Until suddenly, he wasn’t.
Without warning the boat sputtered loudly and stopped running. Alex and Meghan pitched forward, Alex hitting the windshield and cutting his lip open, Meghan slamming lifelessly into a seat and stopping there. As he was about to use the magical verbal component to get the boat started again, he noticed, out of the corner of his eye, Simber frozen mid-flap in the air. The giant cat tipped forward sharply and began falling, falling, falling. “Simber!” Alex yelled, but the giant stone statue didn’t respond. “Simber!”
Simber slammed face-first into the water with an enormous splash, sending a giant wave that nearly capsized the boat. Alex and Meghan flew out over the side like weightless rag dolls being tossed across a room, and plunged headlong into the sea. When Alex surfaced, coughing and sputtering, he saw the tip of Simber’s tail disappearing under the water. “Simber!” Alex cried out again. But he had no time to think about Simber now. He twisted in the water, looking frantically in all directions.
“Meghan!” he screamed.
She was nowhere to be found.
Gone
Aaron watched in amazement, and then came to his senses. He grabbed a pistol from the table and pointed it at Claire Morning. “If you speak, you will die,” he said.
Ms. Morning couldn’t make a sound. She didn’t even look at Aaron. She could only stare at the body of her father, crumpled and unmoving on the floor. He looked so helpless.
Keeping the gun trained on Claire, Aaron turned back to Mr. Today. He stepped carefully over to the mage and nudged him with his foot. The magician didn’t respond.
“Is he dead?” Bethesda asked. “What did you do to him?”
“Quiet,” Aaron barked. His heart raced. Had he killed Mr. Today? Had it really been so easy? He turned to Crawledge and Bethesda. “Take her to the pantry and lock her up. Bar the door. Liam, give her a little something to help her remember not to give us any trouble.”
Liam’s eyes widened. “Like what?”
Aaron shoved his hands into his pockets to keep them from trembling. “Just . . . whatever. Threaten her. Think of something! I don’t care.”
Claire turned her head back to Liam now, her eyes filled with hatred and unshed tears. She glared at him, and he couldn’t look at her.
“Come on,” Liam said roughly. He picked his way over Mr. Today and around furniture and led them to the kitchen pantry, Claire struggling slightly, but not enough to get herself shot. “Just throw her in there,” he mumbled. “I need to help Aaron with the body.”
Crawledge and Bethesda shoved Claire into the space under the bottom shelf, tied her wrists and ankles, stuffed a dusty cloth in her mouth, and closed the door. When they had secured the pantry, and the sounds of their voices grew distant, Claire Morning closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the wall.
The Restorers
nce Eva had delivered the false message, Gondoleery Rattrapp wasted no time. She’d been waiting weeks for this moment, and her teams and weapons were ready. They slithered toward Quill, staying in whatever late afternoon shadows they could find along the way. They arrived at dusk. Gondoleery tried to release the spell on the gate, but it didn’t work. She tried again, and then realized it must be a very strong spell’more powerful than she was at the moment.
“We’ll have to break it down,” she said. But first she gathered her troops around her to go over the plan one last time. They were all in agreement to wait until the moon was high overhead so they could have some advantage of light when the Artiméans came pouring out of the mansion to fight.
But before the plan could be enacted, a strange cry rose up from inside Artimé. Gondoleery and her team could hear it, plain as day. As far as she knew, that had never happened before’Artimé had a sound barrier around it, which had helped to keep it from being discovered all those years. But now they could hear people shrieking and crying out. Something chaotic had clearly happened. And then the gate clicked and popped open an inch.
Gondoleery was happy to take advantage of that.
“Ready?” she whispered harshly. “Charge!” She opened the gate and her team streamed in behind her. But it wasn’t long before they were all nearly trampled or swept up by the crowd of people that flooded out of Artimé.
“After them!” Gondoleery cried. She wasn’t pleased that no one seemed to even notice her ferocious team amid all the chaos. Still, they managed to take down a few straggling Unwanteds as they chased after them.
Out in the road around Quill, the Artiméans, realizing they were under attack, struggled to pull themselves together. Soon they began to fight back. Gondoleery flinched as an Artiméan sent a rubber sphere flying toward her, hitting her in the shoulder.
But nothing happened. The spell component bounced harmlessly to the ground and rolled in the dirt. As the look of surprise came over the face of the Unwanted who’d thrown it, Gondoleery picked up the ball and stared at it, then shoved it in her pocket. There was no time to ponder this latest development now. She had a battle to win.
To the Depths of Despair
Alex sucked in a breath and dove down, eyes wide open, looking for any flash of color, any sign of Meghan. It was dark down there, and mentally he scrambled for all of the possible spells he could use to help him in a situation like this, but he could think of none. Even his origami dragons would be of no use now to light up the night, for they were a sopping wet mess in his component vest pocket.