Exile (Keeper of the Lost Cities) (31 page)

She forced her shaky legs to work, entering a round stadium-size sitting room. Silver chandeliers dangled from the ceiling, and chrome bookshelves packed with books thicker than Sophie’s head covered the curved walls. The massive space was broken up with plush silver armchairs grouped around crystal tables filled with balefire, which reflected off the silver floor and painted the room with soft blue light. Everything looked sleek and modern and immaculate. A place where the best of the best went to mingle among other greatness. But at the moment it was empty, save for a few silver-cloaked prodigies who rushed past without so much as glancing at Sophie.

“Tardiness is a serious offense,” Master Leto said, leading her to a spiral staircase that wound its way up from the center of the room. He explained that everything in the tower went vertical, not horizontal, and as they passed floor after floor
after floor, Sophie wished the tower had an elevator. Especially since the staircase bent sideways and slantways and upside down—leave it to the elves to defy gravity—as the tower itself twisted around the Gold Tower.

They had just passed floor number seven when Master Leto paused. He turned around and gestured for her to do the same.

“This is the Hall of Illumination,” he announced as he led her into a round room lined with mirrors. At least twenty Sophies stared back at her—but each reflection was slightly different, kind of like funhouse mirrors, though instead of making her look stretched or warped, the changes were much more subtle. Some had different shadows, or parts of her were blurred, or places were blasted out by light.

“Each reflection is designed to teach us something about ourselves,” Master Leto explained, “and one of the requirements for commencement is to learn what all of them mean.” He pointed to a mirror directly across from them. “That’s the one everyone always solves first. Any guesses?”

Sophie stepped closer, hating to admit she didn’t see anything different about it. But maybe that was the lesson. “To be true to yourself?”

He frowned and moved to her side. “This is a
human
mirror. Their mirrors invert and reverse everything as they reflect it back. Look at the
F
on my badge.”

She wanted to roll her eyes and tell him she was familiar
with how human mirrors worked. But . . . how had she not noticed that elvin mirrors were different?

“So what’s the real lesson?” she asked.

“That’s for you to figure out. Master them all, and you’ve achieved true wisdom. In the meantime, we’d better move along.”

She turned to follow him back to the stairs, but light reflecting off one of the mirrors flashed straight into her eyes. She braced for a headache, but instead she felt a strange pull, and a hum of energy started to build under her skin—a warm simmer that grew hotter by the second, until she felt like her insides were on fire.

“Are you all right?”

Sophie blinked, and it took tremendous effort to step back. Once she had, her head cleared. But the hum of the warmth lingered, buzzing in her mind like a swarm of bees—not that she wanted Master Leto knowing that.

She plastered on her best smile and said, “Of course.”

Master Leto opened his mouth to say something, but a tinkling chime, like the clinking of hundreds of water glasses, reverberated through the tower.

“That’s the warning bell. It means you have two minutes to get to session or you’ll be late. Lady Cadence will be most unpleased.”

“What’s she like?” Sophie asked as she followed him up the stairs.

“Tremendously talented.”

Not exactly the information she’d been hoping for, but it was all he said as they climbed past several more floors. Between the humming in her head and the topsy-turvy staircases, Sophie was incredibly dizzy when they finally stopped at a narrow platform that sloped at a strange angle. Two silver unicorns stared at her with deep black eyes from the center of a room lined with doors.

Master Leto pointed to one marked with a rune she couldn’t read. “That one’s you.”

When she didn’t move, he nudged her forward, and she tripped on her too-long cape and slammed against the door, which swung open and sent her toppling into the room.

She could hear Master Leto snickering as a Mentor with raven black hair and midnight blue eyes leaned over her and said, “This is going to be far worse than I imagined.”

“HOW WAS YOUR FIRST DAY?”
Grady asked after Sophie leaped into the Havenfield pastures. He was up to his armpits in dinosaur fluff, giving Verdi her weekly bath.

“I lived.”

Grady smiled. “That bad, huh?”

Sophie shrugged. Her topple-through-the-door had turned out to be the
high
point of her linguistics session, which basically consisted of Lady Cadence pummeling her with phrases in other languages and muttering “so pointless” when Sophie
translated them correctly. It was the first time she’d gotten in trouble for being
good
at something.

It hadn’t helped that the strange humming in her head had lingered the entire session. She’d almost considered having Elwin check her—but she knew Keefe would tease her mercilessly if she went to the Healing Center on her first day. Plus, the sound was fading. Only a hint of it remained now that she was home, and she was sure the rest would be gone by morning.

Verdi thrashed, spraying them both with soggy feathers that smelled like dirty lizard. But Sophie didn’t mind. She actually liked seeing Grady back to his regular job. It felt like things were still normal.

“The Councillors are easing me into my new position,” Grady said, like he knew what she’d been thinking.

“Is it as bad as you thought it would be?”

“It’s
different
. But right now everyone is still so shocked by what happened that we’re all scrambling a bit.” He glanced over his shoulder, to where Silveny was trotting back and forth along her fence. “Which is actually something I need to talk to you about. The Council is hoping to be able to move up the celebration they’ve been planning for Silveny’s introduction into the Sanctuary.
Significantly
.”

“How soon?”

“Soon. I realize it’s going to be challenging for you, but I agree with their reasoning. Our world is going to desperately
need something happy once the news of Alden’s tragedy breaks.”

“Have they decided when they’re planning to tell people?”

“This Saturday.”

If hearts could sink, Sophie’s would have.

“There’ll be an announcement sent to all residences in the morning,” Grady said quietly. “And the afternoon will have a planting in the Wanderling Woods.”

“But Alden’s not dead!”

Grady swiped the feathers off his tunic and wrapped an arm around her. “I know it’s hard to let him go, but we have to. That’s why the Council decided to treat it like he’s passed away. We all need to grieve, and then move on.”

The others could move on if they liked. She wasn’t giving up on him.

“But that’s why they want to move Silveny to the Sanctuary on the coming total eclipse.”

“The eclipse in three weeks?” She couldn’t imagine how she would get Silveny ready so soon. “Can’t they give me at least a month?”

“No, it has to be that night. Every time there’s a total eclipse, Orem Vacker—one of the Ancient members of the Vacker family—uses his incredible talent as a Flasher to put on a spectacular light show called the Celestial Festival. It’s one of our world’s grandest traditions, but Alden’s loss will surely put a damper on the occasion—and that’s the last thing the Council
needs. They need everyone to feel calm and happy, assured that our world is safe and stable—”

“But it isn’t,” Sophie interrupted. “It won’t be until they catch the kidnappers.” And she doubted they expected to catch the kidnappers in the next three weeks.

“The Council realizes that, Sophie. And they
are
working on it. But in the meantime they have to try something else to calm the unrest. Unrest leads to rebellion, and rebellion leads to tragedy.” He kicked the ground, and she knew he was thinking of the Black Swan—but all he added was, “We need to make people feel comfortable again. And what better way to do that than by celebrating the creature that will reset the timeline—and the girl who discovered her? The girl everyone has wondered about.”

Sophie snorted. What Grady should’ve said was,
the girl everyone is afraid of.

“Our world needs this, Sophie. More than you realize. I’ll do everything I can to help, but we need to make this happen. If you don’t think you can handle it, the Council would be willing to reassign Silveny to the Hek—”

“No,” Sophie interrupted again. No way was she letting that happen. “What do I need to do?”

“Better go inside and change. You and Silveny need to practice flying.”

S
OPHIE HAD HOPED THAT—THANKS
to her enhanced concentration—
maybe
this would be the year she finally wouldn’t be a disaster in PE. But after hours of flying with Silveny and using muscles she hadn’t known existed, even walking felt like a tremendous effort.

At least she’d figured out how to steer Silveny by teaching her simple commands like
left
and
right
and
if you dump me into another pile of sparkly manure, I will clobber you.
But the Council expected her to whisk into the Sanctuary on Silveny’s back, circle the crowd a few times, and then land in the center of the Councillors. And Silveny still bucked and thrashed whenever anyone besides Sophie got too close to her.

Between the bruises from getting thrown from the back of a terrified alicorn and an entire morning of stumbling and falling because her tired muscles couldn’t keep up with the other prodigies, Sophie finally swallowed her pride. She skipped the cafeteria and used her lunch break to visit the Healing Center.

“What is
that
?” she asked, pointing at the picture of her hanging above the bed she was currently sitting on. Or, more accurately, the picture of her in her humiliating mastodon costume in the middle of an awkward dance step at the Opening Ceremonies.

Elwin snort-laughed. “Figured this year I should pay you proper tribute. Just be glad I didn’t take Keefe’s suggestion and rename this place the Foster Center.”

Sandor laughed from his spot in the corner and Sophie glared at both of them. But it was hard to stay mad after Elwin handed her a vial of Achey-Break, and the cooling serum rushed through her muscles and made the pain go away.

She’d just have to steal that photo later.

“You seem like you’re sleeping better,” Elwin said, studying her face. “Glad to see that. I was afraid you might be worse, what with . . .”

Sophie stared at her hands.

She
shouldn’t
be sleeping so soundly—she should be working round the clock trying to find another clue to get to the truth about the Black Swan. But she couldn’t block Silveny’s transmissions, and the alicorn’s emotions were so irresistibly
soothing. No matter how hard she fought to stay awake, sleep always pulled her under. And it was such a relief to have sweet, happy dreams after so many weeks of nightmares.

But she was letting Alden down.

Every second she wasted was a second she left him trapped in the darkness.

“Hey,” Elwin said, jostling her shoulder. “You’re not giving in to any guilt, right?”

She shook her head, trying not to shiver at the reminder.

“Good. Keep it that way. But still.” He snapped his fingers, flashing a bright yellow orb around her face.

The bright light hit her eyes and pain exploded in her mind.

“What’s wrong?” Elwin asked, but all she could do was curl up in a ball and focus on breathing. Something wet touched her lips and she readily swallowed the sweet serum—not even caring if it was a sedative. She just wanted the pain to stop.

Fortunately it did.

She took several more breaths before she chanced opening her eyes.

“Thank goodness,” Elwin said as he wiped the sweat off her brow. “Do you have
any
idea what you just put me through?”

“Sorry. That migraine came out of nowhere.”

“It was more than a migraine,” Tiergan said, and Sophie turned her head, surprised to see him there. “Elwin sent Sandor to get me when you wouldn’t wake up. Do you remember anything about the last hour?”

“Hour?” She had no idea the pain lasted that long.

“Do you really not remember me calling your name or shaking your shoulders or trying to get you to swallow different elixirs?”

“I guess I blacked out.” But she didn’t remember blacking out. She thought she’d been awake.

Elwin ran his hands through his already mussed hair. “Do you see any problems, Tiergan? Because I can’t find anything physically wrong.”

Tiergan squinted at Sophie and shook his head. “I can’t get past her blocking—but I assume that’s a good sign.”

“A good sign for what?” Sophie asked, not sure if she wanted to know the answer.

“If your mind were”—Tiergan shook his head like he couldn’t say it—“I’d think I’d be able to slip through the cracks. But your thoughts are as silent as ever.”

Sophie pulled herself up, moving her head different ways, checking for any remnant of the pain. “I feel fine now. I think it’s just all the stress—it’s been a rough few days.”

No one could argue with that, and she was relieved, even though her stomach was churning and her heart was racing and her brain kept remembering all the times the light had affected her weirdly. She’d gotten better for a few days, but it seemed worse than ever now.

But if Elwin and Tiergan didn’t see anything wrong, she had to believe that she was fine. She couldn’t worry about one more thing.

“I think you should go home and rest,” Sandor suggested.

“If I go home early, Grady and Edaline will worry—and they’re dealing with enough right now. I’m fine, really.” Sophie stood up to prove it. “How hard is it to sit through an hour of study hall?”

Sandor’s glare didn’t falter, but Elwin nodded. “I guess you can rest here until the end of the session—but you’re going to
rest
. And I’m going to check a few more things as you do.”