Fablehaven: The Complete Series (33 page)

Kendra reached the pavilion attached to a small pier. She dashed down the steps and out onto the quay. She reached the boathouse and tried the door. Just like before, it was locked. The door was not big, but it looked sturdy.

Kendra kicked it hard. The impact jolted up the length of her leg, making her wince. She rammed the door with her shoulder, again hurting herself instead of the door.

Kendra stepped back. The boathouse was basically a large shed floating on the water. It had no windows. She hoped it still had boats inside. If it did, they would be sitting in the water, protected by walls and a roof but no floor. If she jumped into the lake, she could surface inside the boathouse and climb into a boat.

She studied the water. The black, reflective surface was impenetrable. There could be a hundred naiads waiting in ambush, or none—it was impossible to tell.

The whole plan would be pointless if she drowned before reaching the island. Based on what she had heard from Lena, there would be naiads eagerly waiting for her to get near the water. Jumping in would be suicide.

She sat down and started bucking the door with both feet, the same method Seth had used to break into the barn. She made a lot of noise, but did not seem to be harming the door at all. Kicking harder only made her legs hurt more.

She needed a tool. Or a key. Or some dynamite.

Kendra ran back up to the pavilion, searching for something she could use to pry the door open. She saw nothing. If only there were a sledgehammer lying around.

She tried to calm herself. She had to think! Maybe if she just kept pounding, the door would eventually give. Sort of like erosion. But it hadn’t budged yet, and she didn’t have all night. There had to be a smarter solution. What did she have to work with? Nothing! Nothing but a few shadowy creatures who ducked out of sight at her approach.

“Okay, listen up!” she shouted. “I know you can hear me. I have to get inside the boathouse. A witch is setting Bahumat free, and all of Fablehaven is going to be destroyed. I’m not asking for anybody to stick their necks out. I just need somebody to beat down the boathouse door. My grandfather is the caretaker here, and I give you full permission. I am going to turn my back and close my eyes. When I hear the door break, I’ll wait ten seconds before turning back around.”

Kendra turned around and closed her eyes. She heard nothing. “Anytime, just smash down the door. I promise I won’t look.”

She heard a gentle splash and a tinkling sound.

“Okay! Sounds like we have a taker! Just break down the door.”

She heard nothing. She suddenly realized that something could have emerged from the water and be sneaking up behind her. Unable to resist, she turned and peeked.

No dripping creatures were in sight. All was quiet. There were ripples on the previously glassy pond. And lying on the dock near the boathouse was a key.

Kendra rushed down the stairs and picked up the key. It was wet, corroded, and a little slimy. Longer than a regular key, it looked old-fashioned.

Wiping it against her shirt, she carried the key to the boathouse and inserted it in the keyhole. It fit perfectly. She turned it, and the door swung inward.

Kendra shivered. The implications were disturbing. Apparently a naiad had tossed her the key. They wanted her out on the water.

With only the moonlight seeping through the door to provide illumination, the boathouse was very dim. Squinting, Kendra could see three boats tied to the narrow pier: two large rowboats, one slightly broader than the other, and a smaller paddleboat. The paddleboat was the kind with bicycle pedals. Kendra had once ridden in one at a park with a lake.

On one wall hung several oars of varying length. Near the door were a crank and a lever. Kendra tried to turn the crank, but it would not move. She pulled the lever. Nothing happened. She tried the crank again, and this time it turned. A sliding door on the opposite side of the boathouse from the dock began to open, letting in more light. Kendra kept cranking, relieved that she would be able to paddle a boat directly out of the boathouse onto the pond.

Standing in the gloom of the boathouse, staring out the open door at the pond, Kendra began to doubt. She felt nauseated with fear. Was she really prepared to go to her death? To have naiads drown her, or to fall victim to a spell protecting a forbidden island?

Grandpa and Grandma Sorenson were resourceful. They might have already escaped. Was she doing this for nothing?

Kendra remembered an occasion three years ago at a community pool. She had desperately wanted to jump off the high dive. Her mom had warned her that it was higher than it looked, but nothing could dissuade her. Many kids were jumping off it, several her age or younger.

She stood in line at the base of the ladder. When her turn came, she started climbing, amazed at how much higher she seemed with each step. When she arrived at the top, she felt like she was standing on a skyscraper. She wanted to turn back, but all the kids in line would know she was scared. Plus her parents were watching.

She walked forward along the diving board. There was a slight breeze. She wondered if the people on the ground could feel it. When she approached the end of the board, she stared down at the rippling water. She could see all the way to the bottom of the pool. Jumping no longer seemed like a fun thing to do.

Realizing that the longer she hesitated, the more attention she would draw, she turned around quickly and descended the ladder, trying to avoid eye contact with the people waiting in line at the bottom. She had not been up a high dive since. In fact, she rarely took any sort of risk.

Once again she was standing on the brink of something frightening. But this was different. Jumping off a high dive, or riding a roller coaster with multiple loops, or passing a note to Scott Thomas—those were all voluntary thrills. There was no real consequence to avoiding the risk. In her current situation, her family would probably die if she failed to act. She had to stand by her previous decision and carry out her plan, regardless of the consequences.

Kendra considered the oars. She had never rowed a boat and could easily picture herself floundering, especially if nasty naiads were giving her a hard time. She examined the paddleboat. Designed for a single passenger, it was wider than it needed to be, presumably for additional stability. The childish craft was not nearly as big as the rowboats, and she would be close to the water, but at least Kendra thought she could maneuver it.

Kendra sighed. Kneeling, she untied the little boat, tossing the slender rope onto the seat. The paddleboat wobbled when she stepped aboard, and she had to crouch and use her hands to avoid falling into the water. The bottom of the novelty craft was completely closed, which meant nothing could grab at her feet.

After getting situated, Kendra sat facing the dock. There was a steering wheel to control lateral movement. Turning the wheel all the way to one side, she pedaled backwards and slid away from the dock. Cranking the wheel the other way, she started pedaling forward, and the boat quietly slid out of the boathouse.

Ripples radiated out from the front of the paddleboat as she steered it toward the island, pedaling briskly. The island was not far—maybe eighty yards. The paddleboat moved steadily closer to her destination. Until it started moving
away
from the island.

She pedaled harder, but the boat kept sliding diagonally backward. Something was towing her. The boat began to spin. Turning the wheel and paddling did nothing. Then the boat suddenly tilted precariously to one side. Something was trying to tip her!

Kendra leaned to prevent the boat from capsizing, and the boat abruptly rocked the other way. Kendra changed position, counterbalancing desperately. She saw wet fingers holding the side of the boat and slapped at them. The action was rewarded by giggling.

The boat began to rotate quickly. “Leave me alone!” Kendra demanded. “I have to get to the island.” This earned a longer titter from multiple voices.

Kendra paddled furiously, but it did no good. She kept spinning and getting hauled in the wrong direction. The naiads started rocking the boat again. Thanks to the low center of gravity, Kendra found that leaning was enough to prevent the boat from capsizing, but the naiads were relentless. They tried to distract her by banging the bottom of the vessel and by waving at her. The boat pitched and rocked and spun, and then suddenly the naiads would heave in earnest, trying to catch her off balance. Time after time, Kendra reacted quickly, shifting her weight to spoil their attempts to flip her. It was a stalemate.

The naiads did not show themselves. She heard their laughter and glimpsed their hands, but never saw a face.

Kendra decided to quit paddling. It was getting her nowhere, and wasting energy. She resolved to exert herself only to keep the boat from tipping.

The attempts grew less frequent. She said nothing, made no response to the taunting giggles, ignored the hands on the side of the boat. She simply leaned as needed when they tried to tip the boat. She was getting better at it. They were not able to tilt it as much.

The attempts stopped. After about a minute of no activity, Kendra started paddling toward the island. Her progress was soon halted. She quit paddling immediately. The naiads spun her and rocked her some more.

She waited. After another minute of tranquility she paddled again. Again they pulled her away. But less eagerly. She sensed them giving up, getting bored.

On her eighth try using this technique, the naiads apparently lost interest. The island grew closer. Twenty yards. Ten yards. She expected them to stop her at the last moment. They didn’t. The front of her paddleboat scraped against the shore. Everything remained still.

The moment of truth had arrived. When she set foot on the island, either she would transform into a cloud of dandelion fluff and drift away, or she wouldn’t.

Almost indifferent at this point, Kendra leaped out of the boat and landed on the shore. There did not seem to be anything magical or even special about it, and she did not turn into a cloud of seeds.

There was, however, a barrage of laughter from behind her. Kendra whirled in time to see her paddleboat drifting away from the island. It was already too late to do anything without jumping into the water. She slapped herself on the forehead with the heel of her hand. The naiads had not given up—they were trying a different strategy! She had been so distracted by the prospect of becoming dandelion fluff that she had not hauled the boat out of the water as she should have. She could have at least kept hold of the rope!

Well, one more favor to ask the Fairy Queen.

The island was not large. It took only about seventy paces for Kendra to walk around the edge of it. Her tour of the perimeter revealed nothing interesting. The shrine was probably near the center.

Although the island had no trees, it had many shrubs, many of them taller than Kendra. There were no trails, and pressing through them was irritating. What would the shrine look like? She pictured a little building, but after crisscrossing the island a few times, she realized there was no such structure.

Maybe she had not turned to dandelion seeds because the island was a hoax. Or maybe the shrine was no longer here. Either way, she was stranded on a tiny island in the middle of a pond full of creatures who wanted to drown her. What would drowning feel like? Would she actually inhale water, or just pass out? Or would the demon get her first?

No! She had come this far. She would look again, more carefully. Maybe the shrine was something natural, like a special bush or stump.

She walked around the perimeter of the island again, more slowly this time. She noticed a thin trickle of water. It was strange to find a stream, no matter how small, on such a tiny island. She followed the stream toward the center of the island until she found the place where it came bubbling out of the ground.

There, at the source of the spring, was a two-inch-tall statue of a fairy, finely carved. It rested on a white pedestal that added a few more inches to the height. A small silver bowl sat in front of it.

Of course! Fairies were so tiny, it made sense that the shrine would be miniature as well!

Kendra fell to her knees beside the spring, directly in front of the small figurine. The night was very still. Looking to the sky, Kendra noticed that the eastern horizon was turning purple. Night was coming to an end.

All Kendra could think to do was pour her heart out in complete sincerity. “Hello, Fairy Queen. Thank you for letting me visit you without changing me into dandelion seeds.”

Kendra swallowed. This felt weird, talking to a diminutive statue. There was nothing regal about it. “If you can help me, I really need it. A witch named Muriel is about to set free a demon named Bahumat. The witch has my Grandpa and Grandma Sorenson prisoner, along with my brother, Seth, and my friend Lena. If that demon gets out, it will wreck this whole preserve, and there is no way I can stop it from happening without your help. Please, I really love my family, and if I don’t do something, that demon is going to, he’s going to—”

The reality of what she was saying hit her like a great weight and spilled out as tears. For the first time, the fact that Seth was going to die fully entered her mind. She thought of moments with him, both endearing and annoying, and realized that there would be no more of either.