فصل 10

Chapter 10

THE FIRST SIGHT of the highway made Call shudder as he remembered the last time he’d crossed it, looking for Aaron. He recalled vividly the pain in his legs as he forced himself to hurry, the panic at the thought of Aaron in danger, and then the discovery that he wasn’t the person he’d always thought himself to be.

Jasper squatted and petted Havoc’s head when the wolf came up to him. For a moment, he didn’t seem like such a jerk.

Then he saw Call looking and glared.

Call sat down on the ground, watching the occasional car whir by. Tamara was typing things into her phone. He wasn’t sure if she was researching stuff for their quest or just e-mailing friends from home. Aaron frowned thoughtfully into the middle distance, the way heroes in comic books did. They could make a figurine of him looking like that.

Call wondered how Aaron would look when he found out that Call had lied to him — lied to him a lot.

He was still wondering about that when the sleek black town car pulled up.

The window rolled down and Tamara’s butler, Stebbins, pushed back his sunglasses to show his pale blue eyes. “Get in,” he said. “We’ve got to make this quick.” Jasper scrambled into the backseat. “Oh, sweet hydration.” He grabbed a water bottle from one of the cup holders and guzzled the whole thing.

“That dog’s not coming in here,” Stebbins said. “He’ll track dirt all over the seats and his nails could scratch up the leather.” “They’re not your seats,” Tamara reminded him, patting the cushion next to her. The wolf hopped into the car and then turned around, looking dubious.

Call got in next, pulling Havoc onto his lap. It was hard to believe that the wolf had once fit underneath his shirt. Now he was almost as big as Call himself.

Aaron got into the front.

“I assume this will be our usual deal,” Stebbins said to Tamara, turning in his seat. “What’s the address?” Call told him, although he didn’t know the number, just the road. Stebbins punched the location into his apparently non-magical GPS.

Then they were off.

“What’s the usual deal?” Jasper asked Tamara under his breath.

“Stebbins drag races with my parents’ cars,” she told him, keeping her voice low. “I cover for him.” “Really?” Jasper asked, frowning at the guy in the front seat with what appeared to be new respect.

As they drove on, Call found himself dozing against the window until his head started knocking against the glass. They were heading down a dirt road.

He blinked. He knew exactly where they were. “Just pull up here,” he said.

Stebbins stopped the car, squinting. “Here?” he asked, but Call was already opening the door. Havoc immediately ran around in circles, clearly relieved to be free.

The kids got out and Stebbins put the town car in reverse, probably glad to be rid of them.

“Are you kidding me?” Jasper said when they saw the landscape of cars. “This is a junkyard.” Call glared, but Tamara shrugged. “He is kind of right, Call.”

Call tried to see the familiar area through her eyes. It was pretty bad. It looked like a parking lot, except that the vehicles weren’t in tidy lines. Cars were haphazardly grouped together. Some had been driven in, but most had been towed and dumped wherever they fit. Rust bloomed along their hoods and along their sides, pocking the once-shiny chrome trim. Long grass had grown up around them, a telltale sign of how long they’d been abandoned.

“He keeps most of these for parts,” Call said, feeling uncomfortable. He’d always thought of his dad as eccentric. But he had to admit that having a lot of corroding vehicles seemed a little bit worse than eccentric. Alastair could never use all the cars he’d collected, not even for parts since so many had rusted through, but he’d kept on collecting them anyway. “The good cars, the ones he’s planning on restoring, are in the barn.” Tamara, Aaron, and even Jasper looked hopefully in the direction Call was pointing, but the ominous gray building didn’t seem to give any of them any comfort.

A cold wind cut across the parking lot. Jasper shivered ostentatiously and hunched down into his jacket. He made a big show of rubbing his hands together as if they were climbing Everest and he was afraid of frostbite.

“Shut up, Jasper,” said Call.

“I didn’t say anything!” Jasper protested.

Aaron waved a peacemaking hand. “You really think your dad might be hiding out here?” “It’s not a place most people would look for him,” Call said, no longer sure of anything.

“That’s for certain,” Tamara said, putting a depth of feeling into those words. She looked over at the farmhouse near the tree line, a gray clapboard building with a tilting, patched roof. “I can’t believe someone lets him do this to their property.” “She’s old,” Call said. “It’s not like her house is in great shape either. And he pays rent.” “Do you think he might stay in there?” Aaron asked hopefully. The yellow glow of the windows seemed inviting. “I mean, maybe she let him crash in her spare room.” Call shook his head. “No. When he comes here, he always stays in the loft of the barn. He keeps bedrolls up there and a camp stove. Cans of food, too. Maybe she would have seen him, though. He usually stops by.” “Let’s go ask,” Aaron said. “Is she one of those old ladies who bakes a lot?” “No,” Call said. He couldn’t remember Mrs. Tisdale ever cooking anything. Aaron looked disappointed. Jasper just kept looking angry and staring up at the sky as if hoping to be saved by a helicopter or an air elemental, or maybe an elemental driving a helicopter.

“Come on,” Call said, setting off toward the house. His leg wasn’t just aching anymore; it felt like spikes of fire were shooting up through the bones. He clenched his teeth as he made his way up the front steps. He didn’t want to make a sound of pain in front of Jasper, not one.

Aaron reached around him and knocked on the door. There were shuffling footsteps and the door opened a crack, revealing tangled gray hair and a pair of bright, pale green eyes. “Kind of short to be door-to-door salesmen, aren’t you?” cackled an old woman’s voice.

“Mrs. Tisdale,” said Call. “It’s me, Callum Hunt. I’m looking for my dad. Is he here?” The door opened wider. Mrs. Tisdale was wearing a checked dress, old boots, and a gray shawl. “Why would he be here?” she demanded. “Think I decided to sell him for parts?” As soon as she came into view, Havoc began to bark like mad. He barked like he wanted to rip Mrs. Tisdale’s arm right off.

“He hasn’t been home in days,” Call said, catching hold of Havoc’s collar and trying to pretend the wolf wasn’t slavering a little. “I thought maybe …” “And the mages haven’t been able to find him,” said Tamara. “They’ve been looking.” They all turned to her in shock. “Tamara!” Aaron said.

Tamara shrugged. “What? She’s a magician. You can see it on her! You can smell the magic in this house.” “She’s right,” said Jasper.

“Quit sucking up, Jasper,” warned Call.

“I’m not sucking up; you’re just stupid,” Jasper replied. “And that pet of yours is a monster.” Mrs. Tisdale looked from Havoc to Tamara to Call. “I suppose you all better come inside — all but the wolf.” Call turned toward Havoc. “What’s wrong with you?”

The wolf whimpered but then caught sight of Mrs. Tisdale and began growling again.

“Okay,” Call said finally, pointing to a spot on the lawn. “Stay here and wait for us.” Havoc sat grudgingly, still growling.

They shuffled into the house, which smelled like dust and cat, but not unpleasantly to Call. As much as it pained him that Jasper might have a point, it was good to be warm. She led them into the kitchen, where she put a kettle on the stove. “Now tell me why I shouldn’t contact the Magisterium and tell them to come pick up some truant students.” Call wasn’t sure what to say. “Uh, because my dad wouldn’t want you to?” “And because we’re on a mission,” Tamara said, although this time it didn’t sound as convincing.

“A mission? To find Alastair?” Mrs. Tisdale took out five mugs from her cupboard.

“He’s in danger,” Aaron said.

“You left the mages, didn’t you?” Jasper asked. “Like Call’s dad.”

“None of that matters.” Mrs. Tisdale turned to Call. “Your father’s in some kind of trouble?” Call nodded vehemently. “We really need to find him. If there’s anything you know …” He could see the moment she relented. “He came by last week. Stayed a few days out in the barn. Paid up a couple of months in advance, too, which isn’t like him. But I really don’t know where he is now. And I don’t like the idea of you four kids being out here by yourselves.” She gave Jasper a sharp look. “I might have left the mages, but that doesn’t mean I’m too proud to call the Magisterium.” “How about we stay over in the barn and we promise we’ll go right back in the morning?” Call proposed.

Mrs. Tisdale sighed, clearly giving up. “If you promised not to cause any trouble …” “Or the house,” Jasper said. “Maybe we could stay in the house. Where it’s warm and not creepy.” “Come on, Jasper,” said Aaron, grabbing him by the arm. Jasper went quietly, as though he’d already decided that even Mrs. Tisdale was not on his side.

In the night air, the cars reminded Call eerily of skeletal creatures, like dinosaur bones jutting out of the earth.

Havoc padded behind them quietly. His pale eyes kept turning back toward the house and his tongue lolled as though he was hungry.

The others seemed to feel the same sense of foreboding. Tamara looked around with a shiver and summoned up a small ball of fire. It danced along the path to the barn in front of them, lighting up scattered license plates, tires, and cans full of bolts.

Call was glad when they reached the barn, with its red-painted door secured by a huge metal bar. Up close, it was easy to see that the metal had been oiled recently. Aaron set to work lifting aside the bar and sliding the door open.

The old post-and-beam barn was a familiar place to Call. It was where the good cars rested, each under oilskin tarps. It was where he and his dad had spent most of their time when they came down here. Call would bring a stack of books or his Game Boy and sit up in the loft while his father tinkered below.

They were good memories, but right then they felt as hollow as the skeletal landscape of cars outside.

“Upstairs,” he said, and started toward the ladder. He put his foot on the lower rung and almost collapsed as a jolt of pain shot up his leg. He bit down on the noise he wanted to make but caught Aaron’s sympathetic look anyway. He didn’t glance over at Jasper, just reached to pull himself up with his hands, keeping the weight off his leg as much as he could. The others followed.

It was dark in the hayloft and Call blinked around for a moment, blind until Tamara appeared with her ball of fire dancing just over her head like a lightbulb in a cartoon. The other two followed, spreading out in the narrow room. There wasn’t much to it — a desk, a camp stove, and two narrow beds with blankets folded at the bottoms. Everything was incredibly neat, and if Mrs. Tisdale hadn’t told them, Call wouldn’t have guessed that Alastair had been there recently at all.

Jasper flopped down on one of the beds. “Are we going to eat? You know, it’s got to be breaking some law to take me captive and not feed me.” Tamara sighed, then looked over at Call hopefully. “There’s a stove. Is there any food?” “Yeah, some. Mostly canned stuff.” Call reached under his dad’s bed for the baskets he kept there. Cans of Chef Boyardee Ravioli, bottles of water, beef jerky, a utility knife, forks, and two large Hershey’s bars.

Call sat on one of the beds with Tamara while Jasper glared from the other one. Aaron efficiently opened several of the cans of ravioli and heated them over the camp stove — kindled with magic — while Tamara spread out a map of the surrounding area she’d found among Alastair’s things and glared at it with her nose wrinkled up thoughtfully.

“Can you read that?” Call asked, peering over her shoulder. He reached for the map. “I think that’s a road.” She swatted at his hand. “It’s not a road, it’s a river.”

“Actually, it’s a highway,” said Jasper. “Give me that.” He held his hand out. Tamara hesitated.

“Where are you trying to go, anyway?” Jasper asked.

“We were trying to get here,” said Call. “But now, I don’t know.”

“Well, if your dad isn’t here, he must have gone somewhere,” said Aaron, bringing over the heated cans of ravioli. They took them gingerly, wrapping cloth around their hands so as not to get burned. Call passed around forks and they started to eat.

Jasper made a face at the first bite, but then he started shoveling pasta into his mouth.

“Maybe we can get Mrs. Tisdale to tell us something,” Call said, but a cold feeling was settling into his stomach. Alastair was clearly on the run, but where would he go? He didn’t have close friends that Call knew of or any other secret hiding places.

Aaron and Tamara were talking in low voices, and Jasper had gotten hold of the map and was staring at it. Call put aside his half-eaten can of ravioli and got to his feet, heading over to Alastair’s desk. He jerked the main drawer open.

As he’d expected, it was full of car keys. Single keys mostly, attached to leather fobs that showed the make of the car: Volkswagens, Peugeots, Citroëns, MINI Coopers, even an Aston Martin. Most were covered in dust, but not the key to the Martin. Call lifted it out of the desk — the Martin was one of his dad’s favorites, even though he hadn’t gotten it to run yet. Surely he wouldn’t have been working on it while he was here, on the run for his life, though?

Maybe Alastair had been planning on driving the Martin? It was a kicky car to escape in, capable of handling sharp turns and maybe even outrunning mages. If so, Call thought it was possible that he’d gotten it to work. Sure, it would be illegal for one of them to drive it, but that was the least of his worries.

He went to the ladder with a sigh, and started the arduous process of going down it. At least, with the others still in the loft, he was free to take it slow and wince as much as he wanted.

“Call, where are you going?” Tamara called to him.

“Can you send some light down?” Call asked.

She sighed. “Why do I have to do it? You can make fire hover just as well as I can.” “You do it better,” Call said in a way he hoped was persuasive. She looked annoyed but sent down a sphere of fire anyway, which hovered in the air like a chandelier, dropping embers occasionally.

Call pulled the tarp off of the Aston Martin. The car was blue-green in color and trimmed out in gleaming chrome, with ivory leather seats that were only a little bit ripped. The floor pan looked in good shape, too; his dad said that was usually the first thing to succumb to rust.

Call clambered into place in the driver’s seat and slid the key into the ignition. He frowned — he’d really have to stretch to reach the gas or brake. Aaron could probably do it; he was taller. Call turned the key, but nothing happened. The old motor refused to rumble to life.

“What are you doing?”

Call jumped and almost banged his head on the roof of the car. He leaned out the open door and saw Aaron standing by the driver’s side, looking curious.

“Looking around,” Call said. “I’m not sure for what exactly. But my dad was definitely poking around this car before he left.” Aaron leaned in and whistled. “This is a nice car. Does it start?”

Call shook his head.

“Check the glove compartment,” Aaron said. “My foster dad always used to keep everything in his.” Call reached over and flipped the compartment open. To his surprise, it was full of papers. Not just any papers, he realized, lifting them out. Letters. Alastair was one of the only adults Call knew who carried on most of his correspondence via handwritten letters instead of e-mail, so the letters didn’t surprise him.

What did surprise him was who they were from. He opened one and scanned to the bottom, to the signature there, a signature that made his stomach turn over.

Master Joseph A. Walther

“What? What is it?” Aaron said, and Call looked up at him. He must have had a shocked expression on his face, because Aaron stepped away from the car and yelled upstairs to the others: “He found something! Call found something!” “No, I didn’t.” Call stumbled out of the car, the letters jammed under his arm. “I didn’t find anything.” Aaron’s green eyes were troubled. “Then what are those?”

“Just personal stuff. My dad’s notes.”

“Call.” It was Tamara, hanging over the edge of the hayloft. Call could see Jasper behind her. “Your dad is a wanted criminal. He doesn’t have ‘personal stuff.’ ” “She’s right,” Aaron said, sounding sorry. “Anything could be relevant.” “Fine.” Call wished he’d been cleverer, wished he’d guessed his father’s hiding spot instead of Aaron, wished he didn’t have to share these letters with the others. “But I’m reading them. Not anyone else.” He kept the letters jammed under his arm as he climbed back up the ladder, Aaron on his heels. Jasper had figured out how the hurricane lamps worked, and the hayloft was full of light. Call sat down on one of the beds, and the rest of them clambered onto the other one.

It was weird, seeing Master Joseph’s handwriting like this. It was spiky and thin and he signed every letter with his full name, complete with middle initial. There were nearly a dozen of them, dated over the last three months. And they were full of disturbing lines.

There’s a way we can both have what we want.

You want your son brought back from the dead and we want Constantine Madden.

You don’t understand the full power of the Alkahest.

We never saw eye to eye before, Alastair, but now you’ve lost so much. Imagine if Sarah could be returned to you. Imagine if everything you lost could be returned to you.

Steal the Alkahest, bring it to us, and all of your suffering will be over.

None of it made any sense. Alastair had been going to use the Alkahest to kill him, hadn’t he? He’d wanted to destroy the Enemy of Death.

Call remembered the astonishment on his father’s face as he’d struck the wall, remembered the feeling of overwhelming fury. What if he’d been wrong about Alastair? What if Alastair hadn’t been lying when he said he wasn’t going to kill Call?

But if Alastair wanted to get rid of him and get the soul of his real son back, that was just as bad. Maybe he didn’t want to kill Call outright, but sticking his soul back in Constantine Madden seemed a lot like dying.

“What?” Tamara was leaning so far off the bed that she was nearly falling. “Call, what does it say?” “Nothing,” Call said grimly, folding up the most incriminating note and sticking it in his pocket. “It’s a bunch of tips on how to grow begonias.” “Liar,” said Jasper succinctly, snatching one of the letters off the bed. He started to read out loud, eyes growing wider. “Wait, these are … these are really, really, really not about begonias!” It was horrible. Tamara and Aaron clearly hadn’t believed him, but the look of betrayal on both their faces was almost as awful as Jasper’s smug gloating. Worse, they read everything. Line after bizarre line — though to Call’s relief, nothing in the letters referred directly to the fact that he possessed the soul of Constantine Madden. Who knew what they would have thought if they’d gotten ahold of the letter in his pocket?

“So, he really has the Alkahest and he’s going to give it to the Enemy?” Jasper looked frightened. “I thought you said he’d been wrongfully accused.” “Look at this one,” said Tamara. “Alastair must have agreed, because Master Joseph is writing about how he’ll contact him and how they’ll meet. It’s supposed to take place two days from now.” “We need to go back to the Magisterium,” said Aaron. “We have to tell someone. Call, I believed you about your dad, but maybe you were wrong.” “We can’t risk the Alkahest falling into the hands of the Enemy,” said Tamara. “It means Aaron could be killed. You see that, right, Call?” Call looked at the fire burning in the lamps. Had he completely misunderstood what was going on with his father? He’d assumed his dad was a good person on the side of the Magisterium and the Masters, on the side of stopping Constantine Madden, whatever the cost. But now it seemed like maybe his dad was actually a bad person on Master Joseph’s side after all, and was willing to do whatever it took to get the soul of his kid back. Which was not the worst thing from a certain perspective. But if Alastair decided to join up with Master Joseph, was Call morally obligated to let him do it or to stop him?

Call’s head hurt.

“I don’t want anything bad to happen to Aaron,” Call said. That was the one thing he was sure about. “I never did.” Aaron looked miserable. “Well, we’re not going to get anywhere tonight,” he said. “It’s late and we’re all tired. Maybe if we sleep for a couple of hours, we can figure something out in the morning.” They looked at the two beds. Each was about big enough for one adult or two kids.

“I call that one,” said Jasper. He pointed at Tamara and Call. “And I call Aaron, because you’re creepy and you’re a girl.” “I can sleep on the floor,” Aaron offered, looking at the expression on Tamara’s face.

“That doesn’t help anyone but Jasper,” said Tamara crossly, and got onto the leftmost bed. “It’s fine, Call; we’ll just sleep on top of the covers. Don’t worry about it.” Call thought that maybe he should offer to sleep on the floor like Aaron had, but he didn’t want to. His leg already hurt and, besides, he knew for a fact that there were sometimes rats hiding in the barn.

“Okay,” he said, climbing in gingerly beside her.

It was weird.

In the other bed, Jasper and Aaron were trying to share a single pillow. There was a muffled cry as someone was punched. Call pushed the pillow on his bed over to Tamara and laid his head down on his crooked arm.

He closed his eyes, but sleep didn’t come. It was uncomfortable trying to keep to one side of the bed, making sure that even his toes didn’t stray over to Tamara’s side. It didn’t help that he kept seeing the words in the letters Master Joseph had written, painted on the backs of his eyelids.

“Call?”

He opened his eyes. Tamara was looking at him from a few inches away, her eyes big and dark. “Why are you so important?” she whispered.

He felt the warm gust of her breath on his cheek.

“Important?” he echoed. Jasper had started to snore.

“All those letters,” she said. “From Master Joseph. I thought they’d be about Aaron. He’s the Makar. But they were all about you. Call is the most important thing.” “I mean … I guess because he’s my dad,” Call said, floundering. “So I’d be important to him.” “It didn’t sound like that kind of important,” Tamara said softly. “Call, you know you can tell us anything, right?” Call wasn’t sure how to answer her. He was still trying to decide when Havoc began to howl.