The Keep (The Secret of Spellshadow Manor #4)(20)

“Elias?” Alex whispered, trying to keep the worry out of his voice. He didn’t know if Elias could even come back from what he had just witnessed. He had never seen Elias do anything like that before, but it hadn’t looked particularly good for the shadow-man.

Fear prickled the hairs on the back of Alex’s neck. Given the extent of what had just happened, whatever it was abruptly silencing his shadow-guide, Alex couldn’t help but wonder what Elias had been about to say.





Chapter 8





Rushing through the hallways, Alex arrived at the tower, still hoping to catch the others before they left to scope out Caius’s favorite spots. His mind was buzzing with the idea Elias had planted there. It was better than any idea he’d had so far, and he was desperate to inform his friends, in the hopes it might bolster their optimism.

The others stood in a group, preparing to leave with Vincent, as Alex burst through the door. Their immediate reaction to him was stiff, given their last exchange, but their apprehension was short-lived, as they saw his excited expression—which he was sure seemed out of place alongside the exhaustion upon his features and the dark circles around his eyes.

“Change of plan! And you’re going to like it,” Alex announced. He skidded to a stop in front of Aamir. “But first, I’m sorry for acting like a complete and utter asshole.”

“It’s okay,” Aamir said quietly. “I won’t hold your words against you; they were spoken from a place of pain. I, of all people, know what it is like to feel out of control, and the crazy things that can make you do.” The shadow of a smile crossed the older boy’s lips, and he brought Alex in for a firm hug.

“So, uh, you have good news?” Natalie asked, eyeing him warily but managing to smile.

“We need to come up with a way of luring Caius out of his hiding place,” Alex said. “It won’t do us any good to wait around, hoping he’ll appear—we have to give him a reason to come to us. We have to do something so big, so crazy, that he can’t ignore it.”

His friends’ expressions turned doubtful.

“And what did you have in mind?” Vincent asked, his eerie voice cutting through the nervous silence.

“I hadn’t really gotten that far—I’m still thinking about it myself and was hoping you guys might have some ideas.”

“An explosion,” Jari declared, an evil grin twisting his face.

“It’s always explosions with you,” Aamir grumbled.

“Explosions aren’t easy to ignore,” Jari retorted.

“That’s true,” Alex said, thinking. “But what could we blow up?”

“It will have to be something he will notice, no matter how far away from the keep he is,” Natalie mused. “If he’s beyond the walls, it needs to be something that will trigger him to return… An alarm or something?”

A lightbulb went off in Alex’s head. “Vincent, do you know what those golden cylinders are, the ones that seem to be stuck on lots of the walls in the keep?”

Vincent smiled. “I do indeed. Good eye, young man. After so long within these walls, I often forget certain sights and sounds that a newcomer would think strange. They are components in a network, running throughout the prison, ensuring Caius’s bidding is done. I believe they are modules that guarantee the smooth operation of the barrier magic that keeps us all at heel... Oft times, I have thought of destroying them myself, but the repercussions have rarely seemed worth the effort. You, on the other hand, have more than adequate motivation for such a thing, and I, for one, shall wait in anticipation of the sight and shall do whatever you require of me, to assist in the act. Any action which aggravates the dear warden is music to my old ears.”

“Wait, so we can actually bring down the barrier magic?” Alex asked, dumbfounded.

“That enough of a spectacle for you?” Vincent smirked.

“Damn right it is!” Jari answered for him.

“How do we do it?” Ellabell pressed, a look of tentative hope in her blue eyes.

Vincent stretched out his arms, his bony fingers clicking. “It won’t be a simple endeavor, and it will require the utmost precision and concentration, but it can be achieved if you are willing to put in the focus, especially with there being so many of you. If we all shoulder a portion of the responsibility, we can have Caius running to us before you know it.” He paused. “However, it is not all plain sailing, and I would not advise we remove the barrier in its entirety, given the nature of so many of the miscreants within these walls. But I do believe the same effect can be achieved if we remove a mere portion of the barrier magic. Its failure should trigger enough of an alarm to force Caius’s hand, and urge him from his lair.”

“And that can be done?” Natalie asked.

Vincent nodded, his large head bobbing on his fragile neck. “The golden cylinders, to my knowledge, work much in the way of a circuit. If we break a section of the circuit, we break a section of the barrier. In addition, the mechanisms within each cylinder are representative of a circuit, so we will be required to investigate more closely the inner workings of a cylinder before we can proceed.”

“How so?” Aamir asked.

“Well, we must discover whether the cylinders’ circuits need to be halted at the exact same time, in order to break the larger body of circuitry. There are many safeguards such as this in place all over the keep, and if this turns out to be the case, everyone will need to halt the cylinders precisely at the given time, to break that portion of the barrier. If it is not required, the task will be far simpler,” he explained.