Peter and the Shadow Thieves (45 page)

“
H
ERE WE ARE,” cal ed Peavey as he pul ed the reins, bringing the carriage to a stop. “Gecierran.” Peter, Mol y, and George climbed down from the coach. Night was newly fal en; a fat moon was rising in the cold, clear sky. They stood on a lonely stretch of the road that fol owed the meandering path of the Avon river, a few miles from the vil age of Upper Woodford. On one side of the road was a stand of trees; along the other ran a high stone wal broken by an iron gate. Through the gate, by the moonlight, they could see a driveway lined with evergreens leading to a massive mansion sitting between road and river, dark and unwelcoming.

“I’m off, then,” said Peavey, as George handed him the fare.

“Maybe you should wait,” said George. “In case there’s nobody here, or it’s the wrong house.”

“Sorry,” said Peavey, flicking the reins. “I said I’d take you here. Didn’t say I’d stay.”

“But—” said George.

“Sorry!” cal ed Peavey as the carriage rumbled away, quickly disappearing around a curve, leaving the trio standing in the dark road.

“Wel ,” said George, after a moment’s silence. “As he said: ‘Here we are.’”

“Yes, we are,” said Peter, looking at the dark woods across the road.

Mol y was studying the house. “This is it,” she said. “I’m sure.”

George tried the gate. “It’s locked,” he said.

“Perhaps there’s a bel ,” said Mol y.

The three of them looked around for a minute, but found neither a bel nor any other means to signal the house that visitors were at the gate.

“I could climb over,” said George. He jumped up and grabbed the top of the stone wal with his fingertips, but was unable to hold on. “Here, Peter,” he said, “give me a hand.” Peter smirked.

“What’s so funny?” said George.

“Look over there,” said Peter, pointing across the road.

George turned and looked. “I don’t see anything,” he said, and turned back.

Peter was gone.

“What?” said George. “Where—”

“Over here,” said Peter, now standing inside the gate.

“But, but…” sputtered George. “How did—”

“Peter,” Mol y scolded.

“What?” answered Peter innocently. He tried to lift the massive iron latch, but it was locked. “I suppose I’l have to—” He was cut off midsentence by a sharp warning sound from Tink.

Behind you!

But before Peter could turn around, he was encircled by two huge, hairy arms, one around his chest, and the other around his neck. He was lifted high off the ground, unable to make a sound, the breath squeezed from his lungs by the frightening strength of the arms. Mol y screamed, then rushed to the gate and grabbed the bars, a look of horror on her face.

“Peter!” she cried. “Don’t move!”

Peter, his lungs burning, fought the urge to thrash and twist. He felt Tink struggle from inside his coat, held shut by the massive, gripping arms.

A voice spoke from behind Peter, from the shadows of the trees lining the driveway. It was definitely a man’s voice, but it spoke in grunts and low, guttural sounds.

As soon as the voice stopped, the hairy arms released Peter. He fel to his knees, gulping cold air. He turned and saw his assailant’s massive, hairy body, topped by an equal y massive head, with a long, dark snout tipped with a wet, black nose.

A bear. And quite a large bear at that.

Peter blinked and, stil on his knees, edged away from it.

“Now then,” said the voice from the shadows. “Who are you, and why are you trespassing on this property?” Peter tried to answer, but his mind was too busy thinking about the bear. It was Mol y who spoke.

“My name is Mol y Aster,” she said. “I’m looking for my father, Leonard Aster. It’s urgent that I find him.” A short pause, and then the voice said, “Who are the others?”

“This is George Darling,” said Mol y, pointing to George. “And that’s Peter, from the island. My father knows them both.” Another pause. Then a man stepped out of the shadows. He was a large man—nearly as tal as the bear, wide as a bul . He wore a broad-brimmed hat. Most of his face was covered with a thick, wild tangle of beard. He held a shotgun in the crook of his right arm.

“You stay where you are,” he said. “Al three of you. You are not to move.”

The man spoke again, but this time in those same low, guttural tones, clearly addressing the bear. To Peter’s surprise, the bear appeared to be listening, then responded with similar-sounding noises. The man then raised his head and made a series of strange barking sounds. Final y he switched back to English, addressing Peter, Mol y, and George.

“Karl here,” he said, gesturing toward the bear, “wil be watching the young man inside the gate. The two of you,” he said pointing to Mol y and George, “are also being watched.” The man turned and walked toward the house, boots crunching on gravel. “Remember: you’re not to move.” Outside the gate, George slowly swiveled his head, surveying the area. He gasped as his eyes reached the woods across the road.

“Mol y,” he whispered.

“What?”

“Over there,” he said, nodding.

Mol y looked, and also gasped. Not thirty feet away, staring at them with eyes that glowed a luminous yel ow in the moonlight, were three enormous wolves.

“Are they…
guarding
us?” whispered George.

“I believe so,” said Mol y.

“But how can they…I mean, wolves, Mol y. And a
bear.
How can—”

“Be quiet, George,” said Mol y.

The silence stretched over several long, tense minutes, with Peter kneeling, stil as a stone, three feet from the giant bear, while George and Mol y stared at the wolves, and the wolves stared back.

Final y came the crunch of gravel again, and the large man reappeared on the driveway, stil carrying the shotgun. He walked past Peter, took a key ring from his belt, and opened the gate.

“Come in,” he said to Mol y and George. As they passed through the gate, George looked back over his shoulder. The wolves were gone.

“You can get up,” the man said to Peter as he locked the gate.

Peter stood, keeping his distance from the bear.

The man grunted something to the bear. The bear grunted back and lumbered off into the shadows.

George gaped at the departing figure. “Mol y,” he whispered, “that man was
talking to the bear.
”

“Be quiet, George,” said Mol y.

“This way,” said the big man, starting down the driveway, fol owed by Mol y, then Peter, then George, who was stil glancing back toward the receding form of Karl the bear.

Peter moved next to George and said, “You should meet her porpoises sometime.”

The mansion was even larger than it appeared from the road, a sprawling structure built of stone in a checkerboard pattern, alternating light gray and dark gray squares. Its windows—eight panes each, four on top and four below—were dark; the only light visible was a lantern burning over the front door.

The large man stopped a few yards from the house and gestured toward the door.

“Go on,” he said.

Mol y, Peter, and George walked past the man. Mol y opened the door and, fol owed by the boys, stepped inside. They found themselves in a large room, rustical y furnished, with massive oak ceiling beams and a huge fireplace blazing brightly. Mol y’s eyes went instantly to the tal figure in the center of the room.

“Father!” she said, and she ran to his arms.

For several long moments they hugged tightly, Mol y’s face buried in her father’s shoulder. Final y they separated. Tears slid down Mol y’s face as she looked up into her father’s eyes, where she saw tenderness losing ground to anger.

“Mol y,” he said, “you should not have come here.”

“I know, Father, but—”

“Do you understand how—” He caught himself and shot a glance at Peter and George, both listening intently. “But I’m being rude.” Aster walked over to the boys, his face softening just a bit as he shook hands with Peter.

“Peter,” he said. “This is a bit of a surprise. How are you?”

“Fine, sir.”

“And what on earth are you doing in England?”

“It’s a long story, sir.”

“I’ve no doubt that it is. You can tel me later. George, how are you?”

“Fine, sir. A bit surprised by the bear. That man outside appeared to be talking to it. And there were
wolves.
” Aster sent a baleful look in Mol y’s direction.

“Yes, wel , animals can be trained to do amazing things, now can’t they?” he said.

“But—”

“Yes, yes, amazing things,” said Aster. “You and Peter must be very hungry.”

“Wel ,” said George, “I—”

“Good, good,” said Aster. “Down that hal way to the right is the pantry. Plenty of food. Please help yourselves.”

“But—”

“I insist,” said Aster, pushing Peter and George toward the hal way. “Mol y and I have some matters to discuss.” When they were gone, Aster turned to Mol y. He kept his voice calm, but his tone was deeply displeased.

“I know you’re an intel igent person,” he said, his eyes boring into hers. “So I cannot for the life of me imagine what possessed you to come here—”

“Father, I—”

“Let me
finish.
To come here, jeopardizing the Return, and to bring those boys, including
George Darling,
for heaven’s sake, who has
no business
getting involved in this. Do you realize the danger you’ve put yourself, and them, in?”

“Father, they’ve got Mother.”

Aster’s eyes widened. “
What
? Who?”

“The Others. They came to the house and took her.”

“Took her where?”

“I don’t know.”

“But what about the guards?”

“They’re working with the Others.”

“
What
?”

“The Others are control ing them,” said Mol y.

“But…
how
?”

“There’s a shadow man,” said Mol y. “I don’t know how he does it, but somehow he takes people’s shadows, and then he controls them.”

“Shadows,” said Leonard, frowning. “We received an odd report from—”

“Egypt,” said Mol y. “Mother told me. ‘Beware the shadows.’ That’s what happened to the guards. This hideous creature came to our house. He cal s himself Lord Ombra. He took Mother, and he tried to take my shadow. If not for Peter, he’d have gotten it.”

“Lord Ombra,” said Aster.

“He gave me this,” said Mol y, pul ing Ombra’s note from her pocket. “He told me to give it to you.” She handed the note to her father. He read it, then read it again.

“Oh, dear,” he said softly.

“That’s why I had to find you,” she said.

“But how on earth
did
you find me?”

For the next ten minutes, Mol y told her father what had happened since he left London—the strange comings and goings outside the Aster mansion; the odd behavior of the maid Jenna; the arrival of Slank, Ombra, and the others, and the kidnapping of Louise Aster; Mol y’s and Peter’s flight from the house, and their decision to take refuge in George’s room; their visit to the Tower; McGuinn’s death; their discovery of the Keep; the eerie, horrifying appearance of Louise Aster’s shadow speaking in Louise Aster’s voice but attached to Ombra; their desperate escape from the White Tower through the garderobe; the decoding of the numbers scribbled on the invoice they’d found; the train trip to Salisbury; the cathedral spire that jogged Mol y’s memory; and the coach driver’s recognition of the name
Gecierran.

Aster reacted only twice: he buried his face in his hands for a moment at the news of the death of his old friend McGuinn, and he managed a wan smile at the garderobe escape. Other than that, he listened intently to Mol y’s account. When she was done, he began asking her questions, most of them about the strange being named Ombra. He made her go over each memory several times, pressing for more and more detail.

Final y, he said: “So, from what you know, this Ombra came into contact with—took the shadows of—Cadigan, Hodge, and Jarvis.”

“Yes.”

“And possibly the household staff.”

“Yes. Certainly Jenna, but perhaps al of them.”

“And…your mother.”

“I fear so, yes.”

“Al right,” Aster said softly, more to himself than to Mol y. “Al right.”

“What do you mean?” said Mol y. “What’s al right?”

“I mean that none of those people knows where the Return is,” said Aster. “Not even your mother knows that. She and I agreed that I would not tel her, in case something like this ever happened. She doesn’t know, so she can’t tel anyone. This Lord Ombra doesn’t know where we’ve taken the starstuff. The Return is safe.” Mol y stared at her father.

“The Return is safe,” she said.

“Yes.”

“But what about Mother?” said Mol y. “What about
that
?” She pointed to Ombra’s letter, stil in her father’s hand. “He says Mother wil come to the gravest harm if you don’t give him the starstuff. The
gravest harm,
Father. He’s going to kil her.”

Aster looked down, ran his hand through his hair, and looked up. Mol y saw anguish in his eyes.

“Mol y,” he said softly. “You must understand what’s at stake here.”

“I
do
understand,” she said. “What’s at stake is Mother’s life.”

Aster flinched, then went on: “I wil do everything in my power to save Louise. But the one thing I cannot do—the thing your mother would not
want
me to do—is al ow the starstuff to fal into the hands of the Others.”

“But—”

“Mol y,
listen.
This is an enormous amount of starstuff, the most we’ve ever recovered. If the Others get hold of it, a thousand years of work and sacrifice by the Starcatchers before us wil be for nothing.
Nothing,
Mol y. The world wil become a terrible place. Al of humanity wil suffer. The plague, Mol y. The Dark Ages. This would be worse than those. We must not al ow it. We
cannot.
”

“But if you return it,” said Mol y, “Mother wil die.”

“If the Others get it,” said Aster, his voice grim, “I fear she wil die anyway. Do you think they would let
any
Starcatchers live?”

“I don’t know what they would do,” said Mol y. “But I do know that if you return it, Ombra wil kil Mother. Isn’t that right?”