The Thief

know the prophecies. Born of absolute power and nothingness.” He laughs, and it echoes bitter around the atrium. “That’s your girl. The monster to end all monsters. If she’d been mine - if she’d actually been mine - none of this would be happening right now. Kyra would never have left me. So I’d never have taken that mirror from Gabriel Katsura, and he wouldn’t have needed to move his pet Wolf into your range. The Ender wouldn’t have followed them here. And I wouldn’t have had to bring Charlotte into this.” He kisses her on the forehead but his grin is cruel.

She pushes him away, aghast and trembling. “Simon!”

“Everything that’s happening,” Simon states, focused on me, “is your fault. I want you to remember, when you look at the ruin I’m going to make of your life, that you ruined mine first.”

“Simon - ” I protest, but the windows by the doors begin to melt, the glass peeling away and twisting into jagged shapes that hang in the air. They float around him, an airborne barrier of crystalline knives.

“Has my mother told you where my father’s mirror is, yet?” he asks, advancing. “His masterwork. The one that goes In Between.” The glass knives twirl around him. “Give me the mirror and maybe I’ll go quietly.”

I back up, an arm out to shield Charlotte. Good god, she’s carrying his child, is he insane? I reach for the part of me that keeps my students in check, but it’s unchanged. The same ever-present heaviness I’ve felt since I was small. The heaviness that had unknowingly kept Simon from his true strength - from the part of him that had no place on this side of the mirror.

He chuckles at my confusion. “I’ve been building up an immunity to undisciplined Tailors for years,” he snarls, saying the name like a curse. “You’ll need better training if you want to compete with the likes of me. Now let’s see,” he says, withdrawing a handmirror rimmed in silver vines from the interior of his coat. “Where is your lovely daughter?”

Jul

My mouth was cool as Gabriel suddenly took his hand away, reaching inside his jacket. He pulled out a vial and hurled it over the banister. It shattered on the floor at my fa- at Simon’s feet, furling sickly yellow smoke. The three of them coughed, collapsing unconscious. Simon’s glass barrier clattered lifeless to the floor.

“Was that a spell?” I asked.

“Or science,” he said. “Depends on who you ask. I doubt when Charlotte gave it to me that she expected she’d be on the receiving end,” he said, descending the stairs swiftly.

I followed, my steps tentative.

“I’ll have that back...” Gabriel picked up the handmirror from Simon’s grip and tucked it inside his own jacket. Then he pulled a small scroll of paper from another interior pocket. He put it in Tailor’s hand, curling his slack fingers around it.

“If only that were enough...” he murmured.

I looked down at the two men on the ground. Even unconscious, Dad - Simon - looked haunted, hand outstretched for something that wasn’t there. Tailor’s glasses had slid down his nose, showing long eyelashes that I’d seen in my own mirror. So he really hadn’t known, after all. So I was a mistake he’d made. Born of absolute power and nothingness. What had Dad meant by that?

“You said you wanted to help Camille,” Gabriel said, looking toward the hall that led to the gymnasium. She’d be in there now, warming up for the exhibition match. “How far are you willing to go?”

“What do you mean?”

“She is the Wolf,” he said, and I gasped. “The one Meredith has come to destroy. But we can’t use the Tailor’s Sword on Meredith without exposing Camille to the full brunt of her own powers. She would be lost. There is, however, another way to neutralize Meredith,” he said, his black hair swinging around his face as he turned to me sharply. “I wasn’t quite sure how to reach it, until just now. A weapon, hidden inside a mirror. I think you know the one I mean. We have to get there before Simon. Camille will never be safe as long as Meredith runs loose - and no one will be safe if Simon claims that mirror.”

Bea had said never to show anyone that mirror. But if Simon wasn’t my father, then Bea wasn’t my grandmother. Not really. My heart constricted. What did I owe her, really? Maybe she’d vowed to hide it, but saving my friend was more important than some dusty old promise.

Guilt flared up like a warning sign. Bea had helped me. Helped all of us, even Camille, despite her distrust of Gabriel. But the thought of Meredith reaching Camille...of finding her a pile of ashes, when I could have saved her...

“It’s just finding a weapon?” I asked.

“In and out,” Gabriel said. “No need to be In Between any longer than we have to.” He seemed nervous, somehow. Reluctant. It sealed my decision.

“Okay,” I said, looking down at Tailor. “For Camille.”

“Lead the way,” Gabriel said.

The monster to end all monsters, Dad had said. That was just his jealousy talking...right?

The sky was bright over Bea’s house as Gabriel pulled his weathered car into the driveway. Smoke billowed up from the chimney, and bursts of flame spit up, threatening to catch the roof.

“What on earth...?” I wondered.

“So it’s here after all,” Gabriel said grimly. “I was so sure it was at the school. I underestimated her paranoia.”

“What’s here?”

“Beatrix thinks she can contain the uncontainable,” he said. “Hurry, we need to rectify her mistake before the house goes up in flames.” He exited the car swiftly. I followed, and we entered the house.

He immediately made for the tearoom, inspecting the wall with the bookshelves. “There used to be a door to the basement here,” he said, pulling books out of the way. His eyes caught on the chesspiece bookend. “The queen, is it?” He twisted it, and there was a grinding sound as the shelf slid back. He made an appreciative noise, looking at the steps that appeared at his feet. “She’s been quite busy in the last decade,” he said.

The computer monitor showed a figure wreathed in fire in a room made of stone.

“Clever girl,” Gabriel said, staring at the screen. “Clever, and also very stupid.”

He picked up a headset and put it on. “Meredith?” he called. “Meredith, can you hear me?”

The flames dwindled, leaving the image much darker. A bedraggled woman in charred, stained leather looked up curiously.

“Who’s there?” she demanded.

Gabriel cast me a brief look and answered, “An old friend. Give me a moment and I’ll have you out of there.”

“Let her out?” I exclaimed. “Are you crazy?”

“Look at her,” he said, setting down the headset. “Do you see those walls?” The marble slabs that formed her prison still glowed from the firestorm she’d been brewing moments ago. The smoldering stubs of what used to be cage bars dotted the floor around her. “Your grandmother is clever, but she doesn’t know Meredith like I do. The prison is already melting, if the roof doesn’t catch first. The stone will keep her at bay for maybe another hour, and when she gets out... Have you ever seen hellfire with a temper?” He descended the steps swiftly, and I followed.

“You said she wants to kill Camille,” I said. “How does letting her out help anything?”

“Your house will remain intact, for one. I can direct her where I want her to go, for another. I’ve got a much better temporary solution lined up, one that if executed properly, will prevent her from harming Camille for the near future. And while that’s in place, you and I can unearth a permanent solution In Between.”

At the base of the steps was a heavy stone door, and a keypad recessed into the wall. Gabriel approached it, inspecting its design.

“Five letters...oh, Beatrix,” he chuckled. He punched a code into the keypad. SOREN. “Paranoid, but sentimental,” he said, and pressed enter. A noise of denial came from the pad. Blinking in surprise, Gabriel glanced back at the chesspiece that had opened the door and immediately punched in GAVIN. The light turned green.