The Eighth Guardian by Meredith McCardle

Author:Meredith McCardle [McCardle, Meredith]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Juvenile Fiction, Action & Adventure, General, Fantasy & Magic, Science Fiction, Time Travel
ISBN: 9781477847664
Google: YAxLngEACAAJ
Amazon: 1477847669
Publisher: Skyscape
Published: 2014-05-05T16:00:00+00:00

The first day of combat training at Peel, I got paired up with a girl named Jordan Magnus. It was the first Krav Maga class either of us had taken, but it turned out that Jordan was already something of a jujitsu maven. I learned this the hard way when I took a roundhouse kick square to the gut. It knocked the wind out of me and left me writhing on the ground, gasping and choking and sure I was going to die.

That’s how I feel at this moment.

“Dr. Ariel Stender,” Alpha says. I stare at the photo. I don’t breathe. I can’t breathe. I know who he is. Of course I know who he is. Alpha starts talking about his background, and I nod and nod and nod. I don’t know what else to do.

Alpha keeps saying the name. Dr. Stender. Dr. Stender. Dr. Stender. Over and over and over again. Stender. Ariel Stender. Abe Stender. And I’d be lying if I said that there wasn’t a notebook lying around somewhere from freshman year with a bunch of hearts and the name Mrs. Amanda Obermann-Stender scribbled in it.

I stare at the picture in the folder. Ariel looks so much like Abe it’s scary—it was always a big joke at the Stender dinner table. They have the same protruding brow, the same intense, heavy eyes.

According to Abe, it’s bad luck in the Jewish religion to name a baby after a living relative, so many times parents choose a name starting with the same letter as a deceased relative. Abe technically was named after a distant second cousin named Adam, but everyone kind of understands that—wink, wink, nudge, nudge—he’s named in honor of Ariel.

Alpha is still talking about Ariel’s background. Why? I already know it. He has to know that I know it. Ariel received a bachelor’s degree in engineering physics from Harvard, then a PhD in aeronautics from MIT. I’m sure it goes without saying, but the man’s wicked smart. He was in the running for a Nobel one year, although he was edged out by some guy who studied liquid crystals and polymers. He lectures all over the world and has even been on a first-name basis with the last three presidents.

Although, honestly, you’d never know that Ariel has all these amazing credentials. There aren’t any diplomas hanging in his study, no awards littering the hallways. You won’t find any of the dozens of books he’s authored shoved into his bookcases. He lives in the same modest house in Cambridge that he grew up in as a child, and he drives a Toyota that’s older than I am.

“Ariel invented time travel?” I ask.

Alpha stops midsentence. He was saying something, but I’m not sure what. I haven’t taken my eyes off the picture.

His shoulders drop, and he lets out a quick breath. “No. He invented the Annum watches.”

“Ariel,” I repeat. “Ariel Stender. He’s involved with Annum Guard?”

“He invented the Annum watches,” Alpha repeats. “I warned you that this was going to be difficult for you, but you have to focus now.

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