Soul Stealer Read Online Free Page B

was silence before she and Tim could just
     discern the distant sound of Sebastian coming up through the wall, rising along the secret passage from his place under the
     ground.

    Over the weeks, since their battle with de Loudéac, they had seen little of Sebastian. A few times, they had caught sight
     of him in the distance, down by the river, usually in the evening, a solitary figure slowly walking along the bank deep in
     thought, his hands thrust behind his back. Twice, he had turned away from the river and come up to the house, but he had not
     stayed long and had said very little. When Pip asked him what he was thinking about, he was reticent and remarked only that,
     despite their vanquishing of de Loudéac, he still felt ill at ease and the
aqua soporiferum,
the potion that induced sleep, would not yet let him fall into a deep slumber. This, he continued, was a sign that something
     remained amiss, although he could not identify it. When Tim had asked if he was worried that Malodor might return, he had
     evaded the question and simply said there remained much evil abroad in the world.
    Sebastian soon materialized in Pip’s bedroom, climbing out from behind the panel in the wall and closing it behind him.
    “Has your day been a good day?” he inquired, sitting cross-legged on the floor before Pip and Tim. “How is your new school?”
    “Big,” Tim replied. “It must have at least a thousand pupils and over fifty teachers.”
    “We’ve got the head of chemistry as our homeroom teacher,” Pip added.
    “Strange guy,” Tim went on. “He’s got the hearing of a bat. I hummed something and he picked it up at five meters. Bit strict,
     but then we’re in his laboratory for a homeroom, so I suppose he has to be.”
    “There’s more to him than that,” Pip went on. “He’s creepy. When he looks at you, you get the feeling he’s sort of studying
     you.”
    “Really,” Sebastian replied thoughtfully, adding, “describe him to me.”
    Tim conjured up a mental picture of the teacher. “He’s tall,” he began, “thin, long bony fingers. Brown hair going gray. Weird
     haircut. Bald on top. Sticks out at the sides. A bit like Krusty the Clown’s, only not green.”
    Sebastian looked nonplussed. “Never mind,” Pip said, “you won’t have heard of Krusty.”
    “Quite a pointed nose,” Tim continued.
    “With hairs sprouting from the nostrils,” Pip cut in. “Earholes are pretty hairy, too.”
    “Of what age would you consider him?” Sebastian asked.
    “Mid-fifties,” Tim guessed, continuing, “pale skin, large ears.”
    “And his eyes?” Sebastian inquired.
    An involuntary shudder ran down Pip’s back. Something told her this interrogation was taking a nasty turn.
    “Dark,” she reported. “Sort of deep. The light from the window reflected in them,” she paused, “as if therewas a flame burning way down inside him, in the middle of his head. And,” she went on, “he uses a strong aftershave.”
    “Of herbs and citrus fruit?” Sebastian asked.
    Another ripple of fear ran down Pip’s spine.
    “Yes,” she nodded and said, “thyme and lemons.”
    “It was not as you suppose a balm for shaving,” Sebastian continued. “It was the scent of a pomander.”
    “A what?” Tim replied.
    “In my father’s time,” Sebastian explained, “it was believed that noxious odors caused disease and, if one could counteract
     them with a pleasant smell, the risk of infection was much reduced. Thus people carried lemons and such fruit with them, often
     pierced with cloves, to produce a strong and beneficial scent. Of course, only the wealthy were able to do this, for such
     fruit were both rare and costly.”
    “Sort of like aromatherapy,” Pip remarked. “Did it work?”
    “No,” Sebastian said bluntly, “it did not. One cannot control sickness merely with vapors.”
    “At the end of the day,” Pip went on, “as we were dismissed, I had the strangest feeling. Going past him, I had