“Why?” Shazad asked.
“Because the purest, most powerful form of magic cannot be created alone. It’s going to take all three of you to change the world and to take it back from the Invisible Hand. They’re still out there. Grayson Manchester was just a cog in the machine. There are other, faster-moving parts—with sharper edges! When the time comes for you to meet them, you’re going to need one another. And you’ll be there for one another. I know you will. I look at you, and I don’t see failure. I see three phoenixes. Hope for the future.” Redondo pointed to Shazad. “Your instinct is to safeguard magic. Protect it. That’s good. You saw that book. This theater has a few items that need protecting.” He turned to Leanora. “You want to use magic to fight injustice. I like the sound of that. This theater has a few things that can help on that front as well.” Finally, he turned to Joey. “As for you, Joey… you just love magic. That’s what it’s all about. The Invisible Hand, they think it’s all about power. Magic is so much more than that. Magic is that thing that lies just out of our reach, but we reach for it anyway, despite all reason and common sense. And when we reach, we do so in the spirit of giving, not taking. The idea is to create wonders that will amaze, astound, and delight. To bring that feeling into the world takes a magician, and the world needs you—all three of you—to make it a magical place.”
“I’ve only been doing this for two days,” Joey argued. “What am I going to do without you there to teach me?”
“I never taught you anything, and yet you learned so much.”
Joey would not be deterred. He wasn’t ready to let Redondo go. “There’s so much I still don’t know.”
“You know enough to begin,” Redondo said. “That’s the hardest part. Magnificence is a decision, young man. Speaking of which…” Redondo clapped his hands inside the mirror. The sound triggered a miraculous, instantaneous restoration of the Majestic. The effect was breathtaking. Joey and the others looked out the open office window, as every bulb lit up with brilliant light, every crack in the wall healed, and every chipped piece of molding re-formed good as new—better than Joey had ever seen it before. The spectacle of the transformation filled Joey with wonder and inspiration. Everything magic was supposed to do.
“What do you think?” Redondo asked, rubbing his hands together. “Did I get everything?”
“I don’t understand,” Joey said, still marveling at the change. “You told me this theater was a part of you. Shouldn’t it get worse instead of better, now that you’re… you know, now that you’re…?”
“Dead?” Redondo said, supplying the word Joey was awkwardly avoiding. The word he couldn’t bring himself to say out loud. “What can I tell you? I’m in good spirits,” he said with a laugh. “Lighten up, Joey. I was on my way out anyway, remember? It’s all right. Even if a piece of this old place is dying with me, there’s three phoenixes rising from the ashes of my life.” A great smile spread out across his face. “I couldn’t have asked for a better final act. First thing you learn onstage is that all people ever remember is the last thing you do. Before this I would have been remembered as the man who let the Order of the Majestic fall apart. Now I am the man who restored it.”
Joey, Leanora, and Shazad looked at one another, then back at Redondo, whose reflection was beginning to fade. “Redondo…,” Joey began. “You’re not talking about us. Are you?”
“Aren’t you the one who asked me if there could be another Order of the Majestic someday? You’re the one who has to answer that question. It’s up to you, young Kopecky. It’s up to all of you.”
Redondo’s reflection faded away. The children kept staring straight ahead into the mirror. The first three members of the newly restored Order of the Majestic stared back.
20 The Great Game
After everything incredible that had happened to Joey, the hardest thing for him to believe was that the next day was only Wednesday. He had traveled to other dimensions, battled evil magicians, released water monsters into the New York City sewer system, and destroyed priceless magical artifacts. His whole world had changed in forty-eight hours, and the week wasn’t even half over.
When Joey got up the next morning, he told his parents he was ready to give Exemplar Academy another try. After they picked their jaws up off the floor, they asked him what it was that had changed his mind. He said he didn’t think it would be impossible to succeed there anymore. It turned out, he was good at impossible. Joey went to school that day with a smile on his face, looking forward to seeing Janelle again.
Dr. Cho met him at the gate, and the first thing he did was apologize for the previous day’s incident. “Oh please, don’t waste another second thinking about that,” she said before he could finish saying he was sorry. “You’re hardly the first student to get overwhelmed on a visit to our school. Believe it or not, I’ve seen worse.” Joey didn’t see how that could be true, but he thanked Dr. Cho for understanding just the same.
On the walk to her office, Dr. Cho mentioned that the school had yet to receive Joey’s PMAP test results. He wasn’t the least bit surprised. After all, “Mr. Gray” had turned out to be Grayson Manchester, and the test he’d taken was a sham. It was a safe bet no test scores would be forthcoming from the NATL.
“Here’s the thing, Dr. Cho. I didn’t actually take the PMAP test.”
“Jules,” she said instantly. “I told you, Joey, please. Call me Jules. And your father told me all about your… alternative test. It sounded very interesting.” She said the word “interesting” the way people usually did when they were too polite to say what they really meant. “I called the NATL yesterday to find out more.”
“What did they tell you?” Joey asked. He assumed she had hit a dead end and that he’d be taking the real PMAP test later that morning.
“I ended up speaking with the head of the NATL. He said he was incredibly sorry for the delay and that he’d take care of everything. He actually came by to personally deliver your test results this morning.”
Joey stopped short. “What? Who came by? When—”
Dr. Cho laughed. “You’re famous, Joey. He said he wanted to meet the boy who did so well on all their tests. He’s right in here.” She opened the door to her office. A man in a suit and tie was sitting in one of the chairs across from her desk. He stood up as they entered. “This is Mr. Black, chief administrator of the National Association of Tests and Limits. Say hello.”
“Mr. Black?” Joey asked, instantly wary of the man. For one thing, he knew the Invisible Hand secretly ran the NATL, and for another, he had already met Mr. Gray and Mrs. White. Joey backed away a step, sensing danger, but the man was fast. He reached out to shake Joey’s hand, got ahold of Joey’s arm, and pulled him in close.
“Joey Kopecky! At last, I’m in the presence of greatness.” Mr. Black gave Joey’s hand a vigorous shake, grinning broadly. He was a handsome man with movie-star good looks and wavy blond hair. He couldn’t have been more than thirty years old. When he let go of Joey’s hand, Joey noticed he had placed a small hourglass on the edge of Dr. Cho’s desk.
Out of the corner of Joey’s eye, he saw Dr. Cho’s body turn rigid. Joey looked over his shoulder and flinched. She had stopped dead at the door to her office. It was as if she had been hit with a freeze ray. “What the…?” Joey checked the clock on the wall. It had stopped ticking. All around Joey, time stood still. There was magic at work, and it wasn’t his.
“Pretty cool, don’t you think?” Mr. Black asked. He gestured to the hourglass as if he were presenting a work of art. “I give you the Sands of Time. Most people think they stop time, but in fact it’s the opposite. The hourglass actually speeds up time within a two-foot radius. It’s not much, but it’s enough for you and me to squeeze a few extra minutes out of the space between this second and the next. Sit down, Joey. Let’s chat. We’ve got until the sands run out to get to know each other better.”
Looking right at home, Mr. Black sat back down and waited for Joey to follow suit. Feel
ing decidedly less comfortable, Joey took the seat across from him. “Who are you?” he asked, trying to sound in control. “Manchester’s boss?” he guessed. “The guy behind the guy?”
The man smiled. “Something like that.”
“Is ‘Mr. Black’ the best fake name you could come up with?”
“It’s not that I can’t come up with anything better. I just can’t be bothered to try. There’s no point in getting creative when the norms will fall for just about anything. My real name, which I’m happy to tell you, is Ledger DeMayne. My card.” He offered Joey a card with the Invisible Hand symbol on the back.
“You can go ahead and keep that,” Joey said. “What do you want?” He held his breath and hoped DeMayne wasn’t there to pick a fight.
“I just came to talk,” DeMayne said behind a reassuring smile. “I wanted to meet the boy who caused so much trouble. Wait. That’s not true,” he said, correcting himself. “Technically, we’ve met before. We’ve just never been formally introduced. Don’t hate me, but I was one of the shadows who tackled you outside the Majestic Theatre last night. My colleagues and I have been attempting to enter Redondo’s sanctuary through the shadow realm for months. We would have gotten away with it, too, if not for you meddling kids!” he added, quoting Scooby-Doo. DeMayne chuckled. “I’m joking, of course. You didn’t ruin my plans. Manchester did. It’s my own fault. I should have seen it coming. Once a traitor, always a traitor. Shame.”
“If it makes you feel any better, he won’t be stabbing anyone else in the back. He’s gone. We dropped him down a black hole last night.”
DeMayne’s eyebrows went up. “A black hole? Really?”
Joey nodded. “Really.”
DeMayne thought about that for a second, then motioned with his hands as if such things happened all the time. “What can I say? I’m sorry I missed that.”
Joey was perplexed by DeMayne’s affable manner, acting like they were old friends or something. “We dropped the wand down there too, in case you were wondering.”
At this DeMayne’s smile faded. He straightened up in his seat and studied Joey for a moment. “You’re serious.”
Joey nodded, staring straight into DeMayne’s bright blue eyes. Joey was afraid he might get angry, but he took the wand’s loss in stride. “That’s too bad. Sounds like I wasted my time coming here.”
“You thought I still had the wand?”
“I did.”
Joey shook his head. “Sorry. You can threaten me all you want, but it’s gone. You’re too late.”
“So you said.” DeMayne grimaced. “It’s quite a loss, but you’re mistaken. I didn’t come here to threaten you. I came to do what Manchester should have done the moment he realized your potential. Recruit you.”
Joey twitched slightly. He wasn’t prepared for that. He shifted in his seat, trying to hide his surprise. DeMayne took an envelope with the NATL seal out of his pocket and offered it to Joey.
“What’s that?”
“Open it up. Find out.”
Joey opened the envelope. Inside were his PMAP test results.
POTENTIAL MAPPING TEST RESULTS FOR:
Kopecky, Joseph J.*
*Alternative testing candidate
JOB RECOMMENDATION:
Subject is ideally suited to pursue
anything he wants.
Joey stared at the test score printout. “Anything I want?” he whispered. After a few seconds of stunned silence, he looked up at DeMayne. “I don’t understand.”
DeMayne smiled like a salesman. “That’s how it is for people like us. Rules don’t apply. We can do anything we want. What part of that don’t you understand?”
“You’re telling me to drop out of school and join the Invisible Hand?”
“You have other plans?” DeMayne probed. It was a simple question, but Joey detected a warning layered underneath it. A subtle threat:
If you’re not with us, you’re against us.
“What’s it going to be, Joey?”
Joey folded up the paper with the test results and put it back in the envelope. He didn’t know how DeMayne would react if he refused, but he put on his most convincing tough-guy face and hoped for the best. Just like with Manchester, if he couldn’t be fearless, he would pretend to be brave, and that would have to do. “Manchester already asked me to join your little club. I remember because it was right before he tried to kill me. Thanks, but no thanks. I’ll pass.”
DeMayne had an injured expression on his face. “You can’t let Manchester color your opinion of us. The man was completely unhinged. Surely you picked up on that. He wasn’t looking at the big picture. He was only thinking about himself.”
“Like the rest of you are any different?” Joey asked. “You keep all the world’s magic to yourselves.”
“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
“Of course it is! You could make the world a better place, but you don’t do it.”
“My world’s a better place, Joey. Yours could be too. If you want it bad enough.”
“I’m not going to join you,” Joey said definitively. “What do you think? I root for the Empire when I watch Star Wars? You think I want Sauron to get the ring back from Frodo? Forget it. I’m the guy who gave up the wand. I’m not going to join the dark side.”
“The dark side?” DeMayne laughed out loud. “That’s adorable. Now I understand why you were able to find Redondo and wield that wand. You might come from New Jersey, but you live in a fantasy world. We’re not evil. We’re just the people in charge. I understand how that can be confusing to you. The powerful always look sinister to the powerless. Especially the young and idealistic. I was like you once. I didn’t understand. You’ve got a lot to learn.”
“What do I have to learn?”
“That you’re not one of them anymore.” DeMayne pointed at the frozen figure of Dr. Cho. “You’re in the show now, Joey. The great game. The prize is nothing less than mastery over magic and everything that comes with it, but you’re not playing to win. You don’t have the killer instinct. If you did, you would have kept the wand for yourself.”
“I kept it from Manchester,” Joey said. “And from you. That’s a pretty big win.”
“Is it? Because based on what you’ve told me, Houdini’s wand isn’t gone. It’s lost. And lost things can be found—by anyone.”
Joey’s stomach tightened. He wanted to laugh off the notion of someone tracking down the wand inside a black hole that wasn’t even there anymore, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Sitting there in DeMayne’s magic time bubble, it dawned on Joey that there was no idea “out there” enough that he could dismiss it out of hand. For all he knew, every black hole in the universe was a doorway to some magic kingdom. What if that was true and DeMayne knew the way in? Joey prayed it wasn’t.
“Do you understand what happened now?” DeMayne asked Joey. “You didn’t win. Manchester lost. Try to appreciate the difference, because you won’t get so lucky next time. Speaking of which, that’s all the time we have for today.”
The last few grains of sand fell through the hourglass and DeMayne snatched the relic off the desk. Time immediately returned to normal. Dr. Cho unfroze and did a slight double take, no doubt wondering when Joey and “Mr. Black” had sat down. A half a second earlier, they had all been standing together.
“I wish I could stay longer, but I have to be going,” DeMayne said, rising to his feet. “Dr. Cho, thank you for introducing me to this young man. It was good to finally put a face to the name. And now I’ll know where to find him if I ever have a need.”
Joey grated at what was clearly another veiled threat from DeMayne. Dr. Cho missed it. “You’re not leaving already?” she said, confused. “What about Joey’s test scores?”
“He’s got them.” DeMayne flicked the envelope in Joey’s hand. “I’ve made my recommendations. It’ll be interesting to see where Joey goes from here.”
“I’ll be sure to keep it interesting, then
,” Joey said, standing up. He nodded toward an inspirational poster on Dr. Cho’s wall with the Exemplar Academy motto written on it: OUR STUDENTS CHANGE THE WORLD. Joey locked eyes with DeMayne. “That’s the plan, anyway.”
DeMayne met Joey’s gaze. He smiled, but there was no warmth in it. “Good luck with that,” he said without feeling. As he left the room, Joey knew there would be more tests in his future, but he wasn’t afraid. He was good with tests, and he wouldn’t face them alone.
Onward, young magicians, Joey thought to himself. We’ve got work to do.
Acknowledgments
“Where do you get your ideas?”
That’s the question I get more than any other. Like most authors, I don’t usually have an answer for it. However, this book was different. I remember the exact moment the light bulb lit up for me.
The fact is, I didn’t plan on writing this book. I was actually going to write something completely different. I had this other idea, something that had been sitting in the back of my brain for years, waiting patiently and growing over time. I was finally going to get around to it when all of a sudden, this story came out of nowhere and pushed its way to the front of the line. Here’s what happened.
My wife and I had bought our children a magic set. My older son was playing with it. He was five years old at the time. I was going to show him how to do one of the tricks, which involved the illusion of twisting your hand all the way around on your wrist in a full 180-degree turn. My son jumped back and looked at me like I was crazy. He didn’t want me going anywhere near his wrist. That’s when it hit me.… He thought it was real. Of course he did. All children believe in magic. Until they don’t. I wondered what would happen if we could hold on to that belief. Wouldn’t that be nice?
Just like that, an idea was born. A boy comes across an old magic set and finds out that magic is real—but only if you believe in it. He gets pulled into a secret magical world, and… that’s it. That’s all I had. But that was enough to begin. And that beginning kept me going. That spark of magic in a kindergartner’s eyes. This story wouldn’t exist without that.
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