Guardian of Secrets (Library Jumpers, #2)

by Brenda Drake

  It was also during these quiet times that Bastien would enter my mind. I’d heard he was completing his final magic tests. What did a novice have to do to graduate to senior wizard? And was he okay? His deep blue eyes and confident smile played across my mind.

  He definitely had a rock-star appeal, as Lei had claimed the first time I met him. It was also then that I discovered we were betrothed to each other before I was born. The Wizard Council had put into law the betrothal system to prevent the birth of a child with two Sentinel parents that would bring the coming of the end. I was that child.

  The end of what? People believed both the human and Mystik worlds, but not my Uncle Philip. He thought it meant the end to an evil that had been simmering under the surface of our worlds for centuries—the Tetrad. An apocalyptic monster that could control the elements and bring about biblical-level destruction. Conemar wanted to control the monster. But we had stopped him.

  I hadn’t seen Bastien since we’d fought Conemar together and sent him to another realm—and not since Bastien had declared his feelings for me. I had hoped we could be friends. But mostly, I worried I wouldn’t see him again, and that scared me. I closed my eyes tight and made the thought go away.

  The sun played on my eyelashes, reminding me of the light blinking through the trees that surrounded the graveyard. The headstone with Proctor on it haunted me. Was it for someone in Emily’s family? Why was the cemetery so far from the city?

  Arik glided up to my side of the pool and said something.

  I popped my head up. “Huh?”

  “Are you ready for the next practice?”

  I straightened, my feet hitting the pool floor. “Is it time already?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  After we changed back into our gear, we met Carrig and Sinead on the secluded field past the pool for battle globe practice.

  Sinead taught us to retract our minds back into our subconscious selves and feel our globes from where they originated within our inner beings. She said it would help us control them better. It took several days for all the Sentinels to grasp this exercise.

  I threw my pink globe so far I couldn’t see where it landed. No one else in the group even came close to that distance. Sinead took me aside to help me learn accuracy in my throws. Before long, I was lobbing my globes, wherever my eyes focused. During practices, we discovered the bigger the globe I made, the more energy it sucked from me, so I created small spheres in my palm and threw them. Once they connected to an object, they exploded and covered it in a pink membrane, protecting or immobilizing its victim.

  Only one other person had had the same type of globe as I did, a boy who lived many centuries ago. He died before his thirteenth birthday from the plague. It was a protection globe, but apparently, it didn’t protect its owner from human diseases.

  Arik threw his fire globe. It landed against a tree trunk across the field and flames licked up the trunk. Jaran tossed his water globe and put the fire out; blue steam hissed from the bark. Demos ran out and lobbed his green wind globe. The blast of air hit the tree and knocked it over.

  “Hey, guys, be nice to the trees!” I yelled at them.

  Arik lobbed another globe at the tree. “Not to worry. It’s a fake.”

  Lei raised her palm and shot lightning from her white globe, and Kale stunned the flash in mid-air with his, turning the bolt purple.

  “All right, Gia, your turn.” Carrig stood behind me and watched me throw a few globes.

  “Has your truth globe returned?” he asked from behind me.

  I glanced at my hand. Each Sentinel had a magical globe they used in battle. But because both my parents had the Sentinel gene, I could conjure two—one that could test if someone was truthful and another that removed spells and protected whoever was inside its bubble. And now one was gone.

  My truth globe. With a drop of someone’s blood on its silvery sphere, it could tell me if that person was untruthful. I’d lost it when Lorelle, a faery on Conemar’s side, had cast an ancient spell on me.

  “No.” I lobbed a pink globe over Kale’s head.

  Kale spun around. “Hey, I said to stop that. You might miss or something.”

  I shrugged. “It’s not like my globe kills people. It just undoes charms and shields things.”

  “And disables my globe,” he added.

  “It comes back after a few minutes.” I threw a curve globe around him.

  “Jaysus,” Carrig said. “Grand throw.”

  Lei shot another bolt from her globe. It zapped across the field and landed just before the line of trees, illuminating a large figure in the shadows.

  “Who’s that?” I said, squinting.

  Carrig and Arik sprinted across the field toward the figure. Whoever it was tore off into the woods. My muscles tightened and I couldn’t move. Was it a spy? One of Conemar’s creatures? I shook off my fear and dashed after Arik, my heart beating fast in my chest. Branches and twigs snapped in the distance. My boots slipped down the hills. Lei came up from behind and passed me, easily descending the hill.

  I slid several times going down, bracing my hand against the ground, my fingers sinking into the cold dark soil. Carrig and Arik reached the street first, with Lei and then me after them. We searched both directions, but no one was there.

  “Could it have been an animal?” Lei scanned the trees. “Or a trick of the light?”

  “It be difficult to tell with the shadows,” Carrig said, combing his fingers through his hair as he searched the trees. “It might’ve been an animal. No one could get through the charms around this place.”

  “A powerful wizard could,” Arik said. “If we’ve been found, we should flee.”

  “Maybe we should contact Asile,” Lei said.

  Feet crunching on the gravel sounded behind us, and we all turned. Demos and Kale dragged a man dressed in all black who looked like he’d been stunned. Most likely from Kale’s globe.

  “Here’s your culprit,” Demos said, with a smug expression on his face.

  Carrig removed a leather rope from his belt and unraveled it. “Remove the stun,” he said.

  After Kale tossed a purple globe on the man to release him, Carrig whipped the rope at him. The leather sparked to life and wrapped around the man’s arms. He fought against its grips, the charge crackling with each of his struggles.

  “What is that?” I asked.

  “It’s a spelled whip,” Lei said. “The energy’s charge can be quite painful when tightened.”

  The man’s thick shoulders and large body looked like it could wrestle a bull and win. He glared at me with white-marbled eyes. I recognized him. He was the hunter who chased us through the T after we accidently jumped through the gateway book that first time.

  “You’re that hunter,” I said.

  The man growled at me. He actually bared his rotting teeth and growled.

  Arik gave me a baffled look and shot his eyes at the man. “Hold on there, it is him. I thought he was Conemar’s hunter.” He got down in the man’s face. “Who sent you?”

  “What hunter?” Lei looked from me to Arik.

  “The one who chased us in the Boston subway,” Arik said, “just after Gia and the others accidentally jumped through the gateway to Paris.”

  The man’s vacant eyes landed on me, holding my gaze. I couldn’t move or breathe, and everything around me blurred. A vision overtook me. The version of me in the image was cold and broken, lying face down on a ground covered in ice and snow. Am I dead? I wanted to scream but all that came out was a choking sound.

  “Don’t look in his eyes!” Arik dragged me away from the man and blocked my view with his body. “He’s compelled.”

  The vision vanished and my head stopped throbbing.

  Carrig tightened the slack on the electric rope, and the man shook under its power. “Hurts, doesn’t it? I can be nice and keep it slack, but you need to behave yourself. I’m sure you can understand me, right?”

  “What was that?�
� I felt like I was trying to balance on the floor of a turbulent plane. My knees buckled before Arik tightened his arms around me, keeping me upright.

  “The wizard compelling him was working your mind.” He held me close to his chest. “To weaken you.”

  “This is a very unfortunate development,” Kale said.

  “I’d say.” Demos paced in front of the man, staring him down. “We won’t get any information from him.”

  Arik glanced down at me. “How are you feeling?” he whispered.

  “Better.” The shakes had stopped, but my head still ached.

  Carrig’s eyes followed Demos’s frantic pacing. “Will you stop that, already? You make a man dizzy with all your back-and-forthing.”

  Demos stopped and gave him a smirk, then started pushing rocks around with the toe of his boot. Asking Demos to stop moving was like asking a bee to stop buzzing. Wasn’t going to happen.

  “There be a way to get something out of him,” Carrig continued.

  Arik looked over at him. “By what means?”

  “The Scryers can read his mind. See what the wizard had learned from the compulsion.” Carrig shuffled the man over to Kale and handed him the end of the whip. “Take him to Asile.”

  “Certainly,” he said. “I’m happy to dispose of trash.” The man grunted when Kale tightened the cord again.

  “What will Asile do with him?” I asked.

  “After they get what they need from his mind, they’ll send him to a Somnium prison,” Kale said, and tugged the rope for the man to follow him. “Shall we be on our way?”

  Demos trotted after them. “I’m coming. You don’t get to have all the fun, Kale.”

  “I’ll inform the others so they’re not chasing ghosts.” Lei climbed back up the hill and ducked under branches on her way.

  “What are we going to do?” I withdrew from Arik, swaying slightly as I stood on my own.

  Carrig started up the hill. “We heighten security until Kale and Demos return with the report from the Scryers. We must see what be learned from the hunter’s mind. Be prepared to move fast if need be.” He pushed a branch aside.

  Arik took my arm and guided me. “Can you manage it?”

  “I think so.” I stepped over a log. Every movement made me feel like my head would pop off and roll down the hill. If this was how Arik had felt when attacked by a compelled hunter, no wonder he’d been moody after his encounter. One of them had cornered him on the day I left my home for Asile and a new life. A life full of magic, danger, and Arik.

  On my first encounter with the hunter, he had been fierce on the platform to catch the T, easily tossing people out of his way and almost toppling the train to get to Afton and Nick inside. The massive man had left destruction in his wake. And he was here.

  How did he find us so fast?

  My boot sank into a muddy puddle. The mud slurped as I tugged my foot out. I pushed a branch out of my way. “Won’t the wizard controlling him know where we are?”

  “There be a delay in transmitting information,” Carrig said. “We can only hope my lasso broke the connection before the controlling wizard received our location. The Scryers can determine if it had.”

  “That hunter was previously in Conemar’s control,” Arik said. “Whoever has hold of the man’s mind now must be searching for Conemar’s whereabouts.”

  “That be likely so,” Carrig said. “When Professor Attwood comes tomorrow, I’ll have him increase the charms around our homes and the club.”

  I looked over my shoulder as we headed back to the others, half expecting a hunter to jump out at us. I knew we had gone into hiding for a reason, but the reality of it hadn’t settled in yet. There were possibly any number of wizards and their hunters searching for us. I no longer felt safe in this quiet ocean-side town.

  Chapter Four

  The council’s chambers were deep within the labyrinth of corridors in Asile’s castle. It resembled a courtroom, except round, with a mosaic copula overhead. Six high wizards sat at a long table elevated on a massive stone slab at the back of the room. One chair was empty, and I assumed it was for Conemar, the missing High Wizard of Esteril.

  I fastened the rhinestone clasp on the black silk clutch I’d bought at a secondhand store, worrying the Wizard Council’s questions would never end. I’d already given my statement, but they insisted I stay through the entire hearing in case they had any more questions for me. If the session went on much longer, I’d miss the play in New York.

  Crossing and uncrossing my legs, I couldn’t get comfortable on the stone bench. I’d rather be wearing jeans than the black dress I’d chosen for Broadway.

  Bastien sat in the witness box beside the wizards. His steel-blue eyes flitted in my direction, and I adjusted myself on the bench, again, lowering my gaze.

  A wizard, ancient-looking and bent over, spoke in a commanding voice. “You are Bastien Renard, son of Gareth, the former High Wizard of Couve?”

  “I am,” Bastien answered.

  “You said in a previous statement that Conemar had vanished.” The man cleared his throat. “Where did he go?”

  “As I have told you at the previous inquiry,” Bastien said. “I have no idea where Conemar is. The ritual I used is in that ancient spell book. You have it. What does it tell you?”

  Merl stood and cleared his throat. His dark hair had more silver in it than when I’d first met him. “As High Wizard of Asile,” he said, “I move that we end the proceedings. We aren’t learning anything new from these interviews.”

  A woman with dark hair and darker eyes rose from her seat on Merl’s left. “I am Akua, of the Veilig haven in Africa. My husband, Enitan Uba, apologizes for his absence here today. He has been stricken by a mysterious Mystik disease. My people are sickened by it. We have uprisings within all the havens. I vote for Enitan, and therefore, I second Merl’s motion. But in hearing the testimonies today, not only do I fear the further spread of disease, but also fear Conemar’s followers. They come from the most undesirables in the Mystik realm. I make a motion that we close all entries into the covens.”

  The rest of the wizards agreed.

  Bastien shot to his feet. “You can’t close the covens. What about the innocents that reside there?”

  “We understand your concern, Bastien Renard,” the ancient-looking wizard said. “But there is no other choice to ensure our safety. Aid will be sent to the covens during this time of quarantine.”

  Uncle Philip stood from his seat in the stand to the right of the wizard council. “I agree with Bastien. This action can only fuel the anger rising in the Mystik world.”

  “We have noted it,” the wizard said. “But the decision has been made. We are done here.” He scooted his chair out and hobbled to the steps of the stage.

  When we were excused, I waited in the corridor for Bastien.

  “Hello,” he said, stopping in front of me. The suit he wore fit him perfectly. “I see you couldn’t resist waiting for me.” He winked.

  There was no way I’d admit it. “I was waiting for Uncle Philip.”

  His gaze passed over me. “He exited through the back door with the high wizards and other council members.”

  “Are you okay?” I asked.

  “I will be fine.” He smiled. “I understand their concerns. But they are unfounded, and Couve will fight this order.”

  “Well,” I said, “It’s nice seeing you again. We haven’t seen each other since…”

  “Since I declared my feelings for you.”

  How could I forget the words he’d said to me? I had pushed them away from my thoughts. “I’m falling for you, Gianna,” he had said. “With time, I’ll prove to you we belong together. Go ahead and have your fun with Arik, but it’s my arms you’ll end up in one day.”

  My skin heated, and I hoped my blushing cheeks weren’t noticeable. “No. I meant since we fought off Conemar together.”

  A Mystik with long arms and grayish skin bumped me, knocking my purse from my h
and. It hit the floor hard and the fastener popped open, spilling the contents across the tiles.

  “Watch where you’re going—”

  The glare in the creature’s large coal eyes stopped me.

  “Don’t worry about him,” Bastien said. “He’s angry at the council’s order.”

  “I would be, too,” I said, watching the creature stomp down the hall.

  Bastien and I bent down at the same time to gather my things from the floor. I snatched up my root beer–flavored Lip Smacker, keys, and pack of tissues. He picked up the two tickets to the play in New York and inspected them.

  “To Kill a Mockingbird,” he said, standing. “A great story. The play is tonight. In fact, within the hour. You should hurry. Arik must be anxiously awaiting you.”

  I straightened, snapping my clutch shut. “He’s not into plays. I’m going alone.”

  “I enjoy the theater, and I’m dressed for it. Would you like some company?” He held the tickets out for me. Our fingers brushed as I grasped them, my breath hitching in my throat. Amusement lit in his eyes.

  Studying the tickets in my hand, I thought about Arik. Would it bother him if I took Bastien? It was innocent. We were only friends. Besides, I trusted Arik and he should feel the same about me.

  “I would love the company.”

  “Good,” he said. “We should be on our way, then.”

  The corridor had mostly emptied of people and Mystiks as we rushed down it. A crowd in the tunnel leading to the Bodleian Library in Oxford, England made me worry we’d miss the play.

  Bastien summoned the gateway book and thumbed through it to a photograph of the New York City Public Library. He studied the page to make sure the coast was clear. The images were like windows into the libraries. “You first,” he said.

  I made my jump into the page. Blackness—dark and cold—surrounded me. I enjoyed jumping through the gateway. I actually looked forward to it now. The chilly air refreshed me and the free fall was a real rush. The faint gray at the end of the portal came into view. I leaned back to slow down. The book flew off the shelf at the same time I came out of it, and I landed with almost no sound on the tiled floor. A few minutes later, Bastien shot out, and we rushed to the exit.