by B. B. Alston
I’ve just been sung back to health.
I blink and everything comes back to me all at once. Then right out of my mouth. “Moreau! The Black Book! Dylan! Did you stop them? Wait—Elsie, did you really breathe fire?”
Elsie laughs. “Sure did. It’s not a full shift yet, but I think I’m finally starting the process.”
“As for the rest of us,” says Agent Fiona. “We didn’t do anything. By the time we tracked down the Jolly Roger, ye were slumped over the Black Book and the Black Key, and Dylan was unconscious inside a cage of lightning. Had a devil of a time getting him out.”
“Then we won?” I ask.
“We did,” says Agent Magnus. “Thanks to you.”
“Can I see my brother?” I ask quickly. “And Maria?” I’ve got so much I want to say to both of them.
“They’re still being operated on by the cursebreakers,” says Agent Fiona. “But we’re hopeful.”
I lay back on my pillow and close my eyes. Thank goodness. But as good as this moment feels, I always pictured sharing it with my partner.
“It was Dylan the whole time.” I get a rush of emotions thinking about him, though I couldn’t even say what they all are. I should hate him for lying to me, but there’s still a part of me that wishes I could go back to when he was still my friend. The Dylan in Dr. Underhill’s office feels like a different person. I wonder if I ever even knew the real him.
“We know,” says Agent Fiona. “Dr. Underhill was a paranoid fellow, as any Key Holder has a right be. He kept surveillance cameras all over his office. We’ve got the whole incident recorded.”
“Where is he now?”
Agent Fiona and Agent Magnus both frown a little. “I’m sorry, but that’s classified information.”
“But don’t go fretting over it,” says Agent Magnus. “The day is saved. Not bad for your first day as a Junior Agent.”
Did I hear that right? “I’m a Junior Agent? I get the scholarship?”
“That’s right!” says Chief Crowe, walking over to my bed. “Congratulations!”
“You aren’t mad that I went after the Black Key?”
“Well,” says Chief Crowe. “As you so eloquently explained to Agent Fiona, you were only a trainee, so you weren’t technically a member of the Bureau yet. Oh, they grumbled and groaned for six hours straight at the emergency session of the Supernatural World Congress, but no one could fault your logic. However, I do hope you’ll take something like this to an adult in the future.”
“What in the world were you thinking?” asks Agent Magnus.
“I was following that look you gave me,” I say, sitting up a little. “When Director Van Helsing accused you of letting the hybrids in.”
“That was a ‘help Agent Fiona get the Black Key’ look.” Agent Magnus goes red in the face. “Not a ‘Go save the world on your own’ look!”
I bite my lip. “Well, you might to want work on your looks then.”
“I’m with Peters,” says Agent Fiona, laughing. She gives Agent Magnus’s scruffy beard a tug. “It’s like I’m always tellin’ ye, things would go a lot better if ye only put a little more effort into your looks!”
Later in the evening, once everyone has cleared out of my room, I get a visit from the last person in the world I expect. “Mama?”
Mama runs over to my bed and throws her arms around me. “Oh, Babygirl, I’m so glad you’re all right. When they called me to say that you were recovering from something called severe post-magic overexertion, I didn’t know what to think.”
“I can’t believe they let you visit me,” I say.
Mama leans back a little. She looks so lost. “I can’t even pretend to understand half the things I saw on the way down here. There was a man with no face in the elevator with me!” Mama shakes her head. “But face or no face, nothing was gonna keep me away from my daughter.”
I smile.
Mama swallows and says, “They also said you found Quinton?”
I nod, and Mama covers her face. “Oh man, you’re going to make me cry.”
She reaches out and we hold each other, crying and laughing.
Quinton’s room is located in the ICU of the Department of Supernatural Health, aka the Intense Curses Unit. Me and Mama hold hands as we walk the halls to his room. The cursebreakers were able to revive Maria, but Quinton hasn’t woken up. The Senior Cursebreaker who came to meet with us explained that he’d done all he could and now it’s just a matter of waiting. My brother could wake up tomorrow, or he might never wake up.
I won’t lie, it wasn’t the easiest news to get. But I’ve got to keep hoping that my brother will be okay, that he’ll wake up sooner rather than later. Hope has brought me this far; surely it’ll get me my brother back healthy.
I don’t know what to do with my hands when Lara Van Helsing runs over and throws her arms around me. Even though it’s just a hug, it still feels dangerous coming from her.
“Thank you for bringing my sister back,” Lara says, taking a step back. “I know I’m probably the last person you want to talk to, but thanks anyway.”
I give her a small smile. “I told you I’d do it.”
She nods and says, “About Dylan, I had no idea . . .”
“He fooled all of us,” I say.
Lara’s eyes turn sad and she runs back up the hall toward her mom.
When we enter Quinton’s room, we find him resting peacefully on the fluffiest pillows you can imagine. Maria sits in a chair beside the bed holding his hand. When she notices us, she flushes and stands.
“Maria Van Helsing,” she says, extending a trembling hand. I can’t get over how much prettier she looks in person.
Mama shakes it first, and then I do.
“Thank you,” Maria says to me. “I’m so sorry that it was me who woke up and not Quinton. The cursebreakers think it’s because he was giving off more of his life essence, so I’d have to give less. It’s just like him to try and one-up me like that.”
“That’s Quinton,” I say softly. “Never lets anyone beat him in anything.”
Maria smiles and relaxes a little.
Mama says, “There’s nothing to be sorry for, sweetheart. I’m sure your family is happy to have you home again.”
“Are you the reason Mama gets to come down here?” I ask Maria.
She flushes again and nods. “My family pulled some strings to get special permission. After Dylan, it’s really the least we could do.”
“Thanks,” I say.
“Do you want to talk to Quinton?” Maria asks.
“Huh?” I say. “What do you mean?”
“That’s what I was doing when you came in,” says Maria. “My supernatural ability—no, I’m sorry. There’s no point in pretending anymore. It’s really just a simple bit of blood magic that allows me to communicate telepathically with anyone I’m touching. If I’m touching two people at once, those two people can also speak telepathically.”
“You go first,” I tell Mama.
Maria takes Quinton’s hand again and then she takes Mama’s. Mama gasps and then come the waterworks. I try to focus on something else, so that they can have their moment. But Maria meets my eyes while Quinton and Mama talk.
“I’m so sorry about my brother,” Maria whispers. “I feel like this has all been my fault. I should’ve seen him for what he was and not who I wanted him to be.”
“Did you know about him being a born magician?” I ask.
She nods. “I taught him how to keep his magic a secret from the rest of the family. At some point he started keeping secrets from me too.”
“What makes being a born magician so special? It’s like . . . Dylan and I are connected somehow.”
Maria’s expression saddens. “There are rules against me explaining.” With a flick of her fingers, she produces a card out of thin air. “Keep this on you and don’t let anyone see it. As long as you have it, they can come to you.”
“Who?”
But Maria just hands m
e the card.
INTERNATIONAL LEAGUE OF MAGICIANS
“You can’t be serious?” I say.
“Even the supernatural world has its secret societies,” says Maria. “They’ll find you when the moment is right.”
My mind spins at the idea that there is a whole organization of magicians out there that not even the Bureau knows about. It also makes me wonder if Dylan knew about them, and what he thought about it.
I think of Elsie, my real friend, and decide to ask the question I know she’d want to get an answer to. “Was VanQuish really breaking up? Dylan said that you didn’t get along and that you were fighting and you really wanted to be a training agent like Fiona. . . .”
Maria raises an eyebrow.
“And I answered my own question,” I say. “Dylan said whatever it took to make you out to be the bad guy.”
Maria gives me a sad nod. “Although I did put in my training agent transfer papers. But Quinton was going to transfer as well. When we graduated from Junior Agent training, we agreed, five years as field agents and then five years as training agents and, at the end, we’d stick with the one we liked best.”
I smile. Well, that sounds totally normal. “And did you know about Quinton talking to Director Horus about you?”
“Dylan was stealing classified files using my security codes and Quinton found out. It’s actually what Quinton and I were meeting to discuss when we were taken.”
I just shake my head. “Is it weird that I still miss Dylan a little, even though he lied over and over?”
“If it is, then I’m just as weird.” After a moment Maria says a little more cheerfully, “Maybe some good can still come from this. Dylan can’t hurt anyone where he’s going. And now that I’ve been outed as a magician, I promise you won’t have to be alone anymore. We’ll do it together.”
It’s my turn to talk to Quinton. It feels like there’s static inside my brain when I touch Maria’s hand.
“Chicken Little?” comes Quinton’s voice in my head.
How’s it going? is all I can think to say.
“Oh, you know, just having the best nap ever.”
I laugh at that. Are you okay in there? Are you hurting?
“I’m dreaming. Remember how I always said I wanted to go bass fishing, and you would tease me that nobody under fifty goes fishing?”
Yeah, because it’s true. I grin.
“True or not, I’m in the middle of a big, wide lake, with my feet kicked up on the edge of the boat. I could get used to relaxation like this.”
I shake my head. Only you would dream about fishing.
“You don’t know what you’re missing.” Quinton’s tone turns sad. “Magnus came by earlier. He told me about you being a magician like Maria. About all the things you’ve had to deal with since you touched the Crystal Ball. I never meant to throw you into a situation like that.”
It’s cool. If I didn’t come to the Bureau then I never would’ve found you.
“I should’ve known if anyone could, it’d be you. You’ve always been amazing, sis. You did this all on your own.”
I don’t like doing things on my own. It’s scary and I never know if it’ll work out.
“That’s part of growing up, Amari,” says Quinton. “You don’t need me anymore. As long as you bet on yourself and believe you can do anything, you can. That’s why I need you to make me a promise, okay?”
Okay.
“Mama told me how obsessed you were with finding me. Promise me you won’t spend your life beside this bed waiting for me to wake up. Go out and do and see everything. That’s what I want for you. Be as great as I know you can be. When I do wake up, and I will, I expect to hear lots of stories!”
Mama has to stop by her job on the way home. She was worried she might get in trouble for missing a couple days to be with me and Quinton, but one call from Chief Crowe to the president of the hospital and not only is it okay, she’s even getting paid for the time she missed.
It gets hot sitting in Mama’s car with no AC, so I cross the street to a supernatural newsstand tucked inside an alleyway. You’d think I’d get some slack on the price since my face is on the cover of so many magazines, but that only makes the hobgoblin charge me double. “Yous can obviously affords it,” it smirks. “Big shot like yous.”
I take a copy of Harper’s Bizarre and find a seat on a shaded bench under a tree. The magazine caught my eye because me and Maria’s faces were both on the cover beneath the headline, “The Good Magicians?” It’s proof that at least some people are rethinking how they feel about us.
“May I sit here?” asks an older man in a dark blue suit. He’s got messy salt-and-pepper hair and a handlebar mustache.
“Sure,” I say, scooting over a little to give him some room.
He takes a seat and places his cane in his lap. “Lovely weather, isn’t it?”
“I guess so,” I say. “Maybe if it wasn’t this hot. Wouldn’t be so bad if I was on the beach, though.”
The guy snaps his fingers, and suddenly our bench isn’t next to the hospital anymore. It’s sitting in white sand leading to a clear blue ocean that stretches out to the horizon. The sun sets behind us and a cool wind whips across my face. “Better?”
I turn and look at the man, hoping this is the meeting I’ve been waiting for. “Are you from the League of Magicians?”
He dips his head. “Cosimo Galileo Leonardo de’ Pazzi at your service. But my colleagues call me Cozmo. My ancestor helped Vladimir create the spell you conjured to save yourself the other day. Knights of the Round.”
“Is that what happened? I didn’t really know what I was doing.”
“It’s why your magic took over,” says Cozmo. “Through sheer willpower and self-belief, you summoned up all your magic and demanded it take action. And, my dear girl, it heeded your call.”
I think about that. It makes me wonder if the smaller snake in my constellation with Director Horus was actually my own magic. It was separate because it was acting on its own, responding to what I wanted and how I felt—unstoppable.
“Who are you guys?” I ask. “Have you always been around?”
Cozmo wrinkles his brow. “The terrible magicians the supernatural world has come to know these last seven centuries have all been newly made apprentices of Moreau. The League of Magicians, on the other hand, are the recipients of magic handed down through the years from a spare few of Vladimir’s original apprentices. We exist entirely separate from the Bureau, although we have allowed the Van Hel-sing magicians into our ranks—the latest being Maria Van Helsing.”
“Is she in trouble now that everyone knows she’s a magician?” I ask.
“You and Maria represent a situation the league has never dealt with. While many of us, including myself, have long advocated revealing ourselves to the Bureau and the rest of the supernatural world, the majority of our order still believes it’s safer to continue to pose as ordinary people. But then, perhaps you will tell us how to proceed?”
“Me?” I ask.
The corner of his mouth lifts. “Or will it be Dylan Van Helsing?”
I lean closer. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying the next two born magicians have both been identified! That makes it a brand-new age! Like all those born magicians that came before, your connection—be it as friends or rivals—has the potential to shape the world, child. Consider these words both a courtesy and a very dire warning.”
I lean back, eyes wide. Suddenly we’re back on the side street next to the hospital.
“You are hereby invited to join the League of Magicians, Amari Peters.” He grins as he gets to his feet. “With all that’s to come, I do hope you accept the invitation.” And with a bow of his head, Cozmo shrinks into a bird and flaps away.
After a full day of freaking out, I decide not to worry about Cozmo’s warning. Not today anyway. What Maria said back in Quinton’s room is what finally allowed me to chill. With Dylan locked away for his crimes, ho
pefully for many years to come, whatever connection we share won’t matter for a long time.
For right now, since summer camp at the Bureau is still canceled until next year, I’ve decided to put my thoughts and energy into something else.
And since I kinda-sorta saved the supernatural world from a second war with the Night Brothers, revealed Dylan as the Bureau’s traitor, and retrieved the Black Book and the Black Key, the Supernatural World Congress and the Bureau of Supernatural Affairs granted me a Congressional Request as a reward. After talking it over with Quinton, I knew exactly what request I wanted to make.
Mama would kill me if she knew I was headed to a boy’s house in the middle of the night. Hero or not, there’s just some things I can’t get away with. Especially when I’ve already kissed her goodnight and told her I was headed to bed. But what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her.
I head down the stairs of the apartment building until I get to the door I’m looking for. I give it a good knock. Most times, knocking on somebody’s door in this neighborhood, this late, is asking for trouble. No telling what’s liable to happen. But I already know Jayden’s mom isn’t home.
Jayden answers the door, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.
“Would you put a shirt on?” I say.
“’Mari? What you doing here in the middle of the night?”
“Um, I’ll explain after you get dressed.”
“Dressed? For what?”
I cross my arms. “You trust me or not?”
“Uh, give me a sec.”
I wait in the doorway while he throws on his Food Mart T-shirt. He’s been working there since last week. He’s not old enough to do anything but sweep the floors, and I’m sure he’s not making the kind of money he used to, but it’s a change for the better.
“Sorry,” he says. “It’s the only thing I got that’s clean.”
“That’s totally fine,” I say.
“You know I don’t run with those boys up the street no more. Trying to leave that stuff alone, man.”
“That’s actually why I’m here,” I say. “Follow me.”
I wait for him to ask me where we’re going but he just shuts the door behind him and says, “I thought maybe you forgot about me. Haven’t seen you around much.”
