Of course he did, Tink said smugly. My brother has always known Will's name.

Chilled, I turned to watch the countryside speed by, wondering if that was a good thing or not.

Chapter Twenty-Five.

It was early evening by the time we made it back to the village. People were gathering debris from last night's attack and burning what couldn't be salvaged. Johnson came to greet us when we pulled up, grimacing when he got close. I grunteda"he was downwind of me and Will and I imagined the smell was pretty awful, what with the dead monster slime, blood and Greenie juice all over us.

"You found trouble, I take it," he said, as he scanned the rest of the group. His lips moved, counting heads, and when he came up a few short, he looked Will and me over more closely. When his gaze landed on the bronze handle sticking out of Will's thigh pocket, he shook his head.

"Cruessana"

Will stood up straighter. "More like trouble found me, sir."

"What happened?" Johnson asked, his deep voice full of concern. I knew why, too. Tough as he was, it hurt Johnson's soul to watch what was happening to me. Now he had to watch it happen to Will, too.

"The major will fill you in," I said quietly. "Will and I need to clean up."

He laid a big, brown hand on my shoulder, not even reacting to the gunk all over my clothes. "There's some water in our gear. Best to use ours instead of theirs, okay?"

I sighed, knowing he was right. What little water the village had couldn't be spared on a bath. "Yes, sir."

Johnson watched us walk toward the Humvee that had stayed behind with the guard crew, his eyebrows drawn up in worry. In fact, every Green Beret in the village paused in whatever they were doing to stare at Will and me. Okay, so we looked like a pair of nightmares, but I knew the real reason: news spread fast, and Will's status as wielder was big news.

Using a pair of empty plastic totes as washbasins, we rinsed most of the gunk off our skin before dressing in fresh BDUs. Being clean made me feel a little better, but I still planned to burn my dirty clothes; they stank of demons and death. Will gave me a weary nod when we were finished, then wandered away to the edge of the village. He had a lot to deal with, so I let him go.

I wasn't ready to talk to Uncle Mike or Ramirez either. I didn't want to relive today anytime soon. Instead, I watched the sun sink toward the horizon, hoping we had completed our job here. Losing guys always made me feel empty, and I needed to know some good would come of it, especially because we'd lost a wielder, too. We weren't immortal, I knew that, but seeing it happen shook me to the core.

"The major tells me Captain Brandt is dead."

I jumped a foot before turning to face Zenka. "You scared me."

"I'm sorry." She smiled one of her mysterious smiles and said, "Come. I have something new to show you."

I didn't feel up to any mysteries, but she was already on the move, so I followed.

Zenka led me across the village to her hut and disappeared inside. She returned with the sketch pad. "I wasn't surprised to hear the captain had been killed. You see, I thought it might happen."

I didn't want to talk about how Brandt dieda"or whya"but she had my attention. "You can see the future, can't you?"

"Not exactly, and I'm not the one who foretold it." She rifled through the pages of her book, then rested a gnarled hand on my arm. "Look at me, Matthew Archer."

I let out a slow breath and met her eyes.

"I know this hurts you. I see the pain written in the lines on your face, but there are things you must know," Zenka said. She waited until I nodded before going on. "I didn't wish to alarm the captain, because I couldn't be sure this would come true and I didn't want him to worry. Now that I've seen Williamawell, it wouldn't have changed anything anyway, but you should know the truth."

She held out the sketch pad and showed me the half-finished portrait, the large head with the blank face who might've been Brandt. Then she flipped through the other wielders to the end. A sketch I'd never seen was slotted behind mine, something she'd hidden when she showed us the sketch book the first time. Another perfect likeness.

Drawn in color.

Will wore his crooked grin and a look of surprise. He was sitting with his knees drawn to his chest and his arms wrapped around them, wearing desert camo and boots. A bronze-handled knife dangled from his left hand. Brandt's knife.

No, Will's knife.

Zenka flipped back to Ramirez's portrait. "Earth."

My heart seized up. "What did you say?"

"Earth," Zenka said. "He's the guardian of Earth. If what you've told me about this war so far is true, the fights themselves are telling us who guards what element. Jorge guards water. Parker, air. And now Ramireza"he's earth."

I hadn't gotten there yet, but she was right. Jorge had killed countless Gators in Perua"monsters that lived in the water and on land. Ramirez and I had killed our share of Gators too, but only Jorge lived in a rain forest. Parker had killed the winged demon in Afghanistan, the one who could spew demons across the countryside to steal children and fly them back to his lair. And Ramirez had killed the Ga-Gorib, a creature of the desert who lived in the ground.

All we had left was Fire and the Shadow Man.

And then there was Will. What did this mean for him? Or me? "Thisaisn't good, you know."

"For you and your friend?" she asked.

"Yeah. If you're right, one of usa" I couldn't go on, struck by what this meant. Will's portrait was in color, just like mine.

Could Will be the Sentinel, instead of me?

"You boys are special, and my husband knew that all along." Zenka closed the book and rubbed her hand over the cover. "This is what my husband and I could offer to youaknowledge. Unlike Jorge, we couldn't build you a knife or create some powerful talisman. But we could tell you the truth, a truth I believe they didn't want you to know, about who would defeat each point of the star and why."

I sat back. There was something else bothering me. This last monster had been trying to kill Will, not me or Ramirez. What was it about my best friend that scared the other side so much?

"The monsters here didn't want Will to become a wielder," I said. "They didn't want us to find out what your husband suspected, to make sure Brandt's knife didn't transfer over to Will."

"Yes, that is what I believe as well," Zenka said, watching my face intently as I pieced it all together. "What we need to discover is why."

So many questionsabut I knew one thing for sure.

Our destinies weren't in our hands anymore.

The night passed without incident, as I suspected it would. In the morning, we said goodbye to Zenka and her people and drove back to our camp. Will was unnaturally quiet during the trip and took off for our tent as soon as we arrived.

Ramirez watched him go, his face a blank mask. "I sent my report to the colonel last night. He wants you two to report to the Pentagon as soon as possible. I'll be staying here for a while just to make sure the threat is eliminated."

"Yes, sir," I said. "When do we leave, sir?"

Uncle Mike joined us, gray-faced and scruffy. He'd really taken a beating on this trip and it showed. "Tomorrow. Technically Will has to be back in school in a week, so we can't stay longer."

"What did the colonel say about Will?" I asked, getting the feeling we were being summoned back because of the wielder changeaand the dead bodies we had to bring home.

"He wasn't pleased," Ramirez said. "But there's nothing we can do to change it. I think he's most worried about what Cruessan's parents will say."

Oh, God, I hadn't thought about that. "Is he going to call them? Or can we just keep up the *study abroad' cover?"

Uncle Mike was already shaking his head. "Given how often we have to deploy you on the spur of the moment, I think we're past running a wielder part-time on the sly. Will's going to be needed, if not immediately, then soon. His parents have to be notified."

He was right, sure, but my best friend would be in for a very rough ride back home when he had to explain his new job to his family.

And Will probably already knew that. "You sure you don't need me to stay here with Ramirez?"

"You need a break," Uncle Mike said firmly. "You're going to Australia next, and the colonel wants you rested up first."

For once, I agreed with him.

Chapter Twenty-Six.

A raw wind tore through my jacket as we made our way into the Pentagon, but I was so glad to be on my way home. Uncle Mike had let Will and me stay in a hotel by ourselves last night so he could be alone with Julie and I'd loaded up on room service, thinking it was time I spent some of my military money on a stupid splurge. Even though I worried about the meeting with Colonel Black, being back in the States where I could get a hot shower and a greasy hamburger was nothing short of heaven.

It took five minutes and six wrong turns before Mike found the right hallway at the Pentagon and when we arrived at the conference room for our meeting, I groaned. Colonel Black was waiting for us, dressed in Class-B uniform and looking stern. Worse, he had a guest with him.

"Why's General Richardson here?" I whispered to Mike.

"To meet his new wielder," Uncle Mike said with resignation. "Let's go get this over with."

"Major Tannen, Mr. Archer, good to see you both!" General Richardson boomed. The man had a voice like a cannon; it could pulverize lesser life forms. He bobbed his giant head in acknowledgment as we entered the room. "And this must be Cruessan."

Will's skin had turned the color of paste. He gulped before saying, "Yes, sir."

"Well, I never thought we'd have two teenagers on this team, but I guess we can't argue with the knives." The general narrowed his eyes and glared at Uncle Mike. "Do we know for sure the knife can't be turned to someone else? Did you even try?"

I held my breath, wanting to tell the general to shove his accusations up his two-star ass, but Uncle Mike might be busted down to captain if I said anything.

Colonel Black drew himself up and towered over the general. "Sir, we've discussed this. The knives aren't some parlor trick; they decide who wields them and can't be turned. A man died and the knife chose Cruessan to go on in Brandt's place."

"I understand that," General Richardson barked. "But I received a very suspicious phone call from the chair of House Armed Services Committee, asking about appropriations for a strange project coming out of the Terrorism and Unconventional Threats subcommittee. My contact there apparently hasn't keep our team's budget scrubbed well enough and the chair has been asking about contractor fees posted to the project. Said he wanted to know who's attached to those accounts."

Contractor feesaas in my paycheck, and Will's. I glanced at Uncle Mike. His lips were pressed together so tightly they'd just about disappeared. Yeah, this was bad.

"Sir?" I said, raising a hand to divert the general's attention to me. "I'll work for free if that'll keep the budget under wraps."

Colonel Black shook his head. "No, Archer. Youa"and Cruessana"are routinely risking your lives for the Army. The least we can do is ensure that you get paid."

General Richardson looked annoyed that the colonel butted in, but he said, "That's right, son. We just need to find a better way to do it." He sighed heavily. "Well, Cruessan, welcome to the team."

The general left the room, muttering to himself, and I caught a number of colorful swear words in his tirade.

Uncle Mike sagged into a chair. "Thanks for the assistance, sir."

"Don't mention it." Colonel Black nodded at Will. "Your parents are still in the dark. What are we going to do about that? As soon as we had that last eclipse, we started get reports from around the world. Suspected supernatural activity has suddenly picked up again and I need you ready to deploy at a moment's notice should any of these reports prove serious enough." The colonel drummed his fingers on the table, wearing the expression of a man asked solve a Sudoku puzzle blindfolded. "How do you want to handle this, Cruessan? I could show up at your house with a slide presentation and a stack of confidentiality agreements, but I have a feeling that won't be very effective."

"No, sir," Will said, sounding hollow. "My parents don't respond well to that kind of thing. My dad was a pretty tough negotiator when he was playing pro ball. I'm going to have to tell them myself to have any shot at making them understand."

"And what if they say no? What then?" Uncle Mike asked.

Will picked at his cuticles. "If they say no, I'll call you. But this is something I need to do on my own, if possible."

The colonel watched him for a minute. "Okay. You and Matt will fly home tomorrow. I need you to tell them as soon as possible."

"Sir?" I asked. "When will you need me?"

"Probably not until late March," the colonel said.

"Butathat's nearly three months away," I said, feeling a flutter of panic in my belly. Yeah, I could use a furlough, but was I going to be stuck in Billings the whole time?

Mike chuckled. "Guess who's going back to school?" When he caught the look on my face, he grinned. "Oh, yeah. Dani's all set to re-enroll you, give you *a taste of normal life' for a while. You, uh, ever work things out with that cheerleader?"

I rested my head on my arms on the table. "No. Not even. In fact, if I show my face at Greenhill, she might try to scratch my eyes out."

Colonel Black started laughing, too. "Well, if I can deploy you earlier, I will. Sounds like that might be preferable."

They had no idea.

We made it back to Billings two days before school started. Mom seemed delighted by the idea that I'd be re-enrolling. I managed not to snarl like a cornered coyote when we discussed it, but I growled good and loud on the inside, especially since the news that Will had been chosen to wield a knife had beaten us home and given Mom more fuel for the "normal teenage life" argument. I blamed Aunt Julie for leaking that secret, but at least I didn't have to explain the story again.

Mamie saw my expression and swallowed a smile. "We're glad you're back."

All my annoyance dried up and that hollow feeling I'd kept at bay while on the hunt came back full force. "So, when are you heading back to Missoula?"

"Wednesday. Which means you have time to tell me everything about your mission and give me some new research topics."

There was so much to tell her, but I wasn't sure I was ready. "I have a raging case of jetlag, so I'd like to put off the long talk until later, buta"

"Butawhat?" she asked, her eyes gleaming. Mamie loved a mystery.

I stared at the floor, knowing I couldn't leave her hanging without some kind of tidbit to chew on while I slept. With so much to choose from, I went for the big pieces first. "Well, apparently it's down to Will or meaone of us has to fight a fire-breathing lizard, and the other has to save the whole damn world. Unfortunately, it's unclear which job I'll get."