Excerpts #1 | thedreadfulseries

"The Einstein Rosen-Bridge In Mr. Dreadful's Attic"

chapter 5

They walked through the rickety exterior door dangling from one corroded hinge. As James’s eyes adjusted to the dark, he could smell mildew. Cobwebs floated languidly in the sunlight pouring through the doorway. The windows were boarded up, but cracks of light bled through. The dust was so thick in the air, James sneezed. He had a flashback of himself running through here, having gone back inside for the grimoire. Smoke had filled his lungs with noxious fumes. As he ran, he’d looked up, and that board wrapped in orange locks of flame had fallen loose and swung down to clout him on the forearm as he raised his arm to protect his face. He touched his skin where it had struck him and felt it itch with tingling nerve memory.

There was a dusty table, a candle-style chandelier over it, a single chair, and rusted pans, pots, and dinner plates in a corner.

They went upstairs. When they reached the second landing where a dim lantern hung against the rungs of the banister, James could see where the gaping hole was in a bedroom. “Is that—”

“Your bedroom—yes,” Arthur said.

James entered it. The room was small and dusty, with cobwebs in the corners, piles of old newspapers, old two-by-fours, crumbled walls, and an overturned bed. Arthur followed him inside, and James stared through the hole into the yard. Then he turned and looked around, before spying an ancient-looking musical mobile on the floor in the corner near the overturned bed. It was burned and

inoperable. He didn’t remember it, but just then, a strange old tune floated into his head. “I remember some song,” he said slowly. “But that thing looks ancient.”

“Your mother’s.”

“You mean it’s from—”

“The Old World—yes.” Arthur stepped forward, poking his stick into a crack in the floorboards. “Enchanted.”

James looked at him wryly. “You used to sing the words to me at bedtime. But—the words were gibberish.”

“Gibberish, eh?” The old man smiled and scratched his white beard, then hummed a few bars of the old song. It was old, sad, familiar, and lovely, and it made James feel strangely nostalgic.

Arthur paused, a note dying in his throat. His citrine eyes wandered over the clutter at his feet. Then he bent forward and picked up a small, lonesome button to a shirt and flicked it out the hole. “Let’s go.”

They went up a steeper set of six stairs and pushed open a small door leading into the attic. “Our headquarters,” Arthur said, sounding pleased with himself. The attic was just as dusty as the house, although light beamed in from a single, circular window at the far end. It was quite empty except for a bed without a mattress, a sofa, a table surrounded by four chairs, and a bronze, old-fashioned vintage lantern. James also saw the Oros Mirror his grandpa had mentioned. It was large and oval, and rested in the corner of the attic.

Arthur plumped down in a pulled-out chair; James noticed a large map unfurled on the table, its curling ends weighted down by a gold compass on one side and an oddleg caliper on the other. Two other scrolls—one partially unrolled—were on the table. A taper rested on the end, and James spied a shadow flickering against the paper. As his eyes adjusted to the brightness of the taper, he realized it was Quizlow standing with one hand against it.

“It’s high time you got here,” the gnome said. He had a quill in his hands, which he’d been using to write precariously on the half-unraveled scroll.

“Hey,” James said, having wandered over to the Oros Mirror. “If I step through this, will it take me to France? Can we go sightseeing until midnight?” He didn’t think it would be much fun hanging around inside an old, musty attic for six hours.

“No,” Quizlow said. “I broke the Oros so I wouldn’t be followed. Now come here. I’ve got something for you.”

James came over to the table. Quizlow crossed the map to one corner and placed his foot on the edge of the compass. “A magnetic, jewel-bearing compass,” the gnome informed him. “It’s called Orbis, and it’s enchanted.”

James picked it up. He expected it to feel different from an ordinary compass, but it was just a cold lump of gold in his hand.

"Estyrmor"

chapter 24

“You are home, child,” she said.

He was afraid of such words. He looked at her cold, hard eyes. Somehow, he could read that she was angered by his mother keeping him away from the Hut. “What do you want of me?” he asked.

“What your mother took, James,” she said.

James met her cold eyes again.

“Your mother had no right to break the blood sigil. By tradition, all Grall children belong to the Hut. Your father’s legacy is our legacy. But now you are here—and here you shall stay.”

“I don’t want to stay here,” James said.

Catpernica only smiled. “You aren’t aware of tradition—”

“I don’t care about your traditions!” James snapped.

“In time, you will learn.”

Not if I can help it. He had no intention of staying. Not unless they were going to chain him to the floor, or keep him in a coffer like Li’s husband.

“Your father’s original name was Jaqrius,” she said quietly. “Jaqrius Dreadful.”

James looked up at her, momentarily forgetting his rage. “What?”

“When he first came here, he was not much older than you. He was hotheaded—wanted to learn magic fast.” She turned to look at the fire crackling in the fireplace. “He also felt the wrong of our kind, relegated to this far, cold land.”

“How do you know this?” James asked.

“I was the one who brought him here.”

James swallowed. “You—you did?”

She looked at him. “Come.”

James obeyed, still uncertain. She placed her hand on the crystal ball on the table. “Have you seen one of these before?”

“Yes.” He remembered the crystal ball from the shop in Paris what seemed like a lifetime ago.

“Touch it.”

James started forward, but Cat, who had followed him up to the table, put his hand on his arm. “Careful.”

James shook his arm free and stepped up until his thighs touched the tabletop. He looked at Catpernica, then at the enchanted globe. He lifted his hand over the crystal, and she took it and guided it to the ball and muttered a soft litany under her breath. He stared into the glass, and just as he suspected, an image appeared.

It was a first-person perspective of someone sitting in a rowboat. It was foggy and dark. Two boys not much older than him sat in the boat, pushing and pulling on the oars. In the distance, he saw pinprick lights of what looked like a settlement. One boy, he could tell, was taller. Even sitting down, he was a head higher than the other, who was also slouchy and pasty-faced.

Then the image changed, and James saw what looked like a birdlike reptile walk by with stilt-legs through a marsh, looking like the one they’d seen earlier at the pier. He saw moss and vines drooping into heavy mists curling around bubbling water. The same two boys were picking their way through reeds carrying bags, brushing past curtains of beard lichen until they came to a set of caves lit with interior fires.

“Jaqrius,” he heard a voice say, and the tall boy—a teenager, dressed in a cowl—turned around at the sound of his name. James gasped. He was a handsome boy, with stern, tense features, and citrine eyes that seemed to sparkle through the fog.

Catpernica waved her hand, and the image vanished. “That was forty-one years ago,” she said, a knowing smile forming in the corner of her cheek.

James looked up at her. “I want to see more.”

“In time.”

"Rimbecella"

chapter 14

“Another!” A guardsman had lifted the tablecloth, exposing James. James had frantically tried to roll out of sight, but this was flawed the moment his foot caught on the tablecloth, and he pulled the entire Celeesian cuisine down around him in delicious cascades of shanklish, bread pudding, and showers of halloumi.

“How many children are hiding in my midnosh!” Gar roared. His mountainous Jell-O belly rippled with his ire. His protest was met with a frenzied cry as a turbaned pjjin tackled a mouse escaping beneath the tables. The furred free-for-all snowballed into a tumble of tails, paws, and twitching nostrils, which rolled under the chairs.

The shaikh jumped up, screaming, “An imp! An imp!”

But the fat gobliness chortled, grabbed the lid of a pot from steamed clams, and slammed it down over the tiny “imp” scurrying away from the rodent melee. “Oi—gotcha!” she barked, and then slid a plate beneath the lid. Like this, she scooped up her prey.

“Whatcha got there?” growled Gar. “An escaping croquembouche?”

“Nay; I’ve a gnome.”

Gar leaned forward, his eyes narrowing. “A gnome?”

She waddled past the shaikh, who was on all fours trying to find his dignity, and presented her catch to the king, lifting the lid.

There stood Quizlow, his fingers plugging his ears like a deafened, pint-sized dessert.

“Ugh,” Gar snapped. “How’d the vermin get in here?” He looked around and spied the turban-wearing pjjin and shouted, “What’s this bloody

leprechaun doing in my throne room, you weasel!” Enraged, he grabbed the large goblet from his cupbearer and threw it at the creature, as well as a platter of pastries. After the pjjin had scurried under the tables, Gar slammed his fist down. “And what are these—?” He turned his head around to look at James and Cat, smashing the lid over Quizlow again.

Cat, meanwhile, was licking his fingers, and was about to reach for another treat, when one of the men-at-arms drew his curved blade and slapped his hand away with the flat side of it.

The king stared at Cat as though he’d grown a rhino’s horn from his buttocks. Then, quite suddenly, he laughed. It was like a mountain collapsing—his laugh. His shoulders shook, and all twenty of his chins danced like a jellied accordion. Soon, the rest of the guests in the throne room had joined.

“Cupbearer!” Gar shouted. “Cup me!”

The cupbearer got down on all fours and went beneath the tables where the frightened pjjin hid, and Gar turned to Cat and said, “Child, you split my sides! Here, have a nip, you poor thing.” And he pushed a plate of food toward him. “Continue eating, boy, before a shaman reads your bones.”

Cat beamed and bowed. “Oh, thankee, suh!” And he rushed to the tables to cram his mouth.

Gar heaved with laughter as he watched Cat pour food in his mouth, and then looked at the others. Tears rolled from his eyes as his massive chest rocked wildly. “Oh, I’m gonna split, this is too-hoo-hoo comical! Spare the jester, all I need is to watch this poor creature

wolf. It’s a fine midnosh when I’m served two guttersnipes and vermin with my pudding!” The goblet reached his hand, and the cupbearer filled it with wine. Gar took it and offered it to Cat. “There, have a draught of that, putz,” he said. “Did I hear right—you wormed your way out of my dungeon?”

Cat was licking his fingers, and he said, “Yes, suh!”

Gar hiccupped and laughed again. “My dungeon’s become a bloody homeless shelter!”

His guests laughed at this, and Gar beamed at the boy. “Think I just might adopt the bugger. He’ll be my piggish little jester—oinking to inspire those not blessed with a voracious appetite.” He looked at the boy. “Tell me a story, sprout.”

“Oh, OK,” Cat said. “Once upon a time—”

“How did you come to be here, stupid!” roared Gar.

“Oh, well you see,” Cat said, “I heard you were offering rides on your magic carpet. I thought it was a great opportunity, being as my friend, here, James, is a magic carpet master. I had to bring him here to have a go at her.” As he said this, he reached for a sfogliatella and crammed it into his mouth, before turning to point at James innocently.

Gar’s massive head swiveled, as though on a turret, to look at James. “Is this true-hoo-hoo?” he laughed.

James felt the attention shift to him and stepped back. “I—I—I’m n-n-no one,” he stammered.

Cat laughed. “So modest! He’s a master at the art of flying…’specially concerning carpets, blankets, shawls—even afghans! You knit it—he can fly it!”

"The Goblin's Shadow Creeps"

chapter 3

Footsteps.

It was quiet in the alley. So quiet, he could hear the sound of the wind rustling the edge of a newspaper and pushing a Styrofoam cup around. But the footfalls were loud, with each one resounding off the brick walls.

Thump…thump…thump…CLUNK! Thump…thump…thump…CLUNK!

He couldn’t help it; paralysis took control of his muscles, making his calves weak. As the sound drew nearer, the streetlight blinked against the wall in front of him, producing a strobing effect on the sudden shadow that appeared. He stifled a surprised gasp. It was the hunched shape of an old man—or creature—small and bald, and with hair growing out of its ugly, bulbous ears. It gripped a stick with a rat skull in its tight, clawed fingers.

The goblin, he thought. No, not his grandpa’s lawyer. This was another goblin. One his grandfather had warned him about a long time ago. A mutated, magical goblin with otherworldly powers.

Instinctively, he crouched behind the Dumpster. Rats scurried around his feet. He could see them scrambling through the flickering light.

“I knew I smelt magic,” the shadow crooned as it hobbled across the wall. “Not soft magic. Like mushrooms growing in a fen. But hard, solid magic. The kind made by wizards of the Old World. It’s not hard to find magic in a place of willytonks. I bet it was the silly old man who did it.”

James believed the goblin was referring to when his grandfather had used the magic lamp about an hour ago. It was the only magic he knew that had been done.

The shadow stopped to sniff the air. “Ah, a young Dreadful. I had the misfortune of meeting your father once or twice. So, I remember his smell. And you smell just like him.

“He did me an injustice—your father.” He giggled. It was a soft, girlish laugh that ended like a bird tweet. “But that’s not why I’m here. You do not know how far I’ve come to find you, little boy. I’ve traveled far. But my kind has been here before. Funny that you thought you could hide from me here.”

“Who are you?” James shouted, his heart racing.

“Ah, I think you know. I’m that cold finger that tickles your spine,” he said with that sickly giggle. “I had a dream about you. Wanna hear?”

“Go away, freak!”

“Nine years ago, I dreamt of an old man. He believed he was a wizard. He had a grandson who was also the son of a powerful sorcerer. One day, the old man left his chest of wonders unlocked, and the silly young grandson heard a peculiar voice calling to him from inside. Curious, the boy opened it, wondering who it was. But all he found was an old book. It was a beautiful book, with designs on its cover. The curious boy opened the book.”

James’s blood was as cold as a winter lake. He remembered everything the goblin was describing. But how?

“A flash blinded the boy. And then, formidable laughter filled his ears. What did the boy see behind his eyes, I wonder?” The shadow turned on the wall. “Do you remember, boy?” James did. That was the night the rats had come. That was the night of the fire. It was the same beautiful book he’d seen sitting on his grandfather’s chiffonier.

Arthur had come up into the attic after hearing James scream, and when he saw the rats, he acted on instinct. He raised his hand and—“Ignio!” He did not have a magic scroll that time. Fire sprang magically from his fingertips. But all James could see of his grandpa was an image of his father.

I stopped believing after that. I stopped believing in the magic world. I stopped

He’d opened it, curiously, and saw a cowled man in his mind. The cowled man was laughing. He had the same citrine eyes as Arthur, but they were as hot as a phoenix’s vengeance. His hair was midnight black, and it touched his shoulders with oily, tangled locks, and he had a face as cruel as poisoned ice. But most importantly, he wore the robe. Long and hooded, hiding his face. It was the same man from his nightmares. The one he’d drawn in his pictures a few years later.

Dad?

And suddenly, he had thrown the book on the floor, screaming.

“Ah,” the goblin’s shadow said flattened on the alley’s brick wall. “So, you do remember.” He coughed a rusty, caustic laugh. “You learned that day who your father was.” The humor was eating the goblin up, corroding him with fits. “And when you saw him, you buried the book. You buried that beautiful, beautiful book!”

“It was evil!” James shouted. “It should not have been his!”

“Yes,” snarled the shadow on the wall. “Evil, James. Because your father is—”

“No!” he screamed, covering his ears. He still remembered how the rats had come that night. They had come for Arthur’s book. They came through the doors, making tiny noises, twitching their tiny pink nostrils. Flicking their tiny tails.

believing in my grandfather. But mostly, I’d stopped believing in him…my father. That was when he became the banker. I made him the banker!

His foster parents had not told the Bradys. He had told them. He’d said it as far back as that night of the fire. He wanted it to be true so bad, he forgot that he had invented it. And he did it because he had learned the truth about…

About Dad.

“I’ve been waiting all these years for your father’s dark secrets,” the goblin said. “Now, tell me, boy. Where did you bury it?”

Suddenly, James felt a warm hand grab his shoulder, and a voice said, “Why not go find it yourself, you potbellied freak? I hear hell has a copy.”

He looked up and saw his grandfather standing beside him in the alley.

“Grandpa!” James cried.

“James,” he said, looking at him. “Run!”

They walked through the rickety exterior door dangling from one corroded hinge. As James’s eyes adjusted to the dark, he could smell mildew. Cobwebs floated languidly in the sunlight pouring through the doorway. The windows were boarded up, but cracks of light bled through. The dust was so thick in the air, James sneezed. He had a flashback of himself running through here, having gone back inside for the grimoire. Smoke had filled his lungs with noxious fumes. As he ran, he’d looked up, and that board wrapped in orange locks of flame had fallen loose and swung down to clout him on the forearm as he raised his arm to protect his face. He touched his skin where it had struck him and felt it itch with tingling nerve memory.

There was a dusty table, a candle-style chandelier over it, a single chair, and rusted pans, pots, and dinner plates in a corner.

They went upstairs. When they reached the second landing where a dim lantern hung against the rungs of the banister, James could see where the gaping hole was in a bedroom. “Is that—”

“Your bedroom—yes,” Arthur said.

James entered it. The room was small and dusty, with cobwebs in the corners, piles of old newspapers, old two-by-fours, crumbled walls, and an overturned bed. Arthur followed him inside, and James stared through the hole into the yard. Then he turned and looked around, before spying an ancient-looking musical mobile on the floor in the corner near the overturned bed. It was burned and inoperable. He didn’t remember it, but just then, a strange old tune floated into his head. “I remember some song,” he said slowly. “But that thing looks ancient.”