“Nice try,” the woman hissed as a similar ball began forming in her hands. “My turn.”
Sami gritted her teeth and felt for the magic again, ready to defend herself. That’s when she heard the song “Thunderstruck” by AC/DC crank up. She looked around and watched in wonder as the woman and the dark room began to dissipate. She was waking up. She began to realize the song wasn’t in her dream at all. Her cell phone ringtone was blaring at her. Someone was calling. She jerked herself upright and looked at the caller ID. Ricky. A glance at the alarm clock told her it was early in the morning—too early. She declined the call and lay back down.
Artemis Baen could only estimate that seven hours had gone by. He was drained on a mental and physical level that he had never experienced in his life. But beyond that, his soul was empty. The Chinese man playing the violin had long since stopped playing, his fingers cramped and his arms bone tired. Wang Wei Ma would recover from his exhaustion, but something deep inside Baen told him that he never would. Without a shadow of a doubt, he knew that Elke had somehow stripped him of his youth, his vitality, and his life as a payment, or more accurately, a sacrifice, for the gift of anti-aging the artifact would give her.
She had given up the pretense of being human some hours ago and had produced a black wand. Looking like a symphony conductor, she had directed the almost famous violinist through his lengthy concert. With dark red and violet swirls of magic dancing all around her, she had turned the violin into something so much more than a musical instrument.
Elke had been surprised to find so much energy in Artemis. His time at The Farm being near RayRay playing the violin had slowed his aging to a crawl. It was like he had extra currency of youth in his physical bank. He’d been careful to hide his earth age to most of the people around him. They all mistook him to be a man in his fifties. The truth was, he was ninety-two, or was it ninety-three, he’d stopped counting years ago.
For a couple of hours, he’d felt the surplus youthful energy leaving him. It was like the exhaustion that comes on slowly when running a marathon. You don’t realize you’re tired until somewhere around mile thirteen. But then it had turned darker, much darker. He felt his original life force, his own youth, beginning to ebb. She wasn’t stealing the extra…she was stealing it all. He had been sure he would die from it until thankfully, fatefully, mercifully, Wang Wei had been unable to go on playing. The silence in the room was deafening.
Finally, he heard Elke’s voice speaking behind his metal chair.
“The results are remarkable, are they not, Finnegan?”
“Incredible, milady.”
She laughed. “No need for such formalities. I’m not a queen…yet.”
“Yes, milady.”
Another more sterile voice that Baen didn’t recognize chimed in. Had to be a lab tech of some kind.
“But the permanence has been in issue,” the man’s voice droned. “In the twenty minutes since he has stopped playing, we have already seen the reversal of several key markers.”
Markers, Baen thought, they must be doing some kind of DNA testing to assess the results of the anti-aging process.
“Best guess?” Elke asked.
“I’d give it roughly a year,” the tech cleared his throat.
“And then?”
“And then, most likely, you will return to your normal age.”
“A year—” Elke’s voice trailed off, “that is magnificent, but not enough.”
Finnegan sniffed. “If I may, milady?”
“Of course, dear gnome. What is it?”
“Studying the text has brought some new things to light that may encourage your results to be more lasting.”
“Continue.”
Baen heard the sound of pages flipping. There must’ve been something in the book the gnome had stolen from the Athenaeum. He strained to listen, hoping to hear something that might be of use.
“To put it in simple terms, the artifact is filled with a certain kind of magic when it is played. If played by an inexperienced musician, the effect will be minuscule and temporary, fleeting at best.”
Baen recognized the description as what he had felt when he played the violin in his car.
“And, the scenario we have explored is if an experienced musician, like Mister Ma, plays it, the effect grows as does the duration of the result.”
“It will last longer and be more pronounced?”
“Exactly.”
“And what does it say about making the changes permanent.”
Finnegan Hobgood must’ve been shuffling his feet; Baen could hear the sound echoing off the industrial tile floor of the lab.
“Nothing in the text refers to permanency, milady,” he finally allowed, “but there is one passage that gives some clue.”
For a moment, there was silence. Then it sounded like Elke slammed her fist down on a table.
“Read, for crying out loud. Get to the point.”
“A Solarian Elf is born every century or so who has the gift to play the artifact, not just merely play notes, but to weave a magic into the artifact that will imbue the listeners with a more um, significant change.”
Baen’s ears perked up. A Solarian Elf. They needed a Solarian Elf and he knew a family of four of them. What if the elf they sought was one of the Proctors. He opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out. He wet his lips and tried again. The croak that escaped his throat sounded like that of an old…no, not old, an ancient man.
“But,” continued Finnegan, “the cost to the sacrifice becomes greater as the magic and the change become more powerful.”
The way he said “sacrifice” made it clear that he knew it was a deadly one.
“Hmmm,” Elke considered this. “Greater sacrifice than that of our poor Mister Baen?”
“Probably much more.”
Baen groaned inside. How much life had he already lost? He knew he had to turn their attention to someone else or he would certainly die in the next playing of the violin.
“Proctorrrr,” he wheezed.
Elke and Finnegan continued to chat about the tome of the artifact. He swallowed and realized he hadn’t had anything to drink for well over a day, since his soda exploded at the truck stop.
“Proctor,” he said in a louder croak.
Shoes clicking on the floor told him they were coming around to speak to him. When he caught sight of Elke’s face, his jaw dropped. Before the magical concert, she had been an attractive fifty-something-year-old woman. She had looked professional and motivated, the perfect picture of a businesswoman dressed in a navy skirt and jacket over a white, open collared blouse.
She had changed clothes, as she was now dressed in a long, form-fitting gown that glittered with gold and emerald colored sequins. Her left hand was still wrapped around the slick, black wand. The effect was startling and for a brief flash, Baen pictured her as a giant serpent standing in front of him. But as his gaze took in her glowing, youthful appearance, he was stunned by how beautiful she had become. She looked like a twenty-year old model straight from the pages of one of his old Sports Illustrated swimsuit magazines. She was...young.
The gnome was standing next to her holding the leather book and rocking back and forth from foot to foot. His eyes never rested completely on Baen as if he didn’t want to look at him. Behind him stood the generic lab tech guy. He stood with his arms crossed over a metal clipboard. Artemis Baen caught a quick glimpse of his reflection in the shiny surface. The oddly horrifying image of an ancient old man stared back at him.
Oh, dear God, his mind lurched. It can’t be. His face looked shriveled and small. White strands of wispy hair clung to the sides of his head with sweat. Liver spots stood out on his cheeks and his teeth looked small and dark. For the first time, he looked down at his arms and saw that they too had become pale and splotchy. His skin looked like a thin sheet of parchment paper stretched over frail bones. It looked like he had sacrificed his youth, all of his youth. If he sacrificed any more of it, he
would be dead for sure.
Elke sensed his horror and stepped closer. She brushed her hand along the side of his face and cupped his chin.
“Artemis.” She hid any sense of the lie she was about to tell. “Fret not. When we have perfected the magic, we will restore your youth. You will not be stuck in this disgusting state forever.” She said the word disgusting as if it tasted like rotten meat in her mouth.
Baen felt tears threaten to come to his eyes, but then he remembered they needed a Solarian Elf to extend the effect of the magic. Once they had one, his life, his youth, would be restored. Surely she would do that for him. Surely.
“Proctor,” he said through a raspy throat. “You need one of the Proctors.”
Elke arched an eyebrow. “And why do I need a Proctor?”
“They are all Solarian Elves.”
Elke looked at the gnome. He shrugged his shoulders to show that he had no idea what Baen was talking about.
“I have lived with them for many…many years. Since you told me about Azuria, I’ve been onto them. They don’t use their magic much, but I’ve seen it first hand.”
Elke considered this for a moment. She pulled a phone out of an invisible pocket in the glittering gown. As she clicked the screen, Baen remembered an important fact.
“RayRay,” he blurted out and shook his head in the direction of the book. “Their son, RayRay, is the one you want. He played the violin all the time. He has to be the Solarian Elf with the talent mentioned in that book.”
Elke’s eyes flared red and for a fleeting second, he thought he saw her hair turn into hundreds of tiny snakes. Baen felt his grip on reality begin to slip. He jerked and pulled against the restraints on his arms and the chair began to rock. He started screaming and shouting incoherent babble.
“Sedate him.” Elke put the phone to her ear.
Within seconds, Baen was unconscious. Drool and a small trickle of blood dripped from his chin.
A voice on the other end of her phone picked up.
Agent Carter Cross was sitting in the Proctors’ great room with Wilmot, Mary, and RayRay in the early hours of the morning when his cell phone began to ring. Dammit, it’s Elke, he thought. He pointed at his phone and motioned for all of them to remain quiet as he clicked to connect.
“Agent Cross?”
“Who’s asking?”
“Very funny, Carter. You know who this is. What is your location?”
Elke’s voice very much reminded him of an overzealous Nazi guard asking for your papers. His mind raced. He wondered if he was being tracked and a wrong answer would result in a severe penalty. This was his company issued cell phone and he was sure it linked to some computer terminal somewhere deep in the recesses of Elke’s underground labs.
“Somewhere in middle Tennessee.” He tried to sound casual. “Waiting for my next assignment.”
“Good.” Elke’s voice snapped. “You are near the Proctor’s home, yes?”
“I guess you could say that, yeah.”
“Bring me the boy, the one with the musical talent.”
“So, I’m reassigned to the Proctor case?”
“Yes, but the artifact is in our possession. We need the boy to play it for us. Bring him as soon as possible.”
“I’ll do my best, ma’am.”
“I have reactivated Agent Seville to assist you as well. His cell will receive your location.”
Agent Seville? Who the hell is Agent Seville? Carter wracked his brains and finally, the image of his partner with the broken sunglasses, frozen in the middle of the highway by the spell Sami had cast, jumped into his mind. Oh, crap. Not that guy. He was bad news for everybody.
“No, wait, that’s not necess—”
The line went dead. So, his partner was on his way.
“We’ve gotta move!” Carter stood and grabbed RayRay by the arm. “We’re getting out of here right now.”
Wilmot and Mary jumped up and started forward as Carter turned toward the door, still holding RayRay’s arm. They all stopped and stared at the figure dressed in black standing in the doorway. He had slick black hair and a shiny new pair of sunglasses.
“Hello, Agent Seville,” Carter said.
“Agent Cross,” the man grinned and raised the pistol in his hand.
18
Into The Forest
Sami woke to the sound of urgent chattering noises coming from outside her bedroom door in the kitchen. She wasn’t alarmed until she heard the loud bang and clang of pots and pans clattering around. I’m being robbed, she thought. She jerked upright in bed and reached behind her bedside table. Pulling out the Margaret Court signature model wooden tennis racket, she held it upright like a club and tiptoed to the door of her room.
She listened with her ear pressed up against the door and could hear the intruder grunting in frustration. She had no idea what he was searching for, but he wasn’t finding anything and he was clearly pissed about it. Taking a deep breath, she turned the knob as slow as she could. She hoped to open the door and then rush the guy before he heard her. About three-quarters of the way open, the doorknob decided to let out a squeal reminiscent of the creaking door from Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”. So much for the element of surprise.
Sami slammed the door open, raised the racket over her head, and ran into the kitchen.
“Get out of my apartment!!” She yelled as she prepared to smack whomever she found rummaging around in her cabinets.
She almost swung the makeshift tennis club when she saw motion but froze when she realized who was there. Digging through the bottom of her pantry, an empty Captain Crunch cereal box and several torn Pop Tart wrappers littering the floor around her, sat Mikki, the Azurian TikTuk. When she realized Sami was standing there, she looked up at her and grinned.
Sami found it hard not to laugh at the creature, who had a banana peel hanging around her neck and a paw stuck deep into a bag that might have once had Doritos in it. Mikki drew her paw out of the bag and Sami saw it glowed in a bright orange, cheesy glow of Dorito dust. She waved at Sami.
“Mikway?”
“How ‘bout we try something with a little more nutritional value to it this morning?”
Mikki cocked her head to the side in apparent confusion.
“DeePee?”
“Let’s give this a try,” Sami laid the racket down on the counter, opened the fridge, and pulled out a jug of brown liquid, “it’s called chocolate milk.”
“Chockit Mik?”
“Uh huh, give it a try. You’ll like it.”
Mikki jumped up on the counter and took the glass Sami had poured. She turned it up and drank the whole glass in one gulp.
“Thirsty, are we?”
Sami filled the glass again and Mikki drank it down too. She finished the entire jug of chocolate milk and held up the empty glass.
“Moooorrreee?”
“Um, well.” Sami bent down and looked into the fridge. “Looks like we might be out. How ‘bout some water?”
In the other room, she heard her phone strike up the opening guitar lick of “Thunderstruck”. Oops, she’d forgotten about the early call from Ricky. She jogged into the bedroom and grabbed her phone.
“Hey, Ricky, what’s up?”
“What’d you do? Put yer phone on silent?”
“More like do not disturb.”
“Well, when I let ya in on my new discoveries, you’ll be wishin’ you’d talked to me earlier.”
Sami shook her head, “Okay, Ricky, whadda ya got?”
“You got your computer handy?”
“Um, yeah. Why?”
“Dial in and get Google Earth up.”
“Dial in? Ricky, please tell me you’re kidding. You’re not still on dial-up, are you?”
“Hey, don’t knock it. AOL ain’t never let me down. You got the map pulled up yet?”
Sami opened her MacBook and clicked a few keys.
“Okay, I’m on it.”
“Cool. Type in Haw Ridge Park, O
ak Ridge, Tennessee, and let me know when ya got it.”
“Got it.”
“Daggone, already?”
xxxSami sidestepped the broadband versus dial-up speed conversation.
“Ricky, focus. I’m looking at a park full of trees.”
“You ‘member how we were talkin’ about a secret lab hidden in there last night?”
“Well, yeah, but that was—”
“Zoom on into the path called Silo Road.”
“I must be missing something, Ricky. My map doesn’t have path names on it. I’m scrolling around on the screen though. I only see green trees.”
“Oh, yeah. Right. That must be on Google Maps. It’s not all green. Wait ‘til ya get a load of this. Here, type in these coordinates: 35°59'55.8"N 84°09'36.5"W.”
She did and the map zoomed in on a small white circle. Expanding her thumb and forefinger on the touchpad, she zoomed in closer. The more she zoomed, the odder the thing looked. Maybe it was a satellite dish, or a radio tower, she couldn’t tell. But it was a strange looking thing to be sitting in the middle of a green, forested park.
“What is it, Ricky?”
“That darlin’, is a silo.”
He said it in triumph and waited. When she said nothing, he sniffed.
“On Silo Road,” he said, as if that would clear things up. “Don’t ya get it? Perfect place for a secret underground lab.”
Sami opened her mouth to respond, but then she closed it before she said anything. As far-fetched as it was, it did kinda make sense. The magic trail had been heading out that direction. She looked at her watch. A few minutes past nine. Plenty of time to get out there and back before her two-thirty vet school shift.
“I know what yer thinkin’ and I’ve done got it all worked out,” Ricky said.
“Huh?”
“Me ‘n Allan ‘n Doris are all loaded up in the truck. I rounded ‘em up this mornin’ after I tried to get you on the phone. We’ll leave out from the Java. S’only about a thirty minute drive.”
“Oh, no. Not happening,” Sami said, “I’m going on this wild goose chase alone.”
“I knew you’d say that. That’s why we’re waitin’ down front outside yer place.”
Spell Song: An Enchanting Urban Fantasy Page 14
