Page 76 of Aru Shah and the End of Time

Aru took a deep breath and settled this the only fair and logical way she could imagine.

“NOSE GOES!” she screamed, smacking her face.

Mini, who must have anticipated Aru being sneaky, immediately smacked her face, too. Except she moved so fast that her glasses flew off her head and fell. Down the hole.

“Ughhhhh,” said Mini. “You’re the worst, Aru.”

And with that, she jumped in after them.

What Meets the Eye (and What Doesn’t)

The descent wasn’t bad. It was like a long waterslide, without the water. It dumped them out in a forest.

But something was off about this place.

Granted, Aru didn’t have much experience with forests. Once, her mother had taken her to San Francisco. At first it had seemed like it was going to be a boring trip, because they spent the whole morning with the curator of the Asian Art Museum. But after lunch, her mother had taken her to Muir Woods. Walking through it was like a delicious dream. It had smelled like peppermint. The sunlight was soft and feathered, hardly skimming the forest floor because the trees were so thick and tall.

But this place, tucked inside a pocket of the Kingdom of Death, didn’t have that foresty feel. Aru sniffed the air. There was no perfume of green and wriggling alive-ness. No smell of woodsmoke or still ponds.

It didn’t have a smell at all.

Mini toed the ground. “This doesn’t feel like dirt.”

Aru bent to check it out. She ran her fingers over the floor. It wassilk.

She walked to one of the trees, planning to snap off a branch and inspect it, but instead walked straightthroughit.

“It’s not real!” exclaimed Mini. She jumped through another one of the trees. “This is amazing!”

A small puddle of water caught the light.

“What is this going to be, a trampoline?” Mini laughed, jumping into it. But the second she did, the liquid stuck to her legs. And then itpulled. With every blink, Mini was vanishing beneath the—

“QUICKSAAAAAND!” screamed Mini. She started struggling.

“Stop!” shouted Aru. “Haven’t you seen any movies? Thrashing around is, like, the fastest way to die!”

“Quicksandquicksandquicksand,”moaned Mini. “I don’t want to go this way. My body will be preserved forever like those bog mummies! I’ll become a Wikipedia page!”

“You’re not gonna die, Mini. Just stop screaming and let me think for a minute!”

She was going to reach for a branch to pull out Mini, but the branches weren’t really there. Aru ran through a couple of the trees. Maybe there was an actual tree lurking in the midst? But there wasn’t.

“Aru!” screamed Mini. By now, she was up to her neck. Any farther, and she wouldn’t even be able to scream. Her arms waved wildly in the air.

“I’m coming!” said Aru, running back.

But Aru tripped. She braced herself for a fall, but of course, the silky ground was soft. She landed with a lightthump. When she looked down, her hands were clutching folds of the “dirt.”

“That’s it,” whispered Aru.

She lifted some silk off the ground. It came up in a dark, slender rope. Aru dragged it over to Mini, who, by now, was buried up to her chin.

Mini grabbed hold of the rope, but the quicksand yanked her under.

“No!” cried Aru.

She pulled the rope as hard as she could. Under ordinary circumstances, she might not have been able to do it. Under ordinary circumstances, Aru probably would have slipped into the quicksand herself and both of them would have become dismal Wikipedia pages.