“Of course we can trust her. Why would she kill us? But she’s so nice…,” Sukey said in a deep voice that I suppose was meant to mimic Zander’s. “I can’t believe I went along with your stupid plan. Now we’re going to be dead and it will probably be Halla who will put an arrow through your heart.”
“Actually,” I pointed out, “he said they had humane methods so I don’t think it’s going to be an arrow—”
“I don’t care how they do it!” Sukey said. “They’re still going to do it.”
“This is just like the room they had me locked in,” M.K. said, after inspecting the perimeter, “except it has bars and there’s no vent. I don’t see any way out of this.”
“Great,” Sukey said in a broken voice. “What are we going to do now?”
For a long time, we all just sat there. I don’t know how many hours went by, but eventually M.K. lay down with her head in my lap and Zander and Sukey stretched out on the floor, too, and somehow, in spite of the direness of our situation, we all fell asleep.
I woke up first and reached over to lift Sukey’s wrist so I could see her watch. Her skin was cool, and underneath my fingers I could feel the steady, insistent pulsing of her blood. I wanted to hold her hand again, to hold her, and to tell her how sorry I was that we’d gotten her into this, but her eyes fluttered and she looked up at me in alarm.
“It’s just me,” I whispered. “I was just checking the time.”
“I thought it was them,” she whispered back. “I thought this was it.”
We stared at each other for a couple of long moments before she looked away, and then Zander and M.K. woke up, too, and the four of us sat there in silence, no one knowing what to say. It was M.K. who finally spoke. “I think I kind of thought that Dad was going to be here,” she said in a quiet voice. “When I saw that envelope, I felt like he was playing a trick on us.”
I nodded. “I know what you mean. It was like they were telling us he was dead all over again.”
“Why would he do that?” Zander asked. “Why would he leave us a map with that note, and no explanation of any of it? How are we supposed to know what to do with it?”
“Maybe,” Sukey said, “it’s like with the other map. Maybe this is only part of it and maybe there’s another part somewhere that you have to find.”
“I think you’re right,” I said, sitting up suddenly. “When you think about it, we were the only ones who could have figured it out. No one else knew about the double map, no one else knew about the Expeditioners. He didn’t tell us anything more, because he didn’t want anyone else to be able to figure it out. It’s useless as it is, but there’s something else to this map, a clue that only we can solve.
“Dad never told us that he’d been kicked out of the Expedition Society. Why? He never told us about the secret map. Why? He never said anything about being part of the Mapmakers’ Guild. Why? There’s some sort of big secret here. I think there must be other places, other secret places that Dad knew about, that maybe other people from the Mapmakers’ Guild knew about, too. And for some reason, he wanted us to know about them. It was a secret map that led us here. Maybe the new one will lead us somewhere else important.”
“Where do you think it is, Kit?” M.K. asked.
I studied the map closely. “‘Girafalco’s Trench’,” I read out loud. There was something about the map that seemed off, even without knowing the location. The whole thing looked strangely smooth and the contour lines were odd. It was almost like…
“Well,” I said, “I’m not positive, but I think this is a bathymetric map.”
“A bathy what?” Zander asked.
Sukey sat up. “I studied this in my cartography class. He means it’s an underwater map. Of the ocean floor.”
“It could be a lake or river, too.” The more I looked at it, the more convinced I was that Dad had given us an underwater map. “But the fact that it says ‘Girafalco’s Trench’ makes me think it’s the ocean. Trenches are in oceans. See how smooth it looks? I’ve seen one of these before. Zander and M.K., do you remember that map that Dad had hanging in the study? Of the Hemelman Trench? That’s what made me think of it.”
I had started to get excited about the map, about collecting atlases and other maps and figuring it out once we were out of the canyon. And then I remembered. I wouldn’t be figuring anything out. I wouldn’t be getting out of here alive.
I sat back down, tucking the map back into my vest. I knew the others had read my mind because they sat back down, too, and we all stared blankly at the wall, trying not to think of what was about to happen.
And then we heard Halla’s voice outside the door. “The Keedow wants them taken to the death chamber,” Halla told the guards outside. “I’ll do it. Can you open the door, please?”
The locks clicked and we looked up from where we sat on the floor to see her standing there in the doorway. “Come on,” she said, not meeting our eyes. “Follow me.”
You would think if you had just heard someone say they were taking you to the “death chamber” that you would do whatever you had to do to get free, but we were shocked, I think, and we followed, walking obediently along until she looked quickly in both directions and then leaned into the wall. There was a clicking of gears and a disguised section of wall swung out. “Quick,” she said. “In there. Right now.” Dumbfounded, we did as she said and a second later heard the wall click back into place behind us.
“All right,” she said. “I’m going to get you out of here.”
“You’re not going to kill us?” I was disoriented now, not sure what was happening, and even more confused by the strange low light in the tunnel. There seemed to be some torches here and there, but otherwise it was completely dark and I wasn’t sure if we were headed up or down.
“Of course not,” she said. “I had to pretend so Hanno wouldn’t know I’m helping you. Follow me.” We ran through the darkness, following Halla, and I remembered what M.K. had said about hidden tunnels behind the canyon walls and underneath the ground.
“Okay,” she said finally, leading the way to the top of a short staircase lit by a large torch. “Here we are. We’re near the mine.”
“Wait,” I said, stopping. “Hold on a minute.”
“What?” Sukey asked. “What’s wrong, Kit?” They were all looking at me.
“We haven’t been thinking straight,” I told them. “We haven’t been…” I turned to Halla. “Your brother is right. We’re not going to tell anyone, but that may not… that may not be enough. There are fifty or so people out there. Before, they were just looking for the treasure, but now they’re looking for us, too. All they’d have to do would be to look behind the waterfall and find the cave. With the IronSteeds, with their equipment, They could come down in a glider or a SteamAirship, break open the ceiling… they’d have no trouble getting here.”
“Well,” Halla said confidently, “they wouldn’t get very far.”
I adjusted my vest. “No, you don’t understand. They have weapons, airships, all kinds of tools. And if something happened to them, more people like them would follow. They’re working with BNDL. That’s a… a government agency. They would never give up on the treasure… or whatever else they’re hoping to find here. Our father knew about your people and the canyon, but I think he had other secrets, too, and these people will do anything to find out what they are.”
For the second time since I’d met her, Halla looked worried.
“They’re bad, these people,” I told her. I paced around the narrow tunnel for a minute. “I have an idea, though. What if we made it seem like these men—the Nackleys, they’re called—what if we made it seem like they’d found the treasure, only in Drowned Man’s Canyon? What if we put some gold, some of the treasure, there, and we led them there so they would find it?” I was making it up as I went, but I knew it was a pretty good idea.
“They’d stop looking,” Sukey said. “No one would ever come here looking for it again. You’d be safe forever!”
“That’s pretty brilliant,” Zander said, grinning at me. “I can’t believe you thought of it.”
“Thanks a lot.” Somehow, Zander making fun of my intelligence was the most comforting thing I could have heard. I turned to Halla. “Would you mind if we take some of the gold?”
She thought for a minute. “If anyone finds out, I’ll have to say you overpowered me and stole it. And you’re going to need horses and saddlebags to carry it out. But I can get you some, I think.”