Behind the Bookcase Page 11

  Sarah smiled. “I knew it,” she said. “Was that you last night at the door, too?”

  Grandma shook her head slowly. “Those are all the sleeping dead. They’re here because it’s their time to enter Penumbra, but I can’t let them in, because, well, look at me.”

  “You mean there are dead people outside?”

  Grandma nodded and went to the window. Sarah followed her and looked down. In the yard below, their forms outlined by the silver moonlight, were about two dozen people shuffling aimlessly around the yard. “They’ll knock again at three o’clock. Just like they’ve been doing every night.”

  Billy appeared next to Sarah and looked out the window. Seeing nothing but the empty yard, he shrugged. “Oh,” Sarah said. “You can’t see them, can you?”

  Billy shook his head.

  Sarah said, “Here,” and shoved the journal and key toward him. He touched the key with one hand and the journal with the other. When he looked out the window again his eyes widened. Sarah was quite sure that if he’d had a mouth, he would have been smiling and saying “Cool!” in that annoying and reverential tone.

  She shook her head and turned to Grandma again. “So what do we do?”

  “We’ve got to get them into Penumbra.”

  Sarah nodded, then realized that that simply wasn’t possible—not with Balthazat in there. She looked at the floor.

  “What is it, child?” Grandma asked.

  “I’m afraid I’ve made some big mistakes,” Sarah said. She took a deep breath and explained how she had found Scotopia and how she had thought Balthazat was her friend. Then she told them about Jeb and how he had made her see the truth: Balthazat only wanted to get into Penumbra so he could steal the sleeping souls who really belonged in Ormaz. She told Billy not to worry about his missing mouth because Balthazat had taken half of Jeb’s face, but she was sure they would figure out a way to put both of them back the way they were.

  Just then, the bookcase slowly came out of the wall, scraping across the floor. Sarah and Billy and Grandma all looked at each other, then looked back at the bookcase. It edged forward again. For a moment, Sarah thought she should throw herself against it and stop whoever—or whatever—it was from getting through. But it was too late. The bookcase slid out farther and she saw the hooked tip of B.B.’s wing poke through just before she heard him whisper, “Sarah? Are you in there?”

  Sarah let a breath out. “It’s okay,” she whispered. “It’s B.B. I’m trying to help him, too.”

  She let Billy hold the key and the journal and pulled the bookcase out far enough to let B.B. in. He waddled into her room and glanced around. “Boy, am I glad to see you,” he said. “I know you told me to wait down there for you, but I couldn’t. Not when I saw those other things show up.”

  “What other things?” Sarah asked.

  “A giant hand and a guy carrying a head.”

  “Lefty and one of the sentinels. Did they see you?”

  B.B. shook his head. “I heard them coming and I backed into the tunnel. Once I actually saw them, I knew they were bad.”

  “What did they do?”

  B.B. shook his head again. “I didn’t stay around long enough to see. I was so worried, all I could think about was finding you. So I climbed up and here I am.”

  Sarah nodded. “You did the right thing. But if they’re down there guarding the entrance, how are we going to get back to Scotopia?”

  B.B. looked at her sadly. “Does this mean you won’t be able to help me find out my real name?”

  “No,” Sarah said. “I will. It just might take longer than I thought.” She sat down on the edge of the bed and hit her head with her palms. “Think, think, think,” she said. “I know that Jeb got through from a different house. And Edgar found a lot of ways in.” She pulled the map from her pocket and unfolded it. “But his map just shows where the doors are inside Scotopia.” Sarah sighed. “If only there were some way we could get back to Scotopia, I could get help from the blemmyes or Edgar.”

  Billy came over and tapped Sarah on the shoulder frantically.

  “Leave me alone, Billy, I’m trying to think.” But he only tapped harder. When she finally looked at him, she saw he was shoving the journal and the key at her.

  She grabbed them both and Grandma Winnie popped into view.

  “You must go to Ormaz,” she said.

  “Ormaz,” Sarah said with a nod, remembering how Jeb had told her it was the place where light comes from. If anyone would know how to fight shadows, it would be someone there. “That’s a good idea, Grandma,” Sarah said. “But how do I get there?”

  “Use the other door.”

  “What other door?” Sarah asked.

  “In the blue room, where your brother is staying. The passage behind his bookcase leads to Ormaz.”

  “Of course it does,” she said, and together they all moved as quickly and quietly as they could into Billy’s room.

  Billy had already taken all the books off the shelves. So Sarah simply grabbed the middle shelf and pulled as hard as she could.

  Nothing happened.

  Her shoulders sagged. Then she tried again. She grabbed the middle shelf and pulled hard.

  “Maybe I’m not strong enough,” she said. “Can you help, B.B.?”

  B.B. waddled forward and put the hooks at the tips of his wings on the outer edge of the bookcase. He pressed them between the wood and the wall, then tugged outward. There was a cracking sound, and at last the bookcase came free.

  Relieved, Sarah wiped her forehead. “Thanks, B.B.,” she said, pulling the bookcase out the rest of the way. She peered into the space expecting to see the same kind of darkness as behind her bookcase. But instead, she saw light shining down at the back. She smiled and looked at the others. Then she took the journal and key from Billy and asked Grandma if she could come with her.

  “No, child,” Grandma Winnie said. “I can’t. I hope I’ll be able to someday. But until then, I’m supposed to be in Penumbra.”

  Sarah nodded, then faced Billy and B.B. “You two better go back to the other side and keep watch. If anyone tries to come through from Scotopia, come over here and find me. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” B.B. asked.

  “It’s all we’ve got,” she said, then slipped behind Billy’s bookcase and walked toward the light.

  Ormaz was nothing like she had expected. When Sarah slid out of the tunnel, she found herself floating in the air right in front of a giant cloud. She looked down and saw no ground at her feet, just clouds drifting past. When they parted, she saw the biggest, brightest ocean ever, even brighter than the Moonlit Sea in Scotopia. Not knowing what else to do, she flapped her arms gently and twisted her body around. Clouds moved past her on every side, even high above her. The sky she floated in was a delicate pale blue. Sarah smiled. How she had ever thought dark old Scotopia was any fun at all, she didn’t know.

  Suddenly, Sarah noticed that the cloud she had come through was slowly moving away from her. She flapped her arms and pushed herself toward it. She grabbed it and found that it felt like cotton. For a moment, she had a grip, but as it moved away from her and she pulled harder, the cloud tore. She let the small piece go and it floated away. She flapped her arms again and pushed herself up, back toward the hole she had come through. Only, now she saw that it was slowly closing up, getting smaller and smaller as the cloud continued moving away from her. She got near the hole and tried to pull it back open, panicking. If that hole closed, would she ever be able to get back home? She tried to climb in, but it was too late. The hole closed completely, and the pieces of cloud that tore off in her hands floated away like dandelion seeds after a wish has been made.

  She stopped flapping and simply floated, watching helplessly as the cloud joined with another and made a bigger cloud.

  “What am I going to do now?” Sarah said out loud.

  “Hold perfectly still,” a voice behind her said, and Sarah
let out a little yelp of fright. She started to turn around but the voice got louder. “DO NOT MOVE!” it boomed.

  Sarah froze. She was beginning to think this hadn’t been such a good idea after all, when a giant bag made of white feathers slipped over her head and closed off at her feet. A moment later, the bag turned over and so did she. She barely managed to right herself before it took off.

  “Excuse me,” she called. “But who are you and where are you taking me?”

  “My name is Dogsbody and I am taking you where all intruders are taken: to the court of the Cloud Queen.”

  “But Mr. Dogsbody, sir, I’m not an intruder. I came here in search of help.”

  “Tell it to the Cloud Queen,” Dogsbody said, and picked up speed.

  “Can you please just tell me if I’m in Ormaz?”

  “Of course you are,” Dogsbody shouted, and Sarah felt some small measure of relief.

  On and on they flew, and after a while Sarah began to consider that maybe this was the best thing that could have happened to her. After all, she had come to Ormaz in search of someone who could help, and now she was apparently being taken to just such a person—a queen, no less.

  “Mr. Dogsbody, sir?” Sarah called through the feather bag. “Is the Cloud Queen the ruler of Ormaz?”

  “You don’t know much, do you?”

  “I don’t know that.”

  “Yes,” he said. “She is. So now you do know it. And just in time, too. We’re here.”

  Sarah felt the bag land on something soft and springy. She waited for Dogsbody to open the bag, but he didn’t. She could hear him talking with someone, but she couldn’t make out what they were saying. A moment later, somebody poked her through the bag.

  “You in there. What’s your name?”

  “Sarah. Sarah Steiner.”

  She heard more muffled voices outside the bag, but she still couldn’t make out what was being said. Not wanting to wait any longer, she dug into the bag until she found the top and ripped through it, tearing the feathers apart, making a hole big enough to climb through.

  As she stood up and pushed the bag down, she found herself standing on a cloud surrounded by other clouds. She heard whispers and gasps, but she couldn’t see anyone—or anything, for that matter—other than clouds. She blinked and stared and at last she began to see small movements in the clouds. Then she realized they weren’t clouds—they were people.

  One cloud separated from the others and floated toward her. As it got closer, Sarah saw that it was a woman, with long flowing cloud hair and pale cloud skin and a cloud dress as blindingly white as snow under sunshine.

  “My,” the cloud woman said, “you are a spirited one, aren’t you?”

  “Who are you?” Sarah said, as whole rows of cloud people came forward: cloud men with flowing cloud beards and cloud suits as white as the dresses of the cloud women with them.

  “I am the Cloud Queen,” said the one who had spoken, and now Sarah noticed the woman had a small cloud crown on top of her flowing cloud hair. “And you, Sarah Steiner,” the Cloud Queen said, “I suspect you must be the young relative of one of the record keepers, is that not true? Tell us: how did you get here?”

  “Through a secret door behind the bookcase in my brother’s bedroom.”

  The Cloud Queen shook her head. “Just like that?” she asked.

  Sarah began to feel nervous. The Cloud Queen seemed to be getting mad. “I don’t understand what you mean,” Sarah said, her voice barely a whisper.

  “Speak up,” said the Cloud Queen.

  “I don’t understand,” Sarah repeated, louder.

  “That much is obvious,” the Cloud Queen said. “Because, young lady, if you understood anything at all, you would not be here. I’ll have Dogsbody return you. We will make you fall asleep, and when you wake up you will be back in your bed with the feeling that this was all a dream.” The Cloud Queen started to turn away.

  “Wait—please!” Sarah said. “I came here for help.”

  The Cloud Queen stopped and turned around. “What do you mean? Help with what?”

  “Something terrible has happened,” Sarah said. She was so afraid of making the Cloud Queen mad that she was whispering again.

  The Cloud Queen frowned. “Did you say that something terrible has happened?”

  Sarah nodded. “Well, you see … I didn’t come here—to Ormaz, I mean—first.” When Sarah said this, a murmur rose among the cloud people.

  “Silence,” the Cloud Queen hissed, and they all did exactly as she said. “Go on.”

  “I went behind my bookcase. The one in my room, I mean. That one took me to a different place. One called Scotopia.”

  A collective gasp burst from the cloud people. But the Cloud Queen said nothing. Instead, she just stared at Sarah, waiting.

  Sarah didn’t know what to do except continue. “I’m afraid Balthazat tricked me. He pretended to be a cat and I brought him home with me.” The Cloud Queen closed her eyes. Sarah kept on. “He got into Penumbra,” she said, and the cloud people began to shriek.

  “Dogsbody,” the Cloud Queen said, “clear the court at once, then wait outside.”

  Dogsbody, who Sarah now saw was a cloud person like all the others, did as the Cloud Queen ordered. As he led all the cloud people through a door in the clouds, the Cloud Queen took Sarah to a bench made of clouds and they sat down together.

  “Now, child,” said the Cloud Queen, “tell me the whole story from the beginning to the end.”

  Sarah did so, as quickly as she could; she was growing anxious. Not just because Balthazat might be going through with his plan, and not just because she was slowly turning into a sentinel, but because she couldn’t stop thinking about all the people who were depending on her: B.B. and Edgar and Jeb and Billy and Grandma Winnie and all the dead people wandering around outside.

  “Well,” the Cloud Queen said when Sarah was finished. “That is quite a story, the likes of which I can honestly say I have never heard.”

  “I’m sorry,” Sarah said.

  “As am I. From what you have told me, a terrible mistake has been made.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, first of all, no record keeper is supposed to go to Penumbra without leaving the job to someone else. It sounds like your grandmother wasn’t prepared for that.” The Cloud Queen shook her head. “I suppose it’s amazing we don’t have more problems like this. It’s too bad I can’t do anything to help you.”

  Sarah felt like she had been pinched, hard. “What do you mean you can’t help me?”

  “Just that, I’m afraid. As your friend Jeb told you, we are all forbidden to cross over. You should not have gone to Scotopia, and your grandmother should not have told you to come here. Every time someone crosses over, the balance is upset. Not just in our world here, but in Penumbra and Scotopia, and in your world as well.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  The Cloud Queen nodded. “Everything was once like this,” she said, waving her arm. “Even all those who are now in Scotopia.”

  Sarah’s eyes widened with disbelief. “You mean Balthazat was once a cloud person like you?”

  “Yes,” the Cloud Queen said. “But he and Leedo and Tantalus and a bunch of others tried to take over. They didn’t like the way I ran things. They thought they could do better. So they started a rebellion. Only, they didn’t realize what they were doing until it was too late.”

  “What were they doing?”

  “Making darkness. Their rebellion created Scotopia, and their confusion about right and wrong has locked them all away in it. That’s why Balthazat can’t find a way out on his own.”

  “Oh,” Sarah said, feeling even worse now.

  “That’s why we’re here and they are there. It’s also why Balthazat wants to bring some of the sleeping souls who belong to Ormaz with him. He believes they will give him light.”

  “Won’t they?”

  “Not in the way he thinks. He believes if
he has something there that belongs here, he will make Scotopia a little bit like Ormaz. But he doesn’t see that his lying and thievery make that impossible.”

  Sarah nodded. “So what am I going to do?”

  “That you will have to decide for yourself.” The Cloud Queen stood and called Dogsbody in.

  “But wait,” Sarah said. “Aren’t you worried about what might happen if Balthazat does what he’s trying to do?”

  The Cloud Queen shook her head. “You are the one who should be worried. If he succeeds in upsetting the balance by getting some souls from Penumbra, then the doors will open and stay open, and your world will eventually become one with Scotopia.”

  Sarah felt a wave of nausea wash through her like cold water. “What will happen to you?”

  “Nothing,” said the Cloud Queen. “We’ve done nothing wrong.”

  Sarah felt frantic. There had to be something she could do. “What about the moonlight I drank?” she asked. “Do you know how I can stop from turning into one of those sentinels?”

  The Cloud Queen smiled. “That,” she said, “I can help you with. Come here.”

  Sarah rushed forward and the Cloud Queen opened a door in the floor. Beneath it was a shimmering pool, shining so brightly that Sarah held her hand up to her eyes.

  “Take a sip of this.”

  “What is it?” Sarah asked.

  “Sunlight, of course. The only cure for moonlight.”

  Sarah stepped forward and got to her knees. She dipped her hand in the pool and was surprised to find that it was warm. In spite of everything, she smiled as she scooped up some of the sunlight and brought it to her mouth. The warmth was comforting as it swished in her mouth and went down her throat. She felt it spreading through her stomach in waves, pushing away the nausea and the fear. In fact, she suddenly felt better than she had since she couldn’t remember when. Overcome with excitement, she dipped her hand toward the pool again, but the Cloud Queen stopped her.

  “No, dear,” the Cloud Queen said. “That’s all you need.”