Dark Waters

The next piece of wood Brian lit on fire. The wood was paper-dry, and it only took a few moments to have a streamer of flame going steadily at one end, burning his fingers when he handed it over. Phil threw it down. “That’s for the Cassie!” he roared. Coco was on her feet, cheering, clinging to an overhead branch two-handed.

Now the snake was really enraged, and instead of leaving, as any sensible animal would do, it lunged higher yet, wrapping its body around the trunk of the tree, jaws going wide. Brian had to pull the sleeve of his wool sweater over his hand to grip the next log, to keep his skin from burning.

Phil pitched the log straight into the snake’s open mouth. Brian saw the flame, glimmering as it fell, illuminating all the rows of teeth and the cotton-pink throat. Then the jaws slammed shut and the snake recoiled, all the way back down to the ground.

They waited, gasping, for it to come up after them again. But the snake had had enough. It retreated, uncoiling from the tree and disappearing into the dark.

They looked at each other.

“Is it gone?” said Phil. “Did we win?”

“I don’t see it,” said Coco, peering. “Phil, that was awesome.”

Phil glowed.

Brian hesitated, following the silver line of the serpent as it vanished into the island’s whispering murk. “We won,” he said slowly. “But I’m pretty sure we won’t win the big prize until we get off this island. Let’s get back to the beach.”

13

THEY RAN FOR the beach as fast as they could, straining their eyes and ears, picking up the remainder of the firewood as they went, keeping close together. The axe that Brian had carried away from the cabin was gone, although the firewood was where he dropped it. What did that mean? Had the axe man picked it up? But where was he now? Where had the snake gone? Brian didn’t know. They didn’t see or hear anything of the snake or the axe man all the way down to the beach.

It was almost full dark when they burst out of the woods. The light had gone purple, and rain spattered down. Phil ran in front, and Brian brought up the rear. Coco was in between.

Brian, despite everything, was happy to have Phil with them. As though, with Phil on the team, a piece of his life had finally joined another piece.

Ollie and Ms. Zintner were sitting by the fire. They had built it up so that it roared and crackled in the darkness, lit up a swath of the shore, and threw orange light on their faces. Brian was glad to see it. The fire seemed like an ally against the night and the island’s known and unknown dangers. Phil, Brian, and Coco burst out of the woods and came clattering down onto the beach in a shower of small, rolling rocks.

“There you are!” cried Ms. Zintner.

“Mom!” said Coco. She ran over and hugged her mother tightly.

“Where were you?” demanded Ms. Zintner, hugging Coco back. “This isn’t a game, sweetie! I was worried sick. I nearly went into the woods after you. But—” She paused.

Brian already knew why she hadn’t gone anywhere. He had caught sight of Ollie and her dad. Ollie had barely looked up when they came pelting across the beach. Ollie’s mouth was in a thin line, and her dad was hallucinating.

He was still sitting upright against the rock. His arm was black and swollen nearly to the elbow. And he was talking, but nothing he said made any sense.

“Remember the goblin,” he muttered. “To the west. The west. There were twelve when they came ashore.” His eyes saw beyond her. “Six in the water now.” His breathing was noisy. “Five got away. One still here. They’re waiting for him. Listen to the chimes.”

“He’s been like this for an hour,” said Ollie, with a shake in her voice. “But nothing makes sense.”

One thing does, thought Brian. The chimes.

Phil put some of their dry wood carefully onto the fire. Flames shot up even higher. The bubble of warmth spread out to wrap them all. Coco put her hands out to the flames with a sigh.

“Any sign of a boat?”

Phil said.

“No,” said Ms. Zintner. She glanced at the untroubled lake. Brian followed her gaze. The Adirondacks were just blacker smudges against a charcoal sky. He couldn’t see any lights onshore.

“The radio isn’t working,” Ms. Zintner went on. She didn’t sound annoyed at Coco anymore. She just sounded worried. “And I don’t understand why we haven’t seen a boat. This isn’t some tiny atoll in the middle of the ocean! It’s a good-sized island in the middle of a busy lake!”

Brian wasn’t surprised. Coco’s mouth just pressed down in a grim line. Brian thought again, with a feeling like a cold finger scraping down his spine, of the axe man’s laughter. No one’s coming, he thought. We’re behind the mist, we’re in the land of the lake monster. Mr. Dimmonds couldn’t find this island on his map. We’re on our own. We have to get ourselves off somehow. But we don’t have a boat. We don’t have any food. What do we do?

He had no idea. Coco said, “Mom, the monster—the thing that sank the Cassie—we found a snakeskin. We—it comes on land.”

Ms. Zintner looked doubtful.