Шеннон Мессенджер - Keeper of the Lost Cities

“Do the fires have something to do with me?” She held her breath as he seemed to debate about his answer.

“I . . . don’t know,” he whispered. “Which is why this memory log is so important. I’ll be checking it regularly to see if there’s anything useful. Make sure you record those nightmares.”

She nodded.

“There’s a good girl.” He pulled her in for a one-armed hug, then froze. “You haven’t told Grady and Edaline about those dreams, have you?”

“No. Why?”

“Jolie died in a fire. Didn’t they tell you?”

She shook her head. “They never talk about her. I don’t think they know that I know.”

Sadness crept across his face in thin lines. “It’s hard for them. You can’t imagine how hard. Death is such a common thing for humans. For us . . .” He stared into the distance. “Her fiancé’s house caught fire. He tried to save her, but there wasn’t time. He barely made it out alive, and even then . . .” He didn’t finish, but something in his eyes told her it did not end well.

Sophie tried not to imagine the horror he was describing. Burning to death—the thought alone made her shudder. “I won’t mention the dreams, I promise.”

“Thank you.” He smiled sadly, and left her.

She went straight to her room and closed the door.

Projecting her nightmares into the memory log was easy. Seeing them so vividly was awful. Her whole body shook as she stared at her terrified family surrounded by smoke and flames. She slammed the log shut, hiding it behind her bookshelf so no one could find it.

Desperate to replace those horrifying images, she grabbed her old scrapbook and sank onto her bed. She hadn’t touched it since the day Dex looked through it.

She never made it past the cover.

Edaline found her later, still staring at the closed album. “Everything okay?”

Sophie jumped, pressing the scrapbook into her chest. “I’m fine.” Her voice sounded sharper than she meant it to be.

Edaline frowned. “Dinner’s waiting downstairs.”

The thought of food turned her stomach. “I’m not really hungry. But thanks.”

“Oh . . . okay.” Edaline sat next to her on the bed. “Did something happen with Alden? You can tell me.” She reached out to stroke Sophie’s arm, but Sophie flinched—afraid Edaline might touch the scrapbook.

Edaline retracted her hand, looking anywhere but Sophie.

“Sorry, I didn’t—” Sophie started.

Edaline waved away the apology, forcing a smile on her lips as she stood. “Don’t worry about it. You want to be alone. I’ll send some dinner up later, in case you get hungry.”

Sophie watched her leave, hating herself for hurting Edaline’s feelings. But she’d have to set it right later. Right now she had bigger problems.

She took a deep breath and forced herself to look at the photo mounted to the cover of the scrapbook again, to make sure her eyes weren’t playing tricks on her.

Bile rose in her throat.

There she was, eleven years old, building a sand castle on the beach. But it wasn’t an imaginary castle, like she’d thought it was at the time.

She recognized that castle.

She’d been inside it this afternoon.

The twisted turrets. The sweeping arches. It was an exact replica of the crystal castles in Eternalia.

So how could she build a model of it a year before she knew it existed?

T HE COUNCIL WAS RIGHT. INFORMATION HADbeen planted in her brain.

The idea was too huge, she couldn’t make it fit inside her head.

Her hands shook as she ripped the photo off the scrapbook. She was violating everything Alden told her—everything the Council ordered —but if anyone found out, her life would never be the same again. She couldn’t face that.

She slipped the photo into the middle of a thick book and shoved the book among a dozen other thick books on the highest shelf. It should be safe there. For now.

All she wanted was to curl into a ball and never get up again, but she didn’t have time. Someone stuck stuff in her brain and she needed to find those memories—before they got her in trouble again.

What had made her think of Elementine?

She pulled out her star maps and plotted the stars on her list on one page—like she’d seen Kenric do at the tribunal. The six stars formed two lines, pointing straight to Elementine.

The room swam around her.

It couldn’t be an accident. That list must’ve been made specifically for her. Which meant someone wanted her to find Elementine.

But who? And why?

And what would they want next?

She stayed up all night projecting anything she could think of into her memory log, but when the sun rose she was no closer to the answer. All she knew for sure was that she had to keep it secret. If the Council found out, they’d never let her stay at Foxfire—Bronte would make sure of it. They might even decide she was dangerous, and she didn’t want to think about what they’d do then.

Especially since she couldn’t be sure she wasn’t dangerous. She’d almost blown up the school—or worse. What if that had been the plan when someone gave her that list?

Nowhere seemed safe enough to hide the memory log, so she stuffed it in the bottom of her satchel to keep with her at all times. None of her friends noticed how stressed she was. They were used to her difficulties in PE, and during lunch they were too distracted by all the pressure they were getting to manifest special abilities. It wasn’t until telepathy that she wished she’d stayed home sick.

“Did you sleep at all last night?” Tiergan asked as she slumped into her chair.

“No.” There was no point lying. She’d seen her reflection. Her dark circles rivaled Edaline’s.

“I expected as much.” He cleared his throat. “Alden told me what happened yesterday.”

She should have guessed that. Which meant he knew about her special assignment. She gripped her satchel, like holding it tighter would protect the secrets inside.

“Have you started the memory log?” he asked, confirming her fear.

She hesitated for a second before she nodded.

“I assume you don’t want to show me.”

Silence stretched between them until Tiergan removed a black pathfinder from his pocket. “Concentrate,” he commanded, and a wave of blue light swept them away.

Noise hammered into her brain as the scenery glittered back into substance.

“Remember to shield,” Tiergan shouted as she covered her ears, trying to squeeze out the pain.

She closed her eyes and pushed against the noise with her mind. The chaos quieted and she started breathing again. Tiergan led her to a bench and she sank down, exhausted.

He plopped beside her. “Welcome to Los Angeles. Actually, I believe they call this place Hollywood.”

She’d been away from humans for almost six months—long enough to forget the traffic, pollution, and trash. It turned her stomach. “Um, aren’t we a little conspicuous?” She pulled on her stupid cape.

“Here?” Across the street Spider-Man and Batman posed for pictures outside Mann’s Chinese Theatre.

“No, I guess not.” If anything, they blended right in. “What are we doing here?”

“Breaking the law.” He held up the pathfinder, casting blue beams of light on the ground. “Only blue crystals take you to the Forbidden Cities, and only certain members of the nobility are allowed to have them. Mine was issued back when I worked for the Council, and I ‘forgot ’ to give it back when I resigned. So this trip is our little secret, okay?”

She nodded.

“I come here sometimes. I’m not supposed to, but it helps to see them in real life.” He pointed to the humans wandering the streets, oblivious to the elves sitting among them. “We’ve cut ourselves off—vanished into the light. Makes it easy to forget how similar we are. Or could be—if they weren’t so stubborn.”