The Passage to Mythrin 2-Book Bundle (10 page)

All that didn't add up to an incredible day. Amelia deleted
an incredible
and put in
a nice
. Lame, but the best she could do. Then added,
How about you?
and signed off.

She fell asleep thinking of Mara. Where was she? Was she all right?

In dreams she soared again above the jagged red landscape. The winged creatures leaped up at her from pinnacles and tower tops. She beat upward, easily outdistanced them, circled back, and dove. They scattered away from her like leaves in the wind.
Ha, cowards!
Fire burst across her vision. The whole sky turned red.

She woke and lay gasping. Her right hand cramped. She uncurled the fingers and the ruby ring slid out onto the blanket. She pushed it under the pillow.

At least I'm in my own bed this time!
she thought. The room wasn't all that dark. She had left the curtains open and the glow from the streetlights poured in. Turning away from the window didn't help much. A bright square lit up the wall a few inches away from her face.

Amelia closed her eyes. That didn't help much either, but she didn't want to close the curtains. The memory of being shut in the pitch-dark stairwell last night still made her shiver.

The glow through her eyelids darkened. She opened her eyes. The yellow square on the wall had a black shape cut out of it.

I'm dreaming
. She turned over in bed and looked at the window. There it was again. A black shadow hanging from the top of the window. Long shadow arms reached to the sides of the window frame. At the bottom, two eyes glittered at her out of the black silhouette.

I don't like this dream. Wake up!
She smacked herself in the face.
Wake — up!

Amelia sat straight up in bed. The shadow at the window bent an arm. Sharp fingers scratched at the frame.

She flung back her head and screamed, “Gran!” And hurled herself out of bed and across the room. The door flew open, nearly hitting her in the nose, and Grandmother was there.

“Sh-sh-sh! It's all right!”

“There was —” Amelia realized she was clinging to Grandmother's warm, rayon-covered, sandalwood-smelling arms like a two-year-old. She detached herself and pointed at the window. “There was something at the window looking in at me!” No shadow hung there now.

Simon was in the room now too. He went over to the window and looked out and down. “Couldn't be. You have no fire escape.”

“It was hanging from the top of the window — upside down.” Somehow that made it more horrible.

Like a great big bat. “I think” — she took a deep breath — “I think it was the Assassin.”

Grandmother made a “Tch!” sound. Simon jerked the curtains closed.

“That was some dream,” Grandmother said. “Want to come in with me for the duration?”

“Y...” Amelia began. Then thought:
How big a baby am I? Would Mara go crying to her gran? You can bet not.
She stood up straight and found her most grown-up tone of voice. “No, thank you, Grandmother. I'll be fine.”

“You're sure?”

“Absolutely.”

After lying awake for an hour, listening for noises at the window, Amelia went and got her laptop and crawled back into bed with it. This time, when she opened her email, it went “ding!” The subject line was “Here we are safe and sound.” She blew out a huge
whuff!
of relief.

It was a long letter, all about airports and terrible roads and interesting people and centipedes of amazing size in the bathroom (Amelia suspected her father had put that in just to scare her off) and summer heat (
Right, it's near the equator
) as well as cold nights (
I get it, up in the mountains
). And they would write every day if they could, and they loved her very much and they knew she would behave her very best and do her share of the chores and be a friend to Simon.

Not a word about when she could join them in Peru. Perhaps they hadn't had time to really read her messages yet.

She typed:

mom and dad i am so homesick i mean homesick for you not vancouver i miss you i don't want to be here

Then she thought,
Mara. She needs my help. Of course I can't go to Peru yet! Besides, Mara wouldn't be such a crybaby. So I won't be, either.

She deleted what she'd typed. Then:

Dear Mom and Dad, I'm glad you got there safe. I am being very nice to Simon and after all he isn't so bad. Just kind of geeky. I miss you very much and still hope to join you if we can fix it up. But give me a few days, maybe a week. There is something important I need to do here first. Lots of love, Amelia.

After that she slept.

§

The window rattled. Amelia flung off the covers and rolled out of bed on the side next to the wall. A cold white light seeped around the edges of the curtains.

Something was out there. What would Mara do?

Check it out. That's what she'd do.

Amelia crawled around the end of the bed — although she was pretty sure Mara wouldn't crawl — and across the room to the window. The frame rattled again, and something made flicking noises on the pane. Her breath came short and her throat tightened.

Here goes...

She reached up and pulled one curtain open. A raging whiteness filled the window. Snow! No, blizzard. She stood up and looked out. Couldn't see the buildings on the other side of the street. The streetlights bounced in the wind.

One good thing, even the Assassin would stay under cover today. Wouldn't he?

Then Amelia thought:
Mara. Is she out in that?

She glanced at the ceiling. Then pulled on jeans, socks, and a sweater and headed out. The apartment was silent and deserted. The clock in the kitchen said nine-thirty. She let herself out, careful to leave the deadbolt off, and ran up the stairs to 3A. The door was locked, and there was no answer when she knocked and called.

The roof, then. But would Mara be on the roof in a blizzard?

Sure she would.

Amelia was halfway up the dim back stairs when the
door at the top swung open, letting in a steel grey light, a wave of snow, and Simon.

“No, she's not there.” He shook snow off his jacket. “And neither are her clothes.”

“Clothes?” Amelia retreated down the stairs.

“I was lying awake last night, thinking,” he said as he clumped along the corridor, shedding snow at every step. “Trying to come up with answers to a lot of questions. Like, how did Mara get up on our roof with no clothes on? So I went up to look for the clothes. No luck.”

“Maybe she threw them over the side.”

“I'm checking that now.” He thumped down the front stairs.

“Wait!”

He didn't wait, but Amelia (coated, booted, hatted, gloved, and scarved) caught up with him three minutes later. He was wading through drifts of snow in the alley beside the Hammer Block, scraping at the hidden pavement with his feet. She watched as he shuffled from one side of the alley to the other, eyes squinted against waves of blowing snow.

“If we don't find Mara's clothes, that won't prove anything,” she said. “Somebody could have taken them.”

“But if we do find them, that proves something.”

“I'll start on the other side.”

They met at the back of the building next to the
dumpster, having found nothing but a few empty beer cans. Then Simon spent five minutes trying to reach the bottom rung of the fire escape by jumping. In his heavy boots and parka he missed by several feet. Amelia did no better.

“But Mara's taller, and I bet she can jump higher.” She thought of the run last night. Now, it seemed like another dream of flying. “A lot higher.”

“Maybe.” Simon led the way back up to the apartment. “So here's the theory: Mara sneaks into the building in the afternoon — it has to be then because the front door's locked at night — and up the back stairs to the roof. No, wait a minute. The door to the roof was bolted on the inside.”

“So she must've come up by the fire escape.”

“Okay. Then she gets undressed and throws her clothes over the side. Somebody finds them and takes them away. She waits in the cold like that until we find her.” He gave Amelia a look. “That's crazy, but at least it's possible.”

“Why are you so worried about things being possible? I mean, weird things do happen.” They were back in the apartment now, shedding their boots and coats.

“Yeah, but things don't happen for no reason,” Simon said. “Even the weird things. They're just harder to figure out.”

“Like, about the Assassin?”

“And like about Mara. Yes.”

“Mara's strange, she's not weird.” Amelia headed for the kitchen. Her stomach was grumbling for food. “I'm more bothered about what's happened to her. She could be dead!”

“I bet not.” Simon opened the refrigerator. “Why else would the Assassin visit you last night?”

“Of course!” Amelia laughed. “He must've been looking for her. It means she's alive!” Then she frowned. “But she could be hurt, and freezing, out in this weather.”

“We could call the police.” He carried eggs and milk and cheese and bread to the kitchen counter. “Ask them to search.”

“But then we'd have to tell them everything! And we can't!”

“Then think of Mara on the roof in her birthday suit. If anyone would be okay in a blizzard, she'd be the one. I'm making a cheese omelet, want some?”

Amelia felt better with a stomach full of cheese omelet. “You really aren't such a kid anymore, are you? Sounds like you've worked out all the answers.”

He flushed but pretended to be cool. “No way. I've just started asking some of the right questions.” He swallowed a forkful of omelet. “Like, where does the Assassin come from, really? And does Mara come from the same place?”

“You think ... not Earth.” She put down her fork, not hungry anymore. “You sound like Ike. This isn't possible.”

“It's not
im
possible. You know what Carl Sagan said.”

“Who's Carl Sagan?”

He stared at her, mouth open, then rolled his eyes up and sighed. For Simon, that was an explosion. “Carl Sagan,” he explained in his most patient tone, “was a great scientist. He figured out that there could be intelligent life on a million planets in our galaxy alone.”

“Okay.” Amelia sipped her juice. “And what are the odds of them turning up here?”

“Um, I don't know. Probably much lower.”

“Do you believe in magic?”

“'Course not!” He laughed. “You don't, do you?”

“I don't know.” She thought of her run with Mara through the streets last night. That had been magic, while it lasted. But had the magic only happened in her head?

“The thing that really gets me is the blue light you saw in the cave.” Simon looked at his watch, glanced at the phone, and reached for more toast. “I think you saw something there.”

“Well, of course I saw something! I just don't know what. Or why. Or how.”

“They're all tied together — the blue light, the cave, the Assassin, Mara. I think we should go back and really search that cave.”

“I think so too.” She rapped him on the wrist. “Why do you keep looking at your watch?”

“Oh, no reason.”

The phone rang. Simon shoved back his chair and lunged across the room.

Ike was on the line. “Any calls?”

“Not yet. Is the
Independent
out?”

“Yeah, it came out ten minutes ago. People will be calling any time now. You stick by the phone.”

“That's what I'm doing.” Simon glanced across the room to where Ammy was eating toast and watching him. It had occurred to him that she still didn't know he and Ike had published an ad about her ring. Considering how touchy she was about the thing, it might not be a good idea for her to find out by answering the phone. “I'll stick by it, you bet. So, you're not mad anymore?”

“You going to let me in on the secret?”

“What secret?”

Ike hung up.

“I wonder if Mara knows how to use the telephone?” Ammy said. “I'd better stay close in case she calls.”

“Don't worry. You can go watch TV or something.” Simon cleared the dishes from the table. “I'll get you if she calls,” he said casually over his shoulder, from the sink.

“I don't feel like TV.” She joined him at the sink and picked up a dish towel —
without even being asked
, he thought approvingly.

“I guess I should admit I was wrong, too.” He fished a mug out of the suds and scrubbed at a tea stain.

“'Bout what?”

“'Bout you. You're much nicer when you're thinking about somebody besides yourself.”

“When have I ever been not nice?”

He was still trying to figure out if she was joking when the phone rang. He dropped the mug into the suds with a splash and leaped, but Ammy, two steps closer to the phone, got there first. “Ad?” she said. “What ad? Today's paper? But we didn't.... Oh.” She listened. “I guess we did.” She sliced a look at Simon. “No, this is the right number. What did you lose? A gold owl off a charm bracelet. No, that isn't what we found. Sorry.”

She hung up and crossed her arms at him. “So. Whose bright idea was it?”

“Um, both of ours.” Her mouth opened; he rushed on. “Look, it's not like it's really yours. Somebody else lost it, and it's probably valuable, and it's only right —”

“But that's for me to decide! I bet Ike's got some silly plan. I thought you were too old to be playing games like this.”

“What games are these?” Celeste breezed into the kitchen with a sheaf of advertising flyers under her arm.