Bad Apple (The Warner Grimoire) by Clay Held Read Free Book Online Page B

Just let me show you.”
    Simon hesitated. “You sent your dog after me.” His voice was thin with anger. “He was in my dream, wasn’t he? You were, too.”
    “Yes,” Boeman said. “He was. That was very special. Couldn’t you feel it? Only the rare and the special ever get such a dream.” He bowed to the dog. “Streaker is my scout. When he comes to you in your dreams, then you should feel honored.” The dog lifted its head and growled at Boeman.
    Simon shook his head in confusion. “Honored?”. His voice was shaking. “It was a nightmare!”
    “Only because you didn’t know why he had come, Simon.” Boeman squatted to look at him. “We have come to help. Your stand-in father has kept things from you. You’re not just one of the fair folk, lad. You’re a warlock .” His eyes glistened green and blue. “I won’t keep those secrets. I will tell you everything .” Boeman stood. “Don’t you want to know the truth? About where you come from? About your parents? ”
    His parents.
    The firehouse buzzed with activity. Several firefighters ran out of the main truck bay. The bay doors were fully lifted, spilling light out into the street as they ran hoses across the street.
    “Come with me,” Boeman said. “Simon, now...”
    Simon flung the bag of salt directly at Boeman. It thudded off his chest and fell uselessly to the ground, spilling everywhere.
    “Oh, well, bravo .” Boeman chuckled as the bag lay on the ground. “Salts. How very cute.” He glanced at the firefighters barking instructions back and forth at one another, getting the hoses into position, shouting for water. Molly and Zoey stood in the two large bay doors of the firehouse. Molly had found a cellphone and was talking into it while Zoey clung to her side.
    “Bravery,” Boeman said, dropping his arms. “A shallow reflex best used only by those to mindless to think forward. Look at them, Simon. Look at how much they have forgotten . It’s in them, every last one. Any one of them could snuff this fire with a thought, if they could only remember the days of magic. That’s why you’re special, Simon. Like me, like Samuel, even that wandering mongrel Tamerlane. The First Secrets are still strong in us. We remember. Our blood remembers. How can you not want to know?”
    Smoke billowed out of the shattered windows of the Paw. Simon kept hoping to see Nathan sprinting around the corner to his rescue, but no such luck. A small shiver rippled up the base of his neck, spreading to his ears, then up to the crown of his head. Boeman and Streaker circled around Simon. “It’s time we left, Simon.” The shiver climbed to Simon’s forehead as his vision began to blur. He started to feel like he had that afternoon, and he realized Boeman was behind it. Magic ? The idea still seemed too foreign, too impossible for him to digest.
    Simon felt a deep sickness twisting inside him, and he knew he was going to lose his balance. Terror seized him as he dropped to his knees, then images beginning to fill his head, bizarre and unfamiliar--black birds sitting on top of high stone walls, a young woman with blue eyes staring down at him, a worn path through a deep forest.
    He struggled to lift his head, to shake the flood of images loose from his mind. Boeman’s shoes came into sight. The tingling in his head turned to a sickening spinning sensation, more images flowed into him, longer, clearer--a dark, dusty place with rows and rows of books, more books stacked so high Simon could not see where they stopped. He could smell the air in there, musty and old. In his next breath the library gave way to an image of a large, elegant room with broad, sweeping staircases curving along the sides up to a second floor where a man stood. The man leaned over the banister, looking down at the floor below. Simon tried to focus on the man’s face, but before he could see him clearly the image melted away again, and a vision of a graveyard swelled within his mind,