Meet me in the forest,
I’ll be cloaked in black,
Hiding in the shadows while you sing.
Meet me in the forest,
You’re never coming back,
Locked away without your precious wings.
—Poem written by Randall Wiggins, age seven
PRESIDENT TURNER IS STILL NOT AWAKE.
It’s been forty-three minutes since the Sire fled. Headmaster Sykes and Director Sandhar are by his side in his bedroom, waiting for him to finally open his eyes. Agent Horowitz has shipped the five captured Dragon Knights back to the bureau with other agents.
I’ve refused to leave until I know President Turner’s okay. I’m sitting in his living room with Agent Horowitz, who now busies herself with a luxury-car magazine. For a woman who’s just kicked major ass, she’s so put together and relaxed, even though her hair’s a bit ruffled and her dress could use a good ironing. She’s the one who told me about Manny. He’d called Director Sandhar the minute I left the Compound. Headmaster Sykes has apologized for not alerting them, but considering his husband’s life was in danger, Director Sandhar let it slide.
“What are you thinking?” Agent Horowitz says, never looking up from her magazine.
“Not much. Just want to know how he’s holding up.”
“Me, too. Hang in there.” She flips the page. “You did amazing, by the way.”
“What? I didn’t do anything.”
“You were calm under pressure. You didn’t endanger yourself or anyone else by acting recklessly. I could see you through the walls. The X-Ray Charm let me witness everything in the building before I Transported inside. Nirek and I are pleased with your poise.”
“Pfft. You’re a force to be reckoned with. Those Dragon Knights will be sore for weeks.”
She giggles. “Let’s hope so.”
Director Sandhar drags his feet into the living room. He’s clutching a sheet of paper as he sinks into the sofa across from me.
I shoot out of my seat. “Is the president awake?”
“Yes. Drained of energy but stable.” Director Sandhar offers me the paper he’s holding. “He just wrote this for you.”
I snatch the paper and read it at once:
It’s an honor to address you all today. In the wake of recent events, I’ve asked my friend and mentor, President Russell Turner, to let me use my voice for good. To unite our Blazewrath family before one of us shatters what’s left of it. This isn’t the time to stand against one another. This is the time to put our faith in those who seek to protect us. Today I wish to express my complete loyalty to the International Blazewrath Federation. I wish to offer my sincerest gratitude to the heroes in the Department of Magical Investigations. And most important, today I denounce those who doubt and oppose these great groups of people, who all are working tirelessly to ensure our safety. Resistance isn’t the answer. Canceling the Cup isn’t the answer. I don’t believe in bending to the will of a terrorist. I believe in the people who strive to see his reign of terror end once and for all.
The threats posed against our world will be stopped, but if we don’t support the ones risking their lives for us all, we’re giving the Sire what he wants. Support the men and women in badges. Support the men and women of the IBF, as well. Don’t waste your breath on hate, for it accomplishes nothing. Thank you, and I wish you all a blessed day.
I sink back into my seat. This is my speech for tomorrow morning. Nothing in this message feels like me. Well, I do support the IBF and the bureau, but not in this super-fanatical way. I crinkle the paper into a ball. With a harsh shove, it gets buried inside my pants’ pocket.
“The press conference is scheduled for eight in the morning, Dubai time,” says a deflated Director Sandhar. “You have to give your speech in front of protesters. Do you have any questions?”
I need some good news before I smash something. “Did President Turner manage to track the Sire tonight?”
“No. Since he was unconscious, he couldn’t use the curse to his advantage in time. We’re hoping to try tracking him again when the president is feeling stronger.”
I’m dying to unleash a flurry of swear words. This is a lot of pressure on President Turner. And he can only locate one of the bad guys. Granted, it’s the Big Bad, but his lapdogs would still be free. There’s nothing the president can do to find Takeshi, much less Randall.
“Director,” I ask, “who really is the boy named Randall?”
He grows a sickly shade of pale within seconds. He’s fidgeting, too. His discomfort makes me uncomfortable, but I don’t regret asking him. It’s time I got my answer.
“I’m afraid we can’t discuss that at this time,” a soft-spoken Agent Horowitz says.
“And when would be a good time? Should I make an appointment?” I turn to Director Sandhar again. “I know he’s not your son. My best friend told me about Hari’s passing, and as sorry as I am for your loss, I also deserve to understand why the hell that vampire wannabe keeps calling you ‘Dad.’ Especially since he’s working for the dragon who’s trying to manipulate me.”
Director Sandhar whispers, “You know about Hari?”
If he’s trying to make me feel bad, it’s not working. “Yeah. Now who’s Randall?”
“Lana. Enough.” A blizzard would be warmer than Agent Horowitz’s tone.
“She’s right, Sienna … She’s right …” Director Sandhar sits back, inhaling like it’s his absolute last breath. “Randall Wiggins was born nineteen years ago in Ravensworth Penitentiary. He’s the son of inmate Grace Wiggins. Are you familiar with her?”
“Edward Barnes’s last arrest before his death,” I say.
“Yes. Her arrival to the prison was rather uneventful, but after a standard physical evaluation three months later, it was discovered that Grace Wiggins was pregnant.”
So he really isn’t Randall’s father. Good. “Why wasn’t her pregnancy ever on the news?”
“Because of the circumstances surrounding it. Despite being imprisoned for three months, Grace’s pregnancy was six days old. She’d been locked in solitary at all times, except for medical evaluations. She wasn’t allowed visitors. Her child’s conception remains a mystery.”
Okay. Weird. “Did you do a DNA test on Randall after his birth?”
Director Sandhar lowers his head. “He has no traces of his father’s genetic makeup. He has only his mother’s. Randall was born a Gold Wand wizard from a Regular’s womb.”
That’s impossible. Regulars can’t have magical children unless they mate with a wizard or a witch. I don’t know which is scarier: the fact that Randall appears not to have been fathered by anyone or that he was born a Gold Wand instead of leveling up like the rest of his kind.
“So … why does he keep calling you ‘Dad’?”
Director Sandhar is even paler than he was a few minutes ago. “We waited six weeks before bringing him to the department. Our mission was to study him. Randall was kept in a sealed chamber, watched and cared for at all times. Our previous director assigned me to the case. The other agents in charge of Randall’s care and observation would hand me notes on his progress, from crawling to walking to talking in full sentences, and I’d sign on the dotted line to ensure the work was being done. For six years, this went on without a hitch.”
My jaw falls. “You kept him locked up for six years?”
Director Sandhar nods to Agent Horowitz. “Show her.”
Agent Horowitz pulls out her Recorder. She activates it with her voice. “Access granted.” Instead of breaking apart, the Recorder’s shards become a screen.
A six-year-old Randall is in a white room. There’s no furniture except the metal chair he’s sitting on. There are dark circles under his eyes. Despite his angelic face, he’s giving the camera the kind of look that suggests he’d like to pour flesh-eating acid on whoever crosses him.
“When is my dad coming home?” he asks someone off camera.
“Your dad?” a woman answers him. “Who’s your dad, Randall?”
“The man who brings me flowers.”
A beat, then the woman says, “Randall, no one brings you flowers.”
“My dad brings me flowers. He leaves them for me in the vase outside. I see him through the glass walls.”
There’s a sigh of disappointment, as if the female agent had been expecting Randall to confess something entirely different. “The man who changes the flowers after they’re dead?”
“Yes. He’s my dad.”
“No, Randall. That’s not your father. That’s Agent Sandhar.”
“Can I talk to him?”
“I’m sorry, Randall. You can’t.” The woman jots something down with a sharp pencil.
Randall watches her without blinking. Now it’s the look of someone skinning their victim alive, keeping them awake through the whole process, living for their screams.
A golden shimmer flashes in his eyes.
POP!
Blood splatters Randall’s shirt, the bottom of his chin. He doesn’t wipe it off.
The woman’s shrieks ring out across the chamber. There’s a loud thud, as if she’s fallen to the floor. Despite her agony, Randall is the epitome of inner peace.
“He performed such strong magic without a wand?” I whisper.
“Yes.” A squirming Agent Horowitz freezes the image on a bloody Randall. “He gouged her eyes out. She died before we could heal her.”
I have a sudden need to take five hundred showers. “Jesus Christ …”
“Our previous director didn’t want to punish Randall. Instead, he thought we could use him to our advantage,” Director Sandhar says. “Randall was supposed to be the bureau’s secret weapon. I opposed this plan, but I started visiting Randall at the director’s request. I’d stay with him for hours, playing with his action figures, talking about the world I thought he’d never see. Randall continued to call me his father. It didn’t matter how many times I corrected him. He stopped using his magic for terrible things … at least he did for the next ten years.”
This is wild. “He worked for you until he was sixteen?”
“He helped whenever he was needed. Most of the time, he tracked criminals and their lairs. He would design traps for them, too. Complicated, intricate traps built from the strongest Gold magic on record. Randall used to call them his ‘skullpits.’ Those were his specialty.”
“And when did he go full regalia against you all?”
He falls silent.
Then he tells Agent Horowitz, “Please show her the last day.”
She taps her Recorder twice, which makes the image warp into fast-forward. There are several glimpses of Sandhar and Randall together in the white chamber. Randall gets taller and less baby faced with each frame. The one constant is his smile. I see them coming and going from the chamber, probably to those secret missions and traps Randall helped the bureau with.
The footage stops on a sixteen-year-old Randall towering over Director Sandhar:
“Why are you abandoning me like this?! Why can’t I go with you?!”
“Randall, please stop yelling. I’m not abandoning you. This is just a brief trip. There are things I must take care of back in New Delhi. Like I said, I’ll be back in a few months.”
“You’re taking him, aren’t you? He gets to go with you while I rot here!”
Director Sandhar furrows his brow. “Whom are you talking about?”
“That stupid little boy!” Randall circles the chamber once, pulling at his hair, kicking at the walls. He’s in full-blown meltdown mode. “He’s the one you really love, isn’t he? You never cared about me! I’m just some weapon to you!” Randall turns his back on Director Sandhar. “You’re abandoning me because you don’t care!”
“Please calm down, Randall. Can you do that for me?” Director Sandhar retrieves his wand from his coat. He aims it at Randall’s back. “Everything will be all right.”
Randall whips around and looks at the wand. He screams out in blind rage.
The glass walls shatter into a storm of knives. Director Sandhar crumples onto the floor, losing his grip on his wand. The world around him is chaos.
The image fades to black.
“Randall broke out of the bureau,” says Director Sandhar. “Eleven agents lost their lives that night. When I regained consciousness, I wondered why he’d left me unharmed. Then I saw the missed calls from my wife.” He’s deep in thought. “Have you heard of Dragonshade?”
Papi’s taught me all about this. “That’s a poison, right?”
“It is. Do you know where it comes from?”
“It’s dragon’s blood. Sick dragon’s blood. Two Un-Bonded Fire Drakes had been fighting in England back in the 1800s. The one who lost sustained tons of bite wounds. One of the wounds got infected, creating a sort of self-destructing virus. The dragon died five days later. Its corpse is preserved in a British lab, but smugglers stole batches of its blood years ago.”
“The bureau recovered most of it,” says Director Sandhar. “A small portion fell into the hands of Grace Wiggins. She used Dragonshade to paralyze her victims. That’s how she was able to behead three witches without retaliation. Dragonshade strips magical beings of their abilities prior to killing them. Dragons die in five days. Humans last three. Randall had stolen a vial of Dragonshade from one of our evidence vaults. No one knew it was missing until he escaped. And they knew it because I told them.” He clears his throat as if he’s keeping tears at bay. “When I arrived home, my nine-year-old son, Hari, was lying on my living-room floor. He was paralyzed from multiple stab wounds. All were dripping with Dragonshade.”
His confession sends me spiraling. It was cruel of the bureau to keep Randall in captivity and use him as a weapon for sixteen years. What kind of law-abiding organization snatches a six-week-old baby from his mother and turns him into a soldier? Then I remember how Hari Sandhar is dead because of Randall. Dragonshade has no cure. It kills without haste. Randall chose to end a little boy’s life. He acted out of spite instead of running away in search of a better future.
“Did you have to end Hari’s suffering?” I ask.
Director Sandhar gives me a simple nod.
I’m as speechless as he is. His son never deserved to die like this, but Randall never deserved to live the way he lived, either. Somehow, though, I manage a soft, “I’m sorry.”
“Randall disappeared after that day. Completely off the grid for three years,” Agent Horowitz says. “He hadn’t been seen until the incident at Ciudad Juárez.”
And now I can’t unsee him.
Headmaster Sykes joins us with a tired smile. It doesn’t erase the deadness in his drooping eyes. His steps are snail slow, the floorboards creaking as he plods along. “Russell wants you all to know he’ll be at the press conference tomorrow morning.” He sits beside me. “He’s getting some much-needed rest, but he’s determined to stand at your side for what you must do, Ms. Torres. I’d also like to apologize for bringing you here under false pretenses.”
“Oh no, I understand. I would’ve done the same.”
“That doesn’t make it right,” the headmaster insists. “Please get home safely, Ms. Torres. Russell and I will see you at the press conference. Thank you for being here.”
After he hugs me goodbye, Agent Horowitz preps my Transport back to Dubai. I need to get out of this place drenched in nightmares. Deep down, I know it’s useless. Tomorrow I won’t just belong to the monsters.
I will become one of them.