“No,” Olivia confirmed. “You are the only one I trust with my health.”
“Good.” Montague breathed out a sigh of relief. He closed his eyes and dropped his head, then continued, “Burton wrote passages throughout the original document. They can be the key to discovering what the Nekrums want with the children.”
“Those poor, innocent children, they’re probably scared to death,” Olivia said.
“Don’t worry. We’ll find him,” said Montague.
For a reason Olivia couldn’t explain, his words fell short of comforting her.
“The diary!” she suddenly said. “Before you came here, you saw Demitri at the library?”
“Yes,” Montague said. “But I assure you, the contents are safe.”
“Safe? If Demitri is the host, he knows the diary holds great knowledge. You said that retrieving the divine history of Naan chronicled in Gabriel’s Dairy was important to the enemy. They want to remove the information from us.”
“My queen, trust me.”
Olivia couldn’t understand why Montague was so calm. “I must see it for myself.”
Montague silently led her to his chambers below the library. And when they arrived, the diary, like Montague had said so certainly, was safe, sitting on its glowing pedestal.
“It doesn’t make sense. Why wouldn’t he try to take it?” Olivia asked.
“The diary has a protective spell cast upon it. It repels copper. And even if he could take it, the Nekrums can’t read angelic writing. Unable to access the information, the diary is useless without my translations,” Montague said.
“A spell…cast by Burton Lang?” Olivia asked.
The ex-farmer had confessed to her that he was taught by the infamous mage who had been exiled from the kingdoms years ago. “Yes,” he said.
“And where are your translations?”
Montague pulled out three scrolls from his robe. “Let me assure you, my queen. My work is safe. I never let it out of my sight.”
Olivia took a breath.
Montague continued, “My sensei told me that he had one last card against the enemy. That card is hidden in the diary. As soon as I return with Alexandal, I will find it. It is my mission. But first we must interrogate Demitri.”
Even though her confidence in Demitri, the headmaster of science, was shattered, she still trusted Montague with her life.
“Bring him here to me,” she said.
“Your highness,” a maid interrupted, entering the room. A small boy behind her stepped in from the doorway with the queen’s personal handmaid, Gretchen, by his side. He wore a glum expression and held a gnarled travel bag close to his chest.
“Indrid Cole of Grale is here,” said Gretchen.
Against his will, Demitri Von Cobb painted his face with the blood of the Faux Tower guards. He’d slaughtered them all. Through his own eyes he’d watched himself spear them like fish and rip them apart with his bare hands as if he possessed the strength of a giant. But he didn’t want to do any of it. His body moved as if controlled by another force while his mind was held prisoner in his subconscious, unable to operate his own vessel. Now, the scientist only existed as a thought form.
The energy Demitri felt coursing through him couldn’t be quantified by any equation he’d ever devised. He was sure of it. It defied natural law. This was the power that Burton had warned him about; a power so great its theory hung on the fringes of science. He was beginning to understand why Burton had been so strict with developing new discoveries.
The Ikarus headmaster walked around in circles in the cellar of the tower as a dry wind piled leaves under his feet. Demitri struggled to control himself. The voice that haunted him grew brassier, and its influence spread. He had asked this controlling force many times what it wanted with him, who it was, and what it was doing. But it never gave any answers, only commands. The voice was deep and harsh, with a wet gurgle layered underneath.
When the possession first happened, Demitri was able to reclaim his body every now and then when the force seemed to tire. But the longer he lived with this demon inside of him its control became stronger and stronger. It used visions to occupy his attention while it controlled him. A scene of his wife standing in a field of flowers would emerge from the darkness of his mind. Their relationship had been wonderful once. But his unfaithful behavior since they lost their five-year-old child made him feel guilty. Secret affairs had eased his pain. He had tried to reconnect with his wife for years after, but she turned him away at every attempt, blaming him for not knowing how to save their sick son, who suffered from an unusual, bacterial infection.
Although he shed no tears, he wept inside. The only way to cope with losing his son had been through science. So he’d buried himself in his studies so much, he vanished from her life. She’d almost forgotten who he was.
Demitri’s life had taken a strange turn back in the heart of Illyrium’s royal gardens. The little marble that farmer Paddett had dropped glistened and stared right through him, calling his name. The moment his eyes had met the strange sphere, Demitri couldn’t move. He’d heard a muffled voice chanting whispers in his head. Take me, the voice had said, dripping with seduction. Touch me. His curiosity had been so great it overrode his primal instinct to run. Instead, he’d picked up the marble and cupped it, staring deep into a white mist swirling through a sea of blackness. When it had blistered his skin, the pain was excruciating. Demitri remembered shaking his hand furiously, in a panic, but the marble had melted into his palm. It had boiled down into a liquid that seeped through his pores. He’d felt his mind being pushed aside as something else took control of his motor functions. He’d seen the image of a dark face gliding past him, smirking as it took the helm of
