The Hotel Between

by Sean Easley

  But no Maid Commander.

  Nico catches my attention, points to Agapios, and mouths, “What are you doing?”

  I motion to Rahki.

  He taps his pocket watch. Yeah, no kidding.

  “They’re sorted here,” Rahki says. “Let’s get to the Elevator Bank.”

  Elevator Bank, perfect. I’ll just take a different elevator from Rahki and head to the sub-level while she deals with this mess.

  But the Bank ring is in complete disorder. Maids guard the elevators with dusters slung over their shoulders, barking commands at staff and guests alike. I’ll never get through them. I have to find another way. Maybe one of the back halls?

  “We’re close,” Rahki says, inserting her coin into the nearest map-board. Auburn ink spreads across the parchment, drawing the four rings of the Hotel trunk. Swirling lines curl away from the “You Are Here” marker toward a door leading off the Bank, guarded by maids.

  If I could touch it without Rahki seeing, it might show me a path to get where I need to go. Then again, it might sense my intentions, too. The last thing I need is to have the building fight back against me, if that’s even possible. But if I can figure out what’s wrong up here, maybe that’ll lead me to a way down.

  I grab Rahki’s attention. “What’s going on?”

  “One of the pins failed,” she says. “It’s leaking binding magic, putting stress on the other doors. If we don’t stop it . . . ”

  “Bad news.” That much I can understand.

  I take in the shouting guests and militant maids. . . . All this fuss, just so I can get my hands on a key? Maybe we’re going about this the wrong way.

  A splitting sound echoes through the hall, and everyone goes silent.

  The noise comes again—like splintering wood—followed by a sound like someone popping the top on a shaken soda bottle. The maids back away from one of the elevators as its doors open, revealing . . .

  Nothing. A dark, cold emptiness. The elevator’s just gone, replaced by what looks like the deepest reaches of space, where even stars don’t shine.

  “Get back!” one of the maids yells, pushing guests away with his duster. “The pins binding the elevators are failing. The elevators are no longer safe. Staff, please lead guests directly to the Mezzanine.”

  The emptiness beyond those sliding doors makes me dizzy. It’s like the elevator inside never existed. Swallowed up. I could have been on that elevator, headed for the Concierge Retreat. Suddenly making my way down to the sub-level doesn’t seem like such a grand idea.

  When Nico said they’d plan a distraction, I never imagined it would be something that would make everyone panic like this.

  I’ll stick with Rahki for now. If it’s as bad as it seems, she might need my help. I don’t want anyone getting hurt because of me.

  We move into an offshoot hallway. Sev is at the end of the next hall crouched down in a circle with others bearing the maroon sash of the doormen. The stucco walls are lined with more doors to nothing.

  I’m thankful to see Sev—he’ll know what to do. But when he looks up at me, the fearful glimmer in his eyes makes my heart race. This “distraction” has definitely gone too far. Time to forget about the topscrew and focus on what’s happening here.

  Rahki ducks under swaths of purple fabric to meet him. “Status?”

  “It is not a snap,” Sev says. “Not yet. If we find and replace the cracked pin, we might get some failed doors back.” He glances at the other doormen. “But we are out.”

  A roll of black canvas lies in the center of the group, sewn with dozens of empty pin-sleeves like the ones on my shirt.

  “Why don’t you just try the same pin in each hinge?” I ask.

  “When one fails, all pins are weaker. More than one pin may be cracked by now. If the stress continues—”

  “We won’t let it get as far as a snap.” Rahki pulls two more pins from her shirt. “I’ve got these. Cam’s got another.” She turns and shouts to the staffers gathering behind us. “Everyone have your pins ready, and do exactly what the doormen tell you.”

  Sev directs me to one of the vacant doors near the end of the hall, between two other determined staffers.

  I step up and stare into the abyss, Sev’s pin in hand. My vision tunnels. The cold darkness draws me forward. I want to know what lies at the end of all that black.

  The girl next to me lines up her plug on the middle hinge of her door and flicks the trigger. The plug pops the old pin out like toast from a toaster, and she shoves her new pin into the hole.

  There’s another crack, another fizz. It didn’t work.

  I focus on my hinge and align the spring-loaded plug Sev gave me. The tool taps the pin up and out of the hole. The pin clatters to the floor. So far, so good. I slide my new pin into place, using the plug to snap it down tight.

  Nothing. No crack, no fizz, no change in the landscape behind the door. It’s like staring into insanity. Now that I’ve re-pinned it, this door should lead to Sev’s room, but Sev’s room isn’t there.

  I wonder what it would be like to step through into that endless black. Would I die from lack of oxygen? If it really is space, I could freeze to death, and my arms and legs and eyeballs would crack and shatter into a million pieces. Or maybe the lack of pressure would make me go boom, WWTD number 313-style.

  Another staffer hammers his pin into place and exclaims, “I got it!” as a wave of light bursts down the hall.

  But I don’t turn to look, because the nothingness on the other side of my door is changing. Shapes begin to form. A bed. A dresser covered in knick-knacks. Safety posters and foldouts. It’s my bedroom. At home. The pin Sev gave me isn’t bound to his room—it’s bound to Oma’s house.

  The weight of all the frustration and intrigue and danger of the Hotel comes crashing down on me. I don’t want to be here. I belong at home, taking care of Cass—not breaking into offices and being trapped in foreign countries and stopping magic doors from tearing holes in space-time.

  So I step through and close the door behind me.

  16

  Like Branches on a Tree

  I’m back. My clothes are in the dresser. My squeaky bed invites me to lie down and forget all the chaos and magic of the Hotel.

  It’s like waking from a dream.

  I glance back at my bedroom door, now bound to the Hotel instead of the hall leading to the living room. Bound to bizarre people, and places unknown, to doors all over the world and . . .

  I don’t want to think about it.

  I pull my chest of drawers away from the wall and slide it in front of my door—blocking Rahki and Sev on the other side. I sit on the edge of my bed, wringing my hands. I failed. My one chance at stealing into the Old Man’s office, and I blew it. I’m back where I started, sitting in Oma’s house with no hope of finding Dad and less than five days to do it.

  Oma. I wonder if she’s here. She’d know what to say to make me feel better. I miss her, and Cass. Are they okay? Was Cass able to come home from the hospital yet? They’re going to have so many questions. But if Sev or Rahki come through that door, they’ll talk me into going back. I don’t know what to do.

  So I pace. Back and forth. In a circle. Clenching and unclenching my fists. My posters and junk remind me of who I am. I’m not staff at a magic Hotel. I’m Cam, the boy who locks himself in lockers and hides in his room and collects safety guides. The kid who dreamed of finding his parents but never knew where to look for them. Who takes care of his sister the way no one else can. It was dumb of me to leave in the first place.

  Knock-knock. “Cam?” Cass’s voice filters through the wall. “Is that you?”

  I stop. The pin and my dresser are all that stand between us. Should I answer? The door jiggles, and I’m not sure whether it’s coming from the hall or the Hotel, or even if Cass can get through while the door is bound. I’d have to un-pin it, wouldn’t I? I’m not sure how it all works. But it’s Cass! She’s okay! She’s back home, and well en
ough to be rolling around the house. At least that’s a relief.

  I sit against the dresser and put my head in my hands.

  “Cam, let me in.”

  “I can’t,” I say. Now she knows I’m here.

  “Where’ve you been? Why’d you leave?”

  “I—I wanted to fix everything. But I messed it up.”

  “What? Let me in,” she says. “I want to see you.”

  I fidget with my necklace, feeling the contours of Dad’s coin. “I can’t,” I say again. And it’s not because I don’t want to. If I unbind that door, if I move that chest, I’ll never finish my mission to help her and Oma. I still want that, even if I’m afraid of failing. They deserve it. . . . No, we deserve it.

  “This isn’t funny,” Cass says. “You shouldn’t have run away. Oma called the cops. And all those stupid postcards—”

  “I didn’t run away,” I say. “I went to get help.”

  “You need to be home, with us, where it’s safe.”

  Safe. I want to be safe. But in order to be safe, something has to change.

  The Hotel can keep its mission; I have my own. I will find a way to help our family.

  “I’ll see you soon, Cass,” I say, and start to pull the chest away from the door.

  But when I do, I see a flash of something. A scene bubbling to the surface of my mind—another fleeting memory, only this time it’s outside of my dreams.

  A stone wall. A door. My hands pushing a big cedar armoire in front of it. And a tree. Enormous branches blocking out the sky. Shafts of sunlight streaming through the canopy. Roots as thick as my whole body curling through the grassy earth.

  I back away from my bedroom door, trying to shake off the image.

  Cold stone. The smell of dust. The double-doored armoire. The door behind it, and the looming tree beyond it, and dreadful sadness that surrounds it. Grief, like I lost something, or I myself am lost.

  Oma’s voice drags me back. “Cammy?”

  I’ll figure out what the memory means later. Now, I have to go.

  “I’ll be back,” I say. “I’ll bring him back.”

  I pull the dresser away from the door and step through, closing it and leaving home behind once more.

  The staff is much calmer when I reenter the Hotel. I’m glad. . . . I don’t think I could handle any more panicky stuff right now.

  Rahki stares me down. “Where did you go? You can’t run off like that. We’ve got things to do.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say, though it feels more like I’m apologizing to Cass than to Rahki.

  “Hang out here. We still need to talk.”

  Talk. Right. About Agapios and all the horrible things the Hotel doesn’t want anyone to know about. I blow a puff of air.

  Rahki goes back to shouting instructions to the staff. When I’m certain she’s not looking, I pop the pin Sev gave me out of the hinge and slide it into my pin-sleeve. I only worry for a moment that removing it might set off another nuclear meltdown, but I need to keep this pin. The plug he handed me before I went through, too. Even though technically I don’t need it, the plug definitely makes using the pins easier. With it, I can keep Cass and Oma close. They’re the reason I’m doing this.

  But that memory—Dad’s memory . . . it felt important. His thoughts were so strong.

  I need to see what’s behind that armoire.

  Even though it feels like Dad wanted to leave it behind.

  • • •

  Rahki heads to the Maids’ Wing to update the MC, and Sev and I go to the Courtyard to wait by the fountain.

  Sev’s not saying anything. Probably because I never made it down to Agapios’s office. He must be disappointed in me, after he and Nico set up such a grand distraction.

  “I’m sorry I failed,” I say after a few minutes. “You gave me the opportunity, and I blew it.”

  Sev sighs. “There will be more.”

  The sun is rising over the Courtyard and the Mezz above, mixing with the out-of-place daylight from the sun-windows and casting a yellow-pink haze over the grounds. We sit in silence, watching the stars wink out.

  I think back to the first sunrise I remember watching like this. It was only a few years ago . . . when I was eight, maybe. I’ve never been one to rise early. Cass had just been through another surgery—one of her biggest. In preparation, the surgeon went through all the possible complications with us before making Oma sign a release. The surgery could collapse Cass’s lungs. She could lose her ability to swallow. Her heart might stop because of the anesthesia. Blood clots. Staph infection. So many things could go wrong. Oma kept saying Cass would be all right, but that didn’t keep me from freaking out.

  That was when I realized how many ways there were for her to die. My list has been growing ever since.

  But when the sun came up, so did Cass. The doctor returned, smiling and promising us that everything would be okay. Sunrises are like that. They smile at you in the dark and promise that something good can still happen.

  I glance up at the watery branches of the marble tree in the fountain, remembering the images that flashed back in my bedroom. The fountain tree looks similar to the one in Dad’s memory, but like a miniature version. The other one was so big.

  “You used the pin I gave you,” Sev says, breaking my train of thought. “You left.”

  I pull the pin from its sleeve. It feels so light, so smooth. “It didn’t go to your room.”

  “I never said it would,” he replies with a hint of a smile. “I thought you would like a way out.”

  “How?” Then I remember. “The dirt Nico took from Oma’s garden.”

  Sev nods. “Soil is how we bind doors to specific places. The dirt contains the binding of the earth—location data. The wood from the Vesima absorbs that binding the same as tree roots consume nutrients from soil. This is why we use Vesima wood for pins and coins.” He points to the pin in my hand. “That pin absorbed the soil Nico brought from your home. Your attachment to your bedroom directed the magic to that door over all others in your house.”

  “But why? Why make this pin for me?”

  He watches the grass. “Because bad things happen in the Hotel. Slavny bubny za gorami. You cannot trust everyone.”

  Quiet creeps back in between us. Who can I trust? I’d assumed Sev’s pin went to his room, just like I assume he and Nico and Stripe are on my side. What if I’m wrong?

  I have to trust someone, though. I can’t do this alone. I only hope they’re the right ones.

  “Did you cause the pin-failure?” I ask.

  Sev gazes up at the pink sky on the edge of the portico. “The wood goes bad over time. Imperfections form in the pins because they are old, and their connection to the Vesima is weak. To find one ready to crack is much too easy these days. Though I fear our plan got out of hand. We went too far.”

  I smile at hearing the ease with which he admits it. At least I know Sev won’t lie to me. “You said the binding comes from life.”

  Sev grunts. “The doors are bound to their places, but also grafted invisibly into each other. They draw life from one another, depend on each other, like people.”

  “So all those doors failed because of one pin.” I run my finger along the soft wood. “Why not replace them?”

  “As I said, there is not enough wood.”

  “Because the Hotel doesn’t have the tree.” I glance back up at the stone branches spraying water in the fountain. Because . . . someone took it.

  “I saw it,” I tell him. “The Vesima tree. At least . . . I think it was the tree.”

  “How?”

  I touch Dad’s coin. “It was a memory. But I have a feeling . . . I think Dad took it. He’s the one who stole the Greenhouse.”

  Sev raises an eyebrow.

  I struggle to piece it together. “In all these memories, I’m worried. Like I’m going to get caught. And Mom’s there, but something happens to her, and then Agapios, and something about the fourth floor.” I pause. “You thi
nk that’s where it is?”

  “It is possible.” Sev’s voice turns somber. “No one knows what happened to the Greenhouse. It, like the Mezzanine, could only be reached through the doors. But if Reinhart re-bound a door somewhere in the Hotel after he unbound the others, it could still be here, hidden.”

  I start to ask more, but Sev looks past me. At Nico, who’s bopping across the Courtyard toward us.

  “Hey guys!” Nico says, smiling his outrageous smile as if he just got off a ride at the fair. “That was fun, wasn’t it?”

  Sev scowls at him. “We do not know the damage yet. It may take weeks to repair.”

  “Eh, you doormen got this.” Nico gives me a slap on the back. “So, Mr. Cam, did you make it?”

  My shoulders slump. “Your distraction was for nothing.”

  “Not for nothing. I mean, you survived your first pin drill, right?”

  “I guess,” I say, a little confused. I thought he’d be more irritated.

  “This is cause for a celebration!” He claps his gloved hands. “I’ve got a surprise for you. What do you say?”

  I look back to Sev, who gives us a weak smile. “Go on,” he says. “I will tell Rahki you had business.”

  “Where are we headed?”

  Nico’s face brightens even more. “It’s a surprise. Let’s go get changed.”

  17

  A Game in Central America

  We go to Nico’s room to change. I didn’t grab any of my clothes when I pinned the door to Oma’s—and going back now would be . . . well . . . stupid—so he lends me a pair of athletic shorts and a soccer jersey.

  “Fútbol jersey,” Nico corrects, spinning the soccer ball on his finger. The Sydney Opera House glows on the harbor outside his window. Gulls caw over the water. “You Americans and your soccer. Seriously, American football players barely use their feet at all.”

  He leads me to the Dallas Door, sticking his tongue out at Elizabeth as we pass the North American front desk. Nico’s clothes are just a little too tight on me. The seam under my pits is totally going to cut off the blood flow to my arms. Wearing someone else’s clothes is weird.