Kingdom Keepers VI(94)

“Believe me. I haven’t forgotten.”

At that exact moment, the sky rumbled.

Philby looked up thinking: What next?

* * *

“What next?” Finn said, his eyes trained on the dark sky.

“Rain?” Willa said.

Charlene had spotted the helmet; Willa, the sign. Finn pointed out the depth of the single track—the scooter—explaining that it would only make such a deep impression if both boys were on it. They headed down the dirt trail, noticing how the jungle closed in from either side, choking off the route. Finally, with three of them riding, the scooter was spinning out too much. They parked it in the vegetation, ditched the helmets, and walked. When the rain came it drenched them like a fire hose, but it only lasted all of five minutes. Then the jungle felt like a sauna that had been turned up. Hot, sticky.

Mosquitoes whined by their ears, the girls swatting at them.

“I don’t like this,” Charlene said.

“Noted.” Finn didn’t like it either, but withheld comment. Troubled by the claustrophobic undergrowth and the lack of light—it felt like midnight!—he kept his fears to himself.

“The sign said something about religion,” Willa said. “House of religion? I’m not sure.”

“We don’t know if it’s important,” Finn said, “until we get there.”

“It could be miles.”

“It could. So I suggest we save our energy with less chatter.”

But it wasn’t long until Finn lost sight of the bike track. He stopped the girls and told them to wait. Back-tracking, he found where the track led into the undergrowth and, eventually, the other bike behind the tree.

“If this trail gets any smaller…” Charlene whispered. She didn’t complete her thought. She didn’t have to: the Overtakers couldn’t be far.

* * *

Among the jungle cries, the buzz of insects the size of bats, and the noises of humans extremely close by, Finn picked out a cooing he identified as coming from Philby. Philby had cared for a wounded pigeon in seventh grade and had taught himself to coo like one, a bizarre talent that only his closest friends knew about. And though a pigeon’s coo in the middle of a Mexican jungle might have caught the ear of an ornithologist, when mixed into the ongoing cacophony, only such a bird specialist would realize it had no place here.

Finn tugged on Willa’s sleeve, stopping her. They’d been using hand signals for the past hundred yards, having heard voices. Now Finn pointed to their left.

There it was again: coo-coo…

Willa took hold of and stopped Charlene. The three carefully tiptoed into the undergrowth, following the call of a city bird a long way from home.

Maybeck and Philby had found a part of an old wall—a very old wall—made of refrigerator-size hand-carved stones stacked with exacting accuracy. Covered in creeping vines, flowering orchids, and giant ferns, the wall wasn’t a wall at all, but the bottom flight of a tiered pyramid temple that had lost two-thirds of its upper structure to fifteen hundred years of hurricane winds and erosion.

With their backs pressed against the moss-covered third row of rock, and hidden by the vegetation, the boys held an elevated post looking down into a large flat area about the size of half a football field. Judging by the tall lumps of vegetation enclosing it, it looked as if it might have been a courtyard, surrounded by temples or meeting places. At its center was a massive stone, waist-high and five feet long, elevated on a platform of smaller stones. The platform and table had been cleared of vines and weeds. It stood in stark contrast to the wild, uncontrollable growth surrounding it.

Tia Dalma stood by the long flat rock, the journal open in front of her. Maleficent paced nearby. The Evil Queen leaned against the van, scowling, a large duffel bag at her feet. Four men—ship crewmen who Maybeck recognized as OT Zombies—struggled with a towering horned gorilla.

Chernabog. As nasty and terrifying a creature as Finn had ever seen. His skin crawled as though he were covered with leeches.

“He’s huge,” Maybeck whispered. Given the jungle sounds he could have shouted and not have been heard. But Chernabog had stunned him to silence.

“He’s disgusting,” Charlene said. “Eew! Is that a bull’s head?”

“And bat ears,” Finn said.

“Eight feet tall at least,” the professor said clinically. “Possibly ten. A living monster.”

“We’ve got to get out of here,” Willa said, her words hanging in the thick air. “He’s…worse than anything we’ve ever seen.”

“And then some,” said Charlene. “Do we really think we can help Dillard against that thing?”