A Quill Ladder

by Jennifer Ellis

  Mark rose to a half crouch and started crashing through the trees in the general direction of the car.

  “You shouldn’t have said run,” Caleb said. “He sounds like an elephant.” They started to sprint after him. But the noise had alerted the dogs, and Abbey heard excited barking, followed by the sounds of two animals thundering through the underbrush.

  “Run!” Caleb yelled.

  They fought their way through the trees and bushes, the dogs closing in on them. Bile rose in her throat as she stumbled over rocks and skidded in the damp soil. Mark and Caleb pulled away, far ahead of her, and then Caleb dropped back to urge her on, tossing rocks in other directions into the undergrowth to distract the dogs. Abbey stubbed her toe and nearly tripped as the blue Jag came into sight, Farley bounding between the front and back seats, barking wildly. Caleb unlocked the doors and they all piled in, pushing Farley back as they went. The two dogs thundered out of the trees and lunged at the Jag, standing on their hind legs and snarling at the closed windows. Farley clawed at the leather door and barked frantically. Mark whimpered from the driver’s seat, and Abbey realized she was trembling violently.

  “What now?” Abbey said.

  Caleb turned away from the frothing dogs. “Now one of us drives.”

  “I’ve had three driving lessons,” Mark said.

  “All right. You’re up first then, and you’re in the right spot. Let’s get out of here.” Damian had rounded the corner of the drive, and the dogs’ nails clicked and scratched against the glass. Caleb passed Mark the keys, and after staring at them for a second, Mark selected one and thrust it into the ignition.

  “Reverse!” Caleb ordered. “Fast.”

  Mark obediently put the car in reverse and then gunned the engine. The Jag lurched backward, and the dogs fell away. Damian pounded on the trunk of the car, but Mark managed to shift it into drive and peeled off down the driveway with the dogs following. Farley immediately slid off the back seat and fell to the floor.

  They screeched down the driveway, taking the curving turns at an alarming pace, Mark’s sausage fingers curled around the wheel at ten and two. Damian and the dogs were left far behind. At the main road, Mark put on his left turn signal, looked both ways, pulled out onto Top Point Drive, and immediately slowed to ten miles under the speed limit.

  Caleb flicked a panicky look out the back window. “Mark, that was some great driving back there. But why are we slowing down, buddy?”

  “Most accidents are speed related,” Mark replied.

  “Yes, but in this case, they’re more likely to be bad man related,” Caleb said.

  “Extremely bad man,” Mark corrected.

  “Bad, extremely bad, super-duper bad, whatever—you need to step on it.”

  Abbey looked out the back window. “Do you think they’re going to follow us? Should we go back up the hill and see if Dad is in their car?”

  A bullet pierced the back window of the Jag and embedded itself into the back of the creamy leather front seat, just missing Farley.

  Abbey screamed and flattened herself on the back seat.

  Caleb slid next to Mark and jammed his own foot on the gas. The Jag fishtailed down the road as it sprang to life, but Mark didn’t let go of the wheel and managed to bring the vehicle under control as it hurtled down the road.

  “Do not ever do that again,” Mark said. “That was very unsafe.”

  “Just drive, Mark,” Caleb said.

  15. Swamps and Ladders

  It wasn’t until they hit Warm Hollow Road that Abbey tentatively allowed herself to take deeper breaths. Nobody seemed to be following them now, and the other gunshot they heard must not have hit the Jag.

  She sat up in the back seat. Mark still watched the road like a predator, as if it might leap up and away from him at any second.

  “Now what?” Abbey said.

  Caleb had a set of the three cards they had found in the file room spread out on his lap. “I think we should go see Simon. At least we know where he is. We have to figure out where the other set of stones is, if there is one. Maybe he has some ideas.”

  “That will require using streets that have traffic lights and making two left turns,” Mark said, his eyes never leaving the street. They had slowed once again to a snail’s pace, but given that they were now in a residential area, Abbey wasn’t as worried about getting shot, or run off the road.

  “It’s okay, Mark. I’ll talk you through it,” Caleb said.

  “You do not have a valid state driver’s license, or any years of driving experience,” Mark said.

  “We could stay on the outside ring of Coventry, avoid the left turn that has the light, and park a few blocks away. I don’t really think we want to park at the detention center with a bullet hole in the window anyway. Would that make you more comfortable?”

  Mark didn’t reply, but he did come to a complete stop at the empty four-way stop, and put on the left turn signal.

  “There’s something on these cards that we need to know. I just know it,” Caleb said.

  “I need to look at my maps,” Mark said.

  “I know, buddy. You always need to look at your maps.”

  “It is very important that you do not patronize me,” Mark replied. “I speak differently and focus on things you find strange, but my IQ is the same as yours. I need my map to measure the distance between the sets of stones.”

  Caleb raked a hand through his hair. “Sorry, Mark. I know that. I just… sometimes I just forget that. I’m sorry. You’re doing a great job driving.”

  “Porcupine, ladder, porcu-ladder, ladder-porc, porcu-climb,” Abbey murmured to herself. What had Mrs. Forrester been trying to tell them with her drawings?

  “Maybe she was talking about quills,” Caleb said.

  “Well that doesn’t make any sense either. Quill ladder. What’s a quill ladder?” Abbey said hotly. She was tired from their night in the file room and then sleeping back to back with Caleb. A quill ladder. A quill ladder. Her eyes drifted closed.

  Her body gave a hypnic jerk just as the word equilateral flashed through her mind. She had fallen asleep.

  Equilateral. The legs of the tunnels had been exactly the same length. Was that what Mrs. Forrester had been trying to tell them? Did they form an equilateral shape? But how did that help? What was equidistant from what? The stones from the docks? The sets of stones from each other?

  Abbey was so deep in thought that she hadn’t noticed that Mark had pulled into a strip mall near the detention center.

  “Bring everything,” Caleb ordered, grabbing the backpack of supplies. “Just in case. Someone might see the bullet hole and call the police.”

  “What about Farley?” Abbey said.

  “We’re going to have to tie him up outside the coffee shop there. He’ll be fine. People do it all the time.”

  Abbey got out with Farley and noticed that a folder of papers had slipped out from under the driver’s seat as they drove. She picked it up and tucked it under her arm.

  “I need to look at my maps,” Mark insisted, his face creased in a stubborn frown.

  Caleb took Farley’s leash and tied him up outside the coffee shop. “Mark, we need to go see Simon. You can look at your maps in there.”

  Mark crossed his arms over his chest and scowled, but relented and followed Caleb when he started walking toward the center.

  They were admitted without any issue, given that they were all on Simon’s visitor list and Mark was deemed to be a guardian. “Family is so important for rehabilitation,” the woman at the front desk gushed, while still eyeing the three of them warily, as if Simon were on a clear criminal trajectory and they were his potential associates. Mark didn’t seem to appreciate having to leave behind his satchel and the keys to the Jag, both of which set off the metal detector, but he was permitted to bring the paper maps. Caleb’s backpack also had to be left behind. The folder Abbey carried from Sylvain’s car and her iPhon
e were declared to be okay, but it was made clear to her that she must exit with the phone.

  After an enthusiastic exchange with Simon’s house leader, Bert, who reiterated the value of family supports, they met Simon in a small, plain room off the kitchen, furnished with a table and chairs. Simon’s face fell faintly when he saw them, but then pulled into a tight smile. Abbey wasn’t sure who he’d been expecting. At least he looked okay, but then again, Abbey supposed he probably wouldn’t starve to death or die of loneliness within the first twenty-four hours. Bert remained in the kitchen chatting with two of the other youth, who, aside from having a few more nose rings than Abbey considered necessary, looked pretty normal.

  “We don’t have a lot of time,” Caleb said in a low voice, settling into one of the chairs. “Mom’s on the other side of the stones, and the stones have been destroyed. Mom might be trapped, and Dad is missing. We think there’s another set of stones, and we need to know if you can think of anything, anything, that would help us find them.”

  Simon stared blankly at Caleb, then glanced out into the kitchen at Bert, who was still engaged in animated discussion with a boy with a black Mohawk. Abbey was vaguely conscious of Mark laying his maps on the table, the pencil he’d borrowed from Bert clutched tightly in his hand.

  “Maybe you should call the police,” Simon said finally.

  “Not yet. They’ll put us in some home or something. Please. Think. I brought the cards so you can have another look at them.”

  Simon blanched, the corners of his eyes creasing in what looked like pain. “I can’t read them, Caleb. I’m a computer geek, not some sort of doer of witchcraft.”

  “Please. Just give it a try. Abbey and I can both see a list of numbers.”

  “Fine.”

  Caleb placed the second cream card in front of Simon, and he picked it up and gazed at it intently. “Abbey found that music helped…” Caleb started.

  Simon waved him away. “Music is noise to me.” He turned the card over and over in his hands, feeling the edges of it, drawing it closer and then moving it farther away.

  “It goes this way…” Caleb began again, reaching for the card, but Simon shook his head and pulled it to his chest. Then abruptly he took the card and started to peel the top layer of cardstock away, separating the card into two pieces.

  “What are you doing?” Caleb rose from the table to snatch at the card. Simon leaned back, stared at him with his eyebrows raised, and then flipped the card around to reveal the row of numbers written in plain black ink on the second layer of cardstock.

  “What? How did you know to do that?” Caleb sputtered.

  Simon blew a faint huff of air out of his nose. “When governments send out documents that have been requested under freedom of information, they have to black out the parts that are private or confidential. They used to black it out by hand with a pen. These days they do it with big black bars that they place over the text in Word. But they often screw up and fail to combine the bar and word into a single image. Most computer techies know how to lift the bars and reveal the words underneath. The card looked like it had two layers glued together. I took a chance.”

  “But how would Caleb and I have been able to read numbers that were under a layer of cardstock?” Abbey said.

  “That, I have no idea. Maybe you have x-ray vision.” Simon rocked back in his chair. “Don’t you think maybe you should call the police, or Sylvain or someone? Maybe someone at Dad’s office?”

  “Sylvain disappeared about half an hour ago. Do the numbers mean anything to you?” Abbey asked.

  Simon rolled his eyes and looked at the card, clearly determined that he couldn’t help, but then his eyes went wider and his eyebrows scrunched together. He dropped the front legs of the chair to the floor and pointed to one of the five sets of numbers. “I know this number. It’s the latitude and longitude of the causeway with the spaceships. I checked it on my phone when we were there.”

  “Why didn’t you say something before? We could have looked that up,” Abbey said.

  “I forgot.”

  “Is it the latitude and longitude of Coventry?” Abbey said, embarrassed that she didn’t know this.

  “Give me your phone,” Caleb said, snatching it out of her hand.

  Abbey thrust the card in front of Mark, who was drawing lines from their house to a circle that she assumed represented Sylvain’s house. “Are any of these sets of numbers the latitude and longitude of Coventry City?”

  Mark barely looked up from his map. “No.”

  “Yes!” exclaimed Caleb, waving Abbey’s phone.

  Mark looked up at Caleb, then returned his gaze to his map. “No. They are the latitude and longitude coordinates of various areas surrounding Coventry.”

  “What areas exactly?” Abbey said.

  Mark looked back at his map, then up at Abbey, then back at his map. Then he gave a deep sigh. “I need my computer and mapping software. But this one is to the southwest, near the stones. This one is to the northwest.”

  “This one set is almost right on top of the stones,” Caleb interrupted.

  “This one is almost due north,” Mark continued. “Then these ones—”

  “The one that’s due north looks like it might be right on top of Sylvain’s house,” Caleb exclaimed.

  “So maybe the coordinates mark the stones,” Abbey said. “Do you think that’s possible, Mark? Maybe there is another set of stones. What’s the closest set of coordinates to here?”

  Bert drifted to the door of the room and everyone tensed up fractionally. “Ten minutes until Simon is due at art therapy.” He glanced at the map with elevated eyebrows.

  “We’re playing an orienteering game,” Abbey said.

  “Oh, we like those around here,” Bert said. He wandered away to inform a few of the other residents of their upcoming classes.

  Mark tapped one set of coordinates. “I would estimate that these would almost be on top of—”

  “Salisbury Swamp!” Caleb announced. “That’s why Mom always wanted to protect it. Because there are stones there.”

  “But the swamp is on fire,” Abbey said. “What about these ones?” She pointed at the two remaining sets of coordinates in the first line. She was trying to work out the distances in her mind. Equilateral. Were the coordinates the same distance apart? Did they form an equilateral shape? Was she right about Mrs. Forrester’s drawings? She wasn’t sure. The swamp was definitely closer to the stones by their house than it was to the stones at Sylvain’s.

  Mark looked at the coordinates. “This one is in the Circle Mountains. There are no roads that way. It would be a very long hike. This one is near the Granton Dam.”

  “It is the Granton Dam,” Caleb crowed. “Another place Mom is associated with.”

  “So it looks like the burning swamp is our best option,” Abbey said, putting as much sarcasm into her voice as she could muster.

  “It’s only smoldering now,” Caleb said.

  “I need to go home and use my map plotting software,” Mark said.

  Caleb handed Abbey her phone, and turned to Mark. “I don’t know if we have time. We need to get to the swamp, and it would be better if we went right away in the Jag before someone sees the bullet hole and starts asking questions.”

  Simon grabbed Abbey’s arm, and darted a furious glance at the doorway to make sure nobody was there. “You were shot at? And who’s driving?”

  “Mark,” Abbey said. “He was very safe.”

  “I need my laptop and mapping software,” Mark repeated.

  “You’re not going to go anywhere that you’re being shot at,” Simon ordered.

  Caleb had already gone to stand by the door. “No worries. We’re going in the opposite direction. Let’s go.”

  “I really want to go home,” Mark said, collecting his stuff and placing it back in his satchel. Abbey trailed Mark to the door, uncertain what to do.

  “Just dr
ive us to the swamp, and drop us off, and then you can go,” Caleb said to Mark.

  Simon rose from his chair. “No. You should just go home.”

  Caleb twisted the door handle. “Well, regardless, we can’t stay here. I doubt we’re on the lunch distribution list.”

  Simon’s voice oscillated up a notch from his teenage baritone. “Promise me you’ll go home. And call someone from Dad’s office. Maybe Sheridan. She’ll know what to do.”

  “We will,” Caleb said. “Don’t worry.”

  They retrieved Farley, got in the Jag, and pulled out of the parking lot. It wasn’t until they were on the road again that Abbey realized she had left Sylvain’s file folder—the one that had slid out from under the car seat—on the table with Simon. She hadn’t even had a chance to look at it yet. She’d have to go back for it another time.

  Once on the parkway, Mark and Caleb resumed their argument about where they were going. Mark stubbornly insisted on going home to map out the coordinates, while Caleb was determined to head to the swamp.

  “We told Simon we would go home, and we have no idea who the Energy is for the swamp,” Abbey said.

  “I still think we should just check it out,” Caleb replied. “The Energy might be like Mark; they might live near the swamp, so the stones are always active. It’s worth a try.”

  “Except that they’re on fire,” Abbey said.

  “Smoldering,” Caleb corrected.

  “But even if we find the stones and don’t get burned to death and they’re working, we have no idea where we’re going to land on the other side, in the future, or which future. We could end up in a desert.

  She could tell by the set of Caleb’s jaw though that he was going to try. “If I go first, we should end up in the causeway future. But you and Mark can go home. I’ll go by myself. I’ll turn right around if there’s a problem on the other end.”

  Mark continued to drive too slowly down the parkway. If Caleb was going, they were all going, Abbey decided.