CHAPTER EIGHT
A Creepy Castle
Our next calamity occurred soon after the big-mouthed rooster in my barn crowed well before dawn—around four A.M. I rolled over and peered into the darkness. I was tired and annoyed with the fowl fittingly named Mr. Cock-A-Doodle-A-Lots. On top of that, I still felt a little uneasy after last night’s troll crone catastrophe. Why, then, did I also feel so . . . hopeful? An idea started to tug at me—a tiny glimmer of the sun’s pale yellow rays painting the apples tress with the soft flush of first light and possibility. It wasn’t just the prospect that we might find a way to spoil the goblins evil plans. Mason’s Plan A kept playing in my mind: Shadow Mountain should be easy to find we just need to look for
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No! We’ll head through those,” Mason pointed to a stand of trees on the other side of the meadow, “and find the walkway that leads to Shadow Mountain.” I considered my alternatives. My way, one of us would probably end up a monsters super, or we could take our chances in a forest free of seething beasts. After less than a second, we were searching for path. Instead, the trees parted like a drapes and there, half-drowned in silver mist, stood a creepy castle—a labyrinth of torrents, towers, and twinkling lights with ivy creeping unchecked over its crumbling face. “The remains of a palace?” Mason said, trying to vanish in the gloom. “Let’s get this over with. We can find out if whoever is in there knows where Shadow Mountain is then be on our way.” “Agreed,” he whispered. We tiptoed sideways through the waist-high weeds toward the fortress. The closer we got, the more the air smelled like a troll with intestinal issues and something worse. Very, very carefully we peered into one of its rectangular windows. It was like the throne room in Count Dracula’s castle, with cobwebbed candles mounted in rusty wall sconces, statues draped in mail, and a million screeching bats suspended upside down from the rafters. Then I saw humpbacked figures lumbering toward a hearth that burned