Keeper of the Lost Cities Book 1 Read Online

  CONTENTS

PREFACE

Affiliate ONE

Chapter Two

Chapter THREE

CHAPTER Four

Chapter FIVE

Chapter Six

CHAPTER 7

Affiliate 8

CHAPTER Ix

Chapter X

Affiliate ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

Affiliate THIRTEEN

Affiliate Xiv

Chapter Xv

CHAPTER Sixteen

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER 18

Chapter Xix

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER Twenty-One

Affiliate TWENTY-Two

Chapter Twenty-3

Affiliate TWENTY-FOUR

Affiliate TWENTY-Five

Chapter TWENTY-Half dozen

CHAPTER TWENTY-Seven

CHAPTER Twenty-EIGHT

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Affiliate Xxx

Chapter THIRTY-ONE

Affiliate Xxx-2

Affiliate 30-Iii

CHAPTER Thirty-FOUR

CHAPTER 30-FIVE

CHAPTER Thirty-SIX

Chapter Thirty-SEVEN

Chapter THIRTY-EIGHT

CHAPTER 30-Nine

Affiliate Forty

Affiliate FORTY-ONE

CHAPTER Forty-TWO

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

CHAPTER FORTY-5

CHAPTER Xl-SIX

CHAPTER Xl-Vii

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

Affiliate FORTY-9

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

ABOUT THE Writer

For Mom and Dad,

who always believed this mean solar day would come.

(And because I'k hoping imaginary grandchildren count!)

PREFACE

BLURRY, FRACTURED MEMORIES SWAM through Sophie'southward mind, just she couldn't piece them together. She tried opening her optics and found only darkness. Something rough pressed against her wrists and ankles, refusing to let her move.

A wave of cold rushed through her as the horrifying realization dawned.

She was a hostage.

A fabric across her lips stifled her cry for assistance, and a sedative's sweet aroma stung her nose when she inhaled, making her head spin.

Were they going to kill her?

Would the Black Swan really destroy their own creation? What was the bespeak of Project Moonlark, and so? What was the point of the Everblaze?

The drug lulled her toward a dreamless oblivion, but she fought back—clinging to the i memory that could polish a tiny spot of light in the thick, inky haze. A pair of beautiful aquamarine eyes.

Fitz'due south optics. Her starting time friend in her new life. Her offset friend ever.

Peradventure if she hadn't noticed him that day in the museum, none of this would accept happened.

No. She knew information technology'd been also late fifty-fifty so. The white fires were already burning—curving toward her urban center and filling the sky with viscous, sweetness smoke.

The spark before the blaze.

Ane

MISS FOSTER!" MR. SWEENEY'S NASAL phonation cut through Sophie's clarion music as he yanked her earbuds out by the cords. "Accept yous decided that you lot're too smart to pay attending to this information?"

Sophie forced her eyes open. She tried not to wince as the bright fluorescents reflected off the brilliant blue walls of the museum, amplifying the throbbing headache she was hiding.

"No, Mr. Sweeney," she mumbled, shrinking under the glares of her now staring classmates.

She pulled her shoulder-length blond hair around her face, wishing she could hibernate backside information technology. This was exactly the kind of attending she went out of her fashion to avoid. Why she wore boring colors and lurked in the dorsum, blocked by the other kids who were at least a foot taller than her. Information technology was the only style to survive as a twelve-year-one-time high school senior.

"Then perhaps you can explain why yous were listening to your iPod instead of following along?" Mr. Sweeney held up her earbuds like they were testify in a crime. Though to him, they probably were. He'd dragged Sophie's form to the Natural History Museum in Balboa Park, assuming his students would be excited about the all-24-hour interval field trip. He didn't seem to realize that unless the giant dinosaur replicas came to life and started eating people, no one cared.

Sophie tugged out a loose eyelash—a nervous habit—and stared at her feet. At that place was no fashion to make Mr. Sweeney understand why she needed the music to cancel the noise. He couldn't even hear the noise.

Chatter from dozens of tourists echoed off the fossil-lined walls and splashed around the clangorous room. Merely their mental voices were the real problem.

Scattered, disconnected pieces of thoughts broadcast straight into Sophie's brain—similar being in a room with hundreds of TVs blaring unlike shows at the aforementioned fourth dimension. They sliced into her consciousness, leaving abrupt pains in their wake.

She was a freak.

It'd been her secret—her burden—since she fell and hit her caput when she was five years one-time. She'd tried blocking the noise. Tried ignoring it. Naught helped. And she could never tell anyone. They wouldn't empathize.

"Since you've decided y'all're above this lecture, why don't you give it?" Mr. Sweeney asked. He pointed to the enormous orange dinosaur with a duckbill in the center of the room. "Explain to the grade how the Lambeosaurus differs from the other dinosaurs we've studied."

Sophie repressed a sigh as her mind flashed to an image of the information card in front of the display. She'd glanced at it when they entered the museum, and her photographic memory recorded every item. As she recited the facts, Mr. Sweeney'southward face twisted into a scowl, and she could hear her classmates' thoughts abound increasingly sour. They weren't exactly fans of their resident kid prodigy. They chosen her Curvebuster.

She finished her answer, and Mr. Sweeney grumbled something that sounded like "know-it-all" as he stalked off to the showroom in the next room over. Sophie didn't follow. The sparse walls separating the two rooms didn't block the racket, but they muffled it. She grabbed what little relief she could.

"Nice job, superfreak," Garwin Chang—a boy wearing a T-shirt that said BACK OFF! I'Yard GONNA FART—sneered every bit he shoved past her to join their classmates. "Maybe they'll write some other article about yous. 'Kid Prodigy Teaches Grade Almost the Lame-o-saurus.'"

Garwin was however bitter Yale had offered her a full scholarship. His rejection letter had arrived a few weeks before.

Not that Sophie was allowed to get.

Her parents said information technology was as well much attention, too much pressure, and she was too young. Cease of discussion.

Then she'd be attending the much closer, much smaller San Diego Metropolis Higher next year—a fact some annoying reporter found newsworthy enough to post in the local paper the twenty-four hour period before—Kid PRODIGY CHOOSES Urban center College OVER IVY LEAGUE—complete with her senior photo. Her parents freaked when they institute information technology. "Freaked" wasn't even a strong enough word. More than half their rules were to assist Sophie "avert unnecessary attention." Front-folio manufactures were pretty much their worst nightmare. They'd even called the newspaper to mutter.

The editor seemed equally unhappy as they were. The story was run in place of an commodity on the arsonist terrorizing the metropolis—and they were still trying to figure out how the fault had happened. Bizarre fires with white-hot flames and fume that smelled like burnt carbohydrate took priority over everything. Esp

ecially a story about an unimportant picayune daughter nigh people went out of their way to ignore.

Or, they used to.

Across the museum, Sophie defenseless sight of a tall, dark-haired boy reading yesterday'southward newspaper with the embarrassing black-and-white photograph of her on the front. Then he looked up and stared straight at her.

She'd never seen eyes that item shade of blue before—teal, like the smooth pieces of sea glass she'd constitute on the beach—and they were so bright they glittered. Something flickered across his expression when he caught her gaze. Disappointment?

Earlier she could decide what to make of it, he shrugged off the display he'd been leaning against and closed the distance between them.

The grin he flashed belonged on a movie screen, and Sophie's heart did a weird fluttery thing.

"Is this you?" he asked, pointing to the motion-picture show.

Sophie nodded, feeling tongue-tied. He was probably 15, and past far the cutest boy she'd ever seen. And so why was he talking to her?

"I thought and then." He squinted at the flick, then back at her. "I didn't realize your optics were chocolate-brown."

"Uh . . . yes," she said, not sure what to say. "Why?"

He shrugged. "No reason."

Something felt off nearly the conversation, but she couldn't figure out what information technology was. And she couldn't identify his emphasis. Kind of British, merely unlike somehow. Crisper? Which bothered her—simply she didn't know why.

"Are yous in this class?" she asked, wishing she could suck the words back as before long as they left her mouth. Of course he wasn't in her class. She'd never seen him before. She wasn't used to talking to boys—particularly cute boys—and information technology made her brain a little mushy.

His perfect grin returned as he told her, "No." And so he pointed to the hulking dark-green figure they were standing in forepart of. An Albertosaurus, in all its giant, lizardesque celebrity. "Tell me something. Do you really think that'southward what they looked like? Information technology'southward a piddling cool, isn't it?"

"Not really," Sophie said, trying to run into what he saw. It looked like a small T. king: big oral fissure, precipitous teeth, ridiculously short artillery. Seemed fine to her. "Why? What do you recollect they looked like?"

He laughed. "Never mind. I'll let you get back to your form. It was nice to run into you, Sophie."

He turned to leave just as two classes of kindergartners barreled into the fossil exhibit. The crushing wave of screaming voices was enough to knock Sophie back a step. But their mental voices were a whole other realm of pain.

Kids' thoughts were stinging, loftier-pitched needles—and so many at once was like an aroused porcupine attacking her brain. Sophie closed her eyes equally her easily darted to her caput, rubbing her temples to ease the stabbings in her skull. Then she remembered she wasn't alone.

She glanced effectually to see if anyone noticed her reaction and locked eyes with the boy. His hands were at his forehead, and his face wore the same pained expression she imagined she'd had only a few seconds before.

"Did you just . . . hear that?" he asked, his voice hushed.

She felt the blood drain from her face.

He couldn't hateful . . .

It had to be the screaming kids. They created plenty of dissonance on their ain. Shrieks and squeals and giggles, plus sixty or then individual voices chattering away.

Voices.

She gasped and took another step dorsum every bit her brain solved her before problem.

She could hear the thoughts of anybody in the room. But she couldn't hear the boy's distinct, absolute voice unless he was speaking.

His listen was totally and completely silent.

She didn't know that was possible.

"Who are you?" she whispered.

His eyes widened. "Y'all did—didn't you?" He moved closer, leaning in to whisper. "Are y'all a Telepath?"

She flinched. The give-and-take made her pare itch.

And her reaction gave her away.

"You are! I tin can't believe information technology," he whispered.

Sophie backed toward the exit. She wasn't nigh to reveal her underground to a full stranger.

"It's okay," he said, holding out his hands as he moved closer, similar she was some sort of wild creature he was trying to at-home. "Y'all don't have to be agape. I'm ane as well."

Sophie froze.

"My name'due south Fitz," he added, stepping closer yet.

Fitz? What kind of a proper noun was Fitz?

She studied his face, searching for some sign that this was all part of a joke.

"I'grand not joking," he said, like he knew exactly what she was thinking.

Perchance he did.

She wobbled on her feet.

She'd spent the past seven years wishing she could find someone else similar her—someone who could do what she could. Now that she'd found him, she felt like the world had tilted sideways.

He grabbed her artillery to steady her. "Information technology's okay, Sophie. I'one thousand here to aid you. Nosotros've been looking for y'all for twelve years."

Twelve years? And what did he mean by "we"?

Better question: What did he want with her?

The walls closed in and the room started to spin.

Air.

She needed air.

She jerked abroad and bolted through the door, stumbling as her shaky legs establish their rhythm.

She sucked in giant breaths equally she ran down the stairs in front of the museum. The fume from the fires burned her lungs and white bits of ash flew in her face, merely she ignored them. She wanted every bit much infinite between her and the strange boy every bit possible.

"Sophie, come dorsum!" Fitz shouted behind her.

She picked up her pace as she raced through the courtyard at the base of the steps, past the wide fountain and over the grassy knolls to the sidewalk. No one got in her way—everyone was inside because of the poor air quality. Only she could all the same hear his footsteps gaining on her.

"Wait," Fitz called. "Yous don't take to be afraid."

She ignored him, pouring all her energy into her sprint and fighting the urge to glance over her shoulder to see how far back he was. She fabricated it halfway through a crosswalk before the sound of screeching tires reminded her she hadn't looked both means.

Her head turned and she locked optics with a terrified driver struggling to stop his car earlier information technology plowed right over her.

She was going to die.

Two

THE Adjacent 2d WAS A BLUR.

The car swerved correct—missing Sophie by inches—then jumped the curb and sideswiped a streetlight. The heavy steel lantern cracked from its base and plummeted toward Sophie.

No!

It was her but thought as her instincts took over.

Her hand shot into the air, her mind pulling strength from somewhere deep in her gut and pushing it out through her fingertips. She felt the strength collide with the falling lantern, gripping on similar it was an extension of her arm.

As the dust settled she looked up, and gasped.

The brilliant blue lantern floated above her, somehow held upward by her heed. It didn't fifty-fifty feel heavy, though she was sure information technology weighed a ton.

"Put it down," a familiar, absolute voice warned, bringing her out of her trance.

She shrieked and dropped her arm without thinking. The streetlight hurtled toward them.

"Watch out!" Fitz shouted, yanking her out of the fashion a split second before the lantern crashed to the ground. The force of the impact knocked them over, and they tumbled to the sidewalk. Fitz's trunk broke her autumn as she landed across his breast.

Time seemed to finish.

She stared into his optics—eyes that were now stretched as wide as they could go—trying to sort through the flurry of thoughts and questions swirling effectually in her caput to detect something coherent.

"How did you do that?"

he whispered.

"I have no thought." She sat up, replaying the past few seconds in her heed. Nothing made sense.

"We need to exit of here," Fitz warned, pointing to the driver, who was staring at them similar he'd witnessed a miracle.

"He saw," she gasped, feeling her breast tighten with panic.

Fitz pulled her to her feet as he got up. "Come up on, let'south leave of sight."

She was also overwhelmed to figure out a plan on her ain, so she didn't resist when he dragged her down the street.

"Which manner?" he asked when they reached the outset intersection.

She didn't want to be alone with him, so she pointed north, toward the San Diego Zoo, where in that location was sure to be a crowd—even during a firestorm.

They took off running, though no ane was post-obit, and for the get-go time in her life, Sophie missed hearing thoughts. She had no idea what Fitz wanted—and it inverse everything. Her heed ran through terrifying scenarios, well-nigh of which involved authorities agents throwing her into dark vans to run experiments on her. She watched the road, fix to bolt at the beginning sign of anything suspicious.

They reached the zoo's massive parking lot, and Sophie relaxed when she saw people outside, milling around their cars. Nothing would happen with so many witnesses. She slowed her stride to a walk.

"What do you lot want?" she asked when she caught her jiff.

"I'thou here to help yous, I promise."

His vox sounded sincere. Didn't arrive easier to believe him, though.

"Why were you looking for me?" She tugged out a loose eyelash, more than than a niggling afraid of the respond.

He opened his oral cavity, then hesitated. "I'thousand not sure if I'k supposed to tell you."

"How am I supposed to trust y'all if you won't respond my questions?"

He considered that for a 2nd. "Okay, fine—but I don't know much. My father sent me to observe you. Nosotros've been looking for a specific girl your age, and I was supposed to detect and report back to him, like always. I wasn't supposed to talk to you." He frowned, like he was disappointed with himself. "I but couldn't figure you out. You don't make sense."

"What does that hateful?"

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