The Copper Gauntlet (Magisterium #2)(48)

“Maybe they decided that if they couldn’t get us back, it was better to have us dead than in the Enemy’s hands,” said Jasper. They all looked at him in surprise. “It’s the sort of thing the Assembly would do,” he added, with a shrug.

“I thought you wanted to go back,” Call said.

“I do. But you guys have messed up royally.” Jasper rolled his eyes at Call like he was an idiot, an expression Call was very familiar with. “The longer we’re away, the more convinced they’re going to become that they have to cut their losses. Wipe out Aaron first, then wipe out us so there are no witnesses, and it’s just a tragedy. If Constantine Madden got hold of Aaron, he could kill him — or he could brainwash him. Maybe they’re afraid of that. Maybe they’re afraid that losing Aaron to Constantine could lose them the war.”

“Not having Aaron would lose them the war!” said Tamara. “He’s the Makar!”

They had reached the barn. Jasper’s face looked like cut stone in the flickering light. “I don’t think you understand how they do math.”

“Enough,” said Call, turning to face the others. “You guys go back to school. I think I can stop my father, so long as I can get to him in time. I have to talk to him. I have to try. But this is getting too dangerous for you to come along.”

They’ll never get it, he thought. My dad wants his son back. He thinks if he trades the Alkahest to Master Joseph, Joseph can fix me. Can make me Callum Hunt again. But Master Joseph’s tricking him, trying to lure him in. He’ll probably kill him once he gets the Alkahest.

But Call couldn’t tell them that, any of that.

You can’t outrun the Enemy of Death.

“No way,” Tamara said, crossing her arms over her chest. “It’s not safe for you to go — it’s not safe for any of us. You don’t even know where Alastair’s headed.”

“I think I do, actually,” Call said. He slid the barn door open and limped inside. The rest of them, even Havoc, waited in the doorway as he retrieved Master Joseph’s letters. When he returned, he held one up to the light.

“There are numbers under Master Joseph’s name,” he said. “In every letter.”

“Yeah, probably the date,” Jasper said.

Call read the numbers off. “45. 1661. 67. 2425.”

“That’s not a date, except maybe on Mars,” said Tamara, crowding closer. “It’s …”

“It’s coordinates,” said Call. “Latitude and longitude. That’s how my dad used to program the GPS in his car. It tells you how to find something. Joseph is telling my dad where he is.”

“Then we know where we’re going,” said Aaron. “We just need to find something we can plug the coordinates into….”

“Here,” Tamara said, taking out her phone. But when she touched the screen, it didn’t come on. “Oh. I guess I’m out of charge.”

“A computer in any Internet café would work,” said Call, folding up the papers. “But there’s no ‘we.’ I’m doing this alone.”

“We’re not leaving you alone and you know it,” Aaron said. He held up a hand against Call’s protest. “Look, by the time we get back to school, your father could already have reached Master Joseph. There might not be enough time to do anything, even if we could convince the mages we knew what we were talking about.”

“And if we go after Joseph and get the Alkahest back, then we go back in glory,” Tamara added. “Besides, they already sent a monster after us. Until we know whether we can trust them, the only way is forward.”

Call looked over at Jasper. “You don’t have to come.” He actually felt bad now for having dragged Jasper into this mess.

“Oh, I’m coming,” Jasper said. “If monsters are hunting us, I am sticking with the Makar.”

“How can the mages of the Magisterium be the good guys if they’d send a monster to murder us just for running away?” Aaron asked. “We’re kids.”

“I don’t know,” Call said. He was starting to worry that there weren’t any good guys. Just people with longer or shorter Evil Overlord lists.

Tamara sighed and scrubbed a hand through her hair. “Right now, we need to find a town, somewhere where we can get new clothes and some food. We look like we set ourselves on fire and then rolled around in the mud. We don’t exactly blend in.”

Havoc, hearing the words roll around in the mud, began to do just that. Call had to admit Tamara was right. They were dirty, and not like actors in movies who had one artistic smear of dirt across a cheekbone. Their uniforms were ripped and bloody and soaked with oily metal elemental goop.

“I guess we start walking,” said Jasper, sounding dispirited.

“We’re not going to walk,” said Aaron. “We’re going to drive. There are three hundred cars here.”

“Yeah, but most of the ones that haven’t been eaten don’t exactly work,” Call pointed out. “And the few that do work don’t have keys waiting for us.”

“Come on,” said Aaron. “I don’t have a dad in prison for nothing. I think I can hot-wire one of these.”

He strode off toward the field of cars with a confident set to his shoulders.