Page 56 of The Tree of Spirits
Dante grunted. “You call that magic?”
“It’s more magical than getting toilet water all over the floor,” I countered, shrugging.
“She’s just messing with you,” Nevada told him. “She can actually dorealmagic.” She looked at me. “I heard about what you did yesterday, Savannah, creating a net of magic petals. That’s pretty cool.”
“How do you know about that?”
Nevada squirted cleaning fluid all over the sink. “Ansel told me. He’s on my team, you know. And he knows the two of us are friends.”
Dante perked up. “Ansel? Picked up a third boyfriend already, Sav?”
I ground my teeth. “Not every boy who talks to me is my boyfriend, doofus.”
“Do they know that?” he asked, feigning seriousness.
I tossed a sponge at his head.
He ducked to the side, and the sponge flew past him, hitting Rhett in the forehead. Rhett’s gaze zeroed in on me. He cracked his knuckles and gave me a cold smile.
“Whoa, what is that noise?” Asher asked.
I’d been wondering the same thing. The noise that had started as an intermittent, distanttinga few minutes ago was now a heavy, steadythump.
“Maybe it’s the tree removal people?” Bronte suggested.
The walls started shaking.
“That’s not from removing a tree,” I said, standing.
Dutch rushed into the room, shouting, “Check the news!”
Eris pulled out a portable tablet. “Thieves tried to raid the jewelry store next door,” she said. “After they triggered the alarm, they barricaded themselves inside. Using a forcefield.” Eris glanced at Orion, who was standing behind her.
Orion read the screen. “The Watchers are on their way, but their SUVs are blocked by the Intelli-move truckandthe enormous dead tree in the road. They are now proceeding on foot, but they can’t bring their forcefield-buster, which is too heavy to carry by hand.”
Jareth jumped to his feet. “I’ll take care of it.”
He rushed out of the room. The other Knights followed.
Before Eris left, she told the Apprentices, “We’ll deal with this. Stay here.”
Bronte grabbed the tablet they’d left on the primping table under the mirror. Everyone had long since abandoned any pretense of cleaning.
“The Knights are on the scene.” Bronte turned the tablet to show us a live news feed of the street outside the jewelry store.
Five Knights and lots of Watchers were standing together, discussing the situation. Jareth wasn’t back yet with the forcefield-buster, assuming he could even carry it alone. Sure, he was really strong, but I’d seen a forcefield-buster, and it looked really, really heavy. It wasn’t for nothing that the Watchers used trucks and cranes to position it.
“The news is sure the Knights will get the thieves,” Bronte read. “The building is surrounded, and there’s only one way in or out. There’s nowhere to go. The thieves are trapped with no hope of escape. Once the forcefield falls, it’s over.”
The walls around us were shaking so hard, dust was raining down.
“I wouldn’t be too sure,” I said. “If the thieves put up a forcefield, that means they have magic. Who knows what else they can do.”
On the tablet screen, a Knight in gold armor lumbered toward the jewelry store, staggering under the weight of the enormous cannon in his arms. Jareth. He was moving very slowly. It was a wonder he was moving at all, given the size of that thing.
The translucent blue shimmer around the jewelry store stretched, consuming the neighboring building. Our building.
I knew what the thieves were up to. I knew how they were going to escape.
