Krystal's World Read online

question away.

  “Tell you later.”

  “Let’s go,” said Lola, and she began to skip away. Tigre gave me a sideways glance, showing his exasperation, and urged me to follow.

  We walked a good ways down the road, and it seems like I always head in the direction Cerberus had chased me down to that first day. I almost can’t believe that was real too. No, I can’t believe it.

  Slam!

  I fall to the ground, holding my forehead.

  “Ungh, what the heck was that?” I cry, trying to stand up through the sudden throbbing headache I’d acquired.

  A door stood there, the twins gaping at the sight of it. It was just a door—no house, no windows, no anything. Only a frame surrounded it, its hinges golden like the sun. The dark wood seemed to call out to me with all its secrets.

  “The Seceraterly door! No one has been able to find it. No wonder you had feelings and—”

  “The door to the underworld,” Tigre said, cutting Lola off. “Do you know the words?”

  “What words?” I asked, my eyes wide.

  “The words. The words. The ones you saw in your dreams, those words!”

  Tigre’s fists clenched in frustration and his teeth began to point. He roared out in pain, and literally roared. His sister had her fist up and looked like she punched him square in the back.

  I was breathing hard, terrified, but suddenly it felt as if my lungs had opened and expanded. I could breathe deeply without worry.

  My best guess was, that by the way Lola was staring at me wide-eyed, that I had a worried look upon my face.

  “OMG, no way!” She exclaimed, suddenly appearing as if she knew this would happen the whole time, but tainted with excitement and sadness for whatever was happening.

  +++

  Tigre finally woke up, yawning, and he asked, “What happened?”

  “Lola—”

  “You passed out.” Lola gave me a look as if to tell me not to let him know about what she did.

  I rolled my eyes and they landed back on the dark, wooden door. We were on the other side of it now, in a boat and drifting down a huge body of water, trees with moss standing at our sides and swaying as if they were live animals. I still didn’t know what words Tigre had told me I should know from my dreams, and I was puzzling over them constantly, ignoring the nonsense chatter Lola used to take up the eerie silence surrounding us.

  I still didn’t really understand where we were; this isn’t what I expected the underworld to look like, all the trees and fog down here, so I asked.

  “We’re headed to the end of the road,” he said simply. “Actually, to the end of all roads.”

  “I think I’ve been there,” I said, gaping out at the trees, their roots anchored to the ground beneath the blue-grey water.

  The twins look at me like I was crazy.

  “It’s true,” I explain, nodding furiously as my heart rate increases. It wasn’t a dream. “Really.”

  “No one has ever been there and made it back alive,” Tigre said.

  I went on. “It’s where I met Hexinoide and Cerberus—well, I met them in my dreams before then, but… I met them for real, at the end of all roads.”

  SEVEN

  THE WORDS

  I’m telling you guys, I did go there!”

  “Well, if you did, then you would know the words,” Tigre grumbled.

  “Oh, man, a wall!” Lilaysh groaned.

  The head of the boat bumped against it, the water seeming to still around us. I stare at it and see some words poking out from beneath a collection of dirt settled about eye-level.

  “Wait, there’s something engraved on it,” I said. I began to make my way to the front of the boat, careful not to tip it over, and rubbed the dirt from its home.

  “The fangs of yellow,” I read aloud, “and the claws of a creat. That’s what makes the transformation complete.”

  “What the heck is a ‘creat’?” Lola snorted.

  A flash of a memory appears to me. Hexinoide flashing his teeth, Cerberus’ claws digging into the ground…

  “The fangs of yell, and the claws of a creat…” I repeat. “Creat… could it be short for creature? A creature like Cerberus? And the fangs… Hexinoide’s sharp teeth. If so, then what’s this about the transformation?”

  “Would they be able to merge in any way?” Tigre asked, startling me. “It’s possible for any creature with abilities like them and us, but we can’t do it; we aren’t strong enough.”

  “Transformation…” I murmured. “Together they would make…” A word manifests itself in my brain, a word from a dream long ago. “Hexerbrus!”

  The wall split in two, the water we float on pushing us into the second half of the trees behind it, and slamming shut as we slip through. On the back, I notice more writing, only it was glowing orange, as if it had just been engraved into the stone with the flame of a blowtorch.

  WHEN THIRTEEN, A GIRL IN BLONDE WILL BE TRANSFORMED,

  A SET OF DOUBLE TAKES CLOSE TO HER HEART.

  SHE WILL FACE TWO BEASTS MERGED INTO A SINGLE BODY,

  A POSSIBLE BETRAYAL ETCHED FROM THE START.

  The words echoed in my mind. Could it be talking about me?

  Nonsense.

  I turned just as we came across another wall in the process of opening. I dedicated the words to memory on the previous stone wall, and searched this moving one for words. Only one.

  CONTINUE

  The next wall we came across stayed shut, a key hole under the words.

  TAKE YOUR KEY AND PUT IT IN,

  AND YOU WILL BE THERE AGAIN

  “What key?” I asked aloud. The twins shrugged, Tigre’s face shadowed with sadness, almost. Why do they need me? I’d never got a straight answer.

  I felt something cool in my hand before I could ask, but when I picked my hand up, there wasn’t anything there. Suddenly something appeared slowly. It was a golden key, shaped in a strange, wavy way, with random shapes sticking off its neck and for the teeth. Two large swirls wrapped around each other at the other end, the end I should hold when putting a key in its hole. My name was engraved into it in strange lettering.

  KRYSTAL ANN LIVINGSTON

  I stuck the key into the door and turned it, and bells began to chime all around us. A screaming whisper blasted in our ears, the random wind hitting us like in a storm, as I make out the words.

  Stay alive.

  My eyes darted around everywhere to find its source, but the wind died down and the echo of the voice disappeared, the dimness clarifying as if clouds had uncovered the sun I couldn’t see. Green grass plated itself down a road as it crept up from the misty waters we traveled on. Trees were an icy blue and algae green, while the trunks were purple and light brown. Birds were chattering with crickets and frogs hopped on lily pads, giving their own melody to the beautiful world around us.

  But it all changed when the bird’s beaks curved downward like a waterfall.

  EIGHT

  THE ROAD’S REVENGE

  The frogs turned black and grew fangs from their nonexistent teeth. Ugly faces appeared on the trees and darkened as their leaves changed to shades of grey. The grass melted away, leaving behind soggy black soil. It turned from beauty to terror as the wind picked back up again and the fog thickened. The bird’s melodies began to haunt the air and moans pressed against our bodies as they drifted through the cracks of the bird’s songs. Goose bumps lined my arms as owl’s hooted in the distance. Lola whimpered behind me as she tucked herself deeper into the boat.

  The head of our vessel crashed into something and we were flung backwards. I stood up carefully and saw a frog almost as big as I was holding the point of the boat.

  “Don’t go any farther,” it whispered around its fangs.

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Shhh!” It hissed. “Be quiet, don’t let them hear you.”

  “Why?” Lilaysh whispered, her voice trembling. “Who’s out there? Is it Cerberus and Hexinoide?”

  “The Revenge of the Road,” the frog breathed. “In the year 1800, Cinder Lake, your home, wasn’t safe. Your great-great-great-grandfather, Gregory Lest Livingston, came here and picked a flower for his love. The trees poisoned the air and the birds feasted on his flesh as he died, his last moments drowned in agony and torture as he choked on the poisonous air. The frogs sucked his blood like vampires—the surroundings eat everyone and everything that comes by and disturbs their slumber.”

  “That’s where the missing people went!” Tigre shouted.

  The frog and Lola shushed him, the forest seeming to stir for a split second. We stayed silent until the birds went back to their haunting tune.

  My breathing came a lot easier then inside the panic surrounding my lungs. Black spots appeared on my skin, but they were faint. As faint as shadows in the light of a full moon.

  NINE

  TRANSFORMATION

  Cheetahs have humongous lungs and gorgeous body patterns. The cheetah that I drew alongside the panther and tiger came back to the front of my mind. It was only a dream. Too many stories. But right then, it seemed as if all of my dreams were coming alive in ways I couldn’t describe.

  And I figured it out.

  I ran, jumped out of the boat, and landed on the black tar of the road. My surroundings stirred the tiniest bit at my loud landing, but it quieted down again after a second.

  “A curse was placed upon him and his family,” the frog went on, “that the first female born in his family would be transformed.”

  “Into what?” I spoke. I recall my twin; I was born only a few minutes before her, like Tigre and Lola. I was the first female born to my