Chapter 4 - The Shadow in the Mirror
"Noah! Lily!"
The voice came through an electronic megaphone, distorted and echoing across the rain-swept lake. It was Gabe, the estate's head of security, accompanied by three men in dark raincoats holding tactical flashlights.
"We know you're in there, kids," Gabe called out. "Your father just wants you safe. Dr. Thorne is worried about your health."
Noah grabbed the blueprint, the cassette tape, and the file, shoving them into his backpack. He pulled Lily down behind the vintage car just as the glass windows of the carriage house shattered under the impact of heavy iron batons.
"Break the lock!" a voice barked from outside.
Noah looked frantically around the dim room. There was no back door. The only exit was the iron door they had come through.
"Noah, I'm scared," Lily whispered, clutching the cassette tape to her chest.
"Listen to me, Lily," Noah said, looking at the heavy canvas tarp covering the vintage car. "We’re not going out through the door."
He pulled the crowbar back up, creeping toward the far corner of the space where an old floor drain was covered by an iron grate. He wedged the bar beneath the rusted iron bars and heaved. The grate gave way with a screech of torn metal, revealing a dark, muddy storm culvert that emptied into the lake drainage pipe half a mile down the ridge.
"Get in," Noah instructed, helping Lily lower her feet into the dark opening. "It’s tight, but it leads down to the creek bed. Follow the water until you reach the main road, then hide near the old stone bridge."
"What about you?" she cried.
"I’m going back for Mom," Noah said softly. "I have the blueprints now. I know how to get into the wall."
"No! Come with me!"
"If I go with you, they'll chase both of us," Noah insisted, kissing her forehead. "I need to draw them away. Go, Lily! Now!"
Lily sobbed, but she squeezed herself into the drain, her small body disappearing into the dark culvert just as the heavy iron door of the carriage house was kicked off its hinges.
Noah threw the crowbar across the room, smashing an old glass oil lantern resting on the workbench. The kerosene spilled across the dry wooden floorboards, catching the spark of a loose electrical wire near the wall.
A wall of yellow flame burst upward, blinding the men who burst through the door.
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"He's in here!" Gabe shouted, shielding his face from the intense heat.
Noah didn't pause. He vaulted over the hood of the canvas-covered car, smashed through the side window frame of the carriage house, and tumbled out into the mud on the opposite side, running full sprint back toward the glowing lights of the main mansion.
