The Drowned Vault by N. D. Wilson Page B

find about John Smith.”
    “Fine.” Cyrus glared at his sister. “Tigs always knows best, doesn’t she, Dennis?”
    Diana stepped up beside Dennis. “I could get a book. Jeb used to eat that stuff up. He knows all the old Avengel stories.”
    Dennis sighed with relief. “I should go now.” He began to tie his hat ribbons beneath his chin.
    “Terrific,” said Nolan, and he yawned and shut his eyes.
    “I should go, too,” Diana said. Her freckled face had gone serious. “This could be a pretty rough week for the Order. It really could. It’s been fun, you know, the Polygoner thing, hanging out like this. But we—I—might have to stop.” Diana stepped back toward the door. “Time to get serious. Anyway, I’ll be around through tomorrow. Then I’ll be wherever Jeb and Rupe tell me to be. Could be anywhere. I’m sorry you’ll be stuck here. It would be great to have an honest-to-goodness trek together sometime.”
    Antigone’s mouth fell open.
    Dennis snuck out the door and shut it behind him.
    Cyrus felt himself slumping. He straightened and met Diana’s eyes. They were actually worried. Afraid of what he would think.
    He cleared his throat. “Don’t worry about it. It’s not your fault we’re stuck.”
    “Seriously,” Antigone said. “Thanks for everything. We wouldn’t be Journeymen without you. You taught us how to fly.”
    Diana laughed. “You would have been fine.”
    “No,” Antigone said. “
I
wouldn’t have.”
    Cyrus glanced around the room. “You’re still a Polygoner. You know where we’ll be.”
    Diana nodded. She opened the door behind her. “I’ll try to come by before I leave.”
    Antigone’s smile was a little too big. “See ya.”
    Diana wasn’t looking at her. She was looking at Cyrus. He raised his right hand in a sloppy salute.
    “See ya,” he said.
    The door closed behind Diana Boone.
    “And thus,” Nolan said from the floor, “the ancient Order of the Polygoners lost its most notable member.”
    Antigone groaned. “Shut up, Nolan. This is terrible. Where could they be sending her? She was the only one who helped us with anything.”
    Nolan rolled onto his side. “What ungratefulness is this? I taught you Latin.”
    “You know what I mean,” Antigone said, and she dropped onto the floor. “Cy, what are we going to do?”
    Cyrus walked to the window beside the fireplace. It was just high enough that he could rest his elbows on the sill. The sun was long down, but the horizon was still faintly glowing. Staring through the dusty, warped glass, he could just make out the army of lit tents that dotted the green. He didn’t know what they were going to do. About anything. He wanted to leave his stupid rooms, and he wanted something to eat.
    He wanted the tooth back. Sometimes he could still feel it and its power slipping from his grasp, being torn from his fingers. His body could remember the strength that hadleft him when the tooth had—the strength of an unbreakable bond between his soul and body, true deathlessness.
    He understood why the transmortals were angry with him. It was hard to blame them. Not because he had killed Maxi; that was stupid. But because what they had could now be taken from them. He had tasted that loss, if only a little bit. Losing the tooth hadn’t made him feel empty; it had made him realize that he had always been empty. There was a crack between his body and his soul that wasn’t supposed to be there. He was meant to be whole—indivisible. But he wasn’t. And in the end, like every mortal, his body and soul would split completely. He would die. Rupert had said mortals learned to face that fear. Maybe Rupert did, but Cyrus was pretty sure most people did the opposite—they just didn’t think about it.
    Cyrus’s hand drifted up to his neck, and Patricia’s cool body twitched at his touch. He fingered the silver sheath where the tooth had been. The tingle it used to give him was long gone. Skelton’s two other charms were