The Pyramid of Souls (3 page)

   But as he slid back down underneath his covers, he already knew. The Shadowkeepers were not only that bold—they were that evil.

   And they would stop at nothing to destroy him and his newfound family.

The next morning, Nick visited Maslow in his stall. His majestic horse was kept with the other animals behind a high stone wall at the back of the casino (hidden from paparazzi and pesky journalists). His giant Akhal-Teke's coat shimmered like fourteen-karat gold.

   "Hey, Maslow," Nick said, holding out a perfectly ripe Macintosh apple. The horse nibbled it from Nick's palm and whinnied his approval. Suddenly, Nick felt two heavy paws on his back. He stepped forward and whipped around. Sascha and Isabella stood there, grinning. At least, Nick thought the Siberian tiger was grinning. He could see her long, pointed, shining white teeth.

   "Have you heard?" Isabella asked.

   "Heard what?"

   "Damian has secured an elephant for our show. I am going to ride in on her back, and you get to make us
both
disappear."

   Nick rolled his eyes. "I don't see what was wrong with the old show. Why does he insist on creating an entirely new show every few months? No other casino in all of Las Vegas does that. Shows usually last for years."

   "He likes the challenge," Isabella said. "You know him. He gets bored."

   "Yes, but
his
being bored means
I
have to learn a whole new act—all new magic, everything."

   "Which is as it should be." Their cousin and tutor, Theo, approached the stables, his long, black scholarly robes swirling behind him. He stood very tall, like his brother Damian, with jet-black hair cropped very close to his head, high cheekbones—a familial trait—and eyes with the bluish tint of a glacier.

   "Of course, you'd defend him," Nick mumbled. "He's your brother."
And he bosses us all around,
he thought.

   "You are too impetuous, Kolya," Theo scolded, using Nick's Russian nickname. "You should know by now that Damian lives to protect his family. The reason he changes the act has nothing to do with boredom." Theo adjusted his horn-rimmed glasses on his nose and turned his gaze to Isabella, who flushed.

   "Then why?" she asked.

   "To keep our skills sharp. Think of it as training. Each new feat increases your power. It deepens your skills as magicians. Plus, Isabella, you know there is a competition at the convention."

   "A competition?" Nick asked.

   Theo nodded. "Each clan will perform magic onstage, and the winner is declared by a measure of applause. We have never lost."

   "Never?"

   Theo shook his head. "

.
Never. This year, however
, we hear rumors of a Parisian contingent with a very unusual display of magic. We want to be sure we win."

"Is there a prize?"

   Isabella said, "The winner can choose any act of magic and claim it."

   "Claim it? What do you mean?" Nick asked, as Maslow leaned his head down and pushed on Nick's hand, looking for another apple. The horse stamped his hoof in disapproval and shook his luxurious forelock.

   "Each family has secrets belonging only to them," Isabella said. Sascha leaned up against her.

   "We have," Theo said, "for example, our snow. While other magicians may try to replicate the snow that falls on the casino…we have perfected it. Our crystalline flakes are real. If one should land in your hand, you would see that it is precise and perfect. I hear that a magical tribe in Kenya once tried to create snow as a respite from the heat but succeeded in making only hail."

   "So if we win, we are gifted with the secret of a single feat of another clan's magic. Anything we want. That is how Damian obtained that French guillotine that can behead a man and then magically piece him together again. We also win bragging rights," Isabella added. "After all, when Damian puts on his billboards that he is the greatest magician in the entire world, it is completely true."

   Nick sheepishly kicked at the hay in the stall. "It's not that I don't like learning new magic. It's just that I was getting comfortable with the old act. It's a lot to remember! And I'm not so good at memorizing."

   "I know. I grade your Russian vocabulary tests! But no worrying. And no sulking!" Theo commanded. "Come, meet Penelope."

   "Who's that?" Nick asked.

   "My elephant," Isabella said. "Come along."

   Nick followed his cousin, watching her long ponytail swing across her back. She was now his best friend, but he had learned three things about her. One: she was bossy. Two: she thought she knew everything. And three: all the animals were hers—and she let him know it. She and her older sister Irina were magical in their own way—they could communicate and control even the wildest and most dangerous of animals with spells that only the two of them and the women of their lineage knew.

   Isabella and Sascha turned a corner, with Nick and Theo close behind. Nick stopped in his tracks. Rising above him was the most enormous elephant he had ever seen in his life—she was on her two hind legs, trunk in the air, and ears spread out like wings.

   "Penelope," Isabella commanded, "you may curtsy. This is Nick—the one I told you about."

   Penelope lowered her trunk and returned to all four feet with a thud that rattled the ground. Then she appeared to actually curtsy, bowing low until her trunk swept the floor.

   "She looks—I don't know…ancient. Wise," said Nick. Penelope's eyes were ebony with gray lashes framing them, and she wore a headdress and halter with faceted jewels that glittered in the sunlight. "Like she knows something I don't."

   "She
is very wise," Isabella answered. "She's ancient. An
d magical. P. T. Barnum wanted her for his circus."

   "Really?"

   Theo nodded. "After the death of Jumbo."

   "Jumbo?"

   "P. T. Barnum was the first man to have a traveling circus. He had human…'oddities,' they called them. Like Cheng and Eng—'Siamese' twins. And a little person named Tom Thumb. And an elephant named Jumbo. The elephant died in a train accident—and Barnum sought a new elephant."

   "I'm about to get a history lesson, aren't I?"

   Theo nodded with a wry grin. "Penelope here has a special crystal ball."

   Nick was used to Gazing. He had his own crystal ball, but once he got good at Gazing, he didn't always even need it. The crystal's power communicated to him in his mind. But Isabella couldn't Gaze, so for history lessons, they would peer into crystals from Theo's crystal ball collection, viewing history as it unfolded.

   Theo pushed back Penelope's ear. The elephant's magnificent jeweled harness wound around her head, encrusted with pink and purple stones. From the top of the elephant's headdress dangled what looked like a purple jewel the size of a large melon, but now Nick could see that it was actually a crystal ball.

   Penelope bent her head and Theo waved his hand. The purple orb filled with smoke.

   "Behold," Theo said, "Penelope…and the greatest show on Earth!" He winked at Nick. "Until us, of course."

***

   "She's magnificent. I must have her." He looked down at his dear friend, General Tom Thumb. "Don't you think she would be a fine addition to our circus?"

   Thumb crossed his arms and nodded. "Indeed," he piped up in a nasal-sounding voice, quite booming for his size.

   A man with a thick Russian accent shook his head. "I do not think so, Mr. Barnum."

   "But when we met at the court of Tsar Alexander II, you assured me you would have oddities for my museum," Barnum protested. "You even showed me some of the collection in the possession of the Tsar, the
Kunstkammer. Remember tha
t entire display of pickled punks!"

   "You may have the pickled punks. But this elephant…she knows secrets."

   Barnum motioned for Tom Thumb. "Look…do you think this elephant knows secrets?"

   The tiny man, just over three feet tall, motioned for the elephant to lower her trunk. The elephant's trunk formed a
U and Thumb sat on it, like a swing. The elephant lifted he
r trunk until General Tom Thumb stared right into her ebony eyes. Thumb looked down at Barnum. "Indeed. This elephant knows secrets. Ancient secrets. We must have this elephant."

   The elephant lowered the little man to the ground, and he hopped off her trunk.

   "I trust Tom Thumb to make many of my business decisions. He has saved me from financial ruin more than once! We will pay whatever you ask," Barnum said to the Russian.

   "I'm afraid that is impossible. Instead…I will offer you a dancing bear."

   "I already have a dancing bear. And one that can ride a bicycle. We need an elephant. Jumbo had been our star attraction. The circus is not the same without an elephant."

   "How about a wager?" the Russian said, a twinkle in his eyes.

   "What kind of wager?" asked General Tom Thumb, squinting his eyes and studying the Russian.

   "If I can make this elephant disappear before your very eyes, you will give me the magnificent crystal ball from the fortune teller in your circus—the one on display in your front hall."

   "And if you can't?" said Barnum, staring at the sheer size of the large gray elephant.

   "Then you shall have the elephant."

   Barnum looked at Tom Thumb. "What say you, Tom?"

   "Deal," said the little man. "The wager is on."

   "Fine," said the Russian, his eyes a pale, almost icy blue. "Fetch the crystal ball then."

   P. T. Barnum walked into his magnificent Victorian mansion and returned to the yard with the crystal ball. It was as large as the standing globe in his study and so heavy that his knees bowed from the effort.

   "Here," Barnum grunted, handing the ball over. "But I believe you have made a sucker's bet. This crystal ball is nothing but glass. And I shall soon own an elephant even bigger than Jumbo was! America will clamor to come see my circus."

   The Russian man nodded. "So you think, Mr. Barnum." He walked around the elephant three times, then whispered something in the elephant's ear. He spoke words—Russian words—so quickly that it was impossible to discern them. Then he clapped his hands three times.

   In an instant, the elephant, the Russian,
and the crystal bal
l were gone.

   And P. T. Barnum and General Tom Thumb stared, mouths agape, at the yard where the elephant had just been. The grass was even tamped down in huge circles where the elephant's feet had been. P. T. Barnum scratched his head. "Well, I'll be a monkey's uncle," he said. Then the greatest showman on Earth started laughing, a loud, delighted, uproarious sound that came up from his belly.

   "Tom…I believe we've been had!" he exclaimed. And the two old friends chuckled, walking around the yard, clearly trying to fathom how the Russian had performed such an amazing feat.

"Is that elephant—the one in the crystal—is that Penelope?" Nick asked. "That would make her really, really old."

   "Indeed," said Theo. "And she still holds onto her secrets. And now you, like your ancestor before you, will make her disappear. Just like that."

   "Sure," Nick said. He had made his hedgehog, Vladimir, disappear. But he had also lost his little pet for an entire night once when he couldn't bring him back from wherever it was that things went to when they disappeared. Vladimir was chubby, but still weighed less than a pound. In Nick's mind, all he could think was, How am I going to make something tha
t
huge disappear?

   "I can read your mind, cousin," said Theo. "After lunch, we will begin preparations. For this will be our greatest show on Earth."

Lunch was a typical feast with his extended family. It was held in the dining room around a massive gleaming table so long that one hundred people could eat at once beneath a glittering chandelier. Tigers stood watch over them, and ornate silver samovars floated through the air, pouring steaming cups of bitter black tea. But the food…was gross. Nick had his choice: borscht, that dark red beet soup—beets!—or stewed cabbage, which smelled like gym socks. Nick ate bread. Lots of bread.