The Daykeeper's Grimoire (25 page)

There is no turning back. I watch out my window as the sun slowly sets, illuminating the sky with the pinks and oranges of the glowing rocks inside the tower.

Dead to the world minutes after the porter made my couch into a bed, I don’t open my eyes until I hear someone knocking on my door.

“Caity, time to get up,” I hear Dr. Slaton say. “We’ll be in Edinburgh in twenty minutes.”

“Thanks,” I reply, trying to sound awake.

The guests all wait for me as we disembark and transfer to the airport train. It’s still really early in the morning so the city is quiet and the air is crisp. The creepiest castle you’ve ever seen sits on a massive rock high above the train station in Edinburgh; it makes Breidablik Castle look like a friendly little playhouse.

Once we’re at the airport, all the guests walk me to the airline counter to make sure I get my ticket and then we go through security together. Since they are traveling to Paris and I’m going to San Francisco, we have different gates and have to part ways after security.

I wave to them as they turn to leave. I feel ten pounds lighter and ten years older. I am alone at an international airport with adults buzzing around me not even paying attention—no one cares, which is both exciting and frightening.

I’m more than two hours early so I buy some magazines and candy and wait at my gate.

Once the flight takes off and we are safely in the air, I feel a strange sensation in my chest. It’s the weirdest thing, like I can’t take enough air into my lungs. It’s not as if I can’t breathe, it’s more like my lungs have expanded beyond what my breath can fill. I have to actually arch my back and sit up straight to get enough air, which really bugs the guy next to me who’s working on his laptop.

I wonder for a moment if I’m having another panic attack and try to calm myself down. I force myself to breathe steadily as I look out the window into the endless sky. I think about the letter from Tenzo’s father, how the stars are still shining brightly just above the blue even though we can’t see them. And then it hits me—this is about pulling away from my parents. I see it plainly now. It’s always been as if my parents were Saturn and I were their rings; hazily separate from them but still a very close part of their system. But now I see them as their own planet, and I, their moon. A broken-off piece of them now orbiting independently.

This realization makes me intensely sad and I have to bite my lip to keep it together. I continue gazing out the window so my seat-mate, who already thinks I’m a freak, won’t see me holding back tears. My eyes become heavy and trying to keep them open is like doing bicep curls; each time gets progressively harder until I can no longer do it.

I have another of those amazing house dreams that Bolon and I were talking about, this one is in kind of a Spanish mission-style house, stucco with big dark beams. I feel like I’ve lived here all my life, but then I open what I think is the kitchen pantry door and instead I find this incredible room. The walls are painted an iridescent blue-green, and a metallic gold peacock head is painted on the ceiling, with this crystal-clustered light fixture as its eye. All the furniture is plush and velvet, in blue-green peacock shades. I walk around looking at all the beautiful gold objects, amazed that this room has been sitting here the whole time. I see another door and I walk over to it. It has a tarnished door-knocker on it that I think is just a ring until I get closer and see that it’s a snake eating its own tail. I reach for the knocker, but the minute I touch it I wake up with a start.

It takes me a moment to remember where I am until the guy next to me exhales loudly and leans away like I’m a leper. I try not to do anything weird for awhile, and between the meals and movies, the rest of the flight goes fairly quickly.

I’m glad I have the window seat as we land in San Francisco. As soon as I see Coit Tower and the Golden Gate Bridge and the sparkly blue water my heart caves in on itself. I can’t take in enough of the scenery and I keep my nose pressed to the cold window until all we see is tarmac.

When the plane door opens I breathe deeply, sucking in the moist air. I wonder if there is any place on Earth that smells like this, the intense combination of salt water, fog, muddy bay, and eucalyptus trees. This first breath of air makes me more homesick for my old, uncomplicated life than anything yet.

Walking directly to the cab stand, I make my way to the city. On the way, I call Mom to let her know I landed safely. The connection is clear but she sounds so far away.

I ask the driver to drop me at the coffee shop across from the Transamerica Pyramid where Justine and I had agreed to meet. As I step out of the taxi I see her in the window of the café and I run toward her; it honestly seems like years, not weeks, since I’ve seen her. My whole life has changed, but here she is, same old Justine, just as excited to see me as I am her.

“I can’t believe how crazy your life is turning out to be!” she says, pulling back from our hug to look at me, I guess to see if I’ve changed at all.

We order mochas and before we can even sit down, Justine says, “Okay, I can’t wait any longer. I have new news.”

“What is it?” I ask, hoping that this is not about backing out of Peru.

“I stalked that Canadian guy who works for F.R.O. last night when he left the Pyramid. Look.” She reaches for something in her pocket and then sets a Montgomery Grand Hotel key card on the table with a snap like she’s laying down a winning poker hand.

“You got his room key?”

“No! I got the room next to his. I told you, I’m total spy material. I have found my calling.” She leans in and starts to whisper, “I waited outside the Pyramid all afternoon and then followed him. He had one of those metal briefcases and although he was trying to hide it with his jacket sleeve, I saw that it was
chained
to his wrist.”

“Like handcuffed?”

“Yup.”

“Because the info is so top secret?”

“Exactly. Which means that if you want to find out what this creepy guy who threatened you is up to, we need to get that briefcase.”

I look at her closely to see if she’s joking.

“Come on—obviously these are not good people, right?” she says. “So getting some answers about why they’d be harassing you is completely justified.”

I’m leaning so far forward in my chair that the back two legs are off the ground. I lean back so the chair doesn’t come out completely from under me. “You don’t think he saw you follow him to his room do you?” I ask.

“Do I look like someone he’d be worried about? I followed him to the hotel, got into the elevator, and off on the same floor. I walked in the opposite direction and when I heard his door click, I ran down and got the room number.” She taps the key card on the table to punctuate her sentence. “I listened at the door for a minute to hear if anyone else was in there, but then I heard the shower start up and that gave me the perfect idea for how to get into his room.”

“So what’s your plan?” I ask.

“You mean
our
plan,” she says, tipping what’s left of her mocha back steeply to catch all the gooey bitter chocolate at the bottom. “Let’s go to the hotel and I’ll tell you everything.”

In our room, an enormous suitcase sits in the corner and two outfits are laid out on the bed. “What’s up with the schoolgirl thing?” I ask. “Does Cruelties have uniforms now?”

“No, this is my disguise. Have you ever looked around a hotel lobby? There are a bazillion little cameras down there, especially at the desk. When this dude finds his case missing and tells the management about it, the first thing they’re going to do is look through the video tapes to find out who asked for a second key.”

“Ah, good thinking.” I pick up a frumpy old maid outfit. “So I guess that makes me the ugly housekeeper?”

“Hey, just be glad I didn’t get one of those totally inappropriate maid costumes that Ashley Levinger wears every Halloween.”

“Yeah, thanks. I do like that this one will actually cover my butt.”

“It’s not exactly Montgomery Grand Hotel regulation, but how will this guy know anyway? There’s almost zero chance he’ll even see you.”

“So run me through the process,” I say as I slip the scratchy polyester dress over my head.

“At about 4:30 I’ll hide in the corner of the lobby. I’ll call you when he comes into the hotel to give you a heads up, then you listen for his door to close. I’ll ask for another key to his room but when they give me a new key, then the key he has no longer works, so it’s
really
important that he is already in his room when I request a second key.”

“Got it. But do you really think they’ll just give you a key?”

She makes the look-at-me gesture with her hands and says, “Who would deny this child a room key?” Then in a small voice she says, “Um, I just came down to get a candy bar at the gift shop and forgot my key. My dad is in the shower so he doesn’t hear me knocking. Room 2013? Under Tremblay?”

“Can I just say you are a genius?”

“Yes. Yes you can,” Justine says, getting into her fake school outfit. She pulls a long brown wig out and puts it on. “Real hair,” she says, braiding it tightly, “I splurged.”

I look at the clock. “It’s 4:20.”

“Okay, gotta run. I’ll call you when I see him come in.”

I flip on MTV so I can turn off my brain. At 4:35 she calls and says, “Ground squirrel on the move.”

My mouth instantly goes dry. I hang up the phone and put my hands over my face. Am I going insane? The way I just nod and say okay to crazy schemes until I have to actually act on them and then I freak out, like right now?

I look at myself in the mirror, jet-lagged and scared in a two-sizes-too-big maid outfit and wonder what I am doing. What if I get caught? Why didn’t I stop this train earlier?
Could
I be going crazy and not know it?

I practically jump out of my skin when I hear the faint ding of the elevator stopping on our floor. Bolting over to the door, I press my eye to the peephole. A tall guy with Raggedy Ann red hair walks by. He looks exactly like Slugworth from the original
Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory
movie, same sunken cheeks, waxy skin, and dead eyes, except with red hair. The hair is really strange—it looks unnatural for a grown man to have red hair and wrinkles at the same time. Hair like that should only be on kids.

As soon as I hear his door close I call Justine.

“It’s go time,” I say. That lame line seems appropriate right now.

Hoping to control him from my side of the wall, I sit on the edge of the bed and chant, “Don’t get in the shower, don’t get in the shower, don’t get in the shower.”

When Justine comes back in the room, I hop up from the bed. “Thank god you’re back. Did you get the key?” I almost hope the answer is no.

She looks insulted. “I can’t believe you even asked me that!”

“Sorry, I knew you would. I’m just freaked out; I didn’t want him to get in the shower before you got back in case he took a really short one.”

She points her finger to the ground next to the wall. “Sit here and listen while I get changed again and then we can switch.”

I sit and put my ear to the textured wallpaper. Then Justine comes back and sits next to me holding the wig and a brush. “Let me take out the braids for you.”

“Oh, I’m going to wear it too?”

“Absolutely. We have to have a security video plan for you as well.”

“So once I get the briefcase, I can’t come back here, right?”

“Not in this outfit, at least. See that big boy?” she asks as she points to the mammoth rolling suitcase in the corner of the room. “When we hear the water turn on, you get in it.”

“Okay …”

“We don’t want them to ever see you leaving this room in a maid outfit, so I’ll roll you to the stairwell and then you get out and do your thing.”

“Got it. I’m going to hang one of these hotel robes over my arm, that way once I get the briefcase I can hide it under the robe before I walk back out the door.”

“Perfect. Just make sure to go back to the stairwell, not to this room. I’ll have a change of clothes for you and we’ll slip the briefcase into the suitcase.”

“Then we’ll just go down a floor and come back up the elevator?”

“Yup. And no one will suspect a—” she doesn’t finish because we hear the water turn on.

I must look seriously scared because she puts her hand on my knee and says, “Caity, you can do this.”

We both stand up and Justine unzips her suitcase. Without saying a word I curl up inside it, clutching a Montgomery Grand Hotel robe from the bathroom. She tosses in the pants and top I was wearing before I got changed and then zips me in. It actually feels kind of good to be safely curled up inside. Justine wheels me out of the room and into the stairwell and then she unzips the case and I reluctantly get out. “Here’s the key,” she says. “You’ll do great.”

My hands are shaking. I try to steady them by clenching my fists as I walk. I get to Tremblay’s room and listen at the door. The shower is still running.

I very gently slip the key card through the slot and open the door. I hold the door open with one foot as I lean forward to look into the room for the case and see it’s under the desk.

I can’t reach it without going all the way into the room, so I have to let the door close. Praying to all my dead relatives to help keep Tremblay in the shower, I creep over to the desk. There’s a chain attached to the handle of the case so I quietly gather up all the links, grab the briefcase, and run toward the door, stopping to flip the robe over the case before I leave.

I try to walk through the hallway so I don’t look suspicious, but as I get closer to the door of the stairwell I can’t help but run. In fact, I run all the way in and then straight down one flight of stairs, taking them three at a time. I feel like I could run all the way across the Golden Gate Bridge right now, my adrenaline is pumping so fast.

Justine comes flying down the stairs after me. We don’t even speak; she unzips the suitcase and I roll the briefcase into the robe and then put it in. I shake off the wig, pull my pants up under my maid dress and then rip the dress off. Justine is ready with my shirt and slips it right over my head, then scoops up the dress and the wig and puts them in the suitcase. We open the stairwell door and walk out, directly to the elevator, which we take back to our own floor.

Once back in the room, we listen at the wall for the shower. It’s still going. I can’t believe we did all that within five minutes. We set the briefcase on the bed and stare at it.

“Now what?” I say.

“You’re the safecracker’s daughter,” she replies. “You tell me.”

“Dad actually has a laptop version of this briefcase; it’s called a Zero Halliburton.”

“Your dad totally wants to be in covert ops, doesn’t he?”

“Yeah. What a joke.” The lock is a three-digit rolling one. I push one of the wheels with my thumb. “I think we have to just go through all the possible combinations, 1-1-1, 1-1-2, 1-1-3, on and on until you run through all nine numbers in all three positions.”

“That will take forever!”

“Got any other ideas? I can’t exactly call my mom and ask how to break into a Zero Halliburton.”

We hear a shout and a glass hitting the wall next door. Justine’s olive skin goes white. I can’t feel my feet on the ground. We both push our ears to the wall and listen.

He’s on the phone with someone. We catch bits and pieces, “been a breach … seconds ago … complicated situation …
dripping wet … by the time … dressed … locked down …”

The minute I hear
locked down
I know we have to leave.

“Oh my God, we have to get out of here!” I whisper.

We throw everything, including my small rolly suitcase and backpack, into Justine’s massive suitcase and run to the elevator. As much as time sped up while we were taking the briefcase, time is moving in slow motion now as we watch the numbers on the elevator. I’m anticipating the ding so desperately that when it finally does sound, it actually hurts my ears. We scurry on and as the elevator doors close I see Tremblay’s door handle move. We back up as far as we can into the elevator, but he sees me just as the doors close.

I reach into my pocket to make sure I still have the address that Bolon gave me.

We make a swift exit to the street, straight into a taxi. The driver tries to get us to put the suitcase in the trunk but we just cram it in next to us.

“It’s okay, please, just go, we’re really late …” Justine says.