To Best the Boys(47)

I seize Seleni’s arm and start shoving at the rest of them. “Guys, we have to go!”

Maybe a different part of the maze will bring relief.

The motion brings Lute around. He shakes his head and blinks, then glances back at me and my vision of Vincent that’s following even as I desperately try to block it out. He frowns and tilts his head, then grits his jaw and jerks his gaze up at the sky. He grabs my shoulder and calls for us to go to the right, then the left. Then straight. Then peers up at the sky again and points us to another left.

He’s using the stars to lead us east, away from the Labyrinth gate entrance.

We follow down one path, then another, and with each turn we make, the nine-foot-high foliage regrows. But at least we’re heading in the right direction.

I think.

The next time the hedge opens up, Lute pushes to the left again, then curses and trips as we run smack straight into Germaine, Rubin, and Vincent who are standing frozen in front of their own visions. From the corner of my eye, I see Vincent’s nightmare. It’s of his own face as a roomful of dead people sit up and begin to come for him. They look diseased.

Something lands at my feet and the next second I’m smacking Will, who’s slumped to the ground. “It’s not real,” I snap at him. “Follow Lute.” I grab his shirt and hoist him up, then sprint forward.

The maze keeps shifting and we keep falling, getting up, and running—single file now—until it feels like time is lost and escaping from these visions is the only thing I’ve ever done, and we are stuck in an endless loop of a nightmare sequence.

A sequence.

Like in math.

I stop so fast both Sam and Seleni plow into me. I shut my eyes and try to remember Kellen’s voice. What did he ask? “How well do you know your maths?”

I spin my mind back over the number of turns we’ve come through and approximate number of steps I’ve run for each. It takes a minute of counting until I land on what is one of the latter maths I learned in my studies with Da. But Lute’s right—it has to do with the stars. The maze is an equation.

“It’s a Foradian equation,” I yell.

“What?” Lute and Vincent both blink through their visions and stare at me.

“A Foradian equation. Count the moves according to the stars—add them up—and follow the formula to find the correct path out.”

Beryll nods even as his mouth stays open in a continuous scream, and Sam shakes his head because he never went that far in school. But Lute and Vincent are already eyeing the sky and calculating the formula same as me.

Count the steps, Rhen. And move.

I start forward but my nightmare’s suddenly in front of me—that image of the ghoul screaming, with its hands on my face.

Ignore it, Rhen.

The scream grows louder and so gut-wrenching, it tears at my blood.

Don’t blink. Don’t alter your gaze. The equation is simple—five left hedges forward, plus three closed behind—

I begin counting off aloud as Lute and Vincent do it with me, and soon Germaine and Seleni are doing it too, until there’s a sudden opening in front of us.

We step through and a flash of something silver wrinkles in the greenery ahead. A door. I have no idea whether it’s back the way we came or forward to the next obstacle. I don’t care. I just want out of here.

Lute presses my shoulder toward it, then turns and grabs Seleni’s, then Sam’s, as Rubin and Vincent and Germaine bolt for what I swear is solidifying into a tangible piece of metal. “Let’s go, Beryll,” Lute yells.

But Beryll’s not coming—he’s staring at the shifting hedges we just erupted from. “Where’s Lawrence?” he’s asking. “Where’s Lawrence?”

“You need to move, mate,” Lute yells. Seleni turns and her eyes go wide, but Lute’s already jumped backward to grab him, and I am reaching for the door Germaine’s just gone through in an effort to keep it open.

“Here—help me!” I shout at Seleni. The thing is far heavier than it should be.

Seleni obeys, then lets out a screech as a green-eyed ghoul plows from the hedge right for us. I shove the door open as hard as I can—and it’s enough for Lute to clear the threshold with Beryll before Seleni and I tumble inside after them.

The door slams shut, and Seleni, Vincent, and I shove our entire weight against it until we hear a click.

Which is when the lights go out.





16

You guys all right?” Sam asks. “Will?”

“I’m here.”

“Lawrence is gone.” Beryll’s voice quivers.

“And you should be glad of it.” Germaine groans through the dark. “Now why not be useful and turn on the bloody—”

The lights flick on, and I’m squinting and blinking at the faces of Vincent, Germaine, Rubin, Sam, Will, Beryll, Seleni, Lute, and some kid I’ve never met.

“Nice work,” Germaine says, getting to his feet. “You do that, Vince?”

“No. It was automatic.” Vincent pushes away from the door and Seleni and me, and gets up to look around the space.

It’s a white stone room no bigger than Uncle Nicholae’s study, except with no shelves, no windows, and no doors other than the one we just came through. I reach up to ensure my hat’s still in place before I sneak a peek at Seleni’s grease-and-dirt-creased face. It’s still good. She catches my look and mouths, “You’re still a boy.” To which I nod and follow Vincent’s cue to move from the door—in case anyone else comes slamming through.