“It’s called a relic. It’s probably a dead saint’s finger bone or something,” I replied, pressing down hard on the door handle. I watched astonished as the door swung smoothly open. “It wasn’t even locked!” I exclaimed, and stepped over the threshold.
“Why would they lock it?” Georgia said, following me in. “Who would steal . . . ‘an eighteenth-century rosary featuring a sliver of the true cross trapped inside Bohemian crystal’?” she read off a tag, and dropped the beads carelessly back onto their stand. “That’s just weird. Man, they could really use a cleaner here. The dust is enough to give you asthma.”
We moved deeper into the darkened room, shuffling through the tight space between ancient waist-high statues of saints with knives through their heads and display cases holding contemporary glow-in-the-dark pope memorabilia. My foot creaked on the parquet, and immediately there came a thump from under the floor. “Ssh!” I whispered to Georgia. “Did you hear that?”
“Oh my God,” she murmured, her eyes widening in alarm. “They’ve got a dungeon.”
The thumping started again: three evenly spaced knocks from beneath our feet. It sounded like someone was tapping a Mayday code on the ceiling of whatever room was below. Like someone needed help. It could be only one person.
“Quickly!” I ran toward the door that led to the back stairway. Instead of going up to the apartment where I had met Gwenha?l, we headed down toward a rusty door that opened with a grinding creak as I shoved it with my hip.
I burst into a low-ceilinged storage cellar, and was blasted by the sharp stench of dank, mildewed air. In one corner was a gated area, penned in from ceiling to floor with chain-link fencing and protected by a padlocked door. Behind it were stacks of boxes—most likely valuables being stored in the shop’s most secure place. And next to the boxes, gagged and tied to a chair, sat Bran.
FIVE
“ARE YOU OKAY?” I YELLED, SPRINTING TO THE cage door.
Bran shook his head, His stick-figure body trembled beneath its bonds, and fresh bruises distorted his face, one eye so swollen that it was only a slit. His face was wet with tears and sweat, and since his mouth was taped shut, he snuffled loudly through his nose in order to breathe.
“Oh, Bran!” I said, covering my mouth in horror.
He had somehow managed to pick up a broom handle, which he had banged against the ceiling when he heard Georgia and me walking above. Now he let go of it, and its hollow clatter against the stone floor broke the muffled silence.
“Do you know where the key is?” I asked, yanking on the padlock.
He shook his head once again.
“Okay, we’ll find something to break it off with. Georgia?” My sister stood motionless, staring wide-eyed at Bran. “Help me find something heavy.” She leapt into action, rushing to an enormous bronze candelabra propped against the wall. “Perfect!” I said, and helped her pull it across the floor to the cage.
“Tuck it under your right arm,” I instructed, and picking up my end, I winced and adjusted my hold as the heavy object sent a shockwave of pain through my collarbone. “We’re going to slam the lock battering-ram style from the side. I don’t think we can break the padlock, but the ring it’s attached to looks pretty rusty. Let’s aim for that.”
As we backed up a few steps, my eyes met Bran’s, and I saw a look of regret as he stared at the candelabra. “This is a really expensive piece, isn’t it?” I asked, unable to repress a nervous smile.
He nodded sadly and then shrugged. “Go!” I yelled, and Georgia and I ran toward the lock, smashing it with the sharp end of our improvised bludgeon. The lock didn’t budge, but a decorative bronze leaf snapped off the candelabra. Bran winced.
“Let’s try it again,” I said, adjusting my Ace bandage under my shirt and gingerly pressing my sore shoulder. Then backing up, we ran full force toward the lock, this time smashing the old ring to bits. The padlock hit the ground with a metallic clink and the door swung open. I rushed into the space, and even though it was Bran—odd, scarecrow-looking Bran—I stooped to hug him quickly before inspecting his bonds.
His attackers had used black duct tape across his mouth, as well as around his wrists, chest, and ankles. “I don’t want to hurt you,” I said, pausing.
He rolled his eyes and nodded as if to say, Just get on with it.
I picked at the tape with a fingernail, loosening a corner on his cheek, and then gritting my teeth, yanked it off with one quick motion. Bran’s mouth dropped open and he gasped in a few choking gulps of air as tears of pain and relief coursed down his cheeks. He struggled against the bonds attaching him to the chair, but they held fast. “You must hurry, child,” he urged me. “They’ve been gone for hours. They could come back at any moment.”
“Who’s ‘they’?” I asked, leaning in to hear him since his voice came out in a breathless wheeze.
“Numa. They’re holding me until the small ancient one arrives to question me.”