CHAPTER ELEVEN
The two children sprinted along the pine-needle-covered trail, under the spindly trees. The shadows flickered over their faces. The sun was high in the sky now, and the air was hot and still.
“Do you hear them?” Elliot panted.
“No. Come on! Run!” said Uchenna.
“I’m running as fast as I can!”
“Really? Oh.”
Elliot frowned and pumped his arms harder. He started to catch up with Uchenna. “There you go!” she cried. Then she sped up. Elliot groaned.
They catapulted around a bend, Elliot right behind Uchenna—
SLAM!
Uchenna bounced and fell backward onto her rear end. Elliot came skidding to a halt.
They both looked up.
Professor Fauna towered over them. His hair stood on end. His black-and-white eyebrows and whiskers bristled. And his eyes—well, his eyes looked like death.
“¡Palabrota! Where have you been? What have you been doing?” The professor was not shouting. He was whispering. And his voice was trembling. Which was much more frightening than if he’d been shouting. “Do you know what is in this forest? Do you know how dangerous this place is? How deadly? What secrets lurk here?” His Adam’s apple, which stuck out from his wrinkled neck, went up and down. Suddenly, he turned away from them.
Elliot and Uchenna did not move as Professor Fauna started back down the path.
Without turning around, Professor Fauna said, “It would be unwise not to follow me.”
Elliot and Uchenna were sure he was right.
Professor Fauna marched out ahead of them, his tweed suit plastered with dust and his leather shoes caked with mud. Elliot wrung his hands. Sweat prickled on the back of his neck. The forest felt colder, darker now. He hated getting in trouble.
Uchenna glanced into the trees to their right. Then she did it again.
“What?” Elliot whispered.
“I don’t know,” Uchenna replied, her voice barely audible. “I think there’s something there.”
A catbrier rustled. Then a blue jay took flight from it.
“It was just a bird,” Elliot said.
Uchenna nodded. But she continued glancing over her shoulder into the trees.
When Miss Vole caught sight of Professor Fauna leading Elliot and Uchenna down the path, she hustled over to them with furious little steps. All the students saw this and immediately positioned their fingers over their ears.
But Miss Vole’s voice dropped about four octaves. “I have never—been so afraid—in my life,” she said. “Anything could have happened to you! You could have been attacked by a bear!”
Elliot nodded and let his head fall to his chest.
“Or had to fight a bobcat!”
Elliot’s head snapped back up. “That’s what I said!”
Miss Vole was in no mood to be interrupted. “Or been kidnapped by pirates!”
“Wait, are there still pirates—?” Uchenna began.
Miss Vole cut her off. “Or accidentally drunk poison from a pitcher plant!”
“How would we accidentally—?”
“Or been eaten by a tiger!”
Uchenna and Elliot looked at each other.
“If it escaped a cage somewhere,” Miss Vole clarified.
Elliot turned to Uchenna. “See?!?” Uchenna rolled her eyes.
Their teacher raised a single finger. Both children fell silent. Their shoulders drooped. Their teacher sighed. “Sometimes, I think I should have stayed in the marines.” Then she turned away from them.
Uchenna said, “You were in the marines?” But Miss Vole was done talking.
Uchenna felt something on the back of her neck. She turned and saw Professor Fauna glowering at her from under his dark brows.