House of Secrets

“Don’t be stupid. It heard something. Listen.”

They all heard it now, far off in the woods: hoofbeats.

“Horses?” Eleanor asked hopefully.

The sound grew louder, drumming through the ground into their legs and the pits of their stomachs. “Everyone inside,” Cordelia said.

“But Deal,” Eleanor began, “I want—”

“Now. Someone’s coming!”

Cordelia rushed to the entrance of Kristoff House. Brendan followed, dragging Eleanor with him. They slammed the door and turned all the locks. Brendan tried to set the house alarm, frantically pressing buttons on the keypad.

“Bren!” said Cordelia. “There’s no electricity!”

“Right, my bad.”

Cordelia led them to a window, inched open a shutter, and peeked out.

“What do you see?” Eleanor asked.

“Shh.” The truth was that Cordelia found it difficult to describe what she saw without sounding completely insane.

A band of warriors was riding up to the house on horseback. They were muscular and massive and terrifying, from the glinting helmets on their heads to the knifelike spurs that rattled on their leather boots. They had thick, bristly beards and big full-plate armour that made her breastplate look like a toy. They carried swords, axes and bows. Their boots were caked with dried mud… or was it blood?

“How many horses are there?” asked Eleanor.

“Seven, I think, but Nell, that doesn’t matter—”

“Let me see!” Eleanor pushed her sister aside. “Oh my gosh!”

Brendan crowded her out. “What is this, Lord of the Rings, the reality show?”

The siblings jostled for position, finding a way to all peer out. The warriors dismounted and tied their steeds to trees. They approached the house with caution. The one who was clearly the leader had a maroon feather sticking up from his helmet like a plume of blood. He took off the helmet to reveal pockmarked skin and a scar running from his ear to his chin. When he turned to speak to his men, the Walkers saw the glint of his black, suspicious eyes.

“A witches’ den. This was not here yesterday,” he declared.

One of his compatriots, a red-haired, red-bearded man, grabbed his arm: “Slayne, m’lord, could be a trap.”

Slayne (good name, thought Brendan; he looks like he’s slain a lot of people) grinned, twisting his scar like a second smile, bearing blackened stumps of teeth. “If there are witches… we need to get inside. And quickly kill them all.”

“Um, may I suggest we go to the attic?” whispered Cordelia.

The Walkers dashed away from the window.

At the front door, Slayne grabbed the knob, found it locked, and turned to his red-headed number two. “Krom?”

Krom handed him a battle-axe. Slayne swung. The first blow left a gaping hole in the door. The second sent it flying off its hinges.

Slayne and his men entered, on guard.

“A great battle was waged here,” said Slayne. He drew his sword, stabbed it through the remains of Bellamy Walker’s iPad, and lifted it off the ground. “And at least one of the parties was a witch. This appears to be some sort of occult toy for children.”

Slayne led the warriors through the living room and library as the Walkers huddled in the attic. They could hear the warriors’ clomping boots and gruff voices, but not their words.

“We can’t just sit here,” Eleanor said. “We’ve got to find out what they want. Maybe they know where Mum and Dad are!”

“How do you propose to find that out?” Brendan asked.

“Watch.” Eleanor opened the attic door and started down to the second-floor hallway.

“No, Nell!”

“Stop!”

But it was too late. Eleanor was already opening the door to the dumbwaiter. The warriors were in the kitchen, below her, and sound travelled directly up the hollow shaft. It was like she was in the midst of the warriors as they investigated their alien surroundings.

“This appears to be a witches’ torture chamber,” Slayne said. Eleanor heard the microwave door pop open. “Possibly a box for shrunken victims.” Eleanor stifled a laugh.

In the kitchen, Slayne opened the fridge and paused. Here was a pleasant surprise. His men were all hungry, and the power hadn’t been out long. Slayne tossed an apple aside and went for a jar of Hellmann’s mayonnaise. Behind him, Krom ripped open a box of Cap’n Crunch, sniffed it, ate a handful, and started pouring it into his mouth: “It’th good!” Slayne unscrewed the mayo and scooped out a big clump.

Upstairs, Brendan and Cordelia poked their heads over the attic steps to get a report from Eleanor.

“They’re eating our food!” Eleanor said. Then she heard Slayne’s voice through the dumbwaiter.

“This white sauce is mine, men. Touch it under penalty of death. It’s so good, I do believe, when we return to Castle Corroway, I’ll eat my horse with it. He’s getting on in years; it’s time for a younger steed—”

The men all laughed. That set Eleanor off.

“He can’t kill a horse!” she said, climbing into the dumbwaiter, gauntlets on, brandishing her barbecue fork.

“Nell, stop! You can’t—” Brendan yelled, but she had already closed the door.

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It was pitch-black in the dumbwaiter. Eleanor could hardly move. If she’d been a foot taller, she never would have fitted inside. She twisted to grab one of the bicycle-chain-like cables that the container rode on and pulled one way. The dumbwaiter inched up. So she pulled the other way and started down, moving quickly. The rusty pulleys squeaked. With every foot she descended the voices of the warriors grew louder.

“Hand me that sweetened meal, Krom!”

“Find your own!”

“We could set up camp here and run raids over the East!”

“It could do with a few slaves to tidy up—”

Halfway down Eleanor started to think she’d made a terrible mistake. Slaves? Raids? This wasn’t some TV show; these men would cut her to pieces. But she couldn’t reverse course and be a coward. Not with Bren and Deal upstairs depending on her.

The dumbwaiter stopped at the kitchen with a metallic chunk.