The Secret Cipher (3 page)

Jax groaned and hung up. “Where is he?”

I checked my watch. “He's at the comic-book store. There's a tournament today.”

Her mouth fell open. “He left the house? Really?”

It wasn't unusual for Tyler to stay in his bedroom all day during the summer, working on his computer. Jax often joked about him being a vampire who couldn't be exposed to daylight. But for the last month, he'd stayed in his room because he'd been too depressed to go anywhere. There'd been a whole week when he could barely get out of bed. Apparently that's what happens when hope is sucked from your soul.

I will never forget the scene. When Mr. and Mrs. Camel drew guns on us, there'd been only one way to disarm them. The plan was for Jax to open the urn. We'd be safe from the effects as long as we were touching the urn's surface—it protects those who hold it. But Tyler had been standing on the other side of the memorial, with a gun to his back. In a moment of unbelievable courage, he ordered Jax to open the urn. He sacrificed himself so that the Camels could be caught. When the urn unleashed its tornado and sucked hope from Mr. and Mrs. Camel and an unlucky security guard, it also sucked hope from Tyler.

After Jax corked the urn, we rushed to Tyler's side. He lay like a limp noodle, his eyes wide open, staring at nothing. He couldn't talk. He couldn't move. Mr. and Mrs. Camel and the security guard
were in the same condition. I called 911. As ambulance sirens wailed, Juniper disappeared, taking the urn with her.

By the time our parents arrived at the hospital in DC, the doctors had no idea what was wrong, so they said it was a viral infection. Viruses can spread fast, so it was possible that the Camels and the security guard had all come down with it. Of course they didn't suspect a Greek urn had been the cause of everyone's weird symptoms. Who would?

Once they came out of their trances, Mr. and Mrs. Camel were shipped back to England, where they were wanted on forgery charges. The security guard went home with his family and Tyler spent the next four weeks recovering in his room. And he hadn't left the house until today.

“Let's go,” Jax said, handing my phone back.

“Uh . . .” I stalled. “We haven't finished weeding. And I was thinking about sharpening the mower's blades.”

She folded her arms. “Ethan, you can come up with a million excuses but you're not going to talk me out of this.”

“It would be impossible for me to come up with
a million
excuses,” I told her.

She smiled. “Impossible? Do you still believe things are
impossible
?”

“Yes,” I said, trying to sound certain. I would cling to denial as long as I could . . . like a germ clinging to the side of a public ketchup bottle.

T
he heat wasn't going to keep me from riding extra fast. I took the lead. Even if Ethan had wanted to be in front, he wouldn't have been able to outpedal me. I was like a bullet.

When we got to Merlin's Comics, sweat coated the backs of my knees and Ethan could barely catch his breath. We locked our bikes in the rack, then went inside.

I'd grown up in Chatham, but I'd only been inside this store a few times. Comic books weren't my thing. The place was cluttered with displays of memorabilia and collectibles. Board games were stacked on shelves. T-shirts and costumes hung
from racks. A table of comic-book bins sat in the center of the room. It was Geek Central.

“Pee-ew,” I said, scrunching my face. It smelled just like Tyler's bedroom. If someone bottled that stench it would be called
Eau de Gamer
.

Ethan winced. He wasn't anything like his older brother. Ethan was a full-fledged nerd, which is totally different from being a gamer. Ethan was socially awkward and liked to read all the time. But he also liked to take showers. And he wore deodorant and changed his socks. Tyler and his weirdo friends thought personal hygiene was a waste of time. They had scruffy beards, uncombed hair, and armpit stains. When Tyler complained about not having a girlfriend, Aunt Cathy told him that girls don't like guys who stink and she threatened to run him through a car wash. Uncle Phil said that Tyler would one day meet a girl who would appreciate him, regardless of his body odor. I'm not so sure that's true.

“Do you see him?” I asked, standing on my tiptoes.

“Over there.” Ethan pointed.

I walked around a large inflatable dragon and headed toward the back room while Ethan
stayed by the door. There were about forty people crammed into the small space. That's not quite a crowd but it's definitely a group. For Ethan, groups were worse than crowds because he couldn't hide as easily. I spotted a couple of girls in the store, but they were as rare as the green clovers in a box of Lucky Charms.

“Hey, Tyler,” I called, cupping my hands around my mouth.

A huge guy stepped in front of me. “The gaming cave is currently off-limits, my lady.”

My lady? I looked up. Whoa! He must have been seven feet tall. His nametag read
Merlin
, so I guessed he was the owner. “I need to talk to my cousin.”

“Interruptions are prohibited during play.” His Batman T-shirt stretched over his enormous gut. He'd braided his long beard so he looked like he'd just stepped out of
Lord of the Rings
. “You'll have to wait until the end of the round.”

“Are you serious?” I asked.

“As serious as Venser sacrificing his heart for Karn. This is a Magic tournament.”

“You mean, tricks and stuff?”

“Tricks and stuff? Not
that
kind of magic.” He
started talking to me the way Tyler often did, as if I was a complete idiot and he was teaching me something I should already know. “Magic: The Gathering is a two-or-more-player game composed of trading cards. Each round is a battle between Planeswalkers, using spells, items, and creatures.”

“Are you telling me it's a stupid card game?”

“I beg your pardon?” Merlin raised his unibrow. “Stupid card game?” Some of the players had turned and were staring me. “I'll have you know that over twelve million people worldwide are Magic: The Gathering enthusiasts.”

“So what? It's still a
card
game.” Maybe I sounded a bit rude, but seriously, he was worried about a game and I was worried about my great-aunt and an urn that could turn people into zombies. When I tried to step around him, he blocked my path. Normally I would have complained to the manager, but this guy owned the place. I sighed. “Fine, I'll wait. How long will it take?”

“Until someone has won.” Merlin pointed to a couch by the cash register. “You're welcome to sit, my lady.”

“The name is Jax.” I stomped over and slumped onto the couch. Ethan joined me. “So this is the
reason Tyler left his room? For a Magic game? I don't get it.”

Ethan pointed at a trophy that sat next to the cash register.

“Oh. Right.” Nothing more needed to be said. My cousin Tyler went after trophies the way a shark goes after blood. His collection was on display in his family's den, complete with custom-made shelving and special gallery-style lighting.

I squirmed. Then squirmed some more. If I sat up real straight and craned my neck to the left, I could barely see Tyler. He hadn't noticed us or maybe he was ignoring us. “I overload my Mizzium Mortars,” he announced to his opponent, who looked about ten years old.

“Crud!” the kid cried, sliding a bunch of cards to the side. “My graveyard's getting full.”

“Guess all those expensive cards your parents bought you were a waste of money,” Tyler said with a snicker. “Your time would have been better spent sitting in your room waiting for puberty. I'm last year's champion, in case you didn't know. Prepare to be humiliated.”

No doubt about it, Tyler was back to normal. A few weeks ago, I wasn't sure he'd recover. I'd been
sitting in his room and I'd asked him what it had been like to have hope sucked from his soul. He said it was the darkest feeling he'd ever had. He'd felt cold inside, like he was made of ice.

For the last three years, a sign had been posted on Tyler's bedroom door:
Embrace the Zombie Apocalypse.
He took it down after he got home from the hospital. He said it felt too real.

A cheer arose from the game cave. I whispered in Ethan's ear. “If you distract the Merlin dude, then I can sneak behind the dragon and get to Tyler.”

“Distract him?”

“Yeah. Pretend you're having an allergy attack and you can't breathe. Pretend you need an EpiPen.” I nudged his arm. “Please?”

“But what if he has an EpiPen? I don't want to get shot with one if I don't need it.”

“Good point.” Every gamer in the place probably had an EpiPen. I sank even lower. “This waiting is going to kill me. Juniper needs us.”

Merlin look a sip from a Big Gulp, then leaned on the counter. “Hey, Ralph.” A skinny guy in a Thor T-shirt had entered the store. “Did you see the new comic by Zenith? It's about Pandora.”

I sat bolt upright. “Hello? Did you say Pandora?” I scrambled to my feet. “You mean like in Pandora's box?”

“You're familiar with Greek mythology?” Merlin asked with a surprised smile. He held up the comic. “This is Zenith's tenth book. In my humble opinion, it's his opus.”

According to legend, Pandora was the first woman on earth. She was famous because she opened a box and released evil into the world. But it was her daughter, Pyrrha, who most interested me, since she'd been the original owner of the urn.

“Can I see that?” I grabbed the comic and flipped through the pages. The drawings were very detailed, all in black and white. Everyone was wearing tunics and sandals. The main character was beautiful, with long rippling hair. I showed it to Ethan. “I wonder if Pandora looked like this.”

“I doubt it,” Ralph said, peering over my shoulder. His breath smelled like Fritos. “That armor she's wearing is medieval. If Pandora had worn armor, I'm guessing it would have been pre-Mycenaean in design. Zenith takes liberties with historical detail.”

“You make an excellent point,” Merlin said.

Historical detail? I set the comic book on the counter and looked from Merlin to Ralph. “You guys are talking like this stuff is real.” Of course, Ethan and I knew the truth, but these guys hadn't seen a tornado fly out of an urn.

Merlin scratched his beard. “To quote one of the greatest twentieth-century minds, Mr. Spock, ‘Once you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.'” He took another sip of his drink.

“That's not technically correct,” Ethan whispered to me. “Spock can't be a great mind because he's a fictitious character.”

“But it kinda makes sense,” I said. Then a cheer arose from the back room. Most of the players had gathered around Tyler's table. “And I swing for the win!” Tyler exclaimed. Everyone applauded. His young opponent burst into tears and fled the scene.

“It's over?” I handed the comic back to Merlin. “Tyler!” I called, pushing my way between players as they swarmed out of the game cave. Ethan followed, his baseball brim pulled low to hide his eyes.

The cave had no windows. The walls had been painted black and the air felt warm and humid, as
if every molecule had been exhaled by the players. Tyler was still seated at a table, gathering his cards. “Greetings, dweebs. What's up?”

I sat on the table, my legs swinging with excitement. “We found Juniper!”

“Well, actually, she found us,” Ethan said.

“She found us, we found her, what does it matter? The point is, we know where she is.”

Tyler wrapped a rubber band around his deck. “Where is she?”

“At the Ladies of . . . something something, in Boston.”

“The Sisters of Mercy Convalescent Center,” Ethan said.

“Yeah, that's the place.” His ability to remember details was like a superpower. I looked around to see if anyone was listening. Lots of people had already shuffled out of the store, but a few stood around Merlin, looking at the new comic book. “The nurse said Juniper had a stroke. But we think she's faking because she wants a place to hide.”

“
You
think she's faking,” Ethan corrected. “A stroke is a blood clot in the brain. To get that diagnosis, they'd have to take an image of the brain. You can't fake—”

“I think, you think . . . whatever. Yeesh.” I squirmed. Sometimes he was way too literal. “I think she needs us. I have a feeling.”

Tyler's whole body stiffened. “I don't want to see her. She got us into enough trouble already.”

“I agree,” Ethan said. “I vote we stay away from Boston. I've got an appointment with my allergist on Wednesday. I'm supposed to start my shots.”

“Are you saying your allergies are more important than the fate of the world?” I looked around again. No one was paying any attention to us. I'm sure that debating the fate of the world was an everyday event in Merlin's Comics. “We saw the urn's power unleashed on four people. What would happen if it was unleashed on a hundred? A thousand? What if Juniper needs help hiding it?”

Tyler's eyes widened. “I'm not getting anywhere near that thing. Not ever again.” He pushed his messy hair away from his face. “It . . . it was in my head.”

“What do you mean it was in your head?” Ethan asked.

Tyler closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, his voice was super quiet, as if his own words scared him. “I could hear it. Not like an
actual voice—that would be crazy. But like a presence, telling me to give up. Telling me that nothing was important.”

I nodded. “I heard it too, when I was carrying it around. It told me to be its protector.”

We shared a knowing look. It was weird having this bond with Tyler. The “Greek Urn Talking in My Head Club” wasn't one I wanted to belong to. Girl Scouts had been bad enough, with the stress of having to sell cookies and go to all those meetings. I didn't need
another
club!