Squeak scurried up on my shoulder. He looked pitiful with his wet fur plastered to his skin and his big ears poking up. But he cheerfully said, “Squeak!”
“Right,” I said. I swam the thankfully short distance to the dock with Connie in tow.
We climbed up onto the marble dock and Connie calmly wrung out her hair. She began to shake, which turned into her twitchy thing, and she stamped her foot like a jackrabbit.
Flicker appeared, then jumped back from the puddle underneath her. She wrinkled her nose at me. “You’re drenched,” she said.
Connie had been completely soaked, but Flicker wasn’t. It was like all the water went away with Connie to . . . wherever Connie went.
Flicker held her hands forward, palms up. A little flare of fire popped up, then vanished. She gave a grunt of frustration, then glared at me like it was my fault. “What I need is a big lava bath to stoke my fires.” She shook her head. “Though seeing my Skitterspark working for Jimmy heated my blood a bit.” She paused. “Boy, he sure hates you. Why?”
“Why does Jimmy hate me?” I asked.
“Did you not hear me, or do you like to repeat things?”
I narrowed my eyes. ’K. Connie was creepy, and this girl was downright rude. “I broke his dream,” I said.
She arched an eyebrow.
“His dream was to steal my parents,” I explained.
“Ah,” Flicker said.
“He was also stealing kingdoms and killing anyone who disagreed with him. Nobody here could stop him, so I did.”
“And you ripped the world to do it,” she said.
“Not all the way.”
“Well, that’s an important distinction,” She rolled her eyes. “Why don’t you have a Doolivanti name?”
Loremaster . . .
“I don’t know. I guess I did, at first, but—”
“You rip that away, too?” she asked.
“Hey—”
“And you don’t listen to the mouse.”
“I do listen to the mouse,” I said, then softer, “I just don’t understand the mouse.”
She laughed and, strangely, it was soothing. Like she really was my friend.
“Okay,” I said. “When Jimmy figures out where we’ve gone, he’s going to come after us. We need to get off this island.” I ignored her laughter and turned to Squeak. “What about that hole you dropped us into? That moved pretty fast. Why don’t we use that?”
“Squeak,” said Squeak.
“Ah,” Flicker said. “The Run Roots. That would work, if one is nearby.”
“Squeak.”
“Hrmf,” she said.
“What?” I asked, trying to keep my temper under control. Was she intentionally trying to flaunt that she could understand Squeak and I couldn’t?
“He said there are no Run Roots to this island,” Flicker said.
I looked down the dock. “No problem. We just grab a boat and get to the mainland.”
Flicker raised her chin and her eyes widened. “Boat?”
Ten
So That’s a Ferbletick
The glimmering white dock held a row of boats of all sizes and shapes. Half of the boats shone as white as bleached bone, made from the same white wood as Ripple’s throne. A few were normal blond wood, and some were made from bright blue and crimson wood.
The largest was a majestic whitewood boat with a carved spider on the front, the uh . . . I tried to remember the name. The prow. Each of the boats had a figure on the prow. Squeak scampered ahead and picked a smaller longboat with a carving of Ripple. I stared up at my missing friend, who gazed serenely over the water.
Flicker glanced at the boat. “No. I don’t like that one.”
I looked back at her. “What? Why not? It’s got Ripple on the front.”
“I don’t like it.”
I gave the boat another once-over. It looked fine to me, and it was small enough for the two of us to handle. I didn’t spot the flaw that bothered her. But I admit I don’t know much about boats, either. “Well, okay, which one do you like?”
Flicker scanned the entire dock of at least twenty boats. “None of them. They’re too old. We need a newer boat.”
“None of them look good?” I asked.
“We need something sturdier,” Flicker said.
“Squeak,” said Squeak softly.
“We’ll just have to find another way, is all.” She peered up at the ramparts of the palace. “Surely there’s a Flapraptor up there. Yes. It would be better to travel by air.”
Okay, I didn’t know what a Flapraptor was, but no way were we going to go hunting through a castle full of Jimmythugs looking for a flying contraption which may or may not be there and which, even if we did find it, we might not be able to fly. Especially since, you know, I could see the shore of the mainland from here. Heck, I could swim there in twenty minutes.
Squeak tugged on my pant leg.
“Squeak.” He tipped his whiskery nose at Flicker. I watched her as she studied the towers.
Her hand twisted her fiery dress. “Don’t oceans usually have birds?” Flicker asked quickly, trying to sound casual. “Where are all the birds?”
“Flicker,” I said softly. “We have to take the boat.”
“Oh, I don’t think so. I’ve seen trustworthy boats and these aren’t trustworthy. They are all going to sink.” She paused, then said, “There isn’t a bridge?” She shaded her gaze with her hand, as though that was going to make a bridge appear.
“We’ve got the boats, or we’ve got Jimmy,” I said. “Try the boat—”
“Try the boat?” She forced a chuckle. “Give it a chance to sink and then, if it does, we try another?” She shook her head. “Pass.”
“Look, I promise I won’t let you touch the water.” I laid a gentle hand on her shoulder. She was warm to the touch. “If something happens, then I’ll use my power—”
“I don’t need you to save me.” She yanked her shoulder away from me. She took a hesitant step closer to the Ripple boat, surveyed it like an empress with her nose in the air. She touched the long hair of the carving of Ripple, which sparkled in the sunshine. Her fingers trembled. The poor girl was terrified. I went over and held the boat with both hands.
“I’ll keep it steady,” I said.
She swallowed, frowning at me like she was going to say something. Then, she cleared her throat and jumped over the side. Sparks flew from her. She landed and sat quickly, clinging to the edges of the boat. Smoke curled up from where her fingers touched the wood.
I undid the rope from the dock and threw it aside before she could change her mind. I jumped in and knelt next to her, touched her arm—
I jerked back. She was hot as a stove. Sparks flew off her and drifted lazily in the still air. Many came to rest on the deck of the boat, and I quickly smothered them with my shoe. “It’s okay,” I said. “We can see the shore from here, and it’s smooth as glass. We’ll be there in five minutes. Try to relax.”
“I am relaxed,” she snapped.
“Smoke is coming up from your fingers. If you burn the boat, we won’t have a boat.”
She snatched her hands away from the edges and held them under her armpits.
I unshipped the oars and began to row. The feisty Flicker suddenly seemed tiny. Standing, with her attitude and flames all around her, she flared larger than life. But huddled on her seat, squeezing her eyes closed and trying to be as un-flamey as possible, she looked skinny and pitiful. Smoke smoldered around her. I rowed faster.
If I could just get her to stop thinking about the ocean, she might cool down. We’d reach the beach in just a few minutes. If she burned the boat to the waterline before then, we’d all be swimming again.
“So,” I joked. “When we get to the Reflection Pool, why don’t you stay on the shore?”
“Pool?” Flicker snapped. “No. We go to my mountain.”
I took a nice deep breath, then I cleared my throat. It’s tough to be nice to someone when you do
n’t trust them, don’t like them, and they keep interrupting you. “Vella said we have to go to the Reflection Pool in the Kaleidoscope Forest.”
“Vella’s wrong. The Fire Lake in my throne room is the source of all fire in Veloran. That’s where I can regain my power.”
“Look, Vella is not wrong—”
“It’s where your friends are,” she said.
“It’s— What?”
“My mountain. Jimmy’s living there. I know right where he’d have them locked up.”
I opened my mouth but paused. Going to spring my friends from jail had a lot of appeal. “No,” I said, shaking my head. “I can’t.”
“You don’t want your friends back?”
“Only more than anything,” I answered. “But you just told me to listen to the mouse, and I’m going to listen to the mouse, no matter how much I want to charge in and save my friends.”
She looked at Squeak, then back at me. “I thought you couldn’t understand the mouse.”
“Well, there was this rock. He bit it and—”
She raised an eyebrow.
“Look, Jimmy set all this up. He baited me into coming here, ambushed me, tried to capture me. He wants me for something, and I can’t just go running right to him. Look at us! I’m broken. You’re broken. We don’t even rank in Jimmy’s class right now.” I drew a deep breath. “But we could. We will. Vella said to go to the Reflection Pool. If we really want to beat him, we need her.”
“Yeah, well every hour that passes, I get weaker,” she warned. “The weaker I get, the easier it is for Agatha to break out of her prison. Once she does, we’re all dead. You. Me. Jimmy. Everyone.”
“Look, Agatha sounds bad—”
Flicker snorted like I’d made the understatement of the century.
“But I’m worse,” I finished. “Don’t you get it? If I don’t find out how to use my powers without ripping the sky, even Agatha won’t survive me.”
Flicker went silent and pursed her lips.
The shore slid closer. Flicker glanced over the edge, saw the water, then pressed her lips into a line and closed her eyes. She clenched her hands together in her lap.
I heard shouting across the water.
Flicker’s eyes snapped open, and she stretched to see.
Jimmy and his Jimmythugs stood on the docks, pointing at us. Lashtail jumped into the nearest boat without untying it. Licorice Man worked at the rope. Jimmy shouted his frustration, then raised his hand. Something silver glimmered and a bridge began forming as fast as a person could run. Jimmy sprinted toward us, the bridge materializing under his feet.
I sat down and started rowing faster.
“I’m beginning to dislike that boy,” Flicker snarled. Her eyes turned a darker red. Her seat caught fire.
“Flicker!”
We were in shallow water, but still a few yards from the shore. I rowed harder. The entire front of the boat went up in flame, and Flicker stood up in the midst of it.
“Cool it,” I yelled. Flicker came to her senses and her flames vanished. But the front of the boat was already crackling and popping, hissing where it touched the waterline. The heat made me squint.
“Put it out—” I shouted, too late. The boat cracked and split up the front. The prow fell forward, and water rushed in.
I dumped the oars and grabbed Flicker just as the water sloshed into me, swirling around my knees. The boat hit bottom, and I strode to the shore with Flicker in my arms. She was like lifting a warm blanket. The girl weighed nothing! I waited for all of my hair to burn off, but Flicker had shut her flame burst down. I set her down on the dry sand.
“You carried me to the shore,” she said, staring at the surf with wide eyes. The boat hissed and crumpled in the shallows.
“I told you I wouldn’t let it touch you. If water’s uncomfortable for you, then I’m happy to—”
“Water will kill me,” she said softly. “That much water.”
My smile faded. “You’ll die?”
“I don’t like boats,” she said curtly, standing up. “But we’d best get moving.” She nodded over my shoulder.
Jimmy was halfway across the distance, running for all he was worth on his bridge. It had started to dissolve about fifty feet behind him, but it didn’t fall, just kept forming in front of him.
Squeak zig-zagged up the beach in a blur and stopped halfway up. Flicker and I ran after him. Last time, the Kaleidoscope Forest had lined the edge of the entire beach. This time, there was only a green plain that stretched as far as I could see.
Squeak tapped the ground and a hole opened up.
“Lorelei!” Jimmy shouted.
We jumped into the hole and slid down a twisting root like we were headed toward the center of the planet. Except we weren’t on a planet. We were on a comet, and there were no normal rules. So we were headed toward the center of something. Maybe we were headed toward the center of someone’s imagination. I wondered if that was where the Run Roots ended, some misty point where the Doolivanti who had created them simply stopped daydreaming about them.
Yeah. So I stopped thinking about that.
Gravity did its weird thing again, where instead of falling down, we were falling forward, and then falling up.
Falling up. You gotta love that.
Ahead, I saw an orange and red light. Fire.
“Squeak!” said Squeak.
“They found us,” I called over my shoulder to Flicker.
Flicker was kind of blurry because the Run Roots aren’t exactly like riding in a Lexus. I was bouncing around a lot. Flicker’s voice rattled as she shouted, “No! It’s Ferbleticks.”
I looked at the fire, which was coming closer really quickly. “Okay,” I shouted. “Let’s pretend I don’t have a manual for every single creature that the Robsombulous ever spat out! What is a Ferbletick?”
“Squeak!” said Squeak, and he zoomed ahead.
Heat washed over me. The fire rushed closer.
“How do we turn this thing around?” I flipped over, but then I was just falling upward and backward.
“We cannot reverse the Run Root until it has run its course,” Flicker said.
My skin started to hurt. It was like being in a heating vent. “Ow! Flicker, I’m going to have to—”
“Grab onto me,” she said, lunging forward and wrapping her arms around me. I flinched, remembering how her skin had burned me in the boat, but it didn’t this time. Instead, her touch was cool, and so was everything around me.
“How did you—” I started, but my question got lost as fire roared around us in the tube. I saw little squirrels with flaming tails running past us on the roots that twined around the Run Root. They squeaked and chattered in terror, but they kept sprinting, burning everything around them.
I should have been torched to a crisp, but somehow holding Flicker kept the fire from hurting me.
“Those are Ferbleticks?” I shouted over the roar of the flames.
“Yes,” she shouted back, and then the Run Root shot us out. We sailed up into the sky above an entire prairie on fire. As far as I could see, tall grass was burning.
And then, of course, we fell back down into the middle of it.
Flicker and I landed in a heap together, and the impact broke me out of her grip.
It was like I’d fallen on top of a bonfire. I screamed and jumped back at her just as she lunged to grab me.
“Don’t let go of me,” she said.
“Ow!” I said. “Ow ow ow.”
“We have to get you out of here,” she said. “This is wonderful weather, but not really for you.”
My heart thundered in my chest and my hair was smoking. My arms hurt like I’d gotten a sunburn on top of a sunburn. All around me, flames raged. I reached for my pen and pulled it out.
Flicker put a hand over mine. “No,” she said. “Hang on to me. I won’t let the fire hurt you.”
I was shaking, and all I could think about was how I could barely breathe in this he
at, and that if Flicker let go of me for even ten seconds, I’d burn up.
I coughed. “How do we get out of here?”
The Kaleidoscope Forest suddenly stood at the edge of the prairie, right where the Run Root had shot us into the sky. It had not been there a second ago. Its majestic purple, green, orange and silver trees hissed as they began to burn.
Eleven
The Metaphorical Forest
My eyes were stinging, but Flicker wrapped a protective arm around my waist, and began running with me toward the forest. The air was too hot to breathe now. I could feel the heat of the flames all around me, aching to get at me, but in her embrace, I was safe.
“Come on,” she said.
We sprinted into the Kaleidoscope Forest. The inferno behind us vanished, replaced by misty air. Burning trees hissed and slowly went out.
I fell back and lay on the moist moss, breathed the misty air. My arms and legs and face felt scorched. I didn’t even want to try touching my hair yet. I knew the moment I did, I’d find it all burned off.
“Are you all right, Lorelei?” Flicker asked, kneeling next to me.
I blinked my gummy eyes open and sat up.
“You did good,” she said. “Most Doolivantis would freak out in a fire like that.”
“I was freaking out,” I said. “But we made it.” I held out my fist to her.
“What’s that?” she asked.
“Fist bump.”
“And it goes how?” she asked, her fiery eyes glowing with interest.
“Knock fists,” I said, then I splayed my fingers. “Blow it up.”
“Blow it up?”
“Figuratively.”
“I love it.” She knocked her fist against mine and splayed her fingers. Hers, of course, flared with an actual bit of fire.
“And you use this when?” she asked.
“When you do something awesome,” I said. “Like keeping me from getting burnt. I didn’t know you could do that.”
“That’s what I do,” she said. “Agatha wants to burn it all up. I want to keep everyone from being hurt by fire. While at the same time, you know, playing with it.” She grinned, and made a tongue of fire dance around in a circle.
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