HEART OF ICE

CHAPTER 26

A little more strength is exactly what I received.

Moe scaled over the broken van, landing on the slick pavement and sliding unstoppably across the short stoop toward the door. He hit it hard, pushing his weight against the plywood all at once. The soldier on the other side bounced backward but quickly recovered. Despite Moe's effort, it still wasn't enough.

Gerald appeared next. He'd run around the van to come bouncing off the brick walls of the shallow inlet. He threw himself, with outstretched arms, into the the enchanted barrier.

The door swung all the way open and wildly out of control. With all my weight pressed against the plywood, there was nothing I could do to stop from falling through the enchanted passage. I wasn't alone. Moe and Gerald fell across the threshold with me. All three of us shouted in surprise, barely masking the sound of armor crunching against a hard, warm floor. The dark cement would definitely have hurt more if the lone Legion soldier hadn't been there to break the fall.

I was still kind of dizzy as I quickly sat up. The jarring impact had sent me tumbling off to the side of the dark-armored trooper. Gerald was already back on his feet. Moe had fallen off to the right. I saw him using the beams of a metal shelf to hoist himself back upright. In front of me, Alejandra was leading the dwarves out of the alley and through the doorway. She looked at me and then suddenly to my right.

The anonymous soldier had pulled their pistol out. I saw the barrel pointed at my head. Their finger was moving on the trigger. "NO," Alejandra said loudly, her scuffed shoe colliding with the soldier's gloved hand in a swift and ferocious kick. A shot leapt from the pistol, cracking into the ceiling above us.

"He's trying to get away," Gerald yelled.

"Grab him," I said, stretching to my left in an awkward dive.

The soldier rolled away from my reach, but not Alejandra's. She grabbed their left arm and right shoulder as they hurried to get on their feet and get away. For a second, it looked like Alejandra was helping him. And then, she shoved the trooper, face-first, into the closest wall. The soldier bucked, trying to recoil. Alejandra expertly countered, swinging the armored foe around and pushing them down hard. With a crack and a thud, the soldier was back on the concrete floor.

"Stop it," Alejandra shouted.

"Moe, Huron, find something to tie him up with," I ordered, standing up.

"Here comes the calvary," Baron said as he hurried across the threshold from the alley.

"Shut that door," Orion said sternly to the breathless teenager. "Where are we, by the way?"

"There's some kind of map over here," Gerald said. He walked toward a framed diagram hanging near a pair of green, plastic, double doors.

"This looks like a stockroom," Alejandra said, glancing around quickly while she held the defeated soldier in place. She had him pinned to one corner of a steel rack while Moe and Huron hurriedly tied his arms and legs to it.

"I smell cookies," said Baron.

"Thank you," I said. "I thought I was the only one."

"Oh. It's a grocery store," Gerald said studying the diagram he had spotted. "It's a Samuelson's. Those are nice stores."

Beyond the green, double doors, the distinctive sound of gun fire filled the crowded sales floor. All of us turned toward the doors at once. The frightened screams of the unsuspecting shoppers bounced off the walls and ceilings. I saw their names moving wildly. They were all trying to flee.