The Box Omnibus #1 (The Box, The Journal, The Sword) (33 page)

Three times the length the trip should have taken
and three pit stops later we pull into the driveway of Gran’s house. As quickly as I jump out of the car, Rose is faster. She stumbles away from the vehicle clutching her stomach. After a second’s hesitation, she runs for the long grass at the side of the house.

Sin walks over to unlock the front door without a glance in Rose’s direction.

“Shouldn’t we help?” I ask.

“Unless you know a spell for motion sickness,
” she says, “and if you do, you should have used it two stops ago, then there’s nothing we can do.”

The second the door swings open, a beast
almost as large as Sin leaps up and starts licking her face with two very large and slobbery tongues. She manages to muscle Farah back into the house while I glance around to make sure none of the neighbors happen to be looking our way. All of the windows on the block are dark.

“You’re lucky it’s so late.” I follow her into the house and duck under
Nyx as he does his usual dive for my head. I bat my hand at him, but miss. As usual. Though maybe that’s a good thing since I’m not sure how a phoenix would react to me hitting it. “What do you think the neighbors would say if they happened to see your pets?”

“Go to bed,” she says. “You get whiny when you’ve been up too late.”

Rose slinks into the house and starts crawling up the stairs.

“Take the back room,” Sin shouts while walking toward the kitchen.
“It’s still got the bucket next to the bed from last time.”

Seeing Rose so sick makes
me feel a bit better about my show on the roof. But still, Al isn’t here to witness her sorry state while he got a front row seat to my weak stomach. I can’t feel too bad for her. Plus, ‘last time?’

I follow Sin into the kitchen and watch as she makes herself a ham sandwich. Neither of us says a word, but I g
lower at her with all of my might, hoping she’ll feel the weight of it. After she stuffs the mayo back into the fridge, she slams the door and turns to face me.

“What?
” she says. “What’s wrong with you now?”

Farah’s lion head lifts from her spot on the floor next to Sin’s feet
and she does her whine-growl at me. I shoot her a glare, which doesn’t faze the beast in the least. I can’t believe Mom let Sin keep the thing. It should have been shoved through the portal first chance we got and left there to rot. Though I guess Sin’s argument we couldn’t let something so dangerous run free in any world was valid. Still. I would sleep a lot better if I knew it wasn’t down the hall, plotting ways to rip me to shreds.

Sin clicks her tongue at the chimera until it stops growling and sets its heads back on its paws. The lion eyes never waver from me, however. And I swear she just licked her lips.

“Get it out.” Sin muffles a yawn. “You’re already ruining my snack. You might as well keep me up too.”

She has no right to act as though I’m the one doing her wrong. After all, she’s the one who has been keeping incredibly important information from me.

“Last time?” I point upstairs in the general direction of where I think Rose is. “How many times has she been here? How many times has
Al
been here?”

She rolls her eyes and stuffs the sandwich into her mouth. Another excuse not to tell me anything.

“He
has
been here.” I can’t believe this is happening. It seems more like a bad dream than an actual conversation with my sister. “In this house. And you couldn’t be bothered to send me a text?”

“It was safer,” she says between bites.

My voice rises loud enough to make me glad the neighbors aren’t as close as at Mom’s house. “For who?”

If she wanted to protect me, I’d think it would be much safer for her to tell me Al is around. After all, he’s developed a taste for my magic. I should
probably know he might show up in the house I’m currently living in and try to attack me at any moment.

I hoped coming here for the summer would be a way to learn more about wizards. After working on my fighting skills so I would no longer be outmatched the second I went up against a wizard, I wanted to read Gran’s journals. Maybe find out how to turn Al back to the guy he’d been before he took Stewart’s magic.

I didn’t expect Al to show up practically the day I got here.

If she’d told me, I could have protected myself. I could have—

“Both of you,” Sin says. “It was safer for both of you.”

Her words stun me. Protecting me I
understand. It wasn’t necessary since I’m more than capable of looking after myself, but I understand it is some big sister thing. But protecting him? How is keeping us apart protecting him?

“What did you expect to happen?” I ask. “For me to stab him on sight?”

She runs her hand through her hair. The gel she’d used earlier this evening causes bits to stand out in strange and interesting ways. “It’s just safer for you two not to be near each other.”

“Fine.” If she’s not going to give a straight answer
, then I’ll have to try a different tactic. “Rose said his sister’s missing. But how is that possible? Did she wake up?”

“We don’t know.” Sin pulls herself up to sit on the counter, the second half of her sandwich untouched. “You saw Al earlier.
You now know how he gets. Pulling information from him is hit or miss. Most of the time, we can’t get him to say anything at all.”

“It’s
the magic.” I remember the way his magic was overwhelmed by darkness and the sick feeling I had just from looking at him. Carrying such poison inside of you all day every day would drive anyone insane. “It’s corrupting his mind.”

Her eyes narrow as she watches me. “You could see it?” I nod. “Can you fix
him?”

“I don’t know.” I gnaw on my lip while going through all of the different types of magic I’ve tried before. Nothing helpful comes to mind. Still, there’s so much about magic I don’t know still.
And I had been able to break the spell he accidently put on Rose. “Maybe.”

Although nothing significantly changes in her expression,
I can sense she’s disappointed with my less than encouraging response. A part of her must have hoped I’d be able to come up with a solution the moment I saw him. I wish I had.

“Well, crazy or not,” she says, “
he thinks The Sword has his sister, and he’s determined the only way to get to her is through them.”

“He said something about a sword on the roof.” I automatically reach for the space
where I have my weapon safely tucked away. “What was he talking about?”

“The Sword are wizards,” she says with a bored wave of her hand. “It’s just what they call themselves. It’s not important. What does matter is whether Al’s right or not
about them taking his sister. He’s definitely right about them being up to something. There are way too many gathering in this world for there not to be something up.”

I have to take a second to make sure I’ve heard her right. “
More than the three tonight? Are you sure?”

“Al has been tracking them in and around town for a while now,” she says. “Those weren’t the first he
caught up with. Rose tries to keep me informed on where he is and what wizards he’s found, especially now you’re here.” She picks up the last of her sandwich and examines it, but doesn’t eat it. “Of course, she can’t always predict where he’ll run off to at any moment. He was supposed to be on the opposite side of town tonight.”

Wizards are in this world. But how?

My head whips around to stare at the stairs and the hidden door at the top.

“How
are they getting here?” She doesn’t answer. “How many wizards have you been letting come and go from this house, anyway?”

“I haven’t been letting them in here,” she says.

But she isn’t as mad about the accusation as I expect. I feel like she’s still hiding something from me.

“There are other portals in the world, you know,” she says. “They must have found one and started using it.

She tosses the sandwich to Farah and the creature gobbles it up with only a minimum amount of fighting between the heads.

“It doesn’t matter.” She leaps from the counter and heads toward the door. “All that matters is they have something planned and Al’s trying to figure out what
it is and how to stop them. Until he does, there’s nothing we can do except keep out of his way.”

“Tonight is normal for him, isn’t it?” The thought of Al surrounded by bloody bodies makes my stomach turn. “How many has he killed? Do you know? Do you care?”

She stops at the bottom of the stairs and sighs. “He does what he has to,” she says. “It’s not like we can stop him. He’s more powerful than any of us. Even you. No, especially you. So don’t do something stupid like go after him. All you’d manage to do is get yourself killed.”

I can feel determination flowing through me. If Sin thinks something is a bad idea, then it’s got to be the right thing to do. I just hope my face isn’t revealing
my new need to run back out the door after him.

She wouldn’t be able to stop me, but it will be a lot easier if she doesn’t try.

“You should have told me they were around.” I put a bit of sulkiness behind my voice to mask the resolve I’m actually feeling.

“You should have told me he took magic from Stewart,” she says. “We do what we have to.” She heads to her room, stopping at the door. “Don’t worry about him. He’ll be fine. He knows what he’s doing.”

She hopes.

I’m glad she doesn’t wait around for me to agree with her
before slipping into her room and shutting the door. There’s no way my lying skills are good enough to pretend I believe her about everything being fine.

The moment her door clicks shut, I hurry to my own room. I
shoo the phoenix out and earn a couple of scratches in the process before I shut the door behind me.

There are a few flaws to my plan, I know. First, I’m exhausted. It’s so late it’s become early. Second, I’ve only snuck out of a house once in my life
, and only with Sin’s help. Sneaking away from her will be completely different. Third, I don’t have keys to her car. Unless I plan on running the whole way, I’ll have to figure out a way to get her keys from her purse, which she has with her in her room. And finally, if I actually manage to get out without being seen, how will I be able to track Al down? If I get close enough, I’ll be able to feel his magic. But outside of randomly ending up in the same place as him, I don’t have any way to know what part of the town to start looking.

Still, Sin isn’t the only stubborn one in our family.

I check out my window, but it’s too dark to get a good sense of how far down the drop is. And there’s no tree to climb down like at Mom’s house. I could use my magic, but if I’m going after Al and whatever dangers included with being near him, I shouldn’t use up all of my power before I leave the house.

There’s the stairs, but with Farah and
Nyx around, it’s next to impossible to go anywhere, even to the bathroom, without them making a fuss.

Then again, she can’t stop me from going downstairs for a glass of water.

Once I’m downstairs, I deal with the rest of the problems.

I slowly open the door and peek out to make sure no one’s waiting for me. No one. Not even an idiot bird.

The stairs are a little tricky. I remember from being a kid there are some squeakier ones than others. Which are which? Well, hopefully I’ll remember when I start walking down them.

Muscle memory kicks in as I
move down the stairs. My feet seem to know exactly which part of each step to put my weight on to make the least amount of noise. The closer to the bottom I get, the more exhilarated I feel.

And then a crash
echoes from upstairs. My initial thought is Sin or her animals must have broken something. However, I know better when I look up and see a burst of magic. The spell shrouding the hidden door is torn apart in a single explosion.

“What the hell are you…
?” Sin runs out of her room into the hall. Her voice trails off the moment she sees the door to the portal swing open and two people walk through.

A
man steps forward and looks over the railing for the stairs at me. Something behind his dark beady eyes flickers and the corner of his lips almost lift in a smile. My gut clenches at the sight of the magic flowing through him.

Wizard. And he’s almost as tainted as Al.

My sword is out in seconds.
The thin man doesn’t attack. He continues to watch me for a moment and then turns back to the woman in a blood red corset.

“This will work,” he says.

She nods at him before turning to my sister. “Hello, Sin,” she says. “It’s so nice to see you again.”

“
Rilla.” Sin’s voice is tight with something I might think was fear if it was coming from anyone else. “What’s going on?”

“Plans are moving forward.” The wizard runs his hand down the wood doorframe as though he’s stroking a lover. “Soon. So soon.”

“Uh huh,” Sin says. “Interesting. I’m a little surprised to see the two of you together. I didn’t think wizards and sorceresses got along.”

Sorceress? Of course. It makes sense. After all, I can feel as much magic coming from her as the wizard, but I hadn’t been paying much attention to her. He’s the threat after all.

And yet, something about her magic feels off. Possibly it’s my imagination. After all, this is the first sorceress outside of Gran I’ve ever met. And my magic was locked away most of my life so I never got to know what her magic felt like. For all I know, all magic feels weird if it isn’t my own. Still, I can’t shake the feeling her magic isn’t quite right.

“Not get along?”
Rilla says. “Perhaps. But Victor and I have become one, haven’t we?”

The wizard is too caught up in stroking the portal to notice she’s talking to him. He, and everyone else for that matter, has forgotten all about me. I creep back up the stairs with my eyes never leaving the wizard. I could run out the front door, but I can’t leave Sin or Rose with these people.

“You’ve what?” Sin asks. “Become one? How does that work?”

“It’s very clever.”
Rilla places a hand on Victor’s shoulder, and he reacts with a small jerk, but doesn’t try to move away from her or the portal. “Something Victor and his Sword have been dreaming up for a while. A never ending source of power. He showed me shortly after your visit.”

My eyes flick to Sin at the same time her lips clamp together. She was in the other world and never told me. It makes sense. If I
’d had time to think about it, I’d have realized it was the only way she could have met these people before. But now I’m left wondering when she went and how many other secrets she’s keeping from me.

“Showed you what, exactly?” Sin asks.

“Our bond,” Rilla says.

The woman’s smile leaves me with the same uneasy feeling Stewart’s always had. And no wonder. Now I’m at the top of the stairs, I can see the flow of magic passing between them. She is the source of a good chunk of the magic inside
the wizard. An ever growing amount as her magic naturally rebuilds and pushes more into him.

In return, the darkness destroying the once pure magic he holds is slowly spreading to her as well.

Not only is she being corrupted, but the magic between them is exactly what she described. A bond. They may have two bodies, but there is no longer any separation between their two lives. I’m not sure they’re capable of being more than a few feet apart.

“How?” The word falls out of my mouth, ruining any hope of surprise I might have over them. But I need to know. “How did he do this to you?”

“Let me show you,” Victor purrs.

He takes a step toward me
before Rilla’s fingers clench on his shoulder. I wait, ready for him to push past her grip and attack, but he doesn’t. His sneer as he examines me from head to toe tells me he would love nothing more than to rip the magic from my cold dead body. Yet he stops.

I’d assumed it was
him
controlling
her
through his tainted magic. Now I’m not so sure.

“You must be the sister.”
Rilla almost sounds pleasant as she smiles at me. “The sorceress who would not fight in the war.” Her eyes go to my sword. “How things change.”

“War?” I shift my stance, trying to close any openings either of them might possibly find. “What war?”

She throws her head back and laughs while the wizard returns to stroking the portal. She looks over at Sin, who seems startled by the sudden attention. Only one reason. She must be planning something.

“As naïve as you claimed.”
Rilla makes no sign of having noticed anything wrong with Sin. “I can see why you were travelling as you were.”

Fingers brush my arm. I jump, ready to turn o
n whoever is sneaking up on me. Before I do, I catch a glimpse of red hair out of the corner of my eye.

She discreetly flashes five fingers at me. No idea what she means. I look to Sin who has one hand in her pocket, and the other flashing me four fingers. Back to Rose. Three.

I might not know what they have planned, but from the way Rose is tugging the back of my dress, I know what’s expected of me.

Two.

Rilla’s eyebrows crease as she realizes something’s happening.

One.

Rose pushes me to the stairs as I get one last glance at Sin. Her dust scatters in the air as Nyx dives straight for Rilla’s face.

I don’t get to see any more as Sin leaps over the railing to join us on the stairs, shoving me in front of her as though I’m the one who needs protecting.

A roar rips through the air. Farah.

The commotion of the fight continues behind us as we manage to scramble out the door and to the car. Only once I’m inside do I risk looking back.
Rilla stands in the door. Her dress is torn and her hair pulled from the braid wrapped around her head. She reaches a hand toward us and I instantly throw everything I have into a protective shield.

Compared to Al’s magic, the attack feels almost nice. No darkness eats through the barrier and I’m able to keep her magic back
without my hand throbbing with pain. The problem is her attack isn’t all we need to worry about. Victor appears next to her. I can feel his magic already being strained to keep Farah motionless upstairs. If he was able to assist Rilla with his full power, there would have been nothing I could do nothing to stop them.

Their powers join and, as one, they slam their magic against my protective wall.

“Sin,” I say through gritted teeth as my magic begins to fail. “Drive.”

For a second, I’m sure she’s going to refuse. Her eyes are locked on the house where her pets still are. Luckily logic wins over sympathy for the beasts. She slams the car into reverse and squeals out of the driveway
.