Mathias lurched back, his eyes wide, his breath coming in shallow gasps. Chase began to have a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach as Mathias’s expression changed to a calculating smile. “I do believe I have found what I need to receive the respect I deserve from Jonah Marlowe,” he whispered to himself. Turning, he dropped to the ground and rolled beneath the coach to the other side.
Hammersley stepped from the coach with the bread and wine clutched to his chest and moved carefully down the stairs. “Mathias, I do hope you are feeling especially hungry. I have the most delectable strawberries—” At that moment, Mathias appeared behind him with a thick tree branch raised high.
“Watch out!” yelled Chase as Mathias swung the branch, bashing Hammersley across the side of his head, sending his wig flying.
Hammersley slumped face first to the ground. Mathias tossed the branch aside and dropped to his knees next to the dazed man. Rolling him over, Mathias ripped open Hammersley’s shirt and yanked the gold chain from around his neck.
Mathias gazed at the shimmering Shard, as if hypnotized. “I have never encountered anything so exquisite. Oh, the miracles I will have the ability to perform.”
Hammersley’s eyes fluttered open. “Mathias? Wh-what is happening?”
“I’m only taking what you wouldn’t share,” said Mathias as he ran his finger up and down the Shard. It grew brighter with each stroke, as if absorbing energy from him.
“Give it back,” said Hammersley. “It belongs to me.” He reached out a shaking hand and grabbed the dangling chain. Rolling to the side, he shoved Mathias away. The Shard slipped from Mathias’s grasp. Looking surprised at the strength of the older man, Mathias recovered quickly and pounced on Hammersley.
Chase watched helplessly as the two desperate men rolled over and over, each battling for control of one of the most powerful and magical objects in the world.
“It’s mine, it’s mine, it’s mine!” yelled Mathias. He sounded more like a petulant child fighting over his favorite toy than a grown man. “Give it back! Give it back!” Finally gaining the advantage enough to take full possession of the Shard, he drew back his fist and punched Hammersley in the jaw with all his might.
Blood pouring from his mouth, the older man flopped onto his back and, panting loudly, lay sprawled in the grass. “No. No,” he croaked. “I—I trusted you.”
Holding the brightly glowing Shard in his bloody fist, Mathias looked jubilant at being the winner. He grinned wickedly. Then, with a maniacal gleam in his eyes, he raised the Shard and plunged it into Hammersley’s heart.
“Nooo!” cried Chase.
Hammersley’s face filled with astonishment and intense pain. Seconds later, his skin began to shrivel and shrink. His eyeballs sank into his skull and his light-brown hair turned white and brittle. His lips melted away, revealing yellow, decaying teeth. It was as if someone had hit fast forward on a rotting corpse. He soon looked like a bizarre skeleton with flaking, brown-spotted skin. It was the most horrifying thing Chase had ever witnessed.
Then, what was left of Hammersley morphed into deep purple smoke and was sucked into the Shard, leaving behind only his gaudy, sapphire-blue suit.
Mathias slowly turned his head in Chase’s direction. Their eyes met. Chase sucked in his breath. Mathias’s eyes were deadly and piercing, as if tiny, blue fires now flickered behind them.
“Whoa!” Chase gasped out. He took a quick step back, stumbled over a rock and fell to the ground.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Memories Best Forgotten
“What the heck did you fall down for?” asked Andy.
Chase stared up at all the faces gazing down at him. “I’m back! Yes!” he exclaimed as relief flooded his senses.
“Back?” said Nori. “You never went anywhere.”
“But—but...I must’ve,” said Chase. He climbed to his feet and held out his palms to show them the abrasions. “How else do explain all this?”
“I don’t know,” said Persephone. “But our fingers touched and two seconds later, you were flat on the floor.”
“But I was in the past for hours! Like—like around three hundred years ago,” said Chase. “I saw Mathias Marlowe, and how he ended up with the Shard of Magic.”
It didn’t take long for the story to pour out of him. It was a relief to share the shock and revulsion he was sure would be with him for the rest of his life.
“How dreadful!” said Persephone. “Oh my gosh! No wonder the Marlowes turned completely evil. The Shard was the catalyst, because it was used for one of the most heinous crimes a person can ever commit.”
Nori turned and studied the painting. “You must’ve been in Mathias’s memories. Maybe he somehow stored them in the painting for someone magical to find.”
“Too weird,” said Andy, wrinkling his nose.
“And sick,” said Nori.
Ben sighed and brushed his hand through his hair. “Look, I know you went through some craziness here, Chase, but we’ll have to talk about it later. Right now we need to concentrate on getting the Shard back and saving Janie.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know, it’s just...you weren’t there. It really sucked seeing that.”
“Oh, and good thing I grabbed Max when you fell,” said Nori, as she handed the ferret back to Chase, “or you would’ve squashed the poor little guy.”
“Thanks for saving him,” said Chase, holding Maxwell to his chest as if to absorb some of the animal’s warmth.
Persephone patted Chase’s shoulder. “We’ll talk about it again later, okay?”
Chase nodded as the kids trailed Benjamin from the room, but as they made their way through the rest of the house, Chase felt as if those cruel, icy-blue eyes were drilling a hole into his back. On top of that, he just couldn’t erase the vision of Hammersley’s gruesome death from his mind.
At last they arrived at the wooden door that led to the dungeon-like basement where Benjamin had been held captive. The door was open several inches.
“I saved the best, or should I say worst, for last,” said Benjamin with a grimace as he eased the heavy door open a bit more for everyone to slip through.
They crept down a long staircase. At the bottom, they found themselves in a large wine cellar filled with racks of dusty bottles. No one was there. In fact, the whole place was eerily quiet. Ben tip-toed to a doorway and peeked around the corner. Seeing that the coast was clear, he beckoned to the kids to follow while he eased around the corner. He raised his hands. “Lights,” he said quietly. Ten balls of silvery light slipped from his fingertips and bobbed around above their heads.
The first few cells they checked were empty. As they moved down the passageway, Chase began to hear sounds of dripping and scratching. Ben came to an abrupt stop in front of a lopsided door hanging partially off its hinges. It looked as if someone, in a fit of rage, had tried to rip it from the wall. Peering around Ben, Chase knew he was staring into the room where his dad had spent over a year of his life.
He saw several twitching rats’ tails as they disappeared into cracks in the walls. The dripping noise was much louder here. It came from the water dribbling from the mossy stones and onto a floor blanketed in scum.
All the kids wrinkled their noses. Persephone and Nori clapped their hands over theirs to try to shut out the cloying smell of rot and mold. Maxwell scrunched his snout and hissed before scrambling to hide in the hood of Chase’s jacket.
Chase swallowed the lump that had formed in his throat. It was hard enough to imagine anyone living two seconds in the filthy room, but months and months? How the heck did Dad do it? he thought, a sick feeling rising in his stomach.
He watched Ben turn away, looking even sicker than Chase felt.
“No one’s here,” said Andy, who had wandered up and down the hallway to check some of the other cells. “Besides, I’m kind of glad Janie isn’t here. It’s a yucky place to have to hang out for very long.”
“It certainly is gross,” said Nori. She pulled he
r coat more tightly around herself and shuddered.
“Like something straight out of a nightmare,” murmured Persephone.
“I wonder how often these were used,” said Chase from a doorway at the end of the corridor. He wandered into the room, followed by the others.
“Wow!” exclaimed Andy. “Was this the torture chamber or something?”
“Or something,” said Ben as he stared around at the gruesome room with its hanging cages, shackles on the walls, and long tables used for different ways of inflicting excruciating pain. His eyes lingered for a long moment on an old whip coiled around a metal peg hammered into the wall. He rubbed his chest as if feeling the burning sting of the awful weapon. “Okay, now we know they don’t have Janie here.”
Persephone stared in horror at what appeared to be dried blood puddles staining the floor and tables. “And there’s no way to tell if she’s even been here at all,” she said hoarsely. Backing from the room, she whirled and headed back toward the wine cellar. “I don’t want to think she ever had to live in this disgusting place. So we need to get going. Where to next?”
“Blackshire,” answered Ben as he and the other kids hurried after her.
“I told you, I want to go to the cliff where Aunt Clair fell,” said Chase. He had to see it in person.
Ben glanced back over his shoulder to scowl at his son. “And I’ve told you that I don’t want to relive those memories. This was bad enough!”
“But then we can sneak into town by following the path you used last time. Plus, I think it might give Persephone’s necklace more time to sense the Shard.”
Ben opened his mouth to voice another protest, but Chase cut in first. “I’m going with or without you!”
“We can’t split up,” said Ben, throwing his hands up and blowing out a puff of air. “So I guess we’re doing what Chase wants.”
“Good!” Chase retorted as they grabbed onto each other and Chase said the words to get them where he wanted them to be. Just before whirling away, Ben snapped his fingers. The enchanted balls of light exploded into showers of sparks.
They appeared at the outer edge of a thick forest. An owl hooted somewhere in the trees behind them, while a soft wind blew the mingled scents of salt water and seaweed through the night air.
Chase scanned the area, searching for the shadowy figure of a girl, of Janie, but no one was there. His shoulders sagged as he trailed the others to the cliff’s edge.
No one moved while they stared down at the craggy rocks and dark, churning water far below. Chase looked at his dad out of the corner of his eye. To be honest, he still had a difficult time dealing with the fact that they’d never actually known the real Clair. You completely fooled us with that one, Dad, he thought bitterly.
After a moment, Nori cleared her throat and shuffled her feet. “Um…guys? I think we should get going. It’s getting kind of late.”
Benjamin jumped as if he’d forgotten what he was supposed to be doing. He swiped his hand down his face. “Yes. You’re right, Nori. We’ve wasted enough time. The path we need is over there,” he said with a flick of his hand.
He led them along the cliff’s edge. The beginning of the footpath was nestled between two boulders. They inched down a lengthy, narrow trail that hugged the side of the cliff. When they reached the sandy beach, with its playful waves rolling up onto it, they all heaved huge sighs of relief.
“Whew! Am I happy that’s over,” said Andy.
Slogging through the wet sand, at last, they came to a long wooden walkway on the outskirts of town. They hurried to the closest building and hid in the shadows. The moon was now almost completely blanketed by clouds, making the shadows even duskier.
Peering around the corner, Chase saw darkened fishing boats tied up to several wide piers. A spooky gray fog had crept in from the sea. It oozed across the boats’ decks and around their barnacled hulls. No one was in sight. Only the far-off barking of a dog and the lapping of the ocean against the boats disturbed the silence. It all looked so creepy and menacing. Chase shivered as the chilly breeze swirled around them.
Ben turned to Persephone. “Anything?” he whispered.
She put her hand to the necklace hidden beneath her shirt and shook her head.
“Okay. Let’s keep moving.”
Hearts racing, they slipped around the corner, edged along the wall, and then dodged across a narrow road to the deep shadows of another building. Like ghostly phantoms, they flitted through town, zigzagging up and down one dark street after another. Chase thought about suggesting that they make themselves invisible, but he didn’t want to look like an idiot by wanting to break his own “no-invisibility” rule. He knew it would make it too hard to keep track of each other, but now, in the moment, it would be nice to have that extra bit of security.
Twelve tense minutes later, they stopped to catch their breaths. “Still nothing, huh?” Benjamin whispered to Persephone as they huddled in a gloomy doorway nook.
“Not even a twitch,” Persephone whispered back. “Just the same warm, tingly feeling I’ve been getting from it for a while now.”
“What do you suppose it means?” asked Nori.
Ben shook his head. “I don’t know. But remember, we still aren’t sure whether it senses the Marlowes’ dark magic or the Shard. Or both.”
While the others discussed Persephone’s necklace, Chase jiggled his leg and darted his gaze around. He didn’t understand why every window in every building they passed was so dark and blank-looking. It was as if no one even lived in any of them. It was strange, and eerie, and for some reason it sent chills racing through his body. Shouldn’t at least some of the windows have light glowing behind them?
Ben beckoned over his shoulder for everyone to follow. They slunk around the corner, scooted down a narrow, cobblestone side street, then through a tall archway, and found themselves in a large town square. In front of them was a weather-beaten, gazebo-like platform. Leafless trees, rusty cars, cracked sidewalks, and shops with dark, broken windows lined the edges of the vacant square.
“Hopefully we’ll find them on the other side of town,” said Ben. “Come on.”
“Seems more like a ghost town than anything,” Chase muttered, cramming his cold hands into his pockets. “Does anyone even live here anymore?”
As they crept past the platform, Persephone lurched to a stop. “Wait!” Yanking the necklace from her shirt, she held it in her palm. “Look! It’s going crazy now!”
As Ben and the kids all crowded around and stared at the pulsating, glowing disk, a gravelly voice said, from high on the platform, “Benjamin. Back for another visit, I see. And this time, you’ve brought the children.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Rescuers
Their heads all snapped up at the same time. Stumbling back from the platform, they stared at a tall, familiar figure smiling mockingly down at them. Chase almost choked on his tongue as he searched his brain for something clever and scathing to say in return, but Ben was the first to recover. He gazed back at Roland, a snide grin of his own plastered onto his face, and said, “Just couldn’t stay away, Roland. Nothing else in the world can beat your fine hospitality.”
Chase shot his dad a sideways look. He was impressed by the man’s speedy response, and his confident attitude to go along with it. He’d had no idea Benjamin had it in him. Way to go, Dad, he thought.
“It’s a shame you left us so soon, then,” said Roland. “I had a spectacular party planned for you.”
As Roland’s cold, piercing blue eyes raked over them, chills raced up and down Chase’s spine. Roland’s eyes looked exactly as Mathias’s had looked after he’d murdered the unfortunate Hammersley.
“Sorry I missed it,” said Ben with a shrug. “But I had other pressing engagements I needed to get to.”
“Ah, yes.” Roland nodded. “You had to get home to your…loving family.” Chase thought Roland said the word loving as if he knew Ben’s return hadn’t been the big happy reuni
on it should’ve been.
Benjamin narrowed his eyes. “Enough chit-chat, Roland. Give us the Shard and Janie and we’ll be on our way.”
“I already tried that last time,” Chase whispered behind his hand.
Roland laughed, a little too loudly. “Thank you for the offer, Ben, but some of my family should be arriving shortly. They’re looking forward to a nice, cozy catch-up with you lot, and I wouldn’t want to disappoint them.” He looked up into the sky. “Excellent. Here they are now. Exactly on time.”
Thick purple smoke swirled through the air above everyone’s heads before swooping down to hover beside Roland. It separated and rippled into five people.
Chase’s eyes swept over each face—Maven, Clive, Ethan, James, all still wearing the dreadful scars from their time in the scorching wall of fire—and finally came to rest on the last one. “Janie?” He was so happy to see her that, without thinking, he almost jumped toward the platform. Ben grabbed his arm and held him.
“Chase!” Ben whispered urgently. “Something’s not right.”
Chase yanked his arm away, but froze when he saw Maven lean over to whisper something into Janie’s ear, as if they were sharing a secret. But then something even more surprising happened. Janie smiled at the woman!
“What the heck?” Chase said, frowning as he craned his neck to get a better look.
“She doesn’t look like any kidnap victim I’ve ever seen,” Ben muttered.
Dressed in black jeans and a red jacket, Janie appeared to be healthy and well taken care of. Her hair was longer than Chase remembered, hanging down past her shoulders now, and she had a silver skull pierced through her left eyebrow. Its glowing yellow eye sockets made it look as if it were alive.
As though sensing Chase’s gaze on her, Janie turned her eyes to him. The burning hatred in them made him jerk back like she’d punched him in the chest. His dad was right. Something was going on. And Chase had a terrible feeling it wasn’t something good.
Chase Tinker and the House of Secrets Page 21
