Chapter 31
Secrets of the Bracelet
BANG! So went the door as Lily came bursting into the secret room of the Sapphire Society, shouting, "Oliver, are you okay?"
Everyone looked up, gathered around the main table of the classroom area with books and papers spread out in front of them.
"Lily!" Oliver cried out. "You should be at your room, resting!"
"There's no way I could do that after I got that text message," Lily said. "Is it true you got jumped by the Schemer?"
"Yes," Oliver admitted. "But as you can see, I'm perfectly fine."
To prove his point, he stepped away from the others, spread his arms out like wings, and did a full turn-around. Lily was relieved to see her friend was okay, but couldn't completely relax just yet.
"What happened?" she asked.
"Well," went the teen detective, "I was on my way to see Director Bluestone when I happened to run into the Schemer and the parrot in the hallway. They spotted me and attacked, but I managed to shake them off and ran straight here."
"It's good to know that you made it out without a scratch," said Lily, "but what were the Schemer and parrot even doing at that hallway?"
"Talking," said Oliver. "It sounded like they were making up some kind of plan."
"Did you catch what they were saying?"
"Well . . . " Oliver looked away.
Lily frowned at the way her friend hesitated. "What? What is it? Go on. Spill."
Reluctantly, Oliver said, "I couldn't make out what their exact plans were, but I did manage to hear a name."
Lily suddenly knew where this was going to go, but she asked anyway, "And?"
"It was Viceroy Kevin Lin. They were talking about your uncle. Judging by how excited and happy they were while talking about him, my guess is that he's going to do something they'll like. And I'm sure you know that anything those villains will like will be bad for everyone else."
"So you still think that Uncle Viceroy's a bad guy?" Lily didn't mean to, but she spoke with a sharp edge to her voice.
"Lily," said Viv, "I know that Mr. Lin's family to you, but you have to admit that there's something fishy about him. We have videos of him wandering places where the Schemer and his parrot struck, and now we got those two talking about him. And that's not all."
She gave Alejandro and the rest of the original library helpers a glance.
With all eyes on them now, Alejandro stepped forward, cleared his throat and explained, "Ahem! Me and the others went around asking the librarians about the game of mahjong Mr. Lin mentioned he lost that got him patrolling the library for them. But it turns out that was a lie. None of the librarians even knew how to play mahjong. The head librarian said that Mr. Lin asked to take over himself."
"I don't have to tell you that makes him more suspicious, do I?" said Viv.
Lily threw her roommate an angry glare.
Sensing danger was brewing, Oliver quickly cut in, "There's only one way to know for sure whether Mr. Lin is guilty or innocent, and that's a good, old-fashioned investigation."
"Is that what all those books and papers are for?" Lily asked, nodding to the clutter on the table.
"No, that's actually something else."
Lily jumped in surprise. "Gah! Where'd you come from?"
Appearing out of nowhere behind her was Tanja, hugging a cluster of old books and rolled up pieces of paper.
"Just from the bookshelves over at the back," she replied, nodding her head over yonder. "Anyway, this stuff is really heavy, so would you mind?"
"Oh, sorry." Lily quickly stepped out of the way, allowing Tanja to rush over to the table everyone was gathered around and dumped everything over an already chaotic mess. Curious, Lily joined them and asked, "What is all this?"
"These," Tanja said, waving her hand over the table, "are all books and worksheets about magic formulas."
Lily blinked. "Magic formulas?"
Tanja nodded. "Magic formulas, basically math in magic. Turns out there's a LOT of math behind magic spells. While you don't really need to understand the math to cast a magic spell, according to some of the books I read, understanding magic formulas can help you to figure out how to break curses or enemy enchantments, or to invent new magic spells just for yourself. Well, first you need to understand the language of magic, which is what is used in incantations and spells, before you can get to magic formulas."
Lily's head spun from the barrage of information rapidly spewing from Tanja's mouth. She quickly raised her hand and cried, "Hold up! Hold up!"
After a short pause to sort through everything, Lily said, "So basically magic formulas are how magic spells work?"
"Pretty much, yeah," Tanja said with a nod. "Anyway, I got to thinking that maybe if I learn more about magic formulas, I could learn more about that bracelet of yours. Because according to my research, magic formulas are a must when making magic items. Take a look at this."
Tanja brushed aside some papers to expose a cream-colored manilla folder. And from the folder, she pulled out a large picture of something blue covered in strange markings.
"What's this?" Lily asked.
Tanja answered, "A blown-up picture of your bracelet."
"A picture of my bracelet? When did you take this? How?"
Tanja answered, "A couple of days after you became Lady Sapphire, using the school's security cameras. They're surprisingly clear. But then again, this is a school for rich kids, so it makes sense their cameras would be topnotch. Anyway, you see those markings all over? Those are magic runes used to write magic formulas on magic items."
"Really?" said Lily, looking down at her bracelet.
George took a look at the markings. "Looks like gibberish. How do you know what this all means?"
"With this handy magic runes to English dictionary," said Tanja, holding up a really worn-out paperback book with yellowed pages.
"That book looks like its got more than a thousand pages," said Lily. "You read all of that?"
Tanja nodded and proudly replied, "Yep. Only took me a day or so."
"Geez!" went Eddie. "Did you even get any sleep?"
"Not at all," said Tanja. And then she burst out a goofy laugh.
"You should probably take a nap now," Lily suggested. "I think you need one more than I do."
"In a minute," said Tanja. "I still need to tell you what I found out about the bracelet."
"What did you find out about the bracelet?" asked Oliver.
"Well, for one thing," said Tanja, "it is NOT what gave Lily magic powers."
Lily blinked. "It's not?"
Tanja nodded and said, "Actually, it's the other way around. If my math's correct, and it always is, the bracelet actually takes power from you when you need it to do something and then gives that power back from the air or whatever when it's done, like recharging a battery."
"So basically, I'm a battery for the bracelet," Lily said.
"That's right," said Tanja. "But not only that, the way it's designed, the bracelet drains more power than what's normally needed to cast any magic spell, as if it was made to use up as much of your energy as possible."
"What's the point of that?" asked Eddie.
Viv spoke up and said, "Maybe it's like a training machine. I remember reading in Mom's journal that magic power's like muscles. It gets stronger with exercise."
"So instead of just giving Lily powers, the bracelet helped her grow her own." Oliver rubbed his chin thoughtfully and frowned. "Hmmm."
"Something wrong, Oliver?" asked Melody.
"Oh! Sorry, it's nothing," said Oliver.
That was a lie. Something about Lily's powers growing made Oliver's brain itch, but he couldn't figure out why.
No need to tell the others this, he thought. It would just confuse them.
"Anyway," he said, "was there anything else you discovered?"
"Well," said Tanja, "I saw runes for fire, water, earth, air and some other elements. And I also saw some runes that mean creation, which I guess is how Lily could make stuff out of nothing. I haven't finished reading the whole formula yet. I just got around to this part here. It kind of looks important so let's take a look right now!"
She placed at the forefront a picture of a part of the bracelet covered in pretty much the same kind of symbols as the rest. Lily couldn't make heads or tails of the markings and simply took Tanja at her word. Tanja pulled out a magnifying glass and put it over the picture.
"Now let's see what we got here," she said. Her fingers brushed over the symbols, which suddenly lit up in an unusual bright shine.
Panicked, Lily cried out, "Look out!" And then she pulled Tanja away, turning as she did so before the shine exploded into a flash that filled the room for an instant.
"Yikes!"
"Eek!"
"Whoa!"
The light startled everyone and made them turn away.
"What was that?" Oliver shouted. "What happened?"
Tanja yelled back, "I don't know! I think I might have tripped a defense mechanism or something!"
"Hey!" Viv called out. "Where's Lily?"
As soon as she could see again, she turned right and left but could find neither hide nor hair of her roommate.
"She was the closest to the picture when that light show happened," said Oliver. "You don't think . . . ?"
He dared not finish that sentence, but he spoke enough to make everyone's hearts sink into a pit of dread.
"It can't be!" Viv cried. "Lily! Where are you? Answer me! Please!"
There was no answer, which made Viv fear the worst. But then -
"Gah! Gah! Goo!"
"Uh . . . " went Hassan. "Am I the only one who's hearing baby babble?"
Everyone exchanged looks. And then slowly, they turned their gazes down to the floor where, looking back up at them was a baby.
While staring at the adorable, pudgy infant, Tanja spoke up. "You don't think . . ."
"Guh!" went the baby. She raised her stubby hand and around her arm was a blue bracelet with matching jewels on it.
"Oh my goodness!" cried Eddie. "You turned Lily into a baby!"
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