Ambush

  “I like you,” I said honestly.

  “I know you do,” she replied. “But there’s a good chance we could be in trouble.”

  I moved the beam of the flashlight and shined it out the metal gate. We could see the solid stone wall moving upward as we went down. As we passed the first floor there was a mark with the number one carved into the stone to indicate how far we had gone.

  “We’re almost to the basement,” I reported.

  “Do you think it stops there?”

  “Why would it go deeper?”

  I kept the light shining out the metal gate. I could see a mark in the stone indicating the basement. We dropped right past it.

  “We’re going deeper,” I said as the gears continued to creak and moan.

  There was another mark in the shaft—then another, and another.

  “It’s going to stop eventually, right?” I asked Kate as if she were an expert on secret elevators and how they operated.

  “This is so scary,” Kate admitted.

  “Don’t worry,” I said calmly. “Elevators are actually the safest form of travel—even safer than walking.”

  Kate shook her head.

  “What?” I asked. “I read that in a magazine.”

  “Did that magazine take into account elevators like this?”

  “Probably not.”

  After another thirty seconds, we both began to wonder out loud about whether or not we should press the button again. Kate thought it might reverse the direction we were going and send us back up to safety. I was worried that it would stop the elevator and that it would never start back up. If that happened we’d be stuck here until we were dead.

  I made the mistake of thinking about how deep we were and how closed in the walls were. It made me remarkably uncomfortable. Suddenly there wasn’t enough air, and I thought I was going to suffocate or have an anxiety attack.

  The elevator began to slow.

  The cables and gears ground and squealed in a group effort to stop us softly. With the flashlight shining out the gate, we could see the elevator shaft open up as we came to a stop and the box settled. There were two clicks, and then everything was silent.

  “We’re here,” I said casually. “This floor is sporting goods and appliances.”

  Kate ignored my joke and bent to grab the gate and lift it up. I helped as much as I could, while still holding the flashlight in my left hand. I shined the light out into the darkness, and Kate put her hand in mine. Together we stepped out of the elevator like two explorers taking the first step into unknown territory.

  We were in some sort of small underground cavern. I waved the flashlight around, and everything sparkled. The walls were like mirrors, and there were thick, stubby crystals growing from the wall and ceiling. Even the dirt shimmered. When I shined the light down, the entire place lit up like a massive disco ball. Kate lifted her right hand to shield her eyes.

  “Wow,” she said loudly.

  “Yeah,” I commented. “All we need is some groovy music.”

  The cavern was breathtaking. It wasn’t huge, but it was compact and colorful like a prism that had grown out of control. We walked around the entire space marveling at how gorgeous and otherworldly it looked. I touched the ground and could see that it was dirt, but it had grains of glasslike sand in it. There were some big pieces of crystal lying on the ground. Like a true gentleman, I picked one up and gave it to Kate.

  “It’s so heavy,” she said in awe.

  “Only the heaviest for my girl.” The sentiment sounded more romantic in my head.

  “You have a way with words,” Kate said kindly.

  We walked around the room a couple of times, checking it out. There were no other doors or openings or elevators for that matter. Kate described it beautifully by saying, “It’s like a glass house in the belly of the earth.”

  One of the most surprising things to me about the space was that it was so empty— there was no furniture or structures.

  “Why would there be an elevator coming down here?” I asked Kate.

  “Why not?” she replied. “It’s spectacular.”

  Kate was right, of course. I could understand why one of my crazy ancestors might have believed it was a worthwhile endeavor to create a way down here. Me? I saw its potential in a different way.

  “Should we get in the elevator and see if we can get back up?” I asked.

  “Yes,” Kate responded quickly. “It’s hard to completely enjoy this place not knowing if we’ll be able to get out.”

  We stepped back into the elevator and turned around to face the glass cavern. Kate closed her eyes, and I reached out and pushed the glowing button. The metal gate dropped, and the box began to shake and then move upward.

  I shined the light at Kate. She wiped her forehead to show her relief.

  “Let’s just hope it makes it all the way,” I said.

  The elevator made it up with no problem. When we were safely in the fifth-floor bathroom, we put the closet shelves back into the elevator and shut the closet door.

  “We’ve got to find a purpose for that space,” Kate insisted. “It’s too incredible not to do something with it.”

  “I agree,” I agreed, not having the heart to tell her that I already knew exactly what I was going to do with it and knowing it would break her heart if she knew.

  Eventually the desire to pillage was too strong to fight. It was a dark day when the gift of growth became a perversion of nature. No one saw

  Chapter 16

  Carry That Weight

  Only I could be so quick to break a promise. As soon as Kate left, I started my plan in motion. I carefully hiked out of the manor and back behind the garage. I kept a close eye out for Scott or any other person who might wish to stop me.

  Going behind the garage, I followed the train track that led to the mountain. Once I got to the mountain, I hiked up the horrible stone stairs to the cave where we had spent so much time with Lizzy. I wouldn’t have minded hanging out for a few minutes, but I had things to do. I went back into the deep part of the cave and trimmed off a small piece of one of the plants that was growing there. I took that piece with me and returned to the manor.

  By the time I got back to my room, it was dark. I grabbed the stone, used the hidden stairs, and returned to the bathroom on the fifth floor. I took the shelves out and hid them in one of the empty bedrooms next to the bathroom. I had rounded up a dozen flashlights from the garage and stables. I figured I would need to always have one on hand. I put the flashlights in the tub to use as I needed. I took one of the flashlights and wrapped a wire hanger around it. I then hooked the flashlight to the top of the elevator so that I would have a light on all the time. It was perfect. All I had to do was reach up to flip it on or off.

  I turned around in the elevator and closed the closet door so that if someone did come looking for me they wouldn’t just see an open elevator shaft. I pushed the button, the metal gate dropped down, and the descent began.

  My legs were still tired from the long hike and from climbing the hundreds of stairs to and from the cave, so I was pretty thankful for an elevator.

  It was a long, steady ride down.

  When I finally reached the glass cavern, I took the plant I had harvested from the cave and planted it in the center of the room.

  I stood up, dusted off my hands, and commanded the plant to grow.

  Instantly, the plant began to grow and fill out. In a few seconds it looked like a small bush. Seeing the plant grow made me happy. There was no way what I was doing was completely wrong if even the plants were cooperating.

  “Perfect,” I said to myself.

  I pulled the stone out of my backpack and looked at it carefully. I knew all the danger and destruction it held, but the part of my brain that paid attention to stuff like that was turned off. All I could see was the glory and thrill of raising another dragon. I could envision the strength it would have and the pillaging power it would possess. Sure, I knew that
what I really was supposed to do was grow the dragon and then destroy it, seeing as it was the only way to completely heal my family. Deep in my heart, however, I hoped it wouldn’t come to that. It had taken everything I had to destroy the dragons I had grown before. I wanted this dragon to be different. I wanted this beast to be noble and good so that I’d be able to keep him around.

  “And maybe oil will gush from my nose,” I said, knowing how unlikely that would be.

  I hefted the stone a few times, begged it to please produce a dragon that would bring calm and not calamity, and then stared at it closely.

  “I shouldn’t be doing this,” I told myself.

  I set the stone in the dirt near the plant. It sunk into the soil a couple of inches, acting as if it weighed a thousand pounds. The plant next to it shook and then shot out leafy shoots into the ground near the stone. The tangled stalks burrowed under the stone and then popped back up and began to wrap the rock up. The plant twisted over and under the rock until there was no sign of stone.

  The soil around the plant seemed to relax and exhale—it was as if nature recognized that it finally had its stone. No more stalking me in museums. No more picking on me in the forest. No more attacks from cornstalks or destruction of school property. Nature and the Pillage gift had come together one final time. Now the future and fate of my family was in the hands of destiny.

  “Kate’s going to kill me,” I whispered as I stared at the leafy stone. I picked up the flashlight and shined it around the glass cavern. Light bounced and bobbed like lasers all around me. “How about we keep this our little secret for a while,” I called out.

  There was no echo, no reply, and no peace of mind. I had done what I knew was inevitable, and there was no turning back.

  I walked back into the elevator and pressed the button.

  Before the family knew it, things began to get hairy. They were quick to reap the rewards and slow to calculate what the pillaging would ultimately produce.

  Chapter 17

  Act Naturally

  Coming to grips with what I had done was remarkably easy for me. Since I had planted the stone, every day for the next week my schedule was pretty much the same. I got up, had breakfast, made sure Millie and Wane saw enough of me to ignore me for the rest of the day, and then headed straight to the elevator.

  Each time I went down to the glass cavern, I would bring buckets of water and hay I had stolen from the stables. My plan was to little by little stock up on the food that the dragon would need once it hatched. The only way to get stuff down there was the elevator, and I couldn’t take that much with me each trip. I also hauled a small portable gas generator and a couple of lamps down. The light helped immensely. When the lamps were on, the glass cavern was spectacular, and if I hadn’t been actually standing in it, I don’t think I would have believed it was real myself.

  The plant around the last stone was growing thick and large, rapidly. It was now as big as a waterbed mattress and it hovered just above the dirt like all the pods had always done. The green closed nest made all sorts of odd noises and sounds, burping and gurgling like an impolite stream and making the room feel a bit like a simmering volcano.

  The worst part about what I was doing was having to keep it a secret from Kate. She had come over every afternoon after school, and every time she was here she wanted to take the elevator down and explore the cavern. I had thought of a number of ways to explain what I was doing, but in the end I went with a lie that sounded like this.

  “Someone turned the electricity off.”

  “Who?” she had asked.

  “Probably Thomas,” I replied. “And now he’s asking me questions about closets. He knows something.”

  “So what should we do?”

  I had told her we should lay low for a few weeks, not go anywhere near the elevator. Kate thought that was very responsible and grown-up of me. She also thought it showed great restraint. I thought it was more like rock-solid proof of what a horrible person and liar I was. Still, there was no way I was taking Kate down there. I had a feeling that when she saw the water and the hay and the lights and the generator and the growing nest that she might suspect I hadn’t been completely up-front with her.

  So Kate had no idea what was happening, and I tried to convince myself that keeping her in the dark was actually helping her. Unfortunately, as I was getting older, I was getting harder and harder to convince.

  At the end of the week, Kate came over after school as usual. She spent some time with me down in the main hall helping me do some of the schoolwork I should have been doing during the day. She was an excellent tutor and made me wish I was bad at everything just so she could slowly explain it to me. I loved the way she talked in almost a whisper as if we were in a library instead of the manor.

  “Do you understand?” she asked.

  “I think so,” I replied. “So Washington, DC, isn’t in the state of Washington.”

  “Right,” she smiled.

  “You learn something new every day,” I said happily.

  “Of course, most people learn that on a day when they’re in second grade,” she pointed out.

  “My childhood wasn’t easy,” I said defensively.

  “That’s it,” she soothed sarcastically. “Blame your upbringing.”

  We moved from geography to geometry and then did a little Spanish. Kate was even prettier speaking a different language.

  “What are you staring at?” she asked.

  “You,” I replied.

  “Well, knock it off,” she said nicely. “We’re almost done.”

  “I can’t help it,” I replied. “It’s your fault. You’re really beautiful.”

  Kate actually blushed and started pretending she was looking for something in her backpack.

  I closed my Spanish book and smiled at her coyly. “What say we knock off the books and go out into the garden?”

  Kate looked at me with her blue eyes shining and her pink lips curled at the ends.

  “I have a better idea,” Kate said. “How about instead we turn the elevator back on and go down to the cavern?”

  I tried not to let the panic show in my eyes or voice. “I don’t think we should. Thomas was asking more questions this morning.”

  “About what?” she asked.

  “Closets,” I replied.

  “So he just asks you random questions about closets?” she questioned. “What kind of questions?”

  “Like do I think closets are important,” I said, sounding like a fool and not being able to come up with anything else quickly.

  “Really?” Kate said, tilting her head slightly. “And what did you say?”

  “I told him yes,” I lied. “I told him how I thought they made storing things really easy.”

  Kate was still just as beautiful as before, but I could tell from her eyes that she was growing suspicious.

  “Tell me another question Thomas asked.”

  “They were all just closet related.”

  “One more,” she pushed.

  “Oh, he asked me if I knew the difference between a linen closet and a storage closet,” I said sounding pathetic. I decided to add some Millie to soften things. “And Millie told Thomas to stop pestering me and let me eat.”

  “So you didn’t answer him?” Kate said.

  “No,” I replied. “But for the record I would have said you put linen in linen closets and storage in storage closets.”

  Kate kinda smiled at me.

  “Are you hiding something from me?”

  “No,” I said laughing. “Why would I make that up?”

  “I can’t stand it when people aren’t honest with me,” Kate said strongly. “You know that’s my worst thing.”

  “I’m being honest,” I lied.

  “Something’s not right,” Kate insisted.

  My palms started to sweat, and the soles of my feet suddenly felt like they were burning. I knew from the popular saying that a liar’s pants caught on fire, but I was
n’t aware that feet could burst into flames as well. I figured that information was in a second verse that I had never learned, due to my poverty-stricken upbringing. Kate could smell blood in the water. She knew I was holding something back, and she was going to find out what it was.

  “What’s going on, Beck?” she asked sincerely.

  I did the only thing I could. I stood up, knelt down, and then asked her to the prom. It was spontaneous, it was cheesy, and it was the only thing I could think up to take her mind off me and my lying. Kate was so surprised, she actually gasped.