Circles of Seven Read online

  Bonnie dropped quickly to join him, mimicking his circular pattern, and they approached a grass-domed hilltop. She landed near the edge of the field just a second or two after Clefspeare, running as her feet settled on the ground. Ankle-high grass covered the expansive summit, bordered by steep drop-offs and a dense forest.

  The dragon turned his head in all directions, twisting his neck and sniffing the cool, damp air. His voice stayed low, a growling whisper. “Danger is near.” He lumbered to the trees, and Bonnie followed. “Stay in the forest while I keep watch. Although we are considerably ahead of schedule, Billy may arrive soon. He is quite aware of my habit of being early.”

  Clefspeare continued sniffing the air. Bonnie tried to detect any unusual odors, but she noticed only a tinge of smoke from a distant wood fire. Maybe the dragon’s sense of smell was more acute than hers. She whispered her question. “Do you smell something?”

  “Flowers,” he replied in a low rumble. “Yet I saw no gardens or wildflowers nearby. It is a familiar odor, but the memory is a distant one from centuries long past.”

  Bonnie sniffed again. This time a slight aroma drifted by, the buttery sweetness of some kind of blossom, maybe gardenia.

  A voice called from the opposite side of the clearing. “Hail, Clefspeare!”

  Clefspeare’s neck straightened, and his ears twitched. “Who calls for Clefspeare? Friend or foe? Show yourself.”

  A figure appeared in the clearing, striding quickly forward and offering a formal bow. “I am Markus, servant and apprentice to Sir Patrick, steward of the Circle of Knights. I have come as his herald to welcome you and conduct you and the initiate’s colleague to his side.”

  Clefspeare snorted a plume of sparks. “The initiate was to greet us personally, along with his mentor.”

  Bonnie kept her eye on the young man, but she couldn’t stifle the need to yawn. The aroma of gardenias filled the air—sweet, intoxicating. A shadow of sleepiness filtered into her mind, and her vision blurred as she tried to refocus on Markus. He bowed again. “We have detected a hole in our security, so I have come to warn you and escort the girl to safety.”

  “But that was not the plan,” Clefspeare argued. “There is danger afoot, and Billy and his teacher must not face it without me.”

  Markus turned his head from side to side. “There is no time to fret about plans gone awry, Great Dragon. If you sense danger, then I suggest we be off at once. Morgan would have the girl in her clutches, and we must keep the two of them apart at all costs.”

  Clefspeare took in a deep breath. His voice slowed, growing labored. “Yes. . . . Danger is . . . very close. A s-s-sinister . . . presence.” The dragon’s head swayed, and his body tipped to one side. As he began to topple, he turned to Bonnie, his voice reviving in one desperate call. “Fly, lass! Find Hartanna!” With a tremendous thud, Clefspeare fell to the ground.

  Bonnie unfurled her wings, but they drooped to the grass, heavy and limp. She could barely raise them above the level of her dizzied head. She tried to jump, but her legs collapsed. A curtain of black closed across her eyes, and she dropped to the grass. A strong hand gripped her wrist and pulled. She fluttered her eyes open and caught a glimpse of Markus’s face and two hooded figures running toward them with swords in hand. As she struggled to get up, a stream of fire blazed behind Markus, but her arms and legs fell numb, and her mind faded into darkness.

  Billy dropped from the mansion roof like a sack of rocks, his arms and legs flailing. He steadied himself just in time to smash his heels into the hooded goon’s shoulder blades, crumpling the man’s body into a heap. Bending his knees to cushion the impact, Billy pushed off to the side, his momentum propelling him into a barrel roll. The professor lay on his back next to his rental car, while the second goon sprawled over the edge of the gravel driveway, his face half-buried in the mud. Billy’s victim writhed on his belly, clutching handfuls of pebbles and trying to push to his knees.

  Billy jumped to his feet, planted his foot on the man’s back, and slammed him down. Grabbing his sword from its scabbard, he lifted his victim’s hood and pricked his neck. “Play dead, and I’ll let you live.”

  The man cursed, then growled, “I don’t take orders from dragon mongrels.”

  Billy lifted his foot high and thrust his heel into the man’s head, driving his face into the gravel. When his victim’s arms and legs fell limp, he stepped aside. “Then have a nice nap.” He sprang toward the passenger’s side of the car, threw open the door, then sprinted back to the professor. Letting out a low grunt, he lugged his teacher to the vehicle, half-lifting, half-carrying his body.

  The professor’s head wobbled. “Do you smell gardenias?” he asked groggily.

  “It’s all right, Prof. I’ll get you out of here.” Billy tucked the professor’s legs inside, fished for the keys from his cloak pocket, and quietly closed the door. He dashed around to the driver’s side, unhitched the scabbard from his belt, and tossed both the sword and scabbard into the backseat. He slid behind the steering wheel, hurriedly surveying the controls. Fumbling with the keys, he finally thrust one into the ignition and started the engine. Leaving the headlights off, he shifted into gear. As the car crept down the driveway, he glanced from side to side, watchful for moving shadows.

  A cloaked figure jumped down from the mansion’s elevated front deck and sprinted ahead to intercept them.

  Billy slammed the gas pedal down. The car lurched forward, fishtailing as it surged past the man, its wheels spinning in the gravel and slinging a hailstorm of pebbles into his face. The tires finally gripped the surface and catapulted toward the estate’s entrance, a closed, metal-framed gate.

  Billy ducked his head. The front bumper smashed through the barrier, launching the gate’s frame over the windshield and sending it tumbling behind them. He spun the steering wheel to the right and careened onto a deserted road, tires squealing as he jerked into the lane.

  Billy turned on the headlights, then nudged the professor. “Prof! You okay?”

  The professor pushed himself upright, slowly shaking his head. “Is it time for tea?”

  Billy let up on the accelerator, settling the car into a comfortable cruising speed. “No, not exactly teatime.” He adjusted the rearview mirror, relieved that no headlights glared at him from behind. “How do we get to the meeting place?”

  The professor blinked his eyes. “William? You’re driving?”

  “Yeah. I got my permit when I turned fifteen. Mom’s been teaching me.” He tapped the steering wheel with his hand. “It feels weird driving on the right side of the car though.”

  The professor laid his head back against his seat and exhaled slowly. “I believe an emergency flight from savage murderers will trump the law in this case. As long as you’re comfortable driving, it’s for the best.” He dabbed his scalp wound with the tips of his fingers. “My head is killing me.”

  “Well, I hope I don’t meet too many cars on the road.” Billy nodded toward the windshield. “But I see some headlights up ahead.”

  The professor’s eyes shot open. “William! You’re not on the right side of the road!”

  “What do you mean? Of course I’m on the right side of the road!”

  “No!” the professor shouted. “Left is right! Right is wrong!”

  Billy shook his head. “Professor that kick must’ve really—”

  The professor lunged for the steering wheel and pulled it to the left, sending the car squealing into the opposite lane just as an oncoming truck roared past, its horn blaring. He pushed the wheel back, steadying the car in the left-hand lane. “Keep it . . . here,” the professor gasped. He leaned back again, holding his hand on his chest, still breathing heavily. “In England . . . the left lane is the right . . . ahem . . . the correct lane . . . for driving.”

  Billy nodded. “Left is right. . . . I knew that. . . . Just forgot in all the excitement.”

  “Now,” the professor continued, “I believe there will be a roundabout coming
up. When you get to it, you’ll want to take the road on the right, but first you must go to the left, and circle around until you get to the street that was originally on your right, though it will be on your left when you get to it. Do you understand?”

  Billy wobbled his head between a shake and a nod. “I think so.”

  “Good.” The professor took a deep breath and ran his hand along his sleeve. “Because of the unexpected attack on your person, we’ll use our travel time to discuss a number of issues—this cloak, for example.” His fingers paused at the cuff. “Strange. Why are there so many lumps in the lining?”

  “Lumps?”

  “Yes. Rectangular lumps.” With a quick jerk, the professor ripped a hole at the cuff’s lining seam and bent the material back. “I do believe they’re microchips!”

  Billy slowed down as he approached a circular intersection. “A computerized cloak? Sounds like a bad secret agent show on television.”

  “Perhaps, William.” He pried one of the chips out and held it close to his eyes. “But bad television or not, this discovery could be vital.”

  Coming to a full stop at the intersection, Billy reached over and felt the cuff. At least six chips made a circle around the professor’s wrist. “I’ll bet Ashley could figure out how the cloak works.”

  “Yes, of course! Miss Stalworth’s talents are perfectly suited for such a task.” The professor lifted the bottom hem of the cloak and reached underneath for his cell phone. “I’ll call and see if she is able to join us. It’s late evening in West Virginia, so she may still be awake. Early morning departures to England are few, but one might be available.”

  Billy drove clockwise three-quarters of the way around the traffic circle and onto a new road. “That’ll be great. When Mom gets done helping Sir Barlow, maybe she can drive down from Glasgow, and we’ll all tour London when this mission thing is over.”

  “I don’t see why she cannot join us,” the professor replied, punching a number into his phone. “Sir Barlow will be able to handle the museum soon enough, and I’m sure we can find accommodations for your mother.” He held the phone to his ear. “Busy. Apparently Miss Stalworth is awake.” He set the phone down again and brushed some of the rust from his sleeve. “I am not sure, however, how long it will take to complete your mission. Sir Patrick is in charge of that, but he has kept the details to himself. For example, I, myself, was shocked when he delayed our journey here by six months. To this day he hasn’t explained the reason. He also insisted that you have one helper, and only one helper, on your mission.” He set a hand on Billy’s shoulder. “He is a very mysterious fellow, but I trust him without reservation, and you should as well. His deeds have proven him an honorable gentleman.” The professor pointed toward a roundabout up ahead. “Turn left at the next intersection.”

  Billy made the turn and proceeded slowly. Tall hedges bordered the narrow road on both sides, leaving no shoulder or even the thinnest strip of grass between the edge of the pavement and the foliage. With the lack of traffic at this early morning hour, he steered the car to the middle of the road. “Do you think the microchip will tell us something about the guy who attacked me?”

  “Perhaps, but there is much I have already deduced. His youthfulness indicates that he is only in the second or third level of the New Table order, too young to be a master. He was probably hoping this mission would qualify him for consideration in joining the upper circle of seven.”

  “The upper circle?”

  The professor pushed his hand into the cloak’s deep pocket. “Yes. I assume with Devin’s departure, there is now a vacancy. You see, there are multiple circles, and the highest level makes up the New Table, a group of seven who—” His jaw clenched. “What’s this?” He drew out a small cylinder that looked like a slender candle, about eight inches long with one melted end. He ran it by his nostrils, then jerked it away again, his nose wrinkling.

  Billy sniffed the air. “It’s that smell, that gardenia smell that knocked me out.”

  “Yes, William.” He placed the candle in his open palm. “This is a scentser, spelled with ‘scent’ as in the scent that a bloodhound would follow.”

  Billy pursed his lips. “Soooo . . . what’s a scentser?”

  “It’s a weapon of a New Table warrior,” the professor replied, holding the scentser close to his face again. “I heard of such a device years ago, but I learned much more about it from the books in Devin’s library. This particular scent is obviously designed to put an opponent to sleep, a useful tool for a burglar or some other deceiver who wishes to disable his victim. Other scents are used for other purposes.”

  “Well, it worked on me. How did you fight it off?”

  The professor returned the scentser to his pocket. “When you recognize an enemy’s weapons, they are easier to resist. If you are caught unaware, however, they are much more effective. I suspect that dragons are more sensitive to the aroma. At least the legends tell us so. You, being a dragon of sorts, are probably more susceptible than I.” He tapped Billy on the arm and pointed toward a gap in the hedge on the left. “Turn in here and park, please.”

  Billy guided the car through the gap and into a deserted parking lot, stopping at the closest space. He shut off the engine and gave the keys to his teacher. “Is this the place we’re meeting my dad—I mean, Clefspeare?”

  The professor hooked his finger through the key ring. “Yes, at the top of a hill on the other side of the road. It’s called Cadbury Castle, though there is no castle there now. It is believed to be the location of Camelot, and remnants of a fortifying wall still exist on the border of the summit.”

  After Billy refastened Excalibur to his belt, he and the professor walked across the road and found a trail leading up the hill. Flanked by tall trees that blocked the moon, they scaled the path slowly, barely able to see their own feet. Billy stumbled on a rock but caught himself before he fell. He unsheathed Excalibur and cast its glow on the path.

  The professor fished his cell phone from the cloak’s pocket. “Since we know our secrecy has already been compromised, it may be important to maintain silence at the top, so I will try Miss Stalworth again before we get any closer.”

  Billy shifted Excalibur, illuminating the professor as he dialed. “With all those goons running around,” Billy said, “I wish Sir Barlow could travel with her.”

  The professor’s face wrinkled with a wide grin.

  “What’s so funny, Prof?”

  “The thought of Sir Barlow flying in an airplane amused me. After spending over a thousand years inside the candlestone, he’s not likely to keep his thoughts to himself should he peer out the window from thirty thousand feet.”

  “You got that right. When Mom flew with him to Glasgow, he fell back in his seat, kicked his food tray in the air, and grabbed a flight attendant, shouting at the top of his lungs, ‘By all that is holy! This iron bird is sure to plummet at any moment!’”

  The professor laughed as he punched the buttons on his phone. “Perhaps Walter would be a better companion for Miss Stalworth. He is a trustworthy young man, and they could watch out for each other.”

  “Yeah. Walter would never tip over a food tray, at least not one that still has food on it.”

  While the professor chatted with Ashley, Billy guided Excalibur’s energy field toward the bordering forest. He thought he had heard twigs popping earlier and assumed any number of small animals could have been scurrying around in the undergrowth, but now his sense of danger pricked his mind. The sword’s glow painted shifting shadows as each tree cast a dark stripe against another, crisscrossing into a patchwork of black phantoms.

  Billy pulled on the professor’s sleeve. “Prof, we’d better get moving.”

  The professor held up one finger. “Very well, Miss Stalworth. We’ll see you when you arrive. Good-bye.” He slapped the phone closed. “Danger, William?”

  “Yeah,” Billy whispered. “And it’s growing.”

  The professor waved his hand at
Excalibur. “Douse the sword. We’ll have to take our chances without its light.”

  Billy slid Excalibur into the scabbard, plunging everything back into darkness.

  The professor hiked up the trail, his outline barely visible as he swung his arm forward, whispering hoarsely, “Onward and upward, William!”

  Chapter 3

  ENGLAND’S CALL

  Ashley hung up the phone and propped her chin in her hand, rubbing her index ring against her jaw. With a deep sigh she lowered her hand and caressed the ring’s gem with her thumb, polishing the rubellite’s smooth surface. I guess a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do. She gazed into the gem and caught a glimpse of her warped reflection and whispered, “Or what a dragon’s gotta do.”

  She rose from a plush sofa in the family room and walked slowly through a hallway toward her computer laboratory. A gallery of photos lined the freshly painted walls—Jared and Marilyn Bannister, their son, Billy, and Marilyn’s five new foster children: Ashley and her four sisters, Karen, Rebecca, Stacey, and Monique.

  The air in the newly rebuilt house was still tinged with the aroma of fresh paint and varnish. The stench of burnt flesh and scorched insulation had been bulldozed months ago, along with the remains of the old house the dragon slayers had burned down.

  Ashley’s shoes squeaked across the tile floor, and the noise echoed in the quiet corridor. Once she entered the computer room, however, everything changed. As soon as she swung the door open, a low-pitched hum bathed her ears in the exciting sounds of technology. Computer displays, digital meters, and poster-sized flowcharts covered the walls. A ten-foot-long work table abutted one wall, its top boasting at least five disassembled computers, their innards strewn across every square inch of space.