Secrets in the Dark (26 page)

A look of impatience
crossed Olivia’s face but she didn’t make a smart comment. I
wondered what that was about. She said, “Fine, we’ll pay attention
to everything. Now, can we go? Or do you want to wait till the
Rejects decide to join us?”

That’s when I realized
she’d been nicer to Brady lately. I thought back and almost said,
“Ah ha,” out loud. I clenched my teeth tightly and managed to keep
it in. Thank goodness. But it was obvious now I thought about it.
Olivia had been nicer ever since he saved her from the
rocks.

I guess even Olivia thinks
you should be nice after someone saves you from certain
death.

All of us were peeking at
the map in Brady’s hands as we made our way down the road and past
the cabin. I knew I wasn’t the only one wondering when Ray and the
others would make their appearance.

This time, no one
complained when Brady asked to double check the sign at the fork in
the road. It only took a minute before he said, “Like I said last
time, it warns about danger to the left, but doesn’t say what
kind.”

“
What does it say
exactly
?” Olivia asked,
sounding almost patient. For her.

Brady sighed and quoted,
“’Warning. The road to the left leads to the Perilous Forest. All
who enter beware. The road to the right leads to certain death.
Good luck.’ It doesn’t say anything else.”

“
All who enter beware?”
Faith asked. She sounded pretty calm. For her.

As in, not completely
freaked out yet.

I decided it was time to
make sure it stayed that way. “It’s not like we’re going in the
forest, we’re going to the cave.”

Faith opened her mouth,
probably to tell me why that didn’t make it less dangerous, but
Brady interrupted. He sounded positively bold and daring. Not like
himself at all. “Even if we did go in the forest, after some of the
things we’ve been through, we could handle it.”

“
Great,” Faith said
sarcastically, but didn’t argue. She hunched her shoulders and
shoved her hands in her pockets.

Listening to Brady and
Faith kept my mind off where we were, but I suddenly realized we’d
walked further down this road than ever before. Would there be
something new to deal with? More falling rocks? Strangely
mesmerizing fields? Poison fruit? Fog? Or would we finally get to
the cave safely?

According to Brady’s watch,
we’d only been walking a couple of hours but I would have sworn it
was longer. “Any sign of the Rejects?” I asked.

Brady asked to see the
Rejects again. When nothing showed up, my muscles relaxed and I
could suddenly breathe easier. My stomach growled. I guess I’d been
too nervous to realize I was hungry before. “Maybe we should stop
for lunch. Once the Rejects come in, we won’t be able to take the
time.”

We moved around another
bend, looking for a good place to stop. I came to an abrupt halt,
awestruck by a strange pyramid shape to our left. It was huge.
Taller than a two story house, and covered with strange markings
etched deeply into the surface. It was thin, only an inch or so
wide. Although it looked like stone, it was glowing.

Brady walked around it,
then carefully reached out, skimming it with his fingertips. He
jerked his hand away. “It’s hot,” he said, startled, and held up
his hand. His fingers were red and I could see blisters rising. He
took a step back, and tripped over one of the loose rocks on the
ground. As he fought to keep his balance, he knocked one into the
structure.

It may have looked like
stone, but it sounded like metal. Like a huge bell. It gave a
deafening peal that kept reverberating on and on. We all jerked
around in different directions as the sound of matching bells
sounded in the distance all around us.

A large dark shape showed
briefly above the trees, way to the right. Ahead of us, a plume of
red mist streamed into the sky, and then slowly dissipated. The
sound of howling came from trees on all sides of us, then died out,
leaving only silence.

My stomach chose that
moment to growl again, loud enough for all of them, human and
animal alike, to hear. Rusty started barking, and I chose to
believe it wasn’t doggy laughter.

“
So, let’s stop and eat
here.” I perched on the stone wall next to the road, and pulled off
my backpack to get my lunch. I felt Shadow’s head stroke against my
legs and looked down to smile at her.

“
Want some?” At her
trilling meow, I offered some of the chicken off my sandwich. She
ate it daintily from my fingers, while a loud purr came from her
chest with each bite.

Rusty was thrilled when
Doug sat and offered a bite of his peanut butter sandwich. We all
laughed as he tried to lick the peanut butter out of his mouth. He
had a doggy grin on his face, and danced around begging for more
when he was done.

“
Uh oh,” Brady said,
looking up from the map he’d been studying. “Guess who just came
in.”

“
Let’s go!” I jumped to my
feet. “We’re ahead, but we can’t risk them catching us.”

“
How do they keep turning
up wherever we are,” Faith asked, sounding frustrated.

Doug sat back, staring at
Faith in surprise. “That’s a really good question. Any
ideas?”

None of us had an answer,
then Faith frowned. “Well, I’m going to figure it out.”

Our animals danced around
as we packed up the remains of our lunch. When I was
ready, I started down the road. Brady called,
“Slow down. Keep an eye out for signs.”

I gritted my teeth in
frustration. I wanted to speed up, not slow down! The Rejects were
coming, and they wouldn’t be walking slow, looking for signs. But
remembering the rock fall, I reluctantly started paying more
attention.

It didn’t take long before
we left the rolling hills behind and entered the mountains. We
slowed our pace as the road grew steeper and rockier. Singing
was
not
giving me
enough exercise. I was puffing a lot more than Faith, Doug or
Brady. I tried to keep up, but was mortified to realize I was
falling behind. I was about to give in and ask the others to slow
down, when Olivia beat me to it.

“
Hey, you guys…some of us
aren’t…Olympic level…athletes. Some of us…can’t keep up…this pace.
Can you
please
…slow it down?”

“
Sure.” Doug sounded
surprised. He wasn’t out of breath, not even a little. If I had
enough energy, I’d stomp on his foot — maybe that would slow him
down — but I was way too tired. He said, “I didn’t realize we were
going too fast. Next time let us know.
Before
I can’t tell what you’re
trying to say through all the panting.”

“
I’m not…panting,” Olivia
huffed.

“
Then you’re doing a great
imitation of a dog.”

“
Shut up!”

“
Then stop arguing,” Doug
said, smirking. “You’ll have more breath for walking.”

“
Fine!” I was sure Olivia
had meant to sound annoyed, but she only sounded
breathless.

After another fifteen
minutes, according to Brady’s watch, we were still well ahead of
the Rejects. We’d been climbing rapidly, and after several hairpin
turns on what was now more trail than road, we saw a dark opening
in the mountainside.

I was the first to notice
the odd shape of the cave opening. “Perfect name,” I said, fanning
my face with my hands. We were all looking hot and sweaty now. “I
wish it was cooler,” I said, without thinking.

Lightning flashed and a
sudden crack of thunder sounded overhead. Clouds gathered around us
as if someone hit fast forward on a movie about a storm. Seconds
later, a cold rain began to fall. Just where we were
standing.

“
Well,” Olivia said,
pushing her heavy wet hair off her face. “That’s certainly cooler,
Kat.” The words sounded nice, but her tone sounded as happy as
Shadow looked. Her ears were flat and water was dripping off her
whiskers. Her eyes were half-closed and glaring straight at
me.

“
Sorry!” I told everyone,
and watched them turn to trudge up the path, which was rapidly
turning to mud.

Note to self — Stop
wishing!

As we slogged around the
last turn on the path, Brady said, “I see why it’s called Sleeping
Dragon Cave.”

Faith’s voice was hushed.
“I can’t believe we finally made it. We’ve been talking about this
place for months.”

“
It’s really dark in
there,” Doug said. “Looks like Ghalynn’s not here.”

“
We’ve got to look. There
might be a clue where we can find him,” I said quickly, afraid he
was
going to suggest leaving without
checking out the cave first.

“
Of course we’re going to
check it out!” Olivia sounded surprised. “After all the work to get
here? Oh hey, did anyone remember to bring a
flashlight?”

“
I’ve got one,” I said,
slipping my pack off my shoulders.

“
That might not work,”
Doug reminded us. “It runs on batteries.”

“
No problem,” Brady said,
and pulled a small glowing baggie out of his pocket. It let out a
surprising amount of light. I recognized the berries he’d grabbed
off the bush by the fog.”

“
And if that doesn’t
work,” Doug said, “I brought matches and candles.”

“
Logical,” Brady said
admiringly.

We entered the cave slowly,
staying close together. I was relieved when Brady’s lightberries
worked. He lowered the bag near the floor, and then held it high so
it shone around the walls of the cave. The rough gray stone
glistened oddly where the light touched it, casting strange
sparkles through the large space. The berries provided just enough
light to see that most of the large space was still shrouded in
darkness.

I turned on my flashlight.
It wasn’t totally dead like our phones, but the light was very
weak, even with the new batteries I’d put in that morning. The beam
began to flutter on and off, making it harder for everyone to
see.

“
Yuck,” Olivia said. “Turn
it off, Kat!”

I turned it off regretfully
and shoved it inside my backpack. “I guess we’re using your
lightberries, Brady.”

Doug said, “Don’t worry,”
and lit us both a candle.

Olivia suddenly started to
sing something about champions. At least I thought that’s what she
was doing. She sounded like a cat being mauled by a
bear.

Olivia broke off her
screeching and said, “We made it. High five.” She slapped her palm
against each of ours. Even Brady and Doug held up their
hands.

“
Come on,” Doug said,
practically shaking with excitement. “Let’s check this puppy
out.”

The cave was shaped in an
almost perfect half circle, with several tunnels leading off into
darkness. “I’m glad we have our animals,” I said, grinning.
“They’ll let us know if anything is dangerous in here.”

We moved slowly around the
main cave. “This doesn’t look like any cave I’ve ever seen!” Olivia
stated. “It’s way too smooth and round.” Now that she said it, I
could see what she meant. I wondered if someone had used magic on
it.

Not everyone saw what she
did. Doug made a disbelieving sound, and Brady quickly said. “It
just looks like something wore down the rocks until the whole area
became round and smooth.”

At the back, a tunnel was
blocked off. At first, I thought it was full of rocks that had
collapsed. Then Faith spoke, her voice filled with disgust. “Eeeow!
Those are bones.”

They were obviously old,
clean and dry, and none of them looked human. At least not like the
ones on TV. But still, they were
bones
.

“
Maybe there really was a
dragon here,” Doug said. His eyes were shining with excitement in
the light from his candle.

“
Dude, you’d better hope
there’s no dragon in here now,” Olivia told him. At her words,
Faith glanced around, worry clear on her face.

Brady carefully poked at a
place where a few bones had spilled out of the tunnel. He dislodged
some, and then others began pouring onto the cave floor. He leaped
back with a sound of disgust, then we all had to back away to avoid
the rapidly spreading pile. Finally, the avalanche of bones came to
a stop, settled, and grew silent.

Doug suddenly darted over
to the edge of the pile. “Don’t touch them,” I yelled.

He reached out and snatched
something off the floor. It was a heavy leather wristband, covered
with intricate patterns burned deep into the leather. In the
center, a small blue-green stone gave a brief flash of light when
Doug picked it up. He looked it over and before any of us could
protest, fastened it on his right wrist. For a moment, it looked
too big, but when he pulled his hand away, it fit him
perfectly.

“
Cool!” he said. “Maybe
the legends about dragons are right. Maybe they do collect
treasure.”

“
You’re not suggesting we
dig through all that!” Faith’s voice was high and her eyes looked
too wide in the flickering light from the candles.