Book Two of the Travelers (17 page)

“Why doesn't anybody help them?”

“Have you ever seen a fat Milago?” Gaveth said. “We're all hungry. There's no extra food.”

Alder couldn't believe it. All his life everybody had always said how the Bedoowans had it so tough putting their lives on the line to protect the Milago and the Novans. But Gaveth was right. Bedoowans hadn't been in any honest-to-goodness fights in, well, generations. Much less an actual battle. Or a war. So to a Milago, it probably looked as though the Bedoowans had things pretty easy.

And maybe they did. It made him feel strange to think that everything he'd been taught was a lie. He supposed that's what Wencil had been getting at, talking about “the old ways” all the time, about how the Bedoowans today didn't live the way they were supposed to. Alder had always thought Wencil just meant that Bedoowans had gotten lazy and didn't train hard anymore. But maybe Wencil had been getting at something deeper.

As everything that Gaveth said was sinking in, the two boys paused again. They had just entered a large cavern. There were six tunnels leading out of it. Gaveth kept looking from one to the next.

“Do you know where we are?” Alder said.

Gaveth didn't answer.

“Weren't we here about fifteen minutes ago?”

Gaveth cleared his throat nervously. “Maybe.”

Alder suddenly felt as if he couldn't quite catch his breath. The walls seemed to be pressing in on him. All he wanted was to be out of the mine. “So…basically…you have no idea where we are.”

“Basically? Yes.”

Alder felt like crying. But knights didn't cry. “So which way?” he said.

“Uh…” Gaveth pointed at one tunnel entrance. Then at another. “This way?”

“You sure?”

For a moment Gaveth didn't say anything. Then they heard a rustling noise, a sound like something being dragged across the rock.

“What was
that
?” Gaveth said.

“You're the mine expert,” Alder said. “You tell me.”

Silence. Then two heavy thumps and a scraping sound.

Gaveth's eyes were wide. “Yeah, but you're the Bedoowan knight. You're trained for this. What should we do?”

“Um…” More scraping and thudding. It was getting closer and closer, louder and louder.

“Based on my training”—Alder heard his voice break into a higher register—“I think maybe we should…”

Alder spotted a pair of large yellow eyes gleaming somewhere deep in the tunnel.

“Run!”

Q
uig!” Gaveth shouted.

Alder frantically tried to draw his sword as the huge beast charged toward them. He couldn't see the quig. But he didn't need to. He knew what it looked like—quigs were giant bears with teeth as long and sharp as daggers, claws big enough to cut a man in half, and sharp spikes on their backs.

“Can you fight it off with your sword?” Gaveth shouted over his shoulder.

“Doubt it!” Alder yelled, finally freeing Falling Light from its scabbard.

The thumping of the quig's feet was growing closer. Gaveth turned hard right into another, smaller passage.

“What are we gonna do?”

“Try to find smaller tunnels!” Alder yelled back. “If we can get into a skinny enough passage, it'll get stuck.”

“This way!” Gaveth dodged into another passage. This one was smaller still. The ground was littered with
rock that had fallen from the ceiling. Alder stumbled. In the darkness it was impossible to see the floor well enough to avoid the dangerous rubble.

And still the quig kept coming. Alder could hear the sound of its claws rasping against the rock as it forced its way through the tight tunnels.

“It's definitely slowing down,” Alder said. “But not enough.”

“Here's an air vent.” Gaveth's voice was high pitched and frightened as he pointed toward a rough hole in the ceiling. A wooden ladder led up into the hole. “Maybe this'll do it!”

Gaveth jumped onto the ladder and began climbing. Alder followed. As he clambered upward, Alder realized to his dismay that the wooden ladder was half rotten. Gaveth was so light that the ladder was holding him okay. But as big as Alder was, the wood was shifting and groaning with each step.

Wham!

The quig thudded into the bottom of the air shaft. Alder felt the entire ladder jerk. He tried to move faster.

Gaveth disappeared above him. He had reached the top. “Hurry!” Gaveth called, his forehead light appearing above Alder. Only a few more feet to go.

But the ladder was moving back and forth now. A terrible rotten-meat smell wafted up the shaft, carried by the rising air. Alder looked down. The quig was in the shaft now. It was crawling upward!

Alder couldn't believe something as big as the quig could get up the air shaft. But there it was, yellow eyes pinned on him, inching its way up the shaft.

Just as he reached the top, the rung that his bottom foot was on gave way. Alder's stomach rose into his chest as he plunged backward into the shaft.

He made a grab for the top rung, missed, grabbed the next rung and hung on, legs dangling into the darkness.

Snap! Snap!
The quig's jaws were snapping shut.

Now this rung started to give way as well. Alder felt a flash of panic. He was done!

Then—just as the rung collapsed—he felt a hand lock around his wrist. It was Gaveth. For such a skinny kid, he sure was strong!

Gaveth lurched to the side, straddling the air shaft. “Hold on,” he grunted.

“I'm holding! I'm holding!” Alder swung his feet around until he managed to get one foot over the lip of the shaft. From there he was able to push himself up.

“Thanks,” Alder said weakly, gasping for breath.

“What now?” Gaveth said, peering down at the quig. It was still inching upward.

Alder pulled out Falling Light and stabbed down into the shaft. His first stab drew blood. The quig roared and thrashed, slipping back down a few feet.

“Yeah!” Gaveth shouted. “Poke him again!”

This time, though, when Alder stabbed at the huge beast, it batted the sword away.

Alder jabbed furiously. He managed to keep the quig from moving upward. But now he was having no success in drawing blood. And in the thick, unhealthy air of the mine, he knew he couldn't keep up this pace much longer.

“I don't—think—I can—stop it,” he gasped.

“Then we've gotta run.”

The passage they'd just entered wasn't small enough to slow the quig down. And, like the one below, it was littered with rocks, some of them big as Alder's head. It was obviously a very old part of the mine. The timbers holding up the ceiling were weak with age.

Alder continued to jab at the quig. “We'll never make it,” he said.

“Wait!” Gaveth said. “I've got an idea. If we knock down the support beams, maybe we can cause a cave-in. That'll block off the tunnel and cut the quig off.”

“Genius!” Alder said.

“There!” Gaveth pointed into the blackness. “That one looks like it's about to go already!”

Alder followed as Gaveth ran down the tunnel.

“Pull!” Gaveth grabbed the beam and heaved. Alder got behind him and yanked. The beam snapped like a toothpick. The two boys leaped backward, but nothing really happened. A thin trickle of dirt fell from the ceiling. But that was it.

Gaveth turned and looked back toward the air shaft. One of the quig's claws crept up over the lip of the shaft.

“Another one,” Alder said. He slammed his shoulder into another support beam. This one wasn't as rotted as the other one though. “Help me.”

Gaveth too leaned into the beam. With a loud groan, it finally gave way.

Again, the results were disappointing. A few pebbles fell from the ceiling. But nothing else.

Gaveth turned toward the air shaft again. The quig's snout had cleared the top of the shaft, and one
muscular leg was hauling the big bear's body upward.

“We've got to run!” Gaveth said.

“No,” Alder said. “Knocking down another support's our only chance.”

“Come
on
!” Gaveth said. “Don't be stupid.”

“It's this or nothing!” Alder said, putting his shoulder against the next support beam. “Trust me.”

“Trust a Bedoowan?” Gaveth said. “I don't know.”

For a second Alder thought he was joking. But he could see that the Milago boy was serious.

“Now!” Alder shouted.

“You don't have to yell,” Gaveth said. He put his arms against the beam, braced himself, and heaved.

The beam slipped a little. But then it jammed on something and wouldn't move.

The quig was now clearing the rim of the shaft. In only seconds it would be on them.

“Never mind!” Alder shouted. “Run!”

They turned and ran with all their strength.

But they didn't get far. Alder's stomach sank as he saw what was in front of them. A blank wall.

“No!” Gaveth shouted. “No!” He pounded his fist against the rock.

Behind them there was a scraping noise and a thud. The two boys turned to look. The quig was in the tunnel now. Its flanks were heaving with the effort, and blood dripped in a steady stream from its nose, compliments of Alder's sword wound.

The quig was in no hurry now. Its yellow eyes were fixed on Alder, and the spikes on its back scraped the ceiling.

Scrape! Scrape! Scrape!

The only other thing Alder could hear was the sound of his heart.

The quig was even with the beam that Alder and Gaveth had been attempting to tear down.

Scrape!

One of its spikes lodged in a ceiling beam. The angered quig lunged forward to free itself. The support that Alder and Gaveth had been pulling on let out a sharp crack. The quig looked back in alarm.

The next thing Alder knew, there was an awful booming noise, like the ground itself was tearing in half. Then the ceiling came down with a noise that was louder and more terrible than thunder.

And just like that…the quig was gone! Nothing was left but a massive pile of black rock, and a choking cloud of dust.

Alder stared at Gaveth. Gaveth's eyes looked at Alder, big and round as gold coins. For a long moment, there was only silence.

“Whooooooo!” Gaveth shouted.

“We did it!” Alder rejoiced. “We killed it!”

They hugged each other and jumped up and down.

And then finally they stopped. Alder looked around. Suddenly his heart sank. Around them was nothing but rock.

“Uh…one question though,” he said. They appeared to be trapped in solid rock. “Since you're a Milago expert in mining, tell me: How do we get out of here?”

Gaveth looked around. “I have no idea.”

A
s the cloud of dust began to settle, Alder looked around. To his horror, he realized they were trapped. The rubble that had killed the quig had also trapped them in a chamber not much bigger than his bedroom back in the castle.

Gaveth met his eyes. “Uh-oh,” Gaveth said.

“How long before the air runs out?” Alder said.

Gaveth shook his head. “Don't know. We'll have to dig our way out.”

Alder looked at the pile of rubble. It rose clear to the ceiling. Some of the rocks in the pile were as big as Alder. Could they even
move
them? “What if it caves in more?”

Gaveth raised one eyebrow at Alder. “Then we'll die even faster.”

“Sorry.”

There was a long silence. It was the most silent silence Alder had ever experienced. As they stood there, afraid even to move, Gaveth's headlamp began to flicker.

“Oh, no,” Gaveth said.

Alder could feel his legs and arms shaking. Every sense was heightened. A tiny pebble shifted and slid down the rubble pile. Shadows flickered and danced on the ceiling in the dying light of the lamp.

“So this is it, huh?” Gaveth said.

Alder felt a soft, cool jet of air against his face. It was strangely comforting, like feeling a gentle breeze on a beautiful spring day.

Suddenly something hit him. “You feel that breeze?” he said.

Gaveth shrugged morosely. But then his eyes widened. He smiled. “Wait…”

“It has to be coming from
somewhere
. Right? There must be a passage somewhere above us that the air's flowing from. Maybe instead of trying to dig sideways, we can go up.”

Gaveth moved gingerly to his left. “The air's coming from this little crack right here,” he said, pointing at a small dark hole between two boulders.

“Go,” Alder said.

“Give me a boost.”

The Milago boy took a deep breath, then eased himself upward and into the crack. Soon his torso had disappeared. Only his feet were hanging out. With the lamp up in the crack now, there was so little light that Alder could barely make them out.

The rock above them groaned. Dust sifted out into Alder's hair.
This place could come down any second,
he thought. Gaveth's feet disappeared.

Alder's heart began racing. The walls seemed to be pressing in again. He was completely encased in
darkness. Utter, complete, total darkness.

He could hear Gaveth inching through the rock.

“I can see a tunnel!” Gaveth called.

“Can you make it?”

“I think so. Follow me!”

Alder climbed up into the tiny fissure in the rock. Gaveth had fit more easily. He had light, so he could see where he was going. And he was way smaller than Alder.

Sharp rocks poked into Alder's flesh as he inched forward. The space grew narrower. He rolled slightly and began crawling on his side. Inch by inch by painful inch he snaked forward. For a moment he was stuck. A panicky sensation ran through him. He squirmed wildly.

Suddenly the crack between the rocks widened slightly. Not much. But enough that he could use his hands again. He saw a light above him. A faint, flickering light. Gaveth was looking down at him!

“You're almost there, Alder!” Gaveth said. “Just a little more.”

And then, finally, Alder was out. He lay gasping on the floor of a small tunnel. It was so low he'd have to crouch to get through it. But after the crevice he'd crawled through, it felt like the Great Hall of King Karel's castle. Relief flooded through him.

When he'd finally caught his breath, he said, “Don't suppose you have any idea where we are, Gaveth?”

“No,” Gaveth said, looking around. His headlamp was flickering badly now. The narrow tunnel angled downward. Its walls seeped moisture, and the floor was slick.

“Hey,” Alder said. “There's a light down here, Gaveth!” He began walking tentatively down the steep slope.

And with that, Alder's feet went out from under him, and he began to slide down the slope into the blackness. Without any light to illuminate handholds or timbers in the walls, he had no way of stopping himself. His arms and legs banged into the sharp rock walls, and for a moment he was sure he was going to be killed.

But then, with a hard thump, he came to rest on his back, staring straight up in the air. There was just enough illumination coming from an adjoining chamber to see a little. Alder looked up and blinked.

There, above his head, was a star carved into the wall. “We made it!” he shouted.

Suddenly a powerful light spilled from the adjoining chamber. The light was so bright and harsh that Alder could barely see. A man, his face and body visible only as a black silhouette in the darkness, leaped through the door. In his two hands, raised toward the ceiling, was a huge sword.

“Yahhhhhh!” the man screamed. Then he swung the sword at Alder's face.