Sky Jumpers Series, Book 1 (8 page)

The tree bark was rough enough to scale, so I set my sack of Ameiphus and my lunch next to the trunk, then hugged the tree with my arms and legs and scrambled up.

Once I got to the branch with the Ameiphus, I swung a leg over it and dug the Ameiphus free. That was when I noticed that Aaren’s group had run into ours, and they were all watching me. Aaren shook his head and smiled like he did anytime I tried something dangerous that he totally expected me to try. Carina looked like she feared for my life. Brock had a gleam in his eye. I knew he’d be up a
tree digging at an Ameiphus before I even got down from this one. But Paige Davies, the smallest girl in my class, just looked at me in awe. It made me smile. And it might have made me show off a bit as I swung from the branch back to the trunk.

I only found one more Ameiphus in a tree I had to climb. Now that the tree secret was out, everyone climbed the trees, even people like Paige. And of course Brock. He climbed more trees than anyone, even me.

While Brock was up in a tree, I knelt down to dig a piece of Ameiphus loose from between two roots. Carina crouched near me and nodded in Brock’s direction. “Someone’s in a good mood today.”

I looked up at Brock and smiled. “Yeah.” There was something about a competition that made him seem less worried.

“I think I know who his dad is.”

“Really?” Since we first met Brock when he started living with his grandpa and coming to school in the spring, we’d been trying to figure out why he’d never been to school before then. Or why we hadn’t seen him around town, at council meetings, or even at any of the festivals. We had no idea how he’d just appeared one day. Honestly, we weren’t even sure who his parents were. The adults were no help, either. Six months ago, when Mr. Allen had said we were getting a new student, we were all in shock.
We’d never had a new student. Mr. Allen had told us not to make a big deal of it, and that the only important thing was making him feel welcome. I’d asked my dad, but he said it was Brock’s story and if Brock wanted me to know, he’d tell me. But anytime we asked Brock, he’d turn away, change the subject, or tell us it wasn’t our business.

Carina whispered next to my ear. “Remember the hermit who lives in the woods up near the warning fences? The one who only comes down during the Summer Festival?”

I nodded. A bandit attack or something before I was born had made him go crazy, and he didn’t like being around people anymore.

“I think Brock’s dad is the hermit,” Carina said.

I couldn’t remember if I’d ever heard the hermit’s last name, but it might have been Sances.

“Maybe he had a son all along, and it’s Brock. And that’s why Brock doesn’t like being around people sometimes—he’s not used to it.”

“Brock’s pretty smart,” I said. “Could a hermit have taught him so much?”

Carina shrugged like her explanation was the only one that made sense. “Why else wouldn’t he talk about it? I think he doesn’t want us to know his dad is nuts.” She nodded knowingly, then walked off in search of Ameiphus.

I pushed the Ameiphus into my sack and looked up
the hill to where Brock was staring at me from his perch in the tree. He grabbed the branch and swung down, dangled his feet for a minute, then dropped to the ground.

Was that his secret? That his dad was the hermit?

At the sound of the whistle, my sack held four clumps of Ameiphus. Mr. Allen blew the whistle a second time, and Brock, Carina, and I emerged from the woods to meet the others on the path.

Brock hadn’t even mentioned the fact that he didn’t meet us to jump yesterday morning. I’d known everyone in my class for my entire life, so if someone didn’t show up for something, I’d be able to guess why. I’d only known Brock for six months, though. With him, I had no idea. As soon as Carina was distracted, I whispered, “You didn’t come jump with us yesterday morning.”

He brushed his hair off his forehead, then looked at me out of the corner of his eye. “If I would’ve come,
I
would’ve been the first to land a double front flip.”

I laughed and gave him a little shove.

It was months ago when Brock had seen us hiking to the cliff, snuck up behind us, and stayed hidden while we made a few jumps into the Bomb’s Breath. When he stepped out into the open, I’d almost had a heart attack—I thought he’d tell on us for sure. He said he wouldn’t if we let him jump. That took me by surprise even more than his sudden appearance did. I didn’t think we’d find
another person anywhere who would be willing to go near the Bomb’s Breath, let alone jump into it. But he did, and we’d met him for jumps ever since. It was one of the few times I’d seen him happy. Like he wasn’t weighed down with whatever made his shoulders slump.

He nodded toward my bag. “How many did you get?”

“Four,” I said with a smile.

He took a few steps ahead of me. Right before he squeezed between two kids, he turned around. “I got five.” He gave me a half-smile, then stepped into the crowd around Mr. Allen, out of my sight.

Ugh! I lost to Brock!
It took away some of my excitement for being the first to land the double front flip, especially since he hadn’t even been there to try to win.

As soon as we were all near Mr. Allen, Nate raised his hand before anyone else, as usual. “My team found six!”

Jella flipped her braid over her shoulder. “We found eight.”

“Nice job!” Mr. Allen said. “Anyone get more than eight?”

Sam held up two sacks of Ameiphus. “We got nine!”

I mentally crossed off half the groups. Maybe mine could win!

Carina held up her two clumps of Ameiphus and yelled our team’s total before Mr. Allen even called on her. “Eleven! We found eleven!”

“Us too!” Aaren said.

I grinned at Aaren. I couldn’t believe our teams tied! I was trying to figure out how six people could each have a turn at Mr. Allen’s desk in only five days, when I heard a commotion behind me. I turned to see Holden and his team crash through the bushes at the side of the road.

Holden took a few panting breaths before he managed to get out, “Fourteen!”

My hopes for a homework-free week fell.

“Congratulations!” Mr. Allen said. “I hope you enjoy spending the mornings of the next week taking turns on a cushioned chair, and the evenings doing something
other
than history homework. Now, remember what we talked about in class—choosing your split is a very important thing. You’ll want to choose one you enjoy, and today you’ll see what it’s like at the mines. Let’s go—Mr. Williams is going to show you something on this field trip that no other group has ever seen.”

After ten minutes of walking through the trees as they became more sparse, we entered a clearing, the edge of the lake in front of us, the mines at our right. Sandy, Mr. Williams’s golden retriever, ran up to meet us. She wagged her tail as we all tried to pet her at the same time, then she ran back toward Mr. Williams, like she couldn’t stand to be away from him for another second. We chased after her and sat down in front of Mr. Williams at the opening of the mine. Mr. Allen tied Arabelle to a post at the mine opening and sat down with us.

Mr. Williams scratched Sandy’s ears, then folded his huge arms and smiled, which seemed to spread his thick mustache even wider. “Raise your hand if you like rocks.
Do you like to throw them, dig in the dirt with them, collect them?”

Most of us raised our hands.

“Then working in the mines might be the split for you.” He brushed his hands together, and a fine white powder blew away in the slight breeze. “Here at the mines, we get to play with several different kinds of rocks every day.”

Mr. Williams had us turn around to face the tunnel where the river flowed in from the other side of the valley—the only way into or out of White Rock. “You all know the green bomb made this crater, but the slope is steeper on this side of the valley.” He gestured over the river to the south, where no homes were built. “Does anyone know why?”

It hadn’t occurred to me
why
it was that way—it just was. A couple of kids raised their hands. Mr. Williams called on Sam.

“Is it because of the rock?”

“Very good. Most of our valley has a layer of dirt over it,” he said as he pointed north, “but a large seam of rock passes through on this side. When the green bomb hit, it couldn’t push the rock as far as it pushed the soil. Who can tell me what kind of rock gives White Rock River its name?”

The whole class raised their hands. Mr. Williams pointed to Ellie.

“Limestone.”

“That’s right. Limestone is important for a couple of reasons. It’s the softest rock in this seam, so when the green bomb hit, it pushed the limestone farther than it pushed the harder rock surrounding it. If it weren’t for the limestone, we wouldn’t have the opening into this valley”—he pointed to the tunnel at the other end of the river—“and there wouldn’t be a groove in the stone for the river to pass through. Instead of staying on the third ring, like it does now, the river would just come in through the opening and flow right down there to the middle of the valley, first flooding City Circle, and eventually filling the entire valley. Because of this seam, it flows into our little lake, which is actually just a place where the limestone seam widened considerably. It then flows through caves in the mountain and comes out the other side.”

Mr. Williams led us into the mining cave with Sandy at his side. The opening was tall enough that one of us could stand on someone else’s shoulders and still not hit our heads as we walked inside. The cave wasn’t new to me—Aaren and I had explored it a few times when we came to the lake to swim, but always after the people who had mining as a split had gone home.

The first room was large enough that all eighteen members of my class, along with Mr. Williams, Sandy, and Mr. Allen, could fit without being squished. Mr. Williams told
us how they dug out the limestone and hauled it to the ball mill, which was like a big spinner with hard rocks inside, and it ground the limestone into a powder so they could make it into cement.

Mr. Williams gestured to the cave. “The limestone seam goes right through the mountain. As we mined last month, we accidentally broke through to the river below because we didn’t anticipate such a large air bubble above the river. Come on. I’ll show you.”

He grabbed a lantern and led us farther into the cave. Off the main room, a passageway with a slightly lower ceiling curved to the right. We followed the passage as it meandered deeper into the mountain, wide in some places, skinnier in others. Along the path, the walls were mostly limestone, with darker rocks showing through in places. As we rubbed against the walls in the skinnier hallways, a white powder covered our clothes. The narrowest hallway led into another cave room filled with sounds of the river.

“Okay, everyone, gather round,” Mr. Williams said as he walked to a hole in the middle of the room. Sandy ran excitedly around the hole, then to the opening to hurry the rest of us along, then back to Mr. Williams’s side.

The hole was bigger than I’d imagined. I thought it would be about the size of my fist, but it was probably three feet wide.

“Come on in. Don’t be afraid,” said Mr. Williams.
“This is the only place where the floor is thin, and we installed support beams below this whole area to make sure it wouldn’t break more. It’s safe to stand here.”

We all formed a wide circle around the hole and leaned forward to see inside. It was completely dark until Mr. Williams tied his lantern to a rope and lowered it down the hole. The river rushed past only ten feet below the opening. There was an actual bank on one side of the river at least eight feet wide, but it narrowed both upstream and downstream to barely wider than the river itself. The ceiling got lower, too.

“Have you gone down the river?” I asked.

Mr. Williams shook his head. “When we set the support beams, we walked along the bank for a distance, but we turned back when it became too narrow and dangerous. We worried that in some places, the cave might only be as big as the river itself—no space above it, no space on the sides of it.”

Everyone gasped as we collectively imagined being swept downstream underwater, unable to come up for a breath. He looked at us pointedly, to make sure we weren’t going to try it ourselves sometime when he wasn’t there. But really … even I didn’t take
that
big a risk.