The water dripped from the cave walls in a sullen drum.
Oak gave a heavy sigh. “One … for the many.”
“Let me—” Charlie said but was silenced by the knife tip pressing deeper into his throat where his vein pulsed.
“Oak, do something!” I shook him but he stood there, limp. “How could you turn kids in as bait?”
He stooped over. “It’s a cross I bear to feed them all. One traded child feeds them all for weeks. We hardly get enough rations for ourselves to live on. It was the only way.” He looked up, his face a grimace of pain. “After my son died, I swore I’d never let another child die in the WC again. Not by birth. Not by murder. Not by starvation. But I found I had to sacrifice one in order to save the many.”
Like the Wild Childs.
“I try to pick the weak ones who might not make it.” He put his face in is hands, then looked up. A lone tear fell down his cheek. “I’m so sorry,” he said to the kids. They nodded as if they understood it must work this way.
My chest tightened for the fate of the kids. They never knew what they were missing: sunshine, a comfortable bed, a family to love. Pain ricocheted through my heart with renewed thoughts of home, my friends, and my grandfather. Looking at these filthy kids growing up in the dark, I swore like Oak I’d never let another one die—I’d get them out no matter what.
“What’s it going to be Oak?” Ratchet sang out, his knife hard against Charlie’s throat. A drop of blood welled and trickled down. The breath of the kids pulsed in a single beat, matching Charlie’s nostrils flaring in and out. Water pinged off rock walls as seconds marched by in slow motion.
Oak wiped his face and opened the door. “Go then.”
Ratchet twisted around with Charlie, who dragged his feet on the ground. Oak flicked his eyes past me and threw his hand up. A warm wind rushed. A low screech swelled. A flurry of arms and legs whirled past us. Charlie was ripped away from Ratchet, who disappeared beneath a mass of angry kids. His muffled cries echoed around the cavern. I helped Charlie up, who reclaimed his knife and Ratchet’s, while Oak barred the door shut and towered over the quivering, kicking mass that clawed at the traitor.
“They know you’re down here!” Ratchet’s words cut through the angry kids.
“Children, off!” Oak commanded. They scattered like cockroaches to hide in dark corners, their gleaming eyes watchful.
Ratchet twitched on the floor, a lump of torn clothes, then slowly stood, scowling at us with a puffy eye while blood ran down his cheek. “The soldiers are already searching the WC for the Oracle. The word on the street is he escaped the queen’s hunt.”
Oak’s eyes flashed to me.
“It’s him isn’t it?” Ratchet stumbled toward me, but I moved behind Oak.
Apollo stepped forward, a fist in the air. The A on his ring glinted clear in the lantern light. “I’m King Apollo. I can help free you. If you let us go, we can raise an army, fight Artemis and Zeus, and open the WC.”
Ratchet wheezed with laughter, blood bubbling at his mouth. “Think I believe you? You stole that ring, thief.” He lunged at Apollo. “Give it to me!”
I cut him off, my bow readied, an arrow aimed at his chest. “I’ll stick you good.” My words came out strong while I shook inside.
Charlie clicked open his knife and held it against Ratchet’s throat. “So will I.”
Ratchet clawed at his side and moaned in pain. “You better run, little Reekers. The WC is no place for kids.” He moaned again and swayed.
“You were one of us,” I said.
“Now a traitor to your own kind,” Apollo said.
The drip of water from the cave walls tick-tocked as Ratchet threw his head back and laughed. “They’ll find the tunnels, Oak. I left the secret hatch in your room wiiiiiide open.”
“No!” Oak cried in a terrible, deep voice, seized Ratchet by the shoulders, and dragged him to the back of the cave.
A sharp cry and a splash told us all what happened.
Oak hunched toward us from the shadows.
“What if he comes back?” Charlie said, breaking the silence.
Oak, punched a fist to his palm. “He’ll be dead—by river or by me.”
Charlie handed Ratchet’s knife to him. “Then you may need this.”
Oak took it, turned it in his hand and thrust it at Apollo. “You’re no friend of mine, King.”
Apollo stood taller and met his gaze. The water dripped in time with my racing heart, hoping Oak wouldn’t kill him, but he nodded curtly and put the knife away. “Neither is Artemis and if she kidnapped you, then you must be against her, which makes you on my side—along with your friends here.”
“She was my ally, along with Poseidon,” Apollo said. “We were in secret negotiations to start a revolution, but evil came in to play and put a stop to it.”
“You’d better escape and work with your friends here to succeed next time,” Oak said. “We’re depending on you.”
Apollo bowed and clamped two fingers around his king’s ring. “My friends here believed in me when I didn’t. You can count on it.”
Oak peered closer at him. “You look like your father. He came to view Poseidon’s slave operation as a young king when I worked in the Sea Realm.”
“What was he like?”
Oak rubbed the end of one side of his mustache. “Full of vigor and ideas. He was also kind, I remember. He spoke to some of us, touched my shoulder in passing.”
“He changed after that,” Apollo said in a tight voice.
“We all change,” Oak said. “Good or bad. It’s a choice. Unless evil breaks our will …”
The floor shook and mud clumps battered our heads.
“They’re in the tunnel!” Oak said. The kids crowded in a circle, tears running down the faces of some, yet they remained silent.
“The river!” I said.
Oak shook his head wildly.
“All rivers lead out. It must split,” I pleaded with him.
Oak snapped his fingers and jumped into action. “Rafts!”
He pulled down crates piled up in a hole in the wall, and we carried them toward the sound of water. Around a turn, we faced the river’s roar. It raged between glowing rock walls, a mad, swirling foam.
Charlie backed up, wiping away the blood at his throat. “We’ll die for sure, mes amis.”
“Maybe not, but we will in the WC.” I tried to convince him, tried to convince myself.
“It’s the only way,” Apollo said. “Together.” He held up a pinky.
So did I. “Together,” I repeated, hooking his finger with mine
“Oui?” Charlie said doubtfully.
“Oui,” I said.
Oak rounded up the kids. “Follow these boys. They’ll lead the way.”
The kids rushed him in a hug. “It wasn’t the way I’d planned. But it’s no longer safe here. Pair up on your sleeping crates.” He pushed them away. “Now go! Follow Joshua. He’ll lead you out.”
It wasn’t a question.
Apollo thrust coins at him. “Take my money, Oak. It may help you. Your sacrifice won’t be forgotten.”
Oak nodded and shoved the coins in his pocket.
“What about you, Oak?” I said.
“I’ll follow, no worries.” He nabbed my shirt by the collar and pulled me close. “If you ever come upon the Leandro we know, tell him we’ll meet again to fight the good fight.”
I didn’t want to mention the fact that Leandro might kill me if we ever met up again, so I kept silent and nodded. He drew the pendant off his neck and placed it around mine. “They go with you—always.”
I clutched my lost family as he turned away from me, urging the kids to leave. “Don’t let them catch you! I’ll find you. Your parents will find you. I promise. Now go!”
He could keep no promise but the kids scrambled together, led by the older ones and helped by Charlie and Apollo.
Shouts burst from the cavern. Thumps echoed around the walls. Oak grasp
ed my arm. “Save them. Save them all!”
He ran back to face off with his keepers.
With a gulp, I grabbed a crate, along with my friends, and jumped into the icy monster promising to deliver us to freedom or death.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Numbing cold slammed into me as I hurtled on my crate. We raced down a deep blue torrent more horrifying than riding the Lightning Road. The river slapped us with icy fingers in our torpedo escape. Behind me, eyes of white fire pierced the cave’s gleam as the kids screamed in terror. Charlie rode a wave next to me, our crates bashing into one another. I dared another glance behind. Apollo’s head bobbed far back in the cave’s glow, bringing up the rear. Eddies swirled and spun into water tornadoes that threatened to swallow us, and the glistening walls rushed by in a mad streak. Stalactites stabbed down from arched ceilings. I yelled at the kids to keep down.
Our view widened ahead. “Charlie, what’s that?” I shouted to him.
He craned his head. “It splits!”
“Which way?”
He shook his head, uncertain as me. If we didn’t veer one way or the other, we’d crash into the center wall in a deadly pileup. If we headed the wrong way, we’d be smashed to pieces and float back dead to Oak.
I clasped my pendant. “Show me the way,” I whispered and blew out hard—certain to be my death exhale—when a spot of light grew to my right. Instinct drove me to make a last-second decision for us all. I jerked my crate to the right. The crate reared up on one side and almost threw me off, but I rebalanced and steered harder.
A frenzied flap of wings burst before us as bats whizzed overhead while we raced to our new destination. The light grew brighter and the tightening in my chest released. The water churned slower, becoming flat as glass. We glided along and I sat up, my breaths slowing with the current, and looked back at the kids.
“Everyone make it?”
The kids nodded, bobbing like shipwreck survivors.
We’d ridden a river and made it out alive. By luck or by my magic? There was no way of knowing, or if Oak survived—or if he’d been caught and sentenced to death. I quickly felt for my mother’s photo and Leandro’s journal. Still there. The book was damp, but a quick thumb-through thankfully revealed its pages weren’t soaked.
I laid my head on my crate. Starry light reflecting from the rock walls dappled the water rippling around me. Stalactites reflected like mountains on its surface. So tired. The adrenaline that coursed through me like liquid fire moments ago now drained away. I closed my eyes to escape Nostos and pretended to laze by the creek back home. There knelt my friend, Finn. We were in the creek digging up rocks to build a wall around our fort. The yellow sun shone so bright it hurt my eyes; a friendly burn warming my skin with summer happiness. The water tugged me along and I trailed a hand in its cool calm, filling Apollo’s canteen that had ended up with me somewhere along the way.
I finally sat up. A glorious light glowed at the end of our tunnel. A new day dawned. It sparkled across the smooth water in a playful dance. Confusion spiraled through my foggy mind. Had the river transported us home? The fantasy fled as the sun’s blue rays told me they were not from Earth.
“Mon Dieu! We made it!” Charlie raised a fist in the air. With his salute, we sailed into a new day under a lavender sky, the safety of the cave gone. Warm air engulfed me and I breathed in a salty tang. Sweeping willows along the river replaced the tall oak and pine trees. This was not the Arrow Realm.
“Ahh, I knew you’d take us the right way, Joshua.” Charlie kissed his crate over and over, splashing water on himself.
I killed his celebration. “Charlie, we’ve got to get off this river. Who knows what else might get us. We’re an easy target.” I flung my hand at him and a giant wave from nowhere flipped his crate. With a splash and a yell, Charlie was tossed into the river. I paddled over with my hands, disoriented, scanning the water for deadly beasts but the river became smooth glass again as if nothing happened.
Sputtering, Charlie climbed back on his crate with the help of one of the kids. “Zut! What was that?”
“I don’t know.” But maybe I did.
He sniffed. “Smells like the ocean.”
Poseidon’s realm might have an ocean! I searched the group of kids for Apollo to ask him about it. “Charlie, Apollo isn’t here!”
He whipped his head around, searching with me. Every crate carried a kid. Except one. Its mangled wood floated toward us. Apollo’s crate. He didn’t make the split. He was gone.
My chest hurt so much I thought it might crack in two.
All this for what? Our purpose for coming here was gone. This place! It sucked away everything you cared about.
Charlie pulled Apollo’s crate to his side. “He made it. I know he did. Back to the cave. Back to …” He slumped over, unable to finish, and turned away from me.
“He died for nothing,” I said in a hoarse voice. “Nothing!”
“No one said he was dead.” His bottom lip quivered and he gently pushed the crate away. It floated down the river ahead of us, turned a bend, and disappeared, as broken and lost as me.
Words from Leandro hung in my head: Someone recently taught me that sometimes you must trust on faith.
If I taught Leandro to trust on faith—could I?
Could I trust that he’d return to the man I knew?
That we’d find Apollo alive?
We’d stop slavery?
We’d get back home alive?
I slammed my fist on the water. A wall of water rose and raced down the river. Charlie and the kids stared at me. Shaking, I pulled my hand back and remembered more of Leandro’s words from another time on another river when we’d been under attack: Part the waters! I couldn’t then. How could I now? But I knew.
I put my hands back in the water, pushing it away, sending Charlie and the kids toward the riverbank. Charlie clung to his crate, his mouth hanging open, speechless for once. There was only one way the power to move water could live in me now: we’d crossed over into the Sea Realm and the power of Poseidon was now activated in me.
I. Must. Be. The. Oracle.
The sky and water spun around me. Grief over losing my friend, leaving my old life behind, and the scary unknown of what lay ahead filled me up. Trembling all over, I sailed toward the riverbank on the water I commanded. We all hauled our crates up under a weeping willow.
“Joshua, why didn’t you tell me you could do that?” Charlie hung on to his crate and squinted at me as if he didn’t know me while the kids stared at the blue sun in wonder.
“I didn’t know.” It was too new in my head to figure out. He nodded, wringing out his clothes, not pushing me about it.
The wind blew up and the kids whirled around, cupping hands to the air as if to catch a gift. Some held on to each other pointing at the trees. With a smile, they fingered leaves, pulling their hands away to reach out and touch them again. How strange. They’d grown up underground. They’d never seen a sun. Never touched a tree. Never felt a breeze.
Apollo may be missing and Oak captured—or worse—but these kids were counting on us now. We were in a new realm with new dangers.
“Let’s keep going down the river,” Charlie said.
“There’s a better way,” I said. “Through the Perimeter Lands.”
“Bandits live here!”
“Some of those bandits are Takers from Earth. People who hunt the Child Collectors. They’d help these kids. And Poseidon may help us. Apollo said he was a friend.” It hurt to say his name and I forced my grief down. “Either way, they have a chance. We have a chance to carry out Apollo’s wishes and get home. So, I say we go that way.” I pointed to where the sky grew brighter through the trees, “to the edge of the Great Beyond, where the Takers hang out, then you and I can figure out how to meet up with Poseidon without getting killed first.”
“Sounds easy,” Charlie said with a thumbs-up but his scared face gave him away.
Yeah. Not so easy with o
ur big group. I counted the kids. Twenty-two total.
“We go that way,” I ordered the kids. “We’ll find people to help. Get to Poseidon. He and Apollo were—are friends.”
The tallest kid signaled the kids to follow us when voices jarred our peaceful spot. Heads bobbed through the trees. We all crouched behind a row of bushes. An idea was forming in my head, but I had to think it out some more.
“Scram and cram,” I whispered to the kid and pointed to the Great Beyond. He seemed puzzled. “Run and be quiet. We’ll hold them off. Give you a head start.”
Charlie met my eyes, probably wondering like me how we’d hold them off, then gave the kid a fierce nod.
The boy gripped my hand, his dirt-smudged face thankful. “Good. Bye.”
Nothing was good about any of this but I nodded. “Watch out for The Edge. You don’t want to fall off and die in space.”
He nodded and ran off with the others close behind, silent as they’d been raised to survive. One by one the kids left, flashing me and Charlie grateful nods. They soon disappeared from sight. The voices grew louder. Arguing about escaped slaves.
We needed a plan B.
Now Charlie and I had only ourselves to worry about. That was scary enough.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“We split up,” a familiar voice blared, closer. “Their scent has crossed into the Sea Realm. You patrol to the north and west. I’ll take the east. Move fast. Queen Artemis tires of the chase. Watch out for Poseidon’s soldiers. Take them down quietly and toss them off The Edge, if you have to.”
Leandro! I pulled Charlie farther behind the bush.
“Yes, sir.”
“We don’t go back to the queen empty-handed. Take all slaves alive. Got it?”
“Yes, sir!”
The soldiers moved away, heavy boots crunching on the forest floor. They faded into the opposite direction and were gone. Charlie and I remained still and quiet. The blood pumped through my ears in a raging drumbeat. A snap of twigs cut through the silence. Charlie looked at me for what to do. I motioned him to stay.
Please, pass by.
Leandro stalked us through the branches. I watched my old friend with a boulder in my chest. Wanting to cry out. Wanting to fight beside him for good once again. Now, he fought the evil fight against us. Because of him, Oak and Apollo might be dead.
Joshua and the Arrow Realm Page 12