T*Witches: Don’t Think Twice (7 page)

Sukari shrugged. “Olsen might let you take a makeup test.” Suke turned to Brianna suddenly. “Hey, you were absent that day, too. You guys could probably take a makeup together — be study buddies. How cute would that be?” she teased.

Brianna’s eye-crobatics signaled her response: “As if.”

The chick chat ’n’ chew moved on. Alex tuned out.

Which is when she heard,
I hope they don’t see me
.

She grimaced. Another unasked-for break-in to Bree’s brain? I’m grounded and I have detention, Alex thought. Isn’t that punishment enough? She walked to the soda machine, but distance didn’t drown out Brianna’s monologue.
I can’t do this. I won’t. Oh, my god, how could she load me up with, like, eight thousand calories!
Alex was relieved when the bell rang, ending the lunch break.

“Bree?” Alex heard Cam say. “Hey,” she whispered, “everything okay?”

Brianna chewed the inside of her cheek, then blinked rapidly. “Why wouldn’t it be?” she responded, tapping her foot and looking everywhere except at Cam.

Oh, please, just go, Camryn
. To Alex, Bree sounded more pitiful than impatient. She sounded whiny, Alex realized, almost as whiny as the woman in the snow.

“You waiting for someone?” Cam continued innocently.

“No,” Bree snapped, then adjusted her tone. “I mean, Kris might meet me here. I’m just hanging for a minute. See you in language arts. Tootles.”

Good!
Bree breathed a sigh of relief when Cam walked away from her.

Alex started toward the door, determined to exit both the cafeteria and Bree’s head. Only she couldn’t do either one.

Go, Alexandra. Hello. What’s she waiting for? I so do not need an audience
.

That nailed it. The sullen desperation Alex had heard had been Bree’s, not Miranda’s.

Alex swung out the lunchroom doors, hoping to catch up with Cam. Her sister was nowhere in sight. She turned back to peer through the diamond-shaped window. Amid the stream of kids dropping off their trays and going off to class, Brianna did an abrupt U-ie. She strode quickly across the cafeteria to a trashcan at the far corner. There, Alex saw, she unzipped her backpack, took out her lunch bag, and dropped it into the rubbish.

Cam was already home and seemed to be engrossed in reading, when her sister finished her hour’s detention and came in from the cold.

“Dude, the weirdest thing just happened —” Alex began.

“Give it a rest!” Cam held up her hand, which, Alex noticed, was trembling slightly. “Later,” Cam added forcefully. “Right now, I’m totally maxed out on weird.”

Alex shrugged, upended her backpack, and dumped its contents on the bed, aiming to deal with her own pile of homework. She opened her notebook but couldn’t concentrate. Her mind kept wandering back to a place
she so didn’t want to be: the Land of Bree. What was the little princess angsting over? Why had she gone from Spandex to sweats? Where had she and Kristen actually been when they were supposed to be partying in L.A.? And, final question, why was Alex still privy to the blond sprite’s panicky thoughts? It wasn’t like Bree needed help the way she had at the bowling alley.

Fifteen minutes later, when Alex had finally gotten into remedial chem, Cam glanced at her watch, got up, and flipped on the small TV in their room.

“Yo, actual studying-in-progress here,” Alex called to her.

“In case your hyper-hearing’s on the fritz, it’s the news,” Cam shot back. “I have a current-events thing to do. But never mind, I’ll be all sacrifice-girl to your sad little GPA and mute it.” Which she did.

“Cami, what did Miranda look like? I mean, in your vision,” Alex ventured.

“Actually, I didn’t see her all that clearly,” her sister answered, annoyed. “Small, blond — why?”

Before Alex spoke again, Cam shook her head, perplexed.

“Blond?” Alex asked.

“I know,” Cam said, only now realizing that she, too, had thought it odd. “It’s not the way I pictured her, either.”

“What if it wasn’t —” Alex began. But her words were drowned out by Cam’s scream.

Alex leaped off her bed. “What? What happened?”

One of Cam’s hands was clapped over her mouth, the other, still trembling, pointed at the TV.

There were snapshots of half a dozen people on the screen, under a network banner that read: “Hit-and-Run Rate Rises.” Alex recognized one of the pictures. She jumped up, grabbed the remote, and hit
VOLUME
.

“… eighteen-year-old Martha Perks of Sun Valley, whose dream of becoming an Olympic athlete was destroyed on a lonely Arizona highway, and the latest casualty, Elias McCracken of Carlston, California,” the announcer was saying. “… He died earlier today from injuries suffered in the ninth hit-and-run fatality this month. Leaving a distraught wife and a one-year-old baby, McCracken was a freelance photographer —”

Before Alex could get the words out, Cam sputtered, “That’s the guy!”

“Dude, he’s the guy who took the picture of Thantos,” Alex yelped.

“No, you don’t understand!” Cam fell to her knees and covered her face with her hands. “He’s the man I couldn’t save.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

ILEANA RETURNS

Ileana returned to the courtroom with a vengeance — heels clacking, cape flaring, her face contorted with determination. Heads turned as she marched down the center aisle of the dome to the People’s bench.

Lady Rhianna shook her head in disbelief. “Back so soon?” she announced drolly. “You missed the best part. But I won’t keep you in suspense. In a landslide decision, the Accused was found guilty of all charges.”

“What a surprise,” Ileana muttered.

Rhianna added, “With better timing, my dear, you could have skipped the entire trial.”

Still standing, Ileana tossed back her golden hair. “Trial or travesty?” she rudely challenged. Karsh covered
his face with his bony old hands, sensing that his audacious charge was just warming up.

“Did she say travesty?” Lord Grivveniss asked.

“I did, Lordship,” Ileana answered, her voice rising so that all could hear her. “This entire procedure is a farce, a sham, a charade. Every witch and warlock in this sacred hall knows that the criminal who ought to be on trial today is Lord Thantos!”

The communal gasp practically emptied the dome of oxygen. A frantic buzz began, followed by spectators calling out their shock, disagreement, or approval. To his credit, Thantos barely blinked. He rose slowly from the Accused’s table and, more slowly still, turned to gaze at the agitated crowd. As his dark eyes drifted over them, they fell silent one by one.

“Lord Karsh,” he announced, sounding more amused than angry, “is this how you reared the child?” Utterly ignoring Ileana, he continued, this time addressing the trio of judges. “And is this, Exalted Elders, how the rude young witch is schooling my nieces?”

“Exalted Elders and members of the Unity Council,” Ileana cried out, “I accuse Lord Thantos DuBaer of murder!”

“Silence!” Lady Rhianna shouted.

“He killed his brother Aron. Everyone knows it!” Ileana persisted. “New evidence suggests that he made
off with Miranda while she was helpless, broken by misery, and incapable of good judgment. And that he knows where she is even now! This is the beast who pretends to care about their children!”

Lady Rhianna, her rich, brown skin turned ashen, stood and unfurled her great wings. The whooshing sound they made and the gust they unleashed silenced the crowd once more. “Enough, Ileana! Quiet … everyone.” When her command had been fulfilled, she reeled in her wings and sat again. “Lord Thantos, Lord Karsh, approach,” she ordered. Sassy as ever, Ileana followed Karsh — and, seeing this, Fredo, seeming nonplussed about the guilty verdict, strutted behind his brother. Rhianna glared at them.

“Oh, let them stay,” Lady Fan said, her small dark eyes gleaming with excitement. “A trial like this comes along once in a century — and I’m too old to wait for another.”

Lord Grivveniss chuckled.

“Fine,” Rhianna gave in. “But do not speak” — this to Ileana and Fredo — “unless you’re addressed directly, understood?”

“Understood,” Ileana agreed. Fredo pretended to lock his lips with an imaginary key and toss it over his shoulder. “Esteemed trackers.” Rhianna nodded at Thantos and Karsh. “This is a most unusual circumstance. Yet
it presents a welcome opportunity. For both of you, it offers the chance to end the harsh rumors and suspicions that have brought discord to Coventry for fifteen long years.

“Lord Thantos, you’ve been very generous to us,” Rhianna continued. “Your contributions helped to restore the great amphitheater. The computers you donated to the Unity Council have simplified our voting system. Can we not call upon you again — to clear your name and return true unity to our divided island? I urge you to think about it. And, Lord Karsh, will you represent our people once more by telling what you know and by asking aloud the questions that have been whispered about Lord Aron’s death for more than a decade?”

“You dare ask me to stand trial for the death of my brother?” Thantos growled.

“Oh, is that what this is all about?” Fredo blurted. “No, no, no. You’re barking up the wrong brother, Rhianna!”

“How would you know?” Ileana snapped at him.

“Silence,” Rhianna shouted.

“He started it,” Ileana protested.

With a cold smile, Thantos shook his head as if he were far above and weary of both of them. To Karsh, he said, “Have you any evidence linking me with the unfortunate incident?”

“Circumstantial at best,” Karsh admitted.

“Circumstantial?” Ileana muttered under her breath. “Who came to call on Aron that very morning? Who was the last person Miranda saw him with?”

“You mean me?” Fredo asked. Thantos glared at him and Fredo again pantomimed locking his mouth and throwing away the key.

“Exalted Elders,” Karsh addressed Grivveniss, Fan, and Rhianna. “As always, I will gladly do what you request of me. I will ask the questions. And then we may leave it to the Unity Council to vote —”

“With
his
computers!” Ileana balked.

“And I, also,” Thantos offered, avoiding Ileana’s blazing eyes, “will do whatever you think best.”

And so it happened, the merely curious trial of Fredo DuBaer morphed into the most compelling one in all Coventry history. The Accused was the most revered and feared warlock of the island, the billionaire mogul, Lord Thantos DuBaer himself.

In accordance with the laws of the Unity Counsel, the Exalted Elders offered him a qualified advocate, as well as time to prepare a defense. The arrogant tracker refused both. “Help to clear my own name? I think not,” he snarled. “Let’s get this over and done with. It won’t take long.”

Karsh, too, waived time to present the People’s case against Thantos. Had a day gone by in the past fifteen years when he hadn’t thought about the devastating day or Aron’s death? It was he — sadly, along with Ileana — who’d found Aron’s bloodied body; who’d assumed the grim task of telling his wife and delivering Aron’s bloody cloak to her. Miranda had told him precious little, but he would never forget her words: “Thantos came … but would not enter. Aron left to speak to his brother.”

No, Karsh didn’t need time to reconstruct what had most likely happened. It was a tale he didn’t want to believe; a small part of him continued to balk. But he knew the story by heart. Aron left his wife and newborns, never to return.

The old man rose. On spindly legs, he made his way to the witness seat. His voice was rasping but steady. “I have known the DuBaer family for many decades. I watched the sons of Leila and Pantheas grow up — one with a brilliant mind, one canny but consumed with ambition, and” — Karsh looked down at his bony hands, avoiding Fredo’s gaze. “One unfortunately slack-witted. Thantos, the eldest, admired all that Aron possessed: his keen intelligence, his beloved and equally gifted wife, his powerful twin children — most of all, the company founded by his brother —”

“Admired or coveted,” Ileana murmured loud enough for many to hear.

Karsh ignored her. “The corporation known then as CompuMage, now DuBaer Industries. Aron and Thantos disagreed about how the company should be run, how its resources should be used —”

Ileana shot Thantos a sidelong glance. His face was a stony mask, but his eyes blazed with anger.

Karsh continued, “This is what I know and one thing more: Thantos was the last to see Aron DuBaer alive.”

Silence fell over the amphitheater as Karsh bowed slightly to the Exalted Elders and retreated to the People’s bench.

Thantos chose not to question Karsh but rose slowly and deliberately surveyed the amphitheater. Wordlessly, the hulking tracker demanded the rapt attention of every member present.

“Lord Karsh is right.” The proclamation, declared in Thantos’s deep booming voice, rocked the amphitheater. Until the menacing warlock thundered, “Right, that is, in his use of the word
alive
.” He paused for effect. “I will recount what happened that tragic day.” Thantos leveled piercing eyes at Karsh. “For I was there. The old man was not.”

Ileana’s face flushed with anger, but Karsh stilled her with a touch.

Thantos would not sit in the witness chair but paced as he talked, his hobnail boots pounding the gleaming floor of the amphitheater. “I came to my brother’s door, this is true. He invited me to meet my newborn nieces. I very much wanted to, but urgent company business had arisen. I did not want to intrude on my dear sister-in-law’s bliss, so I asked my brother if he would talk to me outside. Aron agreed. When I told him of the crisis at our company, he demanded I leave immediately for the CompuMage compound. It was not until the next day that I heard about Aron’s murder. I was shocked and saddened.”

“When you found out,” Rhianna quizzed him, “why not return to Coventry Island? Aron was your brother.”

Ileana could contain herself no longer. “You hid for fifteen years! You’re a coward!” she shouted.

Thantos’s face hardened. To Lady Rhianna, he said, “I knew nothing of the circumstances surrounding his death; there was nothing I could have added to the investigation. After that” — he whirled, staring straight at Ileana and without emotion — “it was just too painful. My beloved brother dead. My cherished sister-in-law vanished. My nieces under the protection of an arrogant young guardian. In the end, I did what Aron would have
wanted: I made CompuMage the unrivaled company it is today.”

It had come down to this: Karsh’s circumstantial yet compelling argument versus Thantos’s word.

As was customary in Coventry Island disputes, Lady Rhianna called for character witnesses. The Accused would begin. “There are many I could call,” Thantos bellowed confidently, “countless who could attest to my exemplary character, but there is one known the world over, whose word is impeccable. I call the warlock Bevin Staphylus.”

Ileana was puzzled. Bevin? Who was that? One of Thantos’s lackeys, a tool, a turncoat? Ileana shaded her eyes against the glare of the lights. She saw him rise, and her hand flew to her mouth; her gasp became a strangled scream. Tall, handsome, and Armani clad, the young man swiftly approached the witness chair. His head was bowed, but Ileana, as millions of others would, recognized his distinctive body and stride. Brice Stanley. Her Brice. How could that be?

Thantos’s thundering laugh filled the domed room. “Or should I say, Brice Stanley, as my former ward is now known. One of the biggest movie stars in the world!”

His ward? Ileana felt dizzy, her throat dry. If not for Karsh’s steadying grip on her shoulder, she might have fainted.

His real identity shocked her. His testimony set her reeling. If what Brice said was truly unrehearsed, the actor deserved a second Oscar! He sat in the witness chair, suntanned and cool, expounding on all Lord Thantos had done for this community, how his generosity had aided charitable causes globally. Throughout his testimony, Brice avoided Ileana’s eyes. He ended by reminding the Exalted Elders that Thantos, though reclusive, was too well known in the outside world to allow himself to stand trial if he were not completely innocent.

As Brice walked back to his seat, Ileana rose, pinning him with a searing stare. Blinded by rage and betrayal, she didn’t notice the slight slump to his shoulders and surely knew nothing of the sadness in his heart.

A second character witness was summoned — this one by Karsh. “The People call Shane Argos.”

It was Thantos’s turn to be unpleasantly surprised. The handsome young Coventry Island native testified that he grew up believing legends of the brilliant and powerful Lord Thantos. When Shane came of age, he made no secret of his allegiance to the leader of the DuBaer clan. Not long ago, he’d helped the powerful warlock attempt to return Apolla and Artemis to their birthplace.

Thantos sat grim-faced. He knew what this boy would say.

Candidly, straightforwardly, Shane explained. “Had this trial taken place several months ago, I would have corroborated all Bevin testified to. But in recent months, I have witnessed another side to Lord Thantos. I no longer believe him incapable of murder.”

“Tell the assembled what you witnessed,” Lady Rhianna instructed.

Shane recounted Thantos’s orders to make contact with the twins through one of their best friends, Beth Fish. The task successfully fulfilled, Thantos then casually ordered the young warlock to “dispose” of the innocent girl.

Thantos banged his fist on the Accused’s table. “I said dispense with her … not kill her.”

“Perhaps I misinterpreted your will,” Shane stared daggers at Thantos, “or perhaps I interpreted it all too well.”

Ileana knew what would happen now. Both sides would continue to present character witnesses, one refuting the other. Both had already presented believable testimony. The scale was evenly balanced. Without an eyewitness? The verdict would be rendered in favor of the Accused. An outcome Ileana could not allow. Karsh read her mind. “There is nothing more we can do, child. We must accept …”

“No. We mustn’t,” she countered, standing tall. An idea flew into Ileana’s mind, fluttering there like a hummingbird.
If they can do it, surely I can, too
.

“You are thinking of the twins again?” Karsh said.

“Who, besides the murderer, is the only one who would know for certain where and how Aron was killed … and who did it?” Ileana asked. “The victim himself,” she replied to her own question.

“Lord Aron?” Karsh was alarmed. “But he’s dead.”

“Did you know,” Ileana asked, slipping her cape back on and feeling in its pocket for her
Little Book of Spells
, “that using the herb marjoram instead of mugwort changes the results of the Transporter spell?” she asked coyly.

“Marjoram, marjoram …” Karsh thought about it. “The herb helps one accept big changes in one’s life. And, of course, in early times, it was said to escort the dead in their travels to other — no, Ileana,” he whispered sharply. “You cannot seriously be thinking of summoning Aron to testify against his brother.”

“Oh, can’t I?” Ileana laughed.