Neverseen (44 page)

“My mom had nothing to do with what happened to him.”

“I know that in my head, but not my heart. Emotion isn’t logical. All I can control is how I act. Remember the oath you each swore when you joined us? You swore to do everything in your power to help your world. That includes relying on those we do not like, if they can help with something we need.”

Sophie gave Fitz
the note from Keefe’s mom. He promised to slip it under Keefe’s door if he didn’t answer. Sleep felt impossible,
so Sophie checked on Silveny, watching the alicorn’s memories of when Silveny told Greyfell he was going to be a daddy.

The joy that sparked in Greyfell’s eyes was one of the purest, most beautiful things Sophie had ever seen. It made her wonder what Lord Cassius had looked like when he discovered Lady Gisela was pregnant with Keefe.

Could a tiny bit of that spark have been there?

She hoped so.

She tossed and turned for another hour, then wandered to her window. She knew Keefe didn’t want to talk to her, but when she saw his lights on she couldn’t walk away.

It cost her three pairs of shoes to get his attention, and he refused to open the window. Fortunately, she’d prepared for that with a premade sign.

I’M HERE.

Time seemed to slow down as Keefe stared at the words.

He didn’t look at her as he turned away, and her heart crashed like stone. But he turned back a second later, holding his blanket and a pillow. No smile, but it was still an invitation.

Sophie raced to grab hers, and they both set up for another window slumber party, each leaning against the glass.

The distance between them had never felt so enormous.

But Sophie was willing to settle for “close enough.”

K
EEFE WAS SILENT
at breakfast, and the meal became awkward with a side of miserable. Dex and Biana were smart enough not to ask what was going on.

Keefe disappeared into his room the second he was done eating. The rest of them moved to the boys’ common room to work. Dex was hammering tiny stone wheels—apparently he and Blur had decided that was the best way to add them to the Twiggler. Biana and Calla worked by the windows, testing to see how long Biana could fool Calla’s eyes. And Fitz and Sophie plopped into the boulder beanbag chairs for another Cognate exercise.

The next assignment was called Trigger Cues, a trick to make them more efficient at probing memories. Apparently
each elvin mind was filled with tiny threadlike trails, and Telepaths could learn to follow them to something called a “cue.”

The more uncomfortable the trail felt to navigate, the more the person had tried to hide the truth at the end. Their assignment was to follow a difficult path and say the cue out loud. The shock of hearing it was supposed to trigger some sort of mental reaction that would uncover the secret to the other person.

Fitz let Sophie go first, and she chose a trail that felt like crawling through an itchy wool sweater. Waiting at the end were two words: Barcelona, Spain. When she spoke them, Fitz’s mind filled with a boy’s startled face—obviously a human boy, based on his clothes. He shouted,
“¡Imposible!”
and chased Fitz through the busy streets.

That happened back when I was trying to find you,
Fitz transmitted.
I’d already ruled out the girl I’d gone to see, and I was getting ready to leave when I saw a group of kids kicking pigeons. One bird had a damaged wing and I was worried they were going to kill it, so I used telekinesis to lift it to safety. I didn’t know anyone was near me. But that kid saw, and when I ran, he chased me, and he kept shouting things in a language I couldn’t understand.

Wow, I can’t believe how much you went through when you were trying to find me.

It was worth it.

Her cheeks flamed, which was of course when Keefe came out of his room. He didn’t acknowledge anyone as he plopped into one of the beanbag chairs near Sophie, but she
could’ve sworn he muttered something about Sophitz.

“My turn?” Fitz asked.

Sophie nodded, imagining that all her most embarrassing secrets had trails lined with the safe, pretty things they were supposed to be avoiding. The trick might’ve worked, because the cue Fitz learned wasn’t embarrassing—though it was the kind of secret she
should’ve
been guarding much harder.

“221B Baker Street,” he said.

Her mind showed him a glass marble floating in a black void.

“Oh, is that how you retrieve the cache?” Fitz asked, then covered his mouth. “Sorry, didn’t mean to say that out loud. And I didn’t wreck anything by saying the words, right?”

“Nope, it only works with my voice.”

Dex ended their conversation by jumping to his feet, screaming, “I DID IT!”

“You got the Twiggler to work?” Sophie asked, rushing to his side. “Does that mean you can use keywords now?”

“And all kinds of other things,” Dex said. “Like, if I do
this
”—he spun the wheels he’d attached like knobs—“it pulls up all the files that have text blacked out. And right here”—he spun to the middle of the scroll—“it tells us what the drakostomes are. They’re nematodes!”

“Are those some sort of frog?” Biana asked.

“They’re parasites,” Calla corrected. “Microscopic parasitic roundworms. I’ve cured many kinds from many forests.”

The five friends looked at each other, knowing what that meant.

“What am I looking at?” Calla asked, leaning closer to the hologram. “This looks like an ancient scroll.”

Dex nodded slowly, realizing their mistake the same moment as Sophie.

“Maybe we should—” she started.

But she was too late.

“Is this a transcript of the ogre treaty negotiations?” Calla asked. “Why is it talking about nematodes? I don’t . . .”

Calla sank to her knees as the understanding washed over her.

“They knew?” she whispered. Her eyes locked with Sophie’s. “
You
knew?”

“Not for sure,” Sophie promised. “Not until right now.”

Calla stumbled back, rushing for the stairs.

“Wait,” Sophie called, chasing after her. “I know this is
huge
, but we need to think this through before we tell anyone. Once the news breaks, there’s going to be chaos.”

Calla’s voice was as hollow as her eyes as she whispered, “The Council has wasted far too much time already. Now we’re too late.”

“YOU TOLD CALLA?”
Mr. Forkle shouted, storming around the girls’ common room.

“Not on purpose. Calla was here when Dex had the breakthrough,” Fitz said.

“Oh, so it’s my fault?” Dex asked.

“I didn’t say that. I’m just saying that’s how it happened,” Fitz said.

“Plus . . . Calla has a right to know, doesn’t she?” Sophie asked.

She couldn’t stop picturing the betrayal she’d seen in Calla’s eyes.

Mr. Forkle rubbed his temples. “I think it’s important we try to remember that the Council still could have good reasons.”

“Like what?” Sophie had to ask.

“Perhaps they didn’t want the gnomes to live their lives under constant fear,” Mr. Forkle suggested. “Or perhaps they worried what would happen if other species discovered the ogres held this powerful weapon? Don’t you think someone else might try to get their hands on the drakostomes as well? It would put them in exponentially more danger.”

Sophie sighed, no longer sure what to think.

“I must speak with the Collective,” Mr. Forkle said. “We must
try
to prepare for the backlash.”

“What kind of backlash do you think there will be?” Sophie asked.

“Like nothing we’ve ever seen.”

He leaped away before she could ask any further questions, and when he returned hours later, she’d never seen him look so pale.

“The gnomes are gathering in Eternalia for a protest,” he
said, sinking into one of the chairs. “The Lost Cities are in chaos.”

“So what happens now?” Biana asked.

“Now we wait for the Council to respond.”

Three endless days passed, giving everyone a glimpse of life in the Lost Cities without the gnomes. Fruit fell from wilting trees, bushes sagged, grass shriveled, gardens yellowed.

On the morning of the fourth day, the Council sent out scrolls informing everyone that they’d be giving a statement in Eternalia that afternoon.

“Can we go?” Sophie asked Mr. Forkle.

“Need I remind you that you have been banished?” he asked.

“So?” Dex said. “Give me five minutes in Slurps and Burps and I’ll have us all unrecognizable.”

“What are the odds of you actually staying here and obeying me?” Mr. Forkle asked.

“Soooo not gonna happen,” Keefe said.

The rest of them nodded—even Della.

Mr. Forkle muttered a string of things that started with “you kids.” But in the end, he pulled out a pathfinder with a dark crystal, adjusted it to a facet, and handed it to Fitz.

“Give me fifteen minutes to help Kesler prepare. Then use that to come find me.”

T
HE STREETS OF
Mysterium—one of the elvin working class cities—were eerily quiet when Sophie and her friends arrived.

The small, plain, identical buildings were closed up and dark, and the food stalls and vendor carts were all empty. Still, Della and Biana vanished, and Sophie, Keefe, and Fitz kept the hoods of their cloaks pulled tight around their faces as Dex led them to the only unique building in the whole city.

With its curved walls and twenty different colors of paint, the Dizznee’s store looked like it had popped out of a nursery rhyme. A glowing sign read:
SLURPS AND BURPS: YOUR MERRY APOTHECARY.

The door belched as they entered, and Sophie’s stomach did a few quick flips.

Waiting for them at the entrance were Dex’s dad and . . .

“Grady?”

Grady scooped her into his arms and she buried her face in his shoulder, giving herself ten seconds to soak up the hug before leaning back to study him. His blond hair was longer than she remembered, and his chiseled features looked a tiny bit sharper. But his eyes were bright and glassy with so much emotion it hurt her heart.

“I love you, Dad,” she whispered.

“I love you too,” he whispered back. “I’ve missed you like crazy.”

From the corner of her eye she could see Dex giving his dad the biggest bear hug he could.

Keefe cleared his throat.

“Sorry,” Sophie told him, wishing Keefe had someone to hug.

Dex let go of his dad too, and both father and son wiped their periwinkle eyes. Sophie had forgotten how much the two of them resembled each other.

“Well,” Kesler said, straightening his white lab coat. “This is an amazing surprise.”

“How did you know we’d be here?” Sophie asked Grady.

“Kesler hailed me after Mr. Forkle contacted him.”

“I hailed your mom, too,” Kesler told Dex, “but she wasn’t
sure she could slip away. Plus, we didn’t want to bring the triplets, since we know you can’t stay. She said to give you this.”

He pulled Dex in for another big hug, and Sophie noticed Keefe cross his arms and shift away.

Kesler tousled Dex’s hair, then frowned and stepped back, “You’re taller!”

“I am?”

Sophie tilted her head. “Whoa—he’s right.”

Dex had always been shorter than her, but now they were the same height. He must’ve gone through a growth spurt over the last few weeks.

“Don’t go changing too much while you’re gone, okay?” Kesler made Dex promise. “And I know time is of the essence, so I already gathered the elixirs I thought would work best.”

He handed them each a small silver pouch filled with glass vials.

“In case you’re worried,” he told Sophie, “yours are all limbium-free.”

Technically, Kesler was Sophie’s uncle—though she never thought of him that way. Just like she never thought of Dex as her cousin. It was only by marriage—and adoption—so it wasn’t like they were actually related. Still, Kesler always treated her like family.

“I didn’t gather any for you,” he told Della, “but I can if you’d like.”

“No, I prefer invisibility,” Della said, vanishing.

“Wish I could hold my vanish for long enough,” Biana mumbled. “These elixirs taste like feet.”

“You’re lucky,” Keefe said, choking down one of his vials. “Mine tastes like armpit.”

“The bad taste is intentional,” Kesler told them. “To deter anyone from growing addicted to altering their appearance.”

Sophie plugged her nose and downed her elixirs. He’d given her
Sea See
,
Absolutely Auburn, Freckle Juice
, and
Tanny Fanny
. She wasn’t sure she liked the sound of the last one—and she definitely didn’t like the taste. It was like drinking trash that had rotted in the sun for a couple of weeks.

“Should we be seeing a change yet?” Biana asked, pulling a mirror from her pocket.

“Usually takes about three minutes,” Dex said, darting into the maze of shelves.

“What are you looking for?” Kesler called after him.

“You gave me boring ones!” Dex returned with seven vials and chugged them all.

Kesler shook his head. “You’re going to regret that.”

“Why?” Sophie asked.

“Let’s just say too many appearance elixirs at once can be
unpleasant
when it’s time to pass them. Another way we make sure no one takes them too often.”

“Ew,” Biana said, tilting her mirror another angle. “I still don’t see anyth—EEP!”

She stumbled back as her dark hair turned red and coiled
into tight curls. Her teal eyes paled to ice blue, and her skin turned even paler, giving her a translucent glow.

“Wow,” Sophie whispered, barely able to recognize her friend.

Fitz looked even weirder. His eyes had turned sky blue and his hair had turned dirty blond. He tossed the strands off his forehead and asked, “How do I look?”

“Like a wannabe me,” Keefe said.

The edge to his voice made it hard to smile at the joke.

Keefe started to say something else, but a sneezing fit cut him off. When he finished, he had thick black hair covering his upper lip.