Black Bird of the Gallows(80)

I bite my lip. Every shred of my being wants to run over there and haul my dog into the van, but it would take three of us to carry a thrashing, snarling Roger inside.

My fingers find the key and turn it. The engine rattles to life, momentarily filling the interior with a puff of exhaust. My stomach clenches at the familiar smell. Memories crowd my head. I lock one hand around the steering wheel and the other around the knob of the gearshift.

Reece looks at me, then hits the garage door remote button. “You got this.”

I nod, but my heart pounds in my throat. “What if they grab on as we’re driving away?”

“That happens only in movies,” Reece says. “Just drive.”

The garage door isn’t fully up before I tromp the clutch and put us into reverse. I’ve driven this beast many times—illegally, of course. I was eleven, twelve, but tow-away zones wait for no mother to regain consciousness.

The Bus feels clunky and old compared to my automatic Honda. But I still remember how to finesse the sticky gearshift and the weird timing required to work the clutch.

I set my jaw and ignore the two Beekeepers who jump out of the way. Roger clamps his jaws on one of their ankles. A powerful arm swings down, sending him skidding across the garage with a pained yelp.

My throat squeezes tight at the sound, but the Beekeepers are already outside. They spread their arms and burst into two massive swarms of bees.

Lacey lets out a muffled scream. “Oh my God, did you see that?”

I hit the brake, turn the wheel, and slam the Bus into drive. The smell of burned rubber mixes with honey and exhaust and the bite of my own fear.

A roiling wall of bees rolls toward us like an angry storm cloud. And it’s gaining on us.

“Where are we going?” I call out to anyone in the van. “Directions!”

“Turn right at the T,” Deno replies. “Follow it to the old mine road.”

I go sightless for a split second. “Are you sick? We’re not going there.”

Deno stabs a finger toward Reece. “He says they won’t go underground. There’s an old mine entrance back there somewhere. It’s—”

“Burnham Mine,” I cut in. “I know where it is.”

“Good. That’s where we’re going.”

Reece nods. “They won’t follow us into the mine.”

I glance at the rearview mirror and let out a whimper.

“You’d better be right.” I grit my teeth and yank the wheel toward the right at the crossroads.

The van pitches to the left but doesn’t tip. Tires squeal. I hit the gas and steer through the winding road as the paved drives of my neighbors’ homes flash by. The road ends in a tidy gravel parking lot and a big sign about proper trail conduct and a dog poop bag dispenser. I never took note of these civilized things before on my many walks out to the mine. The world right now is not civilized at all.

I blow past the trail entrance to the lovely hike up Mt. Franklin and turn left down the maintenance road, flattening a sign that says Official Vehicles Only.

We bounce horribly over rocks and roots, but I can’t slow down. The bees are behind us. I can hear their furious drone over the noisy engine and the branches whipping against the windows. I remind myself to thank my dad for putting new, all-weather tires on this thing when he had it restored. This ride would be over at the first bump if the van still had the bald, cracked ones my mom drove around on.

Then I find the side path to the mine. It’s perilously narrow for a bit, but then the road widens and the entrance to the mine comes into view. So does the eight-foot-high chain link fence that I’m used to squeezing through.

My heart stops. I swear it does. “Reece!”

He grips the back of my seat. “Keep going. The fence is down around the other side, behind those trees.”

This is suicide. The bees must have discerned our plan. They divide up—half follow us, the other half break off and appear to swarm at the entrance of the mine.

I ignore Deno’s frantic pointing and swing around a stand of trees, downshift, and brake in a spray of dirt and rocks. Sure enough, a section of the fence curls away from the rest. I hit the gas and burst through the opening. It’s not wide enough. The sides of the Bus screech as clipped chain link scrapes teal paint, but we take down what is left of the fence and cross to the mine entrance. Yes, the one we’re heading toward. That’s when I understand—the bees are swarming there to disguise the precise entry. Maybe they are trying to make us crash so they’ll have us injured and surrounded.

I bite my bottom lip and line the van up with the domed entrance as best I can, working on memory and instinct and hoping for a bit of luck.

“Oh crap!” Deno yells. “There’s a wall up there, Ange!”

“I can take it down,” I say, not that anyone’s listening.

I’m beyond the point of questioning myself. I couldn’t if I wanted to, and I do not want to. I hold my breath. We’re being sandwiched—a swarm ahead and a swarm behind.

A mine entrance that I may or may not be lined up with.

“Headlights!” Reece bellows.

I fumble for the knob and yank the headlights on. I gulp down air and hit the gas pedal again, propelling us into the swarm. Bees splatter on the windshield in sick thuds, immediately followed by the wooden barrier and gate. The windows darken with bees, then darken completely as we plunge into the pitch-black mineshaft. The buzzing eases off, as does my foot on the gas.