The Search for Artemis - By P. D. Griffith Page 0,39
clap on the surface on impact to garner Landon’s full attention. “Right now, we’re cool, and we’ll stay cool until the day when you wake up forgetting that I’m Brock Holbrooke. . . . And you? . . . You’re just a temporary fad. You feel me?”
Landon stared at Brock, mentally piecing together the subtle threat hidden behind his calm demeanor, but he soon realized Brock was still holding out for a response, so he replied.
“Yeah . . . I got it.”
“Awesome.” Brock pushed lightly off the desk and walked over to the door, and with one foot in the hallway, he continued, “Welcome to the Gymnasium, roomie.”
Once the door closed, Landon let out a deep sigh. He hadn’t even realized he’d been holding his breath. As he leaned back in his chair, he thought to himself, And this is only my first day!
CHAPTER SEVEN
LATE NIGHT
WANDERINGS
It was late in the night in mid-October. Everyone in the Gymnasium had retired to their rooms for the evening except Landon, who sat awake under the amber light of a reading lamp in a deep alcove of the Library. Polishing off the last few pages of Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass, he read comfortably in an oversized, tufted, leather chair. While reading it, he could hear the amusing voices his mother would use for each of the fantastical characters when she read it to him aloud. Alice in Wonderland had been her favorite book. He always seemed to select books that reminded him of her. He started with Treasure Island and in the weeks since, had moved to The Jungle Book, Call of the Wild, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, The Hobbit, and now the Lewis Carroll classic.
Almost two months had passed since he came to the Gymnasium, and he spent nearly every night in the same alcove on the fifth floor of the Library, working his way through one novel after another. It was the only way he could escape the nightmares. Every night the same horrifying scene played in his head moments after drifting to sleep.
He’s walking through a dimly lit hallway. The walls are barren and painted in a sickly beige color. With every step the space grows brighter from a light emanating through the cracks around a single black door. As he approaches, the door creaks open on its own. Passing through, Landon emerges into a large, empty stone chamber with only a massive white flame burning under a glass dome in the center.
He starts to hear a faint cry echoing off the cold walls. With every step, the cry morphs and changes until it settles into the painful wails of his mother. The screams grow to a deafening volume as he approaches the flame. Hoping to get a better look at the inferno under the glass, he presses his body against the dome. The bright white flames dance up from an unknown source, blazing out of invisible embers, and flickering in and out of focus. His mother’s face appears, screaming in agony and fear. Tears stream from her bloodshot eyes.
Landon reaches to help her, to pull her from the infernal flames, but his hand is hindered by the hemisphere of glass. He pounds his fists on it, hoping to shatter the clear barrier, but with every stroke of his fists, the glass holds, yet his mother’s wails escalate and become more blood curdling. He then fights to lift the dome off the ground, release the flame and save his pained mother, but it is sealed shut, secured to the stone floor with a heavy chain and lock. Now crying himself, he fights with the chain, but to no avail; he’s powerless to save her. Standing outside of the dome, he can only watch as his mother screams in agony.
Suddenly, Landon sees a reflection of something in the glass. When he turns and looks, he finds an ax resting perfectly on a stone pedestal; its sharp blade gleams in the firelight. He quickly grabs it, and with a single swipe, the lock on the dome is undone. After tossing the ax aside, he begins to wrestle with the heavy chain, working to unravel it from the base of the dome. All the while, his mother’s cries continue to ring in his ears.
Once the final link is pulled free, Landon presses against the glass, hoping to slide it aside, but rather than move, the dome cracks under the weight of his fingers. The tiny fissures snake and split, covering