Mystics 3-Book Collection (30 page)

The only brand-name things that Zoey owned
were her Converse sneakers—and she had bought them from a
second-hand store.

Zoey looked down at herself. She was covered
in blood and dirt. The three of them looked like they had just come
from a game of rugby in the rain. When she realized she still had
her boomerang in her hand, she folded it and clipped it back onto
her bracelet. The last thing they needed was for the Mutes to get
in their way. But the posh girls shuffled on excitedly when they
were distracted by the perfume counter.

When they were out of earshot, Zoey said,
“We’re in Parrods department store. Does that ring any bells?”

Simon shook his head. “I hate shopping. I
buy everything online.”

Tristan frowned. “We’re close because we
mirror-ported here. Headquarters is
here
somewhere—it has to
be. Maybe there’s another way in.”

“In a department store?” said Zoey.

“Well, okay. We better find it quickly
though. The Mutes are starting to notice us. Maybe we should look
outside—”

“HEY! YOU THERE!”

Two angry security guards in navy uniforms
charged towards them at top speed, like great Doberman
Pinschers.

“STAY WHERE YOU ARE!”

“Great, like we needed more drama,” said
Simon sarcastically. “They don’t look very pleased to see us. Do we
shoot them or wait for them to tackle us.”

“We’ll never make it to Headquarters on time
if they catch us,” said Tristan

“Then we better move ‘cause they’ll be here
any second,” said Simon.

Zoey pointed. “There. Quick! Up the
escalators!”

They raced towards the central escalator,
pushing and shoving angry Mutes as they went.

“Sorry, excuse us! Oops—sorry about the
elbow. I didn’t
mean
to hit you in the eye. Hey, I said I
was sorry!”

As soon as Zoey’s foot hit the first
escalator step, she whirled around.

The two security guards were only twenty
feet away from them. And to make matters worse, two more angry
looking security guards were running towards the escalator from the
opposite direction.

“They’re right behind us,” Zoey yelled.
Tristan and Simon rushed passed her on the stairs.

“RUN!”

They dashed up the escalator to the first
floor.

“Now what?” Simon looked around
exasperated.

“Second floor! Hurry!” Tristan ran up the
escalator to the second floor with Zoey and Simon right behind
him.

They skidded around the corner at the top of
the escalator and sprinted up to the third, and then fourth
floor.

“Stop!” wailed Simon, holding his side when
he reached the fourth floor. His face was tomato-red. “My asthma is
acting up—can’t breathe—I need my inhaler. I’m going to die!”

“You don’t
have
asthma, Simon,” said
Tristan, out of breath.

“I might have.”

Zoey wiped the sweat from her brow. She
peered over the side railing as she tried to catch her breath. The
security guards were running up the escalator to the fourth
floor.

“They’re still coming. I’d have thought they
would’ve given up by now. They look
really
mad.”

Simon shouted at the guards. “You should
seriously rethink those uniforms!” He waved at them.
“Uniforms-R-US, check it out.”

Zoey turned around. “We can’t run like this
forever. We need a place to rest. We’ll never find Headquarters if
we can’t stop for five minutes to think.”

Tristan pointed to the floor above him.
“There! That’s a Sestram mystic. They’re on our side—they work for
the agency.”

Zoey followed Tristan’s gaze and saw a
seven-foot tall man-like creature, with large fawn-colored wings
sprouting from his back. It had a long, curved nose and elongated
jaw like a beak. It looked like a cross between a man and an eagle
in jeans and a t-shirt. The Sestram looked around calmly on the
escalator as it ascended. The Mutes were oblivious to the creature
beside them.

“There’s only one reason a Sestram would be
in a department store.”

Zoey’s eyes widened. “He’s going to
Headquarters.”

“STOP RIGHT THERE!”

The four security guards had reached the
fourth floor. Before they had time to react, they were
surrounded.

“Only the guilty would run,” said one of the
guards in a woman’s voice. He had a round face, deep set eyes, and
a unibrow. His sweat-drenched uniform stuck to his love
handles.

A dozen or so Mutes had stopped their
shopping and came closer to watch.

Zoey lifted her hands in surrender. “We
didn’t do anything. We’re tourists—we were just looking
around—that’s all.”

The man looked skeptical. “Tourists? Well,
ya don’t sound English—but I’ve never seen tourists with the likes
of ya three. Why do ya have blood all over your arm, eh? Why are
you and your friends filthy? Why did ya run?”

“Why did
you
chase us?” countered
Zoey, meeting his gaze.

The security guard lowered his eyes, his
voice pitching higher with his growing annoyance.

“This isn’t a place for street kids. I
recognize the lot of ya—you’re the lot that’s been stealin’ from
the Candy Shop, aren’t ya? But now ya won’t be stealin’ no more.
Now we’ve got ya. Fancy a trip to the police station, do ya?”

“You’ve got nothing on us,
Madam
,”
interrupted Simon.

“It’s
sir
,” growled the guard.

“Whatever you say,” said Simon.

He stood with his hands on his hips. “But
where’s your proof? You can’t arrest us because we’re dirty. I took
a shower this morning, you know. And I exfoliated my skin.”

The security guard ignored him. “You’re all
coming with us. Take them.”

One of the guards grabbed Zoey from behind.
Her instincts kicked in, and she spun around and punched her
assailant across the jaw as hard as she could. He let go and went
stumbling backwards, bleeding generously from the mouth. He came at
her again, and she kicked him in his gut. He cried out in pain and
collapsed to his knees.

The plump security guard caught Simon and
held him in an arm lock.

“Ow! That hurts! Mommy! I’m going to sue
you!”

The two remaining guards advanced towards
Zoey. They were thick and muscled like professional wrestlers. What
kind of place was this?

As she reached out for her boomerang,
Tristan came up behind them and hit the guards on the backs of
their heads with a large ceramic vase. They crumpled to the floor,
out cold.

“Sorry about that,” he said with a smile.
“But it’s not like you gave me another choice.”

“I’ve always wanted to do that.” Zoey smiled
at Tristan and his face lit up. She turned around and glowered at
the only remaining guard.

“Stay back!” he screeched. Spit flew out of
his mouth like a rabid animal.

“Stay back, or I’ll break his arm! I swear I
will!”

“Oh, please don’t break my arm. I like my
arm,” Simon’s face was red and sweaty.

Zoey moved towards the guard angrily. “If
you hurt my friend, I’ll kill you. I swear I will.”

“Stay back!” The security’s eyes widened. He
stepped back. “—I’ll break it!”

“Do something,” cried Simon. “Anything!”

Zoey clasped her boomerang in her right hand
and waited.

“What is that?” cried the guard, his voice
rising hysterically.

“Is that a weapon? I told you to stay back!
I mean it! I will break his arm if you come any closer—”

SMACK!

The boomerang hit the guard on the forehead.
His eyes rolled back into his head, and he crumpled to the
ground.

“Who’s laughing now, big man?” said Simon to
the unconscious guard.

He turned around and bowed to the crowd of
curious Mutes, who weren’t sure if they should applaud or run.

“Guys!” cried Tristan. “The Sestram—he’s
going up to the last floor. We’ll miss the entrance to Headquarters
if we don’t hurry.”

They ran back up the escalators, pushing
themselves past shoppers, and a very angry old lady who wacked
Simon over the head with her purse. When they reached the top
floor, Zoey thought her lungs were going to explode. She could see
sport shops on one side, and restaurants on the other. The smell of
food brought water to her mouth. All that running had made her
hungry.

She looked around for the mystic and caught
a glimpse of him disappearing around the corner of a sports
equipment store.

“There!” They raced past a series of sport
boutiques, turned around the corner, and stopped in front of a
wall.

“Where did he go?” The concrete wall was
covered in sports posters. In the middle was a single window.
Another escalator descended to the lower levels on her right, but
there was no one on it. No Sestram.

“Do you think he mirror-ported?”

“Maybe, maybe not,” answered Tristan. “No, I
think he knew of another way to get in. There’s got to be a doorway
somewhere.”

Simon moved his hands against the walls. “I
got it! There’s gotta be a secret entrance. Look for latches or
something out of place.”

They searched every inch of the wall,
sticking their fingers in every nook and cranny. Things started to
look grim.

“There’s nothing here,” said Zoey, deflated.
“We’ve missed him. He’s gone, and now we don’t know how to get
in.”

“It doesn’t make any sense,” said Tristan,
still moving his hands along the wall. “He wouldn’t have come all
this way if he could have mirror-ported from somewhere less
conspicuous.”

Simon sat on the floor. “What do we do now?
I’m hungry.”

Zoey stepped back and stared at the wall.
She looked along the billboards and finally settled on the window.
The window—she frowned and inspected it closer. It looked like a
regular window with frosted glass. But something was off. The
shadows of the outside almost looked painted on the opaque
surface.

“This is it!” she called. Simon jumped to
his feet, and Tristan rushed over.

Zoey grasped the window’s handle and turned
it. When she pushed it open, she could see a long dark hallway.

“A faux-window,” said Simon. “Cool.”

Zoey stepped back. “Good, no one’s looking.
You guys go in first. Hurry.”

Simon and Tristan quickly squeezed through
the opening, and Zoey followed. They landed in the dark hallway on
the other side.

“Why is it so dark?” asked Simon, feeling
his way down the hallway. “Is it supposed to be this dark?”

Zoey shut the window behind her. “I don’t
know, but I have a bad feeling about this.”

Her mystic premonitions prickled her skin
like an allergic reaction, telling her to go back. But she couldn’t
go back. She had to find Agent Barnes and warn him.

Tristan pulled out his slingshot and started
down the hallway. “There are hostile mystics here—lots of them—I
can feel it. Keep your eyes open and be ready for anything.”

“And the adventure never ends.” Simon
wielded his slingshot. “We better get promoted after this. It
wasn’t in the academy’s course outline. If we die, I better get an
A
for
effort
.”

“Nobody’s dying, but let’s hope we’re not
too late.”

Zoey drew her boomerang and followed Tristan
and Simon cautiously down the dark corridor. It was a dead end.
They stopped in the darkness to consider what to do next. Zoey
heard a swishing sound, and a giant battle-axe came crashing down
towards them.

“
M
OVE!” cried
Tristan as he pushed Zoey and Simon to the ground, just as a giant
axe swung inches above their heads.

Zoey hit the ground, but something sharp cut
her hands as she tried to break her fall. She felt the warm blood
seep between her fingers. She rolled over carefully, but she could
still feel something shattering and crunching under her. She got to
her feet gingerly and looked around. The floor was littered with
broken mirrors.

She pulled a large shard of glass from her
left palm. The cut was deep and blood poured down her arm. The
ground wavered as pain and nausea threatened to take her over, but
she clamped her hand shut and ignored it. She looked up.

A ten-foot-tall, gray-skinned humanoid that
looked like a cross between a dragon and a man stood in front of
her. Its body rippled with muscles, and horns sprouted from the top
of its flat head. It swished its thick tail behind it and watched
her malevolently with beady black eyes.

“What is that?”

Tristan moved to her side. “A Daragon,” he
whispered. “A dragon beast—it’ll kill anything that moves.”

The look of excitement that began to show in
its eyes, and the blood on its axe and its body was clear evidence
that it had murdered before and had enjoyed it.

“Okay, so let’s
not
move,” whispered
Simon.

Through the smoldering fires and smoke, Zoey
could see that they stood in a great cathedral of a hall. All the
light fixtures had been smashed and hung uselessly from their
broken brackets. Hundreds of mirrors had obviously lined the great
hall once, but every single one was completely smashed, and the
floor was carpeted with sharp and deadly glass shards.

Zoey started to gag on the smell of burnt
meat. Feathers dotted the floor to her left, and a pile of scorched
feathers and a body lay a few feet away from them in a pool of
blood—the Sestram. And then she saw something that made her retch.
The burnt remains of three people, their skin crisped and black
like coal lay in a heap near the wall.

“By the looks of it, it’s been pretty busy,”
said Simon. “And it’s destroyed all the mirror-ports, too.” He
pointed to the hundreds of broken mirrors that outlined the great
hall.

“That’s why we landed in the store,” he
continued. “No one could mirror port into here.”