Charlie’s eyes. ‘Hmmmm, let me assure you, you heard me right, little brat. I’ve just negotiated the sale of your skinny behind for a most pleasurable fortune. So enjoy your last twenty-four hours with us, because shortly after Bane will, I’m quite sure, be snacking on your flesh.’
Charlie had been wondering why Narcissa had taken her in. It had made no sense for the woman to offer her services to the Jade Circle and then turn cold and hard the minute she and Charlie were alone. But this explained it. Lady Narcissa had offered to house her purely for financial gain.
‘I congratulate you on getting rid of those tiresome Tremen as well. But now I grow weary. It is late and I need my beauty sleep, so without further ado I shall bid you goodnight. Stones, I think that we should put our young guest in suitable lodgings. Take her to the old cattle pens.’
‘As you wish, Mother.’
Lady Narcissa turned smartly and disappeared up the nearby stairwell of her tower.
Stones grabbed Charlie painfully by her hair and pulled her along, through twisting and winding corridors, until he came to a heavily bolted door. Pulling back the bolts, he carelessly tossed Charlie inside.
‘Until tomorrow, little rabbit,’ he growled. Slamming shut the door, he pulled the bolts back into place and stomped off.
Charlie groaned. Her knees were scraped and bloody and she was sure her shins would be horribly bruised. In her opinion hard stone floors weren’t the most comfortable thing to be thrown on. Picking herself up, she plucked the worst of the splinters from her hands and looked around.
Thin moonlight trickled into the dank room through narrow, barred windows that were shrouded by the forest canopy. Damp straw lay scattered across the floor and empty, rundown cattle stalls lined one of the walls. Charlie wrinkled her nose in disgust; it stank of unwashed animals, rot and mildew. Rats, large millipedes, cockroaches and long-legged spiders scuttled, scurried and squeaked in dark corners.
‘Nice, real nice,’ she muttered to herself. She really wasn’t looking forward to spending the night here. How on earth was she going to sleep without creepy-crawlies trying to use her as a new home? The floor was out of the question – it practically heaved with insects. Climbing on to the fencing of one of the stalls, she perched herself up high and by wedging her back against an upright post managed to get reasonably comfortable.
How did she keep getting into these situations? Her adventures in Bellania seemed to lurch from tragedy to tragedy. Every time she overcame one obstacle another two cropped up in its place. She was no nearer her goals. Her parents were still far, far away, while her grandma had been left behind and was now in who-knew-what kind of sticky situation at the mercy of Mr Crow.
Charlie sat there and brooded. Her brain was whirring and ticking over far too fast with memories and fanciful thoughts of escape for sleep to come easily. Hours passed.
After a while a noise that was different from the background chitter of insects roused her from her troublesome daydreams. Pulling a disgusted face and trying not to scream, she plucked an over-inquisitive spider from her hair, sat up and strained to listen. Arguing voices, muffled behind the bolted door, grew closer. With a thick rattle and scrape, the bolts were drawn back and torchlight flooded into the room.
26
Where There’s a Will There’s a Way
‘You must be mad! Mother would have a shouting fit if she knew we were even thinking about doing this!’ grumbled the familiar voice of Stones.
‘Well, if you were that worried you shouldn’t have allowed me to talk you into coming down here!’ rasped Stix with his sandpaper voice. ‘Come on, don’t worry about it. What’s the worst that can happen? Not much when you think about it. By tomorrow night that little brat of a Keeper will be digesting inside Bane’s stomach. No one will ever know the truth apart from you and me.’
Stones didn’t bother to reply, he merely grunted his consent.
‘Ha! That’s my brother!’ Stix laughed. ‘Come on, let’s have some fun!’
‘What do you two chumps want?’ asked Charlie. She had to shield her eyes from the blazing torch that Stix held in his hand. After the gloom of the cattle pens, her eyes weren’t ready for the intrusive glare.
‘Well, little brat, it’s not every day we have a Keeper at our mercy, even a little wisp of a one like you. Me