The Fake Heart (Time Alchemist Series) (35 page)

Where
was
the Elixir?

Had Dove—or somebody else, perhaps?—gotten it first? My stomach clenched a little at the thought of yet
another
alchemist claiming the shard before us.
Did we decipher Guinevere’s journal and clues wrong?
Or had Guinevere never left a fragment here in the first place? Did she send her pupils on
a wild goose chase on purpose to confuse
Ivan or….was it something….else…

Were we wrong? Was I wrong when I had thought the Elixir was in Kathleen Hearst’s grave?

When I read Dove’s translated notes, the name
Hearst
stood out. I know I had heard that name before. It was eerily familiar. There was a reason that name seemed to keep calling me.

Hearst….Hearst
…

Here likes Kathleen Patricia Hearst....

Hearst…
why
did that sound so familiar?

Then, like a movie, an old memory I nearly forgot started playing in my head.
Was this my life flashing before my eyes?

I still remember the time, on my eighth birthday, when Grandma had given me the bracelet as a birthday present. I had protested, wanting the
My Little Pony
make up collection instead, but she had been gentle and patient when she explained.

“This is a magic bracelet,”
I heard her voice, clear as a bell, telling my mesmerized younger self the special secret of the bracelet,
“It’s very magical. Do you know why, my little Emery? Because it can make your wish come true.”

Grandma….that’s right….Grandma would tell m
e stories about her own mother…
Katie—it must have been a nickname for
Kathleen!
Why had I barely paid any attention to them? (I guess that was just my young, selfish naïve mind at work back then.)

C’mon, Em
ery
!
Think!
Think about when Grandma told you the stories about Katie
!
Then, achingly slow…they came back…one tiny fact at a time…w
hen Kathleen married, her husband adopted her father’s name to maintain the family business. I remember in her obituary that she
only had one child
—a daughter. 

The black-and-white photo of the littl
e girl who looked so much like me
flashed in my brain. I knew there was a r
eason why I thought the girl
looked similar to me. I had thought maybe it was just
a trick of my mind, or
me
just jumping to over imaginative conclusions
, but then…everything clicked, like the gears in my own mind starting creaking again.

The creeping sleepiness started to fade. Why had I come to St. Mary’s in the first place
? I knew that my mother came
here as a child, as did my grandmother and great-grandmother. I always thought I’d never be able to because of my financial status and broken family, but I remember that it was grandmother’
s last wishes for me to one day attend
at St. Mary’s
Academy
.

And then it flashed like a painfully bright light bulb.

Grandma’s first name was Patricia.
Kathleen’s middle name!

Kathleen had a daughter named Patricia Hearst, who married and became Patricia
Hearst
West
on
, who gave birth to my mother, Cecilia West
on
until she married my father
,
Benjamin Miller.

And then there was me: Emery Miller.

I…
was Kathleen’s great-granddaughter.

Kathleen was alive because Guinevere saved her life. She had kept the shard of the Elixir, not knowing what it was, and turned it into her necklace
—her locket
. What the papers never said was that she probably passed it down to her youngest daughter, who passed it to her daughter, and over and over until the stone changed shape, shifting from a thin, dainty necklace with a beautiful oval shaped stone to the tiny bracelet on my wrist, the ston
e now barely the size of a dime
.

It never even occurred to me that Kathleen’s necklace and my bracelet were the same—the shape
of her necklace
was different;
I assumed the shape of the Elixir would be just like the locket:
round and slender, li
ke the size of a large coin, but
mine was smaller. Maybe Grandma—or maybe even my Mother—would have taken the jewelry and changed it
s
shape to make it fit their taste.

My eyes snapped open, adrenaline pumping through my numb limbs. All this time—I had the Elixir in the palm of my hands and I didn’t even know it!

Ignoring the aching pain and popping in my bones I forced myself
up on my elbows; my skin and torn dress scraping against the cold earth as I crawled
closer to Leon’s body.
I yanked the silver bangle off;
my
wrist
already
bone
cold from the loss of warmth. I looked around for something to break the stone—a rock or a brick—but cursed when I found nothing.

And then it hit me: my heels! I yanked the shoe off my good foot
(realizing I had lost my right shoe in the scuffle with Jack—that was going to be a pain to explain to Samantha…)
raising it above my head. Quickly, I made a silent prayer to Grandmother, asking for forgiveness for destroying our beloved
heirloom
, before I brought it down, smashing the small stone into pieces.

The red shards shivered and bounced on the brown earth. I scooped them up in my hands and the stones
instantly melted into my palm—
a small red puddle.

I placed Leon’
s
head on my lap, his wavy dark brown hair tickling my legs, before I leaned over and carefully, carefully laid the liquid Elixir over his gaping wound.

At first, nothing happened, and my heart sunk. Had I been wrong? But then a tingling sensation jittered up my hand into my body. I quickly retracted my hand, and watched in awe as the now liquid Elixir
quivered
and seemed to sink into the wound. A flash of warm red light glowed from his wound and in minutes it closed shut.

His sk
in started to warm;
the sickly gray tone disappearing, replaced by a healthy glow. He coughed, spurting a bit of blood from his mouth before he sucked in a deep breath of winter air, chest rising as if he had just emerged from
underneath
the water
of the Savannah River
. His eyes remained closed, but he was alive.

Leon was alive! He was really, truly alive!

I sighed. My eyes were puffy and swollen, but no tears came this time. I let my chin fall against my chest and closed them. I didn’t even feel myself fall, didn’t even feel the cold dirt against my cheeks as I
laid
there, with Leon’s head still cradled halfway in my lap. My own heart’s pulsing was fading farther and farther away. The last thing I saw as my vision began to black out was Leon’s sleeping, peaceful face.

I smiled. Death wasn’t so bad after all. Because I, Emery Miller, St. Mary’s sophomore had finally achieved something
spectacular.

CHAPTER 31

Beep….beep…beep…

I
groaned. That constant bleeping
was starting to get on my nerves. My eyes were still closed, but my senses started to come back…

I smelled lilac and bleach. I heard shuffling footsteps behind a door and a
drip, drip, drip
of something liquid.
S
noring.
I heard a grunting bear-like snore. And it sounded familiar. I cracked my eyes open, wincing at the brightly lit white room. I was in a bed, nestled in white soft sheets. My ankle was raised at a slight elevation, wrapped in a thick cast. I glanced to my left to see
bandages, a few stitches and
a needle in my arm. The dripping was
from an IV, and the annoying b
eeping sound was a heart monitor.

I was in a hospital. I was alive. And the person snoring away in a hard plastic chair, thick hairy arms crossed and a bit of drool dotting his stubble chin was—

“Dad!”
I croaked out. My whole body screeched in protest as I struggled to untangle myself from the pristine sheets. My dad, clad in his usual red striped button up shirt and muddy work jeans and boots covered in oil
,
jerked to his senses.

His green eyes, just like mine,
almost
popped out of their sockets as he rushed forward, knocking the chair to the ground
with a rumbling clang
. I was instantly wrap
ped
in a big bear hug, and I clung to him, crying. His fami
liar scent of men’s shampoo,
dirt
,
and gasoline was like a baby blanket. He kissed the top of my head, murmuring my name over and over.

“I thought I had lost you,” he babbled, holding me tighter, “When I got the call from the school, I felt like my heart had stopped. I though
t you had—that you’d—”

“
Shh
, it’s okay, Daddy,” I said, nestling into his neck, “I’m so sorry, Dad. I’m sorry!”

We sat there and cried. This was
the second time I’ve ever seen
my dad cry. The first time was when I was a little six year old, peering into his bedroom when he thought I was in bed,
clutching a dress my mother left behind. He
cried his heart out onto that red velvet dress, as if that would bring her back. As I felt the fat drops of his tears hit my head, I cried harder too.

I will never make him cry like that again.
Never.

◊◊◊◊◊

“Are you
sure
I can’t get you anything, Emery?”

I waved him off. “I am! I mean it Dad! Go get some coffee and a good lunch. The nurses told me you haven’t eaten in nearly three days!”

Three days…that was how long I had been out, after I passed out in the cemetery, cradling Leon’s head. What had happened in those three days? Had everything really happened or was it all just some crazy dream?
No—I knew now that none of it was a dream. Digging up an old family grave; Headmistress Margaret had been murdered; I killed…
killed
Ivan Novak and had found the Elixir.

My bracelet was missing. But instead of feeling panicky and upset, I felt…relieved and content. Like it was a good friend that had to say goodbye forever; it was a melancholic state.

But a more important thought churned in my head:
where was Leon? And Dove?

Dad started to protest again but I gave him a stern look as the nurse ushered him out. I waved until the door closed shut, listening to Dad’s heavy thudding boots and the nurses clacking heels fade down the hallway.
Then I pushed
away the covers and stumbled out of the bed
, freeing my cast from its perch. I stood there a little, trying to balance,
shivering in my thin hospital gown. My
bare
feet hit
cold linoleum floor as I limped
towards the
tiny
bat
hroom, using the walls and scarce furniture as support.

Just as I hoped, a large silver mirror hung over the porcelain sink. I grabbed the t
op of my gown and pulled it down to
my chest.

The tattoo had changed.

Instead of a l
ight yellow clock face, it was a shining gold, like somebody had traced my skin with liquid gold
. It was an intricate pattern of gears and grinds, with the same haunting clock face right over my b
eating heart. The alchemic Runes
seemed to stretch over my chest and on my shoulders and neck.

It was beautiful.

I placed a hand to my chest
.
Ba
-thump,
ba
-thump,
ba
-thump.
My heart was beating like normal again.

But was it really normal or…not? I thought I had died in the cemetery.
I thought that last extra shove of my alchemy had finally done me in.
Why was my fake heart still working?