“You still want me to take your book?” Divina asked
me.
“Until I can protect it. Right now, Edward is
protecting them both without any help from me. If you have it, it’ll be safer
and no one would expect it to be away from a Guardian.”
She considered it while Edward pulled out my book and
set it in the middle of the table. Cautiously, she reached for it. The
comforting presence of my book in the back of my mind grew warmer, stronger,
and clearer. The sense of danger instantly cooled, but it certainly wasn’t
gone. She hesitated for only a few seconds before picking it up.
My body went cold and the air was forced from my
lungs. My skin felt too tight, I couldn’t breathe, and everything grew dark.
As the darkness faded, I saw Vretial sitting in a dark green, plush
chair. The chair was faced away, but I could feel distress roll off him. Then a
girl appeared, about eleven with dark, vibrant red hair and irises to match,
wearing white robes. She looked frightened.
“I am very sorry, my lord. I do not understand. The
book has---”
“You took a long time.”
“You know, my lord?”
“Of course I do. I find it interesting that as Shio
was arguing against my orders to go to that planet… Earth, it becomes so
painfully obvious that it’s there.”
“I did not think Krael was telling the truth. He said
that the signal was unmistakably on Earth. I thought it was a trap because he
said it was from the world itself and not a single position.”
“So it seems. We can’t make a tear into that world
until we know it will not destroy…” He sighed and raised his hand to his face.
“What were you saying, child?”
The little girl’s face filled with relief. “The book,
my lord.”
“Yes. Search Earth for its book.”
“How? You said we cannot use the disk, my lord. Shio
can travel but I will have to stay behind. Unless you will let me---”
“Be silent. You’ll wait for his return and we’ll speak
no more on this matter until he does.” His hand twitched. “What are you still
doing here?” He stood up and my body filled with pain for the third time.
* * *
My eyes opened, the pain dulled, and the suffocation
began. I was in the booth at the restaurant with Edward standing and Divina
leaning over me. I tried to breathe, but my lungs refused to expand.
Finally, the tightness released, so I sucked in as
much air as I could. Divina’s hand was warm and reassuring on my neck and I
struggled to sit up without pushing Divina away.
“What happened?” Edward asked.
“Vretial. He’s sending Shio to Earth. He said that
the book lit Earth up with its signal. Why did I have a dream in the middle of
the day?”
“It was a vision, not a dream. It was important information
that your book decided you needed to know,” he said, sitting down. “Did Vretial
seem angry or upset?”
“The first and third personality. I think he has
multiple personality disorder. The girl mentioned a disk and he said something
about not making a tear and destroying something, but then he was cut off by
his personality shift. The girl will have to stay behind while Shio hunts it
down.”
“This is good; he’s looking in the wrong place,”
Divina said. Edward looked doubtful, but I was trying to avoid hysteria.
“No! It’s not good. Vivian. What if he smells my book
on her or in my apartment when she’s in there---”
“The scent is long gone by now,” Edward said. “It
doesn’t matter that they’re not here; only that we now know where they are.
With luck, it’ll be a while before he discovers that the book is not on Earth.
What do you feel about your book? Is it still in danger?”
“Yes.” I focused on my book. “But not as much. It’s
safer, but it’s still in danger. What do we do?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t try to contact Erono like I
wanted to, so I’ll do it tonight. You’re not allowed out of our sight. I’ll
teach you every chance I get.”
“If he gets attacked by Vretial’s strongest servants,
you can’t teach him enough magic in a few days to beat them,” Divina argued.
I find her lack of faith disturbing.
“It only takes the right spell at the right moment to
defeat them.” He gave me a solemn look, which told me I was about to get some
very important advice. “If you are going to kill someone, and you have the
chance, do it. The longer you take, the greater the chance things will go
wrong.”
“I don’t actually want to kill anyone,” I said dryly.
“I know, but sometimes someone else will want to kill
you and you won’t have a choice.”
“I have a better idea,” Divina interrupted. “Keep him
at my place. No one would find him there, and we can take out the servants
while they’re distracted. If Vretial is sensible enough to send more servants,
we’ll kill them too.”
“Are you suggesting that I just hide out in a little
hole while you two fight the bad guys? I’m not cool with that.” A dog that runs
from its master’s side in battle should not bark.
“You really have no choice,” Divina said,
unimpressed.
“Yes, I do. While you two are fighting your little
battle, who will be there to keep me in my cage?”
Edward ignored me. “We can stay here and wait for
them to find us or go after them and try to kill them while they’re not
expecting it. It would be preferable if the books were kept at distance, but I
don’t see that happening.”
“Leave Dylan at my place with your book, and his,
while you and I fight the servants.” Divina slid my book onto the table.
“Why are you going to fight?” I asked Divina. They
were both confused by my question. “Well, it’s not your job to protect the
books, so why are you risking yourself to do so?”
“Protecting the books is everyone’s responsibility.
Duran will be destroyed if Vretial takes the books, and so will your world. I’m
not going to stand by and let that happen,” she said.
“Then why do you want to keep me out of it so bad?” I
asked.
“Why do you think?” She glared at Edward coldly. “Are
you really going to let you poor, new, untrained, unprepared, uninformed
apprentice get in that kind of danger?”
Edward leaned back and sighed. “I wouldn’t have
agreed to teach him if I thought he would sit back and let others fight a
battle meant for him. He’s too much like Ronez to hide from the enemy, even
when it risks his book. I guess that’s a bad quality for a Guardian. If I were
to tell him to run and hide, he wouldn’t listen.”
Divina clinched her fists.
“Which is why I’m keeping this with me at all times.”
He held up a little bottle full of light orange, translucent liquid.
“A sleeping potion?”
“No resistance, no waking early.”
I felt betrayed.
“You have to understand that, in a fight, you’re
either an asset or a liability,” he told me sympathetically. “I don’t care how
Vretial’s servants are teleporting, but it’s obvious that they are. Let the
gods figure out how. What I care about is that they’re after the books,
particularly ours.”
“So what do you want to do?” Divina asked him.
“We’ll do what we came here to do. Come sun fall I’ll
speak to Erono while you two continue as you were. Then I’ll go to visit Hiroku
again. We’ll leave first thing in the morning. You go back to your place and
put up every protection spell you have. We’ll take care of a few things and
then come over.”
“You think we can get all the shopping done in one
day?” Divina asked.
“I highly recommend we try. Do you know what it is
you need?”
“Of course. Since I have less than you to do, I’ll
swing by and turn in his forms.” Edward handed her the papers I signed. “I’ll
be at the Togato inn by sunset.”
Divina gently pushed me up, got out of the seat, and
pushed me back down. Then she pulled a small, black pouch from her backpack.
“What are you doing?” Edward growled.
“I owe you lunch, remember?”
“I told you it’s on me.”
I really, really hoped Divina would just put her
little money pouch back and go. But, of course, she couldn’t, and they were
suddenly arguing again. I plopped my head down and let everything settle in.
They wanted me to hide from the bad guys. If I
argued, they would use force. They would have to find Shio to attack him, and
they probably already had a plan on how to do that. Most likely, Divina would
sign my book, they would go to Earth, and use some kind of spell to hunt Shio
down. I could try to follow them, but I would stay out of the way until I saw a
use for myself; Edward was right about being a liability.
But if they could track Shio, why is it so hard to
believe that he could track us?
“How do you two plan on finding Shio?” I
interrupted. They ceased their arguing, at least for the moment.
“We’ll create a false signal and let him try to track
it. We’ll have to make it small enough that Vretial can’t spot it and realize
it’s a fake, though. We’re wasting day.” She left without another word, Edward
having won the payment argument.
There was an almost awkward silence for a few
minutes.
“Is she mad at me?” I asked.
He shook his head. “She’s just frustrated because she
really likes you,” Edward said. “She’s so determined to protect you; she was
never that way with any of my other apprentices.”
“I’m cute.”
“You’re not going to stay under her protection, are
you?” he asked.
I shrugged. “You’ll probably tell me to stay behind.”
“And that’s supposed to mean you will?”
“That’s supposed to make you believe I will. Believe
I will, or believe I won’t, I’m going to do what I’m going to do. Do you trust
Divina’s defenses enough to use some sleeping potion or something on me that
will leave me helpless against them?”
“No. I was thinking more along the line of using a
very gentle sleeping spell that only lasts a few minutes while telling Divina
that you’ll be out for a week. However, I haven’t made up my mind which way to
go. On the one hand, I agree with Divina that you should stay out of danger. On
the other, I think you could hurt yourself trying to disobey. I assume you plan
to follow us.”
“If I were going to disobey, yeah. But I would try to
stay out of the way unless I was needed.”
“It’s a good plan… if Divina and I weren’t involved.
How long did you think you could follow us, assuming you could, before we would
realize you were there?”
“Well, I figure that if I actually were able to
follow you, then hiding from two very determined, focused people should be no
trouble.”
“You underestimate just how powerful Divina and I
are. You need to learn better judgment.”
“Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of
that comes from bad judgment. I don’t care how powerful you two are, I care how
powerful the enemy is. If I can help at all, I will. It sounds to me like you
two are getting cocky.”
“Did you consider that Divina and I could handle one
wizard by ourselves?”
“Sure. But then I have to wonder how this wizard
killed a Guardian. Besides that, the girl may show up. Now, she doesn’t sound
like much of a fighter, but if she were even able to get away alive, she could
tell Vretial what happened and where we are. That’s also assuming that Shio
doesn’t run off to Vretial as soon as he sees the signal. Then again, he doesn’t
sound like the type who would.” I realized Edward was grinning. “What?”
“I haven’t heard an argument like that since Ronez
and I got into our last fight.”
“The ‘banging your head against an open door’ kind of
argument, or the ‘beating the dead horse’ one? I hate trying to make plans when
I don’t have all the information.”
“It never stopped my brother. He once engaged me to
someone without either of us even meeting her. Turned out she was already
married.”
My fair mood soured.
“Don’t,” he said. “I can see the guilt all over you.
You’re not a reminder of his death; you’re a reminder that he made the right
decision, because Earth is still here. Helping you is keeping what he did from
being a waste. That might even be why Divina is trying to help you so badly.”
“There are other wizards out there. Maybe the book
came to me just by chance. You could have given it to someone who didn’t need
so much protection.”
“No. I do believe the book came to you on purpose.
You are a lot like Ronez, and when trained, you’ll be just as powerful. The way
you adapt, both physically and mentally, is remarkable. Now, we’re wasting the
day,” he said, standing up. He pulled a small sack just like Divina’s out of
his bag and poured out a small handful of coins.
There were gold coins, silver coins, black coins, and
dark brown coins, all about the size of quarters. He put one gold coin and
three silver ones on the table before holding out the rest for me.
“You should have money to keep for emergencies.”
I took it, but held it out hesitantly. “I wouldn’t
know how to use it; I don’t know enough Sudo. Plus, Divina already gave me a
bunch of the black ones,” I said. His eyes widened. “How much are they worth?”
I asked, taking the pouch from around my neck.
“A person in Anoshii with an average job makes about
one jue in two weeks.” He held out a small silver coin with a hole in the
middle. “This is a klah; almost worthless.” He picked out a silver coin with no
hole in it. “This is a dol, worth ten klah.” He held up a larger silver coin.
“This is a menso, worth fifteen dol.” He held up a small gold coin with a hole
in the middle. “This is Kurol, worth five menso.” He held up a gold coin with
no hole. “This is an unlah, worth ten menso.” He held up the black coin. “And
this is a jue, worth fifteen unlah.”
I poured the pouch into my palm and counted fifteen.
“Do you think she would take these back?”
“Absolutely not. However, if you used that to buy
something with, you’d get mugged.”
“That wouldn’t be a problem if you had let me keep
Shinobu. She saved me from a gang.”
He sighed. “I didn’t make you get rid of her to be
mean. That was a dangerous creature. If I had let you keep her, you would have
been arrested for keeping a vicious and poisonous monster. She could have
killed you with one bite.”
“She wouldn’t have bitten me. She likes me.”
“She may have tolerated you, but naowen are not pets.
She would have gotten angry with you for some reason. After arresting you, they
would have put her down. Let her be free to hide in her natural environment.”
I sighed, knowing he was probably right.
“Keep this with you,” he said, handing me a mixture
of coins. “If you get separated again and need something like food, there are
street markets everywhere on Anoshii. You just give them whatever everyone else
is giving them. Food stalls can be found in the covered markets and usually
specialize on one food. Find one that smells good and watch what everyone else
gives and how much they get for it. Please don’t get lost again.” He opened the
door, grabbed his bag, stepped out. After a second, I slipped the coins into
the pouch and put it on.