The Trap (The Magnificent 12 2)

Mack could see her point. He’d spotted at least half a dozen dragons so far. It was hard to see how anything could stand up to them.

“Fire breath?” Xiao snorted. “What, like Eragon? Like in Tolkien? Does my father look like Smaug to you?” Then in a somewhat less offended tone, “The fire breathing? That’s our western cousins, not us. We are not those dragons. We are not barbarians. First, my father will attempt to reason with the invaders.”

They were nearing one of the towering walls of the cave. Mack spotted an opening, like the mouth of a cave, bordered in carved wood. It was simple, nothing ornate.

They were racing alongside the gentle river that wandered through Dragon Home, and Mack realized that the river must flow out through that opening. He couldn’t see it very clearly from this angle. He couldn’t see much of anything because sweat was stinging his eyes.

But he did notice the four Skirrit bounding along the far side of the river, keeping pace on their crazy grasshopper legs, taking twenty-yard steps, racing to cut them off.

And he noticed that at least two of them had something that looked a little like guns—but could also have been bent soda cans.

Skreeet!

That made everyone miss a step. No one had ever heard that sound before. And the missed step saved them.

A spray of crystalline pellets went shooting by, just in front of them.

“Owww!” Jarrah cried.

She stared at the back of her hand (still running, of course; she was curious about the pain, but not curious enough to stand around examining herself).

“It’s a . . . a thing!” Jarrah cried.

“Get it off you!” Xiao yelled.

Jarrah picked at it with her finger.

“No, no! Not with your finger! It’ll sizzle your finger, too!”

As she ran, Jarrah dug out a coin from her pocket and used the edge of it to pry the tiny, painful bead from her hand.

“Are they shooting at us with cans of Mountain Dew?” Stefan asked.

“Sizzle guns,” Xiao said grimly. “The pellets are like tiny magnets. They try to come together, and they put out a bubbly acid to eat anything that gets in the way. Imagine a hundred of them hitting you!”

Imagining this helped Mack and the others run faster. But not as fast as the Skirrit, who were now ahead of them on the far bank and would easily cut them off where the river entered the wall.

“Can you all swim?” Xiao cried. Then added, “Underwater?”

No one answered.

The Skirrit were standing still now, blocking the way, aiming their sizzle guns.

Xiao leaped and broke the river surface with a perfect knifelike dive. Jarrah was right behind her, equally athletic.

Stefan and Mack hit the water together—more cannonball than Olympic racing dive.

Mack swallowed a little water, fought down the desperate urge to cough, opened his eyes, and saw three sets of shoes kicking away from him.

He leveled off, tried not to think about drowning, and swam hard after th

em through lovely aquamarine water.

Turning slightly, Mack saw refracted Skirrit faces peering down into the water.

He kept kicking.

Ahead was darkness like a wall. He saw Stefan’s shoes kicking. He followed.