consort first. Where have you hidden Kyon, Kricket? I’m very tired and I don’t feel like playing your games now.”
Slowly, I inch away from him. I look toward the stairs and the only thought in my mind is making it to them. I look around for Phlix, but she’s nowhere in sight. She’s hidden herself away in the shadow land. I envy her that ability.
In front of me, Giffen stands. He growls as he says, “I’ll ask you once again. Where is Kyon Ensin?”
CHAPTER 18
HALF AWAKE AND ALMOST DEAD
Giffen lifts me up off my feet telepathically and pulls me into his waiting arms. I lose my breath when I hit his chest hard. “You didn’t think we were going to just let you leave, did you? You’re too dangerous for that.”
“What are you going to do to me?” I ask.
“There’s a place in the annexed area that I have set up for you. It’s actually very beautiful. You’ll be comfortable there. Your sister can visit you.”
“And you can all keep an eye on me?”
“It’s the compromise that I worked out to keep you alive. Otherwise, you’re dead.”
“So I’ll be a prisoner for the rest of my life?”
“It’s better than being dead.”
“You can let go of me now. I’m not going to run. I know it’s pointless.”
He sets me on my feet. From behind him, Phlix says, “I have another option for you, Kricket.” Electricity pulses out of the Taser-like gun that she presses into his side. He convulses and flops on the ground fish-out-of-water style. “You can come with me to Earth like we planned.”
“Phlix!” I’m almost too surprised to move.
“No one is making us their prisoners again,” she says. “I will hurt them all if they try.”
I grab Phlix’s hand. “Let’s go. That shock doesn’t last long.”
Phlix tugs back on my hand, saying, “Wait! We have to get our packs!” We put them on, and then run up the stairs to the balcony level of Foundation. We scurry through countless corridors to the tower called Kingdom. We take the tree pillar elevators down to the garden level of the creepy art gallery. “All we have to do is make it to the Hallafast in the topiary maze outside. It’s not very far,” I whisper. Clutching her hand, I lead the way to the giant doors. I open one and pause. Outside, the courtyard glows with fire. The Hallafast that we need to make our escape is a raging ball of orange light and choking black smoke. My heart crashes in my chest.
I sink to my knees on the ground. “I’m dead. I’m so dead.”
“What’s wrong?” Phlix asks. She looks past me to the aircraft. Her soft gasp is a crushing weight on me. She pulls the door closed, slamming it. She looks around us.
“We’re not giving up,” she says, squaring her shoulders. “We’re leaving.”
She tugs on my upper arm and pulls me up. We scramble back toward the pillars, and Giffen suddenly appears at the top of the gallery. He looks pissed.
“Shadow land!” I yell.
Phlix pulls us into her secret world. She grasps my hand and we back up from Giffen as he descends the pillar onto the garden level with us. “He can probably sense us, Phlix. He’s creepy like that,” I whisper.
Giffen picks up a chair telepathically and spins it around as if it’s caught in a tornado. It whirls around the room, coming so close to us that we both have to drop on the floor to avoid it. “We have to go,” Phlix whimpers, grasping my hand.
“I know!”
We both back up, coming up against the Naren Falls landscape. We turn around and stare at the dark, canvaslike opening that now has a view of the two Etharian moons visible in the night sky. “We have to try,” Phlix whispers.
“Are you sure?” I ask.
“It’s worth the risk. On the count of two,” Phlix breathes. “One—”
“—two!” we say in unison. With our hands clasped, I scrunch my eyes as I jump with Phlix into the portal.
I feel the impact of the grassy lawn beneath me. My hand is torn away from Phlix’s. I roll away and I lay on the ground, looking up at Inium and Sinter in the sky. I spit out the dirt in my mouth.
“Phlix,” I call, not seeing her anywhere.
“Here,” she calls back.
“Where,” I scream, panicking. I wiggle out of my backpack getting to my feet. I don’t even see a shadow of her anywhere.
She suddenly appears a few yards away still attached