Chapter 24
The hum of Herm’s truck blended seamlessly with the ever-present rise and fall of the universe in a mind-numbing drone.
It rumbled up from the floorboards and into my bones as I drove us back into town, eager to return to the memorial garden.
To the east, a faint light threatened, visible in flashes through the low buildings.
Benedict was having a hard time keeping his eyes open, but I felt wide-awake—though that might be from the coming prospect of trying to sleep in the grotto.
The truck’s front bench seat wasn’t long enough for three people and a shadow, but I wasn’t going to ask Marty or Benedict to ride in the truck bed.
Head down, Benedict was texting Herm between his yawns.
Marty was to his other side, pressed against the passenger window as she stared out at nothing.
Pluck had surprised me by volunteering to park his shadow ass in Marty’s amulet, currently around my neck.
He had wanted to put some usable dark matter in it, but he was uncomfortable, if his sporadic fizzing was any indication.
You okay? I thought, and Pluck’s agitation sharpened.
A new stone is scratchy, bubbled up through me. There are no comfortable spots.
I glanced at Benedict, wondering if he would mind shifting a little, but he was oblivious to the world as he texted Herm that we’d secured Marty. You can sit on my shoulder if you don’t mind being small.
My lips quirked as the image of Kahu the size of a saltshaker drifted through my head, quickly banished. I had a feeling that Pluck caught it when an odd sensation of reluctance colored our joined moods as he fizzed, Benedict would notice.
I had no idea why that mattered, but I let it go.
Benedict made an unhappy noise. “Ah…Herm says not to go to the grotto.”
My foot lifted from the accelerator in a moment of surprise. “Does he say why?”
Benedict closed his phone out. “No. He says to meet him at Brown’s lab. You think he means Professor Brown?” he asked around a yawn.
I bit my lower lip, worried. Dr. Brown’s lab was more of a woodshop. There was only one reason to meet there.
“Why would he want to meet at—” Benedict’s words cut off as his gaze darted to my stick wedged between us. “Oh,” he said, slumping. “He couldn’t find the last stick.”
“It was a long shot anyway,” I said, and Pluck fizzed sourly.
Marty had perked up at the mention of sticks, and little ribbons of potential sparked through Pluck’s mood at her sudden interest. His belief that she was more skilled than she let on was obvious, but who was I to take the last shred of comfort from her?
Grip tightening on the wheel, I slowly drove through a blinking yellow before making a U-turn.
Early rush hour would start in a few hours, but right now, the streets were empty.
Camping out in Brown’s lab wouldn’t be much better than sleeping on a wooden stage, but at least there wouldn’t be any shadow-rezes about.
Your thoughts are mixed. Eagerness and dread. What’s at Professor Brown’s lab? Pluck asked, clearly interested at my memories of belonging crashing against a new feeling of dismay.
I majored in trap development and construction before I decided to become a sweeper. It was a good group of people. I had fun there. Felt a part of something. I glanced at Benedict. The concern is because Herm wouldn’t send us there unless we needed to make a new stick.
“Five minutes,” I said aloud to ease Marty’s worry. “It’s a good place to catch some sleep, seeing as we’re on Thanksgiving break and no one will be there. Professor Brown knows me. I doubt he believes Dana’s tripe.” I smiled softly.
Benedict put his phone on the dash. “Word is Brown never forgave Ryan for luring you away to be a sweeper.” He chuckled. “You were one of his best students, I hear.”
Marty turned, clearly interested. “You know how to make trap sticks?”
“And knotted cords,” Benedict said proudly as I winced, wanting to downplay it. “She was exceptional at it. Is exceptional. Takes after her dad.”
“I was okay,” I said. Making a new stick balanced to the other four would slow things down.
It had taken me a week to craft three for my final exam.
“It was good I shifted majors when I did,” I said, scanning the long street for any sign of traffic and finding none.
“I was filling my sticks and knotted cords with inert dross. That’s how I found Pluck. He ripped one apart for it.”
Marty leaned past Benedict to look at me, eyes wide. “You couldn’t tell it was inert?”
That did confuse me, Pluck thought, and a fizzing mirth bubbled through me as I pulled into the empty lot. The university building was long, low, and covered with solar panels, and I parked at the edge under a paloverde tree at the back, where the truck would be hard to spot from the main road.
Benedict leaned forward, studying the lot. “I doubt Herm is here yet. I can bust the lock.”
I opened the door, relishing the cool night air spilling in. “No need,” I said as my feet hit the pavement. “Sweepers have a code to get in.”
He chuckled as he followed me out. “Sweepers could steal the world if you wanted.”
“And don’t we know it.”
Marty was slow, taking the time to ease her door shut and then knock her hip into it to close it completely with hardly a sound. Benedict handed me my stick, and together we headed for the front glass doors.
The building itself was open. I went in first, my shoulders slumping at the memories filling me.
There were no mage studies here, and it was blessedly clean of dross right down to the corners.
Pluck, too, seemed to relax, and I wondered if maybe Herm had chosen our new hiding spot better than I had originally thought.
“Man, I’m tired,” Benedict said, stifling a yawn as we made our way down the corridor.
Marty, too, looked beat as she shuffled one step behind us, but Pluck’s nocturnal nature was overshadowing my own, and my steps sounded crisp on the old tile floor.
“Locked,” Benedict said when he tried the door to Brown’s lab, and I punched in the sweepers’ access code. Immediately the light on the box turned green, and I went in.
“It doesn’t ping anyone’s office when you open it?” Marty asked, the woman giving the hallway a last look before following us.
“Maybe Professor Brown’s?” I guessed. “Herm wouldn’t send us here if it wasn’t safe,” I added, eyes closing briefly as I brought the scent of cut wood deep into my lungs, holding it for a moment before breathing out contentment.
The long room looked exactly as I remembered, with its eight workstations, tidy and pristine under dark shop lights.
Each one was equipped with both woodworking tools and dross-handling equipment.
Windows took up one entire side facing the parking lot, and Benedict was already closing the blinds.
I smiled at my old workstation at the back.
Professor Brown’s instruction table was at the opposite end of the room, eight high-top swivel chairs surrounding it.
A more conventional desk sat to the side of it—empty since he appreciated a clean work area—and behind that were the locked cupboards of bottled instructional dross, raw trap sticks, wands, and countless spools of the tightly woven silk with which to make the needed matching ties and long-cords.
“We’re good,” Benedict said, and I flicked on Professor Brown’s desk lamp. “But I’d keep the big lights off.”
Marty grimaced at the hard workbenches. “Maybe we could bring in a couple of the couches from the lobby,” she suggested, and Benedict exhaled to puff his cheeks out.
“I’m so tired I could sleep on the floor,” he said, then sighed. “Oka-y-y-y…” he groaned as he shuffled to the door. “One last push.”
Someone is in the building. Pluck’s thought darted through mine, waking me up fast.
“Wait,” I said, and both Benedict and Marty froze at the warning in my voice. Pluck had already phased out of Marty’s surrendered amulet, and the young woman jerked when he darted to the door, nothing but a dark ribbon skating along the floor. “Pluck says someone is here.”
Benedict’s expression blanked. “Light,” he whispered, and I clicked it off before he carefully peeked past the blind to the parking lot. “A car parked three spots down from Herm’s truck,” he added. “I don’t recognize it.”
Concerned, I gestured for Marty to come stand with me. “I thought you said Herm was going to meet us here,” she whispered, and I shrugged.
It’s Herm and a short man I don’t recognize, Pluck fizzed through my mind. He smells like redwood and silk.
“Professor Brown?” I said aloud, and from the hallway came a distant, frightened shout.
“Great God Almighty, Pluck!” Herm yelled, voice echoing. “Give a person a little warning. I almost dropped everyone’s dinner!”
Dinner? I smiled in relief at Benedict and clicked on the light again. Timing put it more like a very early breakfast, but I could eat.
“Are you sure it’s him?” Marty asked, and I nodded. With Ryan’s three and my one, we still had to make one stick really fast. Fortunately Professor Brown was a three-state expert. It wouldn’t be as elegant or beautiful as my dad’s sticks, but as long as it was balanced to the rest, it would work.
Twin shadows appeared behind the frosted glass in the door.
Herm came in as if he owned the place, his annoyance at Pluck obvious.
Professor Brown was with him, and the slight man met my eyes and beamed, clearly pleased to see me.
Moving with a wary quickness, he set a bag of food on the desk.
His almond-shaped eyes were bright, and he ran his scarred fingers through his short dark hair in worry as he studied Marty.
An elaborately knotted cord held his Spinner lodestone about his neck.