The Magi (The Magi Series) (9 page)

Elijah was sure this was some kind of code for him. “Try retracing your research.” The only place he could think of doing research was in the library.

After his classes were finished, Elijah walked into the library and asked the librarian again for the book of students. He flipped through the pages once more but nothing stood out to him. Elijah sat down at a table and thought. What research had he done? What was Master Roddick talking about? He looked through all of his class research, but he still found nothing.

At last, he thought of something. Elijah remembered talking with Master Roddick during one of their meetings about research he had done in the library near Uncle Stan’s. He asked for a book by J.J. McClintock. They had it! He hurried to the shelf and picked up
Historical Myths and Analysis
—the book he looked through in the downtown library by Uncle Stan’s house.

Elijah opened the book to page 234. He knew this was the right book because when he turned to the page, a note was sitting inside labeled “ELIJAH”. He opened it and read.

“
ELIJAH – I HOPE THIS FINDS YOU SOON.

IF YOU TRUST ME, MEET ME BY THE FOUNTAIN AT MIDNIGHT ON THE LAST DAY OF TERM. I HAVE INFORMATION TO SHARE WITH YOU. IF YOU LET ME, I CAN TEACH YOU MUCH MORE THAN YOU CAN EVEN IMAGINE.

-R-

P.S. THE MAGI ARE REAL.”

****

CHAPTER 6: THE SECRET OF THE MAGI

With just a few days left of term, it took a lot of concentration for Elijah to remain focused. The minute he read Roddick’s note, Elijah decided he was going to meet, but the suspense was almost killing him. Elijah read the note a hundred times, it seemed, wondering what exactly Roddick meant by teaching him much more than he could imagine. Was he going to tutor him? If so, why meet at midnight? Why not just wait until he returned? When the questions started buzzing like this, Elijah had to remind himself to slow down and focus. Just meet, he thought. Roddick will answer the questions then. Whatever the Magi were and whatever Master Roddick was going to teach him would have to wait.

One evening, two days before the end of term, Elijah was feeling particularly lonely and missed his family. He was alone in his room with not much to do. He had finished his homework, his chores were done early, and for the first time in many days, Elijah had free time. He decided to finally open up one of Kyria’s diaries and read. He had been carrying her diaries for a while but never read a single entry. It was too painful to read before, but he felt a particular draw to reading them now. He decided to start reading the unlocked diary first. He picked it up and opened it. On the inside of the cover he found an inscription. It read:

“
To my little cricket:

I hope this is something you can use. Keep it safe.

-Dad”

Elijah flipped to the first page.

“
Dear Diary –

I hope that is the only time I call you “Diary”. I find it cliché. In fact, I don’t know why I call you anything at all. You’re a book. You have no feelings.

Well, I hope to find this book useful. One day I may read back on this and think how stupid this all sounds. Or maybe one day I can share this with my daughters and it will help them sort out their thoughts too.”

—
Kyria

Reading the diary made Elijah upset at how things turned out. His sister would have no more thoughts to put down. There would be no daughters of hers to guide. It was unfair! He considered putting the diary down and reading it some other time, but each time he told himself he was going to stop, he turned another page and read another entry. He kept going and going until he realized he was almost finished. Surprisingly, reading the diary entries made him feel comforted. Most of the entries were silly girl stuff, he thought, but some were very deep. He never knew how much Kyria thought about things.

One entry talked about a fight she had with Elijah. According to the diary, he told her that she only cared about herself. At the time, he was just throwing out an insult in the heat of a fight. Reading the entry, however, Elijah realized how much his insult hurt her. Kyria wrote an entire page on how she hoped she didn’t just care about herself. She even spent time talking about how to improve and how she could show Elijah that she cared about him. If it was possible, Elijah felt like he loved his sister even more.

The end of the diary, however, made him sit up as he read.

“
January 12

This will be my last entry in this diary. I found something out today. Something I can’t write about. I’m not sure what to think now.

I’m sad Elijah doesn’t know. I don’t know how I’m going to keep it a

secret from him for so long. I hope when he finds out, he will forgive me.

-Kyria”

Elijah was about to tear open the locked diary to find out what it was Kyria knew when Samuel walked through the door. It was obvious he had been crying. He walked straight to his desk, pulled out a textbook, and began to read. Elijah noticed him gingerly rubbing the top of his hands.

“You okay?” asked Elijah. Samuel didn’t answer. He continued reading his book. Elijah walked over and patted Samuel on the shoulder, but he shrugged it off and buried his face in his arms. Elijah felt defeated and decided to go to bed. He rolled over under his sheets and said, “If you want to talk, just wake me up. Goodnight.”

Out of his folded arms, Samuel made a muffled noise that sounded to Elijah like a faint “Goodnight.”

That night, Elijah dreamt of his meeting with Master Roddick. In the dream, Roddick taught him everything he needed to know in just minutes, and Elijah was ready to leave Saint Phillip’s Academy. They also snuck into the main hall and stole the Thorn Stick from Hawthorne and used it on him, and Corgan, and the pale-faced man with long, black hair. Afterwards, all three of them—Hawthorne, Corgan, and the pale man—put their heads down in their arms and cried.

Then, continued the dream, Elijah found a key to Kyria’s locked diary and opened it, but he couldn’t read a word because Roddick’s water had spilled all over them, leaving the ink smeared. Elijah woke up furious at Master Roddick.

The last day of term was filled with exams. Tests always terrified Elijah, but before he knew it, he was handing in his last test and returning to his room for the winter holidays. There seemed to be a collective exhale from all the students when exams were completed, but Elijah didn’t relax. Tonight he was going to meet with Roddick. Since receiving the note, Elijah carried it around with him at all times, reading it at least two or three times a day.

In case there was an inspection that evening, he made sure the bathrooms sparkled. He even cleaned them twice in the afternoon. One student actually slipped and fell from the huge amount of cleaning solution Elijah used on the second scrubbing. He was determined that nothing would stop him from being able to meet with Roddick.

Lights were promptly out at 10:00 p.m. and as soon as Samuel was asleep, the countdown began. Elijah pretended to sleep until fifteen minutes to midnight, when he slowly got out of bed. He wore his clothes to bed hoping Samuel wouldn’t notice. He grabbed his belongings and quietly shut the door behind him.

Sneaking down the stairs was the hardest part of his escape. Each stair groaned loudly as he stepped, and the slower he went, the louder it seemed to get. A monitor usually paced the halls at night, so Elijah tried to keep as quiet as possible. He finally reached the bottom of the stairs and looked around. Thankfully, no one stood in the entryway, so he carefully opened the big wooden doors and snuck out of the hall.

Elijah darted down the path toward the enormous fountain. He was thankful that the low clouds covered the moon, making it almost pitch black as he approached the fountain. He hid next to a tree and waited for Roddick.

Elijah remembered back not so long ago to another time he waited for someone in the dark. He remembered hiding next to a tree in a small park, waiting for Uncle Stan who never came. Elijah wondered if this wait would be like the last. Would he wait here all night for Roddick, only to have the night turn to morning?

His wondering didn’t last long. Almost exactly at midnight, Roddick appeared through the trees on the other side of the fountain. Elijah glanced around, and when he felt like it was safe, he walked out and met Roddick by the fountain.

“I’m glad you decided to come. Are you ready to hear what I have to say?”

“I’ve been ready for weeks,” Elijah said, itching to hear the secret.

“Now, I warn you, the things I am going to tell you will be hard to believe and even harder to understand.” Roddick looked at Elijah very seriously as if he was trying to read Elijah’s commitment.

“I’m not sure I know what you’re talking about,” Elijah said apprehensively.

“And you won’t for quite a while,” Roddick explained. “I will tell you what you need to know for now, and as you are ready to learn more, I will explain more. It will be hard to take in all at once, especially in your case. So, you’re just going to have to trust me. Can you do that?”

Elijah nodded.

“First of all,” Roddick began, “we will have to leave Saint Phillip’s Academy.”

“Okay,” Elijah said. “For tonight?”

“Forever,” said Roddick very seriously. “And we will have to do it now. There are too many enemies of yours here. I’ll explain as we go. C’mon!”

Roddick swiftly walked away from the fountain when both he and Elijah heard a startling noise behind them. Roddick ducked down and commanded Elijah to do the same.

Across the way, they heard a small, pleading voice crying for help. Both Elijah and Roddick crept around the fountain to see from a better angle. Directly adjacent to Elijah’s hall, about a hundred yards away, Elijah saw the long, black hair of the pale-faced man who had used the Thorn Stick on him. The pale-faced man was holding a short whip with not one end, but about six or seven, aggressively swinging at a small boy. It was Samuel.

“What are you doing out of your room?” the pale-faced man growled as he swung at Samuel. Samuel managed to dodge most of the whiptails. “TELL ME!!” screamed the man as he swung again. This time, the nasty whip caught Samuel, bringing him to his knees.

“Please!” Samuel pleaded. The pale-faced man made a horrible, mangled-looking grin as he stood over Samuel.

“Nice words won’t save you now,” said the man victoriously. Elijah hadn’t noticed that Master Roddick had completely stood up at this point.

“Back up, Elijah,” Roddick commanded calmly. Elijah did what he was told and witnessed the most incredible sight of his life. To his utter amazement, Roddick raised his arms slowly over his head and closed his eyes as if he was in deep meditation. As he did, the water from the fountain began to spill out and gather above Roddick in a massive tower, growing higher and higher. Elijah watched in awe. Just as the pale-faced man was about to whip Samuel again, Roddick made a violent punch with his right palm and all the water above him shot furiously toward the pale-faced man. In an instant, the force of the water hit him so hard that his whip was ripped from his hand, and he was propelled through the closed wooden doors of Elijah’s hall. The water slammed the pale-faced man clear to the back of the building.

Samuel immediately got up and ran toward Master Roddick and Elijah. Elijah glanced at Roddick, who was more furious-looking than he had ever seen him, but he somehow looked peaceful at the same time.

“Are you okay?” asked Roddick out of breath. Samuel nodded but didn’t speak. “Let’s go. Both of you!” Roddick picked up a lit torch from behind a tree, gathered a pack of belongings, and he was suddenly far ahead. Running to catch up, Elijah looked back at the wreckage of the hall. The commotion had obviously awakened everyone and the pale-faced man, though dizzy and confused, was gingerly getting to his feet. Elijah knew that was probably the last time he would see the school.

It took a while for Elijah to register what he had just witnessed. It was terrifying and amazing at the same time. Roddick would look back from time to time to see if Elijah and Samuel were still keeping up as they twisted and turned through the Canadian forest. The trees were thick and the snow made travel difficult, but if Roddick didn’t know where he was going, he didn’t show it. Even through the twists and turns, he never slowed his pace.