Page 75 of The Tree of Spirits
“The Templars?”
“Yeah, apparently that’s what the guys who kidnapped the Apprentices are calling themselves. That’s what my friendsfound out when they crossed swords with them in the Park the other day.”
“So what do the Templars want?” I asked.
“This heist was never about the jewels, Red. In fact, the Templars left them behind in the store.”
“Then what was the heist ab—” I stopped myself. “The Apprentices.Wewere the Templars’ target, the treasure they did all of this to steal. But why? What do they want with us?”
Conner shook his head. “I don’t know, but this isn’t the first time something like this has happened. A couple Apprentices have gone missing each year, always under peculiar circumstances. No one has been able to figure out who is doing it or why.”
“Why haven’t I heard about this?”
“The General wrote off the missing Apprentices as fluke accidents in a dangerous world.”
I wasn’t surprised by that. At all.
“But some of the Knights just knew those Apprentices were still out there,” Conner continued. “Finally, last year, we found evidence that we were right: a note from one of the missing Apprentices. It was Vivi’s little sister, and she was begging us to come save them all.”
“What did the General say then?”
“He said someone was playing a prank on us,” Conner replied with a jaded smile. “It wasn’t a prank, Red. Those Apprentices are still out there. And the General refused to let us go look for them. He said he wasn’t going to waste valuable resources on a wild goose chase.”
I set my hand on his arm. “That’s why you left the Knights, isn’t it? That’s why you became Rebels.”
“Yes,” he rasped. “These kidnappings have been going on for years, and the Government refuses to entertain even the possibility that those Apprentices are still alive. So they donothing. And they won’t let the Knights do anything either. And when Vivi went looking for her sister anyway, they locked her up and told everyone that the loss of her sister had driven her insane.”
I sucked in a shocked breath. “That’s awful.”
“They left us with no choice, Red. We had to leave. We had to do something. So we broke Vivi out of the Black Obelisk and launched our so-called Rebellion. And we’ve been searching for the missing Apprentices ever since.”
“Do you have any leads?” I asked.
“No. Whoever took them did a very good job of making them disappear. And if we don’t stop the Templars, this year’s four missing Apprentices will soon join them.”
“We are going to figure out why they are doing this and stop them,” I told him.
Conner’s smile returned. “Yeah, I think we will.”
“The Templars are the key,” I said. “If we find them, we find not only this year’s missing Apprentices, but maybe all the other missing Apprentices too.”
CHAPTER 5
MAGICAL INFUSIONS
Vivi peeked her head into the room. “If you’re done flirting with your girlfriend, Conner, we have a situation update.”
His gaze cut past me, to her. “What is it?”
“The Watchers are no longer looking for us.”
“They gave up.” Frowning, Conner stood. “That doesn’t sound like them.”
“They didn’t give up,” Vivi told him. “They’re just…gone. They simply disappeared.”
“Ok, so how did we do that?”
“Wedidn’t do anything,” replied Vivi. “We don’t even know how this happened. The Black Obelisk is in a state of panic. Well, at least what few Watchers still left are panicking.”
