I decided not to read the conspiracy columns. I wondered how many of them were put out by the government.
The Security Council had decided not to go public. One, there wasn’t an immediate solution to offer. Two, they were working on a secret project with Merlin to which I hadn’t been able to get the details. (Matt refused to tell me in case Vane gleaned it through the Dragon’s Eye.) Three, it was decided the chaos such an announcement would cause would undermine what efforts they could make to find a way out.
On impulse, I added another keyword ‘illustration’ to the search. One link immediately stood out—a series of murals hanging in the Boston Public Library. I clicked through websites that detailed the murals. My heart sped up. The series was titled The Quest and Achievement of the Holy Grail.
The drafty glass doors of my room showed a clear night sky. The clock on my cell read midnight. I wouldn’t be able to get into the library tonight. I glanced at my room’s closed door. If I wanted to do this tonight, I had to ask Matt for help. We’d barely spoken since Rourke’s death. He remained holed up in his study, doing who knows what. He didn’t ask for my help and I didn’t volunteer. Again, I found myself unable to cross the chasm between us. It was becoming a pattern.
But I couldn’t ignore this. I trudged down the stairs to Sylvia’s study, deciding not to take the crutch. The hallways were eerily empty. The house had been emptied of gargoyles. Grey, Gia, and Sylvia would return tomorrow morning from the funeral. Apparently, Rourke owned a brownstone in New York or an estate in Long Island. No one wanted to mention the inheritance of the throne, but I noticed Deirdre and Colin staying very close to Grey. As for Grey, I knew he wanted nothing to do with it.
I couldn’t blame him. I hadn’t touched Excalibur for months. I didn’t miss it.
Okay, that was a lie. I tried not to miss it.
I passed by the living room. A group of twenty or so young wizards sat together eating popcorn. Marilynn was on the couch at the center of them. A few girls sighed and pointed to the giant flat screen. I immediately recognized the ultimate prom movie (a personal favorite of mine which I would only admit to under pain of death)—Pretty in Pink.
A girl with long braids spotted me hovering. She gave me a beaming smile. “Will you be going tomorrow, sword-bearer?”
The question blindsided me. I doubted Vane would actually show. “Uh, I don’t think—”
“Merlin is taking her,” a boy next to her said. “I heard it at school.”
Marilynn’s gaze locked on me. “Is he?”
“He hasn’t asked and since it’s tomorrow, I doubt it.”
Marilynn nodded as if I told her nothing she didn’t already know. The other witches and wizards gave me pitying looks. I asked quickly, “Are all of you going?”
The whole group nodded.
“Don’t you have dances at Avalon Prep?” I wondered aloud.
“Um, not really,” said the girl with braids. “We used to have a Yule Ball, but they gutted it after someone made the decorations explode.”
“They were trying to magic them to dance,” murmured the boy beside her.
The girl with braids took his hand and gushed, “Tomorrow is going to be so much fun. I heard the hall is grander than a Parisian opera house.”
It was. I’d seen pictures of the venue. Marilynn had outdone herself. I glanced at her. She was grinning at the girl. For someone who had to be twenty-something Marilynn was oddly obsessed with prom. I groaned internally and forced myself to do the right thing. “Since I’m not going, Marilynn, you ought to go. The head of the committee should show up just in case.”
Her head snapped up to look at me. I returned the suspicious look with a steady gaze.
“Just in case,” she agreed quickly.
She jerked her head back toward the screen as if to stop me from changing my mind. I bit my lip to suppress my smile. The group shushed each other as the big prom finale started on screen. I watched for a few minutes and slipped away. The study, it turned out, was empty.
No Matt in sight.
That’s how I found myself at the library the next afternoon.
I spent the morning on the phone dealing with a last minute prom crisis over parking. Marilynn disappeared somewhere (sans cell phone, I suspected a prom hair emergency). After solving