The 39 Clues: Book 8

by Gordan Korman

Oh, how he didn't want to go inside. In the course of the Clue hunt, he'd been in enough tunnels, shafts, pits, and catacombs to last a lifetime. And in some of them, it had very nearly come to that.

  But he hadn't climbed that stairway to heaven for nothing. He got down on all fours and crawled inside. It was dark and tight, the rock cold and damp from the misty air.

  About fifteen feet in, the cave faded to utter blackness. The shut-in feeling was unendurable -- ancient stone pressing on all sides, zero vision. It was as if he'd been swallowed by Mount Song. He began to hyperventilate. Asthma? No, the gasping breaths were bringing air into his lungs, but they were accelerating, and he was powerless to control them.

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  What was happening to him? Was he sick?

  I'm having a claustrophobia attack!

  He shut his eyes and tried to pump all thought out of his mind. He was nor wedged into an unimaginably tight seam inside millions of tons of solid rock. He was just--chilling.

  It was only about thirty seconds, but it seemed like an eternity. At last, he was breathing normally and ready to press on.

  His probing hand struck a loose rock, and he felt a vibration in his palm. A second later, his knee rattled over the same spot. Odd. He reversed a few inches and tapped at the stone. It made a peculiar sound, not hollow, exactly, but --different.

  If only I had a flashlight!

  All at once, he realized that he did have a light. Not a very bright one, but better than nothing. He aimed his left wrist at the loose piece and pressed the small button that lit up the dial of his watch.

  The glow was dim, but it revealed an amazing sight. This stone was not native to the cave. An examination of the edges showed that it had been specially shaped to fit into that very spot.

  He scrabbled with his fingers and managed to pry one corner up. It lifted easily. He set it aside and activated the watch light once again.

  The exhilaration of discovery flooded over him. He was looking into a secret compartment carved into the rock, not seen by human eyes for who knew how long.

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  He leaned closer. There lay the tattered remains of a moldy blanket wrapped around--what?

  He drew the parcel out and tried to unwrap it. It was no use. This was a two-hand project, impossible to accomplish when one hand was occupied with lighting up the watch face. He reverted to darkness and replaced the stone over the empty compartment. Then he grasped the bundle in his arms and began the arduous journey, inch by inch, reversing out of the cave. Slowly, the light returned, and he was in the open again.

  A quick scan of the shrine and the area around the statue. He was still alone. Eagerly, he unwrapped the ancient fabric and examined the contents. His brow knit.

  Garbage. Literally! Pots and cups, broken glass, all scorched black and half melted.

  Who takes out the trash and hides it like it's something precious and top secret?

  He regarded the pieces. Those weren't cups, they were beakers. And the taller, thin ones --broken test tubes and maybe glass pipes. Those were clamps, the screws charred black. This wasn't trash -- it was lab equipment! And something had obviously gone very wrong, because the stuff was all burned.

  A fire. Wasn't that the Cahill way! His parents, Grace's home, cousin Irina barely a week ago. He could still see her as she fell, as the flaming beach house caved in around her. It was a terrible image -- one that had returned to him, unbidden, over and over again since that awful night.

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  Dan had witnessed a lot since Grace's funeral. But that was the first time he'd ever watched someone die. He remembered Irina's face and couldn't help but wonder if his parents had looked like that when their final moment had come.

  No -- can't think about that....

  His mind traveled back to the underground chamber in Paris. The mural of Gideon Cahill and his four children -- Luke, Jane, Thomas, and Catherine -- the forebears of the Cahill branches. That picture had showed a fire, too.

  Gingerly, he picked up a scorched shard between his thumb and forefinger. The glass was thick and bubbly --barely translucent. The other components were oversize and clunky. They seemed to be made of heavy iron rather than stainless steel or aluminum. How stone-age was this stuff?

  His heart began to beat at double speed. Wait a minute! Gideon Cahill had been an alchemist! Could this be the stuff from his lab -- burned by the very same fire that was depicted in that painting? Henan Province was nowhere near Europe, but five hundred years was a long time, and, let's face it, Cahills got around.

  He began to sift through the burned remnants, searching for some hint as to why this debris was so important that it had to be dragged halfway around the world and then hidden.

  Ow! A shard pierced his skin, and he sucked on the

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  bleeding finger. He could almost hear Amy's voice: I told you not to play with broken glass.

  Oh, yeah? he retorted mentally. Well I'm the one who found it, not you. And I'm not even part of the due hunt anymore!

  Looking down from the heights, he spotted the observation platform far below. Two figures the size of ants were crouched at one of the telescopes. Jonah and his dad? He couldn't tell. But they would probably be looking for him about now.

  His first instinct was to hide the remains of Gideon's lab. It didn't seem to hold any Clue, but the fact that someone had gone to such great lengths to bring it here meant it was probably important. You didn't hand stuff over to the Janus just like that.

  He began to wrap up the pieces. Something tumbled through a rip in the blanket and landed with a clunk at his feet. He reached down and picked it up. It didn't look like part of the lab. It was oval in shape, probably gold --it was hard to tell because it was so blackened. But it had a button catch. He pressed it and the oval popped open.

  The inside was lined with what had probably been purple velvet. Nestled there was an ivory miniature, ornately framed and painted with incredible detail.

  Dan stared at the face of the young woman portrayed there.

  It was his mother!

  No, not possible. This stuff is hundreds of years old!

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  Her hair and her clothes were all wrong --from another time. This couldn't be Hope Cahill.

  But it's her face!

  Dan had been only four when she'd died. Yet you didn't forget your mother's face. Not ever.

  He heard distant voices, chanting in unison. More monks, training on the stairs. He only had a few short moments to hide the lab components --

  He regarded the miniature again. But not this. This was staying with him.

  He stuck the portrait in the waistband of his underwear, hefted the blanket bundle, and started down the d; steps. It had to go somewhere he could find it again if he needed to. He counted twenty-five steps -- fourteen plus eleven, Amy's age plus his own --and strayed off

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  the path into the underbrush that framed the stairway. He found an indentation in the ground and nestled it there, covering it with stones and loose branches. Not the best hiding place, but it would have to do.

  Dan got back on the steps just as a monk and three kung fu students came into view. They passed him at a run without a second look.

  He speeded his descent. The way down was sweat free --and much, much faster. He would have been able to make even better time, except that he kept pausing to marvel at the miniature in his waistband. His mother's face, yet not his mother.

  Amy had to see it. Whatever their disagreements over the contest, she wouldn't be able to ignore this. It was a lightning strike.

  No sooner had he set foot on the telescope platform at the bottom than he spotted Jonah jogging toward him. His father followed several yards behind, hampered by the effort of running and texting at the same time.

  "Where were you, cuz?" Jonah called urgently. "What were you doing up there?"

  "Well--" Dan hesitated, not sure what he dare
reveal.

  Luckily, the star was in too much of a rush to wait for an answer. "Find your clothes and lose those pajamas. We're out."

  "Where are we going?" Dan asked.

  "I'll let you know the deal on the plane. We've got a date -- with an army."

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  CHAPTER 15

  The Great Wall.

  Even seeing it from the bus, Amy had been unable to appreciate its vastness. It had been built as protection from the Mongols, its ribbon cutting clear across ancient China's vast northern frontier.

  Now, walking along the ramparts of the Badaling section, Amy could see why even the Mongol hordes had thought twice before trying to attack this place. For starters, the Wall was thick --the top was as wide as the living room of their apartment back in Boston. That meant the Chinese could pack it with soldiers. There were towers every half mile or so. These served as observation posts, barracks, armories, and storehouses for supplies. The defenders could live on the Wall indefinitely.

  It was also high --at least thirty feet at Badaling. Any attacking army would have to climb that distance through a barrage of arrows and boiling oil.

  Dan should see this, she reflected. Arrows and boiling oil were just his speed. Yet it wasn't only the Wall's

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  military history that made her think of her brother. Rarely did a full minute pass without her recalling their ugly fight in Tiananmen Square.

  And now Dan was gone. Well, not exactly. He hadn't vanished into thin air. She knew who he was with, if not where he was.

  An unpleasant memory returned--(the) murky picture of a slimy ridged body and long reptilian tail. An eighteen-foot Nile crocodile, viewed by moonlight.

  Jonah Wizard could not be trusted. No Cahill could.

  It had been more than two days since she'd last seen her brother. Their longest separation since the day Mom brought the little dweeb home from the hospital to ruin her life. Now it was starting to sink in that, without Dan, she had no life.

  She thought back to their grandmother's funeral, the day when she and Dan had first learned about the search for the 39 Clues. They may have signed on as a sort of tribute to Grace, but, by the time the hunt had taken them to Paris, both believed with all their hearts that the contest was the most important thing on the face of the earth.

  With each passing hour, Amy was becoming increasingly convinced that the whole business meant less than nothing if she couldn't get her brother back.

  Where are you, Dan? Is this my fault? Are you so mad that you're never coming back?

  She recalled his exact words: I hate you! It didn't get much clearer than that.

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  She couldn't blame him for hating her for what she'd said about Mom and Dad. In a weird way, she was almost proud of him for defending them when she couldn't.

  To be relieved their parents were dead. The mere fact that she could think such a thing was like a business card with madrigal printed on it.

  "I can't put you down, Saladin, so stop asking," Nellie was muttering irritably. "It's too crowded. You'll get lost."

  "Mrrp," Saladin complained.

  Crowded. Amy shuddered. Was it ever! Their bus had turned out to be one of hundreds. Near the main parking area, tourists had swarmed like a plague of locusts among guides, souvenir vendors, and security guards. And the stuffl The Wall itself might have been an unspoiled ancient wonder, but beside it the goods for sale would have filled fifty malls --paper cuttings ranging from postcard size to large murals; intricate carvings from walnut shells; pictures made of seashells and feathers; silk kites, toys, figurines; traditional Chinese puzzle boxes by the thousands. Some of it was beautiful folk art; some of it was cheap junk. All of it had throngs of customers lined up with credit cards and fistfuls of yuan. The crush made Tiananmen Square seem empty by comparison. Amy had very nearly lost it. Only the refrain in her head had kept her focused: Jonah draws a crowd ... find Jonah and you've found Dan....

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  But so far, the crowds had been sightseers, not Wizard fans. Around here, the Great Wall outdrew teenage moguls, even the wonderful and celebrated Wiz.

  Nellie peered over the parapet at the purple-tinged mountain vista that seemed to go on forever. "Pretty slick. From here you could spot an invading army twenty miles away. Are you sure those emperors were Janus? This place has Lucian written all over it."

  Amy shook her head. "Way back then there was no Lucian or Janus. The Wall was started two thousand years before Gideon Cahill was even born."

  The au pair shot her a cockeyed smile. "I forgot that there are still a few things on this planet you Cahills haven't had a hand in." The sun was low in the sky now, and she had to squint to see the next tower. "Looks like a big mob ahead. Maybe it's God's gift to hip-hop."

  Amy nodded but said nothing. To her, the setting sun meant only one thing: They had been wandering around the Wall all afternoon, with no sign of Jonah --or Dan.

  They raced along the ancient battlement --this stretch arduously uphill. Nellie set Saladin down, and the cat, happy to stretch his legs, bounded beside them. Puffing hard, they caught up to the horde assembled outside the tower--a Brazilian tour group.

  "Jo-Jo--?" This time Amy's stammer had as much to do with breathlessness as the presence of a large group of people.

  "Jonah Wizard," Nellie finished, scooping Saladin

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  back into her arms. "Have you seen him?"

  "The Wiz?" The tour guide brightened. "He is here? I read his O Filho Da Gangsta bedtime stories to my nieces in Sao Paolo."

  Nellie was totally disgusted. "No matter where you go, or who you meet, it's all Jonah, all the time."

  "But," Amy added, barely able to lift her gaze from the cobblestones, "when you really need him, he's nowhere."

  The au pair recognized the hopelessness in the girl's voice. "Okay," she said, taking charge. "We're tired. It's time to admit that we're not going to find Dan today. We have to figure out where we're going to sleep so we'll be fresh to take up the search in the morning."

  Amy stuck out her jaw. "No! I'm not leaving here without my brother!"

  "Be sensible. It'll be dark soon. We won't improve our chances of getting to Dan if we kill ourselves. We need rest and we need food. We haven't eaten since breakfast. You know how cranky Saladin gets when he's hungry."

  Saladin added a plaintive "mrrp!" to the conversation.

  "That cat eats too much already!" Amy erupted. "Fresh snapper, shrimp dumplings --what's next, beluga caviar? We don't have time for breaks! Who knows what Jonah could be doing to Dan right now? If he harms my brother in any way, I swear I'll put my hands around his throat and strangle him!"

  Her breath caught in shock at the violence of her tone, and -- worse -- the realization that she meant

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  every word. Was the Madrigal in her coming to the surface? Ordinary people tossed words like strangle around casually, not meaning anything by them. It was different for Madrigals. Madrigals killed.

  "So with all that we have to worry about," she mumbled in a quieter tone, "you'll have to forgive me for not dropping everything because Saladin's a little hungry. He could live for a month on his own blubber. The last thing he needs is another snack."

  A few feet away, a tourist unwrapped a sardine sandwich. With a "mrrpl" that was practically the shriek of a hunting bobcat, the Egyptian Mau hurled himself out of Nellie's grasp. Unaccustomed to hunting for his food, Saladin overshot the sandwich, skimmed the parapet at the edge of the Wall, and disappeared over the side.

  Twin screams escaped Amy and Nellie.

  They raced to the edge and looked down, terrified of what they might see.

  Thirty feet below, Grace Cahill's beloved pet stood on the spot where invading armies had been repelled and slaughtered. His tail was high in the air; his fur bristled in outrage. The "mrrp!" he emitted was the most thorough scolding either of them had ever received.

  "You know," Amy said, her voice shaking, "
maybe we should get something to eat and find a hotel for the night."

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  CHAPTER 16

  The city of Xian was much smaller than Beijing, but Dan could hardly tell the difference out the window of the G5. There was no towering skyline like the one in China's capital, but the sprawl of buildings seemed infinite, the red of brake lights clogging every inch of the grid of roadways. Traffic.

  Pollution, too, he thought as the plane descended through a thick layer of brownish haze.

  "Oh, no --" They weren't even on the runway, and Jonah's father was already immersed in his BlackBerry. "Remember those 'Live Large with the Wiz Generation' posters? Well, guess how that translates into Chinese--'Jonah Wizard Makes Your Ancestors Fat.'"

  Dan brayed a laugh in his face. "Can you save me one? It'll go great in my collection!"

  Broderick was not amused. "In that case, why don't you take the conference call from the record company?"

  "It's all good, Pops." Jonah yawned as the jet touched down. "You know the drill. I take some lucky fan out

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  to dinner; we post the whole thing on YouTube; everybody forgets about a few posters."

  "They printed over six hundred thousand," his father reminded him, tight-lipped.

  "Dinner and a movie," Jonah amended. "Better yet, clubbing in Xian. We'll give MTV Asia an exclusive. It'll be epic, yo! Just as soon as we're done with these terracotta homeys," he added with a wink at Dan.

  Of all the managers, publicists, and bodyguards of the Wizard entourage, and even Jonah's own father, the star had chosen Dan to accompany him on this mission to learn the secret of the terracotta army.

  Not that Dan cared about the Clue hunt anymore.

  Another thing about Xian --they had real limos here. A silver stretch was waiting at the airport to take them to their hotel, the Bell Tower, where Jonah had reserved the entire top floor.

  Jonah's father was on the phone with the hotel's nightclub to hire the headline act to perform for them in their suite --a little dinner entertainment.

  Dan glanced at his watch. Seven-thirty. "How late does this terracotta place stay open?"

  Jonah flashed his rock star grin. "It closed two hours ago. We can't go yet. It isn't dark enough."