Peter and the Shadow Thieves (32 page)

“No,” said Hodge. “I don’t fol ow you. Not at al . And I don’t think I should be out here, neither.” He started to turn toward the door.

“Wait,” said Cadigan, putting a hand on Hodge’s thick right forearm.

Hodge, irritated, turned back and started to say something, but stopped when he felt the air suddenly grow colder.

Out of the corner of his left eye, Cadigan saw Hodge’s shadow moving, stretching back….

Instantly, Hodge slumped, the life gone from his face. Gone, too, was his shadow, replaced in a moment by another, thinner one. Now Hodge came back to life, but his expression had changed from suspicion and irritation to passiveness and docility. Cadigan saw Ombra tuck his rough cloth bag into the darkness of his cloak, then turn and glide back toward the corner of the house, where he vanished.

“This way,” said the groaning voice.

“Yes, m’lord,” said Hodge, pivoting and fol owing Ombra. Cadigan fol owed Hodge, both men moving in the same stiff-legged manner. They rounded the house and rejoined the others near the front gate. Ombra ordered Jarvis, Cadigan, and Hodge to guard the house, then turned to Slank and Nerezza.

“You wil bring the lady of the house here. Her room is on the third floor. Do not harm her. Put her in the taxi. Gerch and Hampton wil see her back to the ship. You wil wait here for me.”

“As you wish,” Nerezza said. He exhaled, the cold air causing a plume of condensation to whistle from his nose-piece.

“What about the girl?” said Slank. He very much wanted to see the girl. He vividly remembered the last time he’d seen her—she and the boy—flying away, leaving him in the rowboat, defeated. Oh, yes, he would like to see that girl again, and the look of fear on her face when she realized that she was not rid of him.

But Slank’s face fel when Ombra answered: “I wil deal with the girl.”

Disappointed, but not about to defy Ombra, Slank turned and fol owed Nerezza up the walkway toward the house. A moment later, Ombra glided after them. Gerch and Hampton watched the dark form disappear silently through the doorway.

“I wonder why he wants to get the girl,” said Hampton.

“I don’t know,” said Gerch. “But I would not want to be the girl.”

P
ETER, WITH TINK on his shoulder, crouched on a high tree branch directly across the street from Moly’s house. His worst fears had been realized: Slank had arrived here first, along with the others from the ship, including the dark-cloaked man who aroused such fear in Tink.

Not only were they already here ahead of him, but they’d met no resistance. Although the tree branches, the fog, and the cab al conspired to obscure Peter’s vision of the group across the street, he’d seen enough to understand that al of the men outside the house—including those he took to be guards—were taking orders from the dark-cloaked figure. And he had overheard enough of their conversation to catch the words “lady of the house” and “girl.” Now three of the men—including Slank and the dark-cloaked man—were heading into the house. The other four men remained out front. Peter couldn’t very wel use the front door, but he had to get in somehow. He had to warn Mol y.

M
OLLY BACKED AWAY FROM the doorway, her eyes on the knife in Jenna’s hand. It was a kitchen knife; Moly had seen Mrs. Conine chop vegetables with its long, gleaming blade, always honed razor sharp.

As Mol y stepped back, Jenna moved forward, fil ing the doorway.

“Was the young lady going out?” she said, with mock servility.

“What are you doing?” said Mol y, her eyes stil on the knife.

“I’m keeping you in your room,
m’lady,
” said Jenna, in a tone unlike any she had used with Mol y before. Gone was any trace of subservience; in its place was only hard contempt.

“You can’t do this!” said Mol y, raising her voice, trying to give it a confidence she didn’t feel.

Jenna wiggled the knife. “Can’t I,
m’lady
?”

Before Mol y could speak again, she heard a dul thumping of footsteps coming upstairs from several floors below. The footfal s were heavy: men, possibly two or three of them.

Mol y looked past Jenna, through her open doorway.

“Help!” she screamed as loudly as she could. “Help! She has a knife! Please, help me!”

No answer. The thumps stopped, but for only a moment; then they resumed.

“Help!” Mol y cal ed again, less hopeful y. Jenna smirked, as if to say that whoever was coming up the stairs would be of no help to Mol y.

The two young women stared at each other as the footsteps reached the second-floor landing, then the third. Mol y waited, expecting to hear the familiar creak of footsteps on the stairway that led up to her room in the south tower. Instead, she heard a door opening on the floor below.

Then she heard her mother scream.

L
OUISE ASTER, dressed in a white linen nightgown, stared in horror. Hearing Moly’s cry for help, Louise had run to her bedroom door and flung it open, only to find herself facing two hard-looking men, one with a nose that belonged on a carved wooden mask. She backed away from the doorway, her throat tightening in terror.

Slank and Nerezza stepped toward her. Louise screamed and turned to run. But Slank, moving with the speed of a striking snake, grabbed her arm with thick, cal oused fingers and yanked her back toward the door. Louise cried out again, dragging her heels and throwing elbows into Slank’s ribs, struggling desperately to break free. But Slank held her tightly, pul ing her roughly into the hal way.

There Lady Aster felt a sudden chil engulf her body, a sensation so startling that she stopped struggling for an instant. And in that instant she caught a glimpse of a dark form moving—flowing—up the stairs to the south tower.

To Mol y’s room.

“RUN, MOLLY!” she shouted. “RU—”

A rough hand clamped over her mouth while another took her by the neck, cutting off her anguished voice. Nerezza and Slank both had hold of her now; she struggled, but was powerless to prevent them from dragging her down the stairs. She managed only one glance back, a glance that revealed the dark form sliding up the tower stairwel , silently, smoothly, like a monstrous leech.

T
HE SOUND OF LOUISE ASTER’S SCREAMS echoed horribly up the stairwel to Moly’s room; then—even more horribly—her mother’s voice was choked into silence. Moly took a frantic step toward the doorway, only to be forced back again by a threatening thrust of the blade held in Jenna’s hand.

Mol y spun around, looking for another way out, but there was no other way, save for the window. She ran to it and screamed at what she saw below: her mother, struggling furiously but uselessly, was being dragged down the walk by two men, toward a waiting cab.

Mol y quickly unlatched the window and yanked it upward with al her strength. The window shot open. Mol y reached for the chain around her neck, feeling for her locket.

Too late Jenna had crossed the room, bringing the point of the knife to within inches of Mol y’s face.

“I’l take the locket,
m’lady,
” she said.

“No,” said Mol y, backing away from the blade. She felt herself bump her writing desk; the impact caused the oil lamp to wobble, sending the shadows of the two young women dancing along the wal s.

“If you won’t give it to me,” said Jenna, moving forward, “then I’l cut it from your neck. I might cut you while I’m at it. Sometimes I’m not too handy with a knife.” Mol y saw the knife coming closer. She reached behind her, frantical y feeling for anything to use as a weapon. Her right hand brushed something, and she grabbed it. Jenna flicked the knife forward expertly, catching the locket chain with the blade point, severing it. As chain and locket clattered to the floor, Mol y whipped her arm forward, the ink bottle in her hand. She hurled the ink directly into Jenna’s face. Jenna shrieked and brought her left hand to her eyes, but managed to hold on to the knife with her right. She took a vicious crosswise swipe at Mol y, a swipe that would have slashed Mol y’s throat had Mol y not seen it coming and ducked. Mol y felt the blade edge just barely brush the top of her hair. Taking advantage of Jenna’s momentary blindness, Mol y lunged past her toward the door. Behind her she heard Jenna stumbling around, sightless, screaming in rage.

Mol y reached the door and ran through it onto the landing at the top of the stairs. She stopped—and shrieked again.

The dark man was slithering up the stairs toward her. Mol y was looking right at him, ten feet away, but could see none of his features; where his face should have been, Mol y saw only blackness. But she
felt
his presence intensely, felt the air grow cold.

Behind her, Mol y heard Jenna stumbling toward the doorway, getting close now. But Mol y would rather have faced a dozen knife-wielding Jennas than descend the stairway toward that faceless creeping thing.

Mol y turned around; Jenna, her face stained a deep indigo, was coming out the door, stil clutching the knife in one hand and vigorously rubbing her eyes with the other. Mol y hid to the side. As Jenna stepped through the doorway, Mol y stuck out her leg. Jenna tripped hard, fal ing forward onto the landing, the knife clattering across the floor.

Mol y darted past the sprawling form of Jenna, into her room. She slammed the door shut; the last thing she saw before it closed was the dark man reaching the top of the landing. She could feel him looking at her with his formless face.

Gasping with fear, Mol y fumbled with the bolt on the door, final y sliding it home. She turned and looked toward the window, her only hope of escape now. But she was four stories up; to get out that way, first she had to find the locket. She dropped to her hands and knees and, by the dim, flickering light of the oil lamp, began frantical y searching the floor.

As she did, she heard a groaning sound right outside her door. And she felt the air growing colder.