Pasquinelli/Rise 465

Cold air was biting his face, but Jon pressed on, walking as fast as his shins and calves would let him. Ray was doing a remarkable job of keeping up. Jon supposed that when given no other alternative, Ray was perfectly capable of rushing. She didn’t stay very quiet throughout the journey, though. Her usual snide comments and complaints were droning through the night like a pesky static.

To Jon, it didn’t matter. He was keeping a steady pace, positively determined to get back to the castle in time. There were still a few miles to go, but Jon finally had a plan -- something concrete, real and measureable. Jon hadn’t had this in what seemed like forever. All the aimless wandering and stumbling into situations he had been doing lately were a far cry from how he felt at this moment. Right now, he was in control, and he knew that he could eliminate anyone who stood in his way...a thought that still gave him pause.

The air was getting much colder as night embraced Norea. Jon had remained in civilian clothing, so he was just in his jeans and a T-shirt. His hands were freezing -- one was clenched in a fist to his side, the other was shoved down his intact denim pocket. But he didn’t care. Ray had her black jumpsuit on; she was fine.

It was nearly midnight. Just over nine hours to go and they still had three miles to walk, and a mage to locate.

“Are you sure you can’t fly?” said Jon through misty, tired breaths.

“Uh, yeah. Are you sure you can’t fly? This Phoenix thing is a bird, after all, right?”

Jon snorted. And put someone else’s life in danger? I think not. Jon thought. Ray seemed to hear it through his skull.

“How many times will you have to hear ‘it wasn’t your fault’ before it finally sinks in,” she said.

Jon stopped and wheeled around at Ray. “I don’t know. Another few dozen at least, I think.” There was a pause. Ray didn’t look amused. “Sorry. It’s late, I’m tired, I’ve got a headache, and I murdered someone a few hours ago. And oh yeah, this city is going to be invaded in....” he checked his watch. “Eight hours and forty nine minutes. So tell me, how are you doing?”

Ray was looking at Jon, studying his face for a moment. She then punched him in the shoulder and continued walking.

Jon couldn’t help but smile. “How about that flying thing?”

“Shut up.”

Ninety agonizing minutes later, Jon and Ray somehow reached the castle walls without meeting anyone on the way. Or rather, their purposeful route off the High Street kept them in mostly residential areas where there was very little activity. Jon fell into a lean on the stonewalls, and Ray shook the iron gates as hard as she could because they would not open. “What is this?” she said. Jon turned around. A sign hung on the twenty-foot-tall gates.

“Royal Palace Lockdown

No Entry or Exit

No Exceptions”

Jon grinded his teeth. He was far too tired, hungry (he ate his awesomely delicious scone in three bites two hours ago) and cold to deal with something like this when he was so close. He pressed his hand on the smooth, cold metal. “I could melt it.”

“Yeah right. I bet that metal could withstand a sun exploding.”

“I’m willing to take that chance.” She shoved his hand in his pocket. Instantly, the small terra cotta circle began to heat up. Ray swung around and clamped down on his forearm with her hand, digging her nails into his skin.

“I know you are. But that’s probably a reckless and stupid idea right now, don’t you think?”

Jon opened his mouth to argue, then hesitated. In the last day, he attacked the Prime Minister (accidentally), was broken out of jail (against his will), and committed a murder (in self defense). Indeed, the last thing he needed was destruction of Royal property and breaking and entering a monarch’s private residency thrown on top of the heap. They didn’t have long to contemplate what to do next, though.

“Hey! I know you! Freeze!”

A uniformed guard colored in all white came trotting over to them, unholstering his sidearm and pointing it at Jon. For what seemed like the thousandth time since he’d been to Iannis, Jon was, once again, being held against his will. And he was getting tired of it. But this time, he had another plan.

“For the love of GOD,” said Ray.

The guard just seemed to take notice of Ray and pointed the firearm at her, then at Jon, then back at her. He didn’t know whom to shoot.

“No, Ray,” Jon said evenly. “Let him take us.”

Ray looked mutinous. “You’re--!”

“No Ray, let him. He’s caught us and is going to take us in.”

Ray’s upper lip curled. She tossed her head back. “Fine. Take us in,” said Ray as she walked directly at the guard.

“Don’t move!” he shouted.

“Oh shut up and take us in already.” Ray stopped right in front of the guard’s gun barrel and turned around with her hands behind her. She was ready to be cuffed. As the guard fumbled for his hand restraints, Ray shot Jon a look that said she might poke his eyes out if he was wrong about this.

Jon gave her a quick nod, and lined up next to Ray. He half smiled at the guard’s clumsiness and calculated how he’d best take advantage of it. Jon guessed the guard was probably younger than himself. This time, he knew what to do. The guard moved to Jon, whom already had his hands balled into fist.

He recognized the metal as the clumsy guard fumbled with the handcuffs. Their captor led them through a small door in the stonewall, almost completely camouflaged in the stonework. Jon would have never known it was there had he not been forced to walk through it. He cast a backwards glance at the surreptitious entrance. The door closed and masonry aligned perfectly, as if they had been laser-cut.

“You! Face forward!” cried the young guard, jabbing the air behind Jon with his rifle. Jon gave a little snort and continued walking up the slope to the castle.

Oddly enough, the guard didn’t take Ray and Jon through a similar secret, quiet entrance into the castle. No, he took them right up the main pathway through the two-story tall double doors as if parading a catch of fish. The usual guards that opened the doors were absent -- most likely attending more important business. The gazebos were silent and empty, and even the streams hardly made any sound, as if consciously attempting to remain very quiet.

Jon half expected a wall of people to pour out of the castle, but inside was even more still than outside. Jon sneered to himself, realizing that no one saw the guard capture or bring in Jon and Ray. That was fortunate for them and worked well for his plan. He squeezed the Amulet in his fisted hand, concealed from the moment Jon heard the castle guard call out to him. It grew hot against his skin. Jon willed it hotter and hoped the guard was not paying to the small droplets of melted metal falling onto the royal floor.

For an odd reason, the metal didn’t burn Jon at all. It felt warm and smooth, but it was never unpleasant. Tugging his wrists away from one another, the metal gave completely away and Jon’s hands were free. He used the opportunity to spin directly around and rush the guard. The guard barely had time to register that his prisoner had just spun around, hands-free, because he didn’t respond other than widening his eyes and fumbling with the trigger on the rifle. Jon, however, connected with the rifle and thrust the barrel away from the two of them. It went clattering to the floor. The guard was thrown off his feet by Jon’s inertia, and lay pinned under him.

“Just hurry up already,” Ray said from the sidelines.

In the struggle, Jon managed to find one of the pistol-like guns that were fired at him in Topaz Hall just a few hours ago. It was in a holster, aimed directly at the guard’s shin. Jon heaved all his body weight onto the writhing guard and managed to pin him with his elbow and forearm and used his other hand to reach down and fire the gun. Hoping the pistol wasn’t set to kill, Jon pulled the trigger. The first shot blew a hole in the holster, but Jon fired one more time, and the guard went rigid. The only moving body parts on him were his terrified eyes darting back and forth at Jon and Ray.

“Calm down,” Jon said calmly. He hoisted himself up on one leg -- the other he had twisted falling down onto the marble floor. He stood up gingerly and shook his leg a few times. The pain was subsiding. Ray stood, five feet away, looking as if nothing had happened.

“Well? Come on.” She turned and jingled the handcuffs. ”No fire. Keys.”

“I’m not that sleep-deprived.”

Jon fumbled around inside the guards vest and found of set of keys, and freed Ray’s hands. He also heard footsteps.

“Quick!”

Ray dodged behind a pillar, and Jon dragged the paralyzed guard behind another, just a few feet from Ray.

“No no no. That’ll take too much time. Deploying Indigo Force on the River? Come now.”

“We must cover all of our bases. What if they attack from the River?”

“And how would they get there? Fly?”

“We didn’t think they’d get to Norea, either.”

There was a brief pause.

“Still, there isn’t time. We’ve got merely six hours. Deployment of that magnitude would take....”

Jon never heard the rest. They were out of earshot.

“So what do we do now?” Ray emerged from a shadowed column.

Tables turned, Jon put his hands on his hips and surveyed the prisoner. “We could just leave him here. Someone will find him eventually, but we’ll be long -- ”

“We could kill him, too. That could be effective.”

Jon snapped his gaze onto Ray.

“I’m kidding.”

“Just...don’t.”

“Figure something out then.”

It was then that Jon realized the stunning wasn’t permanent. Jon unholstered the gun and fired it again at the guard, who froze in place when he started wriggling. Jon checked his watch. Those Councilors were right. They had less than six hours. He thought for a moment.

“We’re going to have to put him somewhere.”

“That’s the best you got?” said Ray. “Weren’t you the one who tried to melt down the front gates a few minutes ago?”

“Yeah, but this is different.”

“Classic cop-out.”

“We’ve got to get to the Hall of Records. This is just a waste of time.”

“Oh, and speaking of which,” Ray started in an almost teacher-like tone. “What are you going to do there, anyway? You still haven’t told me all this time. You’ve just been acting like a bull that saw red for the first time ever.”

Jon hesitated. He only told Ray that he needed someone to help him stop time -- he hadn’t told her way. He pulled Ray by the arm to the other end of the hall by the huge flying staircase that led to the upper floors. He didn’t want the still guard to know any of this. “I need to find a temporal mage.”

“I sort of figured that out like two hours ago. You already know how to stop time, what else do you need?”

“Because Jotea once told me that there is more to the temporal abilities than starting and stopping Time.”

“So?”

“So if I can get an advantage over Ignus, I intend to use it.”

Ray crossed her arms. “You’re joking. You’re going to go up against him -- intentionally?”

“If the situation presents itself, yes, why not.”

Ray slapped his shoulder. “Because it’s stupid, that’s why.”

“That was a rhetorical question. Actually it wasn’t even a question at all....”

“No, you’re not doing this. I won’t let you.”

Jon raised an eyebrow. “Honestly, Ray? You and what army? And no, that was definitely not rhetorical.”

“You can’t--”

“Ray,” Jon interrupted, “I can and I’m going to have to. I can do this with or without your help. Without will be harder, I’ll do it if I have to.”

Ray opened her mouth to say something -- most likely to protest -- but nothing came out. Her expression changed from annoyance to fear in a matter of seconds. It was clear she knew she wouldn’t be able to stop him. It was either help him or do nothing.

Already knowing the time, Jon looked at watch again. “Tick tock,” he said quietly. He then fired another stun ray at the guard for good measure across the room. He was surprised that it hit dead on.

Ray’s pained expression wiped clean from her face. “Like there was ever going to be any doubt.”

Jon smiled. It felt good to genuinely smile again after a day like today. “Go find Jotea. I’ve been wanting to communicate with her since I attacked Fauntyle. And I’ve had no luck so far. Tell her everything that’s been happening.”

“Why do I have to do the crappy assignment? I want to go and break down doors and scare Noreans.”

Jon looked at his watch again and looked back at Ray with widened eyes.

“I’m going.”

“Wait a second. We need to get him out of the way,” said Jon, meaning the castle guard.

“Drag him into Topaz Hall and lock him in.”

“Oh, that’s a good idea,” said Jon, thinking that anyone who had heard about the attack on the Prime Minister probably would not want to disturb a crime scene.

He and Ray sprinted back to the other end of the Foyer, and began to drag the still paralyzed guard across the slick marble floor. Jon was at his legs and Ray at his hands, and he was surprisingly easy to maneuver along. Jon put down his side when they got to the Hall door, and picked him up again once the door was propped open. Just as his shoulders were passing through the doorway, the stun wore off and he began wriggling like mad, and started screaming for help.

Jon flung his feet aside, grabbed the pistol he had put in his back pocket for safekeeping and fired at the guard again. Instantly he became still and silent. Ray had been holding onto his hands the whole time, being tugged and pulled on. Once he froze again, she let go and stood up straight.

“You could have just stayed laying like that, you know. We’re not going to hurt you, you just needed to shut up.”

Jon was half expecting that disembodied voice to come on again and seal them inside the Hall, but it didn’t. He guessed that the internal security measures didn’t apply to castle-issued weapons.

“Now where do we put him?” said Ray. “He’s just gonna wake up and walk out the door.”

“Oh no he won’t.” Jon had already eyed a credenza just like the one the Minister had crashed into prior. “Lets put him in there.”

After much tugging, pushing, pulling and heaving, they finally propped up the young guard in the credenza. This time, his eyes were narrowed maliciously at them as they shut the double doors. Jon found a circular gauge on the side of the pistol, which seemed to be the power feed. He turned it to one before what looked to be the highest setting and fired the stun ray at the door handle to the credenza. It was melted together in a mush. Jon tested it -- it wouldn’t turn or budge.

“Whew,” said Ray. “At least the hard part is over.”

Once out of Topaz Hall, Ray wasted no time. She grabbed the Pimicron blaster from him.

“Hey, I might need that,” Jon said.

Ray laughed. ”You might need that?”

“Oh, right.”

She took off at a jog around the banister and up the stairs. Jon, meanwhile, kept going past the staircase to the doorway that sank down into the castle underground levels. He almost made it through the doorway before he heard Ray yelling as loud as she could from an upper floor, “EMPRESS!” searching for Jotea. Nothing about Ray was ever very subtle.

The hallway behind the stairs was usually fairly well lit well during the day, but at four o’clock in the morning, a different kind of light played on the marble floors -- only torchlight. It was even more eerie than when Jon had been there the previous day. But it didn’t matter. Even in the dim light, Jon knew where he was going. He’d accidentally wandered past the Hall of Records once before, this time it was the target. But once he reached the staircase, he saw that down below was pitch black. He groaned, and without hesitation, yanked a torch from the wall and held it out in front of him, in the same hand as the Amulet. And there was no mistaking it anymore. He could feel the energy from the fire roiling and undulating at his hand. Jon let it burn and flicker as it wanted to. He didn’t need it to do anything other than that just yet.

A glass door came into view at the bottom of the dark stairs. They glinted like silver in the light, and a faint glow emanated from the room beyond the doors -- someone else was already inside. Jon remembered the hole in the wall, and now that there were doors there, they seemed huge -- ten feet wide at least, made of the same smoky glass as the Glass Room in the Manor. Jon knew the Hall wouldn’t be open at this time of morning, nor would it be open to ordinary citizens, but this could not wait. He knocked on the doors.

A largely rotund individual hobbled to the door and peered out from the other side at Jon. He narrowed his already narrow eyes and shook his head. “Closed” he mouthed.

Jon shook his head back at the docent and thrust a pointed finger at the Hall, and gave him an imploring look. The fat little man disappeared and returned a few seconds later with what looked like a piece of paper with a seal on it, and from what Jon could tell through the distorted glass, it was a permission document. The docent seemed to know Jon had no such authorization in a few seconds because he didn’t wait for a response, but walked away in the opposite direction. Jon knocked again -- much more forcefully and quickly this time. The docent did not return. However, the glass doors were just that -- glass. They didn’t seem to have a protective field or anything. After all, only royalty, wait staff, and maybe some Councilors would have access to a chamber of this kind in the castle. Perhaps a bit of force at this crucial moment would be okay. The full force of the Phoenix Amulet might be overkill, but if Jon could control the torch like he did the flames back at Oak Tree Manor, this could just work. He knocked on the doors one final time. Again, nothing.

“Okay,” Jon said aloud to the torch. He put the Amulet in between his hand and the torch handle, and clasped his hands together. He focused on the flame; he needed something that could cut through or melt glass. The torch itself would never be hot enough to do that, but condensed, it could be like a waterfall pushed through a straw. The swirling yellow, red, and orange began to slow down. The flames narrowed and came to a complete stop. Now a rust color, the torch had a long narrow bright shaft of frozen fire protruding from the wood. It looked more like a child’s toy than a deadly weapon.

Jon very slowly pointed the three-inch tip of the flame shaft to one of the panes of glass in the door level with his shoulder. He brought it to within millimeters of the glass, but the effect was clear -- the glass pane began to ripple outward from the tip of the torch.

Jon brought it back away from the door in a swift motion.

“Last chance!” he yelled through the door. The docent was clearly ignoring him now. After a deep breath, Jon plunged the tip of the torch into the glass door. It began to liquefy on contact. With some difficulty, Jon moved the torch in a vertical line from where the double doors met in the middle to around a third of the way to the door jam. He then “drew” a line perpendicular to the first one down to the floor. Just a few inches before he hit the floor, Jon pulled the torch out of the door. Despite the outline of where glass used to be, the portion he cut stood straight and did not fall away. Jon stepped back a few paces then ran at the cut outline shoulder-first. Without realizing it, Jon used the same shoulder Ignus shot him at, and a dull pain throbbed through his shoulder. But the slab of glass gave, and crashed flat on the floor inside the Hall of Records with Jon on top of it. It didn’t shatter, but when it broke free of the larger glass and hit the ground, it made a sound like it had indeed shattered. The torch burst back to life a few feet away between Jon and the doorway.

“Welcome, Jonathan Kenneth,” a flat female voice said.

“By the Crystal, what is going on?!” The fat docent finally seemed to care about Jon’s presence.

Jon lifted his head a few inches and saw the docent waddling over to him.

“How did you -- what have you -- ?!”

“You wouldn’t let me inside,” Jon said from the floor. He lifted himself up on his better arm and hoped the Amulet would heal his shoulder, again. Would that feature work if he hurt himself in his untransformed state? He wasn’t sure.

“VIRA, call security and have them come down here immediately.”

“Security relays to the castle guard have not yet been installed in this facility,” the computerized voice said.

“Who’s Vera?” Jon said, standing again.

“Vocal Interface Recognition Array. I’ll have to detain you myself, then.” The docent rushed (as much as he could) to a side paneling in the wall -- presumably to retrieve a weapon.

Jon intercepted him in two running strides. He held the Amulet at the docent.

“Probably not a good idea.”

The docent stopped dead, eyes fixed on the Amulet. “I knew I recognized you.”

“The feeling’s not mutual. Step aside.”

“Absolutely not! You’re a murderer and I’ll fight you if I have to.”

Jon had to give the guy credit. He had guts.

“I don’t want to fight you, or anyone else for that matter. I need to find someone, that’s all.”

The fat man scoffed. “So you can kill someone else? Over my dead body. This facility is far too dangerous for the likes of you.” Under his long billowing robe, Jon swore he could see slight movement -- he was already making a plan to escape, or attack. In any case, he was just buying time by talking to Jon. Out of the corner of his eye, Jon saw the torch, burning happily on the ground, discoloring the marble under it. With his eyes trained hard on the docent, Jon squinted and concentrated on the flame and willed it to grow.

Now he was completely confident he could do it. There was no guesswork or doubt any longer. The Amulet grew warm in his hand, and the flame to Jon’s right crept along the ground as if lighter fluid was pulling it toward Jon and the docent. Jon moved toward the docent and the docent moved back, obviously this time, toward the fire without seeing it. The docent was careful to maintain a six-foot gap between the two of them. Jon feigned a lunge at him, and the large man stumbled backward four paces but didn’t fall down. It was then he saw the trickling fire line separating him from Jon and the interior of the Hall of Records. His eyes widened and he yelled, but he also stopped dead in his tracks, head swinging wildly at the floors.

Jon seized the moment and whipped his gaze at the growing fire. The slow trickle became a torrent, and within five seconds, Jon had a complete line of fire from the torch to around the docent and finally connecting at the wall. Jon was blocked in. Or, rather, the docent was blocked out. The only other space the docent could move was outside the Hall of Records -- exactly as Jon wanted it. The flames danced about the marble, mocking the poor docent, who for a second looked like he wanted to jump over the three-inch tall flames. Jon knew he might try, so he lifted his chin up to the ceiling with a snap, and the small fire line exploded into a ten-foot high blaze. As the flames shot upward, Jon felt an incredible surge of power that gave him chills. He then took a deep breath to calm himself down, but kept his eyes on the firewall. Standing only a few feet from the perimeter, he could feel the warmth from his flames. It didn’t feel hot at all to Jon, just very warm and inviting.

Gripping the Amulet tightly, Jon stepped right up to the warm flames and stood for a second. For some reason, he felt like he could walk through it without any problems. He did need to discover if the docent was still there -- he’d lose control over the fire if he stopped concentrating on it and it could go out completely. But either way, he needed to know if he was going to be disturbed by anyone while he searched. He put his hand right to the fire. Not only was he not burned, but the flames actually bent toward his fingertips, as if attracted by some unseen force. He put his palm parallel to the fire and let the warmth take him. It was an icy-cold liquid-like sensation. It didn’t burn, but felt like it should. He thrust his head through, and opened his eyes on the other side; it felt as if Jon’s head was immersed in a warm shower coming from the ground and the water was a quarter of the weight of normal water. But the docent was gone. Jon put his other hand level with his left and the fire was sucked back into the Amulet in the blink of an eye. Silence ensued.

Jon let out a long breath. “That’s that.”

The air cooled around him, and the power swell subsided. He almost wished it would return -- but he had work to do. He finally saw the Hall of Records properly for the first time. It was unlike the other rooms in the castle by far. Everywhere else inside the castle looked like an ornate European mélange of styles and furnishings from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, complete with overstuffed and oversized furniture and elegant floors with clean lines. Stepping into the Hall of Records from the castle, however, was like walking from a room in Windsor castle to a briefing room in the Pentagon. The blue marble floor was the only castle-like quality to it. The walls stretched up to the ceiling at least twenty-five feet tall, and the room itself must have been the size of a small airplane hangar.

A few feet from where Jon stood, the floor dropped off from a balcony in the direct middle of the room. The most stunning feature of the hall was a curved, Plexiglas paneling that stood a few feet from the walls, angled like a concave vanity mirror from the floor to the ceiling. Tiny bits of textual data scrolled across the clear panel in different bold colors, arranging, rearranging, and appearing and disappearing entirely. The only light in the room came from the panels themselves, and there was something else out of the ordinary that Jon noticed. There were no books, no papers, not even a desk aside from the large Plexiglas paneling and a few small folio sized objects sitting on the balcony banister. This was the Hall of Records?

Jon approached the inside balcony. The railings were made of the same blue marble. He rested his hands on the cool surface and peered over the edge onto the Plexiglas. “Norma Gei, Charelston Derris, Marguerite Waters -- Seventh District; Thomas Arille -- Central District” and on and on. Then it hit Jon -- this was a giant computerized record of everyone in the continent. And it had actually spoken to Jon when he first crashed into the Hall. What was its name again? It had voice recognition. The docent had spoken to it, and interacted with the voice.

“Anita?”

Silence.

“Donna...?”

Stillness.

“Wait, voice -- recognition...something.” He put the letters together. “V-R... VERA.”

Jon heard a delicate chime from somewhere in the room. It seemed to come from everywhere at once.

“Um, what do you do, VIRA?”

“I am the Verbal Interface Recognition Array. I am a voice-command system which allows users to vocally search and retrieve information from a database in this facility.”

“Neat.” This time Jon recognized the voice as the same one he heard when he accidentally attacked the Prime Minister.

“My program is also equipped with instructional algorithms to send and receive commands. This program will be extended throughout the castle in the coming months to achieve a smooth interface of --”

“Thank you, VIRA,” Jon interrupted the computer. Right now he wasn’t interested in VIRA’S mission statement. “I need to find a Mage.”

VIRA chimed again. “Adult or youth?”

Jon thought for a moment. He’d probably be cutting his chances by a quarter, but he needed someone with experience. “Adult.”

“Male or female?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

All the text in the Plexiglas screen retreated radially from the center in less than half a second, and it was replaced by a dizzying array of scrolling names. They moved so fast Jon could make out none of them.

After about five seconds, VIRA seemed to have finished her search. She chimed. “One entry found.” The screen changed to an entry of a person.

“What?” Jon’s stomach turned. Only one person? The display on the screen was of an elderly gentleman with a baldhead and long wiry grey hair growing from the sides and back. He looked about as friendly as a nail gun. His name was Fic Stenton, and there was one saving grace to the entry -- his location was in the Shoreblue District near the city walls. Jon had been hoping to maybe find some way to speak to a Temporal Mage if he found one. Now he could probably meet with one in person. Even if it was Fic Stenton.

“VIRA, can I get ... some sort of printout of this record?”

“Acknowledged. Printing.”

Jon barely heard it, but out from a tiny slit in the wall just above the railing on one end of the wall printed a thin slip of paper that landed neatly on the stone. Jon picked up the smooth snow-white sheet, folded it and put it in his pocket. It had all the information he needed to find Fic. Jon thought he should probably get going (the fat docent could, after all, have reached security by now, and that imposing opaque shielding could return, and Jon would be trapped -- again), but something intrigued him about how the database worked. He couldn’t leave, not just yet.

“VIRA, can you show me a map of Iannis?”

The computer chimed, and Fic’s record shrunk to the size of nothing and a full color and physical map of Iannis appeared.

“Awesome,” Jon breathed. “Can you zoom in on Norea?”

As if a great magnifying glass was placed in front of the eastern coast, Norea was magnified and filled two thirds of the screen like a satellite image. “Show me the two Onyx Guild members making their way toward Norea.” The map zoomed out a bit, and a few miles from the city walls were two blinking dots. “And now show all other Guild members in the Norean lands.” Numerous other names appeared clustered together -- there were at least a hundred or more. Jon frowned. “Show Norea’s forces.” The map zoomed back out again, and instantly there was a rainbow of pinprick dots splashed on the map. Many of the green and blue colored dots were out of the city perimeters, while still dozens in differing colors remained within the walls.

Jon frowned even harder. The Guild members were not that far from the city, perhaps two miles at most. Why didn’t Jotea just deploy a hundred of those flying scooters to intercept them three hours ago? Surely they could have taken down a few dozen people.

A yelling man pierced the calm silence of the Hall. His yells were echoing down the stairs.

“Broke the doors down. BROKE the doors, I tell you!”

Uh oh. The docent had found security. There was nowhere in this room for Jon to run. Jon looked around, but the only place he could hide was over the balcony railing on the lower level of the room...ten fifteen feet down. A broken leg did not sound terribly appealing at the moment, so Jon held onto the Amulet tightly, and if necessary, he could fight his way out.

Wobbling down the last several stairs, the docent pointed at Jon, and a pair of legs was behind him, still obstructed from view. Once the guard reached the landing and stepped into the light, Jon recognized the face. It was Ray, dressed as a castle guard. She was pretending to look stern.

“Him! Right there!” His arm jiggled as he thrust his finger at Jon.

“Show me where he drew fire,” said Ray, pointing the blaster at Jon.

“There, just along here...” he pointed at a scorch mark along the floor.

Ray was still looking directly at Jon, shook her head and smiled at him from behind the docent. “Oh really? Right there, you say?”

“Yes, yes,” he was still doubled over, pointing at the burn marks on the floor. “Now arrest him.” He got up and faced Ray.

Ray looked at and pointed the gun at the docent. “Instantly.” Pfzzt. A stream of blue light hit the docent square in the chest. After gasping, he tumbled down to the floor. Oddly, he didn’t seem that much shorter in a heap on the floor than he did standing up.

“Why didn’t you just stun him up here?” said Jon as they hurried out of the Hall of Records and stopped at the foot of the main staircase.

“Two reasons. First, I didn’t want to have to hide another immobile person.”

“Then?”

“Second...do you want to move him?”

“Good point. How’d you get back down here so quickly?”

“I ran into Fauntyle on the third floor and he told me she was in her study. Took me a second to figure out that meant that room she took us to our first day here a few weeks ago. So I came back down, then I heard him,” she jerked her head in the docent’s direction. ” And he was screaming like... well, me, and changed my clothes.”

Jon gave a small laugh. “You changed that quickly?”

“Not changed like that. Changed changed.”

Ray held out her arms to her side and closed her eyes. She writhed again and the jumpsuit fought its way back on top of the fake clothes she had imitated.

“Right. I should have known.”

Ray took a look around the room at the long burn mark on the floor and broken hunk of glass on the floor. “Nice.”

“Thanks. So...the Prime Minister’s okay?”

“Oh yeah. He was running around the third floor like a crazy person. I doubt he’s hurt anymore.”

Finally, Jon had a reprieve. It felt like a few pebbles were taken off Jon’s boulder-sized guilt resting on his shoulders. At least one of them was okay. But now he felt tugged in two different directions -- he desperately needed, and wanted, to see Jotea. He also only had a few hours left to speak to Fic to take advantage of the one thing that could overpower Ignus. But Ray could talk to Jotea and tell her what she needed to know. Jon needed to find and speak to Fic Stenton face to face. Otherwise, it would be a waste of time.

Ray squinted at Jon. “I know you wanna see your girlfriend.”

“Yeah, I do.”

“But....”

“But she’ll probably still be here when I get back from talking to that guy I need to talk to.”

“Whereas....”

If I see Jotea now, I might not make it in time.”

“And...”

“You could probably tell Jotea everything she needs to know,” Jon said sadly.

“So...”

“I need to leave. Now.”

“Right. So go.”

“Right. Lovely chat we had.” Jon couldn’t help but smile.

“Thought you’d never let me talk,” said Ray.

“I thought that’s all you ever --”

“Shut up.” She jabbed him in the arm. “Go. I’ll find the psychic.”

Jon took a breath. “Thanks, Ray.”

“I know. You so owe me for this. You know how tired I am?” She turned left for the Foyer.

“Yeah, you look it.”

“Don’t start!” she yelled back at him without looking.

Jon took a few steps toward the main door, but stopped in his tracks. A quick impulse struck him, and he jogged back toward the sunken staircase, bounded down the stairs, and back into the Hall of Records. The docent must have gotten up and left because he was gone.

“Welcome, Jonathan Kenneth,” VIRA said placidly.

“VIRA,” Jon commanded, moving to the huge glass screen. “Show me where Ignus is.”

The Iannis map appeared briefly, then zoomed in on the space labeled “The Frost.” Ignus was moving with several dozen dots away from Zorthin. “Time to intercept?”

“Approximately five hours.”

“Five hours,” Jon repeated. “Thank you, VIRA. Something tells me I’ll be talking to you again.”

Jon left the Hall of Records, and took to the stairs two at a time. He’d run the whole way to Shoreblue and back again if that’s what it took to get to Fic and back again in time.