The Stelter City Saga: Ultranatural (49 page)

“
I love that game!” Grace
exclaimed. “But let’s stay down on the first floor. I don’t want to
bug mom.” As she spoke, her bare feet lead the way across the wood
floor to the gaping library just beside the stairs.

Instantly the musky odor of pages that hadn’t
been turned in years raked through Mason’s nose. Along one side of
the walls, tall windows climbed up against the shelves of books and
after Mason’s eyes adjusted to the brightness, he was able to see
the gravel driveway in the front yard. In the ray of sunlight
spotlighting the rug, specks of dust drifted gracefully around in
the air. Several desks lined the walls with computers and lamps
resting atop their wooden surface and as Lee made her way to the
nearest one, he and Ithaca leaned against one of the cozy
couches.

There had been several play dates in the past
when the three would build forts by pushing the furniture together.
They had been so young and innocent they had even slept on the rugs
and Ace’s favorite part was staring up at the vast ceiling high
above his head. The most epic piece of art coated the ceiling. It
was a beautiful collage of storybook characters and places.
Everything from Little Red Riding-Hood to Moby Dick, from Narnia to
Hogwarts, ranged against the ceiling. He had even discovered
Spiderman in one of his childhood games of I-Spy.

The drawer rattled when Grace pulled open the
first desk and found a new box of unsharpened pencils. “Perfect!”
she exclaimed pulling out sheets of paper as well. “Look it’s the
old list of items from the last time we played!” she said holding
the crumpled and written on paper out for her friends to see. “Do
you want do just go by this list or do you want to make up a new
one?”

“
New one!” Mason and Ithaca
said in unison and instantly Grace was making her way to raid
another desk for something to write with.

A single red marker was the first thing she
spotted in the drawer and instantly laid down on the giant rug as
she began to write the newest items of their game. Things like blue
book, sock, and fork came to their minds quickly as Grace wrote the
list. When there were five items thought out, Grace made sure to
copy them all down on separate sheets to give to her friends.
“Alright,” Grace began standing up. “We start here and go all the
way down the hall to the kitchen alright?”

Ithaca and Mason climbed to their feet each
with a set of pencils in their pockets and the folded list in their
hands. “On your mark,” began Mason and instantly the girls crouched
at the ready. “Get set…” There was just enough time to catch Ithaca
glancing at a blue book on the corner of a desk before Mason
shouted, “Go!”

Simultaneously, Mason and Ithaca bolted for
the same item as Grace ran the other direction. Mason was the first
to snatch up the small paperback, but just as he was turning to
head for the entryway, Ithaca snatched it from his hands. She was
the only player who had yet to lose at this game and the reason was
always because she was so sly and quick. Mason lunged at her hands
but she was too fast. There was just enough time to get a face full
of her skirt before he tripped over the couch then she was out on
the entryway rushing to find the next item.

Grace leapt over him with a giggle and a blue
magazine rolled up in her hands. Mason rolled up to his feet just
in time to watch her head for the small archway tucked into a dark
corner beside the shelves of books. It was in the complete other
direction as the entryway Ithaca had bolted into, and considering
it was Ithaca that had gone that way, it was safer to follow Grace
than it was to try going into the same rooms as Ithaca.

A blue book sat on the shelf just beside the
small archway and Ace pulled it out before following Grace. He had
completely forgotten about that small hallway until it had spit him
out into a narrow hallway with only one other door against the
opposite wall before leading to the main hall. If he remembered
correctly, it lead to an office and one of the supplies on his list
was a mouse pad. Instinctively he pulled a pencil from his back
pocket and held it up for throwing. There had been too many
instances where he would walk into a room only to have an opponent
ready to shoot him.

He wasn’t sure if Grace had decided to go
down the hall instead of go for the mouse pad, but he would rather
be safe than sorry. Without thinking twice, he burst into the room.
He had expected Grace’s silvery hair to quickly duck around a
cabinet or the desk, but the room was completely empty. Nothing was
there but the cabinets lining the wooden walls and a single desk
facing the door. But just in case there was someone hiding, Ace
didn’t drop the pencil. With the blue book still in his hand, he
made his way across the clean carpet rug over to the desk. Sure
enough, the mouse pad was still there and he quickly snatched it up
and stuck it within the pages of his book to carry it better.

He was on his way out the room when the door
handle jiggled. Startled, Ace dropped his book and spun on the
spot. The first hiding place he could think of was behind the
curtains draped alongside the windows and so he bolted. There was
just enough time to throw the fabric over his feet when three pairs
of footsteps entered the room. After realizing that it couldn’t
have been Lee or Ithaca, Ace felt it was safe to reveal himself. He
was just about to step out from behind the curtains when Mr.
Stelter’s urgent voice made its way to his ears.

“
There’s not much time is
there, Derik?” asked Mr. Stelter locking the door.

Rex
Diachi
! That was his father’s name.
Instantly he recognized his father’s heavy footsteps make their way
to the center of the office. He wasn’t in the greatest shape of his
life which is what explained the heavy steps. In fact, Ace
remembered him being a very large plump man with a thick black
goatee on his sickly pale face. He hadn’t always been that way. Ace
remembered when he and Mr. Stelter would lift weights together at
the Diachi Mansion. But he had recently been diagnosed with a
sickness that prevented him from being able to do little more than
walk.

“
Thank you Edrick.” Mason
heard his father sigh as he slumped down in a chair. Mason didn’t
remember a chair being in the center of the room, but from where
their voices were coming from, that’s where they seemed to have
gathered. “And you’re right there isn’t much time. It has to be
tonight, there is nothing more we can do.” Once more he sighed and
when he spoke again, there was sorrow in his words. “Forgive me
Edrick; I’ve been such a fool. I’ve been putting this off for as
long as I can. But I fear Gadiantion is about to realize that I’ve
found out he’s been poisoning me.”

Mason’s eyebrow folded. Gadiantion as in
Ithaca’s uncle? He was his father’s right hand man. From what Mason
knew, DiAchi Tech was nearly halfway his anyway. But what startled
Mason most was the idea that Gadianton was poisoning his father.
Was that the reason Rex was in such bad shape?

“
We understand.” A third
voice muttered but sounded deep in thought. Ace recognized it
immediately as Grace’s older brother Lambert. The tall Stelter
never wore a smile on his acne spotted face. Though he was old
enough to be out of that teenage phase, he still broke out in small
clusters all around his face. Ace was sure that if he hadn’t been
spending so much money on hair gel and business suits, he would
have a face as flawless as his sisters’.

“
For a man that has been
second best since our families started being industrious, I can see
why he’s so jealous.” Lambert continued.

Ace’s father nodded though his son couldn’t
see. “Not only that but he has been the reason my family has hated
yours for two-hundred years. I suppose that another reason why he
wants me dead so badly is to punish me for befriending your family.
For two-hundred years he’s been one person away from my seat. But
if he knows I have found out he’s been slowly killing me, there’s
nothing to stop him from finishing me now. He’s already taken
Estelle… I need to know what you’re plan is. I need to know how you
can save my son.”

A hollow silence followed and Ace could only
imagine Lambert and his father eyeing each other gravely. Finally
Mr. Stelter’s voice spoke up. “What’s this?”

Mason held his breath as he listened to Mr.
Stelter’s feet walk over to his desk. He paused for a moment and
Mason was sure he had been discovered. Then there was the sound of
something being picked up from the floor and Mason could almost see
the confused brows of Mr. Stelter as he held the blue book in his
hands. “I guess one of the kids must have dropped it when they were
playing.”

“
Are Mason and Ithaca here
already?” Rex asked with a wisp of enthusiasm in his
voice.

“
Yeah, they are.” Lambert
answered and Mason heard his footsteps come over to join his
father. But before he knew it, the curtain was being thrown aside
and he was exposed to the three men in the room.

Mason’s face flushed as Lambert loomed over
him with a fistful of curtains in his hands. The look on his face
wasn’t mad. Lambert was never a mad person. He just always seemed
to have something else on his mind. Even as he asked. “What are you
doing here Mason?”

Mason skimmed the room. Mr. Stelter stood
just over Lambert’s shoulder in a crisp white suit and a green tie
to match his eyes. A slight smile crept over his lips as he shook
his head. There was always something so intimidating about Mr.
Stelter. It frightened Mason at the time, but Ace didn’t think it
scary at all. He was a big man with wide shoulders and a balding
head. That, plus the fact that he was almost always in a suit gave
the illusion that he was a military general, but as Ace thought
back on it, he was the perfect father.

“
Come over here Mason.” His
own father called, and Mason tore his eyes from Edrick
Stelter.

Mason was around the table in no time and
hopped onto the couch he was pretty sure hadn’t been in the room
when he first entered. Nonetheless, he hugged his father just as
Rex put an arm around his shoulder.

“
What are you talking about
dad?” Mason asked as the Stelters joined them.

“
Oh nothing you need to be
worried about. It’s just some stuff for us old people.” Said his
father with a smile and Mason could see a twinkle in his father’s
dark brown eyes.

“
Is everything okay?” he
asked.

His father didn’t answer right away. Instead
he sat there with a weary smile and nodded. “Yes son. Everything
will be alright.”

“
Is Gadianton in trouble?”
Mason asked.

Rex scoffed, “Oh tell you what. If he’s not
in big trouble, he will be when I’m done with him. But you can’t
tell Ithaca okay. This has to between you and me.”

“
Ithaca!” Mason exclaimed.
“We’re playing a game! She probably already won.” With that, Mason
slid from the couch and grabbed the book Mr. Stelter had set on the
desk, along with the mouse pad. Without another word he turned on
the spot and hurried for the door. Mason made sure to shut it
before he went bursting into the hall and down to the kitchen. As
he sprinted through the empty wooden hall, expensive paintings
whizzed past him on the walls and pillars that formed the large
hallway swooped passed him as well. There were a couple maids that
turned their heads as he hurried past but other than that he was
alone on the run to the kitchen.

His shoes squeaked as he rounded the corner.
The kitchen doors were just a few more strides before him, but
before he could pick up his feet, a volley of pencils slapped the
side of his face. “Ithaca!” he gasped when his eyes adjusted to the
girls against the wall. “Grace, there you are! I was looking for
you.”

Grace giggled, “Well we were doing the
same.”

“
Where have you been Mace?”
Ithaca asked holding her five items out for him to see. “You only
grabbed two things?”

“
I could have gotten more.”
Mason muttered looking down, “Actually I was going to the office to
find the mouse pad but then our dads walked in.”

Grace smiled, “My dad won’t get mad at you.
He loves your family.”

Mason nodded, “Yeah, but that’s not my point.
I overheard them talking.” Just as soon as he said it, Mason
regretted the words coming out of his mouth. He was supposed to
keep what he heard a secret. It was a secret just between him and
his dad.

“
I over hear a lot of people
talking.” Ithaca added. “I think that’s just what people do
Mace.”

Mason kept his eyes on the wooden ground and
scuffed his feet. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

Just then footsteps came from behind them and
when they whirled around, Lambert was slowly approaching them. Of
the Stelter children, Lambert was the only boy, and probably had
the most distant relationship from any of them. His emerald eyes
were the same color as Grace’s but had a serious tweak to them as
if there was never a time in his life to laugh.

“
What are you kids doing?”
he asked and from his expressionless face, Mason couldn’t tell if
he was trying to figure out what he had overheard.

“
We just got done playing
secret agents.” Grace beamed. “Do you want to play with
us?”

Lambert never played anything but golf with
his father or perhaps a game of pool. Ace wouldn’t have wasted his
breath on asking him to join in, but Lee always did. Maybe that’s
why he liked her so much. “No thanks Hails, Actually it’s almost
time for dinner. Do you know where mom is?”

“
In the art veranda with
Lotus. They are working on her Grammy dress. Have you seen it yet?
Lotus looks like a princess!”