The Silver Mask (Magisterium #4)(37)

Aaron exhaled. Tamara had said he’d been screaming, and Call realized now he’d braced for that, but Aaron seemed calm enough, if upset about Tamara. Aaron picked his fork back up and shoved some stuffing into his mouth.

His shoulders were stiff, as if he were angry. Call wondered if Aaron hated him. He had every right. But maybe he was just upset about Tamara. Aaron was used to people thinking of him like a hero. He would be devastated if he knew Tamara thought there was something wrong with him.

Tamara was wrong.

She had to be wrong.

“It is not so easy to have your whole world turned upside down,” said Master Joseph. “As she struggles to accept what is possible, so too will the Assembly. So will the Magisterium. But our time — the time of harnessing the power of the void — begins now. With you.” He gestured to Call. “And you.” He turned to Aaron.

“What about the rest of us?” Alex asked.

“Call was able to bring back Aaron. That’s only the beginning. Aaron’s only the first of our departed to return. When the Assembly realizes what we’re capable of, they will have to make an alliance with us — on our terms. This is the biggest breakthrough since lead was first made into gold. Bigger, maybe.”

“You will be able to replicate it, I’m sure,” Anastasia told Alex, answering his question. Obviously Master Joseph had gotten so tangled up with his own thoughts about the future that he’d forgotten everything else.

“It is amazing that you were able to do what Constantine couldn’t,” Jasper told Call, then looked at Aaron. “How are you doing, buddy?”

Aaron turned toward Jasper, his expression haunted.

For a moment, no one spoke. Call held his breath.

“You okay?” Jasper asked.

“I feel tired,” said Aaron. “And strange. Everything is so strange.”

“Yeah, I feel that way a lot, too,” Jasper said, leaning over to clap him on the shoulder. Call stared. It seemed like such a casual gesture, and so out of place.

“Am I really back?” Aaron asked.

Master Joseph smiled at him. “If you can ask that, then you must be.”

Aaron nodded and went back to methodically eating his food, which wasn’t the way Aaron usually ate at all. Aaron was either really mannered and polite, or devoured his food like he was afraid someone was going to snatch it away from him. Call watched him, worriedly.

But then, if Aaron had just gotten out of the hospital, he might act weird, too. Call tried to think of it as getting out of surgery. Years ago, Alastair had needed to have his appendix taken out and when he’d gotten home, he’d been too tired to do anything but sit in front of the television, eating soup out of a can and watching a weekend-long marathon of Antiques Roadshow.

“So what was it like?” Alex asked finally, breaking the silence.

Aaron looked up from his food. “What?”

“What was it like, being dead?”

“Shut up,” Call hissed. But Alex just smirked at him.

“I don’t remember.” Aaron stared at his plate. “I remember dying. I remember you.” He looked up at Alex and his green eyes were as hard and cold as malachite. “And then I don’t remember anything else until Call woke me up.”

“He’s lying,” Alex said, reaching for his glass of Coke.

“Leave him alone,” Call said fiercely.

“Call’s right,” said Anastasia. “If Aaron doesn’t remember —”

“Though it would be very useful to have someone who knew what the afterlife was like among us,” said Master Joseph. “Imagine what powerful information that would be.”

Call pushed back his chair. “I’m not feeling well. I think I’d better go lie down.”

Anastasia was on her feet. “I’m sure you must still be exhausted. I’ll walk you back up to your room.”

“But what about Aaron?” Call said. “Where’s he going to sleep?” He tried to keep his voice calm; he was imagining Master Joseph telling him Aaron was going to go back to sleep in the experiment room, or be imprisoned somewhere.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. Aaron being back was supposed to solve everything. Aaron’s death had been the moment that everything had gone terribly wrong — Call being exposed as having the Enemy’s soul, being imprisoned, being hated by most of the people he cared about. Some part of him had expected the world to right itself as soon as Aaron opened his eyes.

That part of him was childish.

“There’s a room that connects to yours,” said Anastasia. “Jericho used to stay there sometimes. Aaron could use it, right?”

She looked toward Master Joseph as she said it. His answering gaze was unreadable. There was a glint deep in his eyes that Call really didn’t like. Now that Call had done it — now that he’d actually raised Aaron — would he still be of use to Master Joseph, or would Master Joseph decide Call’s powers would be a lot more useful without Call attached to them?

“Of course,” Master Joseph said. “It may need some dusting.”



The room did need dusting — a lot of it. Anastasia used her air magic to shake the worst of it out of the bed covers and blinds, leaving all of them coughing. Jasper excused himself to “check on Tamara,” though Call suspected he was just trying to get away from the choking dust clouds.