Spell of the Crystal Chair Read Free Page A

hunched his shoulders in despair. “I know it will turn out to be no good.”
    “Sure it’ll be good,” Tam said. “I’m glad to be here.”
    “Me too,” Volka boomed. He had cleaned up all the food and sat looking hopefully for more.
    “What are you fellows doing here?” Abbey asked. “We didn’t expect you to come.”
    “It’s that Goél again,” Mat said, a woeful look on his face. “He told us to come here.” Then he glared around angrily. “We’ve got to take care of you babies again!”
    “Goél told you to come here?” Josh said, suddenly alert.
    “Yes. Worse luck,” Mat complained. “To be babysitters.”
    “What did he tell you to do?” Dave asked, puzzled. All of the Sleepers knew that any message from Goél must be obeyed instantly.
    “Didn’t say,” Mat said. “Just gave us a map and saidto be here. Well, here we are. Now we’ll just have to wait until he shows up.”
    “It’ll be fun,” Tam said happily. He hit his twin in the side with his elbow. “Cheer up! Things could be worse.”
    Mat glared at him. “They probably will be.”

2
The Word of Goél
    N one of the Sleepers slept particularly well the night after the Gemini twins and Volka arrived. Josh, as their leader, was more restless, perhaps, than the others. He lay awake for a long time listening to the breathing of his friends grow steady and slow as they finally dropped off into sleep.
    What’s Goél going to send us into this time?
he wondered.
    Locking his hands behind his head, Josh stared up at the thatch roof of the hut that had been their home for several weeks. He thought of the dangers that he had encountered simply finding the other six Sleepers. Thoughts of Emas, the chief interrogator for the Dark Lord, came to him, and he remembered how the man’s eyes had fastened on him with hatred. At last he shoved Emas and the Dark Lord out of his mind and went to sleep. But he tossed and turned most of the night.
    The next day at breakfast, Mat tasted the porridge that the girls had cooked, and a frown crossed his face. “What is this? It tastes like paste.”
    “It’s porridge, Mat,” Sarah said. She did not grow angry, for she knew that this was simply Mat’s way. He seldom had anything good to say about anyone or anything. Tam, on the other hand, grinned and reached for Mat’s bowl. “I’ll eat it, brother, if you don’t want it.”
    “Keep your hands to yourself, and don’t be so confounded cheerful! I’ve got a feeling we’re going to be in a terrible situation.”
    “Give no thought for the morrow,” Josh said. “Sufficient to the day are the troubles we’ve got right now.”
    When they had finished eating and the others went outside, Josh offered to help Sarah clean up after the meal. The two of them heated water in the fireplace. Then Sarah washed the tin dishes and flatware while Josh dried them and put them in a box that was nailed to the wall.
    “Remember what it was like to have a dishwasher?” he asked suddenly.
    “Do I!” Sarah breathed fervently. “And I used to complain about having to wash dishes.”
    “We complained about a lot of things in Oldworld. Like having to walk to school instead of going in a car.”
    Sarah handed Josh a platter, then asked thoughtfully, “Do you think about those days a lot?”
    “I do,” Josh said. He dried the plate slowly. “I miss my parents.”
    “I miss mine, too,” Sarah said. “I think about them all the time. Every day.”
    The two worked on until finally the dishes were done, and Sarah said, “How about a tea party?”
    Josh grinned. “We used to have those when you first came to live with us. I thought they were silly.”
    “And you laughed at my dolls too, but you finally got to where you would play with them.”
    Josh glanced over his shoulder with a worried look. “Don’t let that get around. If Reb ever found out I played with dolls, he’d never let me hear the last of it.”
    “There’s nothing wrong with boys playing