And, finally, his mom’s abduction and torture.
If Mike had his way, he would warp over to DuBois’s castle and beat the living hell out of the man. But he couldn’t teleport, and Garzan claimed he couldn’t beat the guy in a fight. So, considering the circumstances, he might’ve settled for blowing up a wing of the mansion, or a two-hour Sparring session where all his adversaries were either dead or incapacited—
Wow. Killing other students? Maybe I am pretty evil. Who knew?
Mike pounded up the marble staircase, marvelling at his own negative creativity. He knew where he was headed; that idea had formed the moment he’d left Garzan’s office. The Headmage had told him not to tell anyone, but Garzan’s instructions be damned if a piece of missing information might cost a Guardian his life.
Besides, he needed to burn off some steam. And maybe hatch a plan how to free his mom of DuBois’s clutches.
He climbed the stairs leading to the dorm. Instead of stopping at the third floor he made his way up to the fourth, then poked his head into the first room on the right.
“Which room is Zucker’s?” he said a little more forcefully than he intended.
A bare-chested blond-haired kid was sitting crosslegged on his bed, reading a novel or something. He jumped, and dropped the book he was holding.
“Uh, four down on the left, 409.”
“Thanks,” Mike said abruptly, and headed down the corridor. When he came to the correct door, he knocked loudly, which was received with a surprised, “Uh, come in?” Mike opened the door to see Zachariah sitting on his bed looking at a magazine. The look on his face said he wasn’t used to receiving guests.
Mike had planned on speaking with Zachariah outside the Manor, out of earshot, but that seemed to be unnecessary. The other bed in the room was bare, with no sheets or pillows whatsoever. The second closet was empty, as well. The walls were covered in posters of different bands. Zachariah’s taste apparently ranged from Grateful Dead to Guns N’ Roses. And was that… cigarette smoke? Was that even allowed?
“What are you doing here?” Zachariah said, his eyebrows slanted.
“Uh, where’s the other guy?” As soon as the words left Mike’s mouth he wished he could have them back.
“Where you should be,” Zachariah snapped. “Out of my room.”
Mike didn’t miss a beat. “But then you wouldn’t hear how right you are.”
Zachariah closed his magazine and tossed it on the floor. “What?”
“About there being different rules here.”
Zachariah sat up straighter. “How so?”
Mike prayed his instincts were right about this. The dream with his mother’s spy-warning flashed through his mind. So did Stockton’s words, from Garzan’s office a few nights back. Perhaps the spy we’ve been looking for.
But for some reason, Mike was pretty sure Zachariah wasn’t it. It just didn’t seem right – what spy would go around pissing people off all the time?
Mike told Zachariah about his meeting: How Guardians and Slayers were mortal enemies, even though they fought a common adversary. How disgraced and alone their clan really was. And how the Headmage was afraid they’d be massacred if the other clans found out what Mike and Zachariah had done.
“And, because I didn’t kill my girl—uh, ex-girlfriend…” Mike took a deep breath. “My mom was kidnapped. She’s being tortured and held by some French prick, in a Guardian stronghold somewhere.”
Zachariah’s eyes bugged out. “A Guardian stronghold?”
Mike nodded, his emotions suddenly taking hold of him. He bit his cheek. He couldn’t cry here, in front of his worst—well, not his worst enemy, that was DuBois, or the Brethren… oh, whatever…
For a minute, Zachariah said nothing. He stared at the floor, legs dangling, toes playing with one of his flip-flops. “Can I ask you something?”
Mike inhaled. “Uh, sure.” At least I didn’t just break down in front of this guy. I’d be the laughingstock of the school.
“Because I’ve got to ask somebody in this place or I’ll go nuts. You seem to be one of the less clueless guys here, however pathetic that may be.”
Mike considered several comebacks, most revolving around how he’d kicked Zachariah’s butt in their one Sparring session, but decided against all of them. He was more curious than anything at the moment.
“Does it seem to you that we got dropped in the middle of a war without anyone telling us, without asking whether we’d like to be included or not?”
Mike nodded. “Um, duh.” Especially now that it’s us versus the world.
“I mean, my bro’s in the US army, so at least when he’s thrown into some crazy stuff in Afghanistan, they can say, hey, you signed up for this. Don’t get me wrong, that’s not any consolation if things go to hell. But here… it’s like we just got drafted, you know, and nobody told us anything until we were out there.” Zachariah pulled his hairy legs onto the bed.
“Totally agree with you, man,” Mike said, even though his brain was muttering, is this really the second heart-to-heart you’ve had with Zachariah in the past twenty-four hours?
Then Mike noticed a small picture taped to the wall, just by Zachariah’s bed, cut with a scissor to outline a female shape. He squinted to get a better look. It was Annabella, at the beach, hands spread up to the sky as if showing off the new yellow dress she was wearing. She had a huge grin on her face.
Mike nodded at the picture. “How long’ve you known her?”
Zachariah looked at the small cut-out. He smiled. It occurred to Mike that it was the first time he’d ever seen the guy do that.
“Girl next door. Literally. The only one in the world who understands me.” Zachariah brushed Annabella’s picture with a thumb.
Just then, the door flew open. Mike whirled to see Aaron Caulderon standing in the doorway. He had a reptilian look to him; the contacts in his eyes were green and yellow.
Aaron looked from Mike to Zachariah, back and forth, as if unable to process the information. His eyebrows raised ever so slightly.
“Uh, you two hanging out?”
“Mike’s mom was kidnapped,” Zachariah growled. “He was here for a bit of therapy.”
“What?” Aaron said. “How? By who? Who told you?”
“Garzan,” Mike said, not totally loving the therapy comment. He gave Aaron a quick rundown about what happened in Central Park. “Some French guy took her, because I didn’t kill Laura.”
Aaron leaned in with his yellow eye. “Which French guy?”
“DuBooty or something,” Zachariah said.
“DuBois?” Aaron offered.
Mike raised an eyebrow. “How’d you know that?”
“He’s the head of the Grey Talon clan, in France.” Aaron chuckled. “I forgot you don’t know this stuff.” He rubbed his neck. “What a scumbag, I can’t believe he’d kidnap another Guardian. Is she okay?”
“She’s alive, if that counts,” Mike growled. He was done talking about his mother; all it did was make him want to blow stuff up. Which, if he wasn’t careful, might actually happen. “So… what’s up?”
Aaron shook his head as if to wipe away the cobwebs. “Right. We’ve been in this place almost a week, and we haven’t raided the girls yet.” He grinned. “That changes now.”
Chapter Twenty Three
“Come on,” Aaron urged as he ran through the halls. “Everybody’s waiting downstairs.”
Mike and Zachariah followed Aaron down the staircase and turned into Monster Hall, as the corridor with all the vampire paintings was now called. There was a collection of eight or nine guys poking fun at a painting that depicted a Gargoyle tearing flesh off of a carcass of some sort. Mike recognized Aaron’s roommate – what was his name again? – and a few of the other guys from his classes, but he didn’t really know any of them.
“You know there are cameras everywhere, right?” Mike said to Aaron. He’d seen them all over; just something he’d noticed as part of his paranoia trai
ning with his mom.
Mom.
I hope you’re all right.
And if she’s not, DuBois… I’m going to rip your limbs off and feed them to a gargoyle.
“Got that covered,” Aaron said as he nodded to his roommate. “Take it away, Toadman.”
Mike had to admit, the short fat kid with horrendous acne did seem to resemble a blown-up amphibian. Either way, Toadman picked up a book that was lying on the floor and opened it to where his thumb held the place. He started mumbling, words Mike didn’t recognize. As Toadman’s eyes started fluttering, Mike got a strange sense that this was a great idea about to go terribly wrong.
“Uh, what’s he doing?” Mike said nervously as Toadman’s pitch got a little louder.
“Illusion spell, to cover up the cameras,” Aaron said, his face eager. “Found it in a book in the library. It’s completely safe, don’t you worry.”
Something about ‘found it in a book in the library’ did not sound completely safe. “What does it do?”
Aaron said, “It puts a fake image in front of a camera, basic stuff. We’ve staked out all the cameras in the place – there are almost a hundred – and it’s just taking a minute for the Toad to cover ‘em.”
“You don’t think they’ve put spells on the cameras to prevent tampering?”
Zachariah said, “Shut up or don’t come, Prior.”
“Fair point,” Mike allowed. Of course, there was no way he wasn’t coming; this was nothing short of an inauguration into the cool clique at Windham, and he was not missing out on it.
Finally, Toadman’s eyelids stopped trembling. “We’re ready,” Toad proclaimed.
“Let’s do it!” Aaron took the lead.
Mike followed towards the back of the group. From behind he could tell Aaron was checking to see if any Guardians were in the hallway. As it was around 11:00 pm, Mike knew most of them had to be sleeping. Of course, he couldn’t imagine that one or two Guardians would not be on duty, watching the cameras, just in case anything went wrong. After all, he had just come out of a meeting with Garzan and Stockton a few minutes ago, so they couldn’t have gone to sleep yet…
“Come on, quick,” Aaron whispered. Toad dissolved the video. Zachariah slipped ahead to hold open the door.
And then Mike was out in the open, following the guys who had poured down the steps. They tiptoed as they went, trying their hardest to move across the marble floor without making noise.
Mike’s heart was in his throat. Somehow his mind was more alert than he could ever remember. He felt everything, as if the sensations could give him away at any moment. The strained breathing of the guys around him. The residual smell of gargoyle hide. The warmth of the lights as they burned down on his neck. His mind was fresh with memories of Yaris creeping up on him from behind Garzan’s office, and every sound of foot on marble echoed in his mind as if someone was beating a gong.
As soon as Mike’s foot touched the marble staircase, he heard a creak from behind, as if the front door had opened. Instinct kicked in, and he bolted up the stairs. Apparently some of the other boys had heard it too, because this triggered a miniature running of the bulls, which culminated with about ten boys plowing into each other on top of the landing.
“Get off of me,” somebody whispered.
“Come on!”
“Move it, go!”
Finally, somehow, they were past the glass doors that led to the girls’ dorms. Mike took a peek behind him. The Greeting Hall was empty.
For what seemed like an eternity, no one moved.
“I think we’re in,” Aaron murmured.
The mood in the hallway lightened immediately, and Mike found himself grinning and slapping palms with guys he didn’t even know. Which was a pretty awesome feeling in its own right.
“Okay, what’s the plan?” Zachariah said.
Aaron removed a sheet of paper from his jeans pocket. It seemed to be a list of some sort, a few pages stapled together.
“Zachariah, Annabella is Room—”
“I know where she is,” Zachariah dismissed him with a wave of a hand.
“Fair enough. Jonesy,” Aaron said to another kid, running a finger down the sheet of paper. “Sara Borders, room two-oh-one.”
Jonesy nodded and repeated the number. “Two-oh-one, got it.”
Mike slapped his forehead. So that’s what they were doing… for some reason, Mike had it in his head that they were going on a destructive raid. Well, this was interesting…
Aaron pointed to Toad. “Jessica Robinow, right?” Toad nodded as Aaron flipped to the third page. “Room three-ten.” Quickly, Aaron read off a few more names. Then he turned to Mike.
“Mike, who’re you raiding? Steph?”
“Sure, why not.” It wasn’t like he had another option. His first choice lived a hundred and fifty miles away.
“What’s her last name?”
“Er… I don’t know.”
That caused a chuckle or two. Aaron frowned. He flipped over the sheet and skimmed it again, running his finger down to keep place. “That’s funny. I don’t see a Stephanie on the roster anywhere.”
“Really?” Mike said. “Lemme check.”
Handing the papers over to Mike, Aaron said, “Okay guys, you know where to go. You have one hour until the camera spell wears off. Probably a little less.” He spread his arms out wide, as if he was Santa giving out candy canes. “Enjoy yourselves!”
Mike turned back to the roster as the guys went off, hooting quietly amongst themselves. Steph wasn’t on the student list? How could that be? Maybe she had a first name she didn’t like, and Stephanie was her middle name? Had she transferred in late? No, that was impossible – any list would probably have the whole of the Guardian family, regardless of when they had arrived at Windham…
After running through the list three times, Mike realized he would just have to suck it up and ask somebody. He headed towards the stairwell, his heart racing, but not from fear. The last time he’d felt this way, he’d been standing outside Forest Hills High, holding a bouquet of flowers and getting ready to ask Laura out after the school play.
He took a deep breath and steadied himself. There were shrieks coming from inside the corridor, surely girls yelling in surprise over their male visitors. Mike smiled and reached for the door.
But then he heard more screaming, coming from upstairs. This had a different quality to it, almost… scared, desperate. In his curiosity, Mike abandoned the first floor and skipped up to the second, taking two steps at a time. But before he could reach the landing, a train of girls piled out past him.
They were squealing, crying, pushing each other down the stairs. Their faces were red, and they had expressions of terror on their faces.
What the…
Mike pushed past the flood of girls in pajamas and burst into the hallway.
Then he stopped dead in his tracks.
The walls, which Mike assumed were usually white, were splotched red, as if an elephant had dipped his nose in paint and sprayed it everywhere. Clothes, shoes, and books littered the floor.
And lying on the floor were two pairs of legs extending into the hallway, their upper bodies hidden from Mike’s line of sight.
The limbs were as lifeless as a Barbie doll.
Holy hell…
Something caught Mike’s eye. There was a video camera stuck into the top of the wall, in the corner. Surely the Guardians had seen whatever had attacked—
Mike swore under his breath.
The cameras weren’t working. Because of Toad’s spell.
That meant there were no Guardians coming to help.
Mike looked for some weapon to grab, very aware that whatever had attacked them was probably still here. He was too raw with his electrokinesis, he felt, to grab electricity from the light bulbs up like Stockton had done in class. There was no fire or water nearby. Mike cursed and resigned himself to telekinesis. He crept along the suddenly silent hallway, hands at his sides as if rea
dy to pull a revolver from its holster.
What could it be? A vampire? A Slayer? One of the Brethren? Mike’s imagination ran wild, causing his heart to beat at an insane level—
Then he heard the noise.
Terror flooded Mike’s brain. It was not a human noise. It was animal in nature. Almost cat-like.
There was sudden movement from across the hallway. Mike tensed, but it wasn’t a Calebra.
Zachariah exploded through the door.
“Get back!” Mike waved his arms frantically. “Get out, get out!”
“What?” Zachariah said, moving slowly towards Mike. “I heard the commotion, and then a ton of girls piled through – what’s going on with—”
Out of nowhere, a flash of orange and black jumped through the air towards Zachariah’s head. And then Zachariah was on the floor.
“No!” Mike ran through clothes and strewn books. He threw telekinesis in Zachariah’s direction, hoping to knock the Calebra off him. His fourth shot hit its mark; the creature slammed into the wall and bounced off, twirling around and landing on its feet as if it was Sonic the Hedgehog.
This one was much bigger, almost the size of a small dog. Its face had a line straight down the middle, orange fur on the right, black on the left. Protruding from the black side was an enormous saber-toothed fang, almost vampiric in appearance. The creature’s mouth was splotched with red. Mike prayed that was its natural color, whatever natural meant, because otherwise—
The creature reared back and zoomed off the floor as if it had rockets attached to its legs. Mike instinctively threw up a shield. The creature hit the shield with such force that Mike fell backwards, and for a moment the shield disappeared. Mike panicked, expecting the Calebra to charge at him, but no such attack came. Mike reformed the shield and scrambled to his feet.
The Guardian Lineage Page 14
