Deception of the Magician (Waldgrave Book 2) (16 page)

“Bringing this thing back is going to cause an explosive reaction in the Council, but I have faith in the system. They’ll work it out long before this ever trickles down to you, I hope. I got a letter from Pyrallis Daray today,” He chuckled in a good natured way, “God knows how he knew I would be here. He’s your other grandfather, in case he dies before you meet him. Avalon keeps insisting that he is going to die, but then, she’s been saying that ever since I first met her. Says she can see it in his eyes; I don’t know if it’s true or not, but if it is, I hope you don’t have the misfortune of inheriting that ability. What a terrible thing to have to know about people.”

He looked over at her and frowned; Lena looked directly into his eyes, and for a brief moment, their eyes locked on to each other. Goosebumps broke out on her skin—he was seeing her. But it was impossible that he was seeing her—he wasn’t even alive, and none of it had happened back when Ben had originally made this trip. Then, very suddenly, he reached out and started shaking her. Panic pulsed through her veins as she tried to pull away.

“Lena! Lena!”

She blinked, and he was Master Rivera again.

“Lena! Are you okay?”

“Um, yeah…Yes, I’m okay. Ben was here.” She stared at Matias Rivera nervously. This was the second time she had mistaken him for her grandfather. “Are we…are you related to Ben somehow?”

Master Rivera was taken aback. “No. I don’t believe so.”

She continued to stare at him. It was too much of a coincidence. “What about your mother? What was her maiden name?”

Master Rivera was looking at her like she was crazy. “Ferrari.”

Lena’s heart sank. She didn’t know the extended genealogy of her family anyways, so she wasn’t sure what she had expected. Maybe a name that at least sounded familiar. “I’ve never heard of them.”

“They died out. If I recall correctly, the man who married her older sister inherited Master Ferrari’s position in the Council.” Matias shrugged indifferently.

They stared at each other for a while before walking back to the room. Lena went to bed, and her renewed success sparked the usual debates the next morning; no one could deny that the search was back on. She hadn’t received any new information about where Ben had gone next, but people were starting to build faith that she would figure it out even if she didn’t know exactly where they were supposed to go. In celebration, they decided to stop for a nice lunch that day. As was typical, Ava drank slightly too much and Griffin gave her disapproving looks the whole time. Even though she had decided to sit with Greg, Matias (the first real Council ally she had made by herself), and Master Weller, Griffin was in her head for almost the whole meal.

I can’t believe you’re going to go through with this. You’re going to destroy everything we’ve worked so hard to achieve! And you’re playing right into their hands! They’re manipulating you, and you’re too naïve to realize what’s happening…

Not for the first or last time, she wished she had the ability to discretely respond that he himself was one to talk about manipulators. But she couldn’t, and she had long ago lost hope that she would ever develop the ability. Griffin had gotten himself into a particularly bad mood lately, and though he wasn’t showing it as much as Ava, Lena could tell that all the travel was starting to wear him down. He was tired and moody; he kept watching Lena at all hours of day and night. He was as paranoid as Howard, but it felt like there was something else, too. He wasn’t afraid of losing her the way that Howard was…Griffin was a watch dog. It was his duty to watch her, even if the exhaustion was going to kill him. It was his life, and Lena wasn’t sure if she found his devotion more annoying or intimidating.

Soon, they were back on the road again. There was a lapse in the letters between Costa Rica and Central Mexico, and they covered the miles with surprising speed—they took on a new tactic to cover the distance quickly and started sleeping in shifts so that they wouldn’t have to stop at hotels as frequently. While the situation resulted in smellier and crankier Council Representatives, they were traveling much faster.

They stayed in a large-sized town in Mexico for a couple of days to allow Lena to scope out a few sites of interest, where she located Ben twice more, and then they settled into a hotel room to get a much needed good night's sleep before they planned on crossing the border back into the states the following day. The fact that they were drawing close to home, combined with Lena’s growing status among New Faith Representatives who had been skeptical of her previously, had allowed for some leniency in Lena’s usual guard. Griffin, of course, took as much advantage as he could of the lapse. Before Lena could even protest, he had made himself at home in the sitting area in the corner of her and Ava’s room.

“You really intend to find it. You really think you’re capable.”

“Yes.” She said, trying not to look over at him. He was in a brooding mood again, and she didn’t want to be the target of any more of his rants.

Griffin sighed audibly. “You’re such a little girl. You can’t see how this is going to affect anything beyond your own life.”

Lena let it go. He was trying to pull her into an argument. She wasn’t sure if he was bored, irritable from travel, or just needing attention, but he seemed to always want to argue with her lately. Her solution had been to ignore him as much as possible. After several minutes of silence, Ava came out of the bathroom freshly-showered and dressed in modest nightclothes. She’d had her usual wine that night, and even though she still talked a lot, she seemed to be building immunity to the other unsightly affects alcohol had on her.

“I think it’s great. I think it’s great that she’s going to find it. She’s my girl,” Ava sat down on the bed next to Lena and put her arm around her, “And I love her. She’s done more with her life than I ever did with mine.”

Griffin gave her a disapproving look. “She’s finding it to give it to 
them
. I can’t say I’d be proud.”

“Oh, Griffin!” Ava waved him off. “For goodness sakes! You’re just like him, taking all of this so seriously. If the portal was never found, and you died without it being found, would you be happy?”

Griffin continued to stare at her, the critical gleam still in his eyes.

Ava continued. “No. You wouldn’t, because you’re just like him. He’s going to die unhappy. You’ll be unhappy as long as you don’t know where it is or if you do and it’s in the hands of the New Faith. What are you afraid of? They can’t destroy it…”

“You don’t know that.” Griffin growled.

“I do. I’ve read it.” Ava leaned back against the headboard of the bed. She turned on the television in the corner. The only channel they could get to come through was all about weather in the region; apparently they were expecting abnormally large amounts of rain over the next week. “So there’s no pleasing you. Either of you. And if my little girl needs to find it to be happy, I think she should. God knows we could use 
someone
 in this family who’s happy with her life.”

No one talked after that, and they watched the loop of the weather report three times before Griffin turned it off and left, but Lena was starting to gain a new respect and liking for Ava. She was flourishing away from Waldgrave; she was thinking, and her independent streak had grown to the point that she felt confident taking on Griffin in a dispute. Lena slept soundly that night, and for the first time since the accident, she actually dreamed about her father. It was only a few seconds—they were checking into a hotel together, just like in the old days. They checked in, and then he faded away, and she was alone. It was only a moment, but it was enough.

They had a late start the next day, as the next postcard had come from just across the border in Texas. The caravan didn’t get moving until nine-thirty in the morning, crossed the border without incident, and stopped for lunch at a fast-food restaurant. Despite the fact that they had left enough time to make it to the next town in time, they quickly found that they wouldn’t be making it by nightfall. The road they had intended to use had been closed; torrential rains that season had created periodic floods and mud slides on several roads.

They detoured to a small town fifteen miles away and spent another lazy afternoon and evening in a chain motel that smelled heavily of tobacco smoke and bleach. There weren’t any adjoined rooms, but Lena had gained enough trust with the right people, and she was allowed to stay in a room alone with Ava as long as she called before going out.

It was March, and the weather was getting fickle; storm clouds were gathering on the horizon outside of Lena’s window, and the smell of ions was on the air. Ava hadn’t had anything to drink yet that day, and she was in her usual spot on the bed with one hand on her forehead like she had a headache. Lena had pulled a chair over in front of the window, which was the only source of gray illumination in the room because Ava had all the lights turned off, and was nonchalantly sorting through Ben’s letters.

She already knew he hadn’t been here; she was getting much better at listening to the déjà vu that crept under her skin when she stood in a place where he had once been. This place was new; it had a foreboding feel, but it wasn’t the feeling she ever got when congressing with Ben. She thumbed through the letters three times, then looked out at the clouds; lightening danced on the horizon. There wasn’t a thermostat in the room, and she shivered.

She put her letters on the bed and went to her suitcase. She pulled out Ben’s coat and put it on; she wondered if Howard would be willing to let her sew a new lining onto the interior. She pushed her hands down into the pockets, feeling the familiar rip in the pocket and the note Ben had hidden for her, and gazed at Ava, who had fallen asleep. Her hand had slid off her forehead and was resting gently next to her face; the light from the window cast ghastly shadows over her face. She looked blue in the shadowy light, and somehow it accentuated every small wrinkle that had ebbed onto her face over the years. Her face, which had always resembled Lena’s, didn’t anymore. Not in this light. Just when they were starting to see eye to eye, they were finally growing distinct from each other.

Lena had the sudden impulse to lean down and brush a hand across her mother’s cheek, but she was afraid of waking her up. There was a loud knock on the door. It was Griffin.

He was dressed the most formal that Lena had seen him since they had left Waldgrave. He had on grey pressed dress pants and a red button-up shirt; no tie, but most of the representatives had left their formal attire at home, favoring a more civilian look for the trip. Casual clothing avoided unnecessary attention. “Do you have dinner plans? We need to talk about something.”

Lena looked over her shoulder at Ava, still asleep and unmoving on the bed. “I guess not. Is this…?”

“I’ve already cleared it with them. I’ll go out and pick something up. Meet me in the lobby at seven.”

“Okay. Sure.”

Griffin walked away down the hall to the stairs; he never looked back. Lena went back into the room. As she closed the door, Ava shuddered and turned over on her side. It was starting to rain again. She put her letters and Ben’s coat away, and half an hour later she walked down to the lobby to find Griffin. He was late, but only by five minutes. He walked into the lobby soaked through his coat and put a fast food bag down on an end table next to a sofa from the seventies. He gestured for Lena to sit as he ran his other hand through his hair, trying to purge a little water out of it.

“You don’t want to change…?” Lena asked; Griffin was very particular about his appearance, and it figured that it would rain the day he tried to dress for business again.

Griffin shook his head and gestured again. “I’m fine. Just sit.”

The lobby was a small room, and it was empty save for Lena and Griffin. The walls were covered with newer looking blue wallpaper and the rug on the tile floor seemed well-maintained. The sounds of a sports game on a television were coming through a door behind the desk; it was unlikely that they would be disturbed. They sat down on a couch in the corner farthest from the concierge’s desk and Griffin put the food bag in Lena’s lap. He started to talk.

“Doctor Evans called me today. Master Daray is getting worse.”

Lena pulled a burger out of the bag and started to unwrap it. When Griffin didn’t continue talking, she looked up and realized he was waiting for a response. It might have been the fact that he was soaking wet, but he looked miserable. Lena sighed and continued unwrapping the burger.

“He’s not dying. I told you before, he’s just too—“

Griffin shook his head. His voice was softer than she had ever heard it before. “No. This is it. He’s sure. The doctor’s sure. Even Master Daray is sure. He’s finalizing his will, and he didn’t do that last time. I’ve never heard him so adamant about being sure that everything gets…taken care of.”

Lena stared at him uncertainly. He wasn’t looking at her, and it was unusual. It was evasive. She put the burger down. “So, what your saying is we have to ditch this whole mission right now and go rushing to his bedside? Do you think I’m a moron, or what? I know what you’re trying to—“

Griffin didn’t look over at her, but he gave a small, sardonic smile; it was as if he had taken her reaction as something meant to cheer him up. “That’s not it at all. That’s not what I’m trying to do. You need to find it, and you need to find it quickly. The doctor thinks he has a month left, maybe two. He’s been sick for a long time, and he’s been in a lot of pain. He’s been on a lot of pain medications. His liver and kidneys are shot, and the dialysis will only keep him for so long. Half his organs are already partly or completely non-functional. He’s dying, Lena.”