TO DISTURB THIS PLACE IS TO INVITE DAMNATION.

They were both quiet for a moment.

Finally Benny said, “Well, that’s comforting.”

Nix said nothing.

They looked around. The hatch opened into a narrow compartment that seemed to divide the airplane into two parts: the cockpit to their left and a huge cargo bay to their right.

Both doors were closed, and there were painted warnings on each, and white wax had been poured over the door handles. Red ribbon had been pressed into the wax.

Nix used her palm to wipe away a film of grime that obscured the message on the cockpit door. It was a single word:

LIES

“That’s interesting,” she said. “Let’s see what’s on the other door.”

She crossed to the cargo bay door and tore away some creeper vines. Again the message was a single word.

DEATH

“Charming,” observed Benny. “Take your pick.”

Nix crossed back to the cockpit door. “This one first.”

“Sure.” Benny bent and examined the seal and found it untouched. “Looks like nobody has been here. Open these doors and that wax will crack right off.”

Nix touched the door to the cockpit. “Open it.”

“You sure this is such a smart idea?”

She made a disgusted sound. “Don’t be such a girl.”

Benny bit back four or five vile and wildly inappropriate comments and reached for the door. The wax seal was thick, and he had to use both hands to turn the metal handle; then with a crack the wax broke apart and the lock clicked open.

Nix, for all her bravado, pushed Benny’s shoulder. “You first.”

Chapter 51

51

SAINT JOHN CAME SLOWLY OUT OF THE FOREST AND STOOD AT THE EDGE of the plateau. The crashed steel angel lay where it had died two years ago. The gray wanderers who had been the crew of the plane still hung from their posts.

Everything was as it should be.

He bent and studied the ground, but there was no easy story to read. The top shelf of the plateau was mostly flat rock, baked hard by the sun and unable to take a footprint. The tracks of the two teenagers had petered out a quarter mile back, and now Saint John was unsure if he had come the right way.

He looked up at the open hatch. Had they gone up into the thing?

He smiled and shook his head, dismissing that level of heresy in children so young. They would not remember airplanes anyway—they’d grown up in a world without such machines. Or . . . mostly without them.

He walked to the base of the plastic sheeting and gave it an experimental tug.