The Lofties (The Echelon Book 2) by Ramona Finn (no david read aloud .txt) 📕

over, and it was Derrick, eyes wide in death, fixed blankly on the moon. Lock thumbed them closed, but they cracked right back open, shrunken dry. I looked away, fighting sickness and a deep, clawing rage.

“Should we bury him?” The words quavered out of me in a voice not my own.

Lock made a rasping sound. “We have nothing to dig with, so...” His shoulders hitched once and were still. “We’ll take him home, at least. We can do that much.”

I watched as Lock shucked his fine coat and shook out the sand. He laid Derrick out on it and crossed his arms over his chest. He combed the dirt from his hair and wiped his face with his sleeve. Then, he buttoned his coat over him, folding him into it like a shroud.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’d never have wished this on you.” He knelt there a moment, then he squeezed Derrick’s shoulder and gathered him to his chest. I hovered over him, at a loss.

“Can you carry him on your own?”

“I’ll be fine.” Lock struggled upright and set out for the Spire. I followed him at a distance, to give him space to breathe. We trudged through the night, a grim procession, into the graying dawn. Sand gave way to gravel, and then to yellow grass. The mountains towered over us, their peaks cloaked in snow. I scanned the floodplain for movement, searching for any sign of life, but only the grass stirred, rippling in the breeze. Lock stopped at the creek bed and waited for me to catch up.

“No barrier here, either.” He nodded at the fissure leading into the caves. Sure enough, it stood empty, no flicker of purple to suggest a gretha shield.

“They could be in the Haven,” I said. “Maybe the Decemites came back. Maybe they took cover.”

“Maybe.” Lock settled Derrick more securely against his shoulder. I licked my lips and tasted sulfur. My legs had turned to lead.

“Some of them made it,” said Lock. “From the camp, I mean. I saw footprints past where Derrick was. Big steps, running steps. Not a lot, but some.”

“And the rest of them?”

He pinched his lips together and said nothing. I fell in behind him as he picked his way across the creek bed. The silence pressed in on us, and I felt myself crushed by it, an unbearable weight anchoring me to the moment. No voice rose in challenge as we closed in on the base, no sound but the warm wind soughing through the grass. I called out anyway, at the top of my voice, so loud Lock stumbled, boots scuffing in the dirt. I called out the challenge the gate guard had once issued Ben, called out and waited, and the mountains called back—when do we rest, when do we rest, when do we rest…

Chapter Twenty-Two

The Haven stood open, yawning black and cold. Its great doors lay twisted, blown from their frame or melted from it. I smelled death beyond them, and I lowered my lantern to my side. I’d snagged it off the wall heading into the caverns, but the state of the base had me wishing I hadn’t—the empty rooms, the scattered trash. Something had happened here, something bad.

“Let’s check the mines,” said Lock.

“What for?”

“Signs of Lazrad. Signs she’s mining. Don’t you want to know why?”

I shouted, half-laugh, half outrage. Why? For rigur, for spite, what difference did it make? The Decemites had left nothing to salvage. The village was ash, the school blown to dust. Ben’s room of stars, they’d turned into a furnace, filled it with wreckage and set it ablaze. Ben’s stars were dead now, blacked out with soot. And Ben—

“You’ve got the light,” said Lock. “Please. We’ll be quick.”

I led the way to the elevator, and Lock laid Derrick on the platform. I hung my lantern on a peg, and we worked the pulley together, rattling down in fits and starts. The shaft was colder than I remembered, the chill turning our breath to vapor. My eyes stung with sweat, and I blinked it away. By the time we hit bottom, we were both soaked and shivering, grimacing to keep our teeth from chattering.

“It was warm before,” I said. “Stuffy, even.”

Lock scooped up Derrick and shuffled past me. “What’s that down there?”

I raised my lantern and grunted in surprise. The shaft was black and burnt, half-collapsed down one fork, jammed with debris down the other. I saw one of the furnaces toppled on its side, its innards blown out, its door embedded in the wall. Lock’s boot crunched on something—a shattered pressure gauge. I did a slow turn, taking in battered mine carts on tracks hacked to bits, helmets cracked open, sniffers smashed against walls.

“All this, just to wreck it? Just to spoil it for everyone, so no one can use it?”

Lock shook his head slowly. I could see the whites of his eyes, lurid in the gloom.

“We should go back,” I said. “No point hanging around.”

“Not yet.” He picked his way onward, past the blasted furnace and down a crumbling shaft.

“Where are you going?”

Lock splashed through a puddle into a cramped alcove. A shelf hung off one wall, cracked down the middle. Underneath lay a bedroll, covered in dust. Lock knelt down next to it and laid Derrick on the mat.

“This is the closest we’ll get to a proper burial,” he said. I shivered so violently my stomach lurched.

“But it’s so cold.”

“I don’t suppose he’ll mind. Besides, he has my coat.” Lock unbuttoned and rearranged it, threading Derrick’s arms into the sleeves. He smoothed the lapels over his chest and turned down the collar. I found a pillow in the corner, and Lock tucked it under Derrick’s head. His eyes were still open, clouded yellow in death. He didn’t look scared. He didn’t look anything, and maybe that was for the best.

“We should say something, I guess.” I hugged myself to get warm but shivered again anyway. Lock got to his feet and wrapped an arm around