The Warriors of Brin-Hask (3 page)

‘We never should have come back to the hotel,’ Charlie grouched, dragging the garbage
bag behind him. ‘We should have gone straight back to Archie’s and spent all of Tom’s
money on lollies. Instead …’ He made a disgusted sound.

Amelia hoisted her own bag over her shoulder and followed James into the next bedroom.
She and Charlie had been given a dustpan and brush each, and had to sweep up all
the rat poo and chewed rubbish they found while James, who was wearing heavy leather
gardening gloves, checked all the rat traps and poison baits. So far, James definitely
had the better job, because while Amelia and Charlie had found plenty of poo to sweep
– and it
stank
– James hadn’t found a single dead rat or sprung trap to deal with.

Dad couldn’t see any sign of where the rat had come from in the kitchen, either.

‘They’ve taken the cheese out of the traps,’ said James, ‘but left the poison baits
untouched. It’s almost as if they know what they’re doing.’

‘Of course they do,’ said Charlie scathingly. ‘They’re alien rats, aren’t they?’

Amelia watched James closely and thought she saw a tremor in his cheek before he
scoffed, ‘Are you still playing make-believe? Aliens! As if.’

Charlie opened his mouth to retort, but Amelia shook her head. What was the point?
If James refused to believe the gateway was real and thought Amelia and Charlie had
made up the aliens as a game,
and
that (for some reason) all the adults including
Tom had decided it would be fun to play along too … well, you couldn’t argue with
a person that deliberately dumb. At least, arguing hadn’t worked on him so far.

James got down on his hands and knees and peered under a bed. Another empty trap.
And then, ‘Hey what’s this?’

He stood up and held out a familiar black cylinder with brass rings along its length.
It was a holo-emitter. James was about to throw it in the box with the traps when
Charlie said, ‘Wait! That’s mine!’

James’ eyes narrowed. ‘Yours? What’s it doing up here, then?’

‘I just remembered,’ said Charlie. ‘We were playing hide-and-seek the other day.
That’s when I dropped it!’

‘Ah, well, in that case then,’ James said kindly, holding the holo-emitter out to
Charlie. ‘You know what they say? Finders, keepers!’

He snatched back his hand and put the emitter in the top pocket of his shirt.

‘That’s not fair!’ Charlie was livid. ‘You don’t even know what it is!’

James refused to be drawn. ‘I know it’s mine now. And you could have found it yourself
if you were doing a better job with that dustpan and brush.’

Charlie looked like he wanted to hit James, but Amelia pulled him out to the corridor.

‘What?’ Charlie snapped.

‘Let it go,’ said Amelia.

‘No! Why should I?’

‘Well, for one thing, you should’ve already given it back to Tom, so you can’t really
complain to anyone that you lost it. Plus,’ she spoke over Charlie’s objections,
‘you haven’t been able to figure out how to use it yet. If anyone can, it’s James.
He’s a genius with gadgets, and if you don’t want to ask Tom for help, James is the
best person to solve it, or fix it, or whatever the problem is. Also,’ and here she
got a look in her eye, ‘if James
does
figure it out, he will have actual, physical
proof in his own hands that the alien stuff is real. If you want revenge on him for
anything, then let him deal with
that
.’

Charlie calmed down. ‘Yeah, but still …’

Amelia sighed. ‘OK, one more reason: the more you want the holo-emitter, the more
you care, the more determined James will be to never, ever let you see it again.
Act cool, and you
might
have a chance.’

‘Fine.’ Charlie turned to go back to poo sweeping when a movement caught his eye
– something outside the big picture window at the end of the hall.

‘Amelia! Quick!’

She ran to stand beside him, just in time to see a figure in a long, dark coat disappear
into the hedge maze.

‘Who was that?’ Amelia said in a low voice.

‘One of the Brin-Hask dudes, do you reckon?’ Charlie sounded excited. ‘Come through
early?’

‘Or,’ said Amelia, ‘that extra arrival we’re not supposed to know about.’

Saturday was clear and beautiful. After a crisp morning down at the beach, splashing
through the freezing water and hauling up seaweed, the sun was delicious on their
legs. A light wind off the sea carried the sound of the waves far below, and rustled
the trees so the bushland seemed to sway. Amelia sprawled on the grassy hillside
with Charlie, and wondered how she had ever fit herself into that tiny flat back
in the city.

‘So you still haven’t met Lady Naomi?’ Charlie asked. ‘And you live in the same house?’

‘The same
hotel
. She has her own toilet and shower, and she never eats with us, so
… no. Anyway, you’re here almost as much as I am. Have you seen her?’

Of course he hadn’t, but he was spared admitting it as a huge, old-fashioned saloon
car crunched up the gravel driveway. Amelia knew nothing about cars, but even she
could understand why Charlie scrambled to his feet in astonishment. It was a gorgeous,
dark green, elegant, luxurious
automobile
. They raced up to the hotel’s turning circle
to get a closer look.

Amelia wondered who would get out of a car like that. One of the foreign leaders
Mum used to work with when she was a diplomat? Some billionaire who wanted to buy
the hotel? A rock star who wanted to record an album here?

The driver’s door opened and out stepped a tall, thin, slightly stooped man. He was
wearing white cotton gloves, held a handkerchief to his nose, and peered up at the
hotel with a foul expression. Amelia watched him take a briefcase from the back seat
of his car, and then walk stiffly up the steps, sniffing with distaste as he rapped
on the door.

Dad opened the door.

‘Snavely!’ he beamed. ‘I can’t believe they sent you! How are things back at HQ?’

Mr Snavely’s mouth didn’t relax as much as a millimetre as he stepped into the lobby.
Dad, holding the door open for him, saw Amelia and Charlie standing there.

‘Oh, kids, come on up,’ said Dad. His grin, Amelia saw, was slightly too wide. ‘I
want you to meet Mr Snavely.’

Mr Snavely turned and peered down his long nose at Amelia and Charlie and said, ‘Ah,
yes – the
children
.’ He made it sound like children were a horrible disease he didn’t
want to catch. He turned to Dad. ‘Isn’t there another one?’

‘Another …’ Dad hesitated. ‘Oh, another kid! Yes, hold on a moment – James!’ he bellowed
up to the second floor.

Amelia was confused. Dad
knew
Mr Snavely. It sounded like they might have worked
together, or perhaps Dad just knew something about Mr Snavely’s office. Was he another
scientist? Maybe he had an amazing brain, even if he wasn’t very friendly. But Amelia
didn’t know any scientist with a car like Mr Snavely’s.

Mum stuck her head out of the library and saw who it was. ‘Oh, hello, Adrian. Let
me go and get James for you, Scott.’

She hurried up the stairs to the family wing of the hotel, while Amelia grew more
and more puzzled. Why would her parents want Mr Snavely to meet James? Mr Snavely
didn’t look that keen to meet anyone. Maybe he was a strange uncle they’d never heard
of before.

Mr Snavely looked around him. ‘And the caretaker?’

‘Tom,’ said Dad. ‘Yes, he’s down in his cottage. We thought you’d probably like to
see his set-up for yourself.’

Mum came back down the stairs, James trailing behind her. ‘Mr Snavely, this is James.
James, this is Mr Snavely,’ she glanced at him, ‘the Health Inspector.’

Ahh … now it made sense. And a Health Inspector might be a kind of scientist, measuring
temperatures, taking samples of bacteria in the kitchen, that sort of thing.

‘And this is the extent of the spread?’ said Mr Snavely. ‘Apart from the caretaker?’

‘And Charlie’s mum, Mary Floros,’ said Dad. ‘Our housekeeper. I put it all in the
paperwork I sent you.’

‘Yes …’ Mr Snavely opened his briefcase and took out a sheaf of papers. ‘This is
what you sent us originally, before the placement began. But already containment
has been breached. And with the first guest under your care! What I want to know
is –’

‘How the kitchen looks!’ Dad blurted. ‘I know, it’s the obvious place to start your
inspection, isn’t it!’

Dad led him down the hallway.

Mr Snavely slunk into the kitchen.

‘What a freak!’ Charlie whispered to Amelia.

Mary came down the stairs from the guests’ wing, an enormous laundry basket in her
arms. ‘Oh, hello! You all here to help me with the curtains?’

‘Err, no, Mary,’ said Mum. ‘Scott’s just taken the Health Inspector to the kitchen.’

‘Oh.’ Mary bit her lip. ‘Well, I suppose … well … how bad can it be? We’ve only just
opened. It was only one complaint. There can’t be –’

Mary’s attempt to look on the bright side was cut off by a high, warbling scream,
and then a heavy clang, as though a saucepan had been thrown. It sounded a lot like
Mr Snavely had a complaint of his own.

‘Oh, no,’ Amelia muttered. ‘I bet it’s all that seaweed we collected this morning.
We just dumped it on the bench.’

But seaweed didn’t explain the sound of more pots and pans being thrown, or why Dad
was now shouting along with Mr Snavely.

Amelia and Charlie ran to the door, aware of both mums calling them back, but unable
to resist the noise. They
had
to know what was going on. Charlie flung open the door,
and Amelia saw Mr Snavely standing in the sink, holding his briefcase in both hands,
his face utterly white.

She couldn’t blame him. It seemed Dad had finally discovered where all those rats
were hiding. For some reason, the Health Inspector must have been poking around those
couple of dodgy floorboards in the corner of the kitchen, next to the oven. Amelia
could see a carving knife wedged between two planks, as though about to prise one
up. And next to that …

She gulped.

Dad was standing a metre from the oven, a broom held defensively in his hands, staring
at a hole in the floor. Two or three floorboards had been pushed up and out of the
way, and in the cavity below, dozens of tiny red lights twinkled. No, flashed on
and off. No, she realised in horror – they
blinked
. She was looking not at dozens
of tiny red lights, but dozens of pairs of tiny red eyes. The space under the floor
was filled with rats whose eyes glowed in the dark.

‘This is outrageous!’ Mr Snavely said shrilly. ‘This isn’t a containment breach any
longer. We’re talking illegal entries! Harbouring! Total border-security failure!’

‘Adrian,’ Dad said through his teeth. ‘Not now.’

‘Forget about losing the hotel, Walker. I’ll see you jailed for this! Jailed, you
hear me?’

‘You can’t jail people for rats!’ Charlie shouted.

Mr Snavely was turning purple by now. ‘This is chaos, Walker. I knew you’d fail,
but not this quickly!’

‘It’s just rats!’ Charlie cried, which was very loyal of him, but totally untrue.
Anyone could see these were anything but
just
rats.

Mr Snavely shrieked again, and Amelia saw the rats had begun to creep out of their
nest. Six of them had inched forward, and now their heads and shoulders were out
of the hole, their front paws all resting on the edge of the floor. They were massive,
hulking things, almost as big as cats, only more solid and far more threatening.
Dad stared at them warily, and when he didn’t move or try to push them back with
his broom, the six hopped up in unison, landing in perfect formation.

They crept forward, and Amelia saw another six line up behind to take their place.
And behind them, another twelve eyes glowed in the dark. How many more rats were
down there, all lined up in sixes and waiting their turn to emerge?

‘OK,’ said Dad, very calmly and gently. ‘I think it’s about time we casually strolled
out of here. Kids, you first. Just very slowly wander back out the way you came.
OK?’