Cordus Center for Advanced Magical Innovation and Learning—facing south. There’s a glass of whiskey on the table in front of me on top of a stack of old books. There’s a lot of books stacked everywhere, actually.
Somebody’s knocking. I turn around and whistle, flicking my fingers. The doors open, and the man runs in. He’s dressed in military sweats, the kind we sleep in. He’s out of breath, too out of breath to talk. He gestures for Merlin to follow him, and Merlin does. They go to the elevator and down to the fifth floor. Everybody at the Camel calls it the Chosen Floor, because that’s where the Chosen One lives and where his army trains. Almost nobody’s allowed on that floor, so I’ve never seen it before myself—this fellow has to scan his badge before the elevator will move.
[Low tone continues.]
Elevator opens to an empty hallway. Only it feels off, somehow. Sort of—stuffy, like the way the air feels when there’s way too many people in one place, except here there’s not a soul in sight.
“I’m on night patrols. I went up—heard something—” The soldier’s recovered enough of his breath to explain the situation. “Saw—didn’t know who else to call—”
“You did the right thing,” I say. Merlin says, I mean. “What’s happened?”
“The army’s gone,” he says. They reach the end of the hallway, where there’s two doors with crash bars on them. Above them is a sign that says training area. He lets Merlin open them. The floor is squishy, like a gymnasium. Rubbery, too, so it squeaks under his shoes. But it’s dark in there, only the emergency lights are on, so all I can see is dark shapes here and there, little bumps on the floor. It maybe looks like—looks like someone left a bunch of mats out, forgot to put them away. Merlin whistles, waves his siphon hand. All the lights go on at once. They’re so bright he shields his eyes for a second, and I . . .
[Low tone continues.]
. . . I wish he’d kept shielding them.
[Low tone continues.]
They’re all lying there in their training clothes. White shirts and gray pants. They all fell in different positions, some flat on their backs, some flat on their faces, some on their sides, their arms under them, their legs twisted, like they were running and tripped before dying. Their eyes are open—nobody tells you that sometimes, people die with their eyes open. Somebody has to shut them, only no one has, here. So there are just these stares coming at me from all sides, empty stares. Slack mouths too, open, drooling. God. It’s—
There’s one alive. Coming to his feet right in the middle of the room. Not a military man—dressed in civvie clothes. Tall. Really tall. The kind of guy you wouldn’t start a fight with. He sees us, and I can’t get a good look at his face because his hair’s falling in front of it, and then he lifts his hand and there’s sound and light—it hurts, God, so loud I can’t help but stagger back and shield my head. It’s over in a second, though, and I blink hard to get my vision back, but it takes a minute for the splotches to disappear.
The soldier who brought me here is lying on the ground now, and I reach for him, shake his shoulder. He doesn’t move. He doesn’t move—he’s dead, and the tall man is gone, and I’m alone with the dead.
[Low tone ceases.]
OFFICER L: Who was he? Do you know?
MERLIN: Sibyl said there would be another. A Dark One who could end the world, just as the Chosen One could save it. I think we have finally met him.
TOP SECRET
22
AN HOUR LATER, Esther and Sloane stuffed themselves into a taxi with Kyros and a fellow soldier, a buxom woman named Edda. Sloane looked through the raindrops at the Merchandise Mart, wide and squat, lit from beneath. She almost, in the moments before she remembered where she was, felt like she was at home—in the car with Matt, on their way to a restaurant where they would sit in the back, in a booth, so no one could see their faces. They would have a steak, a glass of wine. Tell each other stories they had both lived through already. That time they went to an old farmhouse where they thought the Dark One was staying and found only an old lady with rollers in her hair and a shotgun on her