Spirit’s Key (12 page)

There should be plenty of sunlight left in the day, but the trees thicken enough to block it. The occasional beams of light cast long tree-shaped shadows that manage to make the woods seem even thicker. The only path is the one we make with our bodies. The sticks and branches resist. They grab at our bags and clothes, and snap and crunch under our feet.

Now that we're playing a game, Gomez and Yasmine get serious about being fast. They ignore the woods' efforts to yank them back. They scramble over a fallen tree like it's nothing. It takes me a few tries, and I bloody my leg getting across. They're younger than me, and their legs are shorter, yet they can run faster. It's annoying I'm not quicker, because Sky and his friends are getting farther ahead, and what if they change direction?

Gomez stops to break a huge branch blocking our way. He kicks and stomps it, but he isn't strong enough to break it. Yasmine jumps on, too, and together they bounce up and down until it snaps. “Yahoo!” they cry.

Sky is ahead of them anyway and his buddies jump higher, run harder, and dodge trees with a sixth sense for where they'll be. His friends dash ahead out of sight, like they don't have Sky's loyalty and can't be bothered to wait for me.

I force my arms and legs to pump faster. The darkness deepens. I don't want to be stuck in the middle of the woods without Sky. I bragged that I knew the way, but I don't. There's supposed to be only one way, straight through, like Gomez said, but I feel twisted up. At this point, I trust Sky to know better. I've never been in the woods without him. I hadn't realized it before, but maybe Sky has always led the way.

We can't lose him.

I'm panting and sweating, and my backpack feels like it's gained a few apples. But I don't stop. Gomez and Yasmine leap ahead as if they have an infinite amount of energy. They high-five and help each other over trees and bushes like siblings who've played together their whole lives. They aren't afraid of the darkness.

It's so dark now I want my flashlight. But it's zipped up in my backpack, and if I stop to get it, I'll lose Sky.

And then I lose him anyway. He darts into a thicket of trees and,
poof
, he's gone. I can't see him anymore. I squeeze his dog tag in my sweaty hand, but it doesn't bring him back. “Sky, wait!” I scream.

“What?” Gomez calls. He and Yasmine stop running.

“Wait for me,” I say, hoping they didn't hear me say Sky's name.

“Guess we know who's a rotten oyster,” Gomez says.

I keep running right past them, grinning like it's still a big game, and I've tricked them into stopping while I leap ahead.

“Hey! No fair,” Gomez yells as I whip by.

“Last one there's a rotten jellyfish!” I scream, upping the ante, relief rushing over me because I see my good dog. He stands at the end of the thicket, waiting.

He barks once, then leads us into another tangle of brambles.

Gomez dives into it like it's a pile of leaves instead of ouchy sticks. He's on the other side before me and Yasmine. Ahead again, he yells, “Last one there's a rotten baldie!”

I'm irritated this is the animal he picks, but I chose to play the game, so I bite back my complaint.

When I get to the other side, Gomez puts out his arm to stop me. His voice is a whisper. “Stay back.”

But I've lost sight of Sky again, so I move his arm out of my way and push forward.

Then I see what Gomez sees. A cave. And Sky trotting up to the entrance. I don't think twice about following.

“No!” Gomez yells.

“I want to see what's inside.”

“Get back!” Gomez tries to grab my arm, but I shake him off and keep walking toward Sky.

“Baldies!” Yasmine cries behind us as a pack of wild dogs exit the cave. They don't notice Sky. They growl a warning deep and low, but I don't act fast enough. I've followed Sky to the entrance of a cave of live baldies. One runs at me, teeth bared.

I scramble back and fall into thick bushes. The angry baldie jumps on top of me, and I scream. The brambles stab me all over as I thrash, but I can't get free. Sky is barking and trying to help, but the wild baldie can't hear or feel Sky, so he doesn't let up. I try to push the animal against his chest, but instead my arm goes right into his mouth. A sharp pain cuts into my skin.

Bam!
A noise pops and the baldie whimpers a wounded cry.

“No!” I scream.

“Run!” Yasmine screams back, the pellet gun dangling from her hand.

The hit baldie retreats, and Gomez and Yasmine take off. I'm left alone in the bushes.

I try to get up, to run, but I'm stuck. I try again, but my backpack is caught on the branches. The hit baldie and his friends have turned their attention to Yasmine and Gomez. They run forward a few feet and bark at the kids' retreating backs. They stay near their home to protect it. Soon they'll notice I'm still here—too close, a threat.

I wiggle out of my backpack. I try to pull it out of the brambles, but it won't come. The baldies turn to me.

I'm not sure how I'll fare fleeing a pack of baldies that can run so much faster than any human ever could, but hanging on to this pile of brambles while being eaten alive hardly seems like the key to survival.

So I leave my bag. And I run. My heart hammers so fast it feels like a ticking bomb that could explode me into a million pieces. I'm terrified of being chased and knocked down again. The barking of the baldies seems to get louder. Are they after me? I won't be able to fend off more than one. I scream for Yasmine and Gomez, but they're gone. I took too long getting untangled.

I twist my head back to the baldies. I stop running, and relief floods my body. They haven't followed me. Not even Sky. I can't believe it. I stare in amazement, my jaw dropping. I'm running for my life, and Sky is … playing?

The other ghost baldies are there, too. They nudge their live friends, knocking them and running around, trying to get noticed.
Hey guys, it's us. Back from the dead,
they seem to say, hitting into their oblivious friends. But the live baldies can't see them.

They only see me.

They stare me down, their eyes a menacing black. The baldie Yasmine hit limps back into the cave. The others bark a warning.
Don't come back.
Another lunges at me a few steps, in case I'm thinking of staying.

I have to leave. I tear away.

But my good dog doesn't come with me.

 

17

T
HE
K
EY TO
H
OME

I don't know where I am anymore. My backpack of supplies, my compass and flashlight, are stuck in a bush near the baldies' home. My forearm has bite marks that bleed streaks down to my hand. The bite aches, and the sight of it terrifies me. Yasmine and Gomez are long gone, and Sky isn't here to lead the way. My worst fears are realized. I'm lost and alone in the woods. I have nothing but a metal dog tag that no longer makes my dog appear in front of me.

I push it back into my pocket and find I have one other item. My house key. I squeeze it and concentrate on home. I don't need the future. I need a compass. But this is all I have. I abandon the idea of going to the whale station. It's dark, and I don't know the way.

The noises in the woods seem to get louder. The sound of an owl and an unidentifiable flutter in the trees cut through the silence. As much as it seemed annoying to have Yasmine and Gomez come along, now I'd give anything to have them with me. My heart hasn't stopped hammering, and I imagine it won't anytime soon. Every noise makes me jump. I check behind me for baldies whenever I hear the woods crackle and snap. The dogs have every right to chase me down. The cave I marched up to was the baldies' home. Of course they want to protect it. Mrs. Borse accused the eagle of trespassing.

We had just trespassed, too.

Oh, Sky, why? Why did you lead us to that cave?
I could have gotten killed.

For the first time since I read the
Beware of Baldies
poster, I'm really scared. If the baldies do carry some disease, getting a bite from one seems like a sure way to catch it. I frantically try to wipe the blood off on my shirt.

I'm sad and confused that Sky isn't here with me now. I followed him, convinced he wanted to show me something important. But what if he just wanted to play with his friends? Maybe he doesn't know anything about where Dad's been taken.

I look down at my arm. With the streaks cleaned, it looks less frightening, at least in the dark. Harmless even—the puncture marks are barely visible. I can do this. I can get out of here.

Tree branches thwack my body as I stumble through the darkness, clutching my house key. I beg it to take me home. I don't know if it has that kind of power, but it's my only hope, until a squawk brings my attention to the sky.

The trespassing eagle.

She nods as if to say,
I'll help you find home.

Home. I look down at the key in my hand. I thought of home when I wanted the eagle to go out the window. I started Nector's reading by smelling his home. Dad told Mr. Selnick home is an important part of who we are. Sky's tag tells a stranger how to bring him home.

Home is the magic of a person's key.

Home. I'd give anything to be in mine with Dad and Sky.

I follow the eagle through the dark woods.

I'm filled with relief when she leads me out and onto my familiar road. “Thank you,” I whisper.

She flies down toward me, then back up into the sky, her way of saying,
You're welcome.

It isn't just the woods that are dark. The road is dark, too. I have a feeling the Hatterasks' dinner hour has come and gone. The last time I chased Sky into the woods, time sped up. How long have I been gone?

*   *   *

I find out that it's after midnight. The Hatterasks aren't happy. I stand in their house, an injured and guilty dingbatter.

Yasmine and Gomez were my responsibility. I led them into danger. I'm so relieved they made it home safe that it takes the sting out of Mrs. Hatterask yelling at me.

“I don't know what your father allows, but we don't let our children go in the woods,” Mrs. Hatterask says.

“What took you so long?” Yasmine asks. “We've been back hours.”

“I lose time,” I confess, though it sounds even crazier out loud than in my head. I expect them to think so, too.

But Mrs. Hatterask pauses a minute, then nods. “Death is a thief who will snatch the day. Look at this.” She holds up my arm like it's proof of something. Me being a dingbatter? The baldies' devilish nature? All of the above?

Or is she telling me I'm going to die from this baldie bite? I'm shocked.

The Hatterask kids shrug like their mom says scary, nonsensical things all the time.

Mr. Hatterask turns to his wife. “We should tend to that wound and put her to bed.”

Mrs. Hatterask calms, but I wonder if it's the eye of a hurricane. Maybe she's going to kick me out or send me off to be quarantined. I've been bitten by a baldie. But she gets me antiseptic and a bandage and wraps my arm.

After she's finished, she says, “You're staying under our roof, so you obey our rules. The woods are forbidden.”

I want to go home to my own bed. My own house. My own beliefs. But when I say so, her husband shakes his head. “Your father wouldn't want you to be alone. He'd want you to stay here.”

I'm suddenly too tired to disagree. They feed me dinner and tuck me into bed beside Yasmine. “Aren't you worried I'm contagious?” I ask.

“We don't believe in that foolishness,” Mrs. Hatterask says. “Devil wants a person, he finds them. Locking people away or hiding won't save you. I ought to know.”

“Is that why you don't move houses even though the hurricane knocks yours down every year?”

She nods. “Hatterasks tried that in the early days. Didn't do a bit of good.”

Their house is so empty, it's a miracle they had an extra pillow. Mr. Hatterask even brings me a raft to put beside the bed. Yasmine has one on her side, too, so it's my own.

After her parents turn out the light, Yasmine whispers, “I'm sorry.”

“What for?” I wait awhile for her to answer, but her breath gets heavy and even, the breathing of dreams. I figure she's sorry for leaving me, but she shouldn't be. She saved my life shooting that pellet gun when she did. Even if I don't approve of shooting a baldie, as far as I'm concerned her debt to Dad has been repaid.

Outside the baldies howl. They remind me of a family at the dinner table talking all at once. They speak over each other, a crowded roar of interrupting, overlapping cries. They don't usually keep me awake, but they sound more agitated than usual. I wonder if they howl for their relative who turned up dead on the beach—or maybe the one Mr. Selnick found on his lawn.

The image of the ghost baldies knocking into their live friends replays in my mind. I sit up in the bed. Maybe what looked like playing was really Sky and the others trying to warn their buddies?

Four baldies are dead. Is it possible more will die? Is it possible to save them?

No one on this island but me would care to. And then I
know.
This is what I'm meant to do. It's up to me to save Dad and the remaining baldies. I crawl out of bed, get dressed, and tiptoe into the Hatterasks' living room. I intend to go outside to see if I can conjure Sky and the other ghost baldies, but I run into Nector.

“The bathroom's this way,” he says. “I'm finished up in there.”

“Oh. Thanks.” I stand awkwardly in the center of his living room, the front door an aggravating five feet away. I assume if the Hatterasks don't allow their kids in the woods, they also don't allow them outside in the middle of the night. Well, nearly morning at this point.

Nector gives me an odd stare. Not that I can blame him. Maybe he notices I'm wearing my sneakers.