Willow's Perfect Storm

by D J DuMont

  “She promised me you’d come back. She said she never would have left you there if she hadn’t been sure.”

  Willow was floored. “Wow. I can’t believe that she had so much faith in me.”

  “You’re a good Agent, Willow. The best.”

  Willow smiled. “Thank you. But I’m not the best. My father is the best, and he’s alive.”

  Sam’s hand flew over his mouth. “Did you see him?”

  Willow smiled, savoring the memory of her father’s hand on her shoulder. “I did. But before I get into that, please tell me that Alexis made it back okay?”

  Sam smiled. “She’s back, and she’s okay. It’s quite a long story, though. Tell me about your father, first, and then I’ll tell you about Alexis.”

  Willow managed a laugh. “Deal. Got any coconuts? Cayenne deserves a couple, and I need to talk to Clove. You can tag along and hear the whole story about my father.”

  Sam had a whole bag of coconuts, and he fed Cayenne a half-dozen of them before telling the ravenous dragon to save a few for Clove.

  Willow made her way to the walkway overlooking the dragon stables with Sam and his coconuts trailing behind her. She whistled to Clove, and hoped he would understand when she explained why she’d had to leave her father behind.

  She shouldn’t have worried. As soon as Clove came up to her, his eyes searching hers, he understood. Before she even said a word, he knew. He gave her a giant lick, and tears started streaming down Willow’s cheeks.

  “It’s true, Clove. He’s alive. I saw him.”

  Sam wanted to hear the whole story, so Willow explained it all, even though the details didn’t seem to matter to Clove. By the time Willow was done explaining, word had made its way to Anjali that Willow was back. Anjali showed up at the stables just as teary-eyed as Sam had been, and demanded to hear everything about Willow’s adventure. Willow told her, but decided not to say anything about the Q7 station until she could speak privately with Anjali. She wasn’t sure whether her father’s message was meant to be confidential, and she didn’t want to take any chances.

  It would be a while before Willow had a moment alone with Anjali, however. As news spread that Willow had returned safely, it seemed that everyone on the Dragon Heart Campus wanted to see her—especially once the news got out that Willow had seen her father, the great Sigmund Ember. Willow found herself surrounded by senior Agents, and as happy as she was to hear all of their well-wishes, she was much more interested in seeing her friends. She wanted to see Alexis, and see for herself that her friend was recovering. Anjali had assured her that Alexis was in the Dragon Heart sick ward receiving excellent care, but Willow wanted to see her with her own eyes. She also wanted to see Marcus and Kent, and know that they had dealt okay with the trauma of their first Dragon Heart Mission. Of course, Willow wanted to see Sylvie, and even Cara.

  And then there was Locke. Willow wanted to see him more than anyone, perhaps even more than Sylvie. He had been her longtime nemesis, and yet he had saved her life, defying his own parents to do so. She owed him a huge debt of gratitude.

  The only problem was that he didn’t want to see anyone or talk to anyone. He’d asked Anjali to take a leave of absence, but she hadn’t been able to allow it because the President wouldn’t approve of it. Anjali had, however, allowed Locke to seclude himself in the safe house, far away from everyone. Willow couldn’t imagine how much pain he must feel, if he willingly chose to go back into the safe house. Her heart ached for him, which surprised her. How quickly her attitude toward him had changed. He had always been prideful and obnoxious, but when it came down to a life or death situation, he’d been a true Dragon Heart.

  “I’m going to get you back to your dorm room now,” Anjali said, breaking into Willow’s thoughts. There had been a brief reprieve in the flood of Agents wanting to talk to Willow, and Anjali was taking advantage of the opportunity to get Willow to her room. Willow was tired, but she wasn’t ready to be cooped up just yet.

  “What about seeing Alexis? I’ve done so much for the Academy today. Surely you can grant me the chance to at least see her.”

  Anjali hesitated. “She needs her rest, but I do think she would like to see you. I also have some news to give all of you, and I might as well share it with her at the same time. I’d rather she hear everything from me than from the gossip grapevine.”

  “So I can see her?” Willow’s heart leapt with hope.

  “Yes. Walk with me. We’ll head to her room in the sick ward and I’ll have the other students meet us there. Alexis is tired, but seeing everyone might lift her spirits.”

  Willow grinned. “I think you’re right about that. She’s always been a social butterfly.”

  About ten minutes later. Willow stood in the hallway outside of Alexis’ room with Anjali, Sylvie, Cara, Marcus and Kent. Locke’s absence felt glaring, but everyone knew better than to mention it. It still felt surreal to realize that his parents had been the traitors. If Willow herself was so sickened by the news, she couldn’t imagine how Locke felt. He was probably going to need quite a bit of time before he felt ready to face everyone.

  For now, Willow was happy to be seeing Alexis. When Anjali pushed the door to the room open and Willow saw Alexis sitting up in bed with her eyes open, Willow couldn’t hold back the flood of tears that filled her eyes.

  “Alexis!” Willow ran over and hugged her friend, ignoring Anjali’s pleas to be gentle. “Are you okay?”

  “I was okay, before you crushed my lungs just now,” Alexis joked as Willow smothered her in a huge embrace.

  “Sorry,” Willow said, taking a step back. “I’m just so happy to see you alive. I feared the worst after…after the earthquake.”

  “It’s been quite an adventure, but I’m alright,” Alexis said. “And now I’ve finally been let in on the secret of what you and Sylvie have been doing all this time. I never imagined it was magic. I saw a dragon that one night we got caught in a blizzard, but I thought I must have been seeing things. I convinced myself it had been a large bird…”

  Behind Willow, Sylvie laughed. “Cayenne’s a lot bigger than a bird.”

  Alexis grinned sheepishly. “I know. But I just couldn’t figure out how any of this was possible. Now I know, and I can’t believe you all managed to keep it such a secret.”

  “We had no choice,” Willow said. “But I’m relieved that you know now. Are you going to be working with the Dragon Heart Agency?”

  Willow glanced hopefully over at Anjali, who was smiling and nodding.

  “Alexis has been offered the opportunity to be a liaison between the wizard and non-wizard world, and she’s accepted.”

  “It’s perfect for me,” Alexis said “Almost too good to be true. I wanted to work in an international field, and now I’ll be working for an international branch of the CIA, with top security clearance. It doesn’t seem real.”

  “But it’s very real,” Anjali said. “And I need to update all of you on everything that’s happened. We’ve learned quite a bit of information tonight, and you all deserve to know what’s going on.”

  Willow took a deep breath and sat on the edge of Alexis’ bed. Marcus sat on the other side, his hand covering one of Alexis’ hands. Sylvie had told Willow that they’d had to practically drag him out of the room earlier to let Alexis rest. He didn’t want to leave her side now that she was back.

  “As you all know,” Anjali began, “We’ve discovered who the traitor was that was feeding information to Stein. This is good and bad news. Good, because now the flow of information to Stein will stop. Obviously, no one is going to be giving Locke’s parents any more Agency information. It’s bad news, however, because Locke is quite broken up about this. I encourage you all to take care of him as best you can over the next few weeks and months. Give him space when he needs it, but let him know that you’re there for him and still believe in him as an Agent. It’s important that you all know that there is absolutely no evidence that Locke had any idea that his pare
nts were the traitors. He has been completely loyal to the Agency, and no one should punish him or ostracize him because of his parents’ actions, is that understood?”

  Anjali looked around the room as all of the students nodded. She nodded herself in satisfaction and then continued to speak. “We are quite thankful that we recovered Alexis. I’ve had the opportunity to speak with her at length, and I’ve explained dragons and magic to her. She’s been granted security clearance and will be working with the Agency in a non-wizard capacity, as she’s just told you.”

  Willow’s heart swelled with happiness, and she had to stop herself from literally jumping up and down in delight. But Anjali’s face had turned quite serious, and Willow had a feeling that whatever she was about to say wasn’t going to be cause for celebration.

  “From what Alexis has told me, and from a small amount of information we were able to recover from Stein’s hideout, it appears that Stein is attempting to mutate the Dragon Heart virus so that it’s usable by all humans, not just those with the Dragon Heart gene. Of course, this news isn’t entirely unexpected. We suspected that if Stein learned of the virus, he would try to use it for his benefit. But knowing for sure that this is what he’s doing is quite concerning.”

  Marcus frowned. “I’m not sure I understand why it would be such a bad thing for everyone to be able to use magic. Obviously we don’t want Stein using it, but there are a lot of good people, like myself, who could be huge assets to the Dragon Heart Agency if anyone could use magic.”

  Anjali looked at Marcus with sad eyes. “I would love to be able to give you magical abilities. But mutating the virus is a dangerous proposition. It could result in quite a bit of dark magic. It could turn into something like a plague that would kill off large portions of the population. Or it could become ineffective at producing magic for everyone, including those with the Dragon Heart gene. We don’t know what the consequences would be, but odds are they wouldn’t be good. At one of our top secret Dragon Heart Labs, scientists have tried to mutate the virus under very securely controlled conditions. Without boring you with the details, let’s just say the results have never been good.”

  Alexis let out a bitter laugh. “That doesn’t surprise me. Every experiment Stein tried on me didn’t go well.”

  Willow felt sick when she realized what Alexis was implying. “Did Stein infect you with the Dragon Heart virus?”

  “Some form of it, we think,” Alexis said. “It made me quite sick. Anjali tells me I’m lucky I recovered.”

  Anger burned deep inside Willow. “I’m going to kill that man, if it’s the last thing I do!”

  Anjali sighed. “The best thing would be for Stein to stand trial for his crimes. But in any case, the good news is that Stein’s attempts to mutate the virus have caught the attention of both the President and Dragon Heart leadership. Stopping Stein has become their number one priority.”

  “Good,” Willow spat out. “He can’t be stopped soon enough.”

  “No, he can’t,” Anjali agreed. “But I want to make sure you all understand that it might still be some time before he’s stopped. I’m sure he didn’t stay at the hideout we just left. No doubt he’s already moved on. And even though Locke’s parents won’t be able to get any new information from the Dragon Heart Agency, they’ll still have plenty to tell Stein. They understand how the Agency works, and they’ll be able to give Stein a lot of details on where our buildings are located and how our Agents work. They’ve already told him so much. Remember how surprised the Agency was when Stein found the secret island? Now we know how he found it, and how he so quickly broke through the magic shield there and stirred up a storm. Locke’s parents helped him, and we have every reason to believe they’re going to continue to help him. This isn’t going to be an easy fight.”

  “It doesn’t matter how hard it is,” Cara said, speaking up for the first time since they’d entered Alexis’ sick room. “He must be stopped.”

  Willow looked over at Cara, surprised at how strong the girl’s voice sounded. Cara usually spoke softly and tremulously, but now she sounded sure of herself. Willow saw that Cara’s sapphire magic ring was glowing blue, and smiled at the sight. Cara’s ring signified the virtue of courage, which had seemed a strange match for someone so timid. But now, in their third year at the Dragon Heart Academy, perhaps Cara was finally stepping into her courage.

  “We will stop him,” Anjali promised. “But I need you all to understand that we won’t be rushing off to battle tomorrow. The President wants you all to have a part in this, so you’ll have at least some role to play in capturing Stein, although I can’t promise at this point how large or small that role will be. For now, what I would ask is patience. Keep your head down and work on finishing out this year strong in your studies. That’s the best way to be ready when the moment comes.”

  Willow bit her lip hard to keep from making a sharp retort. She’d grown weary of always being told to keep her head down and study, but she knew that complaining about this to Anjali would prove pointless. Anjali didn’t think sending students to fight the Agency’s toughest battles was wise, but as long as the President wanted them on Stein’s case, Anjali would have to allow it.

  “That’s all I have to tell you for now,” Anjali said. “Any other questions?”

  Willow frowned. “I do have one question. Why did Stein take Alexis? If he just wanted a non-wizard to experiment on, it would have been easier to get one from pretty much anywhere else besides the Birch Point Campus. Why go to the trouble of a Terraemotus earthquake, which I’m assuming Locke’s parents set off, just to capture a non-wizard when you could grab anyone off of pretty much any street?”

  Anjali nodded. “It’s a good question. We think Stein’s guards meant to grab you or Sylvie. He wanted to capture another wizard to be able to steal even more magic for his magic guns, but his guard grabbed Alexis by mistake. Our guess is that because Alexis was always hanging out with you guys, Stein’s cronies recognized her and mistook her for one of you. Once he realized she wasn’t a wizard, he must have figured she was as good a test subject as any for his virus mutation tests.”

  “And the Terraemotus earthquake? That was indeed Locke’s parents?” Sylvie asked.

  Anjali nodded again. “We’re almost certain. It makes sense when you think about it. Remember that there was another Terraemotus earthquake in Europe just after the one here? We were surprised that whoever had caused the earthquake here could get to Europe so quickly. But we couldn’t imagine that there were two traitors, so we figured it was the same person. Now, we realize we were wrong. What probably happened was that one of Locke’s parents caused the earthquake here while his other parent was already in Europe, ready to cause an earthquake there. We did actually have two traitors in our midst, working closely together.”

  Sylvie shook her head. “It’s hard to believe anyone could betray the Agency like that.”

  “It is,” Anjali agreed. “But Locke’s parents were able to do it because they were such advanced wizards that they could perform complicated spells, and they could resist lie detector spells. We also think they had plans to use the well portal to allow Stein’s men to infiltrate the Dragon Heart Campus. They were in the process of testing it when Cayenne showed it to you, Willow. They were trying to figure out a way to get large numbers of people across at once. I should have taken the threat more seriously, and I owe you an apology for that. Some good did come of it, though, since Marcus and Kent came over accidentally and have now joined the Agency. That never would have happened on purpose. And it won’t happen again: the portal has been changed by one of our master wizards so that it merely leads to another location on the Dragon Heart campus. We also have Agents constantly guarding the location, just in case.”

  “I guess that’s it, then,” Sylvie mused. “Everything’s been taken care of other than finding Stein.”

  “Yes, that’s pretty much it,” Anjali said. “For now you should all return to your dorm rooms here on
the Dragon Heart Campus, and resume studying for all your classes. I’m sorry to inform you that you’re still on lockdown, and not allowed to leave the campus.”

  Groans went up from the students, but Willow knew none of them were surprised. Until Stein was captured, this would be the way things were. Just one in a long list of reasons why his capture couldn’t come soon enough. The biggest reason, of course, was that Willow wanted her father freed from captivity, and thinking of her father reminded her of his warning to her. Willow again wondered if it was confidential, but then decided she might as well tell Anjali now. Her father hadn’t said it needed to be top secret, and Willow knew none of the students would spread gossip about it if Anjali told them to be quiet.

  “One more thing, Anjali,” Willow said. “I didn’t tell you earlier because I didn’t want to say anything in front of all the other senior Agents, but my father gave me a message for you.”

  Anjali’s eyes widened slightly. “What did he say?”

  Willow thought she saw the hint of tears glistening in her professor’s eyes. Anjali and Willow’s father had been good friends before he’d been taken away.

  “He said to tell you that Stein is planning an attack on the Q7 station. He didn’t have time to explain further, but he seemed to think you would know what that meant.”

  Anjali’s hand flew to her mouth. “The Q7 station?”

  Willow felt a sense of dread starting to creep up again. If Anjali’s reaction was any indication, this was very bad news. “That’s what he said. You know what the Q7 station is?”

  Willow wasn’t sure whether Anjali would share any more information, since she tended to be so secretive. But Anjali nodded and then explained. “The Q7 station is one of the most secret locations in the Agency. You must have the highest of security clearances to be told where it is, but Locke’s parents might have had that clearance.”