Slate’s entire body jerks, including his gaze, which gleams ferociously in the firefighters’ bright beam. He snatches his hand out of the well and pulls his arm back so fast it blurs. His fist comes flying at Adrien’s jaw.
Shoving the table on the ice as though it’s a hockey puck, I scream Slate’s name.
He freezes and looks over at me. His eyes go wide, and he blinks. At me, then at the well, then back at me.
“Keep talking to him, Cadence,” Adrien yells.
“Want to grab breakfast with me at the tavern?” I shout, slowly sliding the table closer. Almost there.
Sloshing followed by a heartbreaking cry for help make both Slate and me turn to the well. Gaëlle, who’s back on her feet, pushes in front of Slate, and her face blanches. And then she’s reaching into the well, but Adrien seizes her wrist right before it can vanish over the stone lip.
“Look away, Gaëlle,” he hisses.
She shuts her eyes and winces when the cry for help echoes against the peaked wooden roof sheltering the well. The voice is deep and familiar. So familiar it raises goose bumps over my arms.
My hands slip off the legs of the table. “Papa?”
Fingertips topped with buffed, blunt nails poke out from the well.
Oh my God.
Papa is in the well! I slip and slide toward it.
“It’s not real, Cadence.” Adrien’s heated whisper makes me skid to a stop. “And don’t look into the well.” He turns to the others. “All of you, look away!”
I snap my gaze to the frosted ground. Adrien pushes the table forward, then flips it right-side-up so that its legs straddle the round opening. Tapping begins and then scratching. Adrien flattens his palms against the tabletop to keep it in place.
One of the firefighters shoos a student off the ice and lumbers toward us. “MonsieurMercier,you really think abouchon en boiswill prevent the well from overflowing?”
“Yes, I believe a wooden cork will do the job.” Adrien’s brow glistens with sweat. “For the time being, at least.”
“I realize you’re trying to help but—”
Adrien shifts to lean his right forearm on the table and fishes his phone from his pocket with his left. “Actually, it’s my father and Rainier de Morel who gave me instructions to cover the well. If you’d like to speak to either one of them directly, I’ll give them a call.”
“No need.” The fireman zips his lips shut.
“Would you have anything heavy to put on top?” Adrien asks.
Whatever’s in there scratches again and yelps a muffledhelp.
I expect the fireman to rip the table off, but instead, he says, “I’ll go find something to weigh it down.” His cleated boots grip the slippery ground as he trudges toward his squad.
Adrien must notice my surprise because he whispers, “The piece only calls to the four of us.”
I stare at his face and notice it’s streaked with blood, but I’m too perplexed by what he’s just said to comment on it. “The piece?”
“Yes. It’s the piece that’s trying to lure you in by sounding and looking like someone you’d do anything to save.”
Slate’s rough breathing becomes suspended.
“That’s why I heard Papa,” I murmur.
Adrien nods.
“And me, Romain.” Gaëlle rubs her cheek, still red from Slate’s slap.
Slate doesn’t volunteer who he saw. Not that it matters. His hands are locked into tight fists at his sides. His knuckles are cracked, and blood streams off his fingers and into the ice, staining it crimson.
