Kingdom Keepers II(10)

“Oh, man! How cool is that?” Philby said excitedly. “Hold on to my shirt, lightning bug. I saw some stairs over here.”

Finn reached out and held on, as much to keep his balance as to stay with Philby. They reached a set of metal stairs, the handrail cool to the touch.

“Going up,” said Philby.

They started climbing the spiral stairs. Higher and higher.

From below them came the heavy breathing of the man pursuing them.

He’d already caught back up. He sounded incredibly close.





7


MAYBECK PROVED HIMSELF the faster runner, arriving next to Amanda at nearly the same instant as Charlene and Willa despite having come the long way around. The rain was falling in punishing waves, and thunder was cracking menacingly overhead.

Amanda, soaking wet, was on her knees, crying. Jez just stood there, the rain passing through her. It took Maybeck and the girls a few seconds to realize what Amanda already knew.

“Oh, man,” said Maybeck. “How long ago did this happen?”

Willa and Charlene helped Amanda to her feet. Everyone but Jez was now drenched. Charlene held her hands over her hair, as if that would do any good.

“She didn’t keep up,” Amanda said. “I thought she was probably fiddling with her iPod—trying to protect it from the rain. She won’t stop messing with that thing. So I looked back, and …she was there.” She pointed to the DHI of her sister.

“But how is that possible?” Willa asked. “Jez isn’t a DHI.”

“She is now,” said Maybeck, contradicting. He ran his hand right through Jez’s body and out the other side.

Some kids cheered and called out from the crowded area in front of Peter Pan’s Flight, where they stood protected from the rain.

“Somebody did this,” Amanda said. “They programmed a DHI for her. But it’s not much of a program. She’s just…standing there.”

“But why?” Maybeck said.

“Who?” Willa said. “The Imagineers wouldn’t do this without Wayne telling us.”

More kids called out from the line, this time wanting autographs.

“We can’t stay here,” said Maybeck.

“I have to find her,” Amanda said. “The real her.”

“We need Finn and Philby,” Willa said.

Hunched over and miserable in the rain, Charlene added, “Could we maybe move this meeting somewhere dry?”

Maybeck said, “We saw you two not five minutes ago. If they grabbed her…if they made a switch…it had to have happened between then and now. Somewhere really close to here.”

“Are you saying she was…kidnapped?” Charlene said, a little too concerned with her hair to have stayed with the discussion.

“If humans take you, you’re kidnapped,” Maybeck answered. “I doubt there’s a name for it when it’s a band of Disney villains. But yeah. She’s missing.”

“But why?” Charlene asked Maybeck. “Why kidnap Jez?”

The three kids stared at Amanda, waiting for an answer. She pursed her lips as if she’d swallowed something bitter. “If I told you—which I can’t—you wouldn’t believe me.”

“Try us,” Maybeck said.

“You’d be surprised at what we can handle,” said Willa.

“The Overtakers?” Maybeck asked, winning Amanda’s attention.

“You don’t know the half of it,” Amanda said.

“Try us,” Maybeck repeated.

“Please tell us,” Willa pleaded. She wiped the rain from her eyes. “We want to help, but we need to know what’s going on, what we’re involved in.”

Charlene proved she’d been paying attention after all. “This has to do with Finn, doesn’t it? When Finn got tangled up with Jez, and you said some kind of spell had been removed. Maleficent’s spell.”

That incident had happened months ago, though the kids remembered it as if it were yesterday. Maleficent had kept Jez under her control to prevent Jez’s own powers from interfering with Maleficent’s plan. The DHIs had managed to trap Maleficent, and Finn had helped free Jez from the spell—though her powers had yet to be explained to any of them. Maybe this was why the sisters had vanished recently: to keep from having to explain themselves.

“We have to hurry,” Willa said. “For one thing, those kids are blowing our cover. For another, every second counts. She can’t be far.”

“Since when are you a detective? You’ve been reading too many American Girl books,” snapped Charlene.

“No, she’s right,” Maybeck said. “Time is in our favor, but not for long. Amanda and I will retrace her route, looking for her. Willa, you and Charlene get Finn and Philby out of the castle and meet up with us.”