by Morgan Rice
Sam turned to Pol y. “I made a mistake,” he said. “I need to make it up. I need to try to rescue Caitlin.”
“Me, too,” Pol y said. “I’m coming with you.”
The door shook, as several more people banged against it.
“GO!” Aiden yel ed.
Sam took off at a running start, and felt Pol y right behind him. He leapt high up into the air, through an open window, and flew into the night.
Soon, the two of them were high in the air, racing towards the horizon.
He was determined to do whatever it took to save his sister.
And if that meant kil ing Kendra, then so be it.
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
Caitlin unrol ed the new scrol with shaking hands. Her heart pounded as she realized that it was the second half of her Dad’s letter.
She quickly took out the first half of the letter, unrol ed it, and held it up to this one. As she put them together, she saw that the ridges fit perfectly, and that now, final y, it was one complete letter.
She read the entire letter again, from the beginning: My dearest Caitlin:
If you are reading this, you have already surpassed many obstacles. It means that you have already chosen to travel the road less traveled, to take the difficult path. For that, I commend you.
You are truly your father’s daughter.
You must forgive al the riddles, codes, letters, and keys, but the secret that I guard is most powerful, and must be broken into fragments, to prevent others from decoding it.
Only the truly worthy—only yourself—are meant to decode the secret that you ultimately wil .
If you are reading this, you already have one key in your possession. You must obtain the final three to reach me.
The second key is your focus now. To find it, you wil first have to go to the Fields of the Scholars—
Now Caitlin lifted the second half of the letter:
—and you wil need to visit the Notre Dame and retrieve the key. The dagger wil point the way.
And don’t forget: the island is a big place.
We wil be together soon.
I love you.
Your father.
Caitlin read the letter again and again, completely bewildered. The dagger wil point the way?
What dagger?
Caitlin checked back inside the marble compartment, wondering if she had missed something.
She reached in deeper than she had at first, combing its wal s with their hands.
And then she felt it. Something was attached to the back of it.
She pul ed hard, and out came a smal , silver dagger. She was shocked. She had almost overlooked it.
Now she had the dagger, and she assumed that she would need to use it, somehow, in the Notre Dame, in order to find the key.
But what did he mean when he said that the island was a big place?
Al the clues seemed to indicate that the Notre Dame was the last stop. But then again, something bothered her about his letter. It felt too obvious, too straightforward to her. She felt that there was some embedded message in there she was missing.
At least Caitlin knew where she needed to go next.
As she stood to go, there was a sudden bang at the door, fol owed by the smashing of stained glass al around her.
She heard a chorus of angry shouts, and knew it was the mob. The humans, in the midst of their revolution. Her heart broke to see such beautiful precious, ancient glass shattering, fal ing to pieces al around her.
But this was not her war. Not her revolution. She had another war to wage. One far more dangerous.
And it began in the Notre Dame.
CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN
CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN
Caleb flew through the night, determined to rush back to Caitlin’s side. He hated himself. He didn’t understand how he could have been so stupid, so naïve. So easily misled.
Worse, he had left Caitlin for nothing. He had ruined their moment, the very time he was about to propose, the very peak of their love, to run off for an il usion. For a false belief that his son was stil alive.
He would never forgive Sera for what she’d done. For ruining his life—again.
But more importantly, he would never forgive himself for being so stupid. He should have listened to Caitlin, and stayed put.
As he flew, Caleb closed his eyes, and the image passed through it again: he recal ed his arriving back at his castle, and the sinking feeling of finding it empty. Caitlin gone. He had run through empty room after empty room, and had final y realized that she had left him.
Ever since then, he had combed the skies, had looked for her everywhere. Now he was combing Paris, block by block.
As he did, he received a sudden signal, like an electric shock to his system. It was the signal of Caitlin. Of her presence. Of her being in distress. He could feel it, in every pore of his body. She was in trouble, he was certain of it.
And he could now feel where it was coming from. From deep inside Paris.
Caleb changed course, heading towards a different section of Paris with new speed, new resolve.
He was determined to find her this time, and to make wrongs right.
This time, it would be different. This time, they would real y make a new start of it. Truly be together forever. This time he knew, there would be nothing to stand in their way.
And when they final y did get a moment together, alone, he would ask her the question he’d been dying to ask her from the start.
He would ask if she would be his wife.
CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT
CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT
Caitlin flew the short distance from Saint Germain Des Pres over the Seine river, and then over the Ile de la Cite.
She circled the smal , narrow island slowly, trying to take it al in. There, of course, was the Notre Dame, huge, enormous, towering over everything, the largest building on the island.
It was an overwhelming structure. The thought of finding whatever it was she needed inside it seemed daunting.
She circled the island again, trying to take it al in context, and noticed that the Notre Dame wasn’t the only building on it. There were rows of medieval houses, crooked al eyways, cobblestone streets, and other buildings spread throughout.
She looked down to see if the mobs were here, too, as they seemed to be everywhere else in Paris. Strangely enough, they were not. In fact, the square in front of the Notre Dame was completely empty. She found that to be odd. Why would the masses revolt everywhere else in the city, but not in its most famous place? Who was control ing them, exactly?
Caitlin swooped down lower, looking more careful y. Al was eerily silent. Was it a trap?
Caitlin landed in the huge, stone plaza before the church, having it to herself, and set Ruth down. The church was lit up by dozens of torches, and she stared up at its edifice in awe. It was massive, with huge, arched doors, and dozens of figures carved over it. She had been to many churches on her journey: she thought of the Duomo in Florence, St.
Mark’s in Venice, and dozens of others—but she had never been to a church as large as this. She also couldn’t help remembering that she had begun her journey here: did that hold some significance? Was she coming ful circle?
She walked right to the front door, and tried the knob, just in case.
To her surprise, it was open.
She turned and looked over her shoulder, sensing some danger. But she saw nothing there.
She turned and went inside, not liking the feel of this.
Everything was too quiet. Everything seemed too easy.
Caitlin looked inside the church, and was blown away by its size and scope. Here, the pews stretched as far as the eye could see, and the aisle seemed endless. On either side were enormous stone columns, the size of tree trunks, reaching high into the sky, culminating in a series of arches.
Between them were enormous candle chandeliers.
At the end of the a
isle sat an immense altar, crowned with dozens of statues. Caitlin wondered how anyone could worship in here—it was so large, it seemed like it could hold an entire city.
Caitlin reached down and felt the dagger in her hand, and wondered where on earth she should begin her search.
She sensed danger again, and spun, but saw no one. She suddenly felt that time was of the essence.
Caitlin closed her eyes, and summoned her inner power.
She al owed her senses to take over, to lead her. She wil ed herself to get calm, to get quiet, and to tune in to where the key might be. She knew that there was a key to be found, from the letter, and she knew that the dagger would play a part in it. But other than that, she had no idea where to look.
After several moments, her senses began to take over, and she felt a strong sudden impulse to head into the lower levels of the church.
She found herself walking to her left, through a large marble corridor, then turning down another corridor. She fol owed a series of statues along the wal , until she found herself led to a smal , narrow staircase.
Caitlin descended, twisting and turning, and final y, it lead her into a wide-open, low-ceiling, underground crypt. It was even more solemn down here, with only a few candles burning, and Caitlin could see that this was a mausoleum of some sort. Al along the wal s, as far as she could see, were sarcophagi. It looked like the perfect place for an ancient vampire coven.
Caitlin let her senses take over, and felt herself being led.
She walked down the long corridor, in the dank, musty air, passing one sarcophagus after another. Final y, she felt herself wanting to stop before one of them.
She examined it, and saw nothing out of the ordinary.
Caitlin was about to look elsewhere, but Ruth sat there, whining at it, not letting her leave.
Caitlin looked again.
As she examined the intricate design of the lid, the smal figure of a knight carved into it, the folded hands outlined on the stone, the armor, the belt, she realized something.
There was a slot in the belt, notched into the stone. Just wide enough, she realized, to hold a dagger.
Caitlin held up the smal , jewel-encrusted dagger, and gently inserted into the slot. It fit perfectly.
Encouraged, she pushed it al the way in.
A stone lever suddenly sank down, and a smal compartment opened on the statue’s palm.
Caitlin was amazed. A smal , gold key was now sitting in the statue’s palm.
Caitlin held it up, inspecting it, thril ed to have found it.
But she was also stumped.
This could not be the second key. This key did not look anything like the other one: it was smal and gold, not large and silver. It appeared to be a key to something else.
Caitlin suddenly heard a noise somewhere, high above, in the upper level of the church.
She quickly stashed the key into her pocket, grabbed Ruth, and hurried out from the crypt.
She ran up the steps, and onto the main floor of the Notre Dame. She checked both ways for danger, but saw none.
But suddenly, as she watched, the main front doors of the church were kicked open. To her shock, there suddenly rushed in a huge, unruly, screaming mob.
Caitlin sensed immediately that this mob was different from the other. These were vampires.
And at the center was a figure she recognized from the history books: Napoleon. She was surprised to discover he was of her kind—and that he was leading an entire coven, hundreds of vampires, charging right for her. She was vastly outnumbered.
It had been a trap, she realized. They had been waiting for her to come here, to find what it was they needed. And now that she was boxed in, they were determined to kil her off for good. She had been setup.
As the crowd charged, Caitlin thought quick. She closed her eyes, and focused on summoning her primal energy.
Her rage. She focused on her new powers, and she knew that she could fight off an army. She knew it.
As the hundreds of vampires charged, Caitlin suddenly charged them. At the last second, right before they col ided, she leapt high into the air, higher than she ever imagined possible, and grabbed hold of a huge, dangling chandelier, fifty feet off the ground. She immediately climbed its chain, scaling it faster than she could have imagined possible, heading straight for the ceiling. From there, she figured she could break her way through one of the huge stained-glass windows, and escape through the roof.
Just as Caitlin was getting close, suddenly, one of those huge ceiling windows shattered.
She looked up, and there before her, looking down, snarling, was one of the most evil looking creatures she had ever seen.
Six more stained-glass windows suddenly shattered, and she saw that there were seven of these creatures—huge, enormous, disfigured vampires. They blocked her access to the roof.
Caitlin was cornered in from both directions. She had no choice but to stand and fight.
She didn’t wait a moment longer. She grabbed hold of the chandelier’s chain, and snapped it off from the ceiling. The huge iron chandelier, twenty feet wide, plummeted straight down to the crowd below, Caitlin plummeting with it.
It landed on dozens of Napoleon’s vampires, crushing them beneath its weight.
Caitlin activated her wings at the last moment before she hit the ground, hovering in the air, and landed softly. On the ground, she then took the enormous candelabra by the end of its chain, and with her Herculean strength, she swung it over her head as a weapon. She swung in larger and larger circles, and as she did, the enormous iron knocked out dozens more of Napoleon’s men. She was a one-woman wrecking machine, and no one could come within fifty feet of her.
But then she heard an unearthly screech, and saw the seven evil creatures plunging down towards her. She took hold of the chandelier and with one last swing, hurled it, aiming right for one of them.
It was a perfect shot, and it took him out, sending him flying backwards and embedding him in a wal .
But that left six more of those things, and before Caitlin could react, one of them came down hard and kicked her, sending her halfway across the church. The creature had strength unlike anything she had ever fought. She smashed against a wal hundreds of feet away, the wind knocked out of her.
Caitlin felt that she could handle Napoleon’s men. But she didn’t possibly see how she could handle six of these things on her own.
Stil , she jumped back to her feet, ready to fight. And just in time. One of them was already in the midst of swinging for her head, and as she ducked, his large fist went right into the wal . Caitlin reached over, grabbed the sword off of his belt and decapitated him.
Sword in hand, Caitlin faced off with another of those things, which was already lunging for her.
She ducked just in time, then swung around and chopped him in half.
But that stil left four of them, and she was just not quick enough to handle al four at once. She felt herself being kicked hard from behind, right in the kidneys, and she went flying through the air, and smashed headfirst into a wal .
She got up, but now her world was blurry, and those things were bearing down on her, along with dozens of Napoleon’s vampires. She needed some time to regain her strength, but there was no time to be had. They were closing in fast, and she just didn’t have more left in her. It was one of the few moments in her life when she felt that it was over. And she resigned herself to her fate.
At just that moment, another huge stained glass window smashed, and another vampire plunged down, aiming right for her.
As he came into focus, she saw who it was.
Her eyes opened wide in shock. It was Caleb.
Caleb dove in just in time, swooping her up in his arms, and flying her off into the air just before one of those evil creatures stomped her with this foot, crushing a huge hole in the floor were Caitlin had been lying.
He carried her up high, to one of the upper balconies of the Notre Dame, and placed her safely on a s
eat. He then turned and leapt off the balcony, meeting one of those evil things in midair. The two of them grappled with each other, struggling; eventual y, Caleb gained the upper hand, and threw the creature across the church, smashing him into a wal .
But Caleb was suddenly jumped by the other three creatures, who dragged him down to the main floor.
Caitlin snapped out of it. She felt her primal energy return to her, especial y as she saw Caleb in danger. She leapt off the balcony and dove to help him, feeling stronger than she ever had.
As she flew through the air, she saw the three evil creatures smash Caleb into the floor, pounding and kicking him in the back of the head—and fury overcame her. It was a fury unlike any she had ever known. She felt the rage course through her feet, her arms, up through her head—and felt herself alive with a primal battle fury.
She increased her speed, diving for al she was worth, aiming right for one of the creatures.
Without slowing, she dove right at him. At the last second, he turned his disgusting face, and she punched it so hard, she snapped its neck in half.
Caitlin then wheeled and elbowed the other creature right in the face, knocking him back. Before it could get to its feet, she leapt and kicked it under its chin with such force, she sent it flying halfway across the church. It landed on a huge spike, impaling it.
There was but one of those things left, and as it charged at Caitlin, she closed her eyes, and tapped her new power.
Using her mind only, she lifted it way into the air, then sent it flying, across the church, and out a glass window at the speed of light.
Caleb looked up at her in awe.
Napoleon’s vampires, too, were in shock that anyone could kil such evil things. Caitlin faced them and roared, ready to bear down on them next, and as she did, they al suddenly turned and fled. Napoleon fled with them, not wil ing to face Caitlin after what he had just witnessed.
Caitlin reached down and picked up Caleb and brought him to his feet. He smiled back at her, and she knew he would be al right.