Ambush

“From . . . you . . . our . . . the school is a mess!” Principal Wales was so angry I thought his head was just going to rocket off of his shoulders and blast through the roof.

  “I had nothing to do with this,” I reiterated.

  “I don’t care,” he said. “Those buses were expensive, and you are in need of some time away from here.”

  “I didn’t do this.”

  “That is of no interest to me,” he said, sniffing. “You are suspended for the next three weeks.”

  “But . . .”

  “Butts are for sitting on,” he seethed.

  Adults have the worst sayings. I suddenly wanted to know where grown-ups came up with all the things they said, because most of them were awful.

  “I promise I had nothing to do with this mess,” I explained. “And whether you want to believe me or not, the bus thing was an accident. Besides, if you suspend me I’ll just have more time to mess up.”

  “That’s true,” Wyatt said from the crowd.

  Principal Wales glared at him, and Wyatt withered back into the crowd.

  “So, is that a threat?” Principal Wales demanded, turning back to me. “Are you saying that if I suspend you, you’ll cause more harm?”

  “It’s not a threat,” I assured him. “It’s just reality.”

  Principal Wales spotted someone coming down the hall and waved them over. I looked to see who it was that the crowd of students was letting through. I recognized the thin mustache and pained expression instantly.

  “Sheriff,” Principal Wales said. “If you could have one of your men escort this ruffian off the premises, it would be much appreciated.”

  Sheriff Pax shook his head sadly. “Of course.”

  “I didn’t do this,” I told him with spirit. “And I shouldn’t be suspended for something I didn’t do.”

  “That doesn’t matter at the moment,” Principal Wales said. “Let’s pretend you’re being suspended because of the buses.”

  Some people just can’t forgive and forget.

  “Come on, Beck,” Sheriff Pax said kindly. “Let’s get you home.”

  “Great,” I said, throwing my hands up and knowing that I was now headed for another car ride and lecture.

  “I want answers,” Wales wailed. “I want to know why you did this.”

  As Sheriff Pax escorted me down the hall toward the front of the school, all the other students stared at me. I heard a boy I had never spoken to look at me and say, “It’s about time.”

  The way he said it made it sound as if I were some notorious serial killer who had eluded the police for years. Other students pointed and laughed while I took the walk of shame. I wasn’t too bothered until I saw Kate. She was just coming in through the front doors as we were going out. She looked amazing, and I . . . looked like a criminal. I waved while she shook her head. I tried to get Sheriff Pax to stop, but he nudged me forward.

  “What happened?” Kate mouthed as I passed her.

  “Call me,” I mouthed back.

  All the other students in front of the school were gaping and gawking at me.

  “I’m innocent,” I yelled, feeling like the moment called for it.

  Sheriff Pax’s car was parked right out front. He opened the back door and for the second time in the last few days I got into a cop car. I couldn’t help thinking about Thomas and all the accolades I wasn’t bringing to the family name at the moment.

  Chapter 14

  I Will

  Going slowly, Sheriff Pax pulled out of the Callowbrow parking lot and drove two blocks down Main Street. He pulled over to the curb and turned off the car. We were nowhere near the police station and an hour away from the manor. I twisted my head. I couldn’t see a donut shop or any other reason for him to have pulled over.

  Sheriff Pax shifted in the front seat and turned to look at me through the metal screen.

  “I didn’t do that,” I said, pointing back in the direction of the school.

  “I don’t care,” Sheriff Pax said. “Do you remember what we talked about at the police station?”

  “Maybe,” I answered, not sure where he was going with this.

  “I think something is happening in our town,” Sheriff Pax said with excitement. “Things have happened here that people forget—that I’ve forgotten—things about dragons.”

  “How have people forgotten?” I asked. “Dragons tore apart the town, remember? There are still buildings that aren’t repaired. Look at that place.” I pointed out the front window where a collapsed roof still had not been fully repaired. When the dragons had pillaged they had gone after anything metal or shiny, thinking there was value in it. In turn, they had torn off a number of awnings and lampposts from the street. I had noticed how so many things had been repaired, but it was almost as if the town had forgotten what ruined them in the first place.

  “I can remember,” Sheriff Pax said, confused. “But it seems more like an unimportant dream or a story someone told me.”

  “Do you remember coming to the manor and helping me rescue my father and the staff?”

  Sheriff Pax rubbed his forehead vigorously. “Not clearly.”

  “Maybe you’re just getting old,” I suggested.

  “It’s not that,” he said. “I can’t get anyone else to clearly recall what happened. I have to write things down on my arms just to remind myself to keep investigating this each day.”

  “Weird.”

  “When I went to Callowbrow this morning, Principal Wales was having a fit over what had happened, but when I questioned him about other odd things happening at his school he couldn’t recall. Something’s in the water.”

  “Or the soil,” I said, surprised to hear the words coming out of my mouth. It was as if my soul wanted my ears to hear what it already knew.

  “The soil,” Sheriff Pax said to himself. “I don’t know what to think about this.”

  I was really confused. Part of me wanted to spill my guts again to Sheriff Pax. The other part of me, however, wanted to just clam up and not say another word. I was already in trouble, and me saying more could only make things worse.

  “What do you think happened at your school last night?” Sheriff Pax asked without malice.

  “I’m not sure,” I answered honestly. “Plants hate me.”

  “I don’t want to sound bizarre,” he said. “But it looks a lot like an entire farm of corn took over your school and broke open your locker. Like they were looking for something.”

  “Corn,” I waved. “It’s a weird vegetable.”

  “Beck, you know something more,” Sheriff Pax pleaded. “Mushrooms, salads, stories of plants attacking you when you were in the hospital?”

  “It sounds like somebody’s remembering things,” I said.

  “Nobody remembers until I ask the right questions,” the sheriff said. “Even after they tell me, it doesn’t seem as if they believe it.”

  “I need to get home,” I said.

  “Please, Beck, I need to know.”

  Sheriff Pax’s voice was so unsteady and unsure. He sounded like a friend who was in trouble and needed help. Still, I had already told him enough.

  “Do I need to call Thomas?” I asked. “I’m sure he’s not even back home yet.”

  “I’ll take you,” Sheriff Pax said.

  He tried to ask me more questions as we drove, but I kept quiet. So he changed up his plan and lightly lectured me. It was the second worst car ride I had experienced today.

  Millie wasn’t exactly happy that I had been suspended, but since there was nothing she could do about it, she fed me a small lunch and then sent me to my room to think about what I had done. When I told her I hadn’t done it, she insisted I stop being so smart and just take it like a man. I guess men were constantly having to lie to make others believe what they thought was true, was true.

  Life’s weird at times.

  It was hard for me not to cheer when I got back to my room. I was full, and I was free from school for three weeks. I needed
to remember to act disappointed, but in my heart I was pretty excited to be home. I wouldn’t be able to see Kate as much, but she could still visit me in the afternoons. Besides, there wasn’t much school left in the year anyhow. I’d have only a couple of weeks left after my exile.

  The best part of all of this was that I was now free to accomplish some of the things I needed to finish around the manor—two things I had written down on my personal to do list: 1) Fix elevator, and 2) find the stone.

  Yep, I had already decided after coming home last night that I was going to get the stone back. I didn’t know if I’d be able to find it, but I was going to try. The thought scared me, but I knew that it had to be done. I also wanted to find a way to get the elevator working. The biggest deterrents to being able to accomplish either of those things were Thomas, Millie, and Wane. I wasn’t that worried about Scott. He stayed in the stables or outdoors most of the time. Thomas usually kept to the garage or one of the offices on the first floor in the east wing. So he wasn’t a big concern. Millie kept to the main kitchen and her room in the east wing. Wane was the wild card. Usually she kept to the first floor or the gardens, but occasionally she would just show up at my room or come looking for me. And since I was grounded, I was worried she might come looking for me more than usual.

  I decided to start with the stone.

  I figured since the elevator was on the fifth floor, I could work on that at night and nobody would hear me. The utility room where the chute was located was on the first floor. And even though it wasn’t too close to where people usually were, I knew it would be tricky.

  “Let’s do this,” I said, trying to psych myself up.

  I climbed down to the first floor and took the back hallway behind the main kitchen. I walked softly to the unused utility room in the corner of the east wing. I opened the heavy wood door and slipped inside. With the door closed, I turned the latch to lock myself in.

  I walked between the old boilers and water heaters, past the dusty furnace, and down the two steps that led to the lower part of the room. Old tools and broken furniture in need of repair lined the walls, gathering dust and being forgotten by all who lived here. This utility room was never used anymore. Since there was no need to heat parts of the manor where nobody lived, there was no real need to keep all the utilities and guts of the manor in good repair. The main utility room was clean and functioning, but this was a forgotten space that nobody but a curious adolescent would ever visit.

  I pushed through some old, folded drop cloths and boxes. There against the wall was the mouth of the chute I had previously dropped the stone down. I unhooked the hinge and opened the front of it. As expected, it was dark and quiet. I leaned my head into the chute and looked down—nothing but darkness. I whispered, and my voice echoed softly off the sides of the metal shaft.

  I had no idea how to retrieve the stone. I was hoping to just open the chute and it would be there. It wasn’t. I gathered some rope from one of the metal shelves in the room. I tied one end to one of the old boilers and then flung the rest of the rope down the chute. I heard it unravel and then grow silent. Now I just needed to clamber into the opening and climb down.

  I looked into the chute and questioned my sanity.

  I had no idea how deep the chute ran. It could go all the way to China for all I knew. There might be some Chinese citizen currently using the stone for a paperweight. I crawled up to the opening of the chute. I stuck my right leg in and then folded my left in as well. My feet were slipping against the metal sides. I crawled back out and took off my shoes and socks. I then climbed back in. My feet were able to cling to the sides of the chute, allowing me to shimmy down a few inches. I held onto the rope trying to muster up the courage to go down a bit farther.

  I couldn’t do it.

  I needed someone to dare me. I was really good at doing dumb things when others were cheering me on. Striking out alone wasn’t as easy for me. Sure, I had made plenty of mistakes by myself, but I was just better when I had an audience.

  I crawled out of the chute and looked around for a flashlight. There were three in an old metal toolbox but none of them worked. I left the room and found two working flashlights in the laundry room on the other end of the hall. I took the flashlights back, shoved one in my right pocket, and flipped the other one on. I put the end of it in my mouth and bit down to hold it. I then climbed back into the chute. With a foot on each side of the chute, I slowly moved down a foot. I was only a few inches below the actual opening and already my legs were burning. I held onto the bottom edge of the chute opening with my right hand and took the flashlight out of my mouth with my left. I directed the beam of light downward, trying to get a look at what was below me. The beam of light was pretty strong, but it didn’t reach far enough to light up the bottom. I dropped the flashlight and watched it fall forever. Eventually it snapped out. I didn’t know if it had just fallen so far I couldn’t see it any longer, or if it had hit the bottom and broken. Either way, there was no possible way I was going to make it down there like this. The rope wasn’t long enough, and even if I did make it down, I could never climb the rope back up.

  I pulled myself out of the chute again. I had thrown the stone down there knowing it would be impossible to retrieve. Now that I had proven that point, I was pretty discouraged. My father would get sicker, then I would get sicker, and eventually my entire family would perish under the disease of dragons and madness. Our gift of growing things would die with me. A thought struck me.

  “I wonder,” I said aloud.

  I put my shoes back on and ran out to the back of the manor. I looked around to see if I could spot Scott or anybody else that would complicate things. I walked along the brick path that wound through a maze of roses and over to the stone fence on the side of the manor. Near the base of the wall was a series of small clay pots with pansies and marigolds growing in them. I picked up a small pot and tipped it upside down, dumping out the flowers. I scooped up most of the dirt and took the pot to the wall, where I got down on my knee and dug in the ground beneath some strong ivy that was growing up the wall. I dug out a big piece of ivy and shoved the roots into the pot. I pulled the top part of the ivy off of the wall and bunched it up on top of the pot.

  I looked around once more—still no Scott.

  I got back to the unused utility room and locked myself in. I held the potted ivy near the opening of the chute and stared at it.

  “Listen,” I whispered. “You plants have been giving me grief for a while now. If you want me to plant that stone, you have to help.”

  The plant didn’t say a thing.

  “Fine,” I said. “Be that way.”

  I heaved the pot filled with ivy down the chute. I heard it scrape and bang for a long while before it grew silent. I waited a few more minutes and then leaned my head into the chute and looked down. Then, like I had once done at the conservatory, I simply asked the ivy to . . .

  “Grow!”

  I put my hand to my ear, but I couldn’t hear anything. I stuck my head back in the mouth of the chute and looked down into the darkness.

  “Grow!” I hollered again.

  The word bounced off the metal sides. My hope had been for the ivy to reach the bottom in good enough shape to still be alive. Then if nature really was so determined to help me out, the ivy would grow up the chute and I could climb down, using it as a leafy ladder.

  I pulled my head out and groaned. I was glad I hadn’t tried this with Kate. It would be right about now that she would point out how illogical the idea was.

  I was standing there silently wondering if it would be possible to fill the shaft with water and then swim down to the stone when I heard something. At first it was faint, but then it sounded like a bowl of rice cereal popping and cracking.

  Something was rising up from the chute.

  I clapped with excitement and put my head back in the opening. As I looked, large ropes of ivy sprang out and shot across the room. The green strands wrapped themselve
s around the boilers and exposed pipes. In an instant the dusty old room looked much greener.

  “Nice,” I said, talking to the ivy. “I knew you could do it.”

  The ivy had come out of the chute on all four sides of the opening, creating a new green chute that I was hoping ran all the way down to the bottom. I climbed easily into the leafy opening and found hundreds of foot- and handholds to cling to.

  “Much better.”

  I began the descent. Climbing down was a breeze—all four sides of the chute were like leafy green Velcro. My feet and hands flew down as easily as using a ladder with extra rungs. It wasn’t long before the light coming out of the opening was at least four floors above me. I had no idea where this chute went or what its purpose was, but I was beginning to get a bit leery. I wasn’t really scared of there being any monsters or people down there, but the possibility of spiders or roaches seemed almost worse.