The Tower (23 page)

Perhaps Terry was right in that I was soft on Alia. I never blocked the water faucet again, nor did I do anything extra to force my sister to speak. I knew how hard mouth-speaking was for her, and I wasn’t about to push her any more than was absolutely necessary.

Terry, as was often the case, took the complete opposite stance. As if it weren’t enough that Alia had to remain drained all day long, Terry went out of her way to cause extra trouble for my sister. Terry would hide Alia’s shoes so that she would have to ask for them before going out. She frequently blocked the bathroom door, not letting Alia in until she counted aloud to ten. And when Terry ran out of tricks to play, it was often the threat (or the reality) of another really good tickling that drew a few extra words from Alia’s reluctant lips. Terry was as merciless with Alia as she was with me in my CQC training, which I supposed was her idea of fairness.

“How long do I have to do this?”
Alia asked at the start of her second week of training.

My sister had started sleeping with her unicorn again, so I knew how strained she was. But I was also convinced that this was for her own good, so I answered flatly, “Until you can talk and be understood, Alia. Or until you die of old age, whichever comes first.”

Alia threw me an annoyed frown as she slid her ring on and stalked out of our bedroom.

If Alia was stressed about her mouth-speaking, I was equally stressed about my last mad rush to finish my seventh-grade studies. Cindy had assured me that I could enroll late if I had to, but I was still hoping to get back into normal society from the starting line like everybody else. Terry seemed somewhat frustrated as well, possibly with my CQC progress, though it was impossible to tell because she was always a bit on the edge.

“What’s the matter, Adrian?” Cindy asked me as I was helping her cook breakfast on the last day of August, and I wondered how many times this summer I had been asked that.

“It was last night,” I answered quietly. “My parents...”

I hadn’t even realized it until I woke up that morning and saw the calendar hanging by my desk. It had been one year to this day that, just past midnight, my parents were killed by the Angel berserker. This time last year, I was sitting beside Ralph in his rusty blue convertible, heading toward a Guardian gathering that I never attended.

“Oh, right,” Cindy said softly. “If you like, we can go visit their graves sometime.”

I shook my head. “It’s okay, Cindy. I’m not sure I’m ready to do that just yet.”

If I was going to visit my parents’ graves, I wanted Cat to be with me, however long it took. I wasn’t sure I could face them without her.

“Well, since you’re already in a crummy mood this morning,” said Cindy, “I suppose I won’t make it any worse no matter what I tell you.”

I raised my eyebrows, and Cindy continued, “You’ve made remarkable progress in the last two months, Adrian. You’re practically finished with all of your seventh-grade studies, and your power balance is just enough to go back to school if you really want to.”

That certainly sounded a lot like good news, but Cindy wasn’t looking directly at me. Nor did I miss the hint of reservation in her voice.

“But?” I asked apprehensively.

“But as long as you are in my care,” said Cindy, sighing heavily, “there’s no way to send you off to school. The Knights won’t be able to protect you well, and the other Guardian families...” Cindy’s voice trailed off.

I glared down at the kitchen floor, furious but unable to direct my anger toward the people who deserved it.

“I’m sorry, Adrian,” Cindy said quietly. “I know how much this meant to you.”

I looked back up at her, asking, “Why did you push me so hard to finish seventh grade if you knew this was going to happen?”

“I didn’t know,” said Cindy. “I suspected, but I was hoping that we could work something out. But after what happened on the street two weeks ago, I had to agree with Mr. Baker that sending you to school would be an irresponsible risk to the other families.”

There was no need to admonish Cindy for her blind optimism. If there had been even the slightest chance, I would have taken it too.

After a moment of uncomfortable silence, Cindy added, “Listen, Adrian, if you really want to go back to school, we could–”

“No!” I cut across her sharply. “Don’t you dare say that!”

“Adrian...”

“Don’t even think it, Cindy!” I said heatedly. “I’ve already lost one family. I’m not going to lose another!”

Cindy looked at me for a moment before smiling and saying quietly, “Okay, Adrian. Thank you.”

I just shook my head and smiled.

Cindy said, “At least we can take things a bit slower from now on, huh?”

“That would really be great,” I answered, nodding.

Cindy finished up in the kitchen while I got Alia to help me set the table.

As we all sat down for breakfast, I was determined not to let Terry see me upset over something as trivial as being denied access to school. After all, there were plenty of worse things that could happen to a person. And once my stomach started to fill up on steaming hot bacon and eggs, my mood did improve just a little.

“Ad-yi, pash’a saw peas,” said Alia from across the table. Translation: Addy, pass the salt please.

I telekinetically slid the salt shaker toward Alia as I said to Cindy, “She’s getting better.”

“Every day,” agreed Cindy, and Alia gave us a toothy smile.

Admittedly, Alia was still speaking borderline gibberish, but the mere fact that she had asked for the salt aloud rather than stand up and walk around the table for it was marked improvement.

“Told you she’d learn,” mumbled Terry, her mouth full of salad.

“I don’t think we could ever thank you enough, Terry,” said Cindy. “You’ve really come through for us. Adrian’s power balance and Alia’s mouth-speaking.”

“It was my pleasure, but you’re welcome all the same, Ms. Gifford.”

“Someday,” said Cindy, waggling a finger at her, “you are going to call me Cindy.”

Terry grinned. “Someday, Ms. Gifford.”

It was a Sunday, and though I didn’t absolutely need it, Cindy decided to give me a full day off from my studies. At Cindy’s suggestion, Terry canceled my CQC lesson too. All four of us spent much of the afternoon playing nine-ball pool in the game room. Alia was a bit short for the table, but I levitated her when her turns came around. Terry saw that I was giving my sister some help with where the balls were going too, but she knew better than to cry foul.

Over dinner that evening, Cindy said, “Everyone still seems a bit overworked. How about tomorrow, we sneak out of this prison and get out into the countryside for a day? The air will do us all some good. What do you say, girls?”

“Girls?!” I repeated, giving Cindy a withering stare.

She laughed. “You’re a given, Adrian. You’d never miss an opportunity to get out for a while.”

“Sounds like fun,” said Terry. “But by ‘sneak out,’ do you mean we’re going to ditch your Knights?”

“Sure,” replied Cindy. “It wouldn’t be much fun with a crowd like that tagging along. You’re security enough for all of us.”

“How are we going to sneak out?” I asked.

“You’ll see.”

I spent the rest of the evening wondering and prying, but Cindy refused to crack. Terry told us that she knew a perfect campsite, well away from prying eyes, so we changed our plan for a day in the country to an overnight trip. (There was no way to make it longer than that since Cindy had to maintain her hiding bubble over New Haven.) Terry took the elevator down to her Uncle Charles’s condo and returned with a bundle of camping gear. Alia and I helped with the packing.

We woke well before sunrise the following morning.

Grabbing our packs, the four of us headed down the elevator, but only Terry got off at the basement parking lot. Terry took all of our heavy bags too.

“See you on the other side,” said Terry as the elevator doors closed again.

Cindy took Alia and me into the subbasement. The guard and his desk had been removed a week ago, replaced by a security camera bolted to the concrete ceiling. Ignoring the camera, Cindy led us through a door I hadn’t been in before, down a narrow corridor, through another heavy steel door, and into...

“The holding block,” explained Cindy.

It was a large rectangular room with eight jail cells lining one wall. The front walls of the small square cells were made of vertical bars that extended from the ceiling to the floor, inset with heavy iron doors. Each cell contained a shoddy bed and a toilet bowl. At the far end of the holding block was a control panel with a series of levers on it, which I presumed operated the cell doors.

“This is where they kept the spy?” I asked.

“Yup. In this one here,” said Cindy, pointing to the cell nearest the entrance.

Alia and I followed Cindy to the far end of the room, where Cindy pulled the leftmost lever on the panel. The cell door nearest the panel opened with a loud creaking sound, and Cindy led us into the little cell, clanging the door shut behind us. It locked in place.

I stood in the center of the jail cell and looked back through the bars at the control panel. “This isn’t much of a holding block,” I said as I gestured toward the levers. “I could pull those from inside any of these cells.”

Cindy smiled, saying, “I’m sure you could, Adrian. But if you were locked up in here, you would be drained at all times.”

“That’s no fun,” I said. “Why are we in here?”

“This cell is the secret exit.”

“Oh,” I said, stepping toward the far end of the cell and pushing a little switch that was carefully hidden in the concrete wall.

One of the concrete slabs slid away, revealing a long and dark corridor.

“Adrian,” said Cindy, looking at me strangely, “how did you know where the switch was?”

“I don’t know,” I said, wondering the same thing myself. “Lucky guess, I think.”

“Did Terry teach you that?”

“Maybe,” I said slowly.

While I was pondering that possibility, the concrete slab automatically started to move back into place. I pushed the switch again, reopening the secret entrance, and the three of us stepped into the corridor beyond.

The entrance closed behind us. For an instant, we were thrown into pitch-black darkness, but Cindy quickly turned on a small flashlight she had brought. There was no way to reopen the entrance from this side, so the only way out was down the passage.

Alia gripped my right hand.
“It’s creepy in here.”

“Yeah,” I agreed quietly, not only because the long, dark corridor was exceptionally creepy, but because I had the strangest feeling that I had been here before.

“Come on,” said Cindy, taking the lead. “Terry will be at the other side by now.”

We walked for what felt like nearly half a mile down the corridor, finally arriving at...

“A dead end?” I asked.

“No,” said Cindy, stepping aside to reveal an iron lever built into the left side wall. “Try pulling it.”

I did. Another slab of concrete moved, letting us out into a dark, dank and smelly stone pipe which was large enough to drive a truck through.

“What is this place?” I asked as the doorway sealed itself behind us.

“A sewage drain,” said Cindy. “Come on. This way.”

Cindy led us down a narrow walkway that ran along the side of the pipe, and then up a ladder built into the concrete wall. The ladder was made of rusty iron bars. Though I was pretty sure I could handle it, I wasn’t about to take any chances, so I levitated myself up behind Cindy and Alia. We emerged through a manhole behind a large apartment building. Terry was waiting for us at the top.

“What took you guys so long?” asked Terry as she resealed the manhole.

I grinned at her. “You weren’t there to push us.”

Terry led us around to the parking lot, where she had parked...

“Ralph’s car?!” I said, gaping at the rusty blue convertible that I had been abducted in last year.

Terry smiled. “Well, I couldn’t exactly take Ms. Gifford’s, seeing as it has a Guardian tracking device on it.”