Book Two of the Travelers

  Above her head she saw a bright rectangle of light. Silhouetted in the light was a figure. No, two figures.

  One was King Hruth. The other was Nak Adyms.

  “Bye-bye!” Nak shouted, waving cheerfully. “Have fun!”

  Then the stone above her head began to slide back in place. She could hear the terrible grinding sound again, stone gnashing against stone. Nak’s arrogant smile disappeared as the trapdoor closed.

  The room was plunged into darkness.

  The grinding stopped. Aja felt a terrible sense of claustrophobia. Her heart raced and her palms were sweating. If she thought it would work, she could activate her silver bracelet and terminate the jump. But like Nak said, he’d hacked all the codes. He’d blocked her. This jump wasn’t going to end until Nak felt like ending it. Besides—she was here to solve the puzzle. She couldn’t very well quit now.

  Aja tried to calm herself, breathing deeply.

  Suddenly the grinding noise started again. This time the sound was slightly different and seemed to come from a different place. For a moment she imagined the walls were closing in, preparing to smash her like a bug.

  Wait! Light. She could see light—a thin crack, widening slightly at one corner of the room.

  The walls were moving! The chamber was opening. As soon as she could, she squeezed out past the still-moving gap between the walls. She found herself in a long stone passage lit by flickering torches lodged in recesses along the wall.

  On the walls were carved images. A strange, simian creature recurred in each carving. That must be the Beast that King Hruth had talked about earlier. In each picture the Beast was eating people, tearing them limb from limb, trampling over their bodies.

  “Yuk!” Aja said. To think all this nutty stuff came right out of Nak’s imagination. Y