The Eighth Guardian

CHAPTER 1

The man in the green tie has been watching me all day. It’s weird. Both the tie and the watching. His tie is green—not the crimson or navy that seems to be the uniform color for these guys, but green. And he has no business watching me like this. I’m tired. Sweaty. My body has been through hell, and it’s not over yet.

I failed the first challenge. The man should have stopped watching me then.

They hung me by my ankles and plunged me headfirst into a swimming pool chilled to a hypothermic forty degrees. The lock on the chain around my ankles had a code. An alphanumeric code that they flashed in Morse code with the pool light. I had fifteen seconds under the water to figure it out before they’d bring me up for a ten-second break, then dunk me right back under.

But the water was cold, too cold, and every vein in my body exploded when I hit it. Water rushed up my nose, and I sputtered and choked. I whipped my head around and couldn’t even find the pool light. They brought me up, and the ten seconds passed before I could process it. They plunged me back down, and water filled my throat. I coughed and choked and breathed in more, feeling the vomit rise.

I tapped out as soon as they brought me up.

The men and women evaluating me shook their heads. Most of them packed up and said they’d seen enough. But the man in the green tie kept watching me as I stood there, soaked to the bone, shivering under a towel, collapsing under the weight of my failure. His eyes only left me once, when he pulled out a small, worn Moleskine notebook and scribbled something.

His eyes should have left me earlier. I failed.

He was the only one who showed up for my second challenge. Two men grabbed me from behind. They were shouting at me in a foreign language. I think it might have been Yoruba, but I’m not sure. They threw me into a metal chair in a windowless detention room and left. The door locked behind them.

I didn’t think, didn’t breathe. I hopped up on the chair, pulled the emergency sprinkler, and ripped down the plastic halogen light fixture. An alarm blared as cold jets of water rained down on me in the dark room. But I didn’t let it faze me. I waited by the door, and the second it opened, I looped the electrical wiring around my captor’s neck. He submitted, and I trotted out of there in under thirty seconds.

Green Tie nodded his head, made a note in his notebook, and walked away.

Now I’m standing on a wooden platform twenty feet in the air. I’m blindfolded.

“Turn around,” a voice commands.

I obey, and the blindfold disappears from my face. I’m looking over the hills of western Massachusetts. The leaves are orange and yellow and red, creating swirling patterns of color that make my eyes dance. I have no idea what time it is. None. It’s light out, but the gray sky is blanketed with clouds, so I can’t make out the sun’s position. It could be seven in the morning. It could be three in the afternoon. I’ve been awake for at least twenty-four hours now.

“Look down.”

I do. There’s a plywood maze below me. It goes in and out of focus, the twists and turns fusing together into one giant mess of veneer. I close my eyes to give them a precious second’s rest. When my eyes open, the maze stands still. It’s probably fifty yards by fifty yards. Massive. I locate the entrance. I locate the exit.

“Five more seconds,” the man standing next to me says.

My eyes scan the maze, darting from entrance to exit, back over all the turns. There are lefts and rights and a series of rectangular spirals inside the maze. It’s easy. Too easy.

“Done,” the man says, and I’ve got it. A left. Three rights. Two lefts, then two rights. Three lefts. One right to the exit.

But there’s a sinking feeling in my stomach. This is way too simple.

I jog down the steps and over to the woman holding a stopwatch at the start of the maze. She looks at the clipboard she’s holding, marks a notch, then looks up at me.

“Ready?” she asks in a flat voice. No compassion. Typical.

“Yes,” I tell her as I tighten my ponytail. Even though that’s not really true. I just want this to be over with; that’s the truth.

I take a breath and notice that a crowd has formed to watch. Looks like everyone who gave up on me after the first challenge is back. They’re so fickle. It almost makes me want to smile, but then I glance over and see that man in the green tie staring at me again with those same intense eyes. I’m being scrutinized, evaluated like a real candidate. My stomach flips over.

“Go,” the woman says, pressing down on the stopwatch. I take a breath and run forward into the maze.

A few steps and I dart left. All the way to the end, then a right. There are two turns I could take before that, but I run past both of them. They’re dead ends. I hit the last right and take it, then keep running.

There’s nothing in my way. No obstacles. This can’t be right. There has to be something. I make the next right and—

I gasp as a man dressed from head to toe in black jumps in front of me. His left hand grabs the collar of my shirt, and his right hand presses the tip of a knife blade up to my chin.

“Gotcha,” he says.

I don’t make eye contact. You never make eye contact. I stare into his sternum and look at his hand position. Then I lean back before he has a chance to react. My left hand grabs his right wrist, and I loop my elbow through his, forcing him to swing the knife down. I step back with my left foot, pivot, and grab the knife out of his hand.

That took all of about two seconds.

“Sorry, what were you saying?” I ask.

The man raises his eyebrows, then lifts his hands in submission and jogs toward the start of the maze. Away from me.

Only then do I breathe. I look down at my own hand. It’s shaking.

I take the knife with me as I make my third right, then a quick left. I need to make another left here somewhere, I think. I repeat the rest of the pattern in my head.

Two lefts, then two rights. Three lefts. One right to the exit.

I need to make a left, but when? There are so many. There’s one right in front of me, but it feels wrong. I think I’m supposed to go to the next left. Or the one after that? I can’t get lost in this thing. I can’t. Focus!

I close my eyes and let the maze appear in my head. I’m supposed to take the second left. I think.

I turn. The path leads me down a long plywood corridor, and this has to be correct. Yes, it has to. One right, then another quick right. I keep the knife held high, protecting my face. I must be more than halfway through the maze. I have to run into someone else soon. I have to—

Click.

I round to the left, and there’s a gun in my face. A woman is holding it. She’s about my height and all muscle. She looks younger than me, but I know she has to be at least eighteen.

“Drop the knife,” she tells me.

“Or what? You’re going to shoot me?”

“Yep,” she says.

I look at the gun. It’s a black assault rifle, standard issue. Just like the ones they make us shoot here, but with a key difference.

“That’s a paintball gun,” I say.

The woman doesn’t blink. “Ever been shot with one of these at close range?”

I have. It stings like a bitch and leaves a purple welt that doesn’t fade for at least two weeks.

“Plus,” the woman says, “I shoot you, you fail. Now drop the knife.”

I grunt in disgust as I toss the knife behind me. It clatters as the handle hits the plywood floor. And then I stand there with my hands at my sides, waiting. Waiting for the cue.

“Hands up,” the woman says.

And there it is.

I raise my hands and go right for the gun. I jerk it up, then twist it down so it’s hanging by the woman’s side. Disarming is a really simple skill. You redirect the assailant, control the weapon down, attack the assailant, then finally take away the weapon, which usually involves broken fingers. I did steps one and two, but I really don’t think I’m supposed to punch this woman in the face or break any bones. So I go for an easy elbow strike and let the woman deflect it.

She drops the gun into my hands, steps back, and raises her hands. “Well done,” she says. She nods toward the exit of the maze.

I fling the gun over my shoulder and run. Adrenaline courses through my veins. I round to the left. I’m almost there. I take the last left I can into a long corridor. There are a number of lefts in this corridor, but I race past all of them.

Right. The way out is a right.

I see it ahead. I sprint down the corridor. My footsteps pound against the wood, making a slapping sound. I’m almost there. One more right, and I’m—

My arms fly out to the sides, and I skid to a halt. The floor is different. The grain of the wood. The height. There’s a large square section that was cut from a different sheet of plywood and is about a quarter inch higher. I peer around the corner. The exit is right there around the bend, but this section is so big and in such a tricky spot that I can’t jump over it. I drop down to all fours to look at it. I bet it’s one final obstacle. A bomb.

It is. It’s a simple pressure-plate bomb. You step on it, you’re done.

I take a breath of relief. I’m good at pressure-plate bombs. Most women are. There are two hooks on the side, and all you have to do is unlatch them; but you can’t move the plate more than a quarter of an inch or it’ll trip. Men usually use too much force. Macho BS or something that blows up in their faces. Literally.

I slip off the first hook, then shimmy myself backward to get the second. And then my hands start shaking. The exit is right there. I can see it. I want this to be over so badly. My hands jump so much that my teeth start chattering. I breathe and clench and unclench my fingers. I’m close. I can do this.

I suck in my breath and steady my hands as much as I can. My fingers grab the metal hook, and I let out my breath one second at a time as I press down on the hook.

It sticks.

No! I release it, and it snaps back up. My body shakes from my teeth to my knees. Why won’t this day end? I blow out whatever air is still in my lungs. Pull it together. I press down on the hook, just barely, then wiggle it to the side. It gives way, and the plates are disarmed.

I think.

I stand up and take three jumps to get the blood pumping. So close. And there’s only one way out. I leap onto the bomb.

Nothing happens.

I exhale. I did it! Not that they’d actually blow me up or anything, but I’m sure there would be consequences of some sort if I didn’t diffuse it correctly.

The exit is only a few feet in front of me; and I hurl myself forward, out of the maze, and onto the ground. A gong sounds.

I’m lying in the dirt, panting and trembling, when the woman with the stopwatch appears over me. “Seven minutes, four point three-eight seconds,” she says.

I push myself to a seated position. I have no idea whether that’s a good time or the worst time ever recorded. My gallery is there. Most of them have already turned away and are walking back toward campus. A few stragglers are hunched over clipboards. But that man is staring at me. Again. Making a note in his Moleskine.

I look away and get to my feet. Every muscle in my body protests. I would kill for a hot bath and my bed right now.

“You’ll be escorted back to campus,” the woman with the stopwatch says. Like all of the other test proctors who showed up on campus yesterday—or is it two days ago now?—I’ve never seen her before in my life. But in this moment I hate her.

I can’t believe I have to do this again next year.

My escort arrives. I know her. Katia Britanova. She’s a sophomore who lives in my dorm, on the floor below. She has an impossibly large array of Hello Kitty crap, although that pales in comparison to her Bowie knife collection.

“How was it?” Katia whispers as we start the long walk back to campus.

I shake my head at her. My left foot makes contact with the pavement, and soreness races up my body. My right leg makes contact with the pavement and wobbles. Katia hooks her arm under my armpit and steadies me.

“Is he done?” I ask her.

“I’m not really allowed to talk about—”

“Katia, come on. Is he done?”

Katia nods her head. “Finished about an hour ago.”

We trudge on in silence. Testing Day is over for me. Until next year. Dear God, help me. I have to do this again.

I really shouldn’t complain. I’ve known this was coming since I was fourteen, ever since I got a letter congratulating me on my acceptance to the Peel Academy, which was surprising considering I’d never applied. Or had even heard of it.

But my mom had. After the letter arrived, she locked herself in the bathroom and cried for three days straight. That’s not an exaggeration. She’s been known to do that. Plates of food pile up at the door. The phone rings for hours. Begging is pointless. Bargaining goes unanswered. Worry turns to anger, sours to contempt.

When a trustee of the school showed up a week later, dressed in a red skirt suit with an American flag pinned to her lapel, she whispered two magical words that made the decision easy for me: legal emancipation. I didn’t care who she was or what the school taught at that point. All that mattered was that it was my ticket out of Vermont. And then the woman told me that the school was run by the government and was by invitation only for a select group of students whose bloodlines looked promising, and I knew.

I was chosen because of my dad.

Katia and I pass through the iron gates leading to the main part of campus. She walks me past the building that houses science labs, past one of the dorms, past the administration building, and into the dining hall. Another sophomore, Blake Sikorski, stands guard at the door. He checks my name off a list pinned to a clipboard and nods his head toward the hall. Katia gives my shoulder a squeeze and trots down the stairs.

The dining hall is littered with sleeping bodies. Juniors and seniors lie around the room like fallen dominoes, their bodies twisted and broken into sleeping positions that can’t be comfortable at all. But when you’ve been awake for as long as we have and been through what we have, comfort is an afterthought.

I spot Abe in the back corner, sitting with his back against the wall. He’s awake but staring straight ahead like a zombie. My heart flutters. He didn’t have to stay awake for me. But of course he did.

He doesn’t hear me until I’m a few feet in front of him. His head turns, recognition dawns, and his mouth twitches upward.

“I’d get up, but—”

“Don’t bother,” I say as my legs buckle, and I fall to the floor beside him. “Holy cornflakes, that sucked.”

Abe chuckles. “What, no expletives?”

“I’m too tired.” I fold my hands over my chest and close my eyes. Abe hates swearing. Always has. He says it’s a sign of a small vocabulary. But I grew up in a house where four-letter words were pretty much standard protocol, so Abe’s used to hearing them from me.

Except now. I’m not kidding about the too-tired thing.

I crack open one eye and glance at the clock on the wall. A few minutes until four in the afternoon. So that makes thirty-four hours that I’ve been awake.

Peel’s graduation works a bit differently from most other schools. We don’t have caps and gowns; we don’t have long ceremonies and boring speeches. No, we have Testing Day. Once a year, a group of proctors arrives at the school without any warning whatsoever. It could be in September or it could be in May. Testing Day always starts at night, after a long, hard day of work, when you’re tired and ready to unwind. Then—surprise!—the fun begins.

The first part is a twelve-hour written test that stretches through the wee hours of the morning. You’re quizzed on physics, biology, history, geography, calculus, computer programming—you name it. There are also ethics questions. Stuff like: You’re locked in a room with a known terrorist who has planted a bomb somewhere in Washington DC that is set to explode in thirty minutes. You have a drill, a pair of needle-nose pliers, and a gallon-size bucket of water. What do you do? (Here’s a hint: The correct answer involves none of those things.)

After that come the physical challenges. They’re never the same, no matter how many years you go back. Every junior and senior at Peel is tested, although I don’t know why they bother to test the juniors. No one has graduated as a junior in more than thirty years.

Still, I can’t ignore the sinking feeling in my stomach as I think of the man in the green tie who watched me so intently today. His piercing eyes flood my memory and make me shudder.

“I couldn’t finish the first challenge,” I confess as I slide my head into that nook of Abe’s arm, an old, familiar spot.

“That’s fine,” he assures me. “This is just a warm-up, remember? We get to do this again next year.”

“I don’t think there’s going to be a next year for me.”

Abe’s eyes are closed, but he opens one and gives me the side-eye with it. “Of course there is. We’re juniors.”

“There was this man,” I say. “He was watching me all day.”

Abe opens the other eye. “There were a bunch of people watching us.”

“Not like this. This man was . . . intense. Creepy, even.”

“Then he’s probably CIA,” Abe says. “They’re all like that.”

I don’t say anything. I want to believe him. I mean, probably ninety percent of us go on to join the CIA. We’re drafted at eighteen, and I have to admit, it’s a pretty sweet deal. They move us to Langley, and we go to Georgetown on their dime. But weekends aren’t spent binge drinking at frat parties or cramming for finals at the library. Weekends are spent in Mumbai or Mosul or Manila, breaking into banks or climbing into bedroom windows. Well, after six brutal months of additional training and next to no sleep, that is.

We all assume that’s our future. Abe and I have always assumed it. We’ve been together for more than two years now, ever since the first week of freshman year, and we’ve been planning our next steps together for probably that long, too. Abe’s sure he’s going to be a technical intelligence officer in the science and technology arm (I’m dating a computer-engineering-stuff-that-makes-my-head-hurt genius), while I’ll be an operations officer in clandestine services. It’ll mean a lot of time apart, since he’ll be based in DC and I’ll be all over the world, but Abe’s even gone so far as to scout out the best areas in the capital for us to get an apartment to serve as our home base. You know, someday. (I’m also dating a poster boy for type-A personalities.)

“Hey,” he whispers, gently turning my head to look at him. “Stop worrying. You’re not graduating.”

“But—”

“One word,” Abe interrupts. “Tyler Fertig.”

“That’s two words.”

“Tyler. Fertig,” Abe repeats. “If he didn’t graduate as a junior, you’re not going to.”

I nod my head. He’s right. Of course he’s right. Two years ago, Tyler Fertig was a junior when we were freshmen. Pardon my French, Abe, but Tyler Fertig rocked the shit out of Testing Day like no one ever had before. He only missed one question on the written test—one—and outscored every single senior during the physical challenges. And yet at the banquet that night, where the names of the graduating students are called and blissful boys and girls trot to the stage to be handed an envelope containing an assignment, Tyler’s name was skipped. He was sitting at the next table over from me, and I can still picture his reaction. Shock, denial, then anger. He got up, pushed his plate across the table, and stormed out of the room. I never understood why he was so angry, but I guess I get it now. Testing Day sucks. He must have thought that for sure he wouldn’t have to do it again.

Abe’s right. I’m not graduating.

Tonight I’m going to sleep in my own bed, and tomorrow we’ll have Professor Kopelman’s International Relations class waiting for us. The fall is creeping to a close, and the holidays will be here before we know it. We’ll do Thanksgiving with my mom, Hanukkah with Abe’s family, then put in another quick appearance with my mom at Christmas. Just like last year. Just like next year.

I nestle into Abe’s arm a little more, and he rolls to the side and envelops me.

“I missed you today. I kept wishing you were there with me,” he whispers in my ear before he kisses my earlobe.

“I have to smell like a dead cat.”

He laughs and kisses my neck.

“We’re not alone,” I whisper, though I wriggle myself closer to him.

“We’re in a room full of hibernating bears.”

“I kinda wish I was one of them right now.”

Abe’s fingers interlace through mine. “I could get behind that plan.” He goes still and gets very quiet. But then a few moments later, in a voice barely more than a whisper, he says, “Love you, Mandy Girl.”

I close my eyes. “I love you too, Abey Baby.”

And then I’m out.