by Ruth Fox
There was a heavy silence.
“Mr. Sanders?” said Zach tentatively. “We—I—think I found your dog—”
At that moment there was a high-pitched wail of a siren and a screeching of tyres and a loud banging at the door. Mr. Sanders picked up his cane and, suddenly hobbling again, maneuvered himself out of the room.
“It’s open, yer vandals!”
The ambulance officers came in a crowd, their bustling movement forcing Zach into a corner. They shouted commands to one another and into their radios. The only thing they said that Zach understood was “Where was he found?,” and this was directed at Mr. Sanders, who shrugged his shoulders.
“How the hell should I know?”
The ambulance officers decided they would happily not ask this grumpy old man any further questions, and didn’t seem to think it was worth asking Zach. Zach took this reprieve from having to explain about the tunnels, both to Herman Sanders and to those who would ask further uncomfortable questions. He decided that since the boy was in the hands of the people who knew what was best for him, he was free to leave.
He slipped out the door and past the ambulance, which had parked askew on the ragged grass, given that the driveway had long since vanished under a sea of thorns and nettles. He skirted the piles of rusty junk. When he looked back over his shoulder at the house at the top of Greentree Hill, it didn’t seem quite as scary.
He checked his phone again when he was back on the street—he had reception now, but he hesitated before calling his mum or dad to let them know why he was late. He had something else he had to do before going home.
He thought of Fernzy and what he’d said about the mysterious Grelgoroth—and the Cingulum. What were the monsters doing to kids out there?
Chapter Seventeen
Zach walked quickly to Ryder’s house. He knocked at the front door. Usually it was wrenched open in a few moments, either by Ryder’s frazzled mother or a bouncing and grinning Miranda—Max, the oldest Hazelwood sibling, had moved out the year before—but this time it was Ryder himself who opened it, and only after Zach had knocked three more times.
His friend looked very pale and unhappy, but Zach was very glad to see him.
“Oh,” he said. “Hey.”
“Where have you been?” Zach asked him. “I was starting to think you’d Vanished too!”
“Me?” Ryder said. “No, not—”
“I’m looking for Morton,” Zach interrupted urgently. “Have you seen him?”
Ryder shook his head.
“He’s taken off somewhere. Lex did something stupid, and—”
“Ryder?” came a call from down the hallway, and Mrs. Hazelwood appeared behind her son. If Ryder looked worn-out, she looked positively exhausted, but her eyes were red-rimmed and wide with worry. “Is it—” She saw Zach, and her expectant face fell, as if she was disappointed. “Oh,” she said. “Hello, Zach.”
It dawned on Zach that something had happened, and he felt guilty that he’d been so wrapped up in finding Monster-boy he hadn’t even realised until this moment that it was serious. “What’s going on?”
Ryder wiped a sleeve across his cheeks. “Miranda,” he said. “She’s Vanished. They’ve taken my sister, Zach. They’ve got Miranda.”
❖ ❖ ❖
Miranda had gone to bed as usual last night. She wasn’t normally quiet for long, but they hadn’t heard anything from her room all night. This morning, she hadn’t come out for breakfast, and when Ryder went in to wake her up he’d found her bed empty and her window open.
He led Zach down the hall.
“The police had the room cordoned off,” he said. “There was police tape up and everything. They only just took it down an hour ago, when they left. Chief Andy was in there for ages, dusting for prints and stuff . . .”
“Did he ask you anything?”
“Yeah.” Ryder rubbed his eyes as he pushed the door open. Zach looked into the room that he’d seen dozens of times before—it was all purple, which was Miranda’s favourite colour, and there were a lot of horses on the blankets and curtains and even the ceiling; in fact, the only thing that wasn’t horse-related was a photo of Max, scowling and holding a guitar, which was sitting on her bedside table—but the space seemed darker and smaller, somehow, as if, with its owner absent, all the life and light had gone missing too.
Ryder walked in and sat on the purple Pixie Ponies bedspread and looked up at Zach.
“I’m really, really worried, Zach! Miranda’s—well, she’s Miranda. If she can, she’s going to cause trouble. They might have hurt her to keep her quiet. I just can’t stand the thought of her being hurt and alone. She’s only eight.”
Zach closed the door, and then he told Ryder about the tunnels he’d walked through, and about Tommy Granger, and how he had looked when Zach had found him.
Ryder stared at his friend, his eyes wide. “Are you serious?”
Zach nodded. “It’s got something to do with this.” He pulled the wristband out of his pocket and held it up. It just looked like a piece of jewellery—nothing special. He knew now that it was much more than that, though. “I don’t know what it is, but it’s tied to the Vanishings somehow. Tommy reacted to it—it was the only thing that woke him up at all.”
“So,” said Ryder. “Morton has a wristband that the monsters think means something, but we don’t know what. I’m not that good at puzzles, Zach. Maybe you should ask Lex.”
“Do you think I should tell the police?” Zach said. “About the tunnels?”
“I think that’s probably best,” Ryder said, but then he frowned. “They said they had no jurisdiction in the South, remember?”
Ryder had just echoed Zach’s thoughts. “And we don’t have a lot of police, either. Chief Andy said that, too. We don’t have an army or even many guns. But the monsters do. Morton told me.”
Ryder looked grim. “There’s already a lot of bad feelings about the monsters. It might make things worse, and . . . what if they hurt the kids?”
Zach nodded miserably. But he had reached a resolution as they’d been talking, and now he told Ryder about the conversation with Monster-boy last night. That they had to do something. That they could do something. That they would, if Ryder would help them.
“Are you kidding?” Zach’s friend said. His normally cautious attitude had vanished in the face of his fear for his sister. “Of course I will. I’d like to think I would have before, even if it wasn’t Miranda. But now . . . well, we don’t have a choice, do we?”
Zach felt his confidence grow. Yes, they could do this.
But first, they had to find Monster-boy.
❖ ❖ ❖
Zach walked home, disobeying another Rule. He arrived two hours later than he should have if he’d caught the bus straight from school. Mr. Morgenstern wasn’t home yet, but Mrs. Morgenstern grabbed him as soon as he walked in the door.
“Where have you been?” she wailed. “I’ve been out of my mind, thinking both my boys were missing!”
“I was looking for Morton,” Zach said, which was true, and his mother crumpled into tears.
“Oh, Zach, why would he take off like that?” Mrs. Morgenstern sobbed. “When he knows how much danger there is . . .”
“Mum, I think he’s fine,” said Zach. “I think he needs some time to himself.”
“But what if he’s been kidnapped? He’s not answering his phone, and there were more kids taken just last night . . .”
“I think Morton’s too smart to let them get him,” said Zach, but he was starting to get even more worried himself. He had assumed that Morton wouldn’t be a target for the monsters, since he was a monster. But there was no evidence for that. The only kids that had been taken so far were human, but that was because everyone on this side of the Wall was human. Th
ey might be taking monster kids from the Other Side as well. How would anyone know?
Mr. Morgenstern got back a few minutes later. “I called the police and Chief Andy sent one of his officers out to look around the school. He couldn’t find anything, though, and he couldn’t spend too long looking. They’re so short-staffed, and there are calls coming from all over from people saying they’ve seen monsters lurking on corners and in alleyways.”
Zach guessed this was why the gap in the Wall had been left untended. It had probably only been for a few minutes, but it had happened to be when he came through with Tommy. “Why don’t they employ more police?” Zach asked.
“I’m pretty sure Chief Andy would love that, but they need to be trained, and that takes time. Even the Silvershine Security people don’t have the proper training, and they can’t carry weapons. We’ve never really needed many police before now!”
Zach tried to do his homework, but he couldn’t concentrate. He tried to bake some meringues, but he was so distracted that they burned on top and were soggy in the middle. So he turned on the TV instead.
“. . . latest abductions,” Philip Nielson was saying. “Amongst the latest victims are two students from Middleview Hills Academy, Fiona Louise Lancaster and Ida Wentworth.”
Zach found himself listening to the following words in horror. His mouth went dry, his stomach churned, and a cold, tingling feeling spread down from his head to his toes.
“They reported to school this morning, but when they didn’t return home this afternoon, their parents alerted police. It seems that neither had been seen since earlier that day. A search of the school grounds revealed this—”
The picture cut to a still frame of a little plastic bag labelled “Evidence: Police Department.” Inside was a necklace. It was a necklace Zach knew very well. A little gold locket. If Philip Nielson opened it, he would have found a picture of Chris Cambert.
Zach picked up his phone and scrolled through his contacts list. Lex answered on the third ring. She sounded as if she had been crying.
“Zach?” she said. “Have they found him?”
“No,” he said. “Morton’s still missing.”
“Oh,” she moaned. “I don’t know what to do. Fiona and Ida—”
“I just saw the news.”
“I saw them just minutes before they went missing. But they didn’t come in from lunch. I went to the nurse’s because I wasn’t . . . feeling good, you know . . . so I didn’t even notice . . .” Her voice hitched. “I could have told the security guards earlier. Maybe they would have found them.”
Lex was quiet for a minute. He imagined she was pushing her glasses back where they belonged as she tapped her pen on a blank notebook page. “I didn’t mean to upset Morton. I thought I was doing something good. I thought if everyone at school had a better idea of who he was, it would mean the negative effects of the monster story wouldn’t be so bad for him, you know?”
“I didn’t think about it that way,” Zach admitted. “But still. You probably should have asked him.”
“I’m a bit . . . uh, impulsive, sometimes,” she sighed. “I hope they find Morton. I hope they find all of them before . . .”
She didn’t need to finish the sentence. Before it’s too late. The unspoken words echoed silently.
“Lex,” said Zach. “I don’t think they’ll find them. They’re . . . they’re not looking in the right places.”
“How do you know?” Lex demanded. It didn’t take much to pique her interest when she sensed a mystery. “What are you talking about? If you know something, you’ve got to tell me.”
“Lex, if I tell you this, you have to promise to keep it quiet.” Zach knew he was taking a risk, but with Ida and Fiona and Monster-boy at risk, he thought he had to take a chance. “And by quiet, I mean quiet. You can’t tell anyone. If it gets out, it’ll ruin our chances of it working, okay? If the media knows, the police will know, and they’ll probably lock us up or something . . .”
“Zach!” Lex’s voice was impatient. “What are you talking about?”
Zach was silent.
“Okay, okay,” she said finally. “I promise.”
Still, Zach hesitated. He didn’t know if he could trust her. But they needed help if they were going to pull this off, and Lex was their most likely ally. “It will be a huge story, right? Afterwards, you can have the inside scoop. But there won’t be any scoop if you tell anyone.”
“Zach?” Lex huffed. “Please believe me. I won’t tell anyone.”
“All right,” said Zach. “We’ll talk at school tomorrow. I’ll tell you everything.”
Chapter Eighteen
Later that night Zach woke in the darkness with a start. It was that time of night when everything was quiet and still. That was what made it so noticeable—the change in the air, the prickle at the back of his neck that meant something was moving in a way it shouldn’t be.
He pushed the blankets aside and climbed down from his bunk. He looked at the window, first, but there was nothing to be seen but the plum tree waving its branches against the moon. He crossed the room, avoiding the creaky floorboard, and crept through the open door. Light flooded from his parents’ bedroom—they’d left their door open, which was unusual, but he could see that they were both asleep, sprawled in their clothes, Mr. Morgenstern with his hand clutched around his phone.
His breath was coming quick, and the air felt sharp and cold in his lungs. But he was almost sure of it. Whoever it was, they were in the house.
He reached the bottom of the stairs and looked at the front door. It was closed, but the lock was twisted to the right. There was no way Mr. Morgenstern would have left it unlocked, not after his speech about the Rules.
Was it one of the kidnappers come to grab him? The thought sent another chill down his spine.
He peered left into the lounge room. Again, nothing moved. He ducked back into the hallway and edged along to the door to the kitchen.
A light flickered on and off. The fridge door, opening and closing. In that brief second, he saw a dark figure.
“Morton!”
Monster-boy whirled, a carton of milk dropping from his claws.
Zach wasn’t sure what to do. He felt like hugging his adopted brother, but that seemed a bit too girly. “I—where—what are you doing?”
“I was making some muffins,” said Monster-boy, looking miserably at the splattered milk. “You said cooking was the best thing to do when you want to calm down. I wanted to calm down.”
“But where were you? Where did you go? I looked everywhere—”
“Morton!”
Mr. Morgenstern burst into the room, flicking on the light and making them all blink in its sudden brightness.
“Oh, my gosh!” Mrs. Morgenstern said, close on her husband’s heels. “Oh, Morton! We’ve been so—”
They both hugged him tightly. Ignoring the spilled milk, they steered Morton into a chair and started to berate him and laugh, scold him and hug him, all at once. Morton just sat there quietly until they asked him where he’d been.
“I just went . . . for a walk. A long walk. I didn’t mean to worry anyone. I didn’t even think . . .” He stopped, his luminous eyes looking duller than usual. “Didn’t really think you would . . .”
“You didn’t think we’d notice?” Mrs. Morgenstern finished for him, with a sharp glance at Mr. Morgenstern. “Or that we’d care? Oh, Morton.”
Mr. Morgenstern sighed and put his hands on the table.
“We weren’t going to tell you this,” he said grimly. “But we had another visit from Ms. Cutter. Two more, in fact, while you’ve been at school. She’s been recommending your removal from our house, Morton. She’s been lobbying quite hard. Having you be taken in by the police the other night hasn’t helped matters.”
> “That’s why it’s so important that you follow the Rules, Morton. You can’t go running off like this. It looks like we’re not looking after you.” Mrs. Morgenstern dabbed at her eyes with a sleeve of her nightgown. “We are—Morton, we are, aren’t we? You don’t want to go back . . . or go somewhere else?”
“No,” said Morton, hanging his head. “No, I don’t ever want to go back. Please don’t let them make me go back.”
“Of course, we won’t,” said Mrs. Morgenstern. “But you just have to stay out of trouble.”
“You’re as much a part of this family now as any of us,” said Mr. Morgenstern. “I don’t know what life was like on the Other Side. I’m beginning to think it’s much worse than any of us realise. But let me tell you something about the Morgenstern family. We’re made up of different parts, but we all fit together in a certain way. You take one of those parts out—well, it leaves a gap. None of the other parts work properly. You see? We’re all needed. We’re all wanted. We’re all essential.”
He looked at Zach as he said this, and Zach nodded, knowing his dad was saying this just as much for him as for Monster-boy. He had nodded to show he had listened—and that he agreed with it, one hundred percent.
“Right,” he said. “Well, I think we’re all in need of some muffins, eh, Zach?”
Zach disagreed—an occasion like this required chocolate. So he whipped up a quick double-choc-cherry mud pudding, and they ate the whole thing with steaming cups of cocoa and went back to bed with stomachs full to bursting.
