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Oh boy Here we go Alex had been very specific about going straight there and straight back And now, here ere, taking a detour I squeezedfor all hell to break loose

"What!" Alex shouted, slaht I told you eren’t supposed to stop anywhere else!"

Laylen slid the keys out of the ignition and kept his voice cal out, here me out first Trust me, you’ll hat I stopped for"

"Trust you?" Alex let out a cynical laugh "Are you kidding estured at the"I already trusted you and look where it got us"

For ain the distance, and a loud bang, like a garbage can toppling over, echoed through the air

Alex tossed his hands in the air "Fine What did we stop for?"

Laylen tapped his fingers on top of the steering wheel "The Sword of Immortality"

One…two…three seconds ticked by

"Dammit Laylen!" Alex exclaimed "You’ve had it all this time"

Whatever this Sword of I important It was obviously a sword--duh--but what kind of sword? An immortal one? That didn’t make any sense How could a sword be immortal?

"Had it," Laylen corrected hio"

Alex grinded his teeth "So let ht You stole it from us just so you could lose it"

"I took it for a good reason," Laylen said "I didn’t want to leave it in the Keepers hands after I turned immortal" He paused "You know this is why I didn’t want to tell you about to begin with I knew you’d overreact"

"I’" Alex flopped back in the seat "You didn’t just take sonificant like a car You took the Sword of Immortality"

No one spoke No one so ht burst from the drawn-out silence, I asked, "What’s the Sword of Immortality?"

"Exactly what it sounds like--a sword that can kill an iravated "And it would have been real handy to have while ere on the bus being attacked by Death Walkers"

I gaped at him "The Death Walkers are imged his fingers through his hair and nodded "The sword is one of the few things that can kill theht "So back on the bus, ere being attack, you couldn’t have killed them?"

Alex shook his head "Nope"

My eyes widened as the reality of the fact that, only a few hours ago, I could have very easily died

"So hoe get it back?" Alex asked, his voice still ringing hotly

"Well, it’s inside there, in a display case on the second floor" Laylen pointed at an old brick building "It’s unguarded and everything The only proble into the display case It doesn’t just have a normal lock you can pick In fact, I don’t think it even has a lock, and I’lass would set off an alarht know a spell that would work"

Alex leaned forward and held up his hand "Hold on just a second First, I need to knohere here is?"

Laylen didn’t reply, staring off of at the brick building he’d pointed at early

"Laylen," Aislin said "Where are we exactly?"

Laylen let out a tired sigh "The Black Dungeon"

Alex cursed a sequence of to-inappropriate-to-repeat words, and then stared pensively at the building Laylen wanted us to go into to get the sword "Aislin, how quickly do you think you could do the spell?"

"I’ll do it as quickly as I can," she told hiet it unlocked Magic takes tier at me "You’ll have to make sure and stay by me at all times"

"I already made that promise to you back at the house," I reminded him