Conjured

“No, please!” Quickly, I explained—the memory losses, the visions, the hat, the box. “Those boxes … that’s how he held his victims, if my visions are true. They’re magician’s boxes—they shrink whatever you want to put inside. Created for magic tricks, little parlor tricks. And then … adapted. The agency left one on your desk for me to find, to jog my memory, to frighten and manipulate me …” I described how I’d woken in the hospital and how they’d manipulated me to induce other visions.

Patti’s face paled. She lowered herself into her desk chair. “They used my office, my library …” She ran her hands over her desktop as if reassuring herself that the box was gone.

“You hide yourself. You keep yourself safe,” I said. “Please, tell us how to do it!”

Patti shook her head slowly, as if to deny my words or my request or me in general. “WitSec hid me. My family … I’m safe because of the marshals. I don’t know how to be safe from them.”

Zach watched the door. “Does she need to be scared, or are we being paranoid?”

I watched Patti’s face, trying to read her expression. Patti’s eyes flickered toward the door. Uncertain, I guessed. She doesn’t know. Or doesn’t want to tell me. Patti rose and crossed to her bookshelf. She lifted two books and pressed a button on the shelf behind them.

The shelf slid to the side to reveal a windowless room.

“Whoa,” Zach said.

Crowding into the doorway, we peered in. The hidden room had a bed on one side and a bank of monitors on the other. Each monitor showed a different view of the library—the lobby, the reference area, the parking lot.

“About an hour ago, the marshals infiltrated the library.” Patti pointed to people in several monitors—a woman in the reading room, a man in the lobby, another man in the nonfiction section. She also pointed to the black SUV under the tree in the parking lot. “As to whether they’re here to help or harm you … you have to trust yourself. In the end, that’s all you have. You.” She’d said that before, when I’d asked for her help with Aidan.

“I don’t know who I am,” I said.

“Then find out,” Patti said.

She said it so matter-of-factly, as if that wouldn’t mean walking into the heart of my nightmares and confronting the very people from whom WitSec was purportedly hiding me. “But I’m the target,” I said.

“Only if you let yourself be,” Patti said. “My only strength is in hiding and watching.” She gestured at the bed and the monitors. “But you … you aren’t powerless, especially combined with Zachary. I’ve watched you two. Together, you can make yourself safe—once you find out who you need to be safe from.”

“She’s right!” Zach lowered his voice and repeated himself, “She’s right. Think about it: I know that dragonflies can fly at speeds up to thirty-five miles per hour, switch directions in midair, and even fly backward, and you can make it happen. You have extraordinary magic, and I have an impressive imagination fueled by a decade of dedicated bookworming. Together, we’re unstoppable.”

My cheeks began to ache, and I realized I was smiling broadly, widely, wildly. He said “together.” Reaching out my hand, I squeezed his. “Are you sure? It’s dangerous.”

“I’m coming with you.”

“The agency will chase us. They need the visions in my mind.”

“I’m still coming with you.”

“We’ll have to leave this world. And we might not come back.”

He hesitated and then turned to Patti. “My parents … Can you tell them that I’m all right? Tell them that I’m … tell them I’m making up for not being able to help Sophie. They’ll understand that. Or at least my mother will.”

Patti shook her head. “Your parents—”

“Please. I … can’t go back.”

She looked as if she wanted to object again, but she didn’t. “I won’t tell them anything that will endanger them. But I will tell them you’re safe. Even though it’s a lie.”

Zach took my hands in his. “Eve … all my life I’ve dreamed of doing something extraordinary. With you, I have the chance. Say the word, and I’ll go with you.”

He hadn’t seen the nightmarish visions. He hadn’t had IVs jabbed into him and new skin grafted to him. He wasn’t haunted by the faces of people who had died. He didn’t see blood, death, and pain when the world went dark around him.

“At worst, you’ll learn who your enemy is, and who you really need to hide from,” Zach pointed out. “And then we’ll run like the wind, if the wind had legs and incredible superpowers.”

“At worst, I’ll be killed. And sliced into pieces.” I shook my head. “No; at worst, you will.” Unless Malcolm had lied … Unless my visions were wrong … Unless the agency was the enemy, and the carnival was the sanctuary … Unless no one had really died …

“Do you know how to find the carnival?” Zach asked.