Classes started up again when the rest of the students returned from their expeditions at the beginning of March. It was actually nice to have everyone back. Every day there was news from Simeria, reports of the terrible things the Indorustans had done to the Simerians who were fighting them. A bunch of ADR agents came to the school and gave a presentation to the students about joining the Explorers-in-Training Academy Corps, an elite group of students who would be trained and ready to join the military when they turned eighteen. Within a few weeks, fifteen or so students, including Lazlo and Jack, had joined. They marched endlessly around campus in their blue uniforms. Maggie had tried to recruit Zander, telling him he would be officer material when he was old enough to join, but he said he wanted to wait.
Sukey didn’t have any choice. Her flying squadron was automatically enlisted in the Academy Corps and she was off nearly every night, training and studying. I hardly saw her. When she had free time, she spent it with Zander.
The snow started to melt in early April and we all thought winter was over. But just before Harrison Arnoz Day, an early spring snowstorm covered the already budding trees and green shoots of leaves with a delicate blanket of snow. Campus was already decorated for the awards ceremony, and the Harrison Arnoz Day Dance and all of the trees outside the Longhouse sparkled with tiny white lights, the chandeliers woven with blue-and-yellow paper chains.
I was trudging home through the snow very late that night when I heard a familiar rustle in the trees next to the path. I stopped, looked around, and then veered off, making my way into the thick trees by the moonlight, very close to the spot where he’d found me the first time.
“Hi,” I whispered, and then he was there, appearing suddenly from behind a tree as though it were the most natural place in the world to wait for someone. He was clean shaven now, dressed in desert khakis rather than his Explorer’s jacket and leggings.
“It looks like they’re getting ready for Harrison Arnoz Day,” he said. “The dance is always fun. Good food, you know.”
“Is that all you have to say?”
He laughed. “I’m very glad to see you alive, Kit. You had quite an adventure.”
I smiled in spite of myself. “Do you know what happened?”
“Most of it. The shipwreck. The oil.”
“We didn’t want to find the oil,” I said. “It was awful. Zander feels terrible about it.”
“But you did what you were meant to do? You found what your father wanted you to find?” He sounded like he was trying to keep the hopefulness out of his voice.
“Yes,” I said. “A map. Of the next place he wants me to go, though I’m not sure where it is yet.”
He smiled. “Good. That’s very good. I’m proud of you, Kit.”
“Don’t be too proud until I figure out what it is.”
“You will.”
“I did find something,” I told him. “A diary that belonged to a boy who was on Gianni Girafalco’s ship. It’s been in the library all this time. It belonged to Mr. Mountmorris. He must have donated it to the library without knowing what it was.”
He turned to look at me, his eyes wide in the moonlight.
“You recognized his name, didn’t you?” I continued. “The first time I mentioned it? Well, Girafalco was a member of the Mapmakers’ Guild. I know from the diary. This thing, whatever it is, has been going on for a long time. Now will you tell me about it?”
He hesitated. “You seem to be figuring it out pretty well on your own,” he said. Far away, we heard DeRosa’s dog bark once. He was on patrol. But the Explorer raised a hand and said, “It’s okay. I made sure they’d be occupied somewhere else tonight.”
“I want you to tell me. You owe me that.”
“Why don’t you tell me what you think you know.”
“There are maps,” I said. “Secret maps, of places that must be hidden at all costs. He codes them so they’ll be safe if they fall into the wrong hands. There’s some element that only I can figure out. He’s leaving them for us. For me. Like a treasure hunt. One leading to the next. And it all has something to do with this secret society of Explorers, the Mapmakers’ Guild.”
“Very good.” He smiled and the corners of his eyes crinkled. “You asked me if your father had been a member of the Mapmakers’ Guild. He was. I am too. And I believe you’re right about Gianni Girafalco. I don’t have time to explain everything, but do you know what a cell organization is?”
“No member of the organization knows everything. Each person only knows a little bit, so if someone’s caught, they can’t give away too much.”
“That’s right. In order to keep the whole organization safe, each member knows only about his or her own assignment.”
“John Beauregard’s was Ha’aftep Canyon,” I said, figuring it out as I said the words.
“That’s right.”
“What’s your assignment?”
“I’m kind of a special case. My special charge isn’t a place. It’s a person. You.”
“Me? Why?”
He hesitated. “At any one time, there are only a couple of members of the guild who know everything, who have all of the secrets. They’re called High Mapmakers. One of these was your father. So was Gianni Girafalco. The rest of the members are there to help the High Mapmaker, to help him or her keep the secret.”
I had suspected something like this, but now that I knew it, my head was swimming with questions.
The Explorer’s voice was so quiet I could barely hear him against the wind moving through the trees. “I’m not sure, but I suspect that your father is leading you to each of the maps, in turn, so that you will become one of the few, like Gianni Girafalco, like him, now that he is gone. I think something similar must have happened to him when he was your age.” We heard DeRosa’s shepherd bark again, closer this time. “I can’t stay. But I’ll be keeping track of you. As much as I can. Good luck, Kit.”
“Can’t you at least tell me your name?” I said.
He chuckled. “Seems fair enough. Tell you what, you can call me Marek.” He buttoned his jacket up around his chin and slipped away noiselessly into the trees.
The woods were cold and silent, the moonlight illuminating an endless stretch of snow and trees. I looked back once and then I hunched down into the collar of my vest and set off into the frigid air.