Page 24 of The Tree of Spirits (Paragons #2)

KNIGHTS & APPRENTICES

A fter finally picking up the tacos, I ran all the way back to the conference center, the lunch bags tucked carefully into my backpack—and in both my hands. But my run stalled as my destination drew near. The crowd was thick, and a big truck was blocking the road.

Rane waved at me. She was standing just outside her parents’ shop. Elves in smart white jumpsuits toiled away all around her, shouting and waving their hands at the dead tree they were slowly easing into the truck with telekinesis.

So Isidora and her Elves had come through for Rane. At least things were going right for someone today.

I burst through the doors of the conference center, spluttering, “Sorry I’m late!” as I deposited the lunch bags on the table.

All of the mentors and all of the Apprentices were gathered in the ballroom, thirty-six people in all. No one looked particularly impressed by my dramatic entrance.

Nala peered into one of the lunch bags, then said, “You’re late.”

Hadn’t I just said that?

“What took you so long?” Altair asked.

I could have told him about Mistress Meeta, the Chameleon, and my mishap with the teleportation spell, but I didn’t think that would help my case here. So all I said was, “Traffic was brutal. And the pickup line was really long.”

“She probably went off on another ill-fated adventure,” Orion said to Eris.

Hey, my adventures weren’t ill-fated. Or at least most of them weren’t.

“Whatever the case, lunch is already over, Apprentice.” Jareth distributed the lunch bags to the various teams. “Over for you , anyway. Now go to the basement and clean something.”

“So I don’t get any lunch, just because I’m a few minutes late?”

“You’re more than a few minutes late.”

I watched the other Apprentices chomp down on their tacos. “This is pretty unfair, you know.”

Jareth shrugged. “Someday, you’ll get to be unfair to Apprentices too. That’s one of the perks of being a Knight.” Then he handed me a toilet brush and a bucket of cleaning chemicals.

I took the stairs down into the basement and got to work in the bathroom. Nevada followed. I gave her a curious look as she knelt on the floor next to me.

“I’m not hungry.” She pulled on a pair of cleaning gloves.

I knew she was every bit as hungry as I was, but she’d come down here anyway so I didn’t have to work alone. That’s one of the reasons she was such a good friend.

“Seriously, what is up with Jareth?” she said. “Who knew he was such a dictator?”

“I don’t think he’s a dictator. He’s just enjoying himself too much. Of all the mentors, he’s the newest Knight. He was an Apprentice last year. I guess the memory of his suffering is still fresh in his mind.”

“Yeah, so he feels compelled to pass along that suffering to the new class of Knights,” Nevada agreed.

The other Apprentices joined us several minutes later. A few of them teased me about missing lunch. The mentors were there too. Jareth made a big show of very slowly eating my taco—and grinning at me the whole time he did it.

I wondered how he’d feel about some chili pepper powder on his toothbrush. The trick was sneaking into the Metamorphs’ castle and into his room…

“Savannah?”

Nevada’s voice pulled me out of my revenge plot.

“Sorry,” I muttered, grabbing a new spray bottle.

“Where did you go?” she asked.

“Everywhere but here.” I frowned at Dante. “Bro, what are you doing?”

“Magic.” He was moving his toilet brush in circles, creating a whirlpool in the toilet.

“Really?”

“Yeah, I’m trying out a super speed spell. Lately, the news has been showing a lot of videos of Knights fighting in the Park. One of them moved his arms around just like this.”

“Super speed, you say?”

“Yep.”

I continued to watch him, but I just didn’t see it. “Are you sure that’s how the spell works?”

“Of course. This is exactly how your boyfriend did it.” Dante winked at me.

Boyfriend ? Good thing Kylie wasn’t within earshot.

Even though I’d gotten more than enough of that mortifying ‘boyfriend’ talk yesterday, I forced myself to smile and tease my brother back.

“Dante really should concentrate on his work,” I commented to Nevada.

“It kind of looks like he’s just moving his hands randomly, sloppily back and forth. I don’t see super speed.”

But Dante was unperturbed. “That’s the thing about super speed, sis. It’s so fast that you don’t even see it.”

I gave my eyebrows a slow, skeptical lift. “So is all the toilet water supposed to end up on the floor like that?”

Dante’s gaze dropped to the floor. With a grumble and a grunt, he redoubled his efforts, concentrating on performing the spell using some weird, elaborate hand movements that I was pretty sure were completely wrong. And not magical at all.

Nevada made a high-pitched trilling noise, and the water Dante had spilled streamed into the floor drain.

“Now that’s real magic,” I told Dante, smirking.

He rolled his eyes at me.

“I’m not the only one who can do real magic,” said Nevada. “Savannah can do it too.”

“What kind of magic can you do, Sav?” Dante frowned when the head of his toilet brush fell off.

“I’ll show you, if you give that thing to me.” I pointed at the broken toilet brush.

Dante handed it over, perplexed.

I grabbed a screwdriver from our toolbox and reattached the brush to the stem. “There you go, good as new.” I handed it back to him. “Just like magic.” I tucked the screwdriver into the waistband at the back of my pants. I’d likely be needing it again.

Dante grunted. “You call that magic?”

“It’s more magical than getting toilet water all over the floor,” I countered, shrugging.

“She’s just messing with you,” Nevada told him. “She can actually do real magic.” She looked at me. “I heard about what you did yesterday, Savannah, creating a net of magic petals. That’s pretty cool.”

“How do you know about that?”

Nevada squirted cleaning fluid all over the sink. “Ansel told me. He’s on my team, you know. And he knows the two of us are friends.”

Dante perked up. “Ansel? Picked up a third boyfriend already, Sav?”

I ground my teeth. “Not every boy who talks to me is my boyfriend, doofus.”

“Do they know that?” he asked, feigning seriousness.

I tossed a sponge at his head.

He ducked to the side, and the sponge flew past him, hitting Rhett in the forehead. Rhett’s gaze zeroed in on me. He cracked his knuckles and gave me a cold smile.

“Whoa, what is that noise?” Asher asked.

I’d been wondering the same thing. The noise that had started as an intermittent, distant ting a few minutes ago was now a heavy, steady thump .

“Maybe it’s the tree removal people?” Bronte suggested.

The walls started shaking.

“That’s not from removing a tree,” I said, standing.

Dutch rushed into the room, shouting, “Check the news!”

Eris pulled out a portable tablet. “Thieves tried to raid the jewelry store next door,” she said. “After they triggered the alarm, they barricaded themselves inside. Using a forcefield.” Eris glanced at Orion, who was standing behind her.

Orion read the screen. “The Watchers are on their way, but their SUVs are blocked by the Intelli-move truck and the enormous dead tree in the road. They are now proceeding on foot, but they can’t bring their forcefield-buster, which is too heavy to carry by hand.”

Jareth jumped to his feet. “I’ll take care of it.”

He rushed out of the room. The other Knights followed.

Before Eris left, she told the Apprentices, “We’ll deal with this. Stay here.”

Bronte grabbed the tablet they’d left on the primping table under the mirror. Everyone had long since abandoned any pretense of cleaning.

“The Knights are on the scene.” Bronte turned the tablet to show us a live news feed of the street outside the jewelry store.

Five Knights and lots of Watchers were standing together, discussing the situation.

Jareth wasn’t back yet with the forcefield-buster, assuming he could even carry it alone.

Sure, he was really strong, but I’d seen a forcefield-buster, and it looked really, really heavy.

It wasn’t for nothing that the Watchers used trucks and cranes to position it.

“The news is sure the Knights will get the thieves,” Bronte read. “The building is surrounded, and there’s only one way in or out. There’s nowhere to go. The thieves are trapped with no hope of escape. Once the forcefield falls, it’s over.”

The walls around us were shaking so hard, dust was raining down.

“I wouldn’t be too sure,” I said. “If the thieves put up a forcefield, that means they have magic. Who knows what else they can do.”

On the tablet screen, a Knight in gold armor lumbered toward the jewelry store, staggering under the weight of the enormous cannon in his arms. Jareth. He was moving very slowly. It was a wonder he was moving at all, given the size of that thing.

The translucent blue shimmer around the jewelry store stretched, consuming the neighboring building. Our building.

I knew what the thieves were up to. I knew how they were going to escape.

“Everyone, get down!” I shouted over the deafening thumps.

And then the wall in front of us exploded.