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“This is a missing person, sir,” he said. “Whether or not the person is special is irrelevant. What’s important is that they are found.”
“Of course, officers. We will be sure to keep a look out for this young man,” my grandmother said.
With one wicked look back at my uncle, the officers left the room, my grandmother following quickly behind them. My aunt and uncle exchanged looks. I grabbed a piece of chicken off my plate, and stuffed it in my napkin and into my pocket.
Hecate would likely be getting hungry.
“Surely they could have picked a better time than dinner,” my grandmother grumbled as she came back into the room.
“Rude is what it is.” My uncle drank some wine, dousing his moustache in red velvet.
I shovelled food into my mouth as quickly as I could and excused myself once I was finished. My grandmother, aunt, and uncle didn’t care to notice, too busy grumbling between themselves at the imposition.
“Here you go, Hec.” As soon as my bedroom door was closed, Hecate jumped down from the bed to greet me, and she grabbed the napkin I produced with both paws and dragged it down to the ground.
I had barely even unwrapped it for her before she got stuck in, eating with fervour.
Wow, she really had been hungry. I wondered when her last meal was.
While Hecate was eating, I mosied over to the window and looked outside. The police officers were standing across the street, talking over the tops of their car with their doors open. Strange that someone was missing in this town. Crime wasn’t exactly high, and missing people were even rarer than someone having their house broken into. Maybe whoever was kidnapping people could kidnap me while they were at it. Anything to get out of this place.
Hecate jumped up on my vanity and pawed at my arm.
I held out my hand to her. I was starting to understand that she wanted to talk to me when she did that. She touched her paw to my palm.
You need to return to the hidden potion store.
“But why?” I whispered. “I found everything there was to find.”
And the look of it had unnerved me, but what more could I do without thinking on things? What my grandmother put in my potions didn’t exactly change anything. What was I going to do? Stand up to her? And go where and do what? I had nothing and nobody outside of this place.
No, you didn’t. Trust me.
Okay, that was interesting. I looked to my door, my lips scrunching up. I wondered what else my grandmother was hiding in there.
* * *
When everyone had gone to bed, I snuck out of my room with Hecate leading the way. Anxiety gnawed at me all the way down the hallway to the living room. But it wasn’t enough to dampen my curiosity. It might even be worth getting caught to find out what Hecate was so concerned about.
We sneaked into the potions room and pushed open the panel into the secret room. Hecate immediately jumped up onto one of the shelves and carefully picked her way down it to a spot in the middle. I followed her and tried to peer between the jars she was pawing at. Unable to see, I pulled a few jars off the shelf and put them to one side.
When I pulled one of the jars off, I froze as I caught sight of another pushed all the way to the back.
Pounding on the side of the jar with both fists was a teeny tiny version of the siren I had seen in the picture.
Chapter Five
Hecate mewled and pawed at the jar. So that’s what she had been talking about.
I grabbed the jar and dragged it to the front of the shelf. The siren wobbled and fell on his backside.
“Ooops, sorry,” I whispered.
He sat up, looking bewildered. His clothes were ruffled, and he looked infinitely more sunken than his picture. How long had he been in here?
“What are you doing in here? How did you get in here?” I asked.
“All I did was sell that crazy lady some powdered sabre cat tooth, and she shrunk me down and locked me in here,” he said.
