Emily nodded. ‘It means you have to go back to work, doesn’t it?’
‘I was going to tell you that it means no school for a few days.’ Then he reluctantly added, ‘But yes, I’ve got to go back to work. I’m due back in at midnight. It was only because of you being home alone that I was able to steal a few hours away.’
Emily lifted the jug of milk out of her dad’s arms. ‘Then you shouldn’t waste this time here. Go sit down and I’ll see what I can make us for dinner. Then I think you should try to get some sleep.’
When her father smiled, it made his dimples appear. ‘Hey, who’s the parent here?’ he demanded, laughing.
‘I am,’ Emily teased as she started to use as many thawing items as she could to prepare their supper.
‘Fair enough,’ he admitted. ‘This has been one strange twenty-four hours.’ He sighed heavily as he sat down at the kitchen table. ‘There is looting going on all over the city because of the power outage and security systems going down. Uptown, people are getting hysterical. Some even went into their local police stations claiming to have seen these huge, grey, four-armed creatures coming out of the sewers. Insisting they were some kind of demons and this was the end of the world.’
‘Wow,’ Emily said as she pulled out a frying pan and set it on the gas stove. ‘That is strange.’
‘But that wasn’t the worst of it,’ her father said. ‘Remember I called you from Belleview? I was there to draw up a report on this mystery kid that had been brought in. Seems he was hit by lightning and fell out a window.’
‘Ouch! That had to hurt,’ Emily said as she started to scramble some eggs. ‘Was he killed?’
‘Nope,’ her father answered. ‘The doctor said he should have been. Not only did he not die, he’s healing faster than anything they’ve ever seen before. His bones are knitting together in record time and the burn on his back is shrinking by the minute.’
Emily stopped scrambling her dad’s eggs. ‘He’s healing really quickly?’ she said. ‘Who is he?’
Her father shrugged. ‘I’m not really sure. He said his name was,’ – he paused and stood up, then bowed at the waist and raised his hand in a flourish – ‘Paelen the Magnificent, at your service.’
Emily couldn’t help laughing as her father repeated the sweeping, formal gesture. ‘Where’s he from?’
‘I haven’t got a clue,’ said her dad, sitting down again. ‘He claims he doesn’t remember much, but after being a cop so long, I know a lie when I hear one.’ He paused as if reaching for something just beyond his grasp. ‘It’s … it’s really strange, Em. There is something seriously wrong with that kid, but I just can’t put my finger on it.’
‘Like what?’
‘A few things, really,’ her father answered. ‘The strange way he speaks. Real formal, you know? Then there’s the way he was found, wearing only a bloodstained tunic and winged sandals studded with jewels. He’d obviously been struck by lightning, but somehow he survived that as well as the fall. When the paramedics arrived, they found him clutching this beautiful golden bridle. Between the jewelled sandals and the horse bridle, it all had to be worth a fortune. But he refused to tell me where they came from or how he got them.’
Emily felt her pulse quicken. Paelen the Magnificent? Healing quickly? Wearing a tunic and sandals, and clutching a golden horse bridle? She knew it had something to do with Pegasus. She just didn’t know what.
The eggs were quickly forgotten as Emily took a seat at the table beside her father.
‘So is he still at the hospital?’
‘No,’ he answered darkly. ‘And that’s another story all its own. When the staff saw his blood test results, they nearly had a fit. Things kind of went downhill from there.’
Emily’s ears were ringing. Everything her father said was shouting Olympus. Somehow, there was another Olympian in New York! She had to tell Joel as soon as she could.
‘What do you mean? What happened?’ Emily finally asked.
‘It seems one of the nurses called the CRU when she saw the results. Not long after that, several of their agents arrived at the hospital to collect him. But when I challenged them on it, they called my captain. I was immediately ordered back to the station and told to forget everything. As always, it’s all very Government hush, hush. I have no idea where they took him or what they plan to do with him. But from what we know of the CRU, I sure wouldn’t want to be in that kid’s shoes. Or winged sandals either, for that matter.’
7