The Magi (The Magi Series) (23 page)

“Actually, I kind of want to talk to someone about that,” Elijah said. “I don’t see why other students are being put in danger just to keep me safe. I don’t want to be responsible for anything else.”

“Oh, don’t you worry about that,” Mr. Button said. “We’ve got this place completely surrounded and under constant watch. I don’t think Maliphist himself could get through.” Mr. Button’s reassurance didn’t make Elijah feel any better, but he figured Button wouldn’t be the person to talk to anyway. “We left the room exactly as it was,” Mr. Button continued. “Take some time to fix it back, but don’t forget you have training today. You missed your early session, and that’s understandable, but you should get down there as soon as you can.”

Elijah looked at the mess in his room. His discussion class books were scattered everywhere. It appeared like a few were even looked through as some lay open on the floor and on his bed. The Maliphists wouldn’t have had much time to do it, but then again, Elijah remembered the attack at his parents’ house and how quickly the figure with the yellow eyes had moved. The Maliphists definitely knew how to do things quickly!

His clothes had been scattered all over the floor, so Elijah began to sort them and put them neatly back into the wooden chest by the window. As he continued to fold and clean, his mind began to wander again and he thought about Samuel. He thought about what Adam said the night before, and he wished more than anything that he could go back in time and spend more time with Samuel.

When Elijah finished putting away his books and clothes that were strung about, his room looked much better, but he soon noticed something that caught the light of the torch burning on his wall. It gleamed under the leg of the chest, so Elijah bent down to see what it was. He got down on all fours and peered under the wooden chest, reaching around until his hand clasped around something familiar. It was his mother’s locket. Elijah picked it up and used his shirt to make it shine again. He delicately handled the cheap metal, inspecting it to make sure it wasn’t damaged, and then returned it to the wooden chest.

Elijah reached into his pocket and felt his father’s pocket watch, which he still kept with him always as his father had done. Since he found two of the three items he kept from his family, he went searching the room for Kyria’s two diaries. To his horror, he couldn’t find them anywhere.

He thought maybe he had accidentally piled them with the other books, but after a second look through his pile, he knew otherwise. His heart raced as he frantically searched high and low for the two priceless diaries. He tore everything out of the chest and scattered everything on the floor again, shaking his clothes and feeling around for the books. He tore his bed apart thinking maybe they had gotten lodged in the sheets. He searched under the bed, under the chest, on his desk, under his desk. No diaries.

Elijah looked at the window remembering that the Maliphists most likely entered and exited through it. He opened it, searching everywhere for any clues of the diaries’ whereabouts. He looked down below at the snow-covered ground for a sign of a book. He didn’t see anything, but sure enough, just as Mr. Button said, a soldier in a black cloak guarded the space under his window.

Elijah ran out of his room, leaving a worse mess than the Maliphists left, passing the soldier guarding his door. The soldier caught him and stopped him.

“Please!” Elijah begged, pulling himself from the hold of the soldier. “I’m missing something. I have to look outside. Please!” Elijah felt himself on the verge of tears, but he kept his composure. The soldier let go.

“You need to follow me,” the soldier finally said, and he led Elijah toward the front of the quarters. They walked outside and Elijah pointed to where he wanted to look. He ran under his window, got on his hands and knees and began shoveling snow, feeling the ground all over with his hands. The two soldiers continued to hover over him. He looked up.

“Help me!” he screamed at them. “I’m looking for two dark brown books. One has a gold lock on it.” Elijah never looked back to see if they were helping, but he thought he could hear them pushing the snow around with their feet.

It wasn’t long before he gave up, knowing the fate of his sister’s only lasting memories. He caught his breath and leaned his back against the side of the wall as he sat in agony. The Maliphists now had possession of Kyria’s diaries.

****

CHAPTER 14: THE CLOCKMAKER

The following Tuesday, Elijah’s discussion class reviewed English sonnets and short stories that had to do with love and death. Elijah had never really been fascinated by poetry, but he was captivated by the short stories they read. His favorite part of class was when Mrs. White had them read
The Raven
and
A Tell-Tale Heart
by Edgar Allan Poe. Most of the other poems and short stories they read were about love, which was utterly boring to Elijah, but he found Poe’s writings a lot more interesting.

Class became a little more complicated, however, when Mrs. White told them they were going to be doing an assignment with a partner in preparation for their next lesson. The students were to find more works by their favorite author from the day’s readings and discuss them with their partner. Then during the following class, they would give a presentation to the class.

Ordinarily, Elijah would have picked Samuel to be his partner, but now that he was gone, there wasn’t anyone obvious to choose. Paul quickly asked Adam to be his partner. Paul was obviously trying to make up for his snotty comment to Adam about not helping Samuel. Isaac partnered up with Rachel, who sat next to him. He looked back at Paul with a rather triumphant look on his face when she agreed to be his partner. Elijah looked around frantically for any available students.

“Do you want to be my discussion partner?” asked a soft voice next to him. Hannah was sitting by him for the second week in a row, and as she looked at him with her pleasant smile, Elijah gulped.

“S-sure,” he stammered nervously.

“Great,” said Hannah as she packed up her books and notes. “We can start tomorrow after your training. Or would you prefer to start today?” Elijah was still recovering from her request to be his partner. He still wasn’t sure he heard her correctly.

“T-tomorrow’s fine,” he said.

They walked out of the classroom and into the training arena where they saw some older students working on a very complicated-looking physical exercise where they had to carry one another through an obstacle course and dodge various objects that were hurled at them along the way.

“Sounds great!” Hannah answered sweetly. “Let’s meet in the library hall at six o’clock.”

“Library hall?” asked Elijah.

Hannah smiled again. “I keep forgetting you’re new. Yes, there’s a library here. It’s located just under us.” She pointed to a set of large doors on the side of the arena directly across from the entrance Elijah used. They were wooden, and carved into it were detailed pictures that Elijah assumed were the four elements, like almost everything else. “Just take the stairs down.” Elijah was amazed at how big the training barracks actually were compared to how it appeared from the outside. The more Elijah learned about it, the bigger it seemed to get.

“How far down does it go?” he asked.

“I’m not sure exactly,” said Hannah. “I know there’s the library and a floor under that, but you’re not allowed to go there until you’ve passed your first Novice level. But my brother’s been there. He says it’s pretty neat.”

“And a Novice is…?” Elijah asked a little sarcastically. He started to feel like there were so many things that weren’t explained to him about his training. Then again, maybe it was better to have it fed to him in chunks like this.

“It’s one of the levels to becoming a Magi,” said Hannah. “We have three levels, but the Novice level is divided into three parts.” Seeing Elijah’s confused and overwhelmed look, Hannah smiled and stopped walking to explain it better to him. “Okay, so you’re a Preliminary now, right?” she started.

“Yes. I got that part,” said Elijah smiling.

“Good. So after that, you have three levels of Novice. Some people also call it the Apprenticeship stage, but mostly just the elders call it that now. The Novice levels are where you understand the basics, but you’re still in training.”

“What do you call the Novice levels?” asked Elijah.

“Level one, level two, and level three. Creative isn’t it?” joked Hannah. Elijah snickered. “Then, the last level is Philosopher. But that’s just a title, really. It’s given to everyone who graduates the training and has their mentor approve them to the Magi council.”

“Is there anyone not in training who isn’t a Philosopher then?” Elijah asked.

“Oh, sure,” said Hannah. “Most students never become approved, but it’s nothing to be ashamed of. Philosopher is quite a prestigious title for the Magi. In fact, most Magi are
not
Philosophers; they’re called Masters. That just means they completed their training, but for one reason or another they don’t get approved.”

“Why wouldn’t they get approved?” Elijah inquired, stopping as they reached the neutral area between the boys’ and girls’ halls.

“There’s lots of different reasons. Sometimes it’s because they don’t have a handle on the elemental training. Sometimes it’s because they didn’t learn something mental about the training. I’m not really sure all the reasons, but it’s very difficult,” she said.

“So if most people are not Philosophers, does that mean they can’t practice element control?” Elijah asked.

“No,” answered Hannah. “Everyone who finishes training can do that. They just can’t be an elder or mentor any students with the elements. You have to be a Philosopher to do that. And there are other leadership roles that require you to be a Philosopher.”

“So, is Master Roddick a Master then? Are we supposed to call them by their title?”

“If they’re your teacher you probably should. But lots of the elders prefer to go by their first name. It just depends on the person, I guess.” Hannah said.

“I guess that makes sense,” Elijah agreed.

“You see,” said Hannah, “it wasn’t
that
complicated, was it?” Hannah’s sweet nature made it hard to tell if she was trying to kid around with Elijah, or if she was serious. He was captivated by her elegance.

“So let me see if I get this right,” Elijah said sensing Hannah was about to go back to her room. “We’re Preliminaries now. Then we turn into a Novice—or Apprentice—for three levels.” Hannah nodded her head, validating Elijah’s thoughts. “Then when we get everything finished and our mentor approves us, we become a Philosopher. If not, then we are a Master?”

“You got it,” Hannah said. Elijah was pretty sure he understood before, but it was a good excuse to keep their conversation going. She was so easy to talk to. “Okay,” she said with a tone that she was ready to be done, “I’ll see you tomorrow. And after our training, we can get to work on our assignment.”

“Sounds good,” said Elijah. They both waved and Elijah puffed out his chest as he walked toward his room feeling, at the moment, like he could take on all the Maliphists single-handedly.

After mental training the following day, Elijah swiftly ran up the stairs to get ready for his study session with Hannah. He took a quick shower, got dressed, grabbed his bag and shoved in a couple books he thought would be helpful. When he got back to the arena, he didn’t see any sign of Hannah. He wondered if she was waiting for him inside the library already, so he opened the tall, heavy wooden doors with the beautiful carvings and walked down the stairs.

As the full view of the library came to him, Elijah had to catch his breath. It was massive! Stacked in shelves from floor to ceiling were more books than he had ever seen in one place. The books covered the entire perimeter of the oval room. Extremely tall ladders were spaced out among all the shelves. About half way up to the ceiling, around the perimeter wall, was a walkway for students to get books that were up higher than the ladders could reach. Elijah stood mesmerized, watching the students as they climbed up to the top of a ladder to get on the walkway. From there, he saw some using a second ladder to get to the upper-most books. He wondered how terrifying it would be at the highest point of the second ladder.

Another thing that astonished Elijah about the library was the architecture. It reminded him of a mix between an old medieval church and a museum. Even though it was underground, there were many beautiful stained-glass windows along the walls and a giant window on the ceiling that seemed to emit light. In the middle of the room were dozens of circular tables for studying with globes and small bookshelves close by. Scattered about the rest of the room stood numerous pillars with paintings, statues, and all sorts of ancient-looking artifacts placed on top. Four fireplaces were evenly spaced around the oval room with tables and chairs surrounding each. Elijah spotted Hannah next to one of the fireplaces.

“This place is incredible!” Elijah exclaimed, sitting down in an empty chair next to her. “I can’t believe I didn’t know about this until now!”

“This is just the student library,” Hannah said looking very unimpressed. “Wait until you see the Savenridge Library in town. It goes down for eight flights.” Elijah’s eyes widened. He couldn’t even picture the amount of books that a library like that could hold.