Traveler, L.E. DeLano [book series for 12 year olds .TXT] 📗

completely black. I take one of the glow sticks and drop it down. It takes a few seconds before I hear a muted splash and a very faint glow lights up the shaft. Well, at least we can see it now.

“You need to be more careful,” Ben urges. “We’re getting into the working areas now. There are going to be shafts and maybe even old explosives lying around. Watch your step.”

I nod, moving away from the edge. I won’t be any good to Finn if I’m dead at the bottom of a mine shaft.

We’re traveling more slowly now, and it’s maddening. Every second we take is another second that she can be closer to us. Or another second that Finn could be bleeding his life away. Ben stumbles over a pile of twisted metal that blended right into the rock and goes staggering, falling heavily into one of the posts. I grab him, steadying him before he falls any farther, and a rain of fine dust and tiny bits of rock falls all around us. I can see the outline of another shaft ahead. They must have them at certain intervals throughout the mine. I break open another glow stick, tossing it down the shaft so we can see it on the way back.

No wonder she chose this place. It’ll be easy to dispose of the bodies.

I suppress a shudder and we keep moving, and we’re doing fine for a while until I catch my arm on something sharp that’s sticking out from a wall. I let out a startled sound that seems to echo through the place in an astonishingly loud way.

It only takes a second, and I hear him.

It’s the faintest, strangled kind-of sound. One someone would make with a gag in their mouth.

“Finn!” His name bursts out from my lips, along with a sense of relief that it’s not too late. We find him a few hundred feet ahead, around another bend and just past another shaft. Ben grabs my glow stick to mark it as I rush over to yank the gag off Finn’s mouth. She’s tied his hands and feet, and he’s sitting against a wooden column that’s warped far more than I’m comfortable with.

“I need some light!” I crouch down next to him as Ben shines the flashlight on Finn’s wrists.

“Jessa,” Finn says quickly. “It’s Eversor! She’s—”

“She’s working for Rudy, I know.”

“Careful,” he says urgently. “Don’t yank too hard—this is a load-bearing column.”

“How did she get you?” I ask as I pull at the ropes, leaning down to get my teeth in them so I can untangle them. After a few moments, one of the knots starts to slip free and I’m able to tug it loose. Once his hands are free, Ben focuses the light on Finn’s ankles and Finn starts to work at the knots, but his fingers are too numb and much larger than mine. I push his hands aside and take over, conscious that every second we waste is one less second to get far away from here.

“She was watching your house. When she saw me, she knew we were both back.”

“Back?” Ben looks confused.

“How?” I ask.

“Because I wouldn’t have disappeared if you were here,” Finn says. “When I left to get coffee, she followed me to Mugsy’s. She came inside, told me she had a flat tire, and asked for my help to change it.”

Ben gave him a look. “That’s what you get for being a good guy,” he says.

“So I see you got my message?” Finn asks me, smiling. The action pulls at a cut on his cheek, and I see him grimace.

“Yes, and hopefully she doesn’t know that,” I answer him. I help him to his feet a bit clumsily, and then I slip my arms around him.

“Are you all right?” I hold him, reveling in the feel of him, safe in my arms.

“I am now.” He squeezes me tight. “You shouldn’t be here.” He looks across at Ben. “And you shouldn’t have brought her.”

“You ever try to talk her out of something?” Ben asks.

Finn raises his brows. “Good point.” He gives Ben a nod. “Thank you. I would imagine you have a lot of questions.”

Ben lets out a sound between his teeth. “That’s an understatement. But they can wait until we’re someplace safe.” He looks over at me, and then back to Finn. “Then we need to talk.”

“Fair enough,” Finn says. “Let’s get out of here.”

He takes my hand and indicates that Ben should lead the way, since he’s got the flashlight. I give Finn one of my glow sticks and start to move forward, but I slam into Ben, who has suddenly stopped moving. Finn’s hand jerks mine back, trying to pull me behind him.

“Jessa! Get back—”

He doesn’t need to finish. I can see her. Eversor is clearly visible in the light of Ben’s flashlight, and so is the gun she has trained at Finn’s head. I pull my hand away from his and step forward.

She maneuvers herself between us and any sort of escape, and then she sets a heavy glass lantern down on the rock floor, where it lights the room with a muted glow.

“Oh, but you’ve made it easy for me,” she coos. “All three in one place. I knew you wouldn’t disappoint me.”

“You’ve got to listen to me,” I say to her, smacking at Ben’s hand and pushing Finn with my shoulder as they both try to pull me back.

“You have such talent, Jessa,” she says almost sadly. “One of my favorite pupils, truly. But this is necessary. A necessary evil.”

“You can’t do this,” Finn tells her. “Think of all the repercussions.”

“We deal in trade-offs every day,” she snaps. “Stop this one from crossing the street, and they may go on to marry that one two years later. Remind that one’s child to return his overdue library book, and he’s kidnapped and murdered on his way to the public library by a serial killer. The tougher laws that come from public