The day Penny got caught was the day she went to the library. Alone.
She had purposely avoided Percy when she left to go to the library.
She knew she shouldn't. He was trying to protect her, after all. But she wasn't sure he would want her trying to find out who-or what-he was.
And so she went alone.
She had searched for at least three hours without any results when, out of pure boredom, she decided to look at old newspapers.
She was at a very large library. One that seemed to have everything in it.
And everything included newspaper files.
Penny started with one from two years before.
She nearly dropped the paper when she saw the front page.
On the headlines was Percy's name.
It was something about how he had been kidnapped and defeated his captor in a gun-battle on the west coast.
The odd thing was, when she looked at the image below the article, it didn't look like a gun-battle.
For one thing, there were no guns. There were swords.
Also, the man Percy was fighting was at least ten feet tall.
The gray-eyed girl Penny had seen when she had first gotten sick was in the picture too. So was a kid Penny didn't recognize.
Penny read the article several times through before the library closed.
She started home with the articles words running through her head.
About halfway home, someone grabbed her arm.
Penny whirled around yelled and stared at the man-no, not the man, the thing-that had grabbed her.
She was too shocked to scream.
The creature had a single eye in the middle of his forehead.
When Penny opened her mouth to scream, a hand from behind her clamped over her mouth.
The creature behind her spoke to his partner.
"The scent of the sea lies heavily upon her. Our master will pay us greatly for her."
Penny's throat felt tight. What did they mean? She felt panic start to well up inside her.
Then something hit her from behind and everything went black.
I suddenly find a fondness for chapters that end in "Then everything went black." That's the second time I've used it.
Review, or I will delay the climax.
Bye!