Page 109 of The Tree of Spirits
I remembered that necklace. Ms. Pirana had scolded Kylie for fiddling with it.
“I made sure Kylie would be safe during the Garden attack,” Elandra told me proudly. “I would never hurt…” Her voice drifted off as her gaze fell upon Kylie, lying motionless on the ground under the Spirit Tree. She pushed past me, running to her daughter, clutching her in her arms. Tears streamed down her cheeks. She threw back her head and screamed at the sky.
Then Elandra jumped to her feet, wiping her eyes roughly with the sleeve of her prickly brown robe. “See what I mean?” she snarled at me. “Magic hurts everyone in our world. It corrupts everything in our world.” Shaking with rage, she pointed at the Templars. “Those fiends stole my inventions, armor designed to fight magic. They corrupted my designs. They used them to enhance their armor, amplify their vile magic, and spread death and destruction. Magic killed my daughter. Just as magic took my husband from me.”
“Magic didn’t kill Kylie.Theydid,” I said as the Templars set off a fiery explosion. “Magic is just a tool, like your suits. It can be used for good or for evil. It all depends on who wields it.”
“She isn’t wrong about that,” the Polymage Templar said, flicking Elandra aside with a potent spell. Then the Templar’s hands closed around my arms, hefting me off the ground. “You’re an Apprentice,” she said to me.
The Spirit Tree was lit up again. Magic shot up the trunk, drenching the branches in a deep, dark indigo blue.
“You will come with me,” said the Polymage Templar. Her voice was almost mechanical. “All Apprentices need to come with me.”
“No.”
“You don’t have a choice,” she told me. “You need to become something else. We all need to become something else.”
“Become what?” I kicked my legs, trying to free myself, but her hold was rock-solid.
“The Many Realms Court is old and broken. A new order is coming.”
“What order? Whose order?” I tried to pry her fingers off my throat, but that didn’t work any better than all the kicking.
“All Apprentices need to come with me,” she said again, her hold on me tightening. “That’s why we’re here.”
“You need the Apprentices for something? What?”
Dark eyes peered at me through her face wrap. “A new order is coming.”
That wasn’t helpful.
I pushed against her, moving my hands as much as I could, swiping them through the air. She let out a surprised gasp—and so did I—when my body phased right through her fingers, escaping her grasp. The moment my feet hit the ground, I dropped and rolled away from her.
Her gaze cut away from me, to the two Knights rushing toward me. With one hand, she snatched Kylie’s body off the ground. With the other, she smashed a smoke bomb at her feet. When the smoke cleared, she was gone.
“Seven!” Kato called out to me.
“Over here,” I said, rising. “She must have escaped through the tree. We have to follow her!” I stopped dead in my tracks when the blue magic lighting up the Spirit Tree fizzled out. “She took Kylie’s body. Why take her body?”
“I don’t know,” replied Kato.
I looked around. “Where are the other two Templars?”
“They escaped into the Park.”
“We need to go after that Polymage Templar.” I turned away from the tree, my gaze shifting between him and Conner. “Dideither of you see the symbol she drew? Do you know where she’s going?”
“No.” Conner grabbed my face, looking me over.
I batted his hands away. “There must be some way to figure out where she took Kylie.”
“There isn’t,” Kato said as Conner grabbed me again.
“What are you doing?” I demanded, trying to shrug him off.
“You hit your head pretty hard, Red. I need to make sure you don’t have a concussion.”
“I’m fine. We don’t have time for this! We need to go through the Spirit Tree. We need to search the Many Realms and bring Kylie back! And we need to find Asher too!”
