Noble shakes his head.
“It’s bloodquest,” Yestin reveals. “With any luck, it will work as a passkey for the Bluetooth connection.”
“Then let’s try it.” Approaching the desk again, Noble interrupts Lorellina. “We’ve changed our minds,” he informs the blonde girl. “We want to visit Rufus’s computer. Is there a way into it from here?”
The girl stares at him blankly. “What?” she says.
Noble tries again. “We have the password for Rufus’s computer. We want to get in. Can you help us?” he queries—again, to no avail. The girl looks just as confused as Lorellina does.
“You want to go where?” the girl asks. But before Noble can do more than sigh, Yestin weighs in.
“Maybe we should give you the IP address and virtual port number. Would that help?”
The girl nods, then begins to jab at her computer screen as Yestin reels off an endless string of digits. Meanwhile, Lorellina puts her mouth to Noble’s ear.
“Tell me why we have to visit this computer,” she hisses.
“To deliver a message,” Noble softly replies. “Yestin says we can put our threat up on the screen, where Rufus will read it.”
“Which Rufus?” The princess still sounds confused. “Our Rufus or the other one?”
“The other one.”
“Oh.”
“I wonder how Yestin knows all those port numbers and virtuous addresses?” Noble remarks vaguely. “Did Rufus tell him about those, too?”
The princess is unable to answer. And it’s not a question that can be put to Yestin just yet; not while he’s is still locked in conversation with the blonde girl. His password must have won her over, because she seems quite happy to be giving him instructions about what she calls our Bluetooth access to the personal area network. As some kind of machine chatters away beside her left knee, she directs his attention to a nearby elevator.
“Just use your swipe card. It’ll take you all the way,” the girl says, reaching down behind her desk for something.
“Swipe card?” Yestin echoes. “What swipe card?”
“Here.” The girl plucks a stiff little square of paper from an invisible slot and pushes it toward him. “Take the elevator up to the fifth floor.”
Examining the card, Yestin reads aloud, “COM5.”
“Just keep swiping it.” The girl produces another card, which she places in Noble’s outstretched hand. The third card goes to Lorellina.
“So is Rufus’s computer still running?” Yestin queries. “I mean, is it turned on?”
“Oh, yes.” The girl’s eyes flick toward her desk, as if checking a signal of some sort. “The device is discoverable.”
“What about our message? The one we just delivered? Has Rufus read that yet?”
“You mean the authorized one?” This time the girl has to dab at her computer screen a few times before answering. “It’s in-boxed,” she finally announces. “But it hasn’t been opened yet.”
“Thanks.” Turning to Noble, Yestin observes, “We’d better hurry. If Rufus sees Mikey’s message, he might panic. He might turn off his own computer, and then we won’t be able to get in.”
Noble nods. He follows Yestin to the elevator, which opens as soon as Yestin’s finger alights on the UP button. It’s another smooth, steel box, very streamlined and efficient-looking, with doors that close behind Lorellina with barely more than a gentle sigh. But when Yestin punches the button marked 5, nothing happens.
“Are we moving?” Noble asks with a frown.
“I don’t think so …,” says the princess.
“Whoops!” Yestin suddenly points at a bisected lump protruding from the wall. “I guess we have to swipe our card, first.”
He drags his card through the slot in the lump, pressing button 5 as he does so. The elevator immediately springs to life. Humming quietly, it ascends at a stately pace, giving Noble plenty of time to ask Yestin about the virtuous port numbers.
“They’re not virtuous, they’re virtual,” Yestin corrects. “And I saw them in that e-mail. The one I found on the garbage truck.”
Noble grunts. He’s casting his mind back, sorting through all the fresh-laid memories. Soon he dredges up a vague image of Yestin sitting in a sea of paper. “Are you talking about the letter you read to us?” he asks Yestin. “That one from Rufus to Mikey?”
“It had all of the source details in it,” Yestin confirms. “I remember them.”
“You remember everything,” Lorellina remarks, with a kind of grudging respect. But Yestin just shrugs and says, “I guess I must be programmed that way.”
Still the elevator keeps moving. It rises and rises until Noble begins to wonder if something’s amiss. Surely, the trip shouldn’t be taking this long? Surely, no building could be this high?
“Will we have to catch another train?” he asks Yestin.
“Maybe.” Once again Yestin shrugs. “Or maybe this is the delivery platform.”
“We have no tokens for a train,” Lorellina observes, so gloomily that Noble feels compelled to reassure her.
“We have the cards,” he points out. “Maybe they’ll work.”
At last, their elevator reaches the fifth floor. It bounces to a halt. Then the door opens onto a scene of utter confusion.
“Oh, dear.” After a brief, shocked pause, Yestin is the first to speak. “I guess this must be the computer firewall.”
Noble blinks. He can’t see any fires—or indeed any walls. All he can see is a very large, well-lit space divided by a long chain of booths, each occupied by a stern-faced, uniformed officer. In front of these booths, half a dozen long queues wind back and forth through a maze of ropes and stands. The lines inch forward every time somebody peels off to approach one of the booths, where a lengthy interrogation then takes place.
Noble decides that he’s arrived at a kind of indoor portcullis. The booths are arranged like iron bars, and the guards manning them are like chained dogs, defending their territory with questions instead of swords and shields. Perhaps they’re asking for the password, Noble thinks, his confounded gaze running over the weird array of applicants standing in line. There are men in white coats, who look a bit like the AV from Thanehaven. There are men wearing orange helmets and tool belts, toting lengths of pipe or spools of cable on their shoulders. There are messengers with bags of sealed envelopes; bedraggled old women propping themelves up on brooms or mop handles; broken-down men who keep getting turned back at the booths because they’re so diseased that they’ve left a trail of hair or teeth or maggots behind them on the floor.
Some of the applicants aren’t even human. Noble spots a black bear with a chain through its nose, a hulking monster made of steel, a one-eyed blue blob, and a sealed bag full of something that writhes and heaves and rolls forward every so often, propelled by whatever is tumbling around inside it.
“Hey! You!” a sharp voice exclaims. “Yes, you!”
Glancing around, Noble spies someone beckoning to him. It’s a short, stocky woman in a gray uniform. Standing near a line of elevators embedded in the rear wall, she seems to be directing traffic.
“Yeah, that’s right. You,” she says roughly. She has bad skin and is carrying too much weight around the middle. “You’re with that group, over there. Come on. Move.”
She gestures at a knot of figures to her left—and when Noble sees them, his jaw drops.
Lorellina grabs his arm. “Is—is that …?” she stammers, but can’t seem to finish her sentence.
Noble recognizes the crest of Thanehaven on a well-muscled warrior’s gleaming white surcoat. He can also identify the salt devils standing behind this warrior, even though they have more spikes and suckers than usual. He’s never encountered anything like the scaly silver horse looming over the salt devils, despite the fact that it bears a Thanehaven brand. And the legless, fork-tongued gargoyles are also strange to him.
But the three-headed Tritus in the warrior’s hand is a dead giveaway.
Noble frowns. “You mean we are in the computer?”
“Oh, I think so. Don’t you?” Yestin replies.
Just then, the squat woman in the gray uniform cries, “Keep moving, please! Let’s go! Over here, sir.” She’s addressing Noble. “It’s okay—you’re not jumping the queue. You, too, ma’am.”
She’s obviously classified both Noble and Lorellina as part of the Thanehaven group. After exchanging glances, they step out of the elevator and move into position. When Yestin tries to join them, however, the woman in gray intercepts him.
“Port number?” she says flatly.
“Uh …” After a moment’s hesitation, Yestin produces his card. The woman examines it, then gestures at another line.
“Over there.”
“But—”
“Sorry, bud. No piggybacking. No queue jumping, either.”
Yestin throws a terrified glance at Noble, who says sharply, “He’s with us!”
“No, he’s not.” The warrior in the white surcoat speaks up. He has long, dark hair and a neatly trimmed beard; his voice is as deep and resonant as Noble’s. “That boy doesn’t belong to this group.”
“Neither do we,” Lorellina points out.
“Yes, you do. You’re Princess Lorellina,” the warrior replies.
Noble attempts to dodge the outstretched arm of the woman in gray. At that very instant, however, Yestin suddenly has a change of heart.
“I’m all right! Don’t worry about me!” Yestin squeaks, as he’s pushed toward his designated queue. “It’ll be much easier if you stay with that group. I’ll meet you on the other side of the checkpoint, okay?”
“We’ll wait for you,” Noble promises Yestin, who looks tiny and fragile sandwiched between a large, angry-looking bird and a pile of books in a silver cart. Meanwhile, the warrior in white is talking to Lorellina.
“I am one of the Seven Scryers,” he’s saying. “I am Sangred, the warrior priest. I guard the Sacred Well of Thanehaven.”
Lorellina eyes him suspiciously.
“This is not Thanehaven,” Sangred continues. “This must be a mystic vision. I have many mystic visions.”
But the princess isn’t interested in Sangred—or his mystic visions. Turning her back on him, she addresses Noble in an undertone. “We need Yestin. We need him with us.”
“I know.”
“How can we give our message to Rufus without Yestin? Yestin understands how it should be done.”
“I know.” Noble lets the Thanehaven group shuffle past him as he pauses to check on Yestin’s progress. Lorellina is right; they can’t post a message without Yestin’s help. Nor can they abandon the boy. It was cruel enough, abandoning Brandi and Lulu and Lord Harrowmage. Abandoning Yestin would be even crueller.
“When I wake up, I will have many truths to convey to the other scryers,” Sangred remarks, near the head of the line. “Truths revealed to me in this vision of the Otherworld.”
Suddenly, Noble has an idea.
“This is more than a simple vision, my lord,” he exclaims. “This is a vision of the future. This is a prophecy.”
“A prophecy?” Sangred echoes.
“A prophecy of the Seven.” Though Noble has never met a single one of the Seven Scryers, he knows that they’re prophets. He knows it the way he knows how to fight. It’s built-in knowledge. “What you’re seeing here is the future of Thanehaven,” he declares. “Soon there will be legless gargoyles in Thanehaven. And bigger, stronger salt devils. And horses covered in silver scales. These things will be ranged against our kingdom, but we must take heart. Because that boy over there will deliver us.”
When Noble indicates Yestin, Lorellina smiles. It’s the first real smile that Noble has ever seen on her face, and he’s astonished at the difference it makes. Her teeth look so perfect. Her dimples look so pretty.
How beautiful she is, he thinks. I keep forgetting.
“That boy over there cannot save us,” Sangred objects. “He is small and weak. He’s not a part of our group.”
“He will be if you invite him to join us,” Noble points out. Then, before Sangred can say anything else, he adds, “If you make the wrong choice in this dream, only bad things will come to pass. But if you make the right choice, you will be aided in your fight against any future perils.”
Sangred frowns, glancing at the nearest gargoyle.
“Yestin looks small and weak for good reason,” Noble continues. “If you had three cups set out in front of you—a gold one, a silver one, and a stone one—which would you choose?”
There’s no reply from Sangred. He ponders, his gray eyes searching Noble’s face.
“Maybe you would choose the gold or the silver cup,” Noble says, “because stone doesn’t gleam. But the stone cup would be the strongest.”
“It would,” agrees Sangred.
“Then choose the stone cup! Let the boy come with us, or Thanehaven will struggle to defeat all these new foes!”
Sangred nods slowly—just as the guard in the nearest booth beckons to him. For an instant, the warrior priest hesitates.
“Go,” mutters Noble. “You’ve been called.” Then he turns and summons Yestin with a twitch of his head.
This time, Yestin takes care not to attract the female guard’s attention. He makes sure that she’s looking away from him before he ducks below the surface of the milling crowd that separates him from the Thanehaven team. This swirling, chattering crowd is made up, not only of hopeful applicants, but of those refused admittance. So while half the crowd is shoving forward, the other half is trying to force its way back to the elevators.
Noble worries that Yestin is going to be trampled in all the confusion. There’s so much pushing and pulling that he nearly gets trampled himself—especially when the scaly silver horse rushes to join all the gargoyles and salt devils who are now treading on Sangred’s heels. Sangred is explaining himself to the guard at the booth up ahead. There’s so much background noise that Noble can’t hear what he’s saying.
“We have to hurry,” Lorellina warns.
“I know.” All at once Noble catches sight of Yestin, who’s wriggling through a mass of tightly pressed bodies. Noble grabs him. With Lorellina in the lead, they rush over to the booth where Sangred has just been given permission to admit his entire group.
Sangred pauses for a moment, as the gargoyles and salt devils jostle him. His expression is mildly anxious. But it clears when his gaze finally falls on Noble.
“This is the boy?” asks Sangred.
“Yes,” Noble affirms.
Sangred gives a satisfied nod. He ushers first Yestin, then Lorellina, then Noble past the guard’s booth. No sooner does he fall in behind them, however, than a sharp voice pulls him up short.
“Wait!” says the guard. “Hold it right there.” He rises from his seat, peering over the counter. “Who is that kid? He’s not one of your people!”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“The boy is with us,” Sangred protests.
“No, he’s not,” snaps the guard. “Look at his outfit! That T-shirt doesn’t belong in Thanehaven.”
“I have a swipe card!” Yestin holds it up, edging away from the guard until he’s backed up against Noble. “I know the password! It’s bloodquest!”
The guard scowls. As Noble wraps an arm around Yestin, his gaze darts back and forth, frantically searching for an escape route. But the space into which he’s emerged is almost identical to the space on the other side of the booths. It’s long and narrow, with elevators along its rear wall and a large set of double doors at either end. The only difference that Noble can see is that there aren’t so many people in this half of the room.
“Please get back to where you were.” The guard leans across his counter, reaching for Yestin. “You belong in the red zone. You haven’t been cleared for this zone, yet.”
“The boy is important,” Sangred argues. He inserts himself between the guard and Yestin. “You have to let him through.”
“I’m sorry, sir, but he needs to make his own application for admittance,” the guard retorts. “He might have a password, but he’s on his own. Can’t you see that? He’s a rogue subprogram that you’ve picked up along the way.”
“You’re lying.” Sangred speaks with such confidence that even Noble is surprised. “That boy is Thanehaven’s best hope for the future. I have made my choice, Sentinel. I have chosen deliverance. And if needs must, I plan to defend my choice.”
“Sir—”
“Test me and I will rise to the challenge!” Sangred’s voice rings out like a tolling bell as he raises his Tritus. “For I am Sangred, son of Foretell, and no dark force will deter me in this world nor any other!”
For one breathless moment, time seems to stand still. It crosses Noble’s mind that Sangred’s Tritus must be dead—or perhaps asleep—because she isn’t reacting at all. She’s just sitting in his hand like any lifeless weapon. She doesn’t try to shape-shift. She doesn’t even bare her teeth.
The guards respond just as sluggishly. They stand and stare as Sangred continues to address them.
“I know you represent Lord Harrowmage and the tides of chaos! I know that you wish to point me down the wrong path! But I will choose wisely, and woe betide you if you oppose me in my wish!”
“He’s gone viral,” says one of the guards. Like a signal, these words trigger an immediate reaction. All at once a high-pitched wail fills the room, making everyone jump. Eee-aw-eee-aw-eee-aw …
A red light begins to flash on the ceiling.
“We’ve got a viral infection here!” The guard who’s been dealing with Sangred looks around for help. “It’s a breach! Code Red! I need backup!”
Uniformed guards immediately rush toward him from every direction. When Sangred swipes at them with his Tritus, even more guards join their comrades, some from the elevators, some from the booths. “It’s a breach!” they cry. “It’s malware! It’s a lockdown!” They’re so intent on pushing Sangred back into line that they seem to have forgotten about Yestin—at least, for the moment.
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