Luthier's Apprentice, The (19 page)

“Yes!” Sonia exclaimed. “Hear my request, oh you great Master of Darkness, Prince of Shadows! As promised, I offer these souls as payment.” She gestured at the violinists. “Such is your price in exchange for magical powers and eternal youth. Hear me, for I am your daughter and faithful servant. I am ready to receive your power. These innocent souls will quench your immortal thirst. Their talent and gift of music will satisfy your ravening hunger. Blessed is the day I turned to you and your World of Shadows!”

The light lapped at the air angrily, writhing with life.

Emma was speechless. She glanced at Corey and saw he was just as stunned.

“Look!” Emma said.

A subtle shape began to form within the light. The shape became denser, and then diffused again. Sonia murmured more incantations, her eyes closed, her arms extended and her hands open wide. Inside the light Emma saw the slightest suggestion of a face... a hooked nose, pointed chin and ears, a flash of glittering, serrated teeth…

Emma noticed the violinists had become more alert. Whatever they’d been given to keep them docile was obviously wearing off.

Suddenly the face in the light took complete shape. Emma grimaced. Worse than how whatever it was looked was how it felt. She’d never sensed such evil.

“Don’t look at it, Emma!” Corey shouted.

Emma didn’t need much persuasion, as she gladly turned her face away and shut her eyes. Life would never be the same again, not after seeing this.

“You shall have your wish…” a grating, inhuman voice spoke. “The pact will go on unbroken. Your desire for continued magical powers and immortality will be granted. Proceed with the ceremony and release to me the souls.”

If Emma’s hands were free, she’d have covered her ears. The voice raised the hairs at the back of her neck and crept like a tarantula down her spine.

She had to know what was happening, so she opened her eyes again. Sonia was grinning triumphantly, her eyes wild with madness.

Then two soldiers burst into the chamber with two prisoners in their grip. Stradivarius barked.

“Grandpa!” Emma cried.

Corey’s eyes went wide with surprise. “Mom!”

“You imbeciles,” Sonia hissed at the soldiers. “How dare you interrupt the ceremony?”

Sonia regarded the new prisoners. Various emotions crossed her face when she saw her own daughter: shock, indignation, and loathing.

“Are you all right, Corey?” his mom asked, ignoring Sonia. Her eyes welled up with tears at the sight of him.

“I’m fine, Mom. I’m not hurt.”

This time it was Grandpa’s turn to speak. “Emma, are you hurt?”

“I’m okay, Grandpa,” she said.

Grandpa scanned the room. “Where’s Lili?”

In response, the monk with the hawk mask raised her hand.

“This is turning into a cheap opera,” Niccolò drawled.

“Silence!” Sonia roared.

I
SWEAR TO YOU, NICCOLÒ,” SONIA HISSED,
“one day I will have you chopped into so many pieces, not even the wolves will find them.” She turned to the soldier that held Grandpa. “Get the old man out of my sight,” she ordered. “And you—” She pointed one sharp purple nail at her daughter. “I told you I never wanted to see your face again. How dare you set foot in my world after having deceived me, you traitor. You quit music and eloped with that good-for-nothing loser.”

“I won’t let you insult my father!” Corey yelled.

“Oh, really?” Sonia taunted. “Are the little birds shooting at the hunters now?” She erupted into raucous laughter, then turned to her daughter again. “I will deal with you and your son later. The ceremony must go on without interruptions. Niccolò, don’t just stand there like a frozen lamb chop. Do something.”

“What do you want me to do? After all, I’m just a useless slave,” he purred.

The purple light in the pedestal dimmed, growing weaker.

“No! No!” Sonia panicked. “Soldiers, hold the prisoners! The ceremony must be finished as planned.” She glanced at the clock. It was 11:20 p.m.

She took a deep breath as if telling herself that everything was under control. “Soldiers, bring the prisoners to the violins now.”

The soldiers that had been standing about the room immediately obeyed, marching toward the violinists. The other two held Grandpa and Corey’s mom.

“What’s she going to do?” Emma whispered.

“I don’t know,” Corey murmured.

Emma looked at the levitated violins that floated above the floor by the pedestal. “What’s with the floating violins?”

“I’m afraid to guess,” replied Corey.

“Must be their violins. That’s why they were taken with the violinists. Sonia needed them for the ritual.”

“Looks like it, Watson,” Corey said grimly.

As one violinist was dragged to his violin, he struggled and pleaded in a German accent. “Release me! This is outrageous!”

As soon as the German violinist came into contact with his violin, something bizarre happened. The violin began to vibrate and come alive, and the metal strings themselves started undulating and writhing. The violinist screamed. Like snakes, the strings on his violin elongated, wrapping themselves around him until he was completely motionless. Then the violin, which until now had been suspended in air, moved up higher, lifting the violinist along with it. The legs of the violinist now hung limply above the floor.

A second violinist was dragged to his violin…to Emma’s horror, it was Monsieur Dupriez.

“No!” Emma struggled to get free.

Emma and Corey watched, aghast, as all four violinists became prisoners of their own violins.

E
LIZABETH TRIED TO KEEP HER NERVES
under control, but the situation became more horrifying by the second. Even though she’d known for years about the ritual, she had never witnessed one. It was dismaying to watch the violins come alive and turn against their masters.

She kept glancing at the door. “Come on, what’s keeping you?” she whispered. What if their plan didn’t work? What if something went wrong?

The sight of Emma chained to the wall broke her heart. Children shouldn’t have to suffer for the sins of their ancestors.

But the plan had to be followed. It was their only option.

She flicked a glance at the monk with the hawk mask, and with her hand made a subtle gesture for patience.

The suspended violinists screamed as the strings wound tighter around their bodies. The purple light above the pedestal grew denser and brighter.

Where are you?
Elizabeth thought desperately, glancing at the door.

W
HAT LOVELY MUSIC,” SONIA PURRED TO
the violinists. “Your screams are lullabies to my ears. A pity you will not live to see the future of the music world. One by one I will eradicate all male violinists from the face of the earth. Only women violinists will rule. What has given you the right to think you are better and superior to women violinists? I was better than you all, yet year after year I had to prove myself. Why? Because I was a beautiful woman! But all of that will be finished soon and men violinists around the world will be forgotten.” Then she mocked sweetly, “And if creating that world takes a smidge of help from me, a little magic, then so be it. After all, it is
I
who will supply their violins.”

By this time the violinists had given up screaming. Helpless, they hung in the air and watched Sonia pontificate.

Taking a step closer to the pedestal, Sonia started to recite dark incantations again. She kept repeating the same phrases many times, as if in a trance, her eyes shut in concentration, her arms making wild gyrating gestures.

“Hear me, Master! Hear me!” Her voice was as deep as a man’s. “Take these souls unto you, so that we may fill the forest with more singing trees, so that more violins can be created as a tribute to you. Provide the cursed, fledgling maples, so that these men’s souls—their musical gifts and virtuosity—may be sucked into them, so that our forest may grow bigger and bigger for the production of more violins which will rule the world!”

A deafening, thunderous tremor filled the chamber as four fledgling maples, enveloped in a shimmering purple cloud, oozed from the light, floated in the air and hovered in front of the violinists.

The clock showed 11:35 p.m.

Above the pedestal, the face of Evil reappeared, as dense and delineated as ever.

T
HAT’S WHY YOUR GRANDFATHER HAS BEEN
getting the wood from this forest,” Corey whispered, his voice filled with dismay. “His violins are haunted with the souls of the violinists. It’s all part of the pact—not only killing the violinists, but also transferring their souls and virtuosity into the trees. One soul for each tree. That’s why the trees are making music... it’s the violinists within them! Emma...are you okay?”

Emma clenched her fists. She stared at him, her face flushed. “Yes,” she said. “Sort of like the Aztecs, who used to eat their enemies’ hearts raw to absorb their essence, their power.”

“Exactly. This must be why Monsieur Dupriez thought some women violinists were playing similarly to some of the old masters…
yes
, that must be it. The violins of these women violinists must have been made by your grandfather with wood from this forest. And if these women violinists already know where their violins come from...why, this could be a world-wide, women violinist conspiracy.”

Corey stopped, struck suddenly by the expression on Emma’s face. She looked
weird
. Her face was so pale it almost looked translucent. Her head was lowered and she stared at him from under the fringe of her dark lashes. For a fraction of a second her brown eyes glinted, turning almost amber. She was clenching and unclenching her fists.

“Are you okay?” he asked again. “Emma…”

G
IDDY AND LIGHT-HEADED, EMMA HEARD COREY’S
voice as if from miles away. Something was happening to her body. It was
changing
. She felt so different. Her blood flowed hot as boiling oil and her head felt as if she had swallowed sunlight. She was blazing like the sun.

“Emma,” Corey said. “Your eyes...”

“What about them?”

“They’ve changed color.”

But she was no longer listening. Her gaze had shifted to the shackles that imprisoned her ankles. As the heat within her mounted, she saw the shackles open gently, as if an invisible hand unclasped them. Her eyes turned to one of her wrists, then the other. Just as before, the shackles gently and quietly opened. Not to attract any attention, she remained in the same position.

Corey stared at her in wonder, but he didn’t seem surprised.

“Now do me, Emma,” he whispered.

Fixing her gaze on Corey’s ankles, she willed the shackles to open. She did the same with his wrists.

“Don’t move,” Emma ordered him in a quiet voice, her eyes darting to Sonia. “We don’t want to catch her attention.”

Sonia was still speaking to the face in the light, reciting words of adoration and eternal commitment. When she finished, an electric silence filled the chamber.

Then everyone’s attention shifted to one of the baby maple trees, the one hovering in front of the American violinist.

He screamed as the maple’s branches began to shimmer with purple sparks, then elongated and slowly crawled up his legs. “No!” he shrieked, struggling frantically against the violin’s strings holding him prisoner. The branches enveloped his body and the violin until no sound escaped the violinist’s lips.

Everyone in the room watched in quiet horror—all except Sonia, who beamed with wicked ecstasy.

Filled with rage, Emma leapt forward and shouted “Release him!” just as a woman she’d never seen before—but who looked like a younger version of her mom—burst into the grand hall.

“That’s enough, Sonia!” the woman ordered, her voice confident and powerful.

Sonia gasped, flinching backwards. “Lili!”

S
O THAT’S AUNT LILI!

Lili’s presence infused Emma with even more energy and strength.

But she didn’t get it. If that was Aunt Lili, then
who
was the monk with the hawk mask?

Sonia seemed to be asking herself the same question. She stepped away from the pedestal and yanked the hawk mask from the monk...revealing Annika’s panicked face.

“Annika!” Emma and Corey said simultaneously.

“What—what is the meaning of this?” Sonia roared. “Who is this creature?” Her eyes darted from Annika to Aunt Lili and back to Annika.

Annika squirmed in her seat.

Now that the ceremony had been interrupted, the branches loosened their grip around the American violinist and receded back into the fledgling maple. The violinist gasped for air.

Realizing what had happened, Sonia panicked, rushing back to the pedestal. “No! No! We must go on! The ceremony must continue as planned!”