Curses & Cries ; Sebastian Sallow

chapter 17: Sebastian Sallow (The Crime)

In the daylight the walls were a dark oak panelling with an elaborate Persian rug in the middle of the room. It was lined with bookshelves and there was a large bureau, Letty saw, by the window which were once familiar to her only in lamplight.

Underneath the bed was the loose floorboard, very long and narrow, perfect to accommodate an average cylinder, where Letty fell to her knees. She gave it a good yank, anticipating the time before one of the three would come flying upstairs to stop them, and when it slid open she could hardly breathe.

It was gone.

"That rat!" said Sebastian with a mad look in his eye. "Well, it's confirmed which side he's on. Did Garreth say anything else of its place?"

"No. Might you have a guess where it could be?" she asked.

Then they heard a clatter of metal at the door, which meant their time was up. Sebastian came forward, bending on a knee, and lifted Letty to her feet as they watched the doorknob shake.

"Bookcase," he said, looking towards the tall one by the fireplace.

They rushed to the other side of the great room, where the shelves went from floor to ceiling, and sure enough the first unit rotated, allowing them to step into another part of the manor. It was cooler than the bedroom by ten or fifteen degrees, and before them was total darkness.

Sebastian casted Lumos, which was only bright enough to light the walls, cramped and gray, that forced them closer together. They shuffled down a hallway much like a tunnel, and he focused on his pace, but not so much that he couldn't feel her taking hold of his elbow.

"And you're sure it's in here?" she asked, also getting out her wand to create more light.

"I didn't say that. I'm just trying not to get us caught. We have to hide and the only way to do that is to keep moving forward."

Letty sighed, and, kicking balls of dust and loose stones as they went, she caught sight of sunlight streaming in from the far end of the tunnel, which looked to be leading them out of doors.

They made for the opening, now rushing the gray floors, into what they recognized to be a vast bit of forest on the north side of Gaunt Manor.

By the time they reached the end it was doom and gloom. Sebastian and Letty kept their lights on and walked the perimeter, filling their lungs with air, before coming across a lonely shack covered in a mass of vines and blooms that twisted sinisterly with the rain.

"How long had we been walking?" said Letty.

The pair looked at each other for one to set something in motion, but Letty shook her head, which made him think she had changed her mind.

"But it could be in there," he said. Letty looked upset and he took to teasing her. "Don't tell me you're afraid of devil's snare. Come on, you know the spell."

Letty casted Lumos Solem, permanently getting rid of the thick tendrils wrapped around the hut, and saw the door secured by a lock. The lock was stiff and turned twice as she incanted another charm, which gave and swung open, into the otherwise docile shack shrouded with loose pages and crumbled parchment and ink. It was just as dull inside as it was outside, and the most prominent element was a high-backed chair where Ominis would go to write.

In fact, the budding novel was out on the desk and left open to an entire roll written about his experience at last night's ball. The look on Letty's face as she read it under wand-light confirmed Sebastian's fear of her backing out.

"I'm not sure we've got time for that," he said.

"Hold on, these are written in Ominis's point of view."