Michael Grant - The Magnificent 12: The Trap

MICHAEL GRANT

THE MAGNIFICENT 12

BOOK TWO

THE TRAP

For Katherine, Jake, and Julia

Contents

G rimluklooking as grim as eversaid the following while appearing as an indistinct image in a shiny chrome object in a bathroom in Sydney, Australia:

I cannot guide you much further, Mack of the Magnifica. You must learn the secrets of this world. Find the ancient ones... the great forgotten forces. Some will help you. Some... not so much. But above all: Learn the ways of Vargran! Assemble the Twelve!! Time is shooooort!!!

Grimluk usually didnt use that many exclamation points. Nor did he typically draw a word out that way by adding unnecessary vowels. He tended to be grim rather than excited. So Mack paid close attention. This involved leaning nearer to the shiny chrome object in question, which if youve ever been in a public restroom, youll know is not considered appropriate behavior.

How short? Mack asked.

Short. Very shooooort.

But I mean, like, days? Weeks?

Thirty-six days from today is the end of the three thousand years of the Pale Queens sentence of banishment. The spell that binds heralready weakenedwill end. And she will be free.

Say what? Youre telling me I have thirty-six days to find all the Magnificent Twelve? Its just two of us so far! Were just the Magnificent Two!

Thirty-six days to assemble the Twelve and destroy the Pale Queen!

You didnt think to mention this earlier?

I didnt have my calendar handy. Then Grimluks wrinkled, haggard, drawn, worn, not-exactly-cute-little-Justin-Bieber face frowned. He rolled his white eyes up as though trying to remember. Wait, he said. Its thirty-five, not thirty-six. I always get seven minus four wrong.

Ive already lost a day? Mack shrilled.

Go to the nine dragons of Daidu, Grimluk whispered.

To which Mack replied, The what?

Dont make me repeat myself, Grimluk snapped. This apparition thing isnt easy. Each time I do it, I lose power. I weaken... I...

And then he faded out. And Mack was left to stare at the chrome pipe with the same frustrated expression he got when the cable went out.

A man standing two urinals down shot him a worried look. You all right, kid?

Yes, sir. Sometimes I talk to toilets. It... Well, they seem to like it.

Is that so? The man thought about it for a minute. Then he said, Hello, toilet.

Mack was giving up on Grimluk and turning away when the ancient apparition came back into view. But now his voice was a whisper. An urgent, sketchy whisper:... dragons may help... the Egge Rocks...

Daidu, nine dragons, egg rocks? Mack repeated. Egg Rocks? Is that a band?

Egge Rocks! Grimluk whispered. Teutoberg Forest. There... the eyes show!

Daidu, nine dragons, a band called Egg Rocks, toityberg... and an ice show?

Eyes!

Ice?

Grimluk shook his head slowly, rolled his eyes up, and gasped, Close enough...

In a faint whisper, so quiet that Mack had to lean closewhich looked extremely not-normalGrimluk said, Beware of...

Mack listened intently and stared at the chrome for a while longer. He tried flushing a couple of times, banging on the handle on the theory that sometimes it helped to bang on things when they didnt work.

But Grimluk was gone.

Again.

Which was very inconvenient because Mack had the impression that the last word Grimluk had said was trap. And thats the kind of word you want to hear clearly enunciated.

Grimluk has got to get himself a phone.

It was irritating. Frustrating. Because Mack had quite a few questions.

He would have to answer those questions the hard way.

He clicked on his iPhone. Opened the browser. Opened the Google search window. And typed in Daidu .

F or David MacAvoywho all his friends called Mackthe flight to China went much better than the flight to Australia had.

The flight to Australia had ended when a beautiful shape-shifting evil princess named Ereskigalwho all her friends (she had no friends) called Riskyturned into a monster and yanked Mack out of a jet at thirty thousand feet and dropped him into the ocean.

On this flight, the one from Sydney to Shanghai, theyd had some turbulence, the first-class bathroom ran out of hand towels, and the meal they served was fish. But none of that was quite as awful as a five-mile fall through thin, freezing air into the shark-infested Pacific. Then they had transferred in Shanghai for a flight to Beijing.

Mack was accompanied by Jarrah Major, the second member of the Magnificent Twelve. And by his former bully and current bodyguard, Stefan Marr.

Stefan could pass for an adult because although he was in the same grade as twelve-year-old Mack, he was fifteen and had the muscular development of one of those guys who sell exercise equipment on cable TV.

In case anyone asked, they were telling people that Stefan was the big brother of Mack and Jarrah. How a dangerously handsome, muscle-bound blond thug had become the brother of a very average-sized, average-looking kid like Mack, let alone the brother of Jarrah, who had the skin tone of her Indigenous Australian mother, was anyones guess.

But people seldom questioned Stefan.

Certainly not more than once.

Anyway, the flight to China was relatively normal, although Mack spent the entire time gripping the armrest and whimpering. He had no fear of flying but he had a morbid fear of oceans and of sharks, and theres a lot of ocean between Australia and China.

At one point Stefan smacked Mack on the head to get Mack to whimper more quietly. Mack didnt really resent this much because if Stefan hadnt done it, the rest of the passengers seated nearby would have. Theres just something about a sweating, trembling, teeth-gritting, seat-gripping, weeping, I-dont-want-to-die-whining kid that gets on peoples nerves.

But now Mack, Jarrah, and Stefan were off the plane and at the Beijing airport waiting for their luggage to come down the conveyor belt. They were surrounded by passengers whod been on the plane from Australia with them. Everyone was bleary and tired and leaning on luggage carts and checking their watches and trying to get more bars on their cell phones.

And standing well apart from Mack.

Mack was thumbing through the Chinese currency hed gotten from an ATM upon landing.

I dont understand this money. Im going to end up paying someone a hundred dollars for a soda, Mack muttered.

And thats when Stefan poked him. Dude, Stefan said. Over there.

A very old man, dressed almost entirely in green, was coming toward them. He was still a hundred yards away and did not move briskly. So Mack had plenty of time to say, Paddy Nine Iron Trout? Here?

Paddy Wacky, Stefan growled. He smiled then and interlaced his fingers in order to crack his knuckles and stretch his arm muscles. Stefan knew that before you engaged in the strenuous activity of beating someone up, its best to stretch. It saves you getting cramps in your biceps.

You know that old git? Jarrah asked.

Hes a Nafia hit man, Mack said.

What? Mafia, like Tony Soprano?

Not Mafia. Nafia, Mack said.

Ah, Jarrah said, as though that clarified the situation for her. (It didnt.)

Mack looked for his bag. There were plenty of bags going by slowly on the carousel, but none were his. Annoying, because if the bag were there, hed have time to pick it up, place it on the luggage cart along with Jarrahs backpack and Stefans bag, and leave at a leisurely pace.