WHEN I OPEN my eyes the next morning, Lamont is sitting on the floor of my room, reading one of my Shadow magazines. My head feels sore and scrambled.
Lamont looks up. “Are you okay?”
I don’t know how to answer. What do you say to somebody the morning after he’s reached into the depths of your brain? But now I understand a few things for sure: Lamont Cranston is real. The Shadow is real. And they’re the same man. And he hasn’t just been around for a hundred and fifty years. He’s been around for ten thousand years!
“I’m sorry,” says Lamont. “I know that was a lot to absorb. But it would have taken me all night to explain it. This was way more efficient.”
“Ten thousand years?” I ask. That’s how much history I have crammed in my head right now.
“These powers have existed even longer than that,” says Lamont.
“But why did you get them?” I ask.
“I worked for them,” says Lamont.
“In Mongolia,” I say.
“Correct,” says Lamont. “The Kharkhorin valley.”
“The Kagyu monks!” I blurt out. This is insane! How do I suddenly know all this stuff? This was definitely not from the radio show.
“My parents raised me,” says Lamont. “But the monks trained me. Martial arts. Invisibility. Everything. But there was another student there at the same time. A better student. An orphan from the mountains.”
“Shiwan Khan,” I say. There’s no doubt. I know I’m right.
Lamont nods. He puts the magazine down. He looks worried, like there’s a new weight on him.
“And now he’s here,” Lamont says.
“What do you mean, ‘he’s here’?”
“Khan. He’s here. He’s in the city right now.”
“Where?” I ask. I’m picturing some dark, mysterious cave. Lamont nods toward the window, looking north.
“He’s living in my house.”
It takes me a couple of seconds to put it together.
“Your house? Wait. You mean Nal Gismonde is Shiwan Khan?”
“One and the same,” says Lamont.
Suddenly Grandma pops her head through the curtain in my doorway.
“Enough gabbing, you two! Time for breakfast!”