21
DEER IN THE HEADLIGHTS
It took Simon and Nolan hours to clean up the mess. Malcolm, Winter, and Jam all pitched in, and while Winter murmured her condolences over the loss of his mother’s postcards, none of them tried to comfort Simon. It was pointless; unlike Nolan’s books, Simon would never be able to replace the postcards his mother had sent him.
No other part of the school had been touched. Malcolm seemed baffled as to why anyone would bother taking a hundred and twenty-four postcards while leaving behind expensive electronics, but Simon knew the answer. Someone else had realized that those postcards were a roadmap of where his mother had been all his life, and more important, where the remaining pieces might be hidden.
Over a late dinner of pizza, which Simon mostly left untouched, he wrote down every postcard he could remember. Some of them appeared in his mind as easily as if they were in front of him, but others he struggled to recall. Not since the weeks after Darryl had died could he remember feeling like this—like he’d lost a part of himself he could never get back. They might have been nothing more than cheap postcards to most people, but they were some of the only pieces he had left of the life he’d lived before discovering Animalgams existed, and every time he looked at the blank wall where they had hung, he felt the full impact of bitter, gut-churning loss all over again.
“I think it was Orion,” said Simon quietly while Winter, Jam, and Nolan were helping him fold his clothes and put them back in the drawers. “He’s broken into the school before, and—and when he was threatening to kill our mom, he said he didn’t need her. That he had other ways of finding the pieces. Maybe that’s what he meant.”
“Maybe,” said Winter doubtfully as she searched for a matching sock. “But I’ve been thinking—Orion still has your mom, and even if he could find the pieces without her, he’d be stupid to try.”
“He’d be stupid to try to hurt her again, too,” muttered Nolan, tossing an unfolded pair of pants into his pile. “I’m pretty sure these are mine.”
Winter shot him an exasperated look. “Does Orion know about the postcards?” she said, refocusing on Simon.
He hesitated. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
“There are over a hundred of them, right?”
“A hundred and twenty-four. A hundred and twenty-six if you count the ones she’s sent since she was kidnapped.”
“How many of those were about insects?”
“Maybe twenty-four or twenty-five. I’m not sure.”
“That’s still too many for him to narrow down where to look for the next piece from your postcards alone,” she said. “He would have to be desperate to use them instead of your mom, especially when all signs point to her helping him at least a little already.”
“She’s right,” said Jam, who was folding Simon’s shirts with military precision. “He isn’t stupid, and he isn’t desperate. Yet.”
“It could be a backup in case she stops cooperating,” said Simon, although he sounded unsure even to himself.
“I don’t think it was about the postcards at all,” said Winter. “Your room was ransacked. Nolan’s, too. If all they wanted was the postcards, those were hanging in plain sight. I think they were after the pieces.”
Simon’s hands stilled in the process of weeding his underwear out of the pile of clothing. She was right, of course. The postcards were a consolation prize. “I don’t know what to do next,” he said miserably. “I don’t know where to go. I don’t know how to keep the pieces safe—”
“We’ll help you,” said Jam. “You’re not alone in this.”
“Sometimes it feels like it,” he mumbled.
“Well, you’re not,” said Winter, distinctly more waspish than Jam. “We’ll figure it out, Simon. We always do. Ariana will help us, and we’ll find the rest of the pieces.”
“But the postcards—” began Simon.
“They weren’t the ones fighting vipers and sharks. You were,” she said. “So enough of this. You get to be upset for the rest of tonight, but tomorrow, once Ariana’s back and everyone’s distracted by the tournament, we’re going to figure out our next steps together.”
Jam groaned. “I forgot about the tournament.”
So had Simon. But while he would still have to represent the bird kingdom in the finals, after everything that had happened in Atlantis, none of it seemed all that important anymore.
“Let someone else fight to win the stupid tournament,” said Nolan. “We’re fighting to save the entire Animalgam world.”
And despite his grief, as Simon looked between them and saw the determination on their faces, he let himself believe that maybe, just maybe, they would win.
That night, long after Felix had started snoring, Simon sneaked into Nolan’s room. His brother was fast asleep, and Simon slipped into the secret tunnel that led out into the Central Park Zoo.
It had been weeks since he’d last searched for a postcard, and he was sure whoever had raided his room would have stolen any his mother had sent him in the meantime. But he had to check anyway, and he walked through the darkness across the cobblestones of the zoo, to the spot where the two huge wolf statues sat.
As he walked past, his fingertips brushed against the wolf that was his father. He’d tucked the picture Leo had given him away in the secret drawer, all too aware that he was in desperate need of a more secure hiding spot. He’d gotten lucky this time, but his luck wouldn’t last forever.
Stopping in front of Darryl’s statue, he ran his hand over the wolf’s muzzle as if petting the stone beast. He’d only seen his uncle in the form of a wolf a handful of times, but this was an important part of who he’d been. As the months had passed since Darryl’s death, Simon had begun to see him as more than simply his uncle.
“I met Leo,” he said so quietly that the darkness seemed to swallow his words whole. “He misses you. I think we all do.”
He paused, his breath visible in the cold night air. He was never really sure what to say to his uncle. Sometimes he felt ridiculous, talking to his grave, but even if it was childish, he didn’t care. He needed this. He needed to remember.
“I wish I’d known I had so much family growing up,” he mumbled. “But I also don’t want you ever thinking you weren’t enough for me. You were. You and Mom, when she could come—you were great. And I miss that. I miss eating breakfast together. I miss how we used to spend Saturdays at the library. And—and no matter how bad the kids at school were, I knew I could always come home and things would be okay. I miss that, too.” He swallowed thickly. “I miss you.”
“How touching.”
Simon snapped his head up. Out from the shadows emerged a gray wolf. It was smaller than his uncle had been, but there was a gleam of twisted savagery in its eyes that made it more dangerous than the entire pack combined.
“Celeste?” he said, his voice breaking.
“Hello, Simon.”
He hadn’t seen or heard from the former Alpha since Malcolm had chased her out of Paradise Valley, and he’d hoped she’d been scared off permanently, but of course she hadn’t. Simon took a step back. “You’re the one who stole my postcards.”
It wasn’t a question, but her low laughter gave him all the confirmation he needed. “I had no idea your mother had been so vigilant about tracking her whereabouts over the years. Thank you for keeping them safe, Simon. I promise to put them to good use.”
He took another step back, nearly stumbling over the cobblestones. “What do you want?”
“The pieces, Simon,” she said, moving closer and closer. “Bring them to me, and I will leave you all alone.”
“You know I won’t give them to you.”
“Not even to protect your brother and uncle?”
“Malcolm’s already proven he can take you down in a fight, and we both know you don’t stand a chance against Nolan,” he said, sounding braver than he felt. “So what do you really want?”
He thought he saw a flicker of a wolfish sm
ile. “You always were the smart one, weren’t you? Your mother chose wisely.” She began to circle him, her movements easy despite the tension in her muscles. “We should be working together, Simon.”
He snorted. “Like you were working with my mother?”
“I know secrets not even your mother knows, secrets about the Predator and Orion that could change the course of history.” She stopped barely a foot away, close enough now for him to see each pointed fang as she spoke. “It’s only a matter of time before you realize you need me, and by then, I might not feel so charitable.”
There was something about the way she said it that made Simon believe she wasn’t completely bluffing, but there was no question in his mind. “I’ll take my chances, thanks.”
She growled, the low sound hair-raising in the dark. “I won’t offer again, Simon.”
“Yeah, you will,” he said. “You need me a lot more than I need you, and you know it. Else you wouldn’t be here begging for my help.”
Celeste snarled and snapped at him, and he barely managed to dodge her teeth. The image of a golden eagle was half-formed in his mind when from the trees came a low trilling hoot, and the wolf froze in her tracks.
In the branches above them was a white-faced owl unlike any Simon had ever seen before. Its front was dappled with brown and yellow feathers, and it stared at the wolf, saying nothing. Celeste slowly backed away from Simon, her body low and her ears flat.
“When you need me, I’ll be waiting,” she said to Simon before disappearing back into the shadows.
He bowed his head and took a shaky breath. That had been close—too close. He should have bolted back into the L.A.I.R., but the break-in had proven that the school wasn’t safe from her, either. Nowhere was. Whatever secrets she claimed to know, whatever deals she tried to make, she would fight to the bitter end, just like Orion. And just like Simon.
Only once he’d steadied himself again did he spot the loose stone at the base of Darryl’s statue. He didn’t dare hope, not after Celeste had been prowling the grounds, but out of habit, he nudged the stone aside with his toe—and to his astonishment, a colorful postcard was hidden underneath.
His chest tightened. Glancing warily into the darkness where Celeste had disappeared, he knelt on the freezing ground and carefully extracted the postcard from its hiding place. On the front was a picture of a delicate web in the middle of a garden bursting with flowers. Several drops of dew were caught in the complicated pattern, and when Simon squinted, he could see an orb spider sitting near the edge, waiting for her prey.
He flipped the card over. On the other side, in his mother’s loopy handwriting, was a single line.
Actions speak louder than intentions. Trust no one.
He read her writing three times as he shivered in the winter air. There was no address—no city or state or hint of where she and Orion might have gone. His hopes evaporated. He and his friends were on their own this time.
The howl of one of the wolves patrolling the zoo cut through the silence, and he heard the soft crunch of a dead leaf nearby. Clutching his postcard, he looked around, his pulse racing. No one was there.
You’re never alone.
His grandfather’s words whispered in his ear as if Leo were standing over him. Simon shuddered, and this time it had nothing to do with the cold. A promise or a warning—he couldn’t be sure, not anymore.
He hurried back toward the center of the zoo, listening hard for any sign of more unwanted company, but the night air seemed to come alive as a symphony of animals played around him. The call of a bird on the overhanging trellis, the buzz of an insect despite the cold, the meowing of a stray cat that must have found its way into the zoo—they were always there. Always listening, always watching.
As Simon reached the eagle statue that marked the secret tunnel to Nolan’s room, the strange owl landed in a nearby tree on silent wings, only the rustle of branches alerting Simon to its presence. For a split second, their eyes met, and neither of them said a word.
Trust no one.
With one more gulp of freezing air, Simon ducked into the tunnel, leaving the foreboding winter night behind.
Copyright © 2018 by Aimée Carter
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First published in the United States of America in February 2018
by Bloomsbury Children’s Books
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[email protected] Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Carter, Aimée, author.
Title: Simon Thorn and the shark’s cave / by Aimée Carter.
Description: New York : Bloomsbury, 2018.
Summary: Simon and his friends from Animalgam Academy race Bird Lord Orion to find a piece of a dangerous scepter in the underwater kingdom’s headquarters outside of Los Angeles.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017022319 (print) | LCCN 2017037961 (e-book) ISBN 978-1-61963-718-4 (hardcover) • ISBN 978-1-61963-719-1 (e-book)
Subjects: | CYAC: Human-animal communication—Fiction. | Shapeshifting—Fiction. | Animals—Fiction. | Adventure and adventurers—Fiction.
Classification: LCC PZ7.C24255 Sf 2018 (print) | LCC PZ7.C24255 (e-book) | DDC [Fic]—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017022319
Aimee Carter, Simon Thorn and the Shark's Cave
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