Page 1 of The Tree of Spirits (Paragons #2)

FAMILY REUNION

“ W ow, that’s a lot of knives,” I commented.

Bronte’s gaze cut past the lady in the bright pink dress, honing in on me. She sighed. “Why don’t you go stand guard outside, Savannah?”

“Fine.”

I knew when I wasn’t wanted. So I stepped out of the shop, leaving Bronte to sort out the latest event planning crisis.

The lady in pink—a Distributor by the name of Ursula—had sent Ms. Featherdale the wrong dinner knives for the Summit’s banquet.

So now Bronte was trying to switch those for a set of knives that were, at least as far as I could tell, pretty much identical.

In other words, today was another exciting day in the life of a Knight Apprentice.

My teammate Bronte and I were lowly trainees, sixteen-year-old magical novices who had to learn the ropes before we could rise to the honorable rank of Knight. Being an Apprentice meant getting stuck with all the jobs that no one else wanted to tackle. Today that job was Ursula and her knives.

While I was standing outside the Distributor’s shop, pretending to look important, I watched humans and supernaturals stroll down the streets of the Magic Emporium, bearing the spoils of their shopping conquests. All of them were having a lot more fun than I was.

Well, almost all of them.

My brother Dante and the other Apprentices from Team Victory were working nearby, lugging around large supply crates and loading them into four big, black SUVs. None of the Apprentices seemed overly thrilled to be acting as errand boys to the General’s soldiers.

I peeled my back off the doorframe and walked over to Dante. “Hey.”

“Hey.” He squeezed the final crate into the SUV and closed the trunk. Then he turned to face me. “How’s life in Team Gold Getters?”

“Thrilling.” I cracked a smile. “Lots of non-magical tasks to do.”

He grunted. “Yeah, I’m pretty jealous of Nevada and Ansel. They told me that today their team gets to play with all the magical artifacts at the Castle.”

“Really?”

“Ok, technically , they’re assigned to do inventory on the Castle’s Treasury, but you know they’re totally going to play with all the magical artifacts stored in there.”

“I just hope they won’t totally blow themselves up.”

“Na, no chance,” Dante said, casually waving my concerns away. “Ansel won’t let that happen. He’s like this total tech genius, you know. Apparently, he built a fusion generator in his garage back home.”

“I hadn’t heard that, actually,” I replied. “But I’m glad you made a new friend. You don’t seem to see eye-to-eye with your teammates.”

He humphed. “Only because my teammates are a bunch of weirdos.”

“What is Team Victory up to today, anyway?”

“Well, when we’re done here, we’re off to Scavengers’ Hall, where an exciting afternoon of sorting and folding old blankets awaits us.

Our mentor promised us the blankets are super itchy—and most likely teeming with fleas.

So my whole body might be covered in a horrible rash the next time you see me. ”

“So, basically you’ll look no different than usual.” I grinned at him.

“Ha. Ha.” He leaned toward me, smirking. “I wonder if you’d dare to be so funny if there weren’t Watchers everywhere, preventing me from retaliating.”

“Of course not,” I told him. “You know me. I’m all about keeping a low profile.”

Dante practically choked on his own snort.

“Though I guess I should be more worried about you keeping a low profile,” I said. “I know how much you like to throw your socks at me when you get mad. And boy are those socks stinky.”

Dante squared his shoulders and stood up taller, like he was proud of that amazing accomplishment, which, knowing my brother, he totally was. “So, what’s your assignment today?”

“Waiting around doing absolutely nothing while Bronte sorts out a bunch of misbehaving Summit vendors.”

“If you let her do all the work, she’ll get all the credit,” he warned me.

I shrugged. “If I try to help, she’ll just scold me. And she gets this really freaky crinkle between her eyes. So I figured I’d just get out of her way and let her do what she does best.”

“See, Sav, this is why you’re at the bottom of the Scoreboard.”

“Actually, I’m not at the total bottom of the Scoreboard anymore.”

All thanks to a timely intervention from my Knight in shining armor.

“But, in any case,” I continued, “I’m pretty sure I’m near the bottom of the Scoreboard because the General thinks I’m the personification of anarchy.”

He snorted. “That too. But you should at least try to do something to earn points.”

“Na, motive is more important than merit.”

His brows squeezed together. “Cute. Where did you pick up that new nugget of wisdom?”

I shook my head. “Nowhere. Never mind.”

Kato and Conner had both said those words to me. It was no wonder if they were best friends. But if I told my brother that I’d been…well, hanging out with two Knights—two boy Knights—the teasing would never end. And I really didn’t need that kind of drama in my life right now.

“Fancy meeting you two here!”

Dante and I turned toward our mom, who was grinning at us like it was the best day of her life.

“My two amazing children, working so hard to become Knights!” Mom hit us with the sappiest look I’d ever seen on her face. “I’m so proud of you!”

“She does realize we’re basically just standing here goofing off, right?” Dante said to me.

I gave him my most innocent smile. “That wouldn’t be anything new for you.”

“Hey, I have goals and ambition and stuff!” he protested.

“Such as?”

Dante actually had to think about that for a moment. “Running a marathon in under two hours,” he finally decided.

“Oh, right. I remember last year when you were running a lot, trying to make that goal.”

“And I remember you tagging along.”

“I didn’t make it nearly as far as you did,” I sighed.

“You made it far enough to get bloody feet.”

I winced. “Yeah, that was awful.”

“What was awful was how Mom totally freaked out when you went through our entire yearly supply of bandages in only a month,” he told me.

“I forgot all about that,” Mom said.

“Well, I didn’t. You gave me one incredibly unforgettable lecture. Like it was my fault that Savannah had gotten her feet all bloody and blistered,” he said with a long, slow roll of his eyes.

Mom frowned. “That’s not why I lectured you, Dante, and you know it.”

“Oooh, what happened? What did Dante do?” I felt my mouth stretch into a very wide, very eager smile.

“The whole reason you had bloody feet was because Dante egged you on about how much better of a runner he is,” Mom said.

“Hey, she didn’t have to try to prove me wrong!”

“Sure I did,” I told him. “It’s kind of my job to always prove you wrong, bro.”

“I’m sure you would have exercised some restraint in this situation if only Dante had told you about his other goal .” Mom bit out the last word like it was poison on her tongue.

“What goal? What am I missing?” I looked back and forth between my mom and my brother.

Dante just rolled his eyes. “Mom thinks that if I hadn’t egged you on, we wouldn’t have run out of bandages. She was irrationally paranoid that I was going to spontaneously split my head open and she wouldn’t have anything to cover the wound.”

“It was a very rational concern!” Mom chimed in. “You were always trying these crazy stunts, Dante. Remember the time you tried to do a backflip off the roof of the old bus stop?”

So that was his ‘other’ goal.

“You tried to do a backflip off the roof?” It was easy to laugh now since I knew he was ok. “Glad I missed that one.”

Dante was sometimes such a doofus.

“You missed a lot of awesomeness, Savi,” he told me. “I almost nailed the landing.”

“On the third try,” Mom said, her lips tight.

“Wait, you tried to do a backflip off the roof three times ?” I gawked at Dante.

He nodded proudly. “I can tell you’re impressed.”

“Uh, yeah, I’m impressed…that you survived! You have got to be the most reckless person I’ve ever met. Seriously, bro, how are you still alive?”

Mom sighed. “I ask myself that same question every day.”

My brother flicked his hand, sweeping our concerns away. “I had everything completely under control.”

I snorted. “I’m surprised you would risk a skull fracture. That would mess with this whole… thing you have going on there.” I waved my hands around his head, indicating his messy hair. It always stood up in a hundred different directions.

“Yes, my hair is awesome. Thanks for noticing.”

“Awesome?” I raised one brow. “Not exactly the word I would have used.”

Somewhere high above, the sky roared.

I looked up, smiling into the blanket of clouds overhead. “Thanks for backing me up.”

“Who are you talking to?” Dante asked me.

“The spirits.”

“My sweet, idealistic sister,” he said, wrapping his arm around me, “that wasn’t the spirits. It’s just the coming storm.”

Mom frowned at the rapidly darkening sky. “I hope it’s not a bad one.”

“The news says it probably will be,” Dante told her. “Maybe even as bad as that storm we had a few years ago in Bayshore. It knocked out the power to the whole town. And when the lights in the building went out, Savannah was totally freaking out.”

I blushed. “It was really scary!”

“You cried until I agreed to go find a flashlight.”

“Not my finest hour,” I admitted, sighing. “Nor was it yours, Dante. Instead of just grabbing the flashlight, you bit off more than you could chew.”

“I remember that,” Mom said. “I found him in my workshop, grunting and growling as he tried to lift my big backup battery off the ground.”

“It was really heavy!” Dante protested. “And I was a pretty scrawny eleven-year-old.” He flexed an impressive bicep to show he wasn’t that scrawny kid anymore.

“It was heavy,” Mom agreed. “Which is why you should have had the common sense to go find an adult to help you.”

“Um, common sense? Dante?” I snorted. “You do realize that this is the same person who did a backflip off the roof?” I held up three fingers. “Three. Times.”