When Jonathan got back to the light and the world and the rest of the Scars, Sebastian was sitting in the Admiral’s chair with his feet up on the table. In his hands was the Admiral’s sword. The very one the Admiral had been holding high in the storm, the one that had brought down lightning and death for himself and all of the grown-ups (except one).
Most of the boys were hanging out in the dining room. Some were munching on great mouthfuls of food. A few had found a deck of cards and were playing at a table. Most were just sitting around or lying around or standing and looking out the windows into the courtyard, which was once again dripping with a drizzling rain.
Benny, Roger, Gregory, and some other kids were seated around Sebastian, looking eagerly to their leader’s smirking face like baby birds hoping for a worm.
“Hey! Johnny! Come here,” Sebastian called when he saw Jonathan enter the room with his candle in one hand and the book tucked under his arm. Walter and Colin had jumped up when they saw him and they followed him to Sebastian’s table, their eyes full of questions.
There were crumpled-up candy wrappers on the table and little dark smears of chocolate in the corners of Sebastian’s mouth. He licked at them like a cat. Sebastian looked Jonathan up and down with a frown.
“Where’d you get that book?”
Jonathan shrugged.
“Found it.”
Sebastian sniffed and picked at something between his teeth.
“We’re divying up the grown-up’s rooms,” he said. “I got dibs on the Admiral’s. But there’s four more. Which one do you want?”
Jonathan looked around at the other boys. Their eyes were wide, waiting. Benny’s reptilian eyes were narrow, glaring.
“Five? There’s sixteen of us. Why would I get one?”
Sebastian frowned and shrugged.
“Whatever. Maybe I like you. Who cares. Don’t you want one? Or do you want to keep sleeping in your little cell?”
Jonathan eyed the other kids. There were seven, counting Benny, waiting on his answer. Most of the kids were older—and bigger—than he was.
“Uh, no, thanks. Someone else can have it, I guess.”
Sebastian screwed up one eye thoughtfully, then scowled and snorted.
“Fine. Whatever. Suit yourself. I’ll give it to someone else.”
“Maybe we thould take turnth in the roomth, Thebathtian. To be fair,” Colin suggested.
Sebastian’s eyes dropped into angry slits.
“Maybe you should thut up, Colin.”
Colin furrowed his brow and looked down at his feet. Jonathan turned to walk away.
“Hey! They said you went to look at the Hatch.” Sebastian pointed with his chin at Walter and Colin.
“Yeah.”
“So? What is it?” Sebastian’s voice still wore its bitter coat of “who the hell cares,” but there was a sharp edge of real curiosity to it.
“It’s … it’s …” Jonathan’s voice faltered. He almost spilled it all, almost spit out everything about the eerie door with its ominous sounds and freezing spray and moss-covered skull.
But he stopped.
If he told them everything, they might want to see it for themselves. And if they went to see it, they might continue up the other staircase, and they might find the librarian. He didn’t want them to. He wanted to keep the library a secret, just for himself. Like the key in his pocket. And the reason he was sent to Slabhenge in the first place.
“It’s just a door,” he said, with a shrug and a roll of his eyes.
“A door?”
“Yeah, like an old metal door. It’s locked, though.” He shrugged again and turned to walk away. “No big deal.”
Walter and Colin followed at his elbow as he walked away into the kitchen. He was starving. Once they were away from Sebastian’s ears and safe in the empty kitchen, they peppered him with questions.
“Where were you, man?”
“What took you tho long?”
“We waited for you at the top of the stairs! Where did you go?”
Jonathan looked around and grabbed the end of a loaf of bread someone had left sitting out. He took a big bite and gnawed it on one side of his mouth.
“I got lost,” he answered with a shrug. “Went the wrong way.”
“Where’th your lantern? What’th with the candle?”
Jonathan shrugged again and looked away.
“I broke my lantern. Then I found this. No biggie. What have you guys been up to?”
Walter rolled his eyes. “King Sebastian out there is really living it up. He’s claimed the Admiral’s room, of course, and most of the best food. He’s called some big meeting in a few minutes, before dinner. I don’t like that guy, man.”
Jonathan grabbed an apple that was sitting on the counter and bit into it.
“You thould have thaid yeth to the room, Jonathan.”
Jonathan crunched an especially big bite and chewed it loudly.
“What? Why?”
Colin sighed and scratched at his arm.
“Becauth. Now Thebathtian ith mad at you.”
“Why would he be mad? I said no to be nice.”
Colin shrugged. “He gave you a room. It wathn’t to be nithe. It wath to thow that he’th the bawth. You made him look bad.”
“I did not!”
Colin looked up at Jonathan with worried eyes.