by Gage Lee
The look in her eyes told me that Consul Reyes was behind this whole mess. She wanted me destroyed. But I’d beaten her and saved my clan.
I won.
So why did it feel like I’d stuck my neck into her noose?
The Return
THE GOLDEN WARDENS summoned a portal and deposited me in the family room at the Hark family’s vacation home. Then they vanished without saying a word, leaving Clem and her parents staring at me with their jaws hanging open.
“Are you all right?” Adjudicator Hark asked, stepping around the couch to put a hand on my shoulder. She’d snapped into business mode and looked ready to file a dozen petitions on my behalf if they had snipped a single hair on my head. “We reached out to the Marshal’s service the second they took you, but no one could tell us where you’d gone.”
“I’m fine,” I said, though the ordeal had left me shaky. The adrenaline would take hours to burn off. “The Consul Triad just wanted to have a little chat.”
That set off a barrage of questions that was almost as draining as the tribunal had been. Reliving my hearing with the Triad left me antsier than ever to get back to the School of Swords and Serpents. I needed to have Tru reach out to Shambala as soon as possible.
“You’re in treacherous waters, Jace,” Adjudicator Hark warned as her daughter and I gathered up our luggage. “I’ll look into this from the legal side. Be careful until you hear from me.”
Clem and I dropped our bags near the front door, and she gave both of her parents’ warm hugs. Then she dragged me over to do the same. Her father and I exchanged awkward handshakes, but her mother pulled me into her arms. It was strange to be held like that, and on top of all the day’s stresses, it was nicer than I could have imagined.
“You have allies,” she whispered to me. “We won’t abandon you.”
Clem’s phone buzzed before I could ask the adjudicator what she meant by that. “Time to go, Jace,” she said. “Limo’s here.”
The first-class ride would have been awesome, if my brain could think about anything other than the deadline hanging over my head. In twenty-four hours, either I’d be a clan elder, or I’d have a bunch of new monk roommates in the Far Horizon. Everything hinged on convincing the former hollows to join me.
When I finally did get my train of thought headed in a new direction, it steamed right into a dark tunnel clogged with worries about my interrupted dream. If Maps didn’t contact me again, how would I know how to finish my quest for the Empyrean Flame?
I fretted about that until the limo glided to a stop and we emerged from its comfy interior into a snowy predawn morning in Germany.
“I thought ending the heretics would calm things down,” I said to Clem as we made our way through the International Portal Station. The building was a masterpiece of jinsei architecture with soaring ceilings and wide walkways, all lit magnificently by golden globes that orbited above the streams of patrons. The stunning design and warm light couldn’t hide the stark faces of the guards, who watched the crowds of passing pedestrians with suspicion and shouldered weapons.
“This is a major transition point. Security is heavy,” Clem said confidently. “I’m sure things are more relaxed in the rest of the world.”
She very well could have been right. We were in a very secure neck of the woods. But the tension I sensed in every guard we passed told me something was wrong. Before I could gnaw on that, though, the attendants whisked us through an open gate to the School.
“Welcome back, Mr. Warin!” Abi’s friend greeted us as we exited the portal. That kid always seemed to be on duty. Must’ve been working his way up the ladder like Abi had.
“Have a good holiday?” I asked as Clem and I headed for the exit.
“The best!” he half shouted as we waved goodbye.
Clem took my hand once we were alone in the hallway. She grinned up at me, her asymmetrical purple bangs hiding her right eye. She’d switched styles again. Baroque patterns of gold stitching covered her robes. Her makeup, not as harsh as it had been after her stint in Kiev, now favored bold splashes of color on her cheeks and above her eyes. “Thanks for coming home with me,” she whispered. “It meant a lot.”
To be honest, it had meant the world to me, too. After our trip to the Umbral Forge, I’d been at loose ends. Staying on the island retreat that Zephyr had arranged was nice, but I’d needed to surround myself with regular, boring life. Clem’s family had given me that gift.
“It was good being with normal people for a while,” I said with a grin. “Your parents, I mean. Not you.”
Clem snorted and dropped my hand to launch a blizzard of punches that were so fast the sleeves of her robes snapped like whips around her flying wrists. Gusts of wind burst away from her hands in a flurry of miniature whirlwinds.
I swatted aside the blows with my right fist and sliced through the turbulence with a quick swipe of my left. That maneuver drained the aspects Clem had sent at me into my Thief’s Shield, and I returned them to her with help from my serpents.
She let out a startled squawk as the gusts struck her shoulders with enough force to knock her off-balance. With a laugh, Clem thrust both hands toward the floor behind her and unleashed a blast of air that put her back on firm footing. “I almost got you that time.”
“You wish,” I said and wrapped an arm around her waist. Our little sparring match had been just what I needed to take my mind off the troubles waiting for me. “They should still be serving dinner. I bet Eric and Abi are there.”
“I would have taken you out if I wasn’t starving to death,” Clem groaned. “I missed one meal and now my stomach aches like I haven’t eaten in days. Tell me this insane hunger goes away when I advance.”
“It does,” I assured her. The truth was, eating bored me since I’d advanced. Food and sleep just didn’t seem worth the effort. “But I’m not sure it’s an improvement.”
We pushed through the dining room doors a few minutes later, Clem’s head tilted back to inhale the delicious aroma waiting for us on the other side.
The biggest crowd of upperclassmen I’d ever seen had taken over the center of the dining hall. I’d only caught sight of a handful of sixth- and seventh-year students before, because they mostly spent their time out on special assignments. Finding so many of them in one place was interesting.
And disturbing.
All their eyes swiveled toward me when I entered the hall. For a split second, no one said anything. They just watched Clem and me walk across the room to the serving line.
“Let me grab some dinner,” I called out, “and then I’ll sign autographs. That’s why you’re all staring at me, right?”
“Oh, me, me!” Eric shouted from the table he occupied with Abi and Tru. He grinned like a fool, while the other two buried their faces in their hands.
My smart-aleck comment and Eric’s response lifted the weight of tension that hung over the room. The older students went back to their own conversations, pointedly ignoring me as I followed Clem to the food.
“That was weird,” she said. “Any idea what’s going on?”
I grabbed a tray for each of us, handed one to her, and started loading up calories I didn’t really need. “No clue,” I said. “But I don’t like it.”
First the security guards, now the upperclassmen. Just as soon as I saved my clan from extinction, finished the second and third legs of my quest for the Empyrean Flame, and figured out how to get the Reyes family off my back, I’d hop right on solving that mystery.
Clem loaded up her plate with three half-inch-thick slabs of prime rib, enough dinner rolls to choke a baby hippopotamus, and an orchard’s worth of fresh fruit and vegetables. She glanced down at the roast beef sandwich and nectarine on my tray and wrinkled her nose. “You’ll give me a complex if you keep eating like a bird,” she said.
“I live off sacred energy now,” I said. “I’m a wise old artist who has transcended the need for mere food.”
She kicked me in the shin
s, then dashed ahead of me to drop into the seat at the head of our usual table. I plopped down to her left, next to Tru and across from Eric and Abi.
“Welcome back, lovebirds,” Eric said through a grin. “How’d meeting the parents go, Jace?”
“It was great,” I said. “I think they like me.”
Abi and Eric both made a sarcastic ooohing noise while Clem and Tru rolled their eyes. I wanted to dive right into asking Tru to reach out to Shambala, but she had a plate of food in front of her and everyone seemed so happy to see us. I decided to finish dinner before jumping to more serious topics. “What did you guys get up to after you left the island?” I asked.
Eric flexed his arms and kissed his biceps. “You know, the usual. I headed down to the Atlanta Battle Federation for some training. Kicked some butt. Picked up my first prizefight date.”
The rest of us applauded that news, and Abi reached over to bump fists with Eric. “That’s awesome, man,” he said. “When do you go into the big leagues?”
Eric waved off the praise, though the ear-to-ear grin that split his face told me he loved it. “Next August,” he said. “The twenty-first. It’s nothing huge. Just a local fight.”
“Don’t sell yourself short,” I said around a bite of sandwich. I shoved an errant piece of roast beef back where it belonged and swallowed. “Most Federation fighters don’t even get a real bout until they’re out of school. It’s amazing they’d give you a shot so quick.”
Eric, Clem, Abi, and I all exchanged knowing glances. In Master Saito’s tomb, Eric had seen a vision of a future that guaranteed he’d be a Battle Federation champion. He’d given all that up to help me complete the first leg of our quest for the Empyrean Flame.
I’d worried Eric would resent me for that, but it looked like he’d used his anger to punch his way to victory. He would be the champion.
“What about you?” he asked Abi. “Do anything fun over the break?”
Abi toyed with the bowl in front of him, stirring long grains of basmati rice into a thick red curry dotted with chunks of crispy fried chicken thigh. “Nothing too fancy,” he said. “I went back home, helped around my dad’s church. There’s a lot more to do now with the seers out of commission. Everything takes longer to figure out.”
Every church and shrine had at least a couple of seers on duty. Before the Flame had taken a hike after the Gauntlet, they’d helped the priests lead their flocks. They’d also performed mundane tasks, such as predicting what maintenance was needed and when, offered financial advice based on their visions of the future, and used their predictive abilities to help streamline church operations. Now that the Flame wasn’t handing out free prognostication, the priests had to do things the hard way.
“Future blindness is freaking people out,” Tru said. She sliced off a chunk of bloody red sirloin and licked the dripping juice from its side. “The seers have finally admitted their gifts are gone for good. Rumor is that terrified the elders. Now they’re circling the wagons to protect their people against... something. Maybe each other.”
I wondered if the dragon’s information explained why the Consul Triad had tried to dissolve the Shadow Phoenixes. It made a sick sort of sense. Whoever got their hands on me would get a significant power boost. As much as I wanted to prod her for more info, I bit my tongue.
Tru didn’t know everything the rest of us had been up to, and I wanted to keep it that way. The dragons had sworn to protect the School of Swords and Serpents against any threats that came after me here, but the ancient creatures weren’t altruistic. If Tru learned something about me and my friends that would benefit Shambala, she’d report it to the Scaled Council before we blinked. Maybe it was paranoia, but even with my mother no longer a threat, I wasn’t ready to trust anyone with the whole truth about my plans. Not until we’d finished the entire quest.
As if sensing my urge to change the subject, Clem leaned forward and gestured for my friends to do the same. She gave us all a conspiratorial grin. “I can’t hold it any longer,” she whispered. “Jace, tell them your news.”
I spilled the beans on my possible new position, leaving out the penalty for failure. My friends didn’t need to carry that burden around.
Eric’s eyebrows rose progressively higher as he heard about my promotion. When I’d finished, he leaned back in his chair with a deep sigh. “That’s”—he contemplated his next words—“that’s really something. I don’t know what, but something.”
“It’ll be good,” I said. “If Tru would be so kind as to reach out to Shambala and help me arrange a portal for my former students, we’ll have this thing locked down in a few hours.”
Abi washed down a mouthful of curried chicken with a long drink of water. He stared down at his bowl for a moment, then straightened his shoulders to look me in the eye. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” he asked. “Bringing those kids here, I mean. They were safe with the dragons, right?”
That was a reaction I hadn’t expected from my friend. I stifled a flash of irritation at his question. The anger vanished the instant my eyes landed on Abi’s wheelchair. He was an experienced sacred artist and I hadn’t kept him safe during our adventure to the Umbral Forge. I furrowed my brow and considered the idea that maybe I couldn’t protect my new clan members, either.
“They’ll be safe here,” I said, trying to convince myself as much as Abi. “It’ll be good for them to come back and study with other humans. No offense, Tru.”
The young dragon threw a fake punch into my shoulder and waggled a finger at me. “You humans always think you know best,” she said with a grin. “This time, though, you’re right. The climate is too chaotic to risk the loss of a clan. I’ll reach out to Zephyr after dinner. As long as none of the students have an issue, we’ll have them here tomorrow morning. The dragons will keep their word.”
“Thanks,” I said. “With any luck, it won’t be necessary, but—”
Tru finished the last of her steak and pushed back her chair. “I hope so, too. But keep in mind that not everyone will be happy to see those kids show up at school under your clan’s banner. Things could get... political. And Shambala’s protection has limits. We won’t involve ourselves with clan infighting. Human politics are none of our concern.”
There was something oddly stilted in Tru’s words. She was being a good friend by telling me that, but she was also representing the dragons. This was her way of letting me know I wouldn’t be protected by Shambala if my shenanigans landed me in trouble with the other clans.
That worried me.
“Leaving so soon?” Eric asked, disappointed that the dragon was leaving. “There’s more steak if you want some.”
Tru laughed and shook her head. “I’ve had more than enough,” she said. “I have to go check in with the Portal Defense Network and coordinate with Shambala on the transport of Jace’s new clan members.”
“I’ll catch up with you tomorrow,” Eric said. “Breakfast?”
“If you’re lucky,” Tru shot over her shoulder.
We all laughed at that as she walked away. She’d gotten almost an inch taller in the two weeks since I’d last seen her. I wasn’t sure how dragon biology worked, but that seemed like a lot.
“You can put your eyes back in your head now,” Clem said with a smirk.
At first I thought she was talking to me, and I opened my mouth to defend myself. But it was Eric who blushed, and he shook his head. “Can’t help it. She’s so dreamy.”
That started another round of laughter, and we all continued ribbing the Resplendent Sun as we finished eating. He took the jokes like a champ, laughing along with us good-naturedly, but I sensed a current of worry beneath his smiling mask. I fell back to walk beside Eric as we carried our trays to the bus buckets beside the hall’s door.
“What’s eating you?” I asked without preamble. “If it’s about Tru, we can stop—”
“It’s not that,” Eric cut me off with a rueful grin. “I mean, it’s partly that, but... I
don’t know. Maybe it’s nothing.”
“It doesn’t seem like nothing,” I said. “Come on. Spill it.”
Eric slowed his pace, and I dropped back to match him. When Clem and Abi were several yards ahead of us, he grabbed the sleeve of my robes and turned to face me. “Be on guard,” he said. “Tru downplayed it, but you need to hear the truth. The clans are nervous. The seers know something changed in the Grand Design, they just don’t know what. People are asking questions. A lot of them are about you.”
That was hardly news. I waved his concern off. “We’ll finish the quest, and everything will be fine. Trust me.”
Eric frowned and put his other hand on my shoulder. “I’m telling you this as a friend,” he said. “It’s not a warning or a threat, okay? But if the clans go to war, the four of us will be on opposite sides of the battle lines. As strong as you are, you need more allies, before all you have are enemies.”
Eric’s words were like a cold splash of water in my face. I hadn’t even considered that possibility. If push came to shove, could I fight my friends?
I hung back as Eric hustled to catch up to the others. Maybe Abi was right to worry about bringing the former hollows to the School. Maybe it would upset the balance of power with the other clans and accelerate the brewing conflict. Without the dragons’ protection, my young clan mates and I would face the full force of the other four clans.
I didn’t like those odds.
But leaving those kids in Shambala would kill my clan and cost me three years in exile. There was no way I’d finish the Flame’s quest from the Far Horizon.
I had to make this work.
The world depended on it.
The Right
MY FRIENDS AND I GATHERED in the dorm commons to chat for a while after dinner. Tru caught up with us there to let me know my special guests were excited to come to the School and would arrive at seven thirty the next morning. She headed to bed not long after, grumbling about working toward her advancement.