Chapter 16

CHAPTER 16 Idiot. Moron. Fool. Amy stared at the door, at the absence of light where Ian Kabra had been standing. It had all been one big joke. He had wrapped her around his fingers and then yanked her inside out. How could it have happened? How could anyone do that? Tears made rivulets down her cheeks and fell to the ground, tapping lightly like the flap of moth wings. Behind her, Alistair and Dan were ignoring her, discussing strategies, trying to figure out how to

escape. How to prevent themselves from dying. Too late, Amy thought. She already knew what that felt like. Slowly, their voices filtered into her brain. "I am going to search for another exit," Alistair was saying. "Amy, you and Dan look for any weakness in the rock wall. If bats live here, there must be some source of air, some kind of hole." Amy nodded numbly. As Alistair's footsteps receded, Dan squatted next to her. "Hey. I want to strangle him, too." "It was my fault," she said. "I-I believed him. I played right into his trap…." Dan helped her to her feet and swung the light around, examining every square inch of the wall. The place was pitch-dark, and after a few minutes, Amy already felt like she was growing short of breath. Alistair's voice echoed toward them from the distance. "No other exits. I just checked the whole W. It goes on much longer than I'd thought. We are totally sealed."

A tomb, Amy thought. He buried us alive. She felt a hand on her shoulder. "I am so sorry, my darling niece," Alistair said gently. "Had I seen you were falling for the boy, I would have done something. It passed over my head, and it should not have." Amy sighed. "How could I have let him trick me? How could I think that anyone would actually feel…" The words got stuck in the back of her parched mouth. "I know this will not make anything better," Alistair said, "but you must believe me when I say I know how it feels to be betrayed." Amy glanced up into Alistair's barely discernible face. "Really?" Alistair looked as if he were going to say something, then changed his mind. "Think only of this, Amy: Your parents loved you. It was in their eyes, even when you weren't around. You must think of them, and they will be there for you." "Did you— know them?" Amy asked. "AGGH! Gross!" Dan shouted from another

part of the cave. "I think I stepped on a bat! Can you guys continue the conversation at a later time— if there is one? If we don't all die and become a banquet for bats?" Alistair raced away, leaving Amy with a mouthful of questions. "Dan, you must never, ever give in," Alistair said encouragingly. "A problem is merely a solution waiting to be found. We will make it out of here— and I predict we will beat the Kabras to Lake Tash—" "Dude, we're not going to Lake Tash," Dan said. "I made that up." Now Alistair was staring at him. "But— the anagram—" Amy said. Dan sighed, shining his lantern on the sheet where he'd unscrambled the words. "I saw the real answer right away, but I didn't trust them. I threw something out to test them. The real answer is, like, a no-brainer—" He began scribbling another word on the sheet, but Amy was looking past him, at the odd reflections of lantern light in the mirror.

"Wait!" she blurted out. "The mirror—who ever heard of a triangular mirror?" "Uh, a triangular mirror designer?" Dan said. "Or an alchemist!" Amy said. "Think, Dan. Alchemy is all about symbols. The planets, the elements, everything had its own funny shape!" "So what was the triangle?" Dan asked. Amy tried to picture the image on the page. "Air? Gold?" "Wait… wait… I can see it…" Dan said. "Water! That's it. Wait. No. With the point down, it represents water… but with the point up, it's fire!" Dan swung the lantern back in the direction of the mirror now, raising it high above his head. Just above the mirror, beyond his reach, Amy noticed several greasy-looking, stringy objects. Her stomach turned. They looked like rat tails. "Are they… alive?" Suddenly, Dan glanced toward the ground. He crouched now, scraping something with his fingers. "Charcoal," he said. "It must be leaking from above."

Alistair looked up. "What's up there?" Choking back nausea, Amy forced herself to follow his glance. To her relief, the hanging tails were way too long to be what she thought they were. They seemed to be just strings, leading into a big crack in the rock. And she became aware of a very particular smell. "Oh, my god…" she said. "Guys, what do you smell right now?" "Bat turds," Dan said. "Rotten eggs," Alistair volunteered. "And that rotten-egg smell," Amy said, "is caused by—?" "Chickens?" Dan said. "Sulphur!" Amy said. Dan smiled. "Oh, right— I learned that in chem lab last year! I snuck this test tube into Mandy Ripkin's lunch box? With this, like, really loose cork? So when she opened it—" "Charcoal… sulphur," Amy said, wracking her brain for something she'd read in science class. "They go together with some other ingredient to