Touch of Fear ▸ House of Anubis [2]

chapter fifty-eight. house of stooges

☾ ☽

            Nina looks at the closed dollhouse the next morning. "Hey. It's worth a try, right?" she asks us. Amber and I nod. Maybe Sarah will be able to help us a little more, maybe tell us exactly where in Victor's office we should be searching. So Nina walks up to the dollhouse and sighs, "We're desperate here, Sarah. You got to have another clue for me."

            Amber and I get up to stand next to her, watching the replica of the house for a sign. Then one of the windows starts to glow, and I grin. Amber says, "It worked."

            I open the dollhouse, finding that the dolls are now on the second floor—in the room we're in right now. "They're in Sarah's room. That's our room. That must mean there's a reflector in here."

            "You have all of Sarah's stuff, Nina," Amber states.

            A lightbulb has just lit above Nina Martin's head. "The music box."

            "Music box?"

            Nina goes over to her bed to pull out the music box from a basket from the shelves of her nightstand. Amber and I sit on the bed beside her as she recites the first part of the riddle, "'On little stars that borrow light.' Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star is Sarah's favorite nursery rhyme." She opens the music box, and lo and behold, on the mirror inside of it is a symbol of a falcon, which is strangely familiar. "There it is! Amber, Ashley, we have our first reflector."

—

            I swear I've seen that falcon symbol on the mirror before somewhere. I just can't figure out where. It's not the mirror itself, I know that much. It's something else, I just can't...we need more clues to go on. With a heavy sigh, I go to close my locker when someone suddenly slams it shut for me. I jump, turning to the culprit—Alfie.

            "Alfie, what are you doing?"

            "I think Patricia's the one."

            Okay, what? Taken aback by that statement, I look at him strangely and silently for a long moment before commenting, "What? What do you mean you think Patricia is the one? The one what?"

            "She's been really different lately," Alfie informs. "And I like it. And I think she likes me."

            "What?"

            "Uh-huh."

            "But she's dating Eddie."

            "She told me she's trying to keep away from him."

            Still staring at him like he's gone crazy, which I think he actually has if he's actually saying these words to me right now, I reply with wide, unbelieving eyes, "Alfie. You cannot like Patricia."