The Secret of Spellshadow Manor 5 by Bella Forrest (book series for 10 year olds .TXT) 📕

of Jupiter off the shelf as he went. Perhaps Hadrian was right; maybe it would be best to have a thorough read-through, just to make sure he hadn’t missed anything important, although he would never admit that to his friends.

In re-reading the spell, nothing new jumped out at him. He already knew he needed more than five drops of royal blood, and that the spell had to be performed at the Mouth of Evil. Alex presumed that to be one of the cavernous pits into which the essence was poured. Soon, he would have the blood too, if everything ran smoothly. It was all coming together, so long as there were no nasty surprises that would weaken their forces. He couldn’t get that notion out of his mind, hard as he tried.

We need more, he told himself, moving over to the small window that beckoned from the far wall of the chamber. The others had all gone to bed not long after he had, and he found himself hoping they were all asleep as he clambered out of the window and dropped down onto the ledge below him, barely making a sound with his bare feet.

A sharp, white-hot flash to the brain stopped him in his tracks.

Chapter 29

“And just where do you think you’re sneaking off to?” Elias purred, dropping from the head of a carved green dragon.

Alex sighed loudly. “You disappear for ages, without a word, and yet you show up again at the most inopportune moments. I don’t know how you do it—you’re like the world’s most irritating ninja.”

Elias cackled. “I’m far stealthier than any ninja, trust me. And I come and go as I please; I am beholden to no one.”

“Well, I wish you’d be one or the other—here or not. That is all I ask,” Alex remarked, sitting down on the wooden ledge, knowing he was going to be there for the long haul. Walking below, in their crisp uniforms, was a band of soldiers who had chosen that exact spot, directly underneath Alex, to stop and have a lewd discussion. He could make out a few words, and they made him blush—far too rude for his ears.

Elias, however, had coiled downward to get a better eavesdropping position. His teeth flashed in a wolfish grin.

“Elias!” Alex hissed.

The shadow-man slunk back upward. “Spoilsport,” he teased.

“I presume you came to bother me for a reason?” Alex whispered, careful not to alert the bawdy men below to his presence.

“It’s more that I came to stop you for a reason,” said the shadow-man, shrugging his vaporous shoulders.

Alex frowned. “Stop me from doing what?”

“Now, you know I’m the last person on this planet who would seek to prevent you from delving into dark and delicious secrets, but on this occasion, I must clamber to the moral high ground. An unfamiliar spot for me, I’m sure you’ll agree, but nevertheless I find myself standing here.” Elias sighed. “You must heed the words of Hadrian on this occasion. It will do you no good to go sniffing out these… half-people, shall we call them?”

“I’m not sure that’s a polite term for them,” Alex remarked, raising a stern eyebrow.

Elias flashed a butter-wouldn’t-melt smile. “I says it how I sees it.”

“Why shouldn’t I go looking?” Alex asked, moving the subject away from Elias’s lack of political correctness.

“They won’t do anyone any good,” the shadow-man said simply. “It’s worse than you’ve imagined. I should know—that’s where I’ve been all this time. You think I’d just run off and leave poor baby Alex alone, if I didn’t have a good reason? Perhaps you don’t know me at all.” He scoffed, feigning hurt.

“How is it worse than I imagined? You don’t know what I’m thinking,” Alex retorted, only to pause as Elias began to laugh. Did Elias know what he was thinking, or could he only make visual suggestions? Either way, Alex wasn’t happy about the shadow-man messing about in his mind. “Which reminds me, stay out of my head! That last one hurt—plus, I could have fallen.”

Elias grinned. “And I would have caught you!”

“Oh, yeah, I forget you’re not as incapable as you let on.” Alex glared, his mind flitting back to the half-formed vision of Elias carrying Ellabell toward the mountain, with the intent of leaving her to the wolves.

Elias had the decency to look ashamed. “Water under the bridge?” he asked, his voice comically high.

“Jury is still out,” Alex muttered, stifling a laugh. “Anyway, what’s wrong with the… victims?”

Elias visibly shuddered. “What isn’t wrong with them? To look at them, you’d think they were fine, but there’s a creepy blank stare that a lot of them have. I kept to the shadows, as I am prone to doing, but I swear most of them could sense me. A couple even tried to start up a conversation, but I was having none of it,” he said, inspecting the shadows where his fingernails should have been. “They’re broken… That’s the only way I can put it. They are damaged inside, wandering around like zombies.” Holding out his wispy arms, Elias began to do a humorous rendition of “Thriller,” stalking this way and that, getting himself distracted as per usual.

“Are none of them healthy?”

Elias let out a bored sigh. “Depends what you mean by ‘healthy.’ They can walk and talk, but they’re like ghosts inside. Sad little spirits trying to find something that has been taken away.”

It reminded Alex of the spirits he’d encountered in the vault, with their sad voices and fractured memories. Perhaps that’s what happened to a person if the extraction process went too far, taking them across the line between alive and dead.

“Aren’t you technically one of them?” Alex asked.

Elias made a rude sound. “How dare you! I am fully functioning, thank you very much. I might not be solid, but I have all my faculties about me still. There are no missing pieces here… except for the little bit you stole, but I can do without it for a while, just