The wind. That’s what gives me the idea there might be another way out. The cool air sighing into my face. I figure it has to come from outside, and if we follow the wind we’ll find it.

Worms sniffs at the air. “Smells like dragon breath,” she says.

I go, “Huh?”

“Sulfur and rotten eggs.”

I go, “Nah,” but she’s got me thinking about dragons and things that live in the dark, or die there.

It turns out there’s more than one tunnel that goes down into the mine. There’s like a maze deal going on, with tunnels branching off all over the place.

It reminds me of this ant farm I had once, until the ants got out and started snacking on Gram’s homemade raspberry jam. Anyhow, before they escaped, the ants were digging a bunch of little tunnels and paths, and they kept streaming in and out, carrying grains of sand that were as big as boulders, if you happened to be an ant.

So I guess miners are like the human version of ants. They just keep digging until they find something good, and then they dig some more. They probably knew exactly where they were going, but I sure don’t. It’s not like they left behind signs that say THIS WAY TO ESCAPE or anything.

All we can do is follow the wind. And that’s not easy because sometimes it’s so faint you can barely feel the air moving, or you think it’s your imagination and not the wind at all.

The Worm, she’s got a talent for it. We’ll be creeping along real slow and careful, making sure not to bump into timbers that hold up the roof, and then we’ll come to a place where the tunnel branches off in two or three more directions. And Worm will stand there, her miner’s hat shining like a lighthouse in the dark. She’ll close her eyes and feel the air on her face, and then finally she’ll point at the right tunnel.

At least I hope it’s the right tunnel. Because the light-beam batteries aren’t going to last forever, and even if Worm isn’t scared of the dark, I am.

I figure once her light goes out, the whole mountain will probably come down on top of us. I can feel it all around me, how much the mine wants to bury us. Partly that’s because I can’t stand up straight, I have to move along hunched over. Whoever dug these tunnels made them for normal-sized people, not for me.

We’re shuffling along, being careful not to bump into any of the old beams that hold up the mountain, when we come to another fork in the tunnel.

Worm shines her light into the tunnels but we can’t see to the end. And I can’t feel any air moving at all.

“Wait,” Worm says, and she closes her eyes and tries to feel the wind on her face. When that doesn’t work she starts counting off the way little kids do, except she does her own version. She goes, “Eenie-meenie-miney-moe, catch a dragon by the toe. If he saves us, let him go. Eenie-meenie-miney-moe.”

“Are you serious?” I ask.

“It’s better than just guessing,” she says. “You got a better idea?”

I don’t have a better idea, so we go down the “moe” tunnel. Which at first seems like all the other tunnels, with these rotten old timbers and boards holding up the roof, and piles of dirt and rock that have seeped down through the planks. But before we get very far, the floor starts getting damp. There are wet-looking streaks along the sides, and if you listen carefully you can hear the bloink-bloink of dripping water.

I go, “I dunno about this,” because the dark is bad enough when it’s dry, but Worm keeps scooting along and it’s hard for me to keep up because the top of the tunnel keeps trying to wham me on the head. I’m going, “Hey, wait up!” but she won’t slow down.

“We’re almost there,” she calls back. “I can feel it.”

I go, “Slow down, please? I’m tired.”

Worm finally slows down and waits for me to catch up. Which turns out to be a good thing. Because right around the next curve in the tunnel there’s this big hole in the floor. At first I think it’s just a shadow, but the Worm’s light doesn’t touch it and I go, “Whoa!” and pull her back from the edge just before we both fall in.

It’s an old mine shaft going straight down into the deepest, darkest place in the world.

Worm aims her miner’s hat into the hole, but the beam of light fades out before it hits bottom, that’s how deep it is. When I drop a rock and listen for the clunk, there is no clunk. Like maybe the rock will keep falling forever, until it gets to the very center of the earth. There’s an old ladder built into the side of the shaft, but some of the rungs are busted and you can see where the dampness has rotted up the wood.

“I bet that’s where it happened,” Worm says. “The cave-in. Way down there.”

I don’t know what to say. Maybe she’s right, maybe this is as close as she’ll ever get to where her father died. I’m trying to think what it means to me when I visit my mom’s grave in the cemetery. I always bring flowers, but today we don’t have any flowers with us. We don’t have much of anything.

“We could pray,” I say, and Worm seems to like the idea. So we get down on our knees and fold up our hands, and when Worm nods her head to pray, her beam of light shines down into the shaft, and it looks scary and beautiful all at the same time.

Worm is praying silent, so I don’t know exactly what she’s thinking or saying inside her head. But whatever it is seems to change her. She kind of relaxes all at once, like she’s been waiting all her life to do this, and now that she’s finally here she can let go and not be scared anymore.

I don’t know what to pray, so I just thank God that her dad gave Worm the miner’s light to find her way, because we sure would be lost without it.

When we’re done, Worm gives my hand a squeeze and says, “Thanks.”

Like a dummy I go, “Thanks for what?”

“For being Max the Mighty.”

I go, “Look, I told you, there’s no such thing as Max the Mighty. I’m just plain Maxwell Kane, okay?”

“Sure, okay. But when things got really bad I told myself Max the Mighty would come, and you did.”

“I couldn’t think of anything else to do,” I say.

“I know,” she says. “That’s why you’re Max the Mighty.”

I’m about to tell her she’s cracked in the brain if she really thinks that, but she goes, “Ssssh. We’ll argue about it later. Right now we have to follow the wind. I can feel it, can you?”

I really can feel the wind. It smells cool and dry and it makes me think we’re getting closer to the outside. Because I can’t really explain it, but the air smells like it comes from the sky.

We edge around the mine shaft — there’s barely enough room for my big fat feet — and head on up the tunnel.

“We’ll come back here someday,” she says. “You promise?”

I go, “Sure thing,” but really I’m thinking no way. We get out of this place, I’m never coming back, not for all the TVs in China.

The tunnel starts to slope up and the wind feels even cooler and fresher, and I’m thinking, Way to go, you big goon, you were right for once in your life, maybe you aren’t so dumb after all.

Then the tunnel starts getting wider, wide enough so the sides kind of melt away into the shadows, and I swear it’s starting to get lighter. The roof part gets higher, too, and stops trying to wham me on the head, and it’s all I can do to keep from running.

Easy does it, I’m thinking. You’re almost there.

“Uh-oh,” Worm says.

Uh-oh is right. Because suddenly the wind starts pushing hard against us, like something big is coming into the tunnel.

Worm goes, “The dragon! He’s coming back!”

The ground starts shaking under my feet and the wind is coming faster and I can hear this low kind of growl, like a giant monster really has entered the tunnel, and we’re in the way of where it wants to go.

Grrrruhhhruhhhhruhhhhhhh!

Coming to get us, making the shadows go crazy and filling the whole tunnel with wind and noise.

Then it starts to ROAR.

My brain keeps telling me, There’s no such thing as dragons, but this sure sounds like one.

I pick Worm up and hold her tight so the wind doesn’t blow her away. I’m so scared, my feet won’t run.

That’s when the glowing eyes find us. Eyes so bright they paint us with light. Eyes so bright it’s like looking into the sun. Which must be what dragon eyes look like when they want to eat you up, or burn you to a crisp.

That’s when I know we’re going to die and there’s nothing I can do about it.