The Fourth Ruby

by James R. Hannibal

  “But you offered him your allegiance,” said Jack, narrowing his eyes.

  “He needed a tracker to wield the rubies, someone he thought he could control.” Tanner continued his regal stroll along his circle of soldiers. “And I needed to live to fight another day. After Joe, he killed Bill Shepherd to get the Einstein-Rosen Bridge—a device he passed to the Phantom so he could steal the other two rubies. And there was one other item he wanted.” His walk brought him full circle, and he stopped in front of Jack, staring down at the zed. “Your other grandfather, John Buckles the Eleventh, dove off a cliff to keep Gall from learning its location.”

  As much as Jack didn’t want to believe it, everything Tanner had said made sense. It matched what he knew of the deaths of the eleventh-generation trackers. And it matched what his father had told him about the zed. He looked up at his former mentor. “But why?”

  “What good is power, if death can take it from you? That sphere preserves life, Jack”—Multi-Tanner made a sweeping, multi-arm gesture—“indefinitely. It is the key to immortality. And with the knowledge embedded in the khan’s rubies, I can help you use it. Together, you and I can bring your father back. Together, we can take our revenge.”

  John Buckles struggled against the soldiers. “No, Jack. This isn’t the way.”

  “You will be my protégé, boy. You’ll be a prince. Not of England or of Persia, but the prince—the prince of the whole world. Nothing will be beyond your reach.”

  Jack couldn’t think. The buzzing in his head had grown to an unrelenting shriek. A billion prickling, numbing points sank into his bones, eating them away layer by layer. No matter how hard he squeezed the zed, he couldn’t stop it. The zed was the source, but he couldn’t resist Tanner without its power. Either way, he would be gone in moments, absorbed into the fourth ruby forever.

  “Don’t listen, Jack.” His father strained against his captors, forcing them to take his weight. “This isn’t Tanner anymore. It’s a thing—an evil thing—and it’s bargaining with you. Think, Jack. Why would it need to do that?”

  “Quiet. We’ve heard enough from you.” Multi-Tanner snapped his fingers, and the soldiers on either side of Jack’s dad drew their scimitars, holding the points at his ribcage. “Last chance, boy. Join me. Or die.”

  Jack’s reflections were all but invisible. Those he could still see nodded, pleading silently for him to take Tanner’s offer. But his dad kept fighting. “It had us beaten, Jack. But something changed. Can’t you see? The evil in this ruby took Tanner. And now it wants you, too. But it can’t have you unless you give yourself willingly.”

  “I said quiet!” Multi-Tanner threw a dismissive hand in the air.

  The soldiers shoved their scimitars home.

  Jack took a step toward his dad. “No!”

  Nothing could have prepared him for that sight, watching his father drop to his knees, flickering, bleeding. The zed was forgotten. It fell from his hand, dissolving into red-and-gold dust before it ever hit the floor.

  Jack felt himself dissolving with it.

  The reflections in the walls—his reflections—faded into nothingness.

  And that was the moment everything changed.

  Chapter Sixty-Two

  JACK’S REFLECTIONS had not disappeared. They had been released. Swirls of glowing white vapor streamed from the walls, passing through the circle of soldiers and slamming into him, jarring his body.

  The buzzing faded. The tingling dissipated. Clarity returned. As the vapor poured into him, Jack saw every significant moment he had experienced since Big Ben, when he had first used the zed.

  He saw the dragos in the train station stare at him, burn scars running down their cheeks.

  He heard his sister recite his thoughts before he spoke them.

  He watched Gwen recount her tale of Arthurians and Merlinians—fire wielders and mind readers.

  He felt the fire that had flashed beneath his hand in the collection of dragons.

  Jack could finally see all the data at once.

  And it all made sense.

  With a resounding thump, the last of the vapor entered his body. And in the silence that followed, Jack heard two whispered words.

  The flame.

  A ring of blue fire shot out from his body, obliterating Multi-Tanner’s ruby soldiers in an explosion of red. Free of his captors, his father flickered back into full, solid form. John Buckles took his hands away from his ribs, looking down at cauterized wounds, and then lifted his gaze to his son. “Jack?”

  A deep, golden feeling of warmth filled Jack’s body, like the feeling he got whenever he touched dragonite. For the first time, it occurred to him that warmth wasn’t the right word. It was more than warmth. It was fire.

  The flame.

  Jack glanced down. In his left hand, in place of the zed, he now held a spinning ball of blue fire. And yellow fire spiraled up the sword from his right fist. He fixed Tanner with an icy glare.

  “Impossible,” muttered Multi-Tanner. “You’re just like him.” Rage built within the many faces, and then he let out a roar and charged, drawing a ghostly scimitar from his belt.

  Jack threw his fireball, hitting the creature fully in the chest. It slowed him, but it didn’t stop him, and the two swords slammed together with a white flash. Multi-Tanner struck again and again, but Jack saw all the vectors. He anticipated every strike.

  “I don’t care what you’ve become!” shouted Multi-Tanner. “You are still nothing but a child—a Section Thirteen.”

  “Jack, look out!”

  Jack didn’t need his father’s warning this time. He heard the soldiers approaching. He could see them in his mind. With a burst of flame, he knocked Multi-Tanner away and slashed two soldiers in half with a single stroke. He heard a subtle finger-snap and looked up in time to see his dad thrust a chin toward the throne.

  John Buckles raised his eyebrows.

  Jack knew exactly what he wanted.

  Jack hit Multi-Tanner with another fireball, turning him, and then charged, pressing him up the platform steps.

  “Mistake, boy,” said the creature. “You’ve given me the higher ground.” He raised his scimitar and rained down blows that sent sparks flying. Jack took all the abuse he could and finally jumped back, retreating. The Mongol warrior behind Tanner’s face grinned.

  But not for long.

  John Buckles stepped out from behind the throne and shoved the butt of his cane into the creature’s back, firing the stun gun within. Purple arcs of electricity wrapped Tanner’s body—just Tanner. The ghosts of khans and emperors flashed out in front of him, faces stricken with terror, and Jack thrust his flaming sword through them all. The image of Genghis Khan reached for him, gnashing its rotten teeth. And then it exploded in a burst of black smoke.

  Tanner collapsed onto the steps.

  John Buckles doubled over, clutching the wounds in his stomach, but he offered Jack a weak smile. “Well, that’s something new for House Buckles.”

  Fire blazed around them. The ruby palace was burning.

  Jack pulled his dad toward a silver staircase. “We have to get you out of here.”

  “I told you. That’s not why you came.” He nodded toward the mirrored hall leading back to the pink mist of the zed. “That’s my road. This time, anyway.”

  He started toward the archway, but Jack pulled him into a hug. “I will save you.”

  “Live, Jack. Become the man you were meant to be. Everything else will follow.”

  Tanner moaned and they both looked his way. Fire had surrounded the platform. Jack furrowed his brow. “What about him?”

  “It’s a spark, Jack. He has to get himself out.” John Buckles backed away as he spoke. The fire spread between them. “Remember. I’m always with you,” he said, and placed a hand over his heart. “Right here.”

  The flames stretched higher, blocking Jack’s view. He watched them for another heartbeat and then turned and crossed the threshold, clearing his mind of everythi
ng but escape. He took one step up the silver stairway, and he was out.

  “Gwen?” Jack lowered the sword. Tanner lay at his feet.

  She rushed to Jack’s side. “What happened? What did you do to him?”

  “I think the professor’s mind is trapped in the fourth ruby. I’ll explain later. Right now we need to get him—and us—out of here.” Jack slid the sword into his belt, checking it for fire, and almost laughed at himself for doing so. That had been a feature of the spark. It was all in his mind. Likewise, the zed had not evaporated. But it was changed. Jack opened his hand and was surprised to find that, beneath its gold latticework, the little red sphere had turned snow white.

  Gwen gazed down at it with him. “What does that mean?”

  “I don’t know.” He ripped a strip of silk from the wall, wrapped up the stone, and placed it in her hand. “Keep it safe for me, will you? And don’t tell a soul about it.”

  Gwen nodded, and with his other hand, Jack closed her fist around the sphere. Together the two crouched down beside Tanner, pulling the gold mail shirt up over his belt.

  Jack breathed a sigh of relief. “The antidote.”

  It was secured in a leather pouch at the professor’s hip—a glass vial of blue serum. They tugged at it, trying to work it free. As they worked, the four rubies lit up like embers. The jewels crackled and sizzled until fames burst out of them. Tanner sat up, eyes wide and bloodshot, and grabbed Jack’s arm. His fingers burned the leather jacket, sending wisps of acrid smoke into the air.

  Both teens punched him straight in the face.

  He fell back again, unconscious, and the rubies on his chest crumbled into black powder.

  Gwen let out a shaky laugh. “I told you we’d take him down together.”

  Chapter Sixty-Three

  EVEN AS JACK CHUCKLED at Gwen’s joke, a tremendous crack shook the tomb. He sensed a telltale groan from above and jerked her back. A giant chunk of rock came crashing down on the platform, crushing the sarcophagus, and Tanner with it.

  Jack surveyed the rubble. His stomach turned. “The antidote. I didn’t—”

  “But I did.” Gwen beamed, holding out the vial of blue serum.

  He wrapped her in a hug.

  “Hey,” she said, grunting under the tightness of his embrace. “What are quartermasters for?”

  Another crack. Sparks exploded from the circular wall. The rubies embedded in the rock were burning, just like the rubies on Tanner’s chest—as if every bit of the strange red mineral was linked. “This place is coming down,” said Jack, taking the vial. “We have to get to the surface.”

  Gwen took his arm and the two ran down the chamber steps together. “We can’t get out the way we came in,” she said. “It’s blocked by the balance table.”

  A resounding boom.

  The whole place shuddered, and both teens covered their heads as rocks and water rained down.

  Gwen peeked through her arms. “There,” she said, pointing up. A gap had opened in the ceiling, growing wider by the second. The stream poured in. “That’s our way out.”

  Jack staggered sideways as the mine shook again. “How? The path is blocked and the walls are too sheer.”

  In answer, Gwen hurried back up the steps. She returned a moment later with a pair of high-tech devices—Tanner’s ankle thrusters. “With these.”

  It only took a few seconds to strap the thrusters over Jack’s jeans. “How do they work?” he asked as Gwen secured the last buckle.

  “Flex your ankles. More flex equals more thrust. Shift your weight to steer.” She wrapped her arms around him, preparing for liftoff, and kissed him on the cheek.

  “What was that for?”

  “Luck.”

  He gave her a sly grin. “I don’t need luck, remember? I’m a Section Thirteen.”

  Gwen slapped him on the back of the head. “And that’s for being cheesy.”

  He flexed his ankles and the two shot up through the mine, slipping and spiraling on the edge of control.

  “Rock!” shouted Gwen, tucking her head into his neck. It missed them by inches.

  “Okay. Maybe I need a little luck.”

  Jack managed to dodge the worst of the debris, taking only one bruising hit in the shoulder. What he could not dodge was the heavy mist formed by the stream pouring down through the hole. He remembered what Gwen had told him earlier, that quantum electrodynamic thrusters and moisture don’t mix.

  The left one sputtered.

  They lost momentum.

  Jack made it to within arm’s reach of daylight before the left thruster failed completely and they started to fall. He caught the ledge.

  “Hang on!” cried Gwen, reaching for the cliff. Her fingers missed by millimeters, and she grabbed his neck again, jostling him.

  Jack’s grip began to fail. “I can’t. The rock is too wet!”

  One finger slipped. And then another. And then a wooden bird swooped down through the hole, fluttering its wings and cooing madly.

  “What’s . . . the bird . . . doing here?” grunted Jack, trying to recover his grip. He couldn’t. The rest of his fingers slipped free.

  Gwen screamed.

  In the same instant, a pair of strong hands caught both of Jack’s wrists. A familiar face beneath a newsboy cap peered down from the ledge. “The bird’s with me.”

  “Ash!”

  “Hello, Jack. Miss me?”

  The quartermaster heaved them both high enough to scramble out, and the three ran away before the gap could open any wider. The dove flew ahead into the glade, toward an airship much like the one that had brought them there, with deep green fabric and a gondola riveted together from some silvery alloy.

  “You managed to crash half our aerial assets in the region,” said Ash. “The old lady brought this one down from Saint Petersburg in a hurry.”

  “The old lady?” asked Gwen.

  Rather than wait to hear the answer, Jack sprinted ahead. He drew the sword and slapped it into Shaw’s chest on the way. “I forgot to give that to you back at the library.”

  “Oi!” the warden called after him. “Wot about them rubies?”

  From behind, Jack heard the thud of a small fist punching tweed, along with Gwen’s voice. “Shut up, Shaw.”

  Ash had delivered on his promise to take care of Sadie. She lay on a gurney in the gondola cabin, eyes closed, IV bags hanging above her. A heart monitor beeped, showing a rate much too fast for a little girl. Beside the gurney, a doctor stood ready with a syringe. Mrs. Hudson was with him, and Jack’s mother was holding Sadie’s pale hand. Jack’s mom gave him a tearful smile. “They let me come out of the Keep for this one.”

  Jack pushed the vial into the doctor’s open palm and then wrapped his arms around his mother. “Dad was there. He fought beside me.”

  “Of course he was, Jack. Of course he was.”

  Slowly, methodically—too methodically for Jack’s nerves—the doctor drew the serum into his syringe and eased it into a splitter on the IV line. Wisps of blue swirled down through the solution. “All we can do now,” he said as he pulled the syringe out again, “is wait and pray.”

  They waited.

  Jack prayed. “Please, God.”

  An eternity later, the beeping on the heart monitor slowed, and an eternity after that, Sadie opened her eyes. “Jack?”

  “Right here.”

  “There’s a spider.”

  He laughed, wiping tears away with a sleeve that still bore the black marks of Tanner’s burning fingers. “I know, Sadie. I got it.”

  Chapter Sixty-Four

  A SCOUT DISC sailed low and silent over the ever-present mists of the arena’s bottom level, curving upward toward Jack, who was crouched atop a peaked turret one level up. He had no trouble seeing the vectors this time. His quartermaster had made a perfect throw.

  Jack made an equally perfect catch.

  He sparked as soon as his fingers touched the scout. With effort, he settled the spinning vision and survey
ed the scene caught in the bronze alloy. The final level represented a single street with a few storefronts and the entrance to a Tube station. A warden sat on a wooden bench, hidden from the levels above by a store awning. The big lummox was goaltending. Jack knew it because the mist, though it gathered in heavy orange balls around the streetlamps and in gray mats over the sidewalks, hung back from the store windows—a sure sign that the particular artifact Jack and his quartermaster were looking for was in there. The bronze lettering painted across the awning read LOST PROPERTY OFFICE.

  The spark ended. Jack clambered down a drainpipe, dropping onto a replica of Fleet Street. Mrs. Hudson had configured the arena with select streets from London—a tradition when the Hunt went into a tiebreaker round.

  Gwen waited beside a pair of giant double doors, leaning on a wolf’s-head cane. “What’d you see?” she asked. “Which street did Mrs. Hudson use for the final level?”

  Jack opened a little black door set into one of the big ones and inclined his head, indicating Gwen should go through first. “Baker Street. And I’ll give you one guess as to where they’ve hidden the item.”

  A QED hovered close, camera twitching. Jack gave it a scowl and it backed away. He could sense the location of every drone in the arena, simply by listening to the hum of their engines. He could hear the whispers, too, just as before.

  Section Thirteen.

  Freak.

  Mrs. Hudson had used the long flight back to London to debrief her wayward team, and Jack had told her everything, with the exception of anything related to fireballs and flaming swords. She had not quite understood how he and Gwen had escaped the dragons at the Archive, but she let it pass. She had also refused to accept that the spooks had opened the cages and released the beasts. “Only the Archivist has the key to that collection,” she had told him. “And only a drago can compel her to use it.”

  The surviving jewels, along with a forgery of the Black Prince’s Ruby, were back in the Vault where they belonged. The crown and scepter had been reformed. The Russians had been given a forgery as well, and they had stopped hunting for the mysterious thieving children.