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“I know everything,” he said, like he could read my mind.
“Okay.” I figured I shouldn’t say much. Find out what he knew first.
“I warned your father not to get mixed up with a human… but he didn’t listen. He never listens. And now look at the fine mess we find ourselves in.”
I didn’t want to talk about the stupid mess. I already knew all its tangles and knots. “So he called you,” I said. “Why?”
“He has always had the worst timing. I was at a Bolts football game, and they were actually winning. Well, with my help, that is.”
“You rig football games?”
He shrugged casually. “Sometimes I use the elements to others’ advantage. That makes me generous, don’t you think?”
I guess that was one way to look at it. Unless you were on the losing end.
Mat cupped his hands as if he were holding something fragile. A flickering light formed in his palms, and he blew on the tiny flame. It zipped into the black sky like a streak of lightning. A second later, thunder sounded. And not just once. There was a series of booms, like someone was knocking down gigantic pins with a bowling ball over and over.
“That should give us some privacy,” he said. “Now, where were we?”
How could I learn to do that?
“Uh… you rig football games,” I said.
“Yes… I mean, no. Stay focused, kid. I’m here to expedite your journey to the Old World.”
The air grew colder. “How?”
He shook his head and sighed with annoyance like I should’ve known the answer. “I control the elements,” he said. “The water does what I command, so I’ll kick some currents into high gear, put the wind at your back, and off you go. Then I can get back to my game.”
Maybe things would work out after all.
“There’s one little problem,” he said.
Why couldn’t things ever be simple?
“I can’t be too obvious—don’t want to draw attention to you
, if you know what I mean. So I’ll have to take it a little easy—as in no hurricanes or tsunamis. Get it?”
“Right,” I said. “No storms.”
Just then, Pacific materialized from the ocean mist. She perched on the boat’s railing, wearing the same jaguar-spotted cape as before. “Is he being nice to you, Zane?”
“I’m always nice,” Mat said to her.
“Mm-hmm… Tell that to the two worlds you destroyed.”
“That’s not the same thing,” Mat said. “They totally deserved that.”
Pacific narrowed her eyes and walked over to me. “So is he? Being nice?”
“Uh-huh,” I said. “What’re you doing here? Did you hear me call—?”
“I’m going to tug on the time rope bit by bit,” she said. “Enough to buy you some time, but not so much that anyone figures out I’m not dead. But really, Zane, we can’t make this a habit.”
I had to admit, I felt a spark of hope in my chest. Then I remembered that in the end I’d still have to have a face-off with the god of death, destruction, and darkness, and the hope fizzled. “How much time will it give us?”
“A few hours… at most,” she said. “Anything more and the gods will notice.”
