Arrival of the Traveler (Waldgrave Book 1) (29 page)

“…And they couldn’t open it. A few years later they found Dobry and took him out of the concentration camps because they wanted him to tell them where he got it, but he didn’t, and he couldn’t open it for them, and so they shot him. That part is in…” Griffin looked over the stack of books sitting on the floor next to them and pulled one out, “This one. It’s his son’s, naturally. Obviously Dobry couldn’t have written about his own death, so his son—your great-grandfather—wrote it down. It’s amazing that we have as much as we do, given Dobry wrote most of it from inside the camps. These are actually recopied journals, done by his son, because the originals were all scribbled on stuff that wasn’t real paper—clothes, walls, he even scratched his last words into his skin.”

Lena looked at Griffin, so happily clutching the personal diary of Master Daray’s father, and tried to smile a little for his benefit. Somehow, she just couldn’t get as happy about a man scratching his final epitaph onto his own hide. “What happened to the portal?”

“Ah…nobody knew, until just recently when your mom found it.”

“In Ecuador.” Lena filled in.

“Off the coast, technically.”

“Might I ask how it got all the way from Europe to Ecuador?”

“Oh,” Griffin looked slightly crestfallen, “Well, we don’t have any first-hand accounts of how that happened. I suspect that it was probably taken by a fleeing Nazi officer. Some of them wound up in Central and South America.”

Lena looked down at the carpet and tried to avoid Griffin’s gaze. It made more sense than she had hoped. It was even plausible.

The door to the library stairs clicked open, and Marie poked her head cautiously inside.

“That’s far enough.” Griffin said disdainfully.

When the girl didn’t respond, Griffin glared at her and repeated the command in thought-speak.

Marie withdrew slightly. 
Dinner’s being served downstairs.
 The door clicked shut again.

Lena glared over at Griffin, who was still glaring at Marie through the closed door. “Don’t be such a jerk!”

She pushed her chair back from Daray’s desk. She needed to get ready for dinner, and she didn’t want to be around Griffin anymore. He was being…as arrogant and offensive as he usually was, actually, but it was different when he directed it at a child. As she tried to walk away, Griffin’s hand closed tightly around her wrist. When she couldn’t shake him off, she turned and glowered at him.

“What?!” She spat.

“Sit down.” Griffin replied, unflustered. “We’re doing something important, and you don’t follow her orders. If dinner’s being served, she can bring it up for us.”      

“Why do you have to be such a jerk about it?! She’s new!”

“She’s a servant. You’re not doing her any favors by teaching her otherwise.” Griffin said evenly.

Lena shook him off. She dressed and went down to dinner. In the kitchen, she passed Marie, who was struggling to hold a large plate of food level as she walked towards the stairs.

Hesper and Eric had settled nicely into their tent. It wasn’t much; in fact, Mrs. Ralston had been forced to apologetically place them in one of the older, smaller tents so as not to raise hell with the other families. There was a small hole towards the back, and the zipper door didn’t close all the way, but the roof was leak proof and Hesper seemed in her usual high spirits. Eric had gone off to have “a serious discussion” with his father, who had just arrived; Serena, Daisy, and Rose were also present, but sleeping off their jet lag. Lena had forgotten once again to ask after Hesper’s consecration ceremony.

“I’m so sorry—I really meant to ask. I’ll ask tonight when we…see each other.” She said apologetically.

Hesper and Eric hadn’t done laundry since eloping, and Hesper was sorting out everything that needed it from their collection of suitcases. “Oh, it’s okay. I really don’t care that much about it. I’m just curious. What are you two doing later?”

“Just stuff. Hanging out.” Lena said.

“You’re a horrible liar.”

“Secret stuff. Family business.” Lena shrugged. “Nothing special.”

“And since when, in your mind, does the phrase ‘family business’ include you and Griffin at the same time? You didn’t even come out to talk last night when we got here because you needed to do something with Griffin.” Hesper accused.

Lena sat down on the edge of Hesper’s cot and watched her shaking out cramped messes of clothing. She had never been so messy in all the time that Lena had known her, and didn’t look happy about the state of the suitcases. She pulled one of Eric’s socks out of a pair of her jeans and grimaced. Lena stared at the criminal sock. “Why did you get married?”

“To annoy my parents—why else?” Hesper replied.

Lena looked up at Hesper and was relieved to see that she had a sarcastic look on her face.

“We got married because we’re in love. It wasn’t a snap decision, and we’ve been looking for the opportunity for about a year now. It never would have happened if we’d left it to our parents to decide…well, my parents were the big issue, I guess. Greg and Serena have been great about it.”

“They knew?” Lena asked.

“Yeah, they knew. Not about the marriage thing, but I’m pretty sure they knew everything up to that point.” She tossed another bundle of clothes into a laundry basket without even bothering to untangle them. The zipper on the tent started to unzip, caught midway, was jerked a bit, and then opened the rest of the way.

Eric stepped into the tent. “Oh. Hi.”

“Hey.”

Eric and Lena stared uncomfortably at each other for a moment. Without ever stopping sorting the clothes, Hesper began to talk.

“Hi, Lena. Hi, Eric. Lena, I’m sorry I kept a really huge secret from you over the summer. I haven’t been able to shut up about how guilty I feel…No, Eric, I’m sorry, I thought you were trying to kill my best friend because I’m psychotically paranoid. Do you forgive me? Of course. We’re going to get to know each other very well in the near future because we’re lucky enough to be the two most important people in Hesper’s life, so we might as well start now.” She threw the last of the dirty clothes into the pile, put her hands on her hips and looked up at Lena and Eric. “Capisce?”

They shared another uncomfortable moment, which was broken when Eric decided to change the subject. “Well. My dad’s happy for us. Not happy in general about the ordeal, but happy for us.”

Hesper sighed and braced herself. “Why?”

“Well, I’ve been kicked off the Council, which means he no longer has a family heir and we’ve lost a vote for our side.” Eric said sheepishly.

Lena was confused. “No longer has a family heir?”

He went over to sit on the edge of a cot. “I can’t serve as heir unless I serve on the council, because the head of family has to vote.”

“Can’t he just name Daisy?” Lena reasoned. “I mean, I know she’s young, but in a few years maybe?”

Eric stared at her. “Not unless you’re planning to make some serious changes, with light speed, after you get in.”

“Maybe I will.” Lena said airily.

Hesper laughed.

“What?” Lena asked.

“You’re just so confident, that’s all.” Hesper nodded at the pile of clothes in front of her. “Now help me take these back up to the house.”

The three of them managed to carry several weeks’ worth of laundry back up to the house in one trip. Once inside the laundry room near the side entrance, they dumped it on the floor just in time for Mrs. Ralston to walk in, look at the mess, and sigh heavily.

Hesper looked at her apologetically. “I’m sorry. I’ll help, if you want.”

Mrs. Ralston looked up at Hesper. “You’ve never done laundry in your life.”

“No, I haven’t…” Hesper held out her hands.

Mrs. Ralston surveyed the mounds of clothes again. “Well, I can’t teach you with these. Some of them will need dry cleaning, and the rest will require special attention.” She looked back up at Hesper. “You’re newlyweds. Just let me handle it this time.”

Mrs. Ralston turned and walked back towards the kitchen. Once her back was turned, Hesper did a mock victory dance. She grabbed Eric’s hand.

“Come on—we need to go talk to your dad again and figure out where we’re going to live and what we’re going to do for the rest of our lives. Lena, could you please tell Mrs. Ralston that everything in this pile that’s mine can go to the Mason’s room for Daisy and Rose?”

Seven more families arrived that day, the Perrys and the Colburns among them. Apparently Serafina and Martin had become engaged over the summer, and planned to get married during the weeks of the Council meeting. Ava made very clear that this was the 
correct way
 to go about engagement and marriage. In Lena’s mind they did make quite a couple; she was sure they would have very stuck-up, elitist, skinny children someday. Also, they were only in their late teens. It seemed too early to get married, but Howard assured her that marrying young was considered tradition in the Silenti culture, especially among the more affluent families.

Even though she had never actually been fond of the Colburns, she made a point of swinging through the kitchen to catch up with Devin when she heard they had arrived. He had gotten taller and had developed a sidekick that went by “Tab” since their last encounter. Tab was a short, skinny kid of fourteen with red hair and brown eyes. He was as predisposed toward cheesy pickup lines as Devin was, and though the two of them looked nothing alike, they gave the impression of being brothers.

Mrs. Ralston and Cheryl sorted through and washed all of Hesper’s and Eric’s clothes surprisingly quickly, and had sent everything that Mrs. Ralston deemed “age appropriate” on to the Mason’s room. Lena was sure it was all Daisy would be wearing the entire month of the meeting, even though many of the clothes were probably too big for her.

After dinner, she found herself in Daray’s study once again, writing and reciting Latito with Griffin. On a whim, Ava had chosen to join them; Mrs. Perry, who had been Ava’s constant social acquaintance at the last meeting, couldn’t stop bragging about her daughter’s impending marriage. Whether Ava was avoiding Cecelia Perry due to jealously or annoyance Lena wasn’t sure, but from the way that Ava kept looking at her, she guessed it was probably the former. After a solid hour of nothing but listening, writing, and repeating had passed, Lena couldn’t take the boredom any longer.

“So, you’re sure it was the portal? The box you found in Ecuador?” She asked, looking to Ava.

Ava, who had been resting her head on one hand and gazing in a frustrated way at Lena, sat up straight. She looked bewildered, and chanced a small smile when Griffin turned to look at her. “Of course I’m sure. Why wouldn’t it have been?”

Lena pursed her lips and glanced around. “It’s just that looking at this room, and listening to your dad talk, it sounds like there’s a lot of Silenti junk that’s floating around out there. So how do you know? Did you open it?”

Ava’s eyes darted to Griffin, who was now staring with interest at her. She looked back to Lena. “Only the heir could open it. Everyone knows that. I didn’t bother to try. But it was 
the
 portal—I’m sure of it.”

“How can you be so sure?” Lena said skeptically.

“I felt it.” Ava replied simply.

Lena looked at Griffin. He continued to watch Ava, then looked over. “What?”

“Well, is there anything else that might help us to identify it? Anything you’ve read?” Lena was thoroughly unimpressed with Ava’s conviction. There had to be something else—a symbol, or a phrase—that was unique to the portal and could be used to confirm its identity.

“The fact that she’s a Daray, and that she believes with certainty what she saw, is enough for me. Her description also closely matches the descriptions left by Silas Cassius. He fashioned embellishments for it while it was in his possession.” Griffin said with finality. Ava smiled deeply and looked proud. Griffin continued. “From the letters we received from Benjamin Collins, just before he died, he also thought it was the genuine article.”

Lena stared at Griffin for a moment. It seemed like an eternity before what he had said sank in. “Benjamin Collins? 
Collins?
”

Griffin stared at her for a moment, but then cleared his throat and averted his eyes. He started to nervously thumb through the pages of Dobry Daray’s journal. Lena turned her gaze on Ava, who was once again looking rather bewildered.

“I’m related to the guy who died bringing the portal back?” Lena asked.

“So?” Ava looked to Griffin for help, but he was focusing very hard on the manuscript in front of him.

“So?”
 Lena said in shock. “Who was he?”

“Howard and Aaron’s father…I really don’t understand why you’re getting so upset about this, sweetie.” Ava laughed lightly.

Lena wasn’t sure what to do. She started to talk and then stopped. She looked at Griffin, then at Ava, then she drummed her fingers on the table. After she had gathered herself and was able to speak again, she looked over at Ava and smiled sardonically. To no one’s surprise, Ava smiled back in the shallow way that said she was confused.

“Well, my other grandfather, the 
normal
 one, died bringing back something that we’re not even sure was the portal.” Lena spoke slowly, hoping that Ava was keeping up. “You don’t think that’s important? Not even at all?”