FIRE & FLOOD by Victoria Scott
Scholastic, February 2014
First Excerpt Reveal
Scholastic, February 2014
First Excerpt Reveal
I drove
across the US of A, left my family without an explanation, and now I’m either
too late or there was never anything here to begin with. F my life. Rearing
back, I kick the door as hard as I can. Then I wrap both hands around the door
handles and release a noise like a wild banshee as I pull back.
The doors
swing open.
I’m not sure
whether to celebrate or freak out. I decide to do neither and slip inside. As I
walk around the inside of the museum, listening to the sound of my footsteps
echo off the walls, I imagine I am moments from death. It’s sad, I think, that
this is all it takes to break my sanity.
Two curling
flights of stairs bow out from the first-floor lobby, and
red and white tiles cover the floors. There are gilded picture frames
everywhere. So many that I think the placement of the frames — and not their
contents — is the real art. Everything, absolutely everything, smells like wax.
I mosey up to an abandoned reception desk and leaf through the glossy pamphlets
littering the surface. I hold one of the pamphlets up to my nose. Yep, wax.
I glance
around, having no idea what to look for. Will there be a sign like at school
registration? Students with last names A–K
this way?
On my left,
I notice a long hallway dotted with doors on either side. Nothing looks
particularly unusual. But when I glance to my right, I spot something. There’s
a door at the end of the corridor that has a sliver of light glowing beneath
it. I’m sure it’s just an administration office, one where someone forgot to
flip the switch. But I’ve got nothing better to go on, so I head toward it.
I pause
outside the door, wondering if I’m about to get busted for B&E. Then I turn
the handle and find myself at the top of another winding staircase.
You’ve got to be kidding me. What is
this, Dracula’s bachelor pad?
I’ve watched
a lot of scary movies, and I’ve learned nothing good is ever at the bottom of a
winding staircase. Pulling in a breath and preparing myself to be eaten alive,
I head down. My shoes are loud against the steps. So loud, I imagine they are
intentionally trying to get me killed.
When I reach
the final few stairs, I ready myself to look around the bend. My heart is
racing, and I secretly pray the worst I encounter is an angry janitor with a
wax addiction. I turn the bend — and my eyes nearly pop from my skull.
The enormous
room is perfectly circular, dotted with candles to light the space. Surrounding
the walls are rows and rows of dark, rich mahogany bookshelves. A large round
table stands in the center of the red-and-white-tiled floor. The room is
spectacular, but what it holds is so jarring, my ears ring.
Across every
shelf, every spot on the table, every tile on the floor — are small sculptures
of hands. And in a few of those hands — the ones still performing their duty —
are eggs. There are only nine eggs left, it seems. For a moment, I imagine how
amazing it would have been to see each hand holding an egg, but it’s enough
just to see these nine.
The eggs
seem to dance in the candle flame, and as I move closer, I realize why. The
surfaces of the eggs are almost iridescent, their colors changing depending on
how you look at them. They are different sizes, too; some as big as a
basketball, others as small as a peach.
I don’t need
the device in my pocket to tell me what my gut already knows.
This is the
Pandora Selection Process.
AHHHH, PANDORAS. THIS BOOK WILL BE SO EPIC!
Peace, Love and Fangirl,
Alex
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