HEART OF ICE

CHAPTER 22-Part One

Everything happens for a reason. I had chosen the third door before I had even realized it. Orion's chalk was between his fingers and then against the plywood in a flash. Barely a minute later, I was leading the way through the opened doorway and onto a damp, concrete stoop. It was at least five or six feet below ground level, leaving only dirt-stained bricks and dried grass as the view in front of me.

I didn't stand still for long after walking across the enchanted threshold. The music building of Trinity High School loomed above and behind me. I glanced over my shoulder to see Moe coming through. It was about to get very crowded in the small, open space below the chorus room. By the time Alejandra was through, I had scaled a set of steep stairs near the open door and was back at ground level.

The music building was empty except for the two teachers of that department, their names visible across from each other in a room at the front corner of the structure. The next closest names were across the street to my right. They hovered above and around the rows of houses that stretched and wound away with the curve of the long street. I didn't see anyone's I recognized or anyone that was coming toward us.

"Christopher, look," said Alejandra, pointing toward the student parking lot in front of us. She had spotted Robert Garrig's car. But where was Robert Garrig?

I walked past the end of the building's pale, brick wall. I wanted a clearer view of the back of half of the campus. Names began to fade into focus. They started out as hazy lines in the distance, then slowly condensed into small, sharp letters. There were more than two dozen moving through and around the gym. A few more were at the cafeteria, and more were beyond there. I closed my eyes. I wanted to block out all the obstacles and distractions. He was here, somewhere. I pushed all my other thoughts aside. I imagined my mind sweeping the air away between myself and the others I saw. My brain zoomed in as best it could, searching anxiously.

"Maybe he's already gone," said Alejandra. "Maybe the others were waiting to pick him up in one of those black vans."

Alejandra might have been right. We had no way of knowing how long ago he'd left his house or when he'd gotten back to school. It seemed like a pointless search-until it wasn't. "Wait," I said.

I spotted the letters R-O-B untangling themselves from the swaying cluster at the gym. Another name was moving ahead of them, Charley Bedem. I didn't know him. I didn't focus on him. Instead, I watched the other name that had fully emerged from the big group. It was the one and only Robert Garrig.

"Got him," I said.

I opened my eyes and pointed toward the gym doors. I glimpsed the scrawny silhouette of Charley Bedem scurrying across the empty street and back onto the main campus.

"What's the plan," asked Alejandra, watching the temperamental Robert in the distance.

"Let's get him," I said simply.

"Sounds like a good plan to me," said Moe, smiling at my side.

"Let's go, then."

"Weapons," Orion asked?

I shook my head. "Not yet."

"Yes, sir."

My pace across the dry grass was steady and quick without seeming like I was leading us on a panicked charge. We hadn't gone very far before I saw Robert Garrig halt in his tracks. I watched his head turn slowly to his left. His eyes on me brought my own hurried gait to a stop. Alejandra and Moe bumped against my arms. I didn't look at either of them. I didn't look away from Robert and he didn't look away from us. My skin crawled in those long and silent seconds. The air felt colder around us. With each new second and tingle sneaking its way up my spine and through my limbs, it felt as if another degree had dropped in the cold air of the aging afternoon.