Iri nudged her. “Better get going. I don’t think he’s waiting for anyone.”
And there’s the problem. Her anger returned, and she stomped after him. Catching up, she grabbed his arm and swung him around. “What fly crawled up your nose?”
Those cold, blue eyes flared, ice replaced by heat in a flash. “Why do you always have to judge me? Can’t you accept that sometimes I don’t have time to explain things? If Markov were here instead of you, he’d know I’d already have considered all the angles!”
Kayla drew back like he’d slapped her. She sucked in air, not feeling like it was reaching her lungs. Then her eyes stung. “What’s wrong with you?” Kayla warbled, shoving him aside and taking the lead. She didn’t want him to see the tears.
Jaden remained where he was for a moment. Then Kayla heard him running to catch up. His hand touched her arm.
Kayla wrenched it away. “Don’t touch me!”
Jaden’s footsteps faltered. Kayla didn’t care. She was done. He can fall back down the tunnel into the river for all I care. The thought stopped her in her tracks. The tunnel had been rising. They had been climbing since leaving the river, and she hadn’t been watching the ground. Wiping away the tears blurring her vision, she sniffed as she glanced at the floor. Relief washed through her. There was still dust.
A realization tempered her relief. Now is not the time to indulge our emotions. We have to focus, have to work as a team. If we don’t, our chances go way down.
Composing herself took a good few minutes. While she did, she remained where she was. She sensed the others stopping when they reached her, silently questioning why. Squaring her shoulders, Kayla rounded on them. Or, rather, on Jaden.
“I realize your analytical brain is probably way ahead of the rest of us with weighing the options. But—and you need to hear this—we are a team. Things don’t work when you do things without telling us.” Jaden opened his mouth, and Kayla raised a finger. “No. You had time to explain what you were doing back there. Our comms work fine down here, and even if you didn’t know exactly how you would handle it, you knew you were aiming for Iri’s cable. How difficult would it have been to deliver that one sentence?”
Kayla heard the rising hostility in her tone. “And I’m sorry if that sounded accusatory. I don’t mean to judge you. I just like to be kept informed, as I’m sure the rest of the team does. If you don’t include us in your decisions, how do you know there’s not a better option?”
Jaden said nothing. Kayla glared at him. He was staring at her, arms folded, his mouth set in a thin line. “Well?”
“I’m allowed to speak now?”
Kayla wanted to punch him. Smash that condescending look off his face. Her arms were already rising when Iri blocked her path.
“Don’t,” Iri breathed.
“Why not?” Kayla demanded. “He—”
Iri cut her off. “This isn’t you. It isn’t Jaden. And considering I’m seeing anger on Atu when he’s normally a blank slate, something in this place is affecting us.”
Kayla had been about to push Iri out of the way so she could get at Jaden when Iri’s words registered. At that moment, a wave of heat washed over them, followed by what was coming up the tunnel. “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding! Not again!”
The others spun, following her gaze. Little spiraling dust motes danced across the floor, swirling together to form funnels. Whirling funnels increasing in size and velocity as they moved up the tunnel, getting closer by the second.
“Aerolators on!” Jaden ordered, grabbing Kayla’s hand. “Run!”
They took off. “Atu, grab Iri’s hand. I don’t want you two separated.,” Jaden called, barreling up the tunnel.
Kayla followed, not given much choice. Jaden’s grip on her hand was steel. At least he wasn’t running at his usual breakneck pace. His long legs easily outpaced hers. That his first instinct had been to get her to safety and then he’d been considerate of her shorter legs mollified Kayla. Not now! She was focusing on the wrong things again.
Their pace didn’t slow. Gradually, they left the mini dust tornadoes behind them. But Kayla still feared a strong wind might shove them back onto their group. In this place, anything was possible. What caused the dust storm in the first place? Heat rising from the river? But there hadn’t been a wind before . . .
“There’s fresh air ahead,” Iri squeezed out between breaths. “And more tunnels . . . I think.”
“You think?” Jaden queried.
Iri stared into the gloom ahead, sniffing. Kayla wondered what she was seeing or smelling with her gift. Iri frowned. “If they are tunnels, they’re tiny compared to this one—or perhaps short. Either way, they’re different.”
Kayla supposed that could explain the sudden breeze, but only if those tunnels themselves were newly opened. “Jaden,” Kayla panted, “what are the chances those tunnels weren’t there before?”
Jaden shook his head. “Slim to none.”
“Great!” came Iri’s muttered response.
They had only run a few more minutes when Kayla noticed the tunnel wasn’t as wide as it had been before. She and Jaden had been running next to one another. Now, she was scraping against the tunnel walls, trying to stay at his side. Seconds later, Kayla had to release his hand and run behind him. “Jaden?”
Jaden nodded, his face stony. “I’m aware.”
On cue, Iri called out. “The source of the fresh air is close.”
At last, Jaden slowed. Kayla had been wondering how much longer she would last. She stopped, gulping air down as Iri and Atu reached them. Kayla flopped onto the tunnel floor, and they took a few minutes to rest and hydrate. Or was it only one minute? It felt that way when Jaden ordered them all back to their feet again.
They had gone another twenty feet when the tunnel closed in on itself. Completely. It ended in a cave. Or perhaps culminated was a better word because lining the walls of the cave were several octagonally shaped tubes, each leading out.
Kayla stared at the tubes. “How are we supposed to escape using those? They’re far too small! Even for me.”
Iri arrowed toward the tubes, her hands drifting in front of a few. “This one, and this one and this one—these are the ones leading to fresher air.”
Desperate to escape this mountain, Kayla darted over to join Iri. Putting her own hands out, Kayla felt the air rushing past. Out of the cave. To the exterior part of the mountain. Kayla wished she hadn’t felt that freedom. It only made her feel more trapped. “A lot of good the air does us. There’s still no way we’re squeezing through those tubes. That’s assuming we’re supposed to use them to get out of here.”
Jaden spoke so abruptly, Kayla wondered whether he’d even been listening to their conversation. “I think we’re supposed to use this.”
Kayla turned to see what he was looking at. The moment her eyes fell on the wall behind him, she dropped her pack and scratched around in it for a pen and paper.
“Oh, goody. Time to take a load off and wait while she translates.” Atu plonked himself down.
Kayla spared a second from her frantic scribbling to cast him a disparaging glance. “No offers of help?”
“Nope. Just like healing’s my thing, that’s all you, baby.” Atu grinned at Jaden’s scowl. “Sorry, let me correct that to ‘Kayla.’ Guess I’m not allowed any endearments.”
At Kayla’s exasperated glance, Jaden protested, “Well, he’s not your boyfriend. I’m the only one with those privileges.”
Grinning and shaking her head, Kayla let it go. She had to focus. Of all the translations she had had to do on this mission, this one was the trickiest. Some of the little lines showing which parts of the word should be stressed were so faded Kayla had to stand up and step closer to be sure she was capturing them correctly.
Just as she was nearing the end, she heard it. The soft whooshing of air moving along the tunnel. Her gaze connected with Jaden’s. He didn’t have to confirm what it was. His mouth thinned into a harsh l
ine.
“Are you almost finished?”
Kayla nodded and copied the last few characters. She sensed the others moving in the cave behind her and had to trust they were doing what they could to keep the mini tornadoes from following them.
Concentrating, Kayla began crossing out characters, replacing and switching letters as she worked on the actual translation. When the air moving across the back of her neck stopped, she vaguely acknowledged the fact. The accompanying silence replacing the whooshing was another indicator something had changed. But when the temperature began rising, Kayla turned to see what was happening.
Using whatever they could scavenge from their packs, they had plugged up the three tubes where air had been rushing out. If Kayla wasn’t mistaken, Iri’s pack itself was plugging the last tube. Instead of looking relieved, the others stared at her, tension radiating from them.
“What?” Kayla asked.
Instead of answering her question, Jaden asked, “Do you have the translation?”
While he kept a calm expression on his face, there was no mistaking the urgency in his voice. “Yes, here it is. Want to tell me why you’re all freaking out?”
Just then, Kayla’s ears popped, like they did during a change in altitude. She put it together in an instant.
Iri nodded. “Yes, it won’t be long before the pressure in here squashes us likes bugs.”
Kayla was already hurrying over to them. As soon as she reached the hole covered by Iri’s backpack, she began tracing her fingers around the edges. Almost at once, she found what she was searching for. To verify, she ran her hand around the edges of the other two holes. There was no doubt in her mind now. Her birthmark had itched unbearably when she had touched that tube, only serving as additional confirmation.
“I believe this is the tube that will get us out of here. But you might want to check my reasoning before we try what it says.”
Chapter Forty-Six
Kayla offered the translation to Jaden. He grabbed it, his eyes wary thinking of the implied threat in the last riddle. Funny how he doesn’t remember he was the object of that threat in the first riddle. I wonder what he’ll make of this one.
Iri and Atu peeked past Jaden’s shoulders so they could read too. Kayla knew the lines by heart already:
In the cave that ends it all
Chart the bottom third on wall
Decimate the veins
Break the binding chains
That deepest emotion find
To negate what makes you blind
Not if you should love
But when you should love
Stop the boy from choking
Stop the girl from smoking
Kayla was more interested in Jaden’s reaction. Watching him closely, she saw his face only showed confusion. No anger or fear.
Jaden grunted. “What am I looking at here? Can you explain?”
Kayla would only explain what was essential. “The pattern is the same as the others. The first line tells us where we are, the second what they did here, and the third what we have to do now.”
“And the last few lines?”
“We don’t need them right now. Getting out of here is more important than analyzing them.”
Jaden gave her a strange look. Kayla guessed he thought she was hiding something, something concerning those lines she didn’t want to discuss. She threw her hands up, exasperated. “They’re not important! But since you won’t let it go, the fourth line is a warning or encouragement, and lines five through eight relate to what’s written on the leather strip.”
Jaden’s mouth was a thin line. “What about the last two lines?”
“I don’t know—I’ve never been able to relate them to anything. Can we get on with it now?”
Jaden sighed. “Okay, explain your logic.”
“Lines two and three give it away. Line two directs us to this tube,” Kayla said. “‘Chart the bottom third on wall’ could mean the third tube from the floor. See, the tubes are all over the walls. But they’re at differing heights. If we count the tubes from the floor to the ceiling, this tube would be the third from the bottom.”
Jaden scrubbed a hand over his face as he was prone to doing. “Okay, assuming that’s the logic they used, this is the correct tube. But how do we know they didn’t mean for us to look at all the tubes in the bottom third?”
“They didn’t.” When Jaden opened his mouth to argue, Kayla cut him off. “My birthmark started itching when I touched that tube.”
Jaden stared. “You’re sure it was that tube?”
“Yes. Not only that. I believe line three confirms this tube.” She didn’t wait for Jaden to object. “It reads, ‘Decimate the veins.’”
“A sentence that makes no sense,” Jaden grumbled.
“Only if you don’t know what you’re looking for.” Kayla grinned at his annoyance. “So how does it feel when someone strings you along?”
The flash of irritation on Jaden’s face melted in an instant. “Yeah, I suppose I deserved that. Okay, Sherlock, tell us what we’re missing.”
Kayla took Jaden’s hand and held his palm flat against the rock wall. She moved his hand until she saw realization on his face. When she released his hand, and he moved it himself, she knew he’d found her clue.
“Grooves! There are grooves in this wall!”
His excitement prompted Iri and Atu to join him, their hands roaming the wall as they explored too.
“Not grooves,” Kayla corrected. “Veins.”
“They run over the whole wall,” Atu said. “How do we know the grooves relate to the tube you pointed out?”
Kayla knew she probably looked smug, but she had found the answer. “Run your hands along the edges of any tube. I’ll bet anything the only tube with grooves around its edge is the one covered by Iri’s pack. The grooves run around the mouths of the other tubes, but never quite reach their edges.”
Kayla waited for them to test her theory. She had only checked the other two tubes air had been passing through, not any of the others. Minutes later, Jaden nodded and justified her choice.
“You’re right. This tube is the only one where the grooves run into the edge. You’re thinking these grooves are the veins the riddle is referring to?”
“I do.”
“But why hide them?” Iri muttered. “If they meant for us to find them, why cover them up?”
Kayla shook her head. “I don’t think they were—at least, not when they created this place. You saw how thick the dust on the floor of this tunnel was when we first entered. I’m guessing the grooves accumulated dust in the same way until they were no longer distinguishable from these uneven walls.”
“How are we supposed to ‘decimate’ the veins?” Jaden asked.
Kayla grinned. As usual, his brain was already on the next problem. “That was the part I needed help with.”
“I can think of something that decimates,” Atu offered. When they all looked at him, he pointed at Jaden and Kayla’s rings and then their DDs.
Kayla gaped. “You don’t think that’s a little drastic?”
Atu shrugged. “They’re the only things we have that destroy those abominations Slurpy created. Utterly ‘decimate’ them.” He grinned.
Jaden hummed. “I don’t know, dude. Zareh created all these clues and containments for the artifacts. If Slurpy had been the one in charge, sure, I could see using our relics stones or DDs. But not Zareh.”
Iri jumped in. “Along that line of thinking, didn’t Zareh say our medallions were the key?” She didn’t wait for agreement before rushing on. “Perhaps we should try fitting our medallions into the grooves before we do something as drastic as trying to cut into them with our DDs.”
They digested her words. Kayla had to agree. Iri’s plan had merit. “I second that. The medallions led us into the final area last time. And this approach isn’t as final as applying our DDs to the grooves. If we’re wrong on that one, we could bring the whole mountain down on o
urselves.”
“Alright, let’s go with that,” Jaden said. “Kayla, any hidden clues in that message on where we place our medallions? And all four or just one?”
Kayla grimaced. “I think all of you keep forgetting I don’t have my medallion anymore.”
Jaden’s face fell. “So we can’t finish this?”
“I didn’t say that. I was just reminding you I don’t have a medallion. Partially because that was an answer to your previous question.” Jaden looked confused. “You asked if we should use all four medallions?”
“Ah, yes, so I did.”
“Last time, we only needed one, so I think one will suffice. Also, if we’re not supposed to use the medallions, and the grooves swallow them like the keyhole did last time, we’ll only lose one medallion, not all three. As for placement, I’d say anywhere the groove meets the edges of the tube?”
Without acknowledging Kayla had phrased that last suggestion as a question, Jaden pulled a knife from his pack and crouched down, gently scraping the sand away from the grooves leading into the tube.
“Are you just going to use your medallion, or were you thinking of asking what everyone else thought?” Kayla knew her tone was snippy, but she couldn’t help it. Frustration boiled anew within her.
Jaden picked up on her tone. He stopped clearing the groove. Wearily, he glanced at her. “I’m happy to waste more time discussing whose medallion we should use. Considering I was closest, it seemed the most logical and efficient course for me to clear the groove and use mine.”
Liar, Kayla thought. You want to protect Iri and Atu from being exposed to the same danger of the Gaptors’ EMPs that I am, should they lose their medallions. She shouldn’t have been upset with him. His heart was in the right place. But still . . . It took an effort of will, but Kayla applied herself. Jaden is worth it. And I shouldn’t be hinting that I doubt his leadership skills now. He got us this far, didn’t he?
“You’re right. We don’t have the time to waste. Thanks for thinking ahead and getting started.”
Destiny Series Boxed Set Page 116