Chapter 26
Hide and Seek
"I applaud your bravery, child!" shrieked the ghost of the matron. "You arrived sooner than I expected. And I see some new faces. Allow me to introduce myself to them! I am the ghost of the matron that haunts this room."
"Yeah, yeah," Lily cut in, acting rather brazen. "You can drop the act. We all know you're not actually a ghost. Just give us back Tanja!"
The matron's ghost cackled again.
"How cheeky of you!" she said. "But you cannot fool me. I can smell the fear in you. You reek of it!"
Eddie lifted his arm up and sniffed under it while wondering aloud, "Did I forget to take a shower again?"
The others took a step away from him.
"Anyway," said the ghost while giving Eddie the skeleton's version of a side eye, "you wish to rescue the spying girl? In that case, you must complete my challenge."
"Figures it'd come to that," Lily mumbled under her breath. And then to the ghost, she asked, "And what is the challenge this time?"
"The challenge is simple," said the ghost. "I have hidden the spying girl somewhere in the school, in the dimension called the Blue World. You have until sunrise to find her. If you cannot find her in time, she will be lost to the mortal world forever!"
"So it's like a game of Hide and Seek, huh?" Lily said.
Oliver, however, was skeptical. "There's no way it can be that simple," he said. "I wouldn't put it past the Schemer to lay traps to get in our way."
"Smart boy," quipped the ghost. "You are correct, young detective. All throughout the school property and lairs of the Bluestone family are obstacles that you must overcome to move further ahead."
As if it wasn't going to be hard enough to find one person in a big place like the whole school, Lily silently complained to herself. But she wasn't surprised. It was just like the Schemer to try and make things as hard as possible for her.
But that doesn't matter, Lily thought. It didn't change what she had to do. She was determined to save Tanja, no matter what got in her way.
"Got it," she said. "Let's get this over with then."
Suddenly, a voice cut in, shouting, "Hold it! We're joining too!"
Lily and the others whirled around to see the whole library helper team standing at the door.
She couldn't contain her surprise and shouted, "What are you guys doing here? How did you guys get here?"
A bit smugly, Hassan replied, "Same way you did, of course! With magic!"
"We haven't been practicing magic all this time for nothing, you know," said Alejandro. "We're part of the Sapphire Society too, and it's about time we started acting like it."
"Besides," added Melody, "I still haven't paid you back for the favor you did for me. Now's a good time as any for that."
"You guys . . ." Lily was truly touched that they would go this far for her. But seeing them put themselves in danger for her sake was the last thing she wanted.
As if he read her mind, Oliver spoke up. "Lily, you can't shoulder everything yourself. And you're not going to dissuade us all from joining, so please just accept our helping hands."
Lily looked around her at everyone. She could see they were all determined to stick around no matter what she said and sighed.
"Fine," she said.
"Well, you heard all that, didn't you?" Viv said to the matron's ghost. "We're all joining this game of yours, and we won't take 'no' for an answer!"
"Fine by me," said the ghost. "It makes no difference how many of you there are. Just try and overcome my challenges if you can!"
With a wave of her bony hand, a circle of smoke appeared next to her with a hole within it that seemed to lead outside to the courtyard in front of the Castle, except everything outside was glowing blue.
The ghost gave a theatrical bow, hands gestured to the hole, and then said, "Now, please enter if you dare."
Everyone gave each other looks. Lily couldn't blame the others for being reluctant, this being their first time entering the Blue World. She hoped they would take this chance to back off. But to her disappointment, they didn't.
Alejandro was the first to step inside, followed closely by Melody, and then Hassan and George. Oliver went in next with Erin. After that were the Waller twins.
Once everyone else was through the hole in the circle of smoke, Lily gave the ghost one final look. The ghost stared back at her with her empty eye sockets.
"Yes?" she asked. "Do you have something to say?"
Lily shook her head and replied, "No." And then she stepped through the hole herself. Once on the other side, she found the others all gawking everywhere.
Oliver let out a low whistle as he looked up. "You weren't kidding how everything's blue here. It's as if I'm seeing everything through a pair of blue sunglasses."
Eddie stared at his own hand in wonder, going, "So weird."
Lily checked the time on her phone and then called out, "Come on. We don't have much time left. We need to find Tanja fast!"
"Got it," said Oliver. "We'll divide up into pairs. Eddie and Viv, you go that way. George and Alejandro, you guys search around that way. Melody, Erin and Hassan will look over there. Lily, you and I'll explore ahead. We'll meet back here when we're all done. Any questions, concerns, objections?"
There were none.
Oliver looked around, gave a satisfied nod and then reached out. One by one, each member of the Sapphire Society stacked their hands on top of one another.
"Okay," went Lily. "One . . . Two . . . Break!"
"Go Sapphire!"
Lily watched as they all went their separate ways, enduring a knot in her stomach as they disappeared out of sight. She was reluctant to tear her eyes away even after they were long gone.
"Don't worry," said Oliver. "They'll be fine."
"I hope so."
And then she followed Oliver down the road.
Eddie and Viv raced back to the dorms.
After reaching the lobby, Viv stopped and announced, "We'll split here."
Eddie asked, "You sure that's a good idea?"
Viv raised an eyebrow at her brother and replied, "Two words: girls' dorm."
"Split up, it is then."
So Eddie went by himself to the boys' dormitories while Viv went to the girls'. Viv headed straight up to Tanja's dorm room, thinking it'd be a good place to start looking. She had just reached Tanja's room door when suddenly - BAM! Brick walls dropped down from the ceiling at either side of the hallway and over all the doors, trapping her in. On the wall that covered Tanja's room door, words written in cursive and gold appeared that read:
"The only way out is through."
Viv softly read the words aloud and then quipped, "Well that's pretty straightforward."
She looked around and saw that the other brick walls had the same words on them in matching fancy, gold cursive.
A few months ago, she'd probably freak out, screaming her head off while thinking she'd be trapped in here forever. But now that she's learned a little bit of magic, there wasn't an ounce of fear in her. And she knew the perfect spell to get out of this trap. It was even one of her mother's favorites, according to her journal.
The magic spell was a simple one. All Viv had to do was speak the magic words while imagining all the magic energy in her veins flowing to her right hand. As soon as it started glowing a deep orange color, she balled her fingers into a fist, raised it behind her head and then swung, while screaming, "GIRL POWER!"
Viv wasn't sure why that last part was important, only that her mom's journal said it was absolutely needed.
As soon as her fist connected with the wall - BOOM! Not only the brick wall, but the door got blasted off, frame and all. Pieces of wood, stone and plaster were scattered all over the floor and bedding, along with a thick layer of dust. Some of the many computer monitors in the room had cracks on them, likely struck by flying debris. But Viv wasn't all that worried. She saw for herself that whatever happened in the Blue World had no effect on the real one, so she could break whatever she wanted here without getting into trouble.
"I should check out the spell books later to see if I can make a Blue World of my own," she thought aloud. "Seems like a good place to blow off some steam."
She stepped inside through the hole she made and took a look around. But she was disappointed to see nothing out of the ordinary.
With a frustrated sigh, she grumbled, "Looks like this place is a dud after all."
She was about to turn and leave when she suddenly heard a loud click noise, followed by a shrill creak. Viv spun around to see the closet door open and out tumbled a stuffed doll. It was a blue-furred tiger. Well, everything in this world was blue, so that was nothing weird. What was weird was how the closet door suddenly opened on its own.
Judging by the sound, the closet was definitely firmly shut. Something made that door handle turn before it opened.
"Which means that something, or someone, wants that doll found," Viv muttered to herself.
Slowly, and cautiously, she reached over and gave the doll a light poke. She waited a couple of seconds and when nothing happened, poked it again a few more times. Nothing happened still, so she picked the doll up by the nape of its neck and gave it a look over. There was really nothing out of the ordinary about it, but it may be a clue to finding Tanja. So Viv decided to take it with her, punched her way out of the bricked-off hallway and went back down to the lobby where she found her brother waiting for her.
"How'd it go?" she asked.
Eddie reported, "Got trapped in by a bunch of brick walls while looking around the second floor, but I got out easy."
"What'd you do?"
Very proudly, Eddie replied, "I melted them all with heat vision like Superman. What about you?"
"Same," said Viv. "Brick walls appeared out of nowhere, but it was when I went to visit Tanja's room. And I used Mom's favorite Girl Power Punch to get out of it. While I was looking around, this fell out of Tanja's closet."
She held up the tiger doll for Eddie to see. His eyes lit up and he exclaimed, "I got a doll that looks just like that. After I melted the walls into goo, this fell down from the ceiling."
He showed his sister his own doll.
"I guess that does it then," said Viv. "These dolls must be some kind of clue."
"But a clue to what?" asked Eddie. "Where Tanja might be?"
Viv shrugged and replied, "Maybe. Let's meet back up with the others."
Eddie nodded. "Got it."
Unbeknownst to them, as they ran back to the Castle and top speed, they were being watched through a mirror floating in the air by a man sitting in a big chair, in his big office full of old-timey furniture. He was dressed in sharp black robes with long flowing sleeves with a hood that cast a thick, impenetrable darkness over his face. Several other mirrors floated around the one showing the Waller twins, each one revealing the actions of the other members of the Sapphire Society.
George and Alejandro had their way blocked by a pool of lava, but they overcame the obstacle by transforming into eagles to fly over it before soaring straight to the gym. Melody, Erin, and Hassan created walls of light around themselves as they pushed through curtains of dancing electricity towards the music building. As for Lady Sapphire herself, she and Oliver found their way into the science building blocked by a huge iron gate that refused to open unless the girl poured enough magic power into a big, magic crystal ball. It was just like the crystal ball back at the Sapphire Society's hideout.
Perched on a stand behind the old man was the blue parrot.
It asked, "Don't you think you are going a bit too easy on them this time around?"
Without looking back, the old man replied, "Not to worry. It is all part of the plan."
"By the way, I have been meaning to ask, why are you dressed in that ridiculous getup?"
"Naturally, old friend, because I plan to make an appearance. It is about time the Schemer show up again, don't you think?"
The parrot shrugged. "Whatever you say. You're the author of this silly story. Do as you see fit. It is already too late to fix it anyway."
"Hmph!" The old man sniffed indignantly. "There's no need to rub it in. You made it clear plenty of times already that I'm no Shakespeare. But that doesn't matter."
"Oh? Are we nearing the end already?"
"Perhaps," said the old man. "As long as my calculations are right. But even if not, the next will be the last."
Fixing his gaze on Lily as she and Oliver passed through the gate, the old man added, "No matter what, I will not wait any longer."
No comments:
Post a Comment