Chasing Power (29 page)

Kayla let her little flame fly up and around. Pillars supported a vaulted stone ceiling. Shelves lined either side, all filled with bundles of gray rags. Between them, lashed to the pillars, were bodies wrapped in more rags. Their dust-coated skulls stared out. The flame flickered over them, making shadows move, making them look alive.

Beside her, Daniel whispered, “So how do we know which one is him?”

She walked forward. Her footsteps sounded like muffled echoes in the vast chamber. “He was important, right? So his burial should be distinctive. Certainly labeled.”

The silent skulls watched them pass. Kayla wished she had a better light. The single flame seemed so very lonely in the vastness of the crypt.

Several archways led off the main burial room. The flame dancing ahead of them, Kayla and Daniel explored the first passageway. The walls were gray, dusty stone, carved directly out of
the earth, and Kayla wondered how old this place was. Certainly seemed old enough for their conquistador. They followed the tunnel to a chamber with an altar and shelves. The shelves held skulls displayed on stacks of bones. A rat skittered behind one of the skulls and then peered out at them with glittering black eyes. They didn’t see anything that indicated the conquistador was here. Backing up, they tried the next passageway.

The second archway led to a chamber with a few shrouded bodies but also a boiler and an electrical box, presumably for the church above. They left quickly and tried the third. It led to a wall display composed only of skulls, hundreds of them, laid one on top of the other as if they were macabre bathroom tiles.

In a hushed voice, Daniel asked, “Who are they all?”

“The new denizens of my future nightmares,” Kayla said. Her lighter flame swept across the eye sockets and then hovered beside a bit of wall. There was writing on it.

Daniel crossed to it and moved to wipe the dust. Faster, Kayla scooted the dust away from the letters with her mind. It had a date, 1630–1699, and then the rest was in Spanish. “I think they’re monks,” Daniel reported. “A hundred years after our conquistador.”

Behind them, Kayla thought she heard a whispered rustle. “Did you hear that?”

“Hear what?”

Kayla sent her mind back behind them, trying to sense the shape of anyone following them, but there were too many corpses and too many statues. She cringed inside at the “feel” of dust and decay and death. She couldn’t tell if they were alone or if an entire army was creeping up behind them—at least not without touching each body.

She heard a steady dripping, perhaps from a pipe. Maybe she’d confused that with footsteps. Of course, the last time she’d been in a tomb and thought she’d heard footsteps, she’d ended up getting trapped. “Never mind.”

Following the flame from the lighter, they returned to the main chamber and continued on. At the far end, the crypt narrowed and became a corridor with an arched roof and unlit sconces on the walls. Here, instead of the wrapped skeletons, there were stone coffins. Words were carved into their sides—names and dates. Kayla and Daniel slowed to read them. The little flame from the lighter danced across the words and shed a golden glow around them. The tunnel ahead of them and behind them was wreathed in blackness. Kayla felt prickles on the back of her neck. She tried to send her mind back again; and again, she felt only skeletons and statues. She listened for other sounds and heard nothing. If anyone else were here with them, he or she was quieter than the rats.

Trying to keep her tone light, Kayla said, “If this ends in bugs, snakes, or a cascade of rats, we are going to have serious words. Very bad words.”

The passageway ended in a chamber with three stone coffins, as well as shelves full of bodies wrapped in rags and ropes. A few arm bones stuck out of the wrappings. “Look at the inscription. That’s him,” Daniel said as he pointed to one of the coffins.

Kayla sent the flame toward it. There was a poem or quote in Spanish on the side, plus the name Juan Rodriguez de la Cosa, born 1489 and died 1543. Sculptures of Spanish knights were carved onto the four corners.

Opposite the coffin was an altar with a cobweb-coated goblet and several candles, as well as a warped and wrinkled old
Bible. An oversize crucifix hung on the wall. Beneath the dust, it looked gold. Kayla transferred the flame to one of the candles and then lit the second one. Warm amber light spread over the stone walls and ceilings, and the whiff of burning dust drifted through the crypt. Skulls leered from new shadows, and a rat ducked between two filthy vases on a shelf. Kayla and Daniel searched the chamber. There were candlesticks, pitchers, and plates, all tarnished and covered in dust and cobwebs, as well as a shield hung on the wall and a moth-eaten tapestry that was dull brown and full of holes. Wrapped bodies were stored on two shelves. Ornate boxes filled a third. Daniel climbed up to the boxes and opened them one after another. “Dust. Bones. Bones. Dust. Necklace, maybe gold. Surprised they’d leave this stuff down here where it could be stolen.”

“You don’t think it’s in
there
, do you?” Kayla pointed to the coffin.

Daniel hopped down from the shelves. “Let’s find out.” He shoved at the top of the coffin. It didn’t budge. Kayla joined him. Stone scraped against stone, echoing loudly through the catacombs. Pushing as hard as they could, they shifted the top about four inches.

“I’ll try to feel it.” Kayla took a deep breath and sent her mind into the coffin.

The dead conquistador was definitely in there. Her mind touched old bones. Retreating, she shuddered and then forced herself to focus again. His clothes had rotted away long ago, but he still wore a helmet and his sword, as well as a heavy belt that had fallen through his desiccated body and lay on his spine. She felt other trinkets: a necklace with a heavy amulet, a dagger, several
coins … and then she felt a familiar triangle. It lay near his hand, or what was left of his hand. “Got it,” she whispered.

Leaning over the side of the stone coffin, Kayla reached in, trying hard not to touch the skeleton, and her fingertips brushed the stone triangle. She grabbed it and pulled it out.

Beside her, Daniel sucked in air.

The stone looked very much like the first stone. It had two serrated edges, and if she looked at it out of the corner of her eye, she could see words that floated, blurred, on its surface. It was deep black with flecks of many colors within it, like a black opal, that glistened in the candlelight. She held it out to Daniel—and felt it yanked out of her hand.

The stone sailed across the tomb and landed in the outstretched hand of a young woman with blond hair and a wide-brimmed summer hat.

Daniel didn’t hesitate. He dropped his hand on Kayla’s shoulder, and the world flickered. They reappeared next to the woman, and Daniel grabbed for the stone before Kayla could even orient herself. The woman held the stone out of reach.

As if shoved by wind, Kayla and Daniel sailed backward. Ropes that had been tying together bundles of bones flew off the rags and wrapped themselves tightly around Kayla and Daniel, coiling around their legs as if they were flies caught by a spider, cocooned together.

The woman smiled.

It was the woman from Mexico. Kayla was sure of it.

The woman was tall and thin with shockingly blond hair and a model-beautiful face. She wore a sundress with a cheerful yellow flower print, and she carried a pink purse. She tossed the stone from hand to hand as she smiled at them. “Thank you so much. I really didn’t want to stick my hand in that coffin. Honestly, why can’t they put these things someplace nicer? Like a museum. Or even a closet. I don’t think that’s too much to ask.” She had a light Southern accent.

Staring at her, Kayla eased the fishhooks out of her pocket. Holding them ready with her mind, she glanced at Daniel and nodded. He vanished, and the ropes around them fell limp. As Kayla kicked the loose ropes off, she sent the hooks flying at the woman’s ankles.

Daniel reappeared behind the woman. The woman only had a mere instant to turn her head and see him, but it was enough. She kicked backward. Her high heel caught him in the stomach. He collapsed against a shelf of skulls, and the hooks
embedded in one of the bundled corpses. Regaining his footing, Daniel charged at her.

She flicked her hand, and one of the skulls flew out of its shelf and smashed against Daniel’s head. He staggered as the skull shattered. Quickly, Kayla stirred a tiny cyclone of dirt, intending to spray it in the woman’s eyes.

“Stop,” the woman said calmly. “Or I release it.” She pointed above Kayla’s head.

“No!” Daniel cried. Clutching his head, he’d fallen to one knee.

Kayla looked up and saw the stone coffin lid, hovering in the air above her. She let the cyclone collapse to the ground. The woman pointed at Daniel. “Don’t vanish.” And then at Kayla. “No more tricks.”

Continuing to stare up at the stone, Kayla marveled at the woman’s power. She’d never even imagined being able to move something that weighed so much. She couldn’t even move it with her arms, much less with her mind. “Amazing,” she breathed. “Who are you?”

“I’m not your enemy.” The coffin lid lowered back onto the coffin. Stone hit stone with a heavy thud. “And I am sorry if I startled you.”

“If you aren’t our enemy, then give us back the stone,” Daniel said.

“Oh, no, can’t do that, but thank you so much for finding it for me. I am grateful.” She did look earnestly grateful—her green eyes were wide and her soft lips were parted as if in breathless excitement.

“You’re the one I saw in the church in Mexico,” Kayla said.
“Who are you? What do you want with the stone? Do you know my father? Are you with him?”

The woman tossed the stone into the air, caught it, and then winked, as if this were all some delightful joke. “Come on, figure it out, Katie.”

Katie.

No one called her Katie. No one knew to call her that. Kayla slowly stood up. Staring at the woman, she tried to force her features to match a memory.

“She looks like you,” Daniel said quietly.

“Aw, I wanted Katydid to figure it out on her own.”
Katydid
, her old nickname. The woman flicked her finger, and several rags from a mummy flew into Daniel’s mouth, gagging him. He clawed at the rags, and the woman leaned over him and tied a knot with her hands. She then tied ropes around his hands and ankles. “Much better. Never a good idea to annoy people who are stronger than you. You really should work on your people skills.”

“Amanda,” Kayla said, tasting the name.

Amanda turned back to Kayla, and her expression changed, softening like butter. “Oh, Katie, I thought I’d never see you again. We looked for you, you know. For years, we kept looking for you.” A tear welled up in one of her bright green eyes.

“I don’t find that as comforting as you seem to think I should.” Kayla’s eyes flicked to the entrance. She wondered where Dad was, if he was nearby, if he was listening.

“Dad never gave up hope that you were out there somewhere. Some days I didn’t believe him. Some days I didn’t want to. After all, you left me.”

“We thought you were dead,” Kayla said.

“Dead?” Both her eyebrows shot up. Kayla noticed that her
makeup was perfect, delicate natural eye shadow over her eyes and pink shimmery lips. In comparison, Kayla was coated in dust and dirt. Amanda was not only alive; she looked vibrant. “As you can see, I’m not. Why on earth would you think that?”

“Dad killed you.” She said it slowly, carefully, as if to someone hard of hearing. “That’s why we fled. Left our house. Left friends. Left everything.”

Amanda’s beautiful smile faded. “Left
me
. Or Mom did. I couldn’t believe it when Dad told me he saw you. I thought I’d never see you again.”

“We’ve been hiding,” Kayla said. “From Dad. Because he killed you. Because we thought he’d kill me. And you’re … It was for nothing? We were afraid for no reason? Why did Moonbeam think you were dead?”

Gently, Amanda said, “She lied to you.”

“No, she wouldn’t. Not about this.” Kayla tried to match this woman up with her memory of her sister. The memory was so frayed, though. She mostly remembered Amanda’s laugh. It filled a room. She remembered they used to play dress-up with Moonbeam’s hats and scarves and makeup. Or the afternoons they’d have tea parties—Amanda would write out invitations, and they’d set up Kayla’s stuffed animals around a blanket. “You could be a fake. Maybe you’re just pretending to be my sister, trying to trick me in order to steal the stone.”

“I already have the stone,” Amanda pointed out. For emphasis, she waved it in the air, and then she tucked it into her pink purse. “No further tricks necessary. Did you call our mother ‘Moonbeam’?”

Stupid
, Kayla thought at herself. She fervently hoped that Dad hadn’t heard. “Mom said you were dead.”

“She knew I wasn’t. She knew Dad didn’t kill me. Just as she knew he would never kill you.” Amanda tilted her head—she looked like Moonbeam when she was thinking hard. “I can’t imagine why she lied to you.”

Kayla swallowed. Her eyes felt hot. “My whole life, ever since you died, we’ve been hiding from Dad so he wouldn’t find us and kill me too. She
can’t
have lied. I don’t believe it.”

“I’m not dead. Ipso facto, Dad’s not a murderer.” Amanda smiled sunnily.

Kayla shook her head. Moonbeam couldn’t have lied. But Amanda was here … Kayla felt sick thinking about it. She sank onto the ground and hugged her knees to her chest.

Across the crypt, her sister plopped cross-legged on the dusty ground. Her dress poofed out around her as she sat. “Come on, Katydid, talk to me. Tell me about yourself. What have you been doing in the years since my supposed death?”

“You’re really Amanda?”

“And you’re really Katie.”

“Kayla now.”

They both stared at each other in silence. Amanda’s smile faded as they evaluated each other. Without moving, Kayla slid the razor blade out of her pocket. She hesitated—she could use it either to cut the purse or to slice the ropes around Daniel. Glancing at him, she saw his eyes were fixed on the purse.