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"Most es can access the four elements," she explained "Re on air, water, earth, and fire to ic?"

Call re fro about chaos and devouring It had sounded bad then and it wasn’t sounding any better now

"They bring so and that’s e call theerous Like the Eneic sounded even creepier than his father had said "Being the Enemy of Death doesn’t sound that bad," he said, reat I mean, ould want to be the Friend of Death?"

"It’s not like that" Tamara folded her hands in her lap, clearly annoyed "The Enee -- maybe even the best -- but he went crazy He wanted to live forever and ain That’s why they called him the Enemy of Death, because he tried to conquer death He started pulling chaos into the world, putting the power of the void into animals … and even people When he put a piece of the void into people, it turned theone, with only a se of the horizon to reht As the bus trundled along, farther into the dark, Call could pick out more and more stars in the canopy of the sky out the busHe could pick out only vague shapes in the woods they passed -- it was just leafy darkness and rock as far as Call could see

"And that’s probably what he’s still doing," said Jasper "Just waiting to break the Treaty"

"He wasn’t the only Makari of his generation," said Ta a speech she’d heard many times "There was another one She was our champion and her name was Verity Torres She was only a little older than we are now, but she was very brave and led the battles against the Ene about Verity "But then, the Ene anyone could ever do" Her voice dropped again so that the Masters up in the front of the bus couldn’t possibly hear "Everyone knew a big battle was coicians, had hidden their families and children in a rees The Ene to the battlefield, he went there to kill them all"

"He expected the in, her voice soft She’d obviously heard the story lots of times, too "It was just kids and old people and a few parents with babies They tried to hold him off They killed the Chaos-ridden in the cave, but they weren’t strong enough to destroy the Enemy In the end, everyone died and he slipped away It was brutal enough that the Assembly offered the Enemy a truce and he accepted"

There was a horrified silence "None of the good icians lived?" asked Drew

"Everybody lives in pony school," Call h money to buy any food at the rest stop, because he was pretty sure he would have thrown it up now He knew his mother had died He even knew she’d died in a battle But he’d never heard the details before

"What?" Tamara turned on hi" Call sat back with his arone too far

"You’re unbelievable Yourthe Cold Massacre, and you joke around about her sacrifice You act like it was the es’ fault instead of the Enemy’s"

Call looked away, his face hot He felt ashary, too, because he should know about these things, shouldn’t he? His father should have told him But he hadn’t

"If your mother died on theto make peace The flower in her hair was still crumpled frohtly singed

"In the hospital," Call said "My leg was uess she should have just stayed in the hospital waiting room, even if the coffee was bad" It was always like this when he was upset It was like he couldn’t control the words corace," Tairl she’d been throughout the Trial Her eyes danced with anger "Half the legacy kids at the Magisteriu that way, soround pool and no one will be sorry, including me"