Free Magickeepers: The Eternal Hourglass by Erica Kirov Page B

watch. “Ask your ball for the number the roulette wheel at table eighty-five will land on in ten minutes.”
    Nick looked at Theo. “Ask the ball? Like talk to it?”
    “Exactly.”
    “I feel like an idiot talking to a ball.”
    “Put your hand on the ball. It's yours. You must bond with it.”
    “Bond?”
    “Just do as I say.”
    “All right.” Nick rubbed his hands on the crystal ball. It felt warm to his touch—alive in a way. But he knew that was impossible. Feeling foolish, he said, “Crystal ball, what number will the roulette ball land on in ten minutes at table eighty-five?”
    The ball filled with a smoky green haze, and then Nick saw, in a flash—twelve red.
    Nick smiled at Theo. “It gave me the number!”
    Theo smiled at him, sat down at his desk, and said a few words, and a pot of tea appeared. “We wait. Care for tea?”
    “No. Why can’t you guys drink soda?”
    “It's not our way.”
    Nick rolled his eyes again and leaned back in his chair. If he had a crystal ball that told him numbers to bet on, that could predict the future, then he would be rich. No more small hotels with his dad. Heck, they could buy a hotel. A hotel where he would serve cheeseburgers and orange soda and pizza, and he wouldn’t have to wear ridiculous black pants and white shirts. He’d ride his skateboard through the halls, and there’d be a skateboard ramp in the lobby.
    After about ten minutes, Theo took his own ball and spoke to it, and Nick could see inside the casino. Theo spoke in Russian, and a roulette wheel appeared close up. The dealer spun the wheel. It whirred. The little ball flung around, click, click, click… and landed on eight black.
    Nick looked at Theo, puzzled. “What happened? Why wasn’t it twelve red?”
    “Precisely what I said. You must approach your crystal ball with a pure heart. It will deceive you otherwise.”
    “But how do I know if I have a pure heart?”
    “You cannot ask for personal gain. You must ask with the intention of doing good. Not for money or fame or riches. You must learn to discern, my young cousin. And most importantly, you must learn to do it quickly. The Shadowkeepers are closing in.”
    “How long have you been reading crystal balls?”
    “Since I was your age.”
    “Well, how can I ever get good at it so fast? I need more time.”
    “The Shadowkeepers do not care about such things.”
    “But what do they want?”
    Even as Nick asked, the key burned.
    “Come,” Theo said. He stood and led Nick out of the classroom and down the hall to an elevator. The minute Theo stood in front of it, the doors opened. Nick jumped back. An enormous brown bear took up most of the car.
    “Our elevator operator. Keeps out the riffraff.”
    They stepped onto the elevator, and Nick noticed there were no buttons at all on the elevator's panel. The doors closed, and with a whoosh that made his stomach feel like it dropped to his shoes, they descended.
    “Where are we going?” Nick asked, aware that the bear's breath was hot near his neck.
    “The vault.”
    The doors opened, and as they exited the elevator, they entered an enormous room. The floors were marble, and their heels clicked on them as they walked. The ceilings were three stories high, Nick guessed. Like Damian's library, they were painted with scenes of magic in Russia, fanciful pictures of people flying through the air and polar bears and tigers soaring over onion-topped domes in snow-covered Siberia. As he looked upward, the pictures moved, stars twinkled, and occasionally a polar bear dove into a painted water scene.
    “This is the vault,” Theo swept his hand to the left, “that we show the Nevada Gaming Commission if they come to check out our casino.”
    Nick looked and saw a bank of security cameras and a command center with lights flashing and occasionally beeping.
    “If someone broke in, would alarms go off?”
    “I don’t know. No one's ever tried. Those lights and beeps are just magic—for show.”