Hearing his voice is pure relief. I reach out for him.
“Ow, hey.” My fingers poke hard into soft flesh.
Oh, he was only half a foot away. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay.” His voice sounds muffled, like he’s got socks in his mouth. Maybe he’s breathing through a cloth like I am.
Garrett’s voice comes out of the blackness, not far away. “Hey, where are you?”
Tom puts his hand on my back, maybe to keep me from wandering off or maybe just to give me a human touch in this nothingness. Thank you.
Tom answers, “About ten feet directly behind you.”
I hear some feet shuffling until Tom says, “Close enough. I’m right here.”
“Thanks.” Garrett’s voice comes from only three or four feet away, and he sounds like he’s got socks in his mouth, too. But I can’t see anything. I peer at the spot I think his voice came from, but it’s no different from any other part of this blackness.
Tom takes my hand and puts it into his. No, not his. Garrett’s. “Here. You two wait here. Hold on to each other, and don’t move. I’m going to see how bad it is.”
“How bad it is?” I want to be calm, but I can’t stop myself from sounding hysterical. “How bad it is? They’re all dead, that’s how bad it is. Ginger. Oh god.”
Tom says softly, “We’ll see,” and he slips off into nothingness.
What will I tell Susannah’s girls? Ginger had become a big sister for them, almost a second mother. I don’t think I can handle this. At least I still have Garrett. Maybe we can try to find Fobrasse. Maybe we could try to live in Subterra. Maybe Garrett and I could eventually make each other… well, not happy. Neither of us will ever be happy as long as we live. Not without Shack.
It hurts so much to think that it was Shem that ruined us after all. The violent drunkard Shack sacrificed himself for. Where would we be if Shack had done the less noble thing? If he’d let his father die? We’d already be in Upper, that’s where.
Garrett squeezes my hand.
I feel sobs starting to build up inside me. I don’t care anymore. I shake. My knees give way, and Garrett lowers me to the floor where he sits beside me. His hand slides over my shoulders until it finds my neck, and he pulls me to him. He sits back against the side of the tunnel, and he draws my head against his chest. The sobs overwhelm me, and I let the tears run down my cheeks.
After a few seconds, Garrett strokes my hair and whispers, “Loop.”
I fight to hold back the sobs. I will be sad forever, but the relief that crying brings lasts only a moment. It releases me and lets my mind go blank. I focus on the slow warmth of Garrett’s chest rising and falling, the soft thump of his heartbeat.
“What were they fighting about?”
“Oh.” It’s all I can think to say. How could I ever explain it?
“Try,” he says.
Oh. Was I thinking out loud?
“Yes,” he mumbles, and he squeezes me to him.
I’m a fool.
“Well,” I say. Where do I begin? “Do you remember,” I say as gently as I can, “what Shack told you about that night your mother disappeared?”
“He never told me anything.”
“Yes, he did.”
“Nothing real. He made up some story. It made him feel better.”
“Something about angels, right?”
“Yeah. He told you, too?” An edge has crept into Garrett’s words, and I tense a bit. I won’t soon forget how jealous he got when we started talking about my last moments with Shack.
He strokes my hair again, and I feel him relax against the wall. He whispers, “I’m sorry, Loop. It’s just—”
“I know,” I lie.
“I don’t understand.”
Unfortunately, I do.
“The story,” I say, bringing us both back to now, “was true.”
“The angel story?”
“Mm hmm. But it wasn’t really an angel that took your mom away. It was a Subterran.”
I pause to let it sink in, but Garrett finishes the thought. “It was Tom.”
“Yes.”
“But why?” The edge is back in his voice, but this time I’m not scared. Now his frustration is with his brother. And with Tom. And with everything but me.
“Because your father was about to kill her.”
“And that’s why Shack always hated him so deeply.” Garrett still strokes my hair, but now it’s automatic. His mind is somewhere else. On all those times he fought with Shack over what happened that night, over their father.
We sit in silence for a few seconds before he asks, “Where did he take her?”
“I don’t know, “ I reply, and it’s mostly true. “Into Subterra, I think. It’s the only place she’d be safe from Shem. But I wouldn’t want to live there,” I say with a shiver.
Tom’s voice appears in the darkness. “It’s not so bad.”
Oh no. I hope I didn’t offend him. “No, I didn’t mean—”
“Never mind that. I’m talking about the cave-in.”
I sit up and try to look at him, but it’s just black everywhere. “Not so bad? Ginger?”
“Ginger and Steven are okay. But we have to dig them out, or they won’t be so okay in a few hours.”
“How—”
Tom cuts me off. “The ceiling collapsed only in the two doorways. The room itself held up just fine. So we can dig our way back into the room. Then,” he finishes with his hand on my shoulder, “we can see what the other corridor looks like.”
CHAPTER 17
I’ve never been so covered in dirt. I feel like I could lean against the wall of this cave and just melt right into the mountain. I’ve been digging so long I may have become made of dirt.
One more two-handed tug and another pile of dirt tumbles from the endless wall in front of me to the floor. As I pull dirt down, Tom and Garrett push it down the hall so we don’t trap ourselves in. It’s slow going, but ten minutes ago I broke through, a hole big enough for my fingers to slip in and touch Ginger’s. Now I can wriggle through like a worm. Garrett and Tom can’t fit, but that’s their problem.
Our dim torch illuminates two pale hands in the black hole before me, and I grab them tight. “Pull me through,” I rasp as if the words are made of dirt.
She pulls, weakly. I wriggle and squirm, swimming through earth. In a few seconds I’m tumbling down the other side and pulling her close to me. She feels limp, like one of her rag dolls. I breathe hard with the effort, but there’s little good air in here to breathe. If we’re to bull our way through the rest of the cave-in and get to Upper, we’ll need more air.
“How bad is it?” Garrett’s voice fights its way through the darkness from the other side of the wall.
“Here,” I reply. “Pass me the torch.”
A flame floats through the hole above me, and I scramble up the pile of dirt to grab a part of the torch that’s not on fire, then slide back down. Before I get to my feet, Steven is already inspecting the other half of the cave-in. Poor Ginger is almost as pale as Tom, her eyes sad and small. I try not to imagine the depth of the dead silence she’s been buried in for over an hour.
He looks at me, squinting into the torchlight. He shakes his head, a deathly look in his sunken eyes.
I have to see for myself.
“Loop? How’s it look?” Garrett’s voice is filled with concern.
“Hang on,” I reply, probably too softly for him to hear. Then, louder: “Hey, pull Ginger back through, will you? I think she needs some air.” I try to smile at her and joke, “Not that there’s much out there. But it’s better.”
She nods and claws her way up to the hole I came through, and I turn my attention to the next pile.
Oh, god.
“Garrett?”
Some grunting as Ginger’s feet disappear through the hole and are replaced by Garrett’s face. “Yah?”
“Not good.”
“Okay, give us a minute, will you?”
As Tom and Garrett widen the hole and make their way through, I prod the new pile with my toe, my fingers, my torch. The other barrier came down fast, but that was nothing. Just making a little hole. This…
Soil spills from the doorway as if there is no doorway. The fractured end of one of the timbers pokes out, but only barely. Worse, there are stones. Big ones. Bigger than I can lift. Who knows how much of the roof fell in? Steven and I share a few looks of despair while waiting for Tom.
When he arrives, he kicks at the rocks, pokes his hand into the dirt, prods the ceiling with his fingers. He inspects every crack, squints at every pebble.
“We can get through,” he says at last. “But it will take some time.”
There’s hope. Hope is good. We can work with hope. Then I look into Tom’s eyes. “What do you mean,” I ask slowly, “by ‘some time’?”
He tries to sigh, but the air is so thin in here that sighing takes too much effort. He stifles a cough. “Three days. Maybe two if we don’t stop.”
Garrett still hasn’t come through, but his face floats in the hole behind us. “Well, better get started then,” he says, but there’s no happiness in his voice. Still, it’s better than we should just give up. Which is what I would have said.
I kick one of the rocks again, solid and unmoving. I try to push it aside with my boot, but it doesn’t budge.
No way we can do this.
Tom turns to Garrett’s face glowing in the torchlight, framed in brown-black. “I’m sorry about your father, Garrett. It wasn’t my intention to fight him.”
“I know.”
The two look at each other for a few seconds. I wonder if they’re thinking about digging through. How long we’ll dig before we encounter a foot, or a hand, or Shem’s face. What he’ll look like, his lungs and mouth filled with dirt, his body cold and buried where he died.
Finally, Garrett says, “I think we should send someone back for water and more torches.”
Tom and I nod. But I don’t really see the point.
“We have to try, Loop,” says Garrett, his eyes boring into me. “Upper is still out there.”
He pauses as we stare at each other, our features dark and shadowy in the dim torchlight.
“For now.”
When he finishes our thought out loud, my skin prickles and I shiver. We’ll never break through in time.
Tom puts his hand on my shoulder. “You go. You and Ginger. Organize the children and have them carry as much water, as many torches as they can. We’re going to have to take turns. Unless we widen that hole up there, no one should stay in here working more than… two hours at a time.”
I’ll take his word for it.
“We can have the children widen the hole while we dig away here. We can pile the diggings in the chamber.”
I don’t want to leave here. I want to dig.
“Lupay,” Tom says as he squeezes my arm. “it’s best that you go.”
I’m about to protest, but Garrett says, “He’s right. It needs to be you. You and Ginger.”
What, do they think girls can’t dig? That I can’t move heavy rocks? Didn’t I just do most of the digging that got us this far? I set my feet square and get ready to tell them off. They can go back and play with the children. Carry my water. I’ll stay here and work.
“Lupay,” Tom says softly, “you’ll have your turn. Don’t worry. But those families back there… they need to see you. Not me. Not Garrett. You.”
“What th—”
Garrett cuts me off. “Loop, he’s right. You know it.”
“I do not know it,” I say. I have no idea what they’re talking about, and it makes me angry they would say that.
“Lupay?” It’s Ginger, her thin voice drifting in past Garrett’s face. “Please come with me.”
I give Tom and Garrett one last huffy frown before shoving the butt of the torch into the pile of dirt and scrambling up at Garrett’s face as fast as I can. He better get out of my way, or he’ll end up with a bloody nose. I get a little satisfaction from his shock as I fling myself at him fists first, and the resulting tumble and thump as he rolls back into the corridor.
But as soon as I’m through and see Ginger’s trembling lips, her pale face looking a little blue in the dim light… my anger breaks. She’s been so strong and mature all summer, I’ve forgotten she’s only just turned fourteen. But the cave-in did something to her. And she needs me.
Garrett stands up and brushes himself off, but there’s not much reason to since he’ll soon be covered in dirt again. He ignores the past few minutes and focuses on the tasks before us.
“We’ve got six torches left,” he says, pointing to a pile nearby.
“And plenty more back in the cavern,” I say, trying but failing to do some silent calculations.
“They last a long time. One should be enough to get you back to the cavern, if you hurry,” he says.
I can see some fear in his face as he says this. He won’t beg or even argue if we take two. But, which would be worse? Us running out of light in the corridor, with a mile or so to walk and no way to get lost, or them running out of light with no idea when we’ll be back?
I nod and pick up one torch. We’re talking by the light that filters through the little hole above. I hold the torch up to the hole, and Tom lights it with the other one.
I look Garrett in the eye. I don’t want to leave him. I don’t want to be separated under this mountain. I want to reassure him. Promise him we’ll bring what he needs. “We’ll see you in—”
“When you get here,” Garrett finishes. Neither of us really want to think about how many hours from now that might be. Eight miles each way. “Now get going,” he says, with a quick squeeze of my hand. He turns away and scrambles up the dirt. I watch him wriggle through the hole, watch the soles of his boots disappear.
Without speaking or looking at her, I take Ginger’s hand and start walking.
It’s been hours. Mind-numbing hours. We count the mile markers, both of us brushing them with our fingertips as we pass. It’s like we need to verify they’re real. Seeing them isn’t enough. We need to touch them.
As we walk, the air gets clearer, cooler, fresher. After five miles we can breathe and almost smile. After six miles, Ginger starts humming, and I even hum along with her sometimes. It feels good to make music, even as bad as I am at it. But mostly I just listen to her, which I think pleases us both better.
Seven miles, and we find ourselves speeding up. I keep thinking of the well and how thirsty I am. My head feels like it’s being crushed between two rocks, and my throat burns with dryness. Poor Ginger must feel worse, but she never complains. Not once. Every now and then she reaches for my hand and holds it for a quarter mile, then lets go.
All at once the walls of the corridor disappear, and we’re in the giant cavern. It’s bigger than I remember. Enormous. Like outside on a starless night. I whoop a laugh at the sudden surge of freedom, but it croaks out like a squished toad, and Ginger coughs out a few laughs in reply.
There are voices away by the well, and a small campfire. The voices stop when we come in, and one woman stands up—Susannah—surrounded by children. My eyes adjust to the brightness and the distance, and I see a number of other silhouettes—the other adults who stayed here—sitting just outside the firelight.
Susannah starts toward us with an eagerness but stops suddenly, like she’s run into an invisible wall or she’s held back by a leash. Ginger starts in on a run to meet her, they come together in a big hug. I walk slowly to the group, and I douse the torch as I approach. No need for that now. Might as well save what’s left of it for later.
As I come closer, I notice all the children are staring at me, wide eyed.
Honey hops up from where she sits and runs to Susannah. She grabs onto her mother’s leg and half-hides behind it. She points at me. “Mama,” she says, and then I don’t hear the rest.
“No, Honey,” Susannah replies. “That’s Lupay. You know Lupay.”
I put a question in my eyes, first for Susannah and then for Ginger. What did Honey say?
Susannah smiles at me. “You look terrible, Lupay.” I can see her smile hides fear.
“I feel terrible,” I croak. “Like raccoon sh—” My mouth slams shut. Not because I don’t want to say shit in front of the little girls, but because that was how Shack and I used to greet each other.
But Susannah’s no idiot; she can tell something awful has happened. There are just two of us. We’re packed in dirt. And we weren’t supposed to be back nearly this soon.
“You must be thirsty,” she says. “Honey, go bring Lupay and Ginger a cup of water, okay?”
Honey scoots away, and Susannah reaches out her hand to me. I want a hug like Ginger got, not a handshake. The two of them… it’s not fair that Ginger gets that kind of comfort, and my mother is locked away. But I can’t let myself give in to those feelings. Garrett needs me more than I need my mommy.
“I’m sorry about Honey,” Susannah says before the little girl comes back. “I was telling the children the legend of Forsada when you two arrived.”
I’ve heard that name before, but it means nothing to me. Ginger mentioned it. What had she said?
Susannah laughs, nervously. “Can you believe it? She saw you come in, and she thought you were her. Forsada, I mean.”
I shake my head. No idea what you’re talking about, I want to say, but if I try to talk it’ll only come out like wood dragging across stone. I need that water. I hope Honey hurries.
“In fact,” Susannah continues, “we were at that same point in the story where Forsada comes back. You know, from the big battle, after she kicks out them invaders.”
I must look like an idiot with my mouth hanging open and a blank stare.
“You know that part. Didn’t your mama ever tell you about Forsada?” She laughs a short, tinkly little laugh that gets swallowed up by the cavern’s emptiness.
No, I want to say, my mama never told me, and right now thinking too much about my mother would be a bad idea.
Ginger lets go of Susannah and comes to me, takes both my hands.
“Yes, Lupay, you remember. Your mama used to tell us the stories.”
Forsada: Volume II in the New Eden series Page 19