The Breaker (The Secret of Spellshadow Manor #2)(56)

Alex wandered over, glad to be away from the grate’s sickening stench and the slick substance that glistened in the semi-darkness of the chamber. Cautiously, he picked up the steel hilt of the bladeless knife and felt a sudden rush of energy course through his forearm, oddly cold, as a blade appeared at the end of the handle. The silver blade glowed with radiant white light, solid and menacing. Holding it up in awe, Alex caught sight of something peculiar as the brightness of the knife’s blade cast a silvery glow across the room. At the opposite end of the chamber, buried beneath a dense mass of gray ivy, stood a thin wooden door, the black handle just visible beneath the layered leaves. He must have missed it in the rush of his last, hurried visit to the chamber.

Putting the knife down, Alex moved toward the door, skirting around the grate and feeling his foot slip in something vile. Shuddering, he rested his hand on the door handle, trying to avoid the ivy that hung across the wood as he pushed against it, but the door wouldn’t budge. It was locked.

Slowly, Alex covered the lock with his palm and conjured a small ball of black-and-silver anti-magic, focusing the blast of it into the center of the lock. There was a quiet crack as the door gave against the shove of his shoulder.

In the room behind the first stretched a long antechamber, filled with row upon row of wooden shelves, stacked neatly with small black bottles. Though there were no windows, the room was somehow filled with a dim light, just bright enough to see by. Alex squinted into the long room, wondering if it was another wine cellar. As he ventured farther along, he realized the bottles were far too small for wine, and they seemed to glow dully from within, like fading fireflies, pulsing with a dimmed red color behind the black glass.

Leaning closer to some of the racks, Alex saw they were labelled with dates. One rack had 1909 written in curling black ink underneath, but there weren’t any bottles on that one. Frowning, he saw that only the most recently dated racks were full—the shelves closest to the door. Behind those, many were empty.

Horror gripped his stomach as he hurried back up the length of the room and reached for a bottle on the first rack. Illuminated by the dim red glow within, Alex almost dropped the bottle as the letters on the label lit up. In the dim pulse, he felt sick as he read the name over and over, wanting to be sure.

It read R. Derhin.

As he closed his hand around the bottle, gripping it tightly in his palm, Alex felt the energy radiate from within as color rippled out from the dark glass, causing the world around him to bend and distort as the ground rushed away from him and his body tumbled through darkness, into oblivion.





Chapter 21





As the world stopped spinning and the rush of air slowed to a light breeze, Alex found himself floating unseen above a familiar setting. Students rushed past below him, dressed in black, their laughter echoing down the hallways as they pushed and shoved in small groups, chattering away about the trials of the day ahead. Everything seemed more colorful, with only narrow patches of gray ivy creeping from the chilly stone walls and cracks in the flagstones, hardly noticeable and easily kicked away by a stray foot as students trod over it. There were more students than Alex had ever seen at the manor, the corridors crowded with young men and women.

As he scanned the students below, his eyes were drawn to two boys, on the border between boyhood and manhood, laughing mischievously as they perched side by side on one of the deep windowsills. They were faces he had seen before, though slightly older than these iterations. It was unmistakably them. Lintz and Derhin, smiling and joking, laughing about a mishap Lintz had had with one of his bombs in the mechanics lab, Lintz gesturing to the two ungainly bandages wrapped tightly around his hands where he had managed to burn himself. Derhin was grinning, his face youthful and boyish, his hair jet black and his dark blue eyes glittering in amusement as his friend recounted the tale. Lintz was wincing through a belly laugh as he explained how the bomb had gone off just as Professor Gaze had come into the lab, doing a dramatic impression of the scream she had given. Derhin howled beside him, holding his ribs as the laughter pealed from them both.

Lintz’s ginger hair flopped over his lightly freckled face, smooth and fresh with youth, as he tried to wipe away the giddy tears with his bandaged hands, like bright white mittens on the ends of his wrists. He was athletic-looking, and his chiseled cheekbones flushed pink with humor as Derhin tried to copy the sound of Gaze’s scream, causing Lintz to collapse into another fit of hysterics.

Alex felt an instant warmth toward the two boys in their own hilarious world, not caring about the looks of disdain they were being thrown by other students. Some teachers, too. Alex squinted as he noticed one particular individual, clad in the instantly recognizable cloak of a teacher, standing at the corner of the corridor, watching the pair intently. His eyes were narrowed into slits, and the expression on his face was one of intense displeasure, the muscles in his cheeks twitching each time their laughter pierced the air in a raucous wave. There was something about him that niggled at the back of Alex’s mind. The face was familiar somehow, but Alex couldn’t quite place him. He wondered if he could move closer to the figure to get a better look, but, as he floated forward, a bloodcurdling scream shattered the image.

As the piercing cry vibrated through Alex’s body, the world of Derhin’s memory broke apart, rushing away again as the colors bled away to darkness. Alex returned to the dimly lit antechamber with the glowing red bottles, Derhin’s still clutched in his hand. He shoved it back onto the shelf and tore out of the room, back through the rancid stench of the chamber and out into the stale corridor. He sprinted, his footsteps echoing loudly on the flagstones, until he reached the door of the library. Ellabell sat huddled against the wall by the entrance, her whole body trembling and her eyes wide in horror as blood trickled down her chin. Her hands were clamped tightly over her mouth, her fingers shaking violently. Her spectacles lay crushed on the floor beside her, little shards of glass scattered out from the wire frame.