Glimmerglass

Chapter Three

Of course, I had to try pounding on the door and yelling, but I can’t say I was really surprised when that didn’t work. The only other way out of the room was the window. I had to climb up on a chair to look out, and what I saw was discouraging. I was on the third floor, so climbing out the window didn’t seem like the best idea in the world—even if I could have gotten it open, which I couldn’t. There was no lock that I could see, and it didn’t look like it was painted shut, but repeated banging and prying got me nothing but a couple of broken nails.

Why, oh why, had I decided to leave home? I’d been dealing with my mom for my whole life; what would another couple of years have mattered? Hell, it wouldn’t even have been a full two years—just this summer, my senior year at school (I’d skipped a grade in middle school, so I was generally younger than everyone else in my class) and then the summer that followed. After that, I’d be away at college, and I had every intention of going to school as far away from home—wherever that happened to be at the time—as possible.

My eyes were gritty and my head ached, but I couldn’t imagine lying down and taking a nice little nap under the circumstances.

I found myself fidgeting with the cameo once again. Was my father really in jail? If so, what for? Mom had told me some terrible stories about him, but I was convinced at least half of them were lies.

But what if they weren’t? What if he was in jail because he belonged there?

I shook the thought off. Aunt Grace had intercepted me at the border, bullied me, and then locked me up. I sat down on the edge of the bed and considered my options. Too bad I didn’t seem to have any at the moment. About fifteen minutes later, I heard the sound of footsteps approaching. And voices.

One of them was Aunt Grace, and the other was a man—I hoped against hope that the man was my father. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, and when they got close enough for the words to be distinct, they shut up.

The hair on the back of my neck prickled for no reason I could name, and I backed away from the door. I heard the soft mumble of Grace’s voice, and the door unlocked and opened itself.

I’d said Aunt Grace was tall and imposing. She had to be at least five-nine, five-ten. But the man who stood behind her in the doorway was enormous. Well over six feet tall—probably more like seven—he’d have to bend over to fit through the door, and he was wide enough that I wondered how he’d made it up the narrow staircase. He looked like what you’d get if you crossed an NBA star with a non-green version of the Incredible Hulk.

Grace entered the room, and, thankfully, her giant friend stayed behind. Blocking the doorway, I suppose, in case I made a run for it. I crossed running for it off my list of options.

I had to fight down a shiver even as I tried to sound brave. “Where do you get off locking me in my room?” I demanded. At least, I tried to demand. I’m afraid “whimpered” might be a better description. Then I got a better look at her—and at the big bruise that bloomed on one side of her face. I gasped.

“What happened?” I asked, momentarily forgetting that she was the enemy.

She looked grim. “My brother was … unwise to bring you here.”

“Huh?”

“You are in danger. Our family is one of great power and consequence. Now that Seamus has claimed you as his daughter and brought you here, there are factions who might see you as a tool to be used to control him. Someone must have seen me bring you here. I was attacked while I was unlocking the front door. I was lucky I’d called Lachlan and asked him to meet me. He chased them off before they could do too much damage. But this proves I was right: you aren’t safe here.”

“Tell you what,” I said. “Why don’t you let me go back to London? I can get a hotel room there and wait until my dad’s out of … er, until he’s available. That way I won’t be putting you through any trouble, and—”

She shook her head. “The men who attacked me were human. I don’t know who they were working for, but they could easily pursue you to London. No, we have to take you to a more secure location, at least until Seamus is free.”

My head felt all fuzzy, like my brain had decided it couldn’t take any more and was going on strike. Aunt Grace looked genuinely worried, and that bruise on her cheek was ugly. Still, just because someone attacked her didn’t mean they were after me. I mean seriously, I’m a half-blood American teenager. How could any of this possibly be about me?

“Lachlan will take you to a safe house,” Grace said, gesturing at the giant. “I might make a tempting target for attack, but he does not.”

I looked at Lachlan, who still loomed in the door. I imagined bad guys would take one look at him and run the other way. His huge arms were crossed on the lintel, showing off his incredible height. He flashed me a smile that seemed to have a hint of warmth, but he was still one seriously scary dude. I kinda wanted to run the other way myself, but somehow, I didn’t think Grace would let me get away with it.

“All right,” I said, trying to act like I had a choice. “I’ll go with Lachlan to the safe house.”

“A wise decision,” Grace said, doing a crappy job of hiding her sarcasm.

She crossed to a chest of drawers I hadn’t yet bothered to examine, then rooted through them until she pulled out a long black cloak with a cowl-like hood. Very sinister-looking. She held it out to me.

“Put this on,” she ordered, “and put the hood up.”

The cloak was obviously hers, and was way too long for me. She frowned when she saw it dragging on the floor.

“Can’t be helped,” I heard her mutter under her breath. “Off you go, then,” she said out loud. “You should be safe for tonight, and hopefully Seamus will be able to take over tomorrow.”

I reached for my bags, but Grace shook her head. “I’ll have them sent over,” she said.

Shrouded in the cloak, trying not to trip over its hem, I made my way toward the door, where Lachlan awaited me. He didn’t say anything, just nodded sharply and started down the steps. He had to stoop to get down them, and he walked kind of sideways to keep his shoulders from brushing the walls.

When we got to the ground floor, he led me out a back door. I felt ridiculous walking around in a black hooded cloak—like some kind of shrunken Grim Reaper—but at least it was warm. I tripped along beside Lachlan, trying not to step on the hem of the too-long cloak. The hood practically blinded me.

It was summer, but here in Avalon, a cold, gray mist floated through the streets. Even under the heavy wool cloak, I shivered in the chill.

“Don’t worry,” said a profoundly deep voice that apparently belonged to Lachlan. “We’ll soon have you warm and cozy.” His accent sounded like Grace’s, only with a pleasant, soft burr at the end. Under other circumstances, I might even have said he sounded nice. I wondered if he was Fae. He didn’t look it; or at least he didn’t look like my preconceived notion of what a Fae would look like. Obviously, I didn’t know much.

The “warm, cozy” place Lachlan took me to turned out to be a basement under what smelled like a bakery—I tried to catch a glimpse of my surroundings, but Lachlan herded me inside before I could. The basement was divided into two rooms, one of which looked suspiciously like a guard house, and one of which looked suspiciously like a cell, with a door that looked about six inches thick and featured a heavy wooden bar.

I balked. “Oh, no,” I said, backing up. “I am not going in there.”

Lachlan closed the door behind him. I shoved the hood down so I could glare up at him. He wasn’t intimidated—shocking, but true.

“It’s for your own protection,” he said with a shrug that looked almost sheepish.

“You have got to be kidding me!”

“I’m afraid your aunt considers you a flight risk. You would not be safe unprotected in Avalon, so she’s decided to make certain you stay put.”

I shook my head stubbornly, calculating my chances of getting around Lachlan and out the door. They were not good.

He sighed. “Please, Dana. I’ve no wish to be a bully, but you must go in.” He shifted from foot to foot, looking remarkably uncomfortable. “This is not how I would have chosen to handle the situation, but Grace is your blood relation, and I am not. I have to respect her decision.”

I snorted. “That makes one of us.”

Lachlan looked … distraught. To my surprise, I found myself feeling sorry for him. Guess it sucked being caught in the middle.

The reality was I didn’t have much of a choice. Even if I somehow got past Lachlan, what was I going to do? Go running out into the streets of Avalon by myself when there was a possibility Aunt Grace was telling the truth and I was in danger?

With a heavy sigh—and one last longing look at the front door—I stomped across the room to my cell. Lachlan closed the door behind me, and I heard a heavy thunk that could only be the wooden bar sliding into place.