The Book of Sight (17 page)

Ten minutes later, they were standing in front of the overgrown opening to the cave. For just a moment, everyone looked at each other, feeling the same nervous excitement. This was it. They were here.

Then Dominic stepped forward and started pulling the vines away from the mouth of the cave. Logan and Adam hurried to help him. It didn’t take long to clear the way. In a matter of minutes, a gaping dark opening stood awaiting them.

They all took out their flashlights. There was another pause, and it was Dominic again who squared his shoulders and walked in. He was picturing in his mind the face of that young man in his mother’s painting, unafraid and determined. He hoped he looked that brave right now, even if he didn’t feel it.

The cave was dry and gravelly inside, and the others crowding behind him soon cut off what little light he had. Creeping forward, he flipped on his flashlight, but before he could raise it, a searing pain cut across his face. Instinctively, he threw up a hand, only to experience the same burning across his forearm. The shock and pain were so severe that he dropped to his knees in the gravelly dirt of the cave floor.

His yell of pain stopped the others instantly. There was a general scuffle and the sound of everyone talking at once, then a light was shining in his face and Alex was standing over him.

“Are you all right?” Her questioning look collapsed into lines of worry. “Oh my gosh…are you okay?…guys come here.”

“What happened?” asked Adam. He, too, shined his light in Dominic’s face. “Oh man. Okay, no one go any further. Let’s get him out of the cave into the light.”

Dominic’s face and arm were still throbbing and burning, but it was the reactions of the others that really scared him. “What’s wrong?”

“You’re bleeding,” said Alex.

“It’s going to be okay,” said Adam.

Once out in the light, Dominic put his good hand up to his face. He could feel blood dripping down from two horizontal slashes across his cheek and nose. His right arm had similar cuts, but these crisscrossed a little bit. Both arm and face were stinging like crazy, but the cuts didn’t look too deep.

“What the…” said Eve. “What happened?”

Alex had pulled a first aid kit from her backpack and began applying gauze pads to the cuts.

“I don’t know. I was just walking along and then I felt this pain on my face. I threw up my arm, and whatever got my face cut my arm, too.”

“It doesn’t look too deep,” said Alex, “but it won’t stop bleeding. We need to get you to the clinic. You might need stitches.”

“No, we’re not leaving yet. It’s just some cuts. If you disinfect them, they’ll be fine until we’re done in the cave.”

“But the blood is soaking through the bandages. I only brought a little travel first aid kit from the car. What if you keep bleeding?”

“It’s not…”

“Wait,” broke in Eve. “I have an idea. The Gylf showed me this plant the other day when we were there. Terra said they use it for wounds. To stop bleeding. I don’t know if I can find any around here, but we could try. It had dark green leaves and these little red berries.”

Logan sucked in his breath. “You mean like this?” He carefully took out a small wreath of branches covered with red berries.

“Yes!” Eve was elated. “Where did you get that?”

“Terra was wearing it that first day we visited them. She gave it to me when we left.”

“That’s amazing. It’s like someone planned it. Okay, I think we need the juice from the berries to put on the cuts.”

Dominic sat and tried not to watch his blood soaking through the bandages on his arm while the others scuffled around looking for rocks to crush the berries. He closed his eyes but that was almost worse. With his eyes shut he couldn’t stop imagining what horrible thing might have caused those cuts.

It was a relief when Eve came back. Her voice sounded nervous. “I’m just going to dab this stuff on with the last gauze pad. Hopefully it won’t hurt.”

It did hurt.

It also worked. The berries had formed a kind of pink paste which looked disgusting on his arm, but he wasn’t bleeding anymore. They had no more bandages to cover his wounds, but it didn’t seem like he was going to need them.

Dominic flexed his hand. The burning feeling was gone, replaced by a dull throb. “Okay, we’re good to go,” he said as confidently as he could.

Logan, as usual, wasn’t fooled. “Why don’t you take some aspirin for the pain, at least?”

Dominic nodded, and Alex handed over the pills.

“So now we have to figure out what happened,” said Adam. “Did you hear anything moving, like something was attacking you?”

“No, there was nothing. It was more like I just walked into something.”

“It must be some sort of trap then,” Adam said. “A couple of us should go in with our lights on and move really slowly, looking for whatever it was.” He stopped for a second and looked right at Alex seriously. “Unless you think that’s a bad idea.”

She shook her head. “No, it’s the only thing to do. It’s either that or give up. Dom didn’t really have his light the last time. With light we’ll hopefully be able to see whatever it is.”

Adam nodded, shouldered his pack, turned on his flashlight, and headed into the cave without further conversation.

Logan stood up and went with him.

“Okay,” said Eve. “I say we let Adam and Logan be the ones who look for the scary booby trap.”

But Dominic had no intention of just sitting outside waiting for something to happen. He got up and moved into the entrance of the cave. He could see the flashlights about 20 feet ahead.

“You should be getting to about where I was,” he called out softly. “Do you see anything?”

“Not yet,” said Adam. “Oh wait. Yeah. Yeah, there’s something here. It’s like spider webs or something. It’s practically invisible. You can only see it when the light reflects off it. It’s covering the entire passage. There’s a little gap at the bottom, but I doubt we could squeeze under it.”

Dominic looked down at the criss-crossed slashes on his arm. Spider-webs. That would explain the pattern, but no spider he’d ever heard of made a web strong and sharp enough to cut a person.

“Don’t touch it,” he said unnecessarily. “I’ll get a stick and we’ll see if we can knock them down to get through.”

He turned to go out, but Eve and Alex were right behind him. They were both carrying long sticks.

Unfortunately, the sticks were not enough. Squeezed together in front of the webs, they each took a turn trying to break through but to no avail. The strands looked thin and delicate like a spider web, but they felt as strong as steel cables. They would give a little under pressure, but only bounce back unbroken. Adam even tried scraping the wall where they connected, but however they were attached, it was too strong for the stick, which crumbled away on the end.

Eve was the last to try. “What are these stupid things?” she panted after a couple of minutes. “It’s like we need cable cutters or something. I don’t suppose any of you thought to bring along a pair?”

“No,” said Dominic, “but Adam did bring a sword.”

“Of course!” Alex said. “The sword!”

Adam looked a little doubtful, but he drew the sword out of his belt and held it up carefully to one strand of the web. With only the slightest touch from the sword, the web swung free. A general cheer went up. Grinning, Adam made a few broad swipes, and soon the whole web was hanging limply against the walls. They were through, and no one had any more doubts that they were in the right place.

E
ve followed along behind Alex, listening to the thumping of her heart. She had never been crazy about small spaces. Fortunately, this cave was tall enough to stand up in, even if it was now only wide enough to walk single file. She didn’t know if she could have faced having to crawl through the dark, with only a weak flashlight to show where she was going. It made her feel panicky just thinking about it.

The ground underneath had been dirt and then gravel and had now changed to rock. They were steadily descending. She wondered how deep underground this cave led. In her imagination, she saw a series of caves twisting and turning, a giant hollow underworld beneath the sleepy little town of Dunmore. The thought gave her a shiver. Then she laughed. Why not? Unexplored caves would be the least of the things that the good people of Dunmore knew nothing about.

“What’s so funny?” asked Logan from behind her.

“Nothing.”

“Do you hear that noise?”

“What noise?”

“That rushing sound.”

Eve listened. She hadn’t even noticed, but Logan was right. There was a rustling sound coming from up ahead, just barely heard over the sound of their footsteps.

“Yeah, I hear it.”

“It’s been slowly getting louder for the last half hour.”

“Water,” said Dominic’s voice from the end of the line. “Look at the walls.”

Eve had been keeping her flashlight trained on the floor in front of her, but when she lifted it a little she could see water trickling down the walls on either side. Not much yet, but judging from that sound ahead, there was going to be a lot more. She felt her heart rate speed up a notch.

The rushing sound kept getting louder and louder until she heard Adam call out from the front of the line, and they all stepped unexpectedly into a giant cavern. The weak light from their flashlights was not enough to discover the far walls or the ceiling. Though they couldn’t see it, from the sound and the cool dampness of the air they could tell that the water was right ahead of them.

Without saying anything, they moved forward side by side and so close that their arms were touching. Eve thought she would have even liked to be holding hands, but she didn’t want to seem like a coward. It felt creepy to cross the big open space in the dark, not knowing what was above her or on either side. An uncomfortable tingle was running down her spine with every step. After a minute, she even began to miss the stifling confines of the narrow passage. It seemed like an eternity, but it wasn’t really that long before they were brought up short by a swift river at their feet.

“I guess we found the water,” Eve said.

“Can you see the other side?” asked Adam, shining his light as far out as possible.

“No,” Alex said, straining forward with her light, too. “These stupid flashlights are too dim to see anything.”

“How are we going to get across?” asked Dominic.

“Maybe we don’t have to,” Adam said. “Maybe what we need is on this side. We haven’t explored the rest of this cavern.”

Eve seized on that idea. As much as she hated the thought of wandering around in this enormous room, she liked the look of that dark river even less. “Yeah, let’s check it out at least before we get all wet.”

“We can try,” said Alex doubtfully, “but I’m pretty sure we’re going to end up having to find a way over.”

“One thing at a time,” said Adam.

They divided up into two groups, agreeing to follow the river along in each direction until they hit a wall or found something worth reporting. They would meet back in the middle in a half hour at the latest.

It didn’t take that long. Eve, Logan, and Dominic came to a wall on their side of the river after only a few minutes of walking. The river seemed to gush straight out of a solid rock face. The opening must have been just enough for the water to go through. It certainly wasn’t enough for a person to enter. They followed the rock wall back around until they found the opening to the passage that had brought them here.

It took Adam and Alex longer to meet them back at the river, but their findings had been pretty much the same. The river continued on for quite a ways but then crashed into the rock wall. Alex said that they could barely see the outlet at all through all the spray and churning water. Eve did not find that mental picture reassuring considering that they now had to find a way across.

“As far as I can see,” Adam started, “the only way over is to just wade in and try it. It may not be that deep. Maybe we can just walk across.”

“That’s pretty risky,” said Dominic. “We really need some sort of rope or something, so we can hold onto whoever goes out. The water looks like it’s moving pretty fast.”

“Did anyone bring rope?” asked Eve.

Their silence was the answer.

“Do we need to go back for some?” asked Logan.

“I think we should,” said Dominic.

“If we do that, we won’t be able to come back until tomorrow. And by then Eve’s mom may have found out what happened and grounded her again,” protested Adam. “Just let me at least try it first. I’ll go slow and turn back if it feels like it’s getting too strong.”

“I seriously don’t think that’s a good idea,” Dominic said.

Adam turned to Alex. “What do you think?”

Alex stared at the water for a long minute. “I really don’t know.”

“Okay, then. In the absence of any scary premonitions, I think I’ll risk it,” said Adam. “And don’t worry. I’ll be really careful. I promise that I’ll come back if it’s too deep and we can head home for some rope.”

He took off his shoes and socks and left them, along with his backpack and sweatshirt, next to Alex. Slowly he waded into the fast-moving water, gritting his teeth at the cold.

“Is it freezing?” called Eve.

“Only at first. It’s actually not that bad once you get used to it.” Adam waded out further, slowly disappearing into the darkness. Eve could just barely make him out when he stopped. The water was above his knees but hadn’t reached his waist yet. “I can see the other side,” he called back. “I think I’m over half way there. This has got to be as deep as it gets. There’s a little pull, but it’s not too bad. I think we can make it.”

Eve let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. She could see Adam waiting for their response. “Okay,” she said to the others on the bank. “If we’re going to get wet, let’s get it over with.”

“I guess,” said Dominic hesitantly. Eve thought he didn’t like being proven wrong. “Okay, but let’s just go one at a time and move slowly.”

“I’ll go first,” said Eve. “The less time I have to think about it, the better.”