Read Online The Glass Wall (Return of the Ancients Book 1) by Carmen Caine, Madison Adler - Free Book Online Page B

quite pretty.
    “Never seen it before,” I mumbled.
    “Must be from Halloween,” he said. “Probably part of a kid’s costume.”
    I touched the stone with my index finger. “Where was it?” I asked, curiously.
    Ellison led me outside to the edge of the yard. It was dark and hard to see, but he had a miniature flashlight on his key ring. He shined the beam back and forth around the mailbox.
    “Over here, about a dozen,” he said. He flicked the light and then added, “Oh, a few more over here too.”
    “What about over there?” I asked, pointing to something white glistening in the streetlight.
    We walked closer to the streetlight and found even more white stones. A line of them led toward the greenbelt. Neither of us said anything as we searched through the darkness. We didn’t stop until we had discovered the entire yard was ringed with them and if you dug in the dirt with your heel, there were even more.
    “Odd,” Ellison said. He was no longer laughing.
    We went back inside, sat at the kitchen table, and looked more closely at the handful of stones we had just picked up. They were all white, of different sizes, but all of them had the triangle and loops burned on one side.
    “Let’s look this symbol up,” Ellison suggested, moving to Betty’s computer.
    We spent the next hour sifting through tons of images. There were lots of triangles, but nothing with the swirls inside them.
    After a while, I got bored and went to the kitchen to make ice cream sundaes. Tigger followed me hopefully as I brought our ice cream back to the living room and sat down.
    “Here it is!” Ellison laughed suddenly and popped his knuckles. “Yeah, must be a kid joke. It’s a fairy rune.”
    “Fairy rune?” I peered closely at the screen.
    There it was, a picture of a triangle with swirls, exactly matching the white stones sitting on the desk.
    “Yeah.” Ellison wolfed down his ice cream. “It’s a fairy protection rune. It means protection from fire or something like that. The kids must have tossed them around your yard as a Halloween prank. A little weird, but you know how kids are. What do you think?”
    I glanced at the screen and back at one of the stones. It didn’t look like a toy to me. It was beautiful and for some reason it made me feel good. I didn’t have to say anything, because at that moment Al’s truck pulled up the driveway.
    “Oh, it’s getting late,” Ellison said, glancing at his watch. “I meant to pick up Betty’s birthday present tonight and drop it off, but I’ll have to do it next week.”
    “Birthday?” I asked, dumping my uneaten ice cream in the sink. “It’s Betty’s birthday?”
    “Yeah, her birthday is tomorrow—” he began, but cut himself short as Grace came in and he began to chat with her about the movie instead.
    I felt bad. I hadn’t known it was her birthday. Tomorrow was Monday and school. I’d have little time to find her a present, and I didn’t have any money. I liked Betty. She’d been pretty nice to me, actually. It was because of her that Jerry had a nice cage. Suddenly, I didn’t want to be the only one who didn’t give her a present.
    As Betty joined Grace and Ellison to talk about the movie, I sidled up to Al.
    “Hey, can you drop me off after school somewhere tomorrow so I can get Betty a present?” I asked. I knew I didn’t have any money, but I had my trusty shoplifting skills. I winced a little. I was feeling guiltier about that by the day.
    “I’ll be working late, kiddo,” he replied, but pointed to Betty’s keys. “You can borrow the truck.”
    I flushed a little and looked at my feet. I was almost eighteen, and I still didn’t have my license. Ashamed, I admitted, “I can’t drive.”
    “You can’t drive yet?” Al asked, obviously surprised. “Well, we are going to have to fix that right away. Driving is a basic skill. In my house, you have to learn the basic survival skills! Grace, what are the Mackenzie Basic Survival