Secrets in the Dark (37 page)

I ran to Olivia and tried
to shake her arm, but it was
unmoving.
Like stone. My friends might as well be living statues.

Were
they still alive
?

I tried again, “Olivia,
wake up!”

Nothing changed.

I tried shaking each of
them, making every wish I could think of, begging them to be
okay.

Nothing made a
difference!

I’d gotten my wish. They
were always going to stay the same. I was like the wicked witch
from the Wizard of Oz, but I’d poisoned them with a wish rather
than poppies. And there was no good witch to help them.

I looked around anxiously,
hoping to see Shadow or any of our familiars. Maybe they could
help. It felt like someone kicked me in the gut when I realized
none of our animals were anywhere in sight.

There was no one — nothing
— to help me. I’d never felt so alone.

I threw my head back and
screamed, “Make it stop!”

This time, I didn’t bother
to wait between wishes. I barely bothered to take a breath.
Instead, my words came out in a continuous stream.

“
I wish I could take it
back!”

“
I wish my friends would
talk to me!”

“
I wish everything would
be okay.”

“
I wish I knew what to do!
I wish it would just go back the way it was! I’ll do anything, just
make it be okay!”

“
Please!”

Nothing made a
difference.

I lost track of the times I
begged, pleaded, cried. I tried everything I could think of, but my
friends didn’t move.

I’d gotten my wish, all
right. I wouldn’t have to listen to talk about when we all got
older anymore. None of them would be getting any older.
I
was the only one who
would not stay the same.

I couldn’t bear the thought
of leaving them frozen here like this. How could I? It was all my
fault. And how could I ever tell anyone what had happened to them?
It would serve me right to stay with them until I died of hunger or
thirst. I wondered what our parents would think when none of us
came home and no one ever found us.

I folded over with a moan
and spent a long time losing my lunch. Once that passed, there was
no other sound except my panicked breathing. I
hated
how quiet it was in here,
without the voices of my friends.



I’d forgotten we weren’t on
the road.

I heard a howl from the
woods to the left. Now I wished the silence would come back. How
ironic.

When I heard the sounds of
branches cracking and heavy footfalls, I ducked behind a pile of
rocks to the right of the path. I felt my heart stop altogether,
then stutter back to life as a monster moved out of the
trees.

It was twice as tall as any
of my friends — shaggy and rough-haired, with a long bulbous nose
and short thick legs. Its skin reminded me of an elephant, saggy
and pale grey, sprinkled with short bristling hairs and large
purple warts. It had three stubby fingers and a gnarled warty thumb
wrapped around a small tree branch.

It was a troll. A huge,
hairy troll. Ronny had said it was probably a troll, and now I was
sure of it. I’d read about trolls in
The
Hobbit
and
Harry
Potter
. But I never believed I’d see one —
I hadn’t believed they really existed. They were also supposed to
smell bad. Good thing I was too far away to tell.

It was the ugliest thing
I’d ever seen. I just hoped the books were right about trolls being
slow and dim-witted. Then it moved, much faster than I would have
expected. It lumbered onto the path, then twisted around and struck
Doug with the tree branch.

I desperately stifled a
scream of horror. What had I done? My friends couldn’t even defend
themselves. I dropped my head in my hands, wondering why I was
trying to keep quiet. Wouldn’t it be better to let it get me too? I
heard several more thumps as it struck at my friends. When it was
silent for a moment, I looked up slowly.

My mouth dropped open in
amazement. Good thing there were no flies in Chimera.

My friends were still
standing, still all perfect statues. That huge troll hadn’t broken
any pieces off, or been able to knock them over, or even given them
a scratch. I just hoped they weren’t able to see or feel
anything.

I did
not
want to stand there watching
that ugly thing use my friends for batting practice with a tree
branch. But I was no threat — what could I do? I quietly shrugged
out of my backpack, trying to remember what was in there. It had
grown heavier each time we came to Chimera.

Olivia had me carrying some
of her stuff so she wouldn’t risk losing another backpack in here.
I reached in and pulled out her hairbrush, then her wallet. What
else was in there?

I touched something that
felt like a smooth cylinder. When I pulled it out, it was a small
can of hairspray. I looked at it in disbelief. Hairspray? In
Chimera?

Too bad I didn’t have
Brady’s lighter. I could try using the hairspray as a flamethrower,
like in
Buffy the Vampire
Slayer
. Of course, I’d probably set myself
on fire rather than hurting the troll. Maybe it was
a good thing I didn’t have a lighter…

Next, I pulled out Doug’s
slingshot.

The slingshot. I
remembered the story of David and Goliath, and wondered how well
that would work in real life. If you could call
this
real life. I looked around and
found several small rocks on the path where I was hidden. I
carefully put one in the little pouch on the slingshot and pulled
it back as far as
I could.

My arms were shaking. I
wasn’t sure if it was the strain I was putting on them, or if it
was fear. Would it ruin my ability to shoot? I took a deep breath
then opened my fingers. The pouch jerked forward and made a loud
splintering crack as the rock hit a tree to the left of the
troll.

It shuffled around, looking
into the trees where the rock hit. Well, if nothing else, I knew
how to distract it.

I grabbed another rock and
tried again. This time I hit its huge warty right shoulder. It
shambled around to face the right side of the road. At least it
wasn’t bashing my friends.

I grabbed a slightly larger
rock, and aimed at its back, hauling back on the sling shot with
every bit of strength I had. This time I hit its left side. The
rock hit with a resounding thunk, and the troll let out a bellowing
scream, hunching over with pain. As if that were a signal, several
howls sounded from the woods to the left.

The troll straightened with
a grunt and began a quick shambling run, quickly disappearing into
the woods on the right. I could follow its path by the crashing,
splintering sounds of breaking trees.

I stood there for a moment,
feeling relief flood through me. I’d done it. I’d chased away a
troll — all by myself! Okay, the howls helped, but I was the one
that made the troll scream to begin with. I twirled around in a
celebratory dance until I ran out of breath.

As I stood there, gasping,
I heard my mom’s voice in my head. I didn’t remember when we’d had
this conversation, but I could still hear her saying, “Kat, things
change all the time. Be glad. You wouldn’t want to still be in
diapers, would you?

I remembered how she’d
shaken her head and smiled. “If everything stayed exactly the same,
the world would stop revolving around the sun. If we were on the
dark side, we’d freeze. If we were on the sunny side, we’d burn up.
Everything would die. Change is good!”

I looked at my friends —
they were exactly the same. Yeah, I’d gotten rid of the troll, but
my friends were still frozen and unmoving. Staying the same was
horrible. I dropped to the ground and let the tears come. I put my
head on my knees and choked out, “I was wrong. I don’t want this. I
wish things would stop being the same. I wish everything would
start changing again.”

“
What’re you doing on the
ground, Kat?”

Again, there was no
warning. No flash of light, or swelling music, like in the movies.
One moment everything was horrible, the next Doug was giving me a
hard time. It sounded wonderful!

“
You’re not
crying
are you?” He
sounded horrified.

For a moment, I couldn’t
catch my breath. “No,” I choked out, rubbing my eyes against my
knees without looking up. I wanted to jump up and wrap my arms
around all of them. I heaved a sigh of relief as Shadow ran up and
rubbed her head against my legs, purring.

I took two deep breaths,
feeling happiness bubble up inside me. We’d found treasure, and
avoided the Rejects, then I’d scared off a troll, and undid a
stupid-idiotic-no-good-very-bad wish, all on the same day. Really,
could it get any better?

I stood up and grinned.
“We’d better get back.” My voice was embarrassingly cheery. It
almost sounded like I was singing. And I couldn’t get the dopey
grin off my face. It lasted the entire time we made our way back to
the tree.

“
Why are you so happy all
the sudden?” Olivia asked me suspiciously.

I considered telling her
what had happened. I’d probably tell her at some point, but I
couldn’t bring myself to tell them about my wish right now. I was
still feeling too good to go into that.

“
I’m just glad we were
able to find the clues, get away from the Rejects, and get off that
path safely.” That last made my grin even bigger.

Olivia shook her head and
muttered something under her breath, but I didn’t care. I felt like
I could fly. I almost wished I could try it, but decided I was done
with wishes. At least for now.

When we got to the tree, we
took our time saying goodbye to our familiars. I told them, “We’ll
miss you. We can’t come back next month, but I promise we’ll be
back the month after that.” Shadow gave a plaintive meow and sat on
the path, blinking her bright blue eyes at me.

I kept waving goodbye
as
I stepped back through the
tree.

The End…

Of The
Beginning

Waiting until after school
on Monday seemed like the longest wait yet. There was so much I
wanted to tell Ronny.

Doug went first. “Do you
know anything about that strange red mist over the lake? It made me
feel dizzy to watch it.”

Ronny said, “I translated
more of the pages you found. One described a discussion Ghalynn had
with Mother. She thought someone was creating strange magickal
currents filled with wild energies. Perhaps that is what you saw at
the lake.”

She sat back, looking at
Doug. “Mother was concerned these energies would be used for some
dark purpose. Maybe that is still happening. I am worried what they
could do.”

She opened her mouth to
keep discussing that, but I wanted to make sure she heard
everything first. “Wait, there’s more.” I nodded at Brady. He
spread his notes on the table, told Ronny about the gnome and
described his cryptic riddle.

Ronny sat perfectly still.
She didn’t move. She didn’t blink. I don’t think she even breathed
for a full minute. Then she seemed to melt, sagging back against
her chair. “A gnome still exists in Chimera, but he told you the
other inhabitants are gone? Gone where?”

“
He wouldn’t tell us
anything else. He just quoted at us and disappeared,” I
said.

“
And he said Ghalynn left
that strange poem? About things that must be found? And spells that
must be broken?”

“
Yes,” Brady agreed,
watching Ronny warily. I felt a bit nervous too. She was clenching
and unclenching her hands into fists, her jaw so tight you could
see the cords of muscle running down her neck.

“
I thought I had accepted
this situation, but I was wrong. I cannot bear to be locked out of
my home, unable to help.”

I said, “You and Brady
keep figuring out what all the clues mean. You
are
helping!”

“
Thank you. I will
decipher these new pages you brought me. Now that I know Ghalynn
left these clues, it may help me. You have found much more than I
ever expected, and I appreciate it greatly.”

She spoke slowly, her
voice leaden, as
if each word was an
appalling weight. “I now think being in Chimera is far more
dangerous for you than I ever believed possible. I will understand
if you wish to stop. In fact, I feel I should tell you to end this
quest. Like cats deserting a sinking ship. Like you reached the
bend of the road. Like this is the claw that broke the camel’s
back.

While none of her sayings
were right, we understood what she was trying to say. A babble of
voices broke out around me. I could understand random snippets,
“…to know what it means!” “…too dangerous.” “…other things alive in
there?” “…check out the lake.”