The Grimm Chronicles, Vol. 1

by Isabella Fontaine

  “No. I need to study some more on hedgehogs first.”

  “Right,” Seth said with a vigorous nod. “For the hedgehog quiz. OK, you’re totally creeping me out. Sudden interest in computer code and random animal quizzes, not to mention karate chops to the head… I’m a little scared to find out what’s next. So I’m gonna go for real now.”

  He backed away from me. Slowly.

  I wasn’t being sarcastic: I really, really wanted to know what was in that game. Something purple was on the floor. I picked it up and studied the white Comic Sans letters: ELTAS. It was part of the wrapper from Seth’s disgusting candy bar. It had escaped his pocket, I guess. Carameltastic. An awful candy bar, one that Seth had purchased after seeing an ad in the Castle Cats game.

  Before I left in the afternoon, I checked out a book on advertising. Call it a hunch, but I had a feeling Grayle Incorporated had a lot more going on besides hero hunting …

  Chapter 4

  My dream that night was vivid. And it wasn’t good.

  I was inside a building, following a young man as he made his way down a dimly lit hallway. With its low ceilings, stony gray walls and caged glass light fixtures every five feet, the place seemed almost like a tunnel. His black loafers treaded lightly on polished concrete floors. He was breathing quickly, running from door to door, trying to find one that wasn’t locked.

  “Come on … open!” he called out. His voice echoed down the empty hallway. He pushed his thick glasses up the bridge of his nose. He looked frantic; his forehead was glistening with sweat.

  A noise came from somewhere behind us. The man turned and looked, and so did I. There was nothing, but it was hard to see because the hallway seemed unnaturally dim; it was as if someone had turned off half of the overhead lights. The glass light fixtures along the wall flickered, then turned off.

  “Come on,” he said, trying another door. This one opened, and he hurried inside, shutting the door behind him. I followed, slipping through the door as if it didn’t exist at all. We were in a dark office filled with lots and lots of crude technical drawings taped to the walls. Given the subterranean feel of the hallway, it was disorienting to see through the windows behind the desk that we were high above Lake Michigan. The moon was out, casting a white glow on the lake.

  The man hurried to the other side of the desk, turning on the computer. The light from the monitor made it easier to see the drawings on the walls: they were crude diagrams of cell phones and other electronics. More yet were drawings of smartphone applications, each one quickly sketched out. I didn’t understand much of what was written, but I recognized the company logo at the top of every piece of paper.

  Grayle Incorporated.

  “Hurry … hurry!” the man said to the computer as it continued booting up. Suddenly, the monitor went black. The computer’s hum slowed, then stopped. “No!” the man cried out. He hurried back to the hallway, turning right and then stopping. A gasp escaped from between his lips. I followed and nearly gasped when I saw the dark not-so-imposing figure standing in front of the elevators at the end of the hall.

  It was Flick. The meanest dwarf. He stood wearing a pair of blue jeans and a dark shirt—not exactly a “menacing Corrupted” outfit. What was menacing, though, was the giant rusty pickaxe he held in his hands.

  “You seem surprised,” Flick said through gritted teeth. His fingers tightened around the handle of the axe. “As if you’re the first person to question our … motives.”

  “I swear I won’t tell anybody,” the man said, taking a step back. His hands shook at his sides.

  Flick cocked his head. “Tell them what, exactly?”

  “About the hidden code,” the man said.

  Flick’s grip loosened. He smiled, stepping forward. “That’s what all this is about? A little hidden code? Oh you sweet, sweet young man … if you’d just said something earlier instead of snooping around all night, we could have reached an agreement!”

  “Re … Really?”

  The smile faded. “No. Of course not, you damned idiot. Of course I have to kill you. I can’t have rumors of a secret code getting out.”

  The man took another step back. “Please! I promise. I promise you I won’t tell anyone.”

  “Then what were you doing in that office?” Flick asked. “Just checking your email before you slink out of the building? No, dear boy. You must die.”

  The man turned, then stopped and screamed. I was slow to follow, but I wanted to scream too when I saw what was waiting for us just a few feet away.

  Gilbert. The sickly dwarf Briar had told me about. He shouldn’t have been frightening. He was wearing blue-and-white striped pajamas, for crying out loud!

  But his face …

  Big, bubbly boils peppered his skin. His nose was blackened, and the area under his eyes was blue and swollen. Flakes of dry skin hung from his cheeks, as if he was a snake in the process of shedding. His hair was thin, crisp, falling out in clumps. His eyes were sunken and downright gross.

  Gilbert opened his mouth. Strings of saliva spread between his rotten teeth. The man stepped back …

  … Right into Flick’s swinging pickaxe.

  I woke up, shouting “Pickaxe!” over and over and over. A brown furry mass that had been sleeping under the window popped up.

  “What is it?” Briar asked frantically, holding out his paws like a boxer. He hopped left and right, eyes wide. “What pickaxe? Where’s the pickaxe?!”

  My eyes blinked a dozen times in rapid succession. I looked around. My alarm was buzzing. I turned it off and smacked my dry lips together. “Well, another day,” I muttered.

  “What happened?” Briar asked. “Lordy, my heart’s a-thumpin! I need a glass of milk.”

  “Wait!” I said, stopping him before he could reach the door. “My parents are home.”

  “No, they went golfing an hour ago.”

  “Oh. How do you know that?”

  “Because your dear mother came in and tucked you in.”

  I glanced down at the sheets. He was right: the sheets were tucked in under the mattress, as if a hotel maid had come into the room while I was asleep. The sheets were tucked in so tight that I could barely move my legs. That was definitely Mom’s doing.

  “Turn around,” I ordered, walking over to the closet. I heard my computer start up. “Are you still playing around on Facebook?”

  “I have many things going on,” was the rabbit’s reply.

  “Well, open my music player and turn on some Janis Joplin. I need to get pumped for the day.”

  The rabbit complied. The sound of crunching guitars filled the room. My brain quickly booted up again.

  I grabbed my go-to sneakers, a pair of cropped white skinny jeans, and a ruffled loose-fitting tank top with cinnamon-colored stripes around the neck. I stared longingly at my new blue maxi dress that I’d bought in Chicago. I had to find a reason to wear it soon or I was going to go bonkers and just end up wearing it to the library.

  “Do we have a plan yet?” I asked, turning around. I saw the computer screen over Briar’s shoulder: he was on Facebook. Again. I sighed. “Well, at least you’re not addicted to Castle Cats, I guess.”

  His fuzzy ears perked up. “Say what?”

  “We need a plan,” I said again, grabbing my sheets and tossing them loosely over the mattress. There. Bed made. I was becoming such an accomplished 18-year-old.

  “Yes, I was thinking about that …”

  “And?”

  “… And I’m still thinking. What happened in your dream?”

  I shrugged. “Oh you know, just a poor fool running for his life while a crazy Corrupted dwarf chases him down with a pickaxe. The usual.” I grabbed the magic pen from the desk, flipping it around in my hand. “There was something else, too. The guy said something about the code. What does that mean?”

  “Well, they make software, don’t they?”

  “Yeah …”

  “Software, and games, are composed entirely of code,�
�� Briar said. “It’s a string of commands that tell the game what to say or do.”

  “Castle Cats,” I murmured. “Seth said there was something strange about that game.”

  “For the record, I find it incredibly humorous that the giant talking rabbit is teaching you about how a computer program works. Don’t they teach you this in your school? It seems important.”

  “They were too busy this past year teaching me about biology and literature,” I said. “There’s a lot to learn in high school, you know. We don’t all have an infinite amount of time to surf the web, unlike certain rabbits.”

  Briar clicked the mouse, then deftly pecked away at the keyboard. A new web page loaded. He turned the laptop so I could see it easier.

  “The Fifth Annual Milwaukee Public Museum Fundraiser Gala,” I read aloud. “Blech, that’s a mouthful. Wait, why do I recognize that place?”

  “I suspect because you’ve seen it—or part of it—in a dream.”

  I looked closer. The room was huge, with hundreds of people dressed in black suits and dark dresses milling about beside tall windows overlooking a courtyard with a large fountain sitting directly in the center. The fountain was shaped like a fish jumping out of the water. The fish spat a steady stream of water out of its mouth. A massive crystal chandelier hung from the ceiling. The floor was made of a glossy white tile with gold borders.

  “Give up?” Briar asked.

  “OK. Tell me.”

  He pointed with his paw to the floor tiles. Near the center was a strange logo outlined with dark brown tiles. “This is the logo of the old company that used to own the Grayle Incorporated building.”

  My fingers tightened around the pen. “So the Grayle brothers bought the building and now they’re hosting the gala. When?”

  “This coming weekend,” Briar said. His paw tapped on the desk. “I fear we won’t have enough time to properly strategize …”

  “Dude, we totally have time.”

  “… and of course you’ll need a dress …”

  “I have a dress.”

  “… and I of course will need to find a way to slip in so I may provide support ... and of course the Grayles may not even be there.”

  “Why wouldn’t the Grayles be there?” I asked. “I mean, they own the building, for crying out loud.”

  “Yes, but helping out the community hardly seems like the type of thing they would be interested in.”

  I shook my head in annoyance. “Still seems like a good risk to take.”

  Briar tapped his paws together. “Yes … I suppose. I just don’t know if we’re ready to deal with them. The Grayles … they …”

  “We’re going,” I stated, looking into his large brown eyes. He looked nervous. “This needs to be done.”

  Briar’s whiskers twitched. “Maybe if we just left them alone …”

  I shook my head. “They know who I am now. We need to end this. I command you to help me.”

  “So you want to go in without a plan?”

  “Yes.”

  He sighed. “That seems so very … usual.”

  “Just see what more you can do about getting us into this gala,” I said. A sharp cramp hit my stomach, causing me to wince. “Man, I could use a day off.”

  Briar glanced at me, concerned. “Are you still taking your antibiotics? You can’t miss a dose, you know.”

  “I know, mother. And it’s not that. I’ll be back after the library closes.”

  I grabbed my purse and took it into the bathroom, adding a quick coat of mascara and a dab of peachy-pink lip gloss before heading out, locking the door behind me. I hoped Mary was at the library again. All I wanted was a quiet morning where I could really think this whole situation over. We had an opportunity to get inside Grayle Incorporated and we couldn’t squander it.

  I reached Mooreland Road and turned left, still racking my brain over some credible way to get inside, trying to walk in a way that wouldn’t make the cramps any worse than they already were. Surely there would be security to prevent just anyone from crashing the party, so we’d have to be extra careful …

  I saw the person coming out of the corner of my eye and jumped back, my hand instinctively reaching for the pen in my pocket. The dark-haired woman looked up from her smartphone and smiled.

  “Sorry! I wasn’t paying attention.” It was the same woman who I’d bumped into just yesterday.

  Her phone made a strange “meow” sound. “Whoops!” she said, swiping her thumb across the screen, making sure not to let her long red fingernail scratch it. The same woman from yesterday, playing the same stupid game.

  I watched her walk over to the parked blue car at the end of the street. I looked left: she’d come out of the same little salon, too. She must work there, I thought.

  She started her car, then reached for something inside her sparkling silver purse. I walked closer, trying to be as inconspicuous as I could. But I didn’t need to get any closer to see what it was: a candy bar with a purple wrapper.

  The same disgusting candy bar Seth had been eating yesterday.

  “OK, something is seriously going on here,” I muttered, hoofing it to the library.

  My luck didn’t hold out. Fran was the librarian on duty, and the moment she saw me she narrowed her eyes disapprovingly.

  “No sleeves?” she asked. “That seems a bit scandalous, don’t you think?”

  “Not really,” I said. “I think it’s cute.”

  She just rolled her eyes, and I was thankful that she didn’t make a bigger deal out of it. I wasn’t in the mood. I wanted to feel bad for her losing her house, but you know what? Maybe she deserved it. Maybe she’d stopped paying her bills or something. It was possible. And I had more important things to deal with right now—like, for instance, murderous Corrupted dwarfs who just so happened to own one of the most powerful corporations in the city.

  And stomach cramps. Really, really bad cramps.

  “Gaaaah,” I moaned, grabbing a stack of books from the checkout desk that were ready to be re-shelved.

  “What was that?” Fran asked, raising her eyebrows.

  “Oh, nothing.” I suddenly realized she might have the wrong idea. “I mean, nothing related to the library, that’s for sure. Just thinking about a bunch of stuff going on right now outside of here.”

  “Right. Of course.” Her upper lip was dangerously close to resembling a sneer. She cocked her head. “No doubt you have lots of boy problems and of course there are the text messages pouring in and the constant worries about the next outfit you need to put together for tomorrow. Lots of big problems.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said, suddenly angry. I wanted nothing more than to retreat into the maze of bookshelves.

  “You have no idea what adult problems are like,” Fran said in a motherly tone. And not my mom’s “motherly tone,” either, which was annoying but at the very least tolerable. Fran had a downright mean motherly tone.

  “No, I guess I don’t,” I said, making my way around the checkout desk. The more space I put between us, the less likely Fran was to continue. As if on cue, the cramp in my stomach tightened just a bit more.

  I retreated into the Military History section just beyond the table full of computers. No one was sitting at them yet, which I guess wasn’t strange for a … um … Monday? Tuesday? I pulled one of the computers out of sleep mode so I could check its little calendar.

  Wednesday. Wow. I could remember when I first started high school, the summer days just sort of melted together. No job, no worries, just a lot of trips to the mall and even more trips to Seth’s house to watch movies.

  Now, the days were still melting together, but for entirely different reasons.

  “Hey.”

  I dropped the books I was holding, cringing when they landed face-first on the ground with a heavy clap. “Seth!” I said, spinning around. “Why are you so sneaky?”

  He shrugged. “It’s a library. You’re supposed to be quiet.�
��

  I rubbed my temples. I felt a headache coming on. “I can’t believe you got the jump on me again.”

  “Don’t sweat it,” he said, helping me pick up the books. One of them—an old history of World War II—had landed awkwardly, bending a few of the pages. I tried to un-bend them as best I could, feeling as if I’d damaged something incredibly valuable. “So what’s up?” he asked.

  I shrugged. “Since yesterday? I don’t know. Nothing, I guess.”

  “Huh.” He reached into his pocket, pulling out another of those disgusting candy bars. At first, I thought he was trying to be funny, but then he peeled away the wrapper and brought it to his mouth.

  I slapped it out of his hand. It bounced off a book on one of the shelves and landed on the floor. “Are you insane?” I whispered harshly. “Do you seriously not remember how gross those things are?”

  He shrugged. His finger went to one of the books that had been smudged with chocolate when the candy bar bounced off it. When he brought his finger to his mouth, I nearly gagged.

  “Gawd, only a boy would do that.”

  “It tastes fine to me.” He bent over, grabbed the candy bar, and took a bite. His face slowly contorted. “Maybe you’re right.”

  “I know I’m right, you doofus.”

  He spat out the half-chewed chocolate and whatever else was inside the gross thing, wrapping it up in the wrapper and stuffing it back into his pocket. “That’s weird,” he said. “I swear this morning when I stopped at the gas station before work, I wanted one of these so, so bad.”

  “I can only imagine what the inside of your pockets look like,” I said. “Have you managed to do any research on Castle Cats yet?”

  He cocked his head quizzically, then snapped his fingers. “Oh, the phone game. You know, it’s the darndest thing, but I can’t for the life of me get inside of it to take a look at its source code. I tried three times, and every time my computer rebooted. It’s insane. You’d need to be a genius to get inside it.”

  “Keep trying.”

  His eyes narrowed. “Why, exactly?”