The Dragon's Descent (18 page)

“What are you doing?” Clover asked as Vero sat in front of the desktop.

Vero typed on the keyboard, an idea growing in his mind. Clover sat next to him. She stared at the screen.

“You're searching for flights to Sri Lanka?”

“Yeah.”

“They're nine hundred and fourteen dollars!” Clover said. “Dad's never gonna pay that for all of us.”

“No, he won't.” Vero sighed.

“We have college savings accounts,” Clover said. “Maybe we could take the money from there?”

“They won't do it,” Vero said with frustration.

“I'll keep working on Dad,” Clover said. “It's meant to be. I've got a feeling on this one. I'll convince him.”

Vero didn't answer. His mind was elsewhere.

That night, Vero tiptoed down the hall to his parents' bedroom. He poked his head into the room. His mom lay
fast asleep with her eye mask around her head—she always needed the room to be completely dark to fall asleep each night. His dad was on his back, snoring loudly. Vero often wondered why his mother chose an eye mask rather than earplugs. Some nights he could hear his dad snoring all the way to his room.

Vero gingerly walked back, careful not to wake anyone. He stood at the base of his bed. Last year, when he was terrified for Clover's safety, he got himself so worked up that he produced a heart attack, which caused him to transition to the Ether. Raphael had told Vero that he had actually willed himself to the Ether. So if he could do it once, Vero reasoned he could do it again. He closed his eyes and had one single thought—to get to the Ether. He desperately wanted to go there. He needed to find two angels in particular. The thought consumed him. He felt pain in his chest and grabbed over that area, then collapsed on his bed, his head hanging over the side.

Vero removed his hand from his chest and he looked around him—green stalks met his eyes in every direction. He was lying in a field of sunflowers. He stood up and screamed— the angels Leo and Karael, his parents' guardian angels, stood before him.

“Well, you called us,” Leo said defensively.

“Oh, yeah, I did,” Vero said, slapping his hand to his head in an attempt to recover from the jarring transition.

“When you're a full-fledged guardian, you'll no longer feel the transition,” Karael told Vero. “It gets much easier.”

“What do you need, Vero?” Leo asked.

“I have a pretty good idea where the entrance to the garden of Eden is,” Vero said.

“You do?” Leo asked, surprised.

“Sri Lanka,” Vero said.

Karael looked to Leo. Vero could tell they were speaking mind to mind. He picked up on snippets of their conversation.

“Yes, my dad's going there,” Vero said.

“You can read minds?” Leo asked Vero.

Vero nodded. “A bit. Look, I'm here because I need you to convince him to take me with him to Sri Lanka.” Vero looked to Karael. “And convince my mom too. If she puts pressure on him, he'll take me.”

“We can't just do that,” Leo said. “It has to be approved.”

“What do you mean?” Vero said, the panic rising in his voice.

“Well, of course we need to confirm that it's God's will,” Leo said.

“But I need to go there! It's what I must do! You promised to help me!” Vero pleaded.

“And we will, Vero,” Karael said. “If God allows us.”

“How do we find out if He will?”

“Ask Him.” Leo smiled. “It's not only human prayers He hears.”

Karael flapped his wings. “If He grants your prayer, we can get on it much quicker if we're already at the prayer grid.”

Vero nodded and sprouted his wings. Off the three angels flew. Vero soared over the vast green hills below. He saw animals of every type peacefully grazing. Soon they reached the crystal coliseum that was the prayer grid. As Vero, Leo, and Karael hovered above, they saw the thousands and thousands of angels who were seated in the
stands. Brightly colored rays of light shot up from the grid in the middle of the coliseum, which angels caught into their hands. Soon each flew off and other angels arrived to catch new shards of light. Vero was in awe of the spectacle.

“Go ask,” Leo said to Vero. “We'll wait here.”

Vero nodded and flew off to a peaceful cluster of trees just outside the prayer grid coliseum. He landed on the thick branch of one and pulled in his wings, then sat and closed his eyes. The atmosphere around the prayer grid was so tranquil that Vero had no problem concentrating. He asked God with all his heart to hear his prayer. After a few moments, he opened his eyes, grew his wings, and flew back to the prayer grid.

“Vero, over here!” Karael waved to him.

Vero looked over and saw Leo and Karael sitting on the top bleacher. He flew to them and sat down.

“Any word?” Vero asked.

“Not yet,” Leo answered. “Patience.”

“We need to hurry. Because I willed myself here, time hasn't stopped on earth for me,” Vero said. “Can you see if my dad is still asleep?”

“Sawing wood.” Leo chuckled.

Without warning, two vivid purple rays of light shot straight toward Leo and Karael. Their hands instantly went up, and they caught them.

“All good?” Vero asked them.

Karael smiled and nodded. “But remember, all we can do is plant the seed in his mind.”

“I know,” Vero said.

“And don't expect me to push for first class.” Leo smiled.

“No worries. Business class will be fine with me,” Vero said, meaning it.

Vero woke the next morning with a crick in his neck. When he returned from the Ether, he was so exhausted that he'd slept with his head hanging off the bed, the exact position from when he had transitioned to the Ether. He threw on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, then went to find his father.

“That one could work,” Vero overheard his mother say.

He walked into the kitchen and saw his parents sitting at the table, hovering over his dad's laptop.

“What are you doing?” Vero asked.

“After sleeping on it, I sort of had a change of heart,” Dennis said, looking up from the screen.

“Dad's taking the whole family to Sri Lanka with him!” Nora said excitedly.

“Really?” Vero asked.

Clover walked into the kitchen in her pajamas.

“What's going on?” Clover asked.

“We're going to Sri Lanka!” Vero said.

“All of us?”

“Even Tack,” Dennis said. “We called his parents and they're okay with it. He already has a passport. I guess he was supposed to go on some dowsing trip to Central America with his dad last summer, but then the trip never happened.”

“And our passports are still good from when we went to Cancun. Dad just needs to get the visas,” Nora said.

“This is crazy,” Clover said. “What changed your mind?”

“When I woke up, for some reason I felt like we really needed to spend more time together as a family,” Dennis said. “And then everything just seemed to magically fall
into place. You guys won't miss any school. And somehow I had a ton more frequent flyer miles than what I had remembered . . .”

Clover shot Vero a suspicious look. He shrugged.

“So we're only actually paying for one ticket.”

“Come on, you two.” Nora turned to Clover and Vero. “Hurry up and eat so we can get your pictures taken.”

“Dad,” Vero said. “This is all so amazing. But is there any chance you have enough miles for business class?”

“As a matter of fact, yes.”

“Really?”

“Yep,” Dennis said. “Mom and I will be in business. You, Tack, and Clover can sit in coach.” Dennis smiled. “Unfortunately, the only seats available for you kids were the ones right across from the bathroom.”

Somehow, Vero knew that Leo was also smiling.

13

TRACKING SAPPHIRES

S
ri Lanka?” Tack said to Vero as they pushed the hospitality cart down the sterile hospital hallway.

“Yeah.”

“Why can't the book be somewhere like Hawaii or Alaska,” Tack said. “I always wanted to see Alaska.”

“Sri Lanka's supposed to be beautiful,” Vero said. “After we're done here, can you come over to my house?”

“Yeah, why?”

“I need you to practice looking for the book,” Vero said. “I now know what it is, so we can fine-tune your dowsing skills. Okay?”

“What is it?”

“A gem.”

Vero saw a worried look come over Tack. “What?”

“I've only ever detected water. I'm not so sure I can find a gem.”

“I thought dowsers can find a whole bunch of stuff like oil, metals . . .”

“Some can. I just hope I don't let you down,” Tack said.

Tack's face then turned white. Vero saw fear in his eyes. Then he realized they were standing in front of the same elevator where they were attacked, and that Tack had stopped pushing the cart.

“It's all right,” Vero said. “They're not gonna come back . . . at least for now.”

“How do you know?”

“Because they need me right now. They need me to lead them to the book.”

Tack shook his head.

“What?”

“It's still hard for me to make sense of all this,” Tack said. “How did you deal with it? You know, when you first found out.”

“Part of me was relieved because it explained all the weird stuff that was happening. I really thought I was going crazy. But then I worried that my family would hate me if they knew the truth . . . You too.”

“I'll admit it freaked me out, but I could never hate you,” Tack said. “You know my family. We go to Mass every Sunday, but I guess I focused more on video games than religion. I kind of thought all those old Bible stories were just stories about how not to behave.”

Vero nodded. He understood.

“But here you are, an angel,” Tack said. “I don't know if I would have believed if you weren't here, and if I hadn't seen those monsters.”

The elevator bell dinged, signaling its arrival. Vero looked to Tack.

“I'll get in,” Tack said, eyeing the elevator. “I'm not scared anymore.”

The elevator door opened, and Tack screamed at the sight before him. Not a malture, but Nurse Kunkel walking off the elevator. She gave him a look.

“Get a grip, Kozlowski,” Nurse Kunkel told Tack as she walked past.

Vero searched through his mother's jewelry box, which sat on top of Nora's dresser in her bedroom. Tack stood in the doorway keeping watch.

“I feel weird about this,” Tack said.

“We're not stealing, just borrowing them,” Vero said as he pushed a pearl necklace to the side of the box.

“Hurry up.”

“I can't find them,” Vero said, frustrated.

“Can't we just use something else?”

“Wait! Here we go!” Vero said, excitement in his voice.

He held up two blue stone earrings. Tack looked closely at the earrings in Vero's hand.