“It was the Wind Witch!” said Eleanor.
“Plus,” continued the lieutenant, “I find it pretty odd that yesterday we were fighting in Salerno and now we’re almost three hundred klicks northwest. I don’t have a single memory of us flying that distance or receiving orders to fly it. Do you, Hargrove?”
“No, sir.”
“I think these kids are tellin’ the truth,” said the lieutenant. “They’re real American heroes! Jerry, I want you to transport them wherever they want to go—”
“Rome,” said everyone at once.
“Rome, why?”
“To find our brother,” said Cordelia.
“Not just her brother, one of my best friends,” said Will. “Brendan Walker.”
“You got it,” said Laramer. “Hargrove, take them to Rome.”
“How?” said Jerry. “They won’t all fit in the plane, sir.”
“Take the Tiger.”
“I—excuse me, sir? You want me to take the tank?”
“That’s right. If you encounter any German ’bots, they’ll think twice before attacking their own tank. Heck, they’re practically tanks themselves.”
“But I don’t know how to drive a tank, sir!” said Hargrove.
“Jerry . . . how many times have we had to sit in some trattoria, after a couple jugs of vino, listening to you brag about being the best pilot in the squadron?” Laramer change the tone of his voice, doing a very good impression of Jerry. “‘I can guide any vehicle made by man!’”
“Well, yes, sir, but that was a figure of speech—”
“Airmen in my squadron don’t make figures of speech, Jerry, they make commitments!”
“But sir, the dials and controls are in German!”
“Then take Volnheim with you.”
And that was how Cordelia and Eleanor found themselves walking toward the Tiger I, getting ready to take a trip back to Rome. Volnheim, handcuffed and clanking his wrists against his cuffs, approached the two girls.
“I have a proposition for you two,” he said with a perfect smile.
“Leave us alone, you creep,” said Cordelia.
“I could,” said Volnheim, “or I could tell you about the treasure map.”
UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
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What?” asked Eleanor. “What treasure map?”
“One of the spoils of our battle victories,” said Volnheim, “is the great treasures—paintings, jewels, gold—that we have taken from dirty non-Aryan humans—or Untermensch, as I like to call them. This map will lead you to the place that stores all of these great treasures.”
“No, thanks,” said Eleanor. “We don’t want your Nazi gold. That’s a disgusting, awful—”
“Great idea,” interrupted Cordelia. She looked around to make sure that Will, Felix, and Jerry were out of earshot. They were standing by the tank. She leaned close to Volnheim and whispered: “Where’s the map?”
“What?” cried Eleanor. “You’re gonna actually talk to him?!”
Cordelia gave her a look: Gimme a sec, I’m working on something. Eleanor backed off, although she didn’t trust her sister. Volnheim whispered: “The map is hidden in the walls of the tank. But if I show you where it is, you must promise me one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“You will take me to your world—to the real world—when this is over.”
“It’s a deal,” said Cordelia.
“Have you totally lost it?” Eleanor hissed as Jerry came over, grabbed Volnheim, and led him to the tank.
“Calm down, Nell,” Cordelia said. “You know it’s really true that there’s a lot of treasure never recovered from the Nazis? If that guy has a real treasure map and we can bring some treasure home, there will be a huge reward for returning it to the rightful owners.”
“That’s horrible, Deal. That’s really kinda greedy.”
“No,” argued Cordelia, “it’s about helping our family survive—and protecting our good name. What if we do manage to save Brendan and get home? What kind of home are we going back to? Dad’s gambling away all our money. I don’t want to go back just so we can get kicked out of Kristoff House!”
“I do. I want things to go back to how they were before.”
“You mean when Dad got fired and we had nowhere to live?”
“Okay, maybe things weren’t so great. But here’s another issue . . . You just promised a Nazi you’d take him back to our home!!”
“That’s all I promised him,” said Cordelia. “What I didn’t promise him is that he’d be free. As soon as we get home I plan on turning him over to the authorities for perpetrating hate crimes. Or maybe I’ll give him to a museum and they’ll unplug him and put him on display. Not many people have seen a Nazi cyborg.”
Will called from the tank: “Cordelia, Eleanor! Come on, then.”
The girls climbed inside the Tiger I. Will was sitting in the driver’s seat under the turret. It wasn’t like the driver’s seat of a car; there was no windshield. The only way to see was through the telescopic range finder in front of Will. Once again, he thought, Brendan would love this.
The tank was a lot like a submarine, a tight maze of protruding metal, endlessly complex and requiring careful movement to navigate. Volnheim took the gunner’s seat. Jerry took the commander’s seat behind him, so he could keep tabs on the Nazi. Felix got in the mortar seat below. Cordelia and Eleanor scrunched together uncomfortably in the radio operator’s position.
“Let’s go!” Jerry said, closing the hatch. Will hit a button and the tank came to life with a deep thrumming. It sounded like the inside of a factory, and after a few minutes they were moving down the road, past the field where the Nazis had suffered their losses.
“Farewell, Kristoff House,” Will said.
“Can I see?” asked Eleanor, climbing up to Will and trying to peek through the range finder.
“Sorry, dear, it’s a tank, not a tour bus.”
They rolled through the Italian countryside, with Volnheim instructing Will on how to maneuver the tank.
Soon the sun began to set. Everyone started feeling hungry.
“Is there anything to eat in here?” asked Will.
“In that compartment,” said Volnheim. Will opened a small door to find several cans of motor oil.
“Motor oil?!” asked Will. “You call that food?”
“That’s the only food we need,” said Volnheim.
“Bloody cyborgs,” said Will as he slammed the compartment door shut. “And by the way, it’s getting too dark to see.”
“Just continue to follow the instrument panel, and you should be fine,” said Volnheim.
“But what if there’s a person in the way . . . or a harmless farm animal?” asked Eleanor.
“We will feel a slight bump,” said Volnheim with a mean-spirited chuckle. He was the only one who found this amusing.
As the tank continued on, it got much colder inside. Eleanor and Cordelia were glad that they were sitting with each other, because they could keep warm. Felix could suddenly see his breath.
“What’s going on?” Will asked. “My temperature reads zero.”
“Zero?” Eleanor said. “We’re gonna freeze to death!”
Cordelia explained, “It’s Celsius, not Fahrenheit, so it’s only thirty-two—”
“That’s still pretty cold!”
“This shouldn’t be happening . . . ,” Volnheim said. He looked at the instruments in the gunner’s chair. Particularly the compass. The arrow indicating which way they were going pointed southeast. But it was turning, creeping toward north.
“Are you turning the wheel?” Volnheim asked.
“No!” Will said. “I’m going completely straight!”
But the compass was moving, inching up . . . and then it began to spin as if someone had hit a spring inside. The arrow circled past west, south, east, nort
h—
“What is this? What’s going on?” Volnheim screamed.
“You tell us!” shouted Jerry. “Is this some sorta Nazi trick?”
“No! Stop the tank—”
“I’ve already stopped it! I’m not touching anything,” said Will. “And look at the altimeter!”
“What?” asked Cordelia.
Will explained, “It measures the altitude of the vehicle in meters—”
“I know, but isn’t that a strange thing to have on a tank? This tank stays on the ground, right?”
“The Third Reich is very thorough!” said Volnheim.
Jerry pointed: “Look!”
The altimeter’s small dial was moving past twenty.
“Twenty meters in the air?” said Will. “How is that possible?”
But the needle kept moving, past twenty-five, thirty . . .
“We’re flying!” Eleanor yelled. “What can you see, Will?”
Will looked through the range finder, but all he could see was blackness—and something that looked like white static rushing past.
“I don’t know. We could be in the air. . . .”
“Tanks don’t fly!” Jerry said. “Volnheim, you’re opening the hatch to see what’s going on.”
Jerry removed the steel handcuffs from Volnheim’s wrists. The altimeter kept climbing. Will announced as it went past forty-five, fifty . . . and then the needle started just swinging back and forth, useless—
Suddenly a huge jolt rocked the tank.
The vehicle went completely still. Everyone was thrown forward in their seats. The compass stopped spinning; the temperature gauge read minus two. But the altimeter was still acting very strange, swinging back and forth from zero to fifty, as if the tank were moving up and down regularly. As Will looked at it, he realized he could feel the tank moving up and down, almost as if it were on the end of a yo-yo.
“What’s causing that?”
Jerry shoved his water pistol into Volnheim’s back. “We’re going to find out. Open the hatch.”
“Excuse me, Sergeant,” said Will. “But . . . is your weapon . . . is that . . . ?”
“Yeah, it’s a water pistol! It might look kinda silly, but it’s the only thing that works against these things!” shouted Jerry.
Volnheim obeyed.
A terrific wind poured into the tank.
Everyone gasped. They had somehow been brought into the middle of a raging snowstorm. The cold was so severe, it threatened to knock them out with the force of pure shock.
“Close the hatch!” Jerry yelled. “Close the hatch!”
“But look!” Volnheim stared at the front of the tank. Jerry did too—and saw with horror why the altimeter was moving back and forth.
The tank was perched high up on a cliff in the mountains.
The front of it was hanging over the cliff.
And it was tipping back and forth, as if it were on a seesaw.
UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
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How did this happen?” Jerry screamed. “Where are we?!”
“We must have hit a seam in Kristoff’s books,” Cordelia said, “and crossed into another one of his worlds.”
“What does that mean? How do we get off this mountain?” Jerry looked down to Cordelia, taking his eyes off Volnheim for a moment. The Nazi knocked Jerry’s water pistol out of his hand and scrambled through the hatch.
“Hey, get back here!” Jerry climbed out after Volnheim. On top of the tank, he grabbed Volnheim’s ankle. The Nazi kicked at him. The two began fighting, grappling, rolling away from the hatch on top of the tank.
“Uh-oh,” Will said. Snow blew down on him. “We have to go, people. And bundle up . . . it’s freezing up there!”
Felix grabbed wool blankets for everyone and they climbed out of the hatch and stared in shock at the swirling snow.
The tank was completely surrounded by mountains. Jerry and Volnheim were rolling toward the front of it, punching and kicking—all while the tank was about to fall off the cliff!
Cordelia was immediately cored out by the cold, as if the Wind Witch had returned to possess her body.
“Come on!” Eleanor yelled. “Let’s get off this thing!”
“We can’t leave Jerry!” said Felix.
“That’s right!” said Will. “We’d be cowards—”
Creeeaak—the tank yawned over the chasm where it was perched. Jerry and Volnheim now clung to the barrel of the 88-millimeter gun, holding on for dear life, only able to kick at each other. Jerry’s hands were becoming ineffective in the merciless cold. But Volnheim had no problems. Jerry called to the kids.
“Get outta here! Forget about us—”
Volnheim slammed his boot into Jerry’s stomach, nearly knocking him into thin air. The Nazi cyborg then swung his legs up, wrapping them around the gun barrel. Now he was hanging upside down.
Volnheim cracked a smile as he shuffled rapidly forward with his legs along the barrel of the gun, toward the front, causing the tank to tip further over the cliff’s edge.
“What are you doing?” shouted Will to the Nazi.
“What I should have done earlier. Kill all of you!”
Volnheim hoisted himself onto the end of the barrel and started wrenching it up and down, like a monkey trying to shake coconuts off a tree, moving faster and faster, as if Cordelia had the remote and were fast-forwarding. The vibrations of his heavy metallic body tilted the tank forward, bringing it closer to the chasm.
Will saw his chance.
He ducked back into the tank and sat in the gunner’s position. He knew that the tank was armed; he knew that firing it was a one-man job. He reached his finger toward the button that read: Feuer.
And Will shot the cannon.
Up on the tank, Felix, Cordelia, and Eleanor were blown back and nearly deafened. But that didn’t compare to what happened to Volnheim. Since he was holding on to the end of the barrel, he got hit point-blank; he was blasted off the tank into black space and gyrating snow. Jerry, also hanging on the barrel, saw Volnheim get blown into countless pieces of metal, wiring, and gears, as well as a splash of motor oil—and then the shell detonated against a mountain nearby.
It was like a spectacular NASCAR crash in the middle of the Swiss Alps: For a moment, the mountainside was bright as the sun, and Jerry could see all the tiny pieces of Volnheim fluttering down to the snowbanks far below.
The mountains echoed: kabooom.
Cordelia, Eleanor, and Felix landed in snow. But Jerry couldn’t get off the gun barrel. And the tank, which had been knocked back by the recoil of the cannon, was now being drawn into the abyss. Will climbed out and crawled toward the barrel, extending his hand to Jerry.
“Get closer! I’ll pull you up!”
Jerry reached up—but his fingers were frozen. Jerry looked at his hands, betrayed, as he slipped off the Tiger I.
Will screamed.
Now the tank was going over too, groaning as it slid off the cliff. Will stumbled, trying to leap off—
But it was too late.
“Will!” Cordelia and Eleanor yelled.
There was no way he was going to survive. Except . . . Felix was diving toward the edge of the cliff, landing in snow and whipping his German wool blanket forward, holding it with one hand.
The tank fell away, sending out a shower of sparks as it went down and screaked against the rocky cliff face, finally detonating in a muffled explosion below.
But Cordelia saw: Felix’s blanket was tense, like a rope.
She ran toward Felix. She started pulling his legs. Eleanor followed and pulled her waist. They all worked together, grunting and groaning, trying to keep from being drawn off the cliff, and hauled Will onto the white and desolate mountain.
Then they huddled under German blankets next to a snowbank.
“Where are we . . . ?” Eleanor said weakly over the win
d.
“The third Kristoff book,” said Cordelia. “Whatever that is.”
“It looks like a ski resort,” said Eleanor. “Remember when everything was good at home and Dad would take us on ski trips to Lake Tahoe? Hey, maybe we’re back home . . . Tahoe’s only a few hours from San Francisco. . . .”
“This doesn’t look anything like Tahoe,” said Brendan.
“No,” said Cordelia. “It looks like hell after it freezes over.”
“Is it just me?” asked Felix. “Or is it getting even colder?”
“It’s not just you,” said Cordelia. “Look at Will’s lips.”
They all turned to Will. His lips were blue. His skin was turning white. His eyebrows were flecked with frozen snow.
“We need to g-g-g-get out of here,” said Will. “We’ll d-dd-die of hypothermia.”
“What’s h-hypothermia?” asked Felix, starting to shiver as well.
“Starts with a t-t-t-tingling sensation,” said Will. “Followed by b-b-b-blisters, b-blackened skin. You start to get confused, become very sleepy, d-d-d-drift off, and d-d-d-d-d . . .”
“That sounds aw-awful,” said Felix.
“I’ve heard it’s actually rather p-pleasant once the f-frostbite sets in. You p-p-perish rather quickly. And best of all, you leave a perfectly preserved c-c-c-corpse—”
“Guys,” shouted Eleanor. “Will you stop talking about c-corpses?”
They sat in silence for several minutes. Sadly, besides corpses, they didn’t have much to talk about.
“We should huddle c-c-c-close,” said Will. “Use our h-h-heat. . . .”
“What’s the p-p-p-point?” asked a deflated Cordelia. “I mean . . . there’s no way off this mountain. There’s no one around to help us. Why p-prolong the inevitable? I hate to say it—”
“Then don’t,” interrupted Eleanor. “We’ve come too far to g-give up now. We have to get B-B-Brendan. We have to get back home. And after t-t-t-today, I’ll have to start therapy!”
Nobody laughed.
“That was a j-j-j-joke,” said Eleanor. “Remember how Bren used to handle stuff like this?”
House of Secrets: Battle of the Beasts Page 18
