The Silver Mask (Magisterium #4)(7)

“I am registering a complaint,” Jasper replied in a subdued voice. “With someone. Someone will hear about this.”

The van lurched forward, taking a few turns and then speeding up on what seemed to be a highway. Call couldn’t guess where they were going. He wasn’t even entirely sure of the location of the Panopticon in the first place, much less where they might take prisoners in case of a problem.

He puzzled over the presence of Anastasia and Ravan. Anastasia had told him that she was Constantine Madden’s mother, and that since Call had Constantine’s soul, she would help him. Anastasia had been in charge of the elementals at the Magisterium. She could have engineered all of this. But if she had, what would she do next? The whole Assembly would be looking for Call. She couldn’t just take him to some remote place until things blew over. The whole Enemy of Death thing was never going to blow over.

He went over Anastasia’s involvement, the probability of this being a jailbreak, his fear of never seeing his dad again, his worry that Master Rufus would once again believe Call had been lying to him, and his concern that if they lurched around another curve he was going to get carsick again and again, with no new conclusions, so it was with a heavy heart that he felt the van stop. The back doors opened and light flooded in, making Call blink against it.

The driver stood in front of the open doors. She took off her newsboy cap. Long dark braids tumbled over her shoulders and a familiar grin lit her face. Call’s heart flipped over in his chest.

Tamara.





CALL STARED AT Tamara, absolutely stunned. She looked different. Or maybe she didn’t — maybe his memory of her had faded over six months. But he didn’t think so. He’d thought about her so much he couldn’t imagine he’d forgotten anything about her. Not that it mattered — did it matter? He realized he was still staring and that Tamara was probably expecting him to say something. He was saved by Havoc, who leaped into the van with a loud bark and began licking Call’s face with vigor.

“Jasper,” Tamara said, frowning at the other occupant of the van. “What are you doing here?”

“Have you lost your mind? You organized a jailbreak?” Jasper demanded, sputtering with rage. “And you didn’t even tell me so that I could visit on another day?”

“Sorry I didn’t check on your social plans.” She rolled her eyes, climbing into the van. Pushing Havoc off Call, her fingers going to the wolf’s ruff in a friendly gesture….

Call couldn’t speak. He had so much to say that it got tangled between the thinking of it and the saying it out loud. He was so happy just to be looking at Tamara, so happy that she still liked him enough to be helping him. And yet he knew there weren’t any apologies big enough for him to give her.

She looked at him and smiled softly. “Hi, Call.”

He felt as if he could barely swallow. Her face had changed subtly in the past half year, but up close she looked less different than he’d thought. She still had the same big, dark, sympathetic eyes. He spoke hoarsely: “Tamara. Did you — plan all this?”

“Not without help,” she said, ushering Call out of the van. He jumped down beside her, stretching his aching leg.

They were standing in front of a pretty cottage in the center of a clearing. A little lake was off to the side, with a bridge going over it. Standing in front of the house was Anastasia Tarquin, her white car parked in the driveway.

Anastasia was still wearing her white suit, now marked with soot. She gazed at Call in that way that made him incredibly nervous, as if he were watching a mother lion prowling toward him across the savanna.

“I’ll stay in the van,” Jasper said breathlessly. “Later you can drop me somewhere. Like a gas station, anything. I’ll get back on my own.”

“Anastasia helped me,” Tamara said, mostly to Call. “She let me go down to talk to Ravan.” She looked at her feet. “I didn’t have too many other people to talk to, after Aaron died and you were … gone.”

“You could have talked to me,” said Jasper, still in the van.

“You just wanted to talk about Celia,” said Tamara. “And nobody would talk to me about Call because —”

“Because they think I’m the Enemy of Death,” Call said. “And that I wanted Aaron dead.”

“They don’t all think that,” said Tamara in a small voice. “But most of them, yeah.”

“Call, Tamara,” Anastasia directed from the porch, “come inside.” She narrowed her eyes. “You, too, Jasper.”

Grumbling, Jasper finally hopped out of the prison van.

“When did you learn to drive?” Call asked Tamara.

“Kimiya taught me,” Tamara answered as they went up the front steps. “I told her I needed to be distracted from — you know. Thinking about you and Aaron.”

You and Aaron. Aaron had died and Call had lived but it must have seemed like a sort of living death to Tamara, Call trapped in the Panopticon and everyone else believing he was evil.

He realized how terrified he’d been that Tamara would believe the same thing about him. He felt almost weak with relief that apparently she didn’t.

Inside, the house had a pretty living room, with lace curtains and small tables covered in doilies. There was a pitcher of lemonade on a coffee table. It was welcoming, but the way a candy-covered witch’s house was welcoming. Still, he wasn’t going to complain. He wasn’t in jail and Tamara was here. They’d even brought Havoc.