The Curse of Arkady (37 page)

“Let me help,” said Anita Patel, moving forward to Jason, her small, slender hand outstretched. Henry went into a fit of twitches and stammers and fell over in front of her, his heels drumming on the floor.

Trent said, “She's got no ropes on her.”

Eleanora, who appeared to have reawakened as Brennard's concentration was focused on Jason, tossed her head, dark eyes on Trent, and she managed a nod, going very pale then as if it took all her strength.

“Jason. Take my hand. You'll need strength for the Fire Gate!” The doctor reached for him, her voice soft as silk, her gaze intent, the bells on her anklet chiming as she drew near.

Traitor!
He stared at her as she tried to step around Henry's form, and Henry thrashed back and forth attempting to block her. His glasses finally fell off completely, and Anita's heel crunched them to bits, and she didn't even stop. It might as well have been his head she stepped on, her dark eyes focused only on Jason.

Too eager for the Fire Gate. The Dark Hand wanted them, all of them, through a Gate and out of this world, so they could do with them whatever they pleased. They were driving him to it.

It hung in his head, a Gate wrought of twisting orange-red flames with blue centers, straining to open so that they might escape through it.

The fire came. He could hear the fine, old wood of the McHenry house scream as it exploded into inferno. Window glass burst outward with the heat. Smoke curled in, stinging his eyes. Deadly, it rushed toward them, and only he could lead any of them out. The Gate must be him, what he was made of, and what he needed and knew was right . . . the giant salamander had told him. Dracos infernos. Dragon. Dragon of flame-colored scales and wit and insight. The Gate must be what he was made of. Incongruously, he thought of a school lab door falling open. The human body was made of . . .

Jason
pushed
. The Gate of Flame fell open, inward, smelling like ozone and hot metal. He grabbed up Henry and wrapped his hand around Trent's wrist instead of grabbing Dr. Patel.

“Do it now!” he yelled above the din and chaos.

Trent's vision overlaid his own for a moment. That was all he needed. He pulled on his friends as they reached out for the others, and he knew in a split second when they were all connected. He looked deep into the crystal, the Herkimer Diamond, caught in the wolfhead jaws of Gavan Rainwater's cane. Water, the nemesis of Fire.

And he opened a second Gate, a Water Gate into the tiny drop held in the heart of the flawed diamond and plunged them all into cold, cold wetness . . . and life.

T
HEY popped up out of the pool in Jason's favorite valley like buoyant apples bobbing up in a Halloween dunking tub. Noisier, though, Bailey said later, all of them spluttering and coughing and poor Henry finally found his voice and was screaming to all who could hear that Dr. Patel was the one who'd kidnapped him and watch out!

He quieted after Trent ducked him a second time, while everyone else was hurrying to climb out, for the late October weather and water were cold, cold, cold. Gavan said a word, and his cape steamed as it dried. He wrapped it about Eleanora who forgot to levitate so she would be inches higher as she leaned quietly into his embrace. Tomaz gently made sure that little Lacey hadn't drowned while in Bailey's pocket, holding her in his hand and softly stroking the little creature's flanks until she coughed up spittles of water and finally began breathing evenly on her own.

Jason kept his arm linked with Bailey's, trying to send her reassuring feelings about Lacey and the whole mess while Trent eventually helped a much calmer if spluttering Henry out of the lake. They all straggled up the hill and through the Iron Gate, and Gavan took them home to Ravenwyng, where—after making sure that they all got messages to their families that would give them acceptable alibis for not being home—they had tea and cookies and talked while the world around them celebrated haunts and ghosts and evil running wild, only to be reined in by the morning's dawn. Jason thought he would never look at Halloween the same way again.

“How did you know?” asked Rainwater.

“I didn't. I guessed.”

“Come, lad. Life and death don't ride on guesses.” Gavan watched him, his cape still wrapped about Eleanora and her chair pulled very close to his.

“Well, then . . .” Jason stared down at his plate which now held nothing but crumbs and pushed the china toward Bailey. There was a pause, then a little chirp, and Lacey came out cautiously and hunkered down to steal the cookie bits. “Let's say, it came together. They wanted that Fire Gate. I realized that they'd probably already had it open once, preparing it to receive all of us . . . like a prison or concentration camp, or something.”

“Why?” Tomaz rocked back in his chair, coffee mug settled deep in his hands. “How did you figure that?”

“Fizziwig. They'd got a Gate out of Fizziwig. It's probably what killed him, the strain. Even if it didn't, that's why they wanted him and took him.”

Pain crossed Gavan's face. “Of course. I should have realized that.” Jason stopped, and he gestured. “Go on.”

“For weeks I've been pushed toward a Fire Gate. In my dreams, waking, the McHenry house, they made sure it was centered in my life. The wolfjackals were herding us toward it, and Brennard was piling the pressure on in ways you don't even know about yet, so that I would just have to discover it and open the Gate, for us all to escape.” He looked around the table. “They didn't figure on all of you going after Henry, just us.”

Tomaz snorted. “No credit for good sense. But it was quite a trap, and we were caught.”

“That still doesn't explain why you suddenly went for water.”

“The fire would have claimed or killed us. I'd been advised that Gates are within yourself, and I . . . well, it's silly . . . all I could think of, was that I'm seventy percent water. It suddenly became the only thing I could do. It had to be a Water Gate. The only drop I could find in that whole room to focus on was buried in your Herkimer diamond.”

Gavan lifted his cane, smiling at the wolfhead figure with the gemstone in its jaws. “I've always been very fond of this. Now I have a reason.”

Eleanora said something, muffled, and he tightened his hold about her shoulders. She quieted, smiling.

“You managed to control Brennard after all.”

Jason nodded to Tomaz. “In a way. Actually, all I wanted to do was make him really angry because when you're angry, you can't think. I didn't want him following us.”

“I felt a push,” murmured Eleanora. She tucked some wayward hair behind one delicate ear. “What did you do, Jason?”

“I had this.” He pulled the lavender stone from his pocket. “It seems to have a Talent for persuading.” He grinned, thinking how nice Alicia was every time he asked her to do something while he had the stone in his hand.

“But you couldn't persuade him to let us go.” Henry's voice was squeaky from too much shouting. Now he had barely said a word and looked as if he didn't want to say much more.

Jason shook his head. “I'm not strong enough for anything like that. I was standing there looking at all of you tied up like turkeys for a roasting, and I knew I couldn't outwrestle him. I persuaded him to get angry. And it worked.” He kept grinning broadly.

“May I see that again, Jason?” Gavan put a hand out for it.

“Sure.” He dropped the lavender crystal in Rainwater's palm.

“Where did he get that?” Eleanora stirred, sitting up straight. She put her hand over Gavan's and peered at the stone.

“I was . . . hmmm . . . well, I was practicing opening Gates.”

Gavan's eyebrows went up, but he said nothing. “Were you now? I don't seem to remember you telling me.” Eleanora was practically tucked under his chin, looking at the new focus, and he seemed to be enjoying her proximity, despite his concern over Jason's behavior.

“Gavan,” said Eleanora quietly. “Look deep into it. Really focus.”

“It's Jason's stone,” he reminded her.

“Oh, I know it is! Just look.”

He did. Then he looked up at Jason. “Lad . . . do you see an image inside this?”

“Sometimes.”

“I cannot see it well. Describe it.”

Eleanora leaned back against Gavan's chest, visibly trembling.

Jason told them of the silvery-haired gentleman, with a warm smile and humor and youth despite the color of his curled hair. He stopped as Eleanora spoke a name. “Gregory!”

Tomaz rumbled, “None other. I would say it was no accident Jason found that crystal, and even less of an accident he could use it against Brennard.”

“
The
Gregory?” Trent piped up.

Bailey kept quiet, busy feeding small bits of cookie to her near-drowned Lacey.

“None other. My father,” Eleanora returned. She handed the crystal back to Jason. “Use it well and wisely.”

Jason stared at it as if it had become a hot potato. “He's not . . . he's not trapped in there. . . .”

“Oh, no. Nothing like that.” Eleanora laughed then, a bit of color coming back into her cheeks. “Just an enchantment or two of his in there. He knew things none of the rest of us did, including, I think, what Brennard was capable of.”

“It's a good thing that came into your hands, lad,” Gavan said, “and we'll discuss later the appropriate discipline for trying something daft like that without a backup.”

“Trent was there!”

Gavan looked at Trent, and said nothing.

“What about the others? Think they got out?” Bailey picked up Lacey and was coaxing her back into a pocket, but the pack rat seemed determined to keep an eye on everyone about the table and their cookies.

“No doubt they used their Fire Gate. I imagine the house was lost. It was meant to be. They planned a devastating fire to cover up their taking you four. They had teeth, bones . . . to scatter in the ashes.” Tomaz grunted. “We underestimated them. Won't happen again.”

“Well,” said Bailey. “All's well that ends well.”

“It's only just begun, Bailey.”

She tucked Lacey back in her pocket. “I know that! We've more Gates to get open, more Magick to learn! As long as we get to that ending well part.”

Trent sat back. “Since dessert is a good ending any time . . . I could use a bit more. After all, it is trick or treat.” He looked about the table hopefully, and Henry hoarsely seconded him.

Read on for a preview of
the sequel to

new in hardcover from DAW
July 2003.

J
ason pulled Trent through. “You're sure about this?” The clear crystal doorway shimmered like a bubble, stretched and then popped slightly as Trent emerged entirely into Jason's attic bedroom.

“As sure as I can be without being able to look through my own crystal.” Trent scrubbed his hand through his hair, sending it in all directions. “And I'm beginning to wonder if Eleanora suspects about my talent, or lack of it. She sent me an e-mail.” He frowned. “You don't think Bailey could have let it slip?”

“Never. One problem at a time.” It was odd that the Magicker hadn't used her own crystal to reach Trent, but Jason didn't have time to think about that right now. “At least they're giving us the chance to say good-bye, and at least Jennifer asked for you, huh?” He punched Trent's arm lightly.

His comment didn't seem to erase Trent's unhappiness. “Are we waiting for anyone?”

“Ting and Bailey are going to go through on their own. Don't know about Stef and Rich,” Jason answered with a shrug. He grabbed a windbreaker off the back of his study chair. “Let's go. I can't afford to be missed.”

“You know I hate this.”

Jason stared at Trent. “Hate Jennifer's leaving?”

“Hate traveling like this.” Trent suppressed a shudder. “Doesn't it ever give you the creeps? Stepping into a rock, for crying out loud. Remember when Bailey got lost in hers? Don't you worry about being trapped?”

“Ummm. No.” Jason rubbed his crystal a moment. “Maybe you'd prefer a flying carpet?”

“Actually, a flying carpet has mythological substance to it.” Trent leaned his lanky body against the bed frame. “If you could manage to conjure one up. But what I'd really, really prefer is a Pegasus. Great white winged stallion with a bridle of sunlight, and a sword sheath on his saddle.”

Jason laughed, then said, “Keep dreaming,” and put his hand on Trent's shoulder, gripping tightly. He looked into his crystal, his rock of clear quartz, and gold flecks, and one outer wall of dark blue stone, and found a door to where the Magickers were gathered. Then he began to press through, feeling it stretch as he pulled Trent with him.

They emerged with a faint popping of ears, and for a brief second, Jason thought that Trent might be right. Was this any way to travel? His doubt vanished the moment he saw everyone waiting for them on Jennifer's back lawn. If he'd any other doubt about where they were, the monstrous moving van parked out in the street in front of the house, and the SOLD House for Sale sign dispelled it.

Jennifer, Ting, and Bailey sat on the lawn, reminding him a little of a pile of puppies . . . wiggling, cute, and excited. Jennifer was very much like his stepsister in that she was a few years older, willowy, and had long blonde hair, but the difference between the two was like night and day. He wanted to strangle Allison. Jennifer, well, he didn't feel about her the way Trent did, but he would protect her in any way he could. Allison was quiet and a little calculating. When Jennifer smiled, it lit up her whole face. Although, since she'd lost her Magick, she hadn't been smiling much.