The House in the Cerulean Sea(25)

She nodded.

“I demand you take me to Mr. Parnassus this instant!”

She cocked her head at him. “But what about your cat? Don’t you want to find her before she gets eaten and all that’s left is her tail because it’s too fluffy to choke down?”

“This is very perturbing and irregular. If this is the way this orphanage is run, I will need to inform—”

Her eyes widened before she grabbed him by the hand and began to pull him. “We’re fine! See? Everything is fine. I’m not dead, and you’re not dead, and nobody is hurt! After all, we’re on an island with no way on or off aside from a ferry. And the house has electricity and working toilets, something we’re very proud of! What could possibly happen to any of us? And Zoe keeps an eye on us when Mr. Parnassus is otherwise detained.”

“Zoe?” Linus demanded. “Who is—”

“Oh! I meant Ms. Chapelwhite,” Talia said hastily. “She’s wonderful. So caring. Everyone says so. And distantly related to a fairy king named Dimitri, if you can believe that! Though, he’s not from around these parts.”

Linus’s mind was a whirlwind. “What do you mean, fairy king? I’ve never—”

“So you see, there is absolutely nothing to worry about. We’re always monitored with everything we do, so no need to inform anyone of anything. And would you look at that! I knew Sal would have your cat. Animals love him. He’s the best. See? Calliope looks so happy, doesn’t she?”

And indeed, she did. She was rubbing up against the legs of a large black boy sitting on the porch of a small house set away from the big house, her back arched as he traced a finger down her spine, tail swishing lazily from side to side. The boy smiled down at her, and then wonder of all wonder, Calliope opened her mouth and meowed, a sound Linus couldn’t ever remember hearing her make before. It was rusty and deep, and it nearly stopped him in his tracks. She purred, of course—usually her distaste—but she never talked.

“Yes,” the boy said, voice low. “Such a good girl, aren’t you? Yes, you are. Prettiest girl.”

“Okay,” Talia said quietly. “No sudden movements, okay? You don’t want to—”

“That’s my cat!” Linus said loudly. “You there, how did you get her to do that?”

“—scare him,” Talia finished with a sigh. “Now you’ve gone and done it.”

The boy looked up fearfully at the sound of Linus’s voice. His big shoulders hunched as he appeared to sink inward. One moment, there was a handsome boy with dark eyes, and the next, the clothes he’d been wearing fell to the porch as if the body wearing them had disappeared from the face of the earth.

Linus stopped, jaw dropping.

Except even as he watched, the pile of clothes began to shift. There was a flash of white hair, and then the clothes fell away.

Sal, the large boy who had to weigh at least 150 pounds, was gone.

But not completely.

Because he had turned into a five-pound Pomeranian.

A fluffy five-pound Pomeranian. The hair around his head was white, shot with rusty orange that extended down his back and legs. His tail was curled up behind his back, and before Linus could process the fact that he’d seen an actual shifter change before him, Sal gave a high-pitched bark and turned and ran into the guest house.

“My word,” Linus breathed. “That was…” He didn’t know how to finish.

“I told you not to scare him,” Talia said crossly. “He’s very nervous, you know. He doesn’t like strangers or loudness, and here you are being both.”

Calliope seemed to agree, as she glared at Linus before she climbed the steps and disappeared into the house as well.

The house itself was tiny, even smaller than Linus’s own. The porch wasn’t big enough for a rocking chair, but it looked charming, flowers growing along the front underneath windows that had a warm and inviting light pouring out of them. It, too, was made of brick, much like the main house, but it didn’t exude the dread Linus had felt upon arrival.

He could hear barking coming from inside the house. There was a response that sounded high-pitched and garbled, as if someone was throwing a wet sponge on the floor repeatedly.

“Chauncey’s here too,” Talia said, sounding delighted. “He probably grabbed your luggage for you while we were in the garden. He’s very hospitable, you know. He wants to be a bellhop when he gets older. The uniform with the little hat and everything.” She looked up at him with wide, innocent eyes that Linus distrusted immediately. “Do you think he’d be good at that, Mr. Baker?”

And because Linus believed in the power of positive thinking, he said, “I don’t see why not,” even though he wondered what Chauncey could possibly be.

Talia smiled sweetly as if she didn’t believe a single word.



* * *



The inside of the house was just as endearing as the outside. There was a sitting room with a comfortable-looking chair in front of a brick fireplace, and a table sitting in a nook in front of one of the windows. The barking sound came from farther down the hall, and for a moment, Linus was slightly disoriented, because there didn’t seem to be—

“Where’s the kitchen?” he asked.

Talia shrugged. “There isn’t one. Whoever owned the house before seemed to think everyone should eat together in the main house. You get to eat with all of us. Probably for the best, so you can see we eat only the healthiest foods and are civilized or whatever.”