by C. A. Gray
“Bruce?” he asked, sensing that he was not alone and looking for who had set the tea kettle whistling. He sat up and looked around the room. Then he jumped awkwardly, hitting the table in front of him with his knees and nearly falling off his chair. Three people he didn’t recognize were standing near the doorway. “Ack!” said Ralph. “Who are you?”
“Friends of Bruce’s,” said one of the three, a heavy-set woman somewhere near her early forties. “Have you seen him?”
“Not since two days ago,” said Ralph, frowning. “I keep expecting him back, we were right in the middle of something important –”
“What happened two days ago?” interrupted the woman harshly. “The last time you saw him. Tell us everything you know.”
“Hold on!” said Ralph indignantly. He stood up and crossed to the tea kettle because the whistle was too insistent to be ignored, but he made sure not to turn his back on the strangers. “I don’t even know who you people are!”
“My name is Jael,” said the woman, and she gestured at the two men flanking her sides. “These are Sully and Dan.”
“How do you know Bruce?” Ralph demanded, but with slightly less vehemence now that they appeared to be cooperating. They all exchanged a look that clearly told him they were deciding how much to say.
“Has Bruce ever mentioned Isdemus to you?” said the white-haired man Jael had indicated as Sully.
Now Ralph was curious. “Yeah, actually,” he said, “but he’s never told me who he is, at least not directly.” As he watched them warily, he poured himself a cup of Earl Grey with a lump of sugar. He gestured to the teapot with an inquiring expression in the direction of his guests, reluctantly acquiescing to the demands of hospitality. They nodded, Dan more eagerly than the others.
“Well, we work with Isdemus too,” said Sully with a note of finality in his tone, suggesting he did not intend to give away any more than that.
“If you have a message for Bruce, I can give it to him when I see him next –” Ralph began.
“No message,” said Jael shortly, but accepted the tea with a tense flicker of a smile. “Just tell us what happened the last time you saw Bruce. Please,” she added as an afterthought.
Ralph scowled for a second at her rudeness, but then began to say, somewhat resentfully, “We’d been in the middle of an experiment.”
“What experiment?” said Dan.
“It was an experiment in noetics, you wouldn’t understand.”
“Try us,” said Jael.
Ralph’s eyes narrowed and he said haughtily, “All right, then. Bruce used an isolation tank on the fourth floor to illuminate a light bulb with no direct energy source, using only focused concentration. We measured the illumination using a photon detector…”
“Using focused concentration?” repeated Sully, eyebrows raised.
“Yes,” said Ralph impatiently, and Sully and Dan accepted their tea from him as well, stirring sugar and milk with a tiny teaspoon they found on an aluminum serving tray sitting precariously on top of a stack of books.
Sully and Dan exchanged a look, and Dan said, “I’m just curious, how did he convince you to do that?”
“With sound scientific reasoning,” said Ralph, making a loud slurping sound.
“Which was?”
“Dan, we don’t have time for this,” said Jael impatiently, “it doesn’t matter what his reasoning was.” She turned back to Ralph. “What happened after that?”
Ralph looked slightly disappointed, and said, “Well, the experiment worked. I’d thought he was bloody insane, and I was insane for helping him, but so help me, it worked. Then he started crowing about how we should publish and this would change the face of physics, and we had a bit of a row over it because I knew it would be a lot more complicated than that.”
“You didn’t want to publish? Why not?” said Dan.
“We couldn’t publish data like that, we’d be laughed out of our careers!” said Ralph heatedly. “I can see the headlines now: ‘Physicist turns mystic: claims to illuminate light bulb through meditation alone.’”
“If you didn’t want to publish the data even if it worked, why did you agree to do it in the first place?” Dan persisted.
“Dan!” Jael hissed again, a warning note in her voice, and Dan looked sheepish and stopped talking. Then Jael turned back to Ralph. “Then what happened?”
“Then… he said he needed to call someone. He didn’t say who. I assumed it was his son Peter at the time, but maybe it was your Isdemus, I don’t know.”
“So he left the room?” said Jael.
“Yes. And he never came back.” Ralph frowned again.
“Did he tell you where he went to make the call?” Jael demanded. “Why did he leave the room in order to do it?”
“At the time I assumed it was because he thought I was being a prat for not agreeing to publish right away. He gets like that sometimes, can’t see the practical side of anything. But no, he didn’t tell me where he went and I didn’t think to ask.” Then Ralph’s expression clouded and he said with a combination of suspicion and concern, “Why? Something hasn’t happened to him, has it?”
Rather than answering him, Jael pursed her lips and Sully and Dan exchanged another meaningful look. Ralph was getting flustered. “I’ll call him, maybe he’s at home,” he offered as he strode over to the cordless at the corner of the lab and dialed the number, even as Dan said, “Don’t bother, we’ve been calling him for the last forty-eight hours…”
On the other end of the line, Ralph heard, “Hi, this is Bruce –”
“Bruce!” Ralph said with relief. “Where have you –”
“– and Peter Stewart’s residence,” the recording continued cheerfully. “We’re not here to answer your call right now…”
A look of confusion flickered over Ralph’s face as he replaced the receiver in the cradle, and then turned to the three strangers. “Tell me what’s going on.”
“There’s a situation – involving his son,” Sully said. That was true enough.
“You know Peter?”
“Yes, we’re friends of Peter’s as well, and –”
“Is Peter in some kind of trouble? Is he all right?”
“He’s – in trouble, in a manner of speaking,” said Sully.
“But Bruce isn’t? It’s Peter?” Ralph tried to clarify, confused.
“Bruce might be too,” said Dan quickly. “Look, we’ll explain later. Are there security cameras on the front entrance and in the labs?”
“Er, I think so –” stammered Ralph.
“On it,” said Sully, and took off downstairs.
“What is he looking for?” Ralph asked, alarmed.
“He’s hoping we can find out where Bruce went from the tapes from two days ago,” Jael explained shortly.
“You don’t think… this is because of our experiments, do you?” Ralph asked fretfully. “Because I know there are a lot of people out there who wouldn’t want something like this to get published –”
“No, we don’t think it has anything to do with your research,” Dan cut him off. “And we don’t know for sure that anything bad has happened to Bruce at all, but we need to know –”
Suddenly the elfin nimbus named Verum who had assisted the Jeffersons in the Commuter Station appeared right in front of Jael, whose hand flew to her throat, and she jumped about a foot.
“Geez, don’t do that!” she said sternly.
Ralph looked even more alarmed. “Do what?”
Jael bit her lip. “Nothing. Nevermind.”
With a sidelong glance at Verum, Dan said theatrically to Jael, “I’ll just… uh… go and help Sully look through the tapes, shall I?”
“Yes,” said Jael in the same theatrical tone. “Why don’t you go and do that.”
“You people are even crazier than Bruce,” Ralph muttered, loudly enough that they could hear, as Dan left the room with Verum fluttering in front of him.
“Excuse us for the intrusion,
” said Jael, straightening a skewed stack of papers so that they would be stable enough to support the weight of her empty mug. “Thank you for the tea. If we have any further questions, may we come back and find you here?”
“What do you mean, if you have any further questions? You haven’t answered any of mine! What’s happened to Peter? Look, if something is wrong, we need to inform the police!”
“No!” said Jael, too quickly, and then she amended, “I mean, that’s not necessary, not at this point, anyway. We have the number of the lab, and as soon as we find something out, we’ll be sure and let you know. All right? Thanks so much for your cooperation.” She ducked out of the room before Ralph had a chance to protest.
Chapter 23
After she left the lab, Jael glanced to her left and saw Dan whispering with Verum in hushed tones. She ran towards the stairwell to help Sully, and nearly collided into him between the first and second floors.
“It was a seraph,” Sully blurted before she could say anything. “Seven feet tall at least. He knew about the camera too – looked right at it. Seemed to find it amusing.”
Jael stared at him for a moment, dumbfounded. “He was visible on camera?”
Sully nodded grimly. “The penumbra crossed over to our world on the night of the accident too, according to Kane,” he pointed out. “If Kane hadn’t been armed and the nimbi hadn’t crossed over too and shown up to help, all four of the kids would have been killed.”
Jael shook her head slowly. “The penumbra want Peter that badly? Enough to risk their immortality?”
“Kane and the nimbi that came to their rescue killed a load of them that night, and even that apparently hasn’t deterred the others. They’re still coming,” Sully confirmed. “This is big, Jael.”
Just then, Dan burst onto the landing with Verum fluttering behind him. “What did you find out?”
Sully repeated the story, and Dan went pale. “You didn’t see Bruce on the security cameras, though?”
“I did,” said Sully. “I saw him leaving the lab and getting into the elevator, but there are no cameras in there. I never saw him get out.”
“Well, at least we know the seraph didn’t kill him,” said Dan.
“How do we know that?” said Verum.
“Because there would be a body, wouldn’t there?”
“Of course he didn’t kill him yet,” snapped Jael. “Bruce isn’t the point. The Shadow Lord wants to use him to lure Peter.”
They all stood motionless for a moment. Nobody was sure what to say to that very obvious truth.
“What did you come for?” said Jael to Verum, still a bit resentful that he had made her jump in front of Ralph.
A shadow crossed Verum’s luminous brow, and he said very reluctantly, “Turns out Bruce isn’t the only one missing.”
“What?” cried Jael and Sully together.
“Brock is missing now too,” said Dan. “Probably since last night, but Isdemus only found out this morning. His mother had sense enough to call Fides Dignus instead of the police, and he took her back to Carlion.”
“So now the question is, where are they being held captive?” said Jael.
“Where else?” said Sully quietly. “There is only one place the penumbra would have taken them.”
“Where they’d have the biggest advantage,” Dan said with a growing sense of dread.
Jael regarded them with a mixture of fear and skepticism, hoping the latter predominated on her face. “That place is a myth. You don’t seriously believe –”
“Of course it isn’t a myth!” said Dan. “It makes perfect sense, doesn’t it, that the Philosopher’s Stone could unhinge a real place from the earth and create a sort of bridge between dimensions? If you ask me, that’s where the Gordian Knot used to be tied, too – in Avalon.”
“Actually, no, the Gordian Knot was in –” Verum began, but Jael cut him off.
“There’s never been any proof. Considering the Watchers have been searching for it for millennia, since all the legends suggest that Excalibur was cast into the lake of Avalon, you’d think that if it existed we’d have some evidence by now.”
“Haven’t you read The Life and Times of Morgan le Fay?” said Verum.
“Of course I have, but all it shows is that the castle of Avalon was destroyed!” she snapped. “There’s no reason to suppose that the rest of it became the Fata Morgana.”
“There’s one very good reason,” Dan pointed out, “and you said it already. Obviously, the penumbra didn’t kill Bruce or Brock, because the point is to lure Peter to them. So they’re either being held captive somewhere on earth, which would be far too risky, considering all it would take is one of the nimbi crossing their paths, at which point he’d inform Isdemus, and we’d go and save them and that would be the end of it, or –”
“They’re somewhere the penumbra know we can’t find them,” finished Verum.
“Somewhere nobody can find them unless the place itself desires to be found,” Sully added.
“Oh no,” said Jael suddenly. “You don’t think… Kane…”
All three of them looked at her quizzically.
“What about him?” said Dan.
“Well, you don’t think he already knew this? Or saw it coming somehow?”
Sully nodded gravely. “That’s what I was trying to tell you before. That’s exactly what I think.”
“What?” said Verum, confused.
Jael looked sick. “Okay, go with me for a minute. Let’s just say the Fata Morgana exists, like you say.”
“It does,” Dan interrupted, but Jael silenced him with her hand.
“Let’s say that because it’s unhinged and it’s halfway part of your world,” she nodded to Verum, “humans can’t find it unless they already know where it is, or unless it wants them to find it. Then the penumbra seize Bruce, and Brock, and take them both to the Fata Morgana, knowing that the person who would most want to find it in order to rescue them would be –”
“Peter,” Dan finished, catching her drift.
“Of course, Peter is the whole point. So, the Fata Morgana wants him to find it. Him, and no one else.”
“Not us, you mean,” Sully finished.
“Peter must not find that out!” said Verum, horrified.
“Of course, he won’t find out any of this,” said Jael impatiently. “But… what is the one thing Kane has always been most obsessed with, besides Peter himself?”
“Excalibur,” said Dan immediately. “Oh.”
She turned a hopeless expression in Dan’s direction. “So suddenly Kane became Peter’s best mate as soon as he suspected Bruce had been abducted.”
“He wants Peter to go looking for the Fata Morgana on his own!” exclaimed Verum.
“And he wants Peter to take him along,” Sully finished grimly. “We have to tell Isdemus.”
“I’ll tell him!” said Verum.
Sully said, “We’ll all go. There’s nothing more to be gained from staying here anyway.” He looked at Jael and Dan, who dutifully took hold of his coat, before he said, “Dlúth leis an caisleán!”
All four of them disappeared with a crack.
***
“We have to find Isdemus!” said Lily. Her eyes were bloodshot and she felt bleary, like she needed to yawn but there was too much adrenaline in her veins to allow it.
“What time do you think it is?” said Cole. There were certainly no windows in the depths of the castle, so it was impossible to tell, and inside the books, time seemed to pass differently. They felt as if they had been there for days rather than hours.
“How can you think of sleep right now?” Lily scolded him.
“I’m not!” said Cole defensively, “I just meant, if it’s morning, Isdemus will probably be in the Great Hall, but if it’s still the middle of the night, he’ll be in his chamber…”
Peter slammed The Life and Times of Morgan le Fay shut and shoved it back on the nearest shelf. He couldn’t remember where Kane had
pulled it from and he didn’t particularly care. “One way to find out,” he said. “Let’s go!”
“Do you remember how to get back?” said Lily anxiously as they crept out of the library.
“Not clearly,” Peter admitted, “but I think it was a straight shot. We’ll have to go by feel, anyway, since it’s –” he stopped as the door to the library behind them shut, leaving them in pitch blackness, “– completely dark.”
Peter was in front, so he stretched out both arms, feeling the sides of the narrow hallway to keep from running into the wall. Lily reached out and put a hand on Peter’s back so that she could follow directly behind him, and she groped with her other arm until she found Cole’s hand to pull him along behind.
“Anybody else feel like there’s no air in here?” Cole whispered, trying not to panic.
“We’re fine, Cole,” said Lily, sounding braver than she felt. A few seconds later, she suggested, “We could call one of the nimbi. You know, for a torch. Since they light up and all.”
“No good,” said Peter.
“Why not?”
“I don’t think we’re supposed to be down here,” said Peter. “I’d rather the Watchers not find out we know about this place…”
“Don’t you think Isdemus will figure it out when we tell him we know where your dad is? Where else would we have learned it from?” said Lily.
Peter shrugged. She couldn’t see the gesture, but could feel his shoulder blades rise and fall beneath her fingers. “Maybe. I don’t know why… I just don’t want them knowing just yet.”
