.
Spartan Destiny Page 7