A loud buzzing cut off the remainder of her words. It came from behind them, soaring up and over the edge of the building. A single scanner drone none of them had seen or heard approaching. They raced across the roof, trying to get out of its path, and for a moment, Ridley thought they’d made it. But the drone stopped. Then a blinding spotlight shone down on them and a siren began blaring.
“Quick, before the cops arrive!” Ridley yelled, her hands already glowing. That pounding ache was back in her temples and behind her eyes, but as long as she wasn’t blind with pain or puking up her insides, then she’d force her magic out.
Dad caught her arm. “Are you sure you—”
“Yes! I’d rather not die!” They ran to retrieve their bags, and the drone’s spotlight followed them. “Archer!” Ridley yelled, holding one hand out to him as she lifted her backpack with the other.
“No, let’s split up,” he said as he reached her side. “I’ll take your amulets and go into the building. I’ll hide them somewhere. You get to safety.”
“The bunker,” Ridley said immediately.
“No.” Dad shook his head as he handed the collection of amulets to Archer. “I have contacts who’ll help us. We can—”
“Your contacts will probably end up dead for helping us, Dad,” Ridley argued. “We have to get underground. It’s the safest place for us to be. You can’t avoid the magical community forever.” She looked at Archer and told him, “We’ll be at the bunker. Now go quickly!” As he took off toward the door leading into the building, she spun around, looking for the cat. It leaped at her, and she caught it clumsily. Dad groaned and muttered something Ridley couldn’t hear properly over the sound of the siren and the pounding of her own head. He wrapped his arms around her as she squeezed her eyes shut. And, despite the pain slicing through her skull, they were both lifted into the air and whisked away on the wind.
Ridley barely lasted a few blocks this time. As she and Dad became visible in a deserted part of one of the train stations, the cat jumped free of her hands. “Ridley?” Dad caught her as she staggered. “Are you okay?”
Her stomach heaved before she could answer, but she hadn’t eaten anything tonight and there seemed to be nothing in her stomach to throw up. “The dizziness … from spinning through the air … makes the nausea worse,” she managed to say. “I can’t seem to keep hold of the magic while my body is trying to throw up.”
“At least we got away from that screaming drone,” Dad said. “Here, sit down.” He took the backpack from her and led her to one of the benches alongside the railroad track. “I’ll do that conjuration again. It seemed to help a little, right?”
“Yes.” Ridley leaned forward on her knees while Dad pulled magic from the air. It was still so strange to see him doing that. Before the other night on the Brex Tower balcony, she hadn’t seen him use magic in years. He swept his hands through the air in a series of swift movements before pushing the resulting magic toward her. She shut her eyes as it drifted across her face. Moments later, the nausea began to subside and her head didn’t feel like it was throbbing quite so intensely.
“Any better?” Dad asked.
“Yes. There’s still some head-hammering pain behind my eyes, but it isn’t as bad.”
“I don’t think you should use magic again,” he said. “We can walk from here. If it’s an emergency and we have to get away quickly, then you can make us disappear.”
“Okay.” Ridley looked around, but she couldn’t tell which station they were at. “Do you know which way the bunker is from here?”
“Ridley, I’m really not sure about going there. You know it’s dangerous to be around a large group of magic users. Anyone could discover them at any moment, and then their entire community will wind up dead.”
“Dad, they’ve remained hidden for almost a decade.”
Dad heaved a sigh. “True, but the risk is still there.”
Ridley rubbed her forefingers against her temples. “I don’t understand. We can’t stay in Lumina City, right? We have to leave. And the only way for us to get to the other side of the wall is through that bunker. So we have to go there eventually.”
Dad nodded slowly. “I know you’re right. In the back of my mind, I know I’m only delaying the inevitable.”
Ridley lowered her hands and focused on his face. His tired eyes, and the silvery gray in his dark hair. “It’s really not that bad down there,” she reassured him. “And we don’t have to stay there long.”
“All right then. I guess that’s where we’re headed.”
Nothing went wrong on the way to the bunker, which Ridley took as proof that it was the right decision to go there. Dad knew how to get to Jasmine Heights, and, once they were there, he knew how to locate the passageway that ended with the door leading down to the bunker. Which was a good thing, because the only other way Ridley knew of was via a trapdoor in Ezra’s apartment.
Dad knocked twice on the door, and it was only when it swung open that Ridley remembered the rose bush. With so many leaves, twigs, and thorns tangled around one another, it filled the space ahead of them and was impossible to see over. “Well, that’s new,” Dad said. “Last time I was here, this was a stone wall with a phoenix carving at the center. You had to know which of the phoenix feathers to touch in order to get the wall to disappear.” He looked at Ridley. “Do you know what to do?”
Ridley eyed the many red roses. “The highest rose,” she said. “That’s what we have to touch. I think it’s that one.” She pointed to the spot she remembered Archer reaching up toward. Dad stretched upward, and the moment his fingers brushed the rose, the twigs began to retract. Green and red were replaced instantly by vibrant glowing blue, reminding Ridley that the rose bush was nothing but a magical illusion. It flattened itself against the walls and ceiling, revealing the same two broad-shouldered men who had been standing guard last time: one with copper-colored skin and dark tattoos marking his arms, the other pale and bald with multiple piercings.
“Um, hi,” Ridley said. Her headache had been lessening, but pain pulsed a little harder throughout her skull as her heart rate increased. “It’s a coincidence that you’re here again, right? I mean, you don’t spend all your time at this door, do you?”
The two men looked at Ridley, then at Dad, and finally, at the magic-mutated cat sitting beside Ridley’s ankles. But neither said a word. It was then that Ridley remembered Archer speaking some sort of pass phrase. “The, um, the moon is out—no, the moon is hidden tonight.” The tattooed guy raised an eyebrow. “Look, if it’s changed, I’m sorry,” she continued. “That’s the only one I know. You do remember me, right? It hasn’t been that long since I was here.”
“I remember you,” Tattooed Guy said. His eyes shifted to Dad. “Don’t remember him though.”
“Christa knows me,” Dad told him.
The two men looked at one another. “Funny how everyone says that.”
“Look, you know the drill,” Bald Guy said to Ridley. “We can’t let him in until we’ve confirmed with Christa.”
“Sure, yeah, okay. As long as you don’t try to kill us like last time.”
Dad’s eyes snapped toward hers. “They tried to kill you last time? You told me it wasn’t that bad down here.”
Ridley rubbed above her eyebrows with her thumb and forefinger, attempting to massage away the last of her headache. “Technically, I think they were trying to kill Archer. I just happened to be with him.”
Bald Guy let out a long-suffering sigh. “We weren’t trying to kill him. We just wanted to incapacitate him and lock him in a room while we called Christa. Things would have been much simpler if he hadn’t fought back.”
“Things would have been much simpler if you’d just told us that.”
“Can you please just fetch Christa?” Dad asked. “Without any attacking or locking in rooms? We’ll happily wait back out there in the hallway.” He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder.
“No need,” Tattooed Guy said. �
�You can stand right where you are. We’ll send a message to—”
“Actually,” Bald Guy said, looking down at a commscreen in his hand, “she says it’s cool. You can meet her in the beach rec room.” He looked at Ridley and added, “She says you know where that is.”
Ridley glanced up and around for any sign of a camera. “She’s watching us, isn’t she.”
“Yes. She doesn’t always have time, but tonight, yes. She’s watching.”
“Great,” Dad said, and Ridley couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic or not. “You know where to go?” he asked Ridley.
“Yes.” She led the way past the two men and down the stairs, with Dad on one side and the cat on the other. There had been a lot of running, shouting, and offensive magic-use the last time she was down here, but without all that, it was fairly simple to get to the rec room she’d met Ezra in. Once they’d made it all the way down the stairs, they entered a cavernous tunnel with a canal running through it. A slow-motion replay of Archer falling toward it from high above flashed across Ridley’s mind, but she pushed the memory aside with a shiver. It made her sick to think of what would have happened if her magic hadn’t caught him.
She and Dad—and the cat, of course—crossed the bridge to the other side of the canal and walked through the conjured forest of trees and bushes that grew from the concrete alongside the water. The same luminous pink jellyfish she’d noticed last time pulsed through the water, and lilies floated at the canal’s edge. Vibrant blue tinged the edges of their petals, the only visible sign that all of this was made of magic.
Ridley turned away from the canal and moved through the trees toward the arched doorways that stood at intervals along the wall. She looked into the first room, which didn’t seem familiar, so she pushed past a few bushes to get to the next doorway. This room was also full of cozy couches, rugs, and a few tables and chairs, but it was the walls that told Ridley she was in the right place: they were covered in painted windows looking out onto a painted beach scene. Not a static scene, but one that moved in looping motion, depicting waves that appeared to roll up a sandy shore before sliding back into the sea. Paint infused with some sort of conjuration.
The room was empty except for a man lounging on a couch wearing headphones and a woman who’d just walked into the room from a door on the far side. “Maverick,” she said, a smile spreading across her face as she approached them. Her long brown hair was twisted into a messy bun on top of her head, and she scooped a few gray strands behind her ears as she stopped in front of them. “It’s been a long time,” she said, holding her hand out to clasp Dad’s. Then she turned her green gaze to Ridley. “It’s good to see you again too. I had no idea when we met last weekend that you were Maverick Kayne’s daughter. Ah, and you have an illegal pet,” she added with a grin, looking down at the cat. “How fun.”
“Christa, thank you for letting us in,” Dad said before Ridley could answer. “We need to stay here for a few days, if that’s okay. Do you have space?”
“Yes, I’m sure we can find an unoccupied room. You’re both very welcome here.”
“Thank you. It definitely won’t be for long. We’re heading out of the city. I’m sorry I didn’t contact you sooner to make arrangements. Our decision to leave was very … sudden.”
Christa cocked her head as her eyes returned to Ridley. “You’re the other one they’re looking for.”
Ridley blinked, her head throbbing anew as her pulse ratcheted up again. “I’m sorry, what?”
“It’s all over the news. Two women used magic at a party tonight. Very unusual, dangerous magic, though no details were given as to what exactly that means.” Ridley remained quiet as she tried to decide whether to confirm or deny Christa’s words. Dad shook his head almost imperceptibly, but before Ridley could come up with a lie, Christa said, “You’re one of them, aren’t you. An elemental.”
Surprise flashed across Dad’s face. “You know about them?”
“Yes. I don’t know too much, but I’m aware of their existence.”
“I see. Well, I … I hope you’ll forgive me for not saying anything when we used to know one another,” Dad said. “You understand the need for secrecy, I’m sure.”
“Of course, yes.” Christa looked at Ridley again. “Does Archer know?”
“Um, yes.”
“Oh, I wonder why he didn’t tell me. Anyway, you’ll be pleased to know Callie made it here safely.”
“Callie?” Ridley repeated. “Callie Hemingway?”
“Yes, the other woman who used magic tonight. Weren’t you with her when both of you ended up using magic?”
“Yes. But …” Ridley shook her head. “She said she was going to hide out at home. That she’d be safe there. She had no interest in leaving the city with me. I didn’t realize she even knew about the magical underworld down here.”
“Apparently she’s known for years. Her father discovered this bunker while it was being built. She was quite honest about never planning to come here, but apparently the police showed up at her house, so she had no choice but to run. She said she used magic in a way she’d never used it before. Something she didn’t even know she could do.”
“Air, perhaps,” Ridley said quietly. “She screamed a lot when I did that earlier, so it’s possible she didn’t know she can become the elements.”
“Well, then I’m guessing the two of you will have a lot to talk about.” Christa’s eyes sparkled as she smiled again. “Anyway, let’s go and find you guys a room.”
They left through the door on the other side of the room and entered a corridor. Some stairs and a few more corridors led them into what felt almost like an old house with wooden floors, a wooden staircase up ahead, and large, low windows on each wall. There wasn’t anything real on the other side of the windows, of course, but the walls were painted with the same conjured paint that had been used in the rec room.
They climbed the stairs and stopped on the next landing up. The wall to their left and right each had two doors, as did the wall ahead of them, though one was open to reveal a bathroom. Ridley assumed the others were bedrooms. “Do you mind sharing?” Christa asked as she walked to the left and opened the first door. She flicked a switch on the wall, and an overhead light came on. “We don’t have a lot of empty space left here.”
“I don’t mind,” Ridley said.
Dad nodded. “It’s fine. It won’t be for long.”
The room was only a little bit bigger than Ridley’s bedroom at home. A narrow bed sat on each side of the room, separated by a single bedside table with a lamp on it. Squished into the space beside the door, against the only other available piece of wall, was a small wardrobe. What made the room a little more welcoming, though, was the scene painted behind the fake window above the bedside table. It depicted a lake at sunset with snow-capped mountains in the distance. The lake rippled, and the occasional bird soared low over the water.
“Someone went to a lot of trouble to decorate all the walls in this place,” Ridley observed.
“Some people have been here a long time,” Christa said. “They need to keep busy somehow.”
“It’s great, thank you,” Dad said. “We appreciate this, Christa. I can’t imagine what it takes to keep a haven like this running, and I don’t want to take your hospitality for granted, so … if there’s some way we can contribute, some form of payment you’d accept, or—”
“Don’t worry about it now,” Christa said, a warm smile reaching her eyes again. “We can talk in the morning. See if there’s any way you can help out before you leave.” She clasped her hands together. “I hope you guys sleep well tonight. Oh, and the bathroom you saw out there—” she pointed over her shoulder with her thumb “—is for you to share with the others who live on this landing.”
She left then, and the cat jumped onto the bed on the right hand side of the room. Ridley lowered her backpack beside the cat, wondering if she should come up with a name for the animal that seemed to want to follow
her around. After retrieving her small toiletry bag, pajama bottoms, and a T-shirt, she went to the bathroom to change. Dad used the bathroom after her, and when he returned, Ridley was sitting up in bed, staring at her blank commscreen while the cat slept beside her.
“You didn’t turn that on, did you?” Dad asked immediately.
“No.” Ridley turned the commscreen over and over in her hands. “I just wish I could tell Meera everything that’s going on.”
“You can’t tell Meera,” Dad answered.
“I understand, Dad, I’m saying I wish I could. I feel terrible about vanishing with no explanation. She’s already confused about Shen, and now I’m disappearing too? She’s going to be so confused and upset. And there’s the fact that you’re gone too. She’ll try to find out what’s happened to us.”
“Mei will come up with something,” Dad said as he pulled back the duvet on his bed.
Ridley lowered her face into her palms. “That’s even worse. Lies upon lies. They just never end. Oh,” she added, looking up as she remembered something. “Malachi.”
“Who?”
“The first elemental I found. I was going to meet him again tomorrow. I need to tell him I’m—”
“You don’t have to tell him a thing, Ridley.”
“I don’t want to leave him hanging. He needs to know I’m leaving the city.”
“No, he doesn’t.” Dad repositioned his pillow before lying down and pulling the duvet up to his chin.
“Dad, he just found out that he’s not alone. He’s excited, looking forward to spending time with someone who understands what it’s like to be a freak, and—”
“You’re not a freak, Riddles.”
“I know that now, but I’ve spent my whole life believing I am—and so has he—and that doesn’t just go away overnight. And now I’m just going to disappear without a word? That’s not fair.”
Dad turned onto his side to face her. “Ridley, you can’t contact him. You know that. Someone might be trying to track your commscreen, so you need to keep it turned off. In fact, you should probably get rid of it.”
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