“No! Help!” Veronica cried, thrashing her arms and legs. “Mom! Dad!! Elyse!!!”

She awoke, expecting to find herself forty feet high near one of the most dangerous volcanoes on earth, but her pillow was too fluffy and her blanket too warm. She could hear her sister Elyse snoring somewhere nearby.

“Oh, thank goodness,” she sighed. “It was only a dream.” She pulled the soft blanket over her head, but something sharp poked her in the back. Her heavy eyes opened to a haze of white moongleam. 

“Veronica, wake up! It’s time to go,” the voice was familiar but faraway. Her eyes widened, and she saw herself as she was, dangling in the trees of a cool summer night, the pearl fields of Mount Mystery a day’s walk away. “Which is real?” she croaked.

“Sleepyhead, we have to GO!” Maddy repeated, poking her again with a marshmallow stick. 

“I think … I think … I had a bad dream,” Veronica said.

“Yeah, you think?” Maddy said plainly. “I’ve been trying to wake you. What happened?”

“I—thought—it—was—real,” Veronica said haltingly. “I was standing in the dark over a fiery pit. I tried to yell, but no words came out. All I could here were voices, voices I knew, chanting in the night: ‘SACRIFICE, SACRIFICE, SACRIFICE!’ Everything went white. A hand pressed my back. It was the Diamond King. He pushed me, and I fell.”

The bone-white eye of a low-slung moon stared the Captain in the face. He held the flickering torch close. Maddy and Veronica leaned in, the firefly-light dancing in their eyes. He began: 

It was a land of dragons and redwoods, of towering ferns and boulder-sized diamonds. The People of Wood filled the cosmos. Their starships filled the universe, and they landed right here in the Cloud Forest.

They roamed the forests for thousands of years with no concept of “private property” or even of “my.” They lived as naked as they were born, and as naked as they would die. Everything and nothing was theirs.

They believed in the dream force: the reality that lies behind all things, a world they could touch only in their dreams. They believed everything you see—the entire observable universe—was a mere shadow of a dream. 

They believed there were those among them—the Dreamers—who dreamt, even while awake. They believed space and time bent to these Dreamers, that the whole universe existed simply to make their dreams come true, that every Dreamer dreamt a different part of the same beautiful dream.

They lived the way their grandfather’s grandfathers lived, and they lived that way for thousands of years. No people anywhere lived in one place longer than the People of Wood lived here.

Veronica’s dad reeled in another good-sized trout from the pale blue waters. He called for the girls, but they did not answer.

“Hey Captain,” he said. “Have you seen them?”

The Captain looked around, checked his watch, then stared into the not-quite dark. “They could be anywhere.”

“Veronica! Maddy! Veronica! Maddy!” the two fathers called in every direction. “VERONICA! MADDY!”

But Veronica and Maddy could not hear their fathers’ cries. The girls walked deeper into the forest. Somewhere in the distance, a wild animal howled.

“Hey, Maddy,” Veronica said, her hands full of firewood. “Which way is camp?”

“Umm … right over … there?” She pointed uncertainly. Every direction looked exactly the same. She listened for the rush of the waterfall, but heard only more howls, now closer than before.

“It has to be somewhere,” she said. “We didn’t go that far, did we?” She peered through the trunks for any movement, any light, any sign of the campsite at all. “There!” she shouted. “The light! That’s it!”

Veronica, Maddy, and their fathers stepped out in single file onto the narrow steel bridge. From her perch, Veronica could see the tops of the highest trees poking through the marshmallow clouds. At the center of the bridge, the clouds parted, revealing a lush green forest below. Towering redwoods gave way to old-growth fig, cedar, and teak. 

They continued along the bridge to the small volcano on the other side, emerging onto a mossy glen. A crystal-clear stream meandered through the glen and down the slope. Mount Mystery loomed in the distance.

“We’re almost there,” the Captain said. “Just follow the stream down, and you’ll find the campsite. And don’t worry, this volcano’s extinct.”

Extinct. Veronica had heard that word at least twice before. Once, in science class, describing the ancient volcano at the center of her own hometown, and again, from her father, describing the volcano that would eventually destroy Babeltown.

Together they descended with the stream into the forest, moss drapes deafening every footfall and birdcall. Veronica felt as if the earth itself had stopped rotating, as if everything would always be still and calm and exactly the same. 

Maddy broke the silence first, feeling drops of liquid on her hair and shoulders. “Rain,” she grumbled. “Just our luck.” The drops quickened into a steady spray.

Veronica looked up horrified. “Maddy,” she said, “it’s not rain. It’s … it’s … monkey pee.”

The high steel bridge crossed a fluffy white sea. “We’ll take it over the clouds,” the Captain said to the girls. “I was no older than you when I crossed this bridge for the first time. The campsite is just on the other side, down the small volcano. Let’s break here and catch our breath, before the final push.” 

Hungry from the hike, the girls scavenged in their packs. Veronica retrieved a granola bar and Maddy an apple. Together, they rested on some nearby rocks, gazing at scarlet wildflowers as birdsong filled the air.

Veronica heard footsteps. Two hikers approached from the south, a silver-haired man and a blonde-haired boy. The man seemed to be at least seventy years old and the boy no older than twelve.

“Howdee!” yelled the old timer in a thin, high voice. “On the way to Mystery, too?”

“Yes, sir!” the Captain said. “Made our way over Magma Pass. How about you?”

“From New Lava City, thank goodness,” the old man said, with a nod to the angry northern sky. “It’s my grandson’s first time. He has this crazy idea of finding pearls. Kids never change I guess. Me? I’m too old for this. It should be his parents out here. But his father, he never met the boy, and his mother, she lost interest in Mystery years ago. Spends all her time working in some high-rise over yonder, investing in a life she doesn’t live.” 

Set in the shadow of the great volcano, New Lava City was the region’s only metropolis. Its wealthy residents competed for the best view, erecting skyscraper after skyscraper, each one higher than the last. But unlike a normal city, its weathermen not only had to forecast the rain and snow; they also predicted the ash—and how many inches of it would fall each day. 

Beyond the tunnel, a four-lane highway stretched across a level plain. Veronica’s dad checked the rearview mirror for the cloud.

“Well, that was a little close,” he said. “Girls, you can use the iPad if you like. We’ll be in the Cloud Forest in no time.”

Now, on a wide, flat road, Veronica was happy to have something to take her mind off the drive. She and Maddy played on the iPad, building—of all things—their own virtual volcanoes in their favorite app, LavaCraft.

With each passing mile, the world became more normal, the sun brighter, the sky less full of menace, as if the hellish scene unfolding sixty miles to the west had never happened at all. Veronica and Maddy watched the birds land lazily on the wildflowers and chatted about the pearls they hoped to find on the far side of Mount Mystery.

For the first time since the Pass, the lava car slowed, then turned sharply at an unmarked intersection. The smooth highway transformed into bone-crunching dirt road.

Higher and higher the car climbed, bumping along the dusty detour to a ridgeline more than a thousand feet high. Another tunnel marked the end of the road—only this was no normal tunnel. A tree, towering to the heavens, stood in the center of the road. A hole, big enough to fit a tractor-trailer, cut through the bottom of its massive trunk. 

Veronica read the sign hanging over the gaping entrance:

Here Stands Cloud Forest

The sky turned black as the pyroclastic cloud chased them across the Pass. A sea of fire glowed incandescent behind the angry cloud. Elbows of lightning crisscrossed its murderous face. “Faster, faster!” Veronica screamed. The speedometer crossed one hundred miles per hour. “It’s getting closer,” she groaned.

Veronica’s dad checked the screen. The cloud was 750 degrees and moving 150 feet per second. He opened a red safety cover on the dashboard, exposing a silver toggle labeled “Boosters.” He flipped the switch. The car rocketed across the tundra at 180 miles per hour. With one eye on the rearview mirror, he watched as the ash cloud disappeared into the distance.

“Well, that was a little close,” he admitted. “But we’re safe now—we’ll be out of here in no time.” The car continued rocketing down the road, putting ever more distance between themselves and the cloud. “There! Look there!” he shouted. “Wolf Creek! The way out!”

Wolf Creek marked the end of the plateau and the eastern boundary of the Magma Skyway. The road ran parallel to the creek, meandering down the plateau to a tunnel at the bottom. At the tunnel, the road crossed under the creek, turning into a four-lane highway on the other side. Veronica’s father knew if they could just make it to that tunnel, they’d be safe.

Out of nowhere a torrent of lava bombs slammed into the windshield. The car noticed. “Visibility 0%. Please mind the screen.”

“Girls, look!” the captain said, tapping the passenger-side window. Veronica glanced up from her iPad just long enough to read the sign.

MAGMA SKYWAY

Open June to September

Enter at Your Own Risk!

“Why’s it only open in the summer?” Maddy asked.

“Too much snow,” the Captain said. “Over twenty feet a year! No snowplow dares work this high. The snow comes in October and stays until May—unless the lava melts it sooner, of course.”

“There won’t be any lava today,” Veronica’s dad said. “We’ll be over the Pass in no time. For now, enjoy the view. Just let me know if you see anything weird.” 

“What do you mean ‘weird’?” Veronica asked.

He didn’t answer. He swiped the car’s screen, displaying a colorful map of the surrounding ground. Green patches denoted normal temperatures, yellow above 120 degrees, orange above 500 degrees, and red above 1000 degrees.

“I’ve never seen the screen so yellow,” Veronica said. The Captain glanced at the newfangled screen exactly once, focusing his attention wholly on the road. 

But Veronica’s dad was fixated on the screen. He fiddled with the radio and pushed the pedal to the floor.

A high, shaky voice rasped long-haired poetry through the speakers— something about castles burning.

“Turn it down,” Veronica grumbled. “No oldies, please!”

Her father ignored her, zigzagging up one of the narrowest roads on Earth. A one-lane dirt road, the Magma Skyway lacked any lane markings or guardrails. It climbed relentlessly up a volcanic plateau, one dangerous switchback after another.

Maddy noticed the out-of-place floral arrangements, “Who put the flowers on the bends?” she asked. “And what do the crosses mean?”

“It’s not much further,” called the Captain to the girls, who dawdled behind him chatting and kicking stones. They passed one abandoned shell of a house after another, until finally the Captain stopped. “It’s just through that door,” he said, his voice soft and solemn.

“But this isn’t a grave?” Veronica said.

The house looked much like every other house, but one thing stood out—the door. Or more precisely, the double doors. Two bronze doors—worn, weathered, and covered in a moss of rust—seemed to tell a story. But what story? Veronica was not so sure. Carvings of two bronze angels faced each other, floating over a bubbling lake. A diamond-shaped knob jutted out of each door, daring entry.

“Is this a tomb?” Veronica’s father asked, but the Captain said nothing. He dug in his pocket for a large skeleton key and placed it in the keyhole. The lock screeched like fingernails on a chalkboard. Both girls pushed, but the door would not budge. The two men pressed their shoulders to it, opening the door just enough for the group to slip through, one at a time.

Veronica looked around the dark chamber, its windows sealed from the inside. The sun shone brightly through the cracked-open doors, revealing an empty room with a staircase leading deep down into the darkness. A rat’s tail slipped out of the sun and into the shadows.

Veronica stashed her poem and blanket on the floor. “We don’t have to go down, umm, there, do we?” she asked. “I mean, I didn’t even bring my flashlight.”

The Captain unzipped his backpack and handed each girl a headlamp. “Here, put these on,” he said. “You’ll need them.” 

From the topmost stair, Veronica felt a cool, moist breeze upon her face. The stairway had no railings and no walls, and, it seemed, no bottom. She pointed her headlamp at the next stair, knowing her first wrong step would be her last. The four descended more than one thousand steps into the abyss, the air growing damper with each one.

At the bottom, Veronica looked up. She ran her hands along the walls, exploring the narrow passage. “Is this stone?” she asked.

“Yes, and watch your head,” said the Captain, crouching. “This is a cave. You must mind two things: water and falling rock.”

Veronica squeezed her father’s hand, not quite sure how to mind either. She kept her lamp focused on the ground in front of her, afraid to discover what strange lifeforms might be oozing and slithering on the ceiling, just inches from her head.

Veronica looked out the window, daydreaming with her elbow on the door and her head in her hand. Maddy fiddled with the iPad, unaware of the towering city rolling into view just ahead of her.

Veronica’s eyes rose above the clouds. “Daddy, does it really touch the sky?” she asked. The clouds hiding the city’s peak parted—answering her—with an emphatic yes.

Babeltown, a once-proud city of thousands, looked more like a brightly colored painting in which all the colors had run together. Some of the houses were narrow, others wide, together covering the mountain in a twisted freeform pile stretching to the heavens. Thousands of windows looked out in every direction like so many eyes peering down upon the valley below.

“I thought for sure this place would have burned,” Veronica’s dad marveled. He parked the car next to a walking path and switched off the ignition. “Okay,” he said, “everyone … out! The old house, if it’s still there, should be right up that hill. And if there’s time,” he added, with a wink to the Captain, “maybe we’ll even stop by that grave.”

Maddy stepped out of the car first, directly into six inches of ash. “Ugh! This stuff is everywhere,” she whined. She removed her shoes and banged them together, shaking out the ash. She slipped them back on, bending down to retie the laces. As she did, she noticed a white field pansy flecked with grey. She picked the flower, blew off the ash, and handed it to Veronica.

“Dad?” Veronica asked, as she sniffed the pansy. “Why did you leave? This place looks nice.”

“This place was nice, Veronica. The nicest. But things got bad—” He froze, his boot jerking to a stop just above the most perfect white blossom. “And you see that!” he said. “Another flower! More signs of life! Someday, even this town will recover.”

Maddy watched a scavenging bird exit the broken windowpane of another empty house. “Well it looks like a ghost town to me,” she said, without noticing that Veronica’s dad had stopped. She bumped into him, and he stumbled forward, trampling the wildflower under his boot.

“So much for your recovery,” the Captain said.

Up-close, the brightly colored, crooked cottages revealed the tragedy of the town’s final moments. Every third house or so was nothing more than a colorful shell, hollowed out by fire. The exterior walls had withstood the flames, but the inside was burnt to a crisp.