The Monster's Lair

“I don’t like this at all,” Colin said, backing away from the cages.

“Me neither,” Xavier agreed. “What are these cages for?”

“Maybe we should head back and tell Miss Brimstone what we’ve found?” Gloria said cautiously.

“Do you remember what happened every other time we’ve tried to tell her something?” Trixie reminded her friends. “She told us to investigate, so that’s what we’ll do. Let’s see where this door takes us.”

She turned away from her friends, acting far more bravely than she felt, and pushed on the wooden door. It swung open easily on well-oiled hinges. “It definitely came this way,” Trixie said, mainly to keep herself from thinking about what it might be. Something was still gnawing at the back of her mind. Something didn’t feel right.

The door opened into yet another tunnel. This one was narrower than the others, the ceiling was much lower. Trixie had to walk with one hand raised at head-height to avoid cracking her head on snake-like roots and sharp rocks that intruded at irregular intervals.

Trixie had no idea how long they’d been walking for, but the passage seemed to wind on forever. There appeared to be no general direction either, which made it impossible to know where they were heading. Other tunnels branched off every now and then, but Trixie followed the footsteps in the mud. She knew that to deviate would risk getting lost forever. If they just walked straight, even if they didn’t find anything at the other end, she’d know how to get them back. To help, she made Gloria scratch an arrow into the damp tunnel walls every few yards.

“If we get lost,” she said, “just follow the arrows backwards, and you’ll end up back in the big cavern. If we get separated, we’ll meet there by the cages.”

Eventually, the flame from the torch started to splutter before finally dying. Trixie expected to be plunged into darkness, but instead, a gentle blue glow seemed to illuminate everything. It wasn’t the same swirling mist that they’d seen at the entrance to the cave, but danced and flickered like a flame. Trixie urged them on more quickly now, and she headed straight towards the source of the light.

After a few hundred yards, the tunnel turned a corner and once again opened up into a wider passage. Trixie stopped dead in her tracks. The others piled into the back of her. The wider passage continued for another hundred yards before giving way to yet another underground hall. This one was even larger than the last one. In the middle, a roaring fire burnt with a blue flame, illuminating everything around it.

Unfortunately, what it illuminated made Trixie’s stomach do somersaults. The passageway that they had stepped into was lined floor to ceiling with more cages. Each row must have been six or seven cages high. These cages weren’t rusty and twisted, and they weren’t empty.

“Monsters,” Gloria whispered in shock.

“Maria!” Trixie yelped, louder than she’d meant to. She raced over to a cage halfway along the passage and pulled on the metal bars. The centaur was sat down, her legs tucked underneath her in the cage. There was no room to stand up. A dirty water bottle, green with algae, was strapped to the side of the cage.

“Go away,” Maria hissed. “You don’t understand. Go away while you still can. He’ll snatch you as well.”

“I’m not going anywhere—” Trixie began.

“Who will snatch us?” Xavier interrupted.

“The pishtaco. He’s real,” Maria said. Tears flowed down her cheeks, mapping out rivers in the dirt.

“Where is he?”

Maria nodded towards the fire. Trixie turned and saw the creature from her bedroom. He hadn’t spotted the intruders yet. The towering, gaunt figure was dancing around the fire, screaming curses and insults at yet more cages stacked closer to the centre of the hall. A large iron cauldron was hung over the blue flames. Even from a distance, Trixie could hear something inside it bubbling and boiling. Whenever it overflowed, it hissed and steamed as it evaporated on the burning logs.

Trixie listened closely and realised that the beast's words weren’t foreign curses or gibberish, he was singing a song.

Lock your doors and shutter the windows

Through the eve the shadow grows

Cursed monsters haunt the night

Fire burn and keep it bright

“That’s a song the people in the villages sing,” Xavier said. “It’s supposed to warn their children not to go out at night. Otherwise, the monsters will get them.”

“That’s horrible,” Gloria said. “Monsters aren’t creatures to be afraid of any more than humans are.”

“The fire is burning, children,” the pishtaco screeched. “I am the shadow in the night!”

Trixie stood and stared. She could see the same pale-yellow, watery eyes that had stared into her soul a few hours before. The jagged teeth snapped against each other as the monster danced around the fire, waving its arms and gnashing at the children in the cages. It was tall, but Trixie could see that the pishtaco seemed to be holding itself taller than it was. There was something about the ungainly way it walked, as well. Trixie had watched as her mother had trained the kittens in her cat circus to walk on stilts, and she thought back to when she’d had a go herself. She had staggered around the room in a sort of delayed fall, trying with each step to balance herself. The pishtaco walked the same way, as though his legs were barely under his control.

“We need to get out of here and think about what to do,” Trixie whispered to the others. “Let’s head back to the other hall and come up with a plan.” She turned to Maria and said, “Don’t worry. We’ll be back for you soon. Stay strong.”

Trixie didn’t dare look back as they fled along the winding corridor, carried by their fear. Behind them, the pishtaco continued his song, his voice like fingernails scraping along a blackboard.