Gabriel Stone and the Wrath of the Solarians

by Shannon Duffy

  Empress Malina. Princess Evangeline. Dacho, crazy ruler of the Solarians. And the soul vase full of lost souls—souls that needed a witch trapped at the bottom of a well to break the spell cast on them.

  Brent crawled back to the spot where he had hidden the soul vase. He worked at the mound of leaves and dirt, mumbling about his empty stomach while Piper stood and rubbed her eyes.

  She licked her cracked lips. “I’m so thirsty.” She smoothed her hair away from her face. “Maybe if we can get to Ericville early enough, we can stop by Eric and Flossie’s. What I wouldn’t give for some of her awesome lemonade right now.”

  “I’m all over that,” Brent said, dusting the vase off and getting to his feet. “Let’s get out of here.”

  Gabriel figured that didn’t sound like a bad plan. Finley had said Crimson Lake wasn’t far. If they could get past it and make it to Ericville early enough, he was sure their old friends would offer up some awesome snackage.

  They made their way through the wooded area in the dark, tripping and stumbling over fallen logs, rocks, and branches. It would have been a lot better if they had a stupid flashlight. Gabriel wished he hadn’t been such a loser and had thought about looking for one on the ship.

  The farther they went, the thicker the woods became and the chirring of insects and rustling of critters got louder. Gabriel imagined the black witch popping out at them from behind every fluttering branch. He reminded himself that she couldn’t get out of the cave before sunrise and he tried to walk faster, but it wasn’t easy with only the light of the moon and the stars to guide them.

  After trudging along for a while, Finley slowed his pace and his body stiffened.

  Gabriel wasn’t sure if he really wanted to know, but asked anyway, “What’s wrong, Finley?” He walked alongside the tracker monkey and narrowed his eyes. “What is it with Crimson Lake that’s got you so freaked out anyway? And don’t say nothing ‘cause I saw the look in Gunner’s eyes when he mentioned coming.”

  “Yeah, seriously,” Brent said, cradling the vase under one arm. “If there’s something we need to know, you should tell us now.”

  Finley swallowed and paused for a moment before speaking up. “Well, me not know if true. But … careful no wake lake or fall in. Me hear … me hear lake eat you.”

  Gabriel’s brows shot up. “The lake eats people?” He chuckled nervously. That couldn’t be possible, right? Lakes didn’t eat people. But then again, something in the lake could. Gabriel forced a smile as a sickening thought came to him; witches who steal souls shouldn’t exist either ... but in Valta they did.

  Piper’s body went rigid beside him. “You sure there isn’t another way to Ericville, Finley? I mean, I’m sure the lake doesn’t really eat you … ” she said, saying what Gabriel was thinking. She cleared her throat. “But still, what if there’s some rabid crocodile in there or something?”

  One of Brent’s broad shoulders lifted. “Seriously, Piper,” he said, with a cough. “Crocodiles can’t be rabid.” He looked at Finley, tightening his grasp around the vase. “There isn’t a rabid anything in Crimson Lake, is there, Finley?”

  Finley scratched his head. “Me not know word rabid,” he said moving forward again. He looked over his shoulder. “Friend follow Finley and no talk. Move quick—” He stared at Piper. “And no fall.”

  Piper threw her hands up in the air. “Holy crap. Give a girl a break, will ya? I fell once back on Dead Beach ‘cause of the fog and you won’t let me live it down.”

  Finley managed a smile. “Me no want friend be eaten.”

  “Awesome,” Piper said, rolling her eyes. “Me neither.”

  After about twenty more minutes, Finley came to an abrupt stop. Gabriel could hear the sound of water moving somewhere beyond the trees and figured Crimson Lake was behind the branches.

  Brent pinched his nose and looked at Gabriel. Yeah, a foul smell lingered in the air. Gabriel mock-gagged. He couldn’t figure out what the stink bomb was, but it was kinda gross, like iron mixed with sulphur or something weird.

  Finley gave one last warning to keep quiet, moved aside some branches, and waved them forward.

  Stepping past the brambles, Gabriel muted a gasp. Crimson Lake flowed far beneath them about sixty feet down. Worse, a rickety-looking, narrow bridge a few feet in front of them swayed over top of the lake to the other side of the forest. He squinted, studying the lake, the smell of something coppery hitting his nose even stronger than before. Gabriel covered his nose with his sleeve, trying not to gag when he noticed something odd about the water. It was dark, but the way the moon glistened off the water allowed him a pretty good look—and made his heart jump. “It—it’s red, I think,” he whispered. “The lake. It’s red. Like blood red.”

  “That can’t be what we smell, can it?” Piper asked, going pale.

  Brent slapped a hand against his eyes and let out a long sigh. He leaned in and whispered, “Crimson Lake, huh? Seriously, it’s like the joke’s on us. That’s blood down there. And not the Halloween fake kind either. It’s like real blood. I mean if it looks like blood … and smells like blood … ” He threw his hands up. “Then it’s freaking blood!”

  “Shh,” Finley warned with a scowl.

  Piper shook her head so hard that a strand of her black hair tumbled loose from her elastic. “There’s gotta be another way, ‘cause I don’t do blood baths.” She wrapped her hands around her elbows.

  “Guys … listen,” Gabriel whispered, shoving down the fist of fear that gripped him by the throat. He didn’t do blood baths either. He hadn’t even liked getting his blood taken at the lab last year for a physical, let alone walking across a whole lake of blood. It couldn’t really be blood, could it?

  He curled his hands at his sides. “Even if there is another way, we don’t have time to find it.” He looked at Piper. “Think about Princess Evangeline—your friend.”

  Piper tilted her head back and looked at the starry sky as if it would give her an answer.

  “And, Brent,” Gabriel whispered. “You were the one not so long ago that was dying to get to Ericville—to not be late.”

  “Yeah, well dying is the exact thing I’m trying to avoid,” Brent muttered. He groaned, then glanced at Piper. “He’s right, dude.” He lifted his chin to the bridge. “We’ll have to take that contraption across.”

  Piper shifted around Gabriel to take a better look at the narrow wooden bridge that extended over at least one hundred feet to the other side of the lake. Slatted boards spanned the distance, some missing or cracked, or otherwise looking completely dilapidated. Frayed ropes lined the sides. As the bridge swayed in the breeze, creaking eerily as it moved, Piper turned back around. Her gaze flickered over each of them, straight-faced. “Bridge?” she croaked, like she was fighting to keep her voice down. “That thing should be called Dead Man Walking Way or something. Not a bridge.” Her lips thinned. “And it looks like it hasn’t been used in years.”

  “No other way,” Finley said, straightening his shoulders, looking like he was trying to be brave.

  Well that was a no-brainer. Question was, would the so-called bridge hold them and keep them from splashing into the lake of blood?

  “Sounds sorta like picking your poison.” Piper frowned, then mumbled something in Spanish under her breath. After a minute, she slumped her shoulders, looking defeated. “Si.” “Fine,” she grumbled, stepping forward. “For Princess Evangeline.”

  “And the empress,” Gabriel added.

  As they stepped farther past the tree line, they left the shelter of the forest. Gabriel looked around. As far as he could see, the lake spread out way below them. Without the trees to slow the wind down, the breeze had turned into heavy gusts of wind. The red water below rippled and heaved. The high wind slapped against them, rattling Gabriel’s blue jacket. It puffed it out, making him look like a stupid inflatable toy.

  Finley tapped a furry foot on the first wooden plank while wrapping a hand around the rope. Inhaling a deep
breath, he stepped onto the bridge. It creaked and moaned in the wind, shifting left to right, but held firm under his weight.

  Gabriel realized he’d been holding his breath, so he blew it out, then dragged in a mouthful of air. With the strong odor of blood reeking like a butcher’s shop, it wasn’t exactly the fresh breath he’d wanted.

  Piper headed out behind Finley.

  “Don’t look down,” Gabriel told her. She drew a shaky breath, then wrapped each hand around the ropes on either side of her.

  Gabriel waited for her to get part of the way across before stepping forward. Even though it was cool outside, sweat prickled along every surface of his skin, his heart pumping, racing in his ears like a raging river. He didn’t want to think about what was in the lake below—how a whole lake could be filled with blood. That brought a whole new meaning to the word creepy. Legs stiff, he kept his eyes at his feet, focused on his steps, and tried not to look beneath the slats in the wood.

  In some spots where the wooden planks had chipped or were rotted, he had to stretch his legs across a hole. With the two-foot gap separating the planks, he prayed the next piece would be stable. The whole situation was scary and unpredictable and his already pounding heart skyrocketed to new speeds. It was impossible not to look down when whole pieces of wood were missing. And with the sun rising in the distance, everything became easier to see. His stare landed on the dark, thick water that churned in a sickening red. The wind wafted its iron smell up Gabriel’s nose until he wanted to puke from a mixture of fear and the horrible stink.

  About three quarters of the way across, Piper stopped. Gabriel stalled in his step at the halfway mark, the bridge swaying. He dug his fingers into the coarse rope. Why was she stopping? He didn’t want to yell out to her in case what Finley had said was true. Maybe the lake actually did eat people. As weird as that idea sounded, they were in Valta. Stranger things had happened there after all, and he wasn’t risking it.

  The board under his feet creaked. Gabriel gasped, lifted one foot, and placed it on the next plank back, about two feet behind him, shifting his weight. With his legs stretched wide, Gabriel was afraid that if Piper didn’t get going soon, he’d find out what the lake was all about the hard way.

  Gabriel looked over his shoulder while steadying his stance on the swaying bridge. Brent had taken a few steps forward. One of Brent’s hands gripped the rope and the fingers on his other curled around the soul vase.

  Gabriel eased his head around. Piper, about ten feet ahead of him, still hadn’t moved. But this time her head was turned around, eyes wide and staring at Gabriel. Beyond her, Finley stood on the land, having made it to the other side. He was jumping up and down, furry arms flailing in the air. But Finley wasn’t saying anything. Silence in those kinds of crazy situations was Finley’s motto.

  Gabriel lifted his chin and widened his eyes at her, encouraging her to get off the stupid bridge. Fear clogged his throat. With all of their weight on the rickety thing, he worried it would break.

  They. Needed. To. Move.

  Piper lifted one hand from the rope. Even from there, Gabriel could see that she was shaking. She pointed to the red lake below, alarm flaring in her eyes.

  Gabriel dared to look down. The blood-red water rippled, soaring mountains looming on either side. But they knew there was a creepy lake beneath them when they’d headed out on the bridge. He didn’t know what was freaking Piper out so much now. What the heck would make her stop and freeze like a deer in headlights when they needed to get out of there before they were jam on toast?

  Just when he was about to give Piper a “what gives” look, his eyes trailed over the shoreline below. Gabriel blinked, gripped his hands around the rope, and did a double take. Angling his head, he then realized what it was that had gotten Piper so freaked out.

  Two robots walked the rock-littered shore.

  Freaking robots!

  Their white, metallic frames stood out in the dim light. Across their chests the letter S was engraved into metal. It scrolled out in large, bright red print. Three red orbs surrounded it like a triangle.

  The letter S? Gabriel thought, a sickening feeling rushing over him. Surrounded by three orbs—three suns.

  Solaria!

  What would robots from Solaria being doing on Valta?

  One robot lifted something that looked like a stick from the ground. He turned it over in his hands, examining it. The second robot crouched low at the river’s edge. He held one hand under the water, then lifted it out. Holding a large vial into the air, he swirled the liquid around, looking closely at the contents before pressing something into the top of it.

  He was collecting blood from the lake!

  But why?

  Just as the golden sun crested the mountain, robot number two stood and twisted around to robot number one. Robot one held out the stick in his hand to robot two. A lump grew in Gabriel’s throat as the sun’s rays lit up the area. It made the item in the robot’s hand clearer.

  It wasn’t a stick.

  It was a bone!

  Gabriel wrapped slick hands around the rope until it seared his flesh. He recognized that bone. It was like the fake skeleton hanging in the back of their biology classroom.

  That bone was a leg bone—a femur—and looked like a freaking human bone!

  Gabriel stumbled back a step with a gasp, landing on his butt. A sharp crack shot out as the board beneath him shattered. He barely scooted back before the plank plummeted. The bots’ heads shot up, their line of sight zoning in on the chunk of wood as it dropped. Then they snapped their gaze on Gabriel as the bridge swayed even more wildly, shifting from the sudden movement. The bots’ eyes shone out like glittering diamonds that sliced through the sky.

  Gabriel scrambled to his feet, heart thumping madly against his ribs. He stepped carefully over the gaping hole in the bridge and treaded forward. The bridge swayed side to side, threatening to heave him off into Crimson Lake.

  Leaping, he made it over another missing plank, then grabbed the rope beside him. “Run, guys!” he yelled, not caring about being quiet anymore. The Solarian bots had spotted them. Who knew what technology they had? Maybe they could zap them with a death ray or something.

  Piper finally moved forward, but the shifting of the bridge made it hard for them all to keep their balance. Gabriel darted a look behind him, fingers clinging to the rope. Brent was gaining on him, even with one arm securing the vase. Gabriel needed to keep going. If Brent caught up, both of their weight pressed in the same spot would totally make the old bridge collapse.

  “Hurry, guys!” Gabriel yelled. He dared another glance as he staggered across the bridge. Bot number two had lifted a panel on its forearm. With its pointer finger, it pressed a button. Or maybe a switch to detonate a bomb to explode everything like the alien dudes did in the movie Predator.

  Crap.

  Bot number one kept looking up, rotating its stare from Gabriel to Brent with those unnaturally shining eyes.

  The bridge heaved and swayed, the whistling of the wind whooshing in Gabriel’s ears. He looked up and across to the safety of the other side.

  Close. Almost there.

  Thankfully, Piper had made it and joined Finley in waving him and Brent forward, fear sweeping across her face.

  Move, move, move.

  Then two horrible things happened at once. First the lake of blood began shifting really fast, bubbling and drawing together like a rising funnel. It rose higher and higher by the second like a horrible storm brewing.

  And Brent yelled as a loud cracking sound shot out. The bridge collapsed, ripped apart from its hold on land at their starting point.

  Gabriel yelled as he plunged down through the air, his stomach dropping like he was on an endless roller coaster. Reaching up, he stretched out a hand and caught a piece of the rope as it flew through the air in front of him. He wrapped one hand around its prickly threads, then the other. His fingers gripped tightly around the brittle rope as he looked down. Bre
nt dangled several feet beneath him, suspended from a cord of rope with one hand—the soul vase hanging from his other.

  Gabriel stared at Crimson Lake as they sliced through the air, down, down, down. The blood water rose higher and higher.

  Then a wave shot from the center of the bloody water. It reached out to the side and formed into two red fists. It grabbed one robot, then the other. The blood wave lifted them into the air like they were weightless, yanked them under the water, and swallowed them whole with a loud splash.

  Gabriel focused on hanging onto the rope while still swinging through the air, the cool wind skating past his face. The broken bridge sliced forward, heading toward the cliff. He clung to the cords and tried to get his footing.

  The way Gabriel saw it, there were only two choices: let go and be eaten by the lake of blood, or hang on and be smashed to pieces into the rock face. Either way, he and Brent would be dead. And along with them, Jasra and the other souls in the vase would be lost forever.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  The prickly rope bit into Gabriel’s hands as he clung on, his mind reeling in panic. He couldn’t die like this. Not here.

  Brent yelped and Gabriel snapped his gaze below. His best friend had slipped from the rope. His flailing body plunging through the air, headed toward Crimson Lake.

  Gabriel’s heart pounded. He couldn’t lose Brent. But he was helpless to do anything since he was about to smash into the cliff and become a pancake.

  In the next second, as swift as an arrow, three white tigers swooped down from above, their huge wings thumping in flight. Propelling through the air, one tiger slid beneath Brent just before he hit the water, bolting skyward with him on its back.

  A second tiger shot toward Gabriel. He eyed the flying beast as he swung closer to the side of the rock face, the branches and twigs growing eerily close. There was no way the tiger could make it in time. And if Gabriel didn’t let go of the broken bridge, he’d crash into the side of the cliff.

  He closed his eyes.