Shadow Walkers (14 page)

We had to fly a long way—miles and miles from Hinder Island, much farther south than the cabin by the lake where we’d first found Gilbert.

But this time I wasn’t fumbling along, trying to retrace some forgotten route from earlier. This time I was back to being guided by the sound of a person, which meant we could soar across the sky. Even I felt like Superman now, invulnerable and throbbing with power.

Somehow I knew just when to stop.

“We’re here,” I said, suspended in the darkness.

We were way beyond even the most rustic of country houses now. It should have been just an ocean of darkness.

And it
was
mostly dark, except for a collection of other
worldly lights. They were enormous, five feet across at least, and swaying slightly, like buoys gently rocking in a sea of thick night fog. Even stranger, each light was a slightly different color—muted shades of white, grey, red, yellow, green, blue, and orange.

Meanwhile, strange noises also rose up from below. One sounded like the gurgle of a river, another like pancakes sizzling, one like the hissing of a freeway, and still another sort of like bubbles popping.

What was this, some kind of circus funhouse? But not surprisingly, it was all definitely coming from within the astral realm.

Nothing about this dimension surprised me anymore. Still, I had to know if all this had anything to do with Billy’s father.

I knew for a fact that he was down there. I could hear him breathing.

———

It wasn’t a funhouse—it was a graveyard. That’s where Emory and I found ourselves.

It was an
old
graveyard, maybe even an abandoned one, given the odd angles of some of the gravestones and small monuments jutting up from the uneven ground. In the real world, there was probably nothing much unusual about the place, except maybe its remote location and its age.

But in the astral dimension? I now had a clearer look at the colored lights that I’d seen from above. They were vortexes—like the one Emory and I had seen before back on Hinder Island, the one that had sucked down the spirit of that old man. There were nine in all, each one a different color and each one slowly sucking in on itself like a miniature galaxy. It was their movements that made them look, from above, like they were swaying.

They were also the source of the strange sounds—the popping, the sizzling, the gurgling, and all the rest.

“More inter-dimensional gates,” Emory said. “What do you think? Each to a different dimension?”

This made sense. “But whose—” I began.

Emory pointed into the shadows among the gravestones, to something I hadn’t noticed at first.

Strange figures stood listlessly among the graves. They were in the astral dimension along with Emory and me, not in the real world. They glowed too, like Emory and me, but dimmer. And they didn’t have silver cords.

“Ghosts,” Emory said. “Well, I guess that makes sense since this is a graveyard.”

“Maybe they’re like Alistair,” I said. “Somehow they’ve learned to avoid going through their gates.”

“I don’t think so,” Emory said. “Look at their faces.”

There were nine ghosts in all, the same as the number of vortexes. I saw an old woman in a ball gown, a hunched old man in an ill-fitting suit, even a small girl with a bow in her hair. They all wafted slowly around the graveyard. Did the different gates mean that every person went to a different dimension after they died? That was interesting.

Emory was right that there was something wrong with their faces. Their bodies were dimmer than ours, but more or less focused. But their faces were somehow indistinct, blurred and wavering. I couldn’t make out their expressions, or even their features. It was the strangest thing. It was like the astral breeze was blowing their faces into some kind of flicking smear even as it left their bodies undisturbed. And since they didn’t have eyes, I guess it made sense that they couldn’t see us—none of the ghosts seemed to notice Emory’s and my arrival.

“Lost souls?” I said. “But why haven’t they been sucked into their next dimensions? That’s what happened to the man at the other gate.”

“Unfinished business?” Emory said. “Or maybe the gates are confused because there’s something wrong with their minds. So they’re stuck in some sort of limbo.”

Emory’s theory made as much sense as anything. The gates themselves weren’t shifting locations, so maybe they were somehow anchored near the physical bodies of the dead, while their spirits were drawn to the general area, not able to move away, but not willing to move on to the next life either.

Emory floated to the closest of the ghosts, an impossibly skinny old woman simply wrapped in a sheet. “Hello?” he said.

The ghost didn’t answer, didn’t even turn Emory’s direction. If anything, her face got blurrier.

“Forget the ghosts,” I said, remembering why we’d come. It had been so easy to be distracted by the figures and rotating vortexes that mesmerized like optical illusions. “We need to find Billy’s father.”

“Let’s just stay away from the gates,” Emory said. “They may not detect the ghosts, but I bet they can detect us.”

“Where
is
he?” I said, meaning Billy’s father. He was the reason we’d come, but I didn’t see him anywhere.

“That must be his,” Emory said, pointing to a single car parked in the graveyard’s gravel parking lot. “Why don’t you listen again?”

Duh. I listened again, and immediately sensed him in a patch of gravestones not twenty feet away. A single ember burned orange in the dark—a cigarette. The light from the inter-dimensional gates and the ghosts didn’t shine into the material plane, so I hadn’t noticed him in the night.

I rocketed closer to him.

Billy’s father looked dark and solid—a sharp contrast to the ashen spirits that surrounded us. Still, like those ghosts, it was hard to make out his face. He definitely
had
a face—it was just hidden by the gloom of the graveyard and the dark filter of the astral dimension. All I knew for sure was that he looked more haggard than when I’d seen him last.

I looked around. I didn’t see Gilbert anywhere.

“Where is he?” I said to Billy’s dad. “Where’s my little brother?”

He didn’t answer, just took another drag off his cigarette. He thought he was alone in this graveyard.

I stared him in the eye. “
Answer me
!”

Billy’s father cleared his throat, still raw. He wasn’t hearing me. Nearby, a grey vortex fizzed like churning acid.

“Conrad and Evelyn must not have arrived yet,” Emory said, floating behind me. “This must be their meeting place—the place they talked about on the phone. Assuming you’re right that he really is the kidnapper.”

“I have to be,” I said. “Why else would he be in a graveyard in the middle of the night?”

“Then the fact that Gilbert’s not here yet is a good thing. Billy’s dad doesn’t know yet that they’ve got the wrong kid.” He thought for a second. “That means we can go to the police now. If they get here before Conrad and Evelyn, Gilbert will be safe.”

Emory was right. We’d made it here in time. I let my anger at Billy’s father drain from me like water down a hole in the sand.

“But where are we?” I said. “We don’t even know where to tell the police to go.”

“A sign,” Emory said, already moving toward the parking lot. “We need a street sign or a cemetery sign. Something we can use to identify this place.”

Emory was bringing me back to reality. Figuring out where we were and getting word to the police was far more important than having an astral stare-down with Billy’s dad.

I followed Emory to the parking lot, but even as we searched for something to identify the location, I remembered again how I didn’t even know if Gilbert was still alive.

“He’s alive,” Emory said out of the blue, as if reading my mind. “Conrad and Evelyn have no reason to kill him. They have no way of knowing they got the wrong kid.”

“Then why couldn’t I
hear
him?” I said. I admit I was letting despair get the best of me.

“Got it,” Emory said.

“What?” I said, confused.

He gestured to a weather-beaten wooden sign between the cemetery and the parking lot.

Durston Memorial Park
, it read in faint letters. The name of the cemetery. We could just make it out in the moonlight.

“Now,” he said, “let’s get back to our bodies, so you can call the police.”

But even as he said this, a pair of headlights cut their way into the graveyard gloom.

“It’s too late!” I said to Emory. “Conrad and Evelyn are here!”

“Maybe it’s not them,” Emory said, but the car was already turning into the cemetery parking lot. It was a white SUV just like the one we’d seen out at the cabin on Silver Lake.

“Go!” I said to Emory. “
You
go call the police. I’ll stay here.”

“Zach!”

“Emory, don’t argue with me! I’m staying here, but someone needs to call the police. This is the only way.”

“But what can you even do from the astral dimension?”

“I don’t know. But I’ll think of something. Just go!”

Emory stared at me an instant longer. Then I saw the glint in his eyes as he decided I was right, that one of us really did need to call the police. He glanced around the cemetery, trying to make sure that the shadow creature hadn’t suddenly reappeared. When he still didn’t sense its presence, he looked back me.

“For the record,” he said, “I think I love you.”

Before I could answer, he relaxed. His astral body was instantly whipped out of sight, back to his physical body. From there, he could call the police and report what he’d seen. But given how far out in the middle of nowhere we were, I had no idea how long it would take them to get here.

Meanwhile, I was left alone with the graveyard’s collection of lost, lingering souls. The vehicle was parking, tires crunching on gravel, wan headlights barely slicing through the astral murk. Billy’s father was silently working his way through the graves toward the parking lot.

I flew to the SUV ahead of Billy’s father. I may have been floating weightless in the astral dimension, but I’d never felt so heavy in my life. There didn’t seem to be anything I could
do
. From somewhere back in the graveyard, a green vortex gasped like a drowning man.

In the parking lot, the car doors opened, squeaking like animals in the night. I noticed for the first time that the back windows of the SUV were tinted.

Conrad climbed out one side, and Evelyn huffed her way out of the other.

I’d been right. It really had been Billy’s father who was behind Gilbert’s kidnapping.

“He’d better be here,” Evelyn muttered to Conrad.

“Oh, I’m here,” Billy’s father said from shadows of the graveyard. Evelyn jerked in surprise. “Where’s the boy?”

Conrad faced off with him. “First things first. Where’s the money?”

“How is he?” Billy’s father said. “Is he scared?”

“I told you on the phone,” Conrad said. “Everything’s fine. Now where’s the money?”

“To hell with the money—let me have my son!” Billy’s father stepped closer to the side of the vehicle, tried to open the back door, but found that it was locked.

“He’s
fine
,” Conrad repeated. “He’s sleeping.” Evelyn hung back, watching the interaction between the two men.

Gilbert is sleeping?
Maybe this was why I’d suddenly been unable to hear him. Maybe something about being asleep made his mind blend, undetectable, into the astral dimension.

I flung myself up over the vehicle, then dipped down through the roof like a speed skater taking a hairpin turn. I stopped myself perfectly in mid-air.

I stared into the dark shadows in the back of the SUV, desperate for any sign of my brother.

The dome light shone on a bit of rumbled clothing. Gilbert. I could see the lump of his body rising and falling as he breathed.

He’s okay!
He was just sleeping. Relief swept through me like an avalanche.

“Now,” Conrad was saying to Billy’s father, “about that money.”

“You’ll get your damn money!” Billy’s father said. “I just want to see if he’s okay.”

Billy’s father opened the front door, the side where Evelyn had been sitting.

“No!” I said. “Wait!”

But Billy’s father, unable to hear me from the astral dimension, ignored me and reached in to unlock the back door. Then he opened it.

Seeing the blond boy in the backseat, Billy’s father sighed, reassured. Everything might still be okay, I realized, just as long as Gilbert didn’t wake up. After all, as long as he didn’t recognize Billy’s father, there was no way for the police to connect any of them to the kidnapping. So what if Gilbert had been out to their lake cabin? It had been late at night. He probably hadn’t seen any of the surrounding area—he’d been tied up in the back seat of an SUV. So once Billy’s father realized their mistake, he could still have Conrad and Evelyn drop Gilbert off somewhere where someone would find him. No one would be any wiser.

But for that to happen, Billy’s father had to realize that Gilbert was not his son. For the time being, he’d mistaken him for Billy just like everyone else.

“It’s not your son, you idiot!” I shouted at Billy’s father. “They kidnapped the wrong kid!”

“I’ll get your money,” Billy’s father said to Conrad, still not hearing me. Billy’s father turned for the graveyard where he must’ve had the money hidden.

I floated after him, shouting in his ear. “It’s not your son!”

“I have to say,” Billy’s father said back at Conrad, “it’s not every stockbroker who performs such personal services.” Out among the gravestones again, Billy’s father reached behind one of the markers and lifted up a paper grocery bag folded over into a something like a satchel.

Conrad rolled his eyes. “Well, Simon, you didn’t give me much choice, now, did you?”

Billy’s father—Simon—laughed cruelly. “Should’ve thought of that before that creative accounting of yours.”

This explained how such unlikely kidnappers as Conrad and Evelyn had tried to kidnap Billy in the first place; Simon must have caught them stealing from him. But even that hadn’t been enough to convince them. He’d still had to sweeten the deal with cash.

“Just give us the money!” Evelyn said to Simon.

“
It’s not your damn son
!” I shouted at Simon one more time, but got no more of a reaction than before.

Conrad met him as he returned to the parking lot, taking the grocery bag from his hand.

“Thanks,” Simon said. “For what it’s worth.”

Evelyn lunged out from behind the SUV, snatching the bag from Conrad. Then she opened it up, trying to count it in the dark. “It’s worth a lot more than
this
,” she muttered.

“Evelyn,” Conrad said, “shut up.”

“I hope you’re not offended,” Simon said, “when I don’t recommend you to my friends.”

“We’re even now,” Conrad said. “I won’t be offended if I never see you again.”

Only now that the money had actually changed hands did Simon finally go to the backseat of the vehicle and start to lift Gilbert out. And only now did he realize that Conrad and Evelyn hadn’t quite delivered their share of the bargain.

“What? This isn’t my son!”

But everything could still be okay, I knew, just as long as Gilbert didn’t wake up.

“Don’t wake up,” I said to my sleeping brother. “Don’t wake up!”

“What are you—” Conrad began.

“
This isn’t my son
!” Simon said. “You
idiots
! This is the neighbor kid!”

They’d recognized their mistake, but Gilbert still hadn’t woken up. Even now, if Conrad and Evelyn left with Gilbert before he recognized Billy’s father, everything could still be okay.

“That’s impossible,” Evelyn was saying. “You gave us a description. You gave us a photo.”

“I know my own damn son!” Simon said. “You morons! How could you get the wrong kid?”

Simon turned and dumped Gilbert, still asleep, back into the backseat.

“Stop!” Evelyn shrieked. “Don’t put him back there!”

“What the hell am I supposed to do with him? That’s not my son. You need to take him back.”

Yes
! I thought.
Take him back
.

Evelyn laughed out loud. “Are you out of your mind? We’re not taking anyone
back
.”

But before she could react, Simon snatched the grocery bag back from her hand.

“Give me that!” she screamed, even louder than before.

“I’m not paying for this,” Simon said. “You didn’t do your end of the bargain. You got the wrong kid.”

“Give her the money,” Conrad said, surprisingly calm. When I looked over at him, I saw that Conrad had pulled a gun, and was aiming it right at Simon.

Simon could not have been more unimpressed. “Did you even hear what I said?
You got the wrong damn kid.
”

“Well, that’s your problem now. Give her the money.” Conrad underlined his words with the barrel of the gun.

Simon shook his head in disgust. “I can’t believe you got the wrong kid. You’re an even worse kidnapper than you are a stockbroker.”

Suddenly from the back of the SUV, Gilbert moaned. Simon, Conrad, and Evelyn all fell silent, then turned and looked over at the vehicle.

Floating weightless in the astral dimension, I moaned too. “No! Don’t wake up, Gilbert. Go back to sleep.”

In the backseat of the SUV, Gilbert squirmed upright.

“Don’t do this!” I shouted at my little brother. “Go back to sleep! You hear me? Go back to sleep.”

But Gilbert didn’t hear. The door to the SUV was still open, and Simon was standing just outside. And even in the dim glow of the vehicle’s dome light, Gilbert spotted him right away, someone he knew.

“Mr. Scanlon?” Gilbert said. “Is that you?” Despite the bindings on his feet and hands, he crawled out of the backseat and stumbled over to Simon, immediately trying to wrap himself around Simon’s legs. “Mr. Scanlon, help me! They took me away.”

So that was it. Gilbert had recognized him.

Simon looked up at Conrad and Evelyn in disgust. “You idiots.” Then he pulled a gun of his own out of his pants.

“What are you doing?” Conrad said nervously.

“What do you think I’m doing? He recognizes me. How the hell am I supposed to explain that?”

And here we were, exactly where I’d feared we’d be all along: Billy’s father was going to kill Gilbert. From behind me in the cemetery, the gurgling vortex seemed almost to burp.

I had to
do
something. But what could I possibly do from the astral dimension?

Even Conrad was shocked by what Billy’s father had said. He lowered his own gun. “Simon, you’re not thinking about—”

“What do you suggest I do? By all rights, I should have you do it, but you’d probably screw this up, too. So I’ll have to do it myself. So go on, get out of here, both of you.”

Conrad and Evelyn glanced at each other.

“Get in the car,” Conrad said to her.

“What about the money?” Evelyn said.

“Forget the damn money,” Conrad said. “Just get in the goddamn car!”

Conrad practically leapt into the SUV and twisted the ignition. The engine squealed a little before finally starting. Evelyn hesitated, staring daggers at Simon. But then she turned, huffing for the vehicle. She slammed the backdoor closed.

“Wait!” I shouted at them. “You can’t just leave! He’s going to kill him. He’s just a little boy. You can’t let him kill him.”

Without another word, Evelyn climbed primly into the front seat. The second she was inside, Conrad threw it into reverse, and the SUV scraped its way backward on the gravel. Once clear, he gave it more gas, and it roared out of the graveyard parking lot.

Gilbert had watched the whole interaction with a confused look on his face. But one thing about this whole experience seemed to make sense, and that was the fact that Mr. Scanlon was the father of his best friend, Billy. He seemed to cling to this fact much the way he was still holding onto the man’s leg.

“Well,” Simon said to Gilbert. “Let’s get you untied.” He latched the safety on his gun, then tucked the whole thing into his belt. He bent down to undo Gilbert’s feet.

“Mr. Scanlon?” Gilbert said. “Why do you have a gun?”

“It’s all right, Gilbert,” Simon said calmly. “It’s just a toy.”

He was really going to kill him.