Ambush. Part 18

"Well, there you have it," I said. "My father's not well."

Sheriff Pax pulled past the gate and drove up the drive.

"It really is quite a place you live in," the sheriff said in awe. "I bet there's no other manor in the world as amazing as this."

"That's probably true," I said, feeling proud.

"Funny, I've never seen it mentioned in any articles or seen any pictures of it on the Internet."

"Why would there be?" I asked, wanting him to just hurry and pull up to the manor so I could get out.

"The world loves architecture," the sheriff explained. "It just seems as though there would be a number of people interested in this place."

"We're kinda off the beaten path," I pointed out.

"That's true," Sheriff Pax said. "But combined with the rumors of dragons, this should be like Area 51."

"People used to come around," I said defensively, feeling as if he were ripping on the manor. "They used to try and get to the back gardens and look at the conservatory."

"Why?" Sheriff Pax asked.

"You really need to take some sort of pill that helps you with your memory," I said. "That's where the dragons were raised, of course."

Sheriff Pax stopped the car in the courtyard and put it in park. He didn't get out to open my door for me. Instead he picked up a notebook from the pa.s.senger seat and scribbled something in it.

"I need to tell you something," he said seriously. "I'm going to request that you not attend school the rest of the year."

"What?" I asked, both angry and relieved.

"I can't be sure that you didn't have something to do with what happened today," he explained. "A lot of people could have been seriously hurt."

"So I won't graduate?" I asked with concern.

"I'll get Princ.i.p.al Wales to gather all your work," he said, as if that would comfort me. "You'll graduate, but you won't be attending."

"What happens if tomorrow the bus is attacked when I'm not on it?"

"I'd be surprised," he said. "You and I both know that what happened today had everything to do with you. Now the challenge for me is to make sure I don't forget it."

"When people get older, like you, it gets hard to remember." I wasn't trying to be mean, it was just some useless thought I didn't have the willpower to keep to myself.

"Thanks," Sheriff Pax said sternly.

"You're welcome."

Sheriff Pax closed his notebook and set it back down in the pa.s.senger seat. He stared out the front window at the manor for a few seconds before speaking.

"Do you mind if I look around?" he asked. "It's been a while since I've wandered your grounds."

"I guess not," I replied, shrugging. "Knock yourself out."

Sheriff Pax looked at me strangely, and then got out of the car and opened my door. I stepped out and thanked him.

"I'd tip you," I said, "but Thomas stopped my allowance because of what happened at the museum."

Sheriff Pax put his right hand on my left shoulder.

"Beck, I'm going to figure this out," he said honestly. "Kingsplot means too much to me to let it go."

"Good luck," I said nicely. "I'm rooting for you to come to your senses."

"You could make it easier," he told me.

"Yeah," I replied kindly. "But that's not really my style."

Sheriff Pax smiled.

"Something about you impresses me," he said. "But something bigger concerns me."

"You're a complicated man," I pointed out.

Sheriff Pax walked over toward the garage as I walked into the back service door to try and explain to Millie why I was home early.

Chapter 23.

You Can't Do That Believe it or not, I was very happy to be forcedly homeschooled. There were only a few weeks left of school, and I was more than willing to do all my learning right in the manor. I spent an hour the next morning doing homework in the kitchen with Millie and Wane. I needed their help with geometry, but they had more questions about what had happened yesterday than math a.s.sistance.

"The trees just fell from the sky?" Wane asked.

"No," I replied, wondering why everyone liked to ask that. "They fell from the cliffs."

"Don't be smart," Millie said.

"What should I be, then?"

"Beck, we're concerned," Millie said, ignoring me. "Your father's not available to even talk to. I know that if he were, he'd have instructions regarding what to do with you because of what happened."

"Can't we just act like we did when I first moved here?" I begged. "Remember how we never talked about anything?"

"We want you to be safe," Wane said compa.s.sionately.

"I don't know what happened yesterday, but I know that I seem to have no problems while I'm here in the manor," I pointed out. "And since I'm probably never going to get to go anywhere else, I should be fine."

"You'll be extra careful and watchful?" Millie asked.

"Of course," I promised.

"That's a good boy," Millie said, handing me a plateful of cookies.

Wane put her curiosity aside and helped me with my homework for another hour. I then told them I had reading homework to do and headed back up to the fifth floor. I grabbed a flashlight, opened the closet, hopped into the elevator, and pushed the b.u.t.ton.

All three dragons were waiting for me as I got off the elevator. Jude was strong and so cool-looking. His jet black skin and orange eyes made me wish I could show him off somewhere or enter him into a contest. Paul and Malcolm were cool but in a different way. They were so similar looking. The only real difference was their coloring. They were also more mischievous and unbridled. They screamed and tussled with each other constantly. Jude would always just look as if he were above all that.

Jude was roughly the size of a small horse now. In the last couple of days he had begun to open and exercise his wings. They too were jet black with orange at the tips, and when he flapped them, it felt like he could grasp the dirt and lift the entire earth out of orbit. I knew that now was the time to move them; by tomorrow it might be too late.

I still had no great idea where to put them. I halfway wished I had planted them in the train cave, but it was so far away and it would have taken too much effort to get to. And hauling food up there would have been almost impossible. I thought about moving them up to the seventh floor of the manor. If I put them in the big hall of the east wing they might go unnoticed for an afternoon. I had no real solution, so I figured I would just take them deep into the forest and make sure they were tied up so they couldn't travel too far. If I got them beyond the boulder field, there was a small grove that would hide them from everyone. It wasn't a perfect solution, but it was the best I could think of.

Millie and Thomas were going into Kingsplot in the afternoon to take care of some legal matters for my father. Wane would be gone as well with her boyfriend. So now felt like the perfect time to move the dragons. Scott was a problem, but he was supposedly working on repairing part of the stable roof. If I took the dragons out the east end, he would never see anything.

I returned to my room and waited for Millie and Thomas to leave. I stood by my window and witnessed Wane getting picked up and driving off.

It was now or never.

I went down to the gla.s.s cavern and tried to explain to the dragons what was happening.

"We're going someplace better," I said. "But I'll have to take you one at a time."

They seemed fine with it, but I could tell they also didn't really understand.

I knew that Paul and Malcolm would freak out if I took Jude first, so the plan was to take Malcolm, then Jude, and finally Paul.

"This is going to be great," I said putting my left arm around Malcolm's neck and leading him toward the elevator.

He followed me into the elevator without making any fuss. The fit inside the elevator was tight but we both squeezed in. I turned on the flashlight hanging from the ceiling and adjusted the light. Everything was running smoothly until I pressed the b.u.t.ton. The metal gate dropped, and the elevator wheezed and began to lift. Malcolm pushed at the walls and dug his right wing into my stomach.

"Easy, Malcolm," I said. "This will just take a few minutes."

Malcolm snorted repeatedly as if he were on the verge of hyperventilating. He rocked on his feet and blinked his blue eyes rapidly. He opened his jaw, and his long red tongue rolled out and hung from the side of his mouth as he panted.

"It's going to be fine," I comforted, patting him on his scaly yellow neck.

The truth is, I could tell it wasn't going to be fine. Each inch we ascended, Malcolm became more and more agitated. He snapped at me twice, and by the time we had lifted high enough to be above ground, he was screeching and pulling at the metal gate. He kept trying to open his wings and jump through the ceiling. The flashlight was knocked about, giving the elevator a sort of strobe-light feel. He tore my shirt in half, ripped the right knee of my jeans, and dug a long scratch on my left arm. I started screaming louder than he was, begging him to knock it off. I was scared that his struggling and fighting would break the small elevator apart or strand us mid-floors.

"Please, Malcolm," I pleaded. "Hang on."

Just as the elevator was about to come apart at the corners, we lifted above the fourth floor and came to a stop at the fifth. I threw open the gate and pushed the closet door open. Malcolm didn't waste a second; he burst from the elevator and into the bathroom. He thrashed around, slipping on the tile floor and trying to figure out just where he was.

"Malcolm!" I yelled, grabbing at his tail.

He whipped his tail around, shaking off my grip. He then ran from the bathroom and into the hall. I ran after him, but he was too fast.

"Malcolm!"

His strong talons grabbed the floor and propelled him forward. I could see chunks of wood floor flying around like shrapnel. I dove at him, and he grabbed onto the hallway wall and ran sideways for three steps before spinning and diving into the large fifth-floor foyer.

Malcolm turned and faced me. Spreading his red wings, he stood up tall on his hind legs and snorted.

I held up my hands to show that I wasn't going to do anything. I could see the large windows behind him and knew that if he wanted to he could just bust out and I'd never catch him.

"Malcolm," I reasoned. "I'm not going to hurt you. We just need to relocate."

He c.o.c.ked his head.

"Relocate," I said slowly as if he just needed me to enunciate to clear things up.

I was worried he might go out the windows, but instead he turned and charged directly toward one of the interior walls. He was so strong he broke right through the wall and into one of the bedrooms on the floor. Dust and wood flew everywhere as I stood there in awe.

I could hear him thrashing around in the other room and then he burst out of another wall and back into the hall. Apparently he had no concept of doors.

"Malcolm, stop!"

He tore down the hall, running along the floor and the wall. He would screech and hop back to the other wall to run farther. He was like a tempest that swirled up and down the walls as he ran. He reached the end of the hall and turned to look back at me.

I suddenly couldn't decide if I really wanted him to come to me or not. The look in his eyes was one of great malice.

"Listen, Malcolm," I said, holding my hands up. "I was just trying to help. You couldn't stay down there forever."

Malcolm didn't like my discourse. He screeched and came charging toward me. I moved to the side, and he ran back into the foyer and through the opposite side wall. Before the dust had settled, he had come out the other side and was running on the wall heading in the direction of the bathroom. He skidded to a stop.

"Hold on!" I ordered him.

Malcolm looked at me and opened his dark red mouth. He stomped his feet and crashed through another wall into the room right next to the bathroom that was filled with old washers and boilers. He kept going and rammed himself through the inner wall and into the bathroom. As he did, a large iron boiler broke loose from the storage room and crashed into the bathroom. The boiler rolled on its side and stopped in front of the elevator door.

Malcolm jumped over the boiler and climbed into the elevator. He then sat there calmly and looked directly at me.

"Fine," I said. "We'll go back down."

Malcolm snorted.

I squeezed back into the elevator with him and pushed the b.u.t.ton. I had no idea it was possible for a dragon to look so smug.

"This is what you want?" I asked as the elevator began to descend. "There's no way out for you guys."

Malcolm didn't seem to care.

"Seriously," I said. "In a day or two you'll be too big to get out."

Malcolm emitted a deep guttural growl. I didn't mean to, but I got goose b.u.mps. I guess there's just something goose-b.u.mp-inducing about descending in a secret elevator with a growling dragon.

"I can't keep bringing food down," I tried to reason, barely able to move in the cramped s.p.a.ce. "You'll die without food."