Chapter Ten- Taking The House
After this, things moved rather quickly. Randel clutched control of the Vic-puppet-shell-person that Mother had installed in the house; Dan-Dan ate Viq, and regurgitated him rather fast; a carefree woman, Mairin, self proclaimed sister of the Moppet's neighbor Kyle, waltzed into the locality and picked up an instant relationship with the nanny's brother Jack; and a Grandma of the Cole's arrived in the area.
Randel knew where Mother was going now, the Fairy G-mum had told him, foolish girl. But Mother could wait, first her family had to be…controlled, because a family was the way to a mother's heart, and it was Mother's heart Randel wanted exposed to his knife.
Randel visited one of the dodgier policemen in the area, arranged a visit for Father to the local cells on no charge. Typically, the man's darn kids the Vibs and the Viq, rescued him by turning into a fly and a huge female guard, not necessarily in that order.
Time moved fast.
Randel watched the house from across the road. It was Christmas eve and snow was falling. Randel pulled gloves from off his fingers and held them in one hand. His eyes darkened as he watched the twinkling Christmas lights flash on and off, reflecting in his dark pupils. His fingers tightened around the gloves. "I will take you all," he muttered. "Every one of you will be mine. Then she will weep and howl and come wash dishes for me instead of that Mop. Ha!"
He threw his gloves at the floor, turned away, and ran straight into a woman on the sidewalk. They went down together into the snow, and Randel backpedaled to get to his feet faster than she did, embarrassment and confusion flushing his face. "I'm so sorry. I didn't run into you, I was standing still and you came flying towards me and-"
"Don't," the woman said. She was Mairin, Kyle's sister, Jack's girlfriend.
"Remember my parents try to take over the world once every three months, so don't play games with me. What are you playing me for?"
Randel closed his jaw. "Playing you, my dear girl, do you think this is a game?"
"No, snowballs is a game, building a snowman and calling him Parson Brown, or Bob, or Joe, that's a game. Threatening a family is an…"
"Offence? I agree. What can I possibly do to make you forgive me for what I said just now?"
Mairin blinked. "Forgive-why would I…?"
"You wouldn't, exactly." Randel turned away, then swung back, snapping a candy cane from his jacket pocket and thwacking the side of her head.
A burst of magic energy slammed him as Mairin went down. Randel fell forward over her, and once again found himself struggling to his feet. He rubbed his neck where the force had hit him, and looked up into the gray eyes of the girl who had done that to him.
"My name's Grey," the girl said. "You just hit my boyfriend's sister."
"Well, the family connections have no end, I see," Randel said.
"You are?"
Randel tipped his head. "Randel. Look here, this woman is injured, I wonder if you could help her? Something has hit a blow to her head I'm afraid."
Grey blinked. Hadn't she just seen him hit the woman with a candy cane? She knelt beside the woman. "She'll be ok, it seems to be concussion."
"Yes," Randel said. "From this." And he attacked Grey with the cane in the same manner. Three minutes later he was driving away from the Moppet's house with two girls tied in the boot of his car.
Meanwhile, inside the Moppet's house, Jack began to worry. His girlfriend had been gone too long.
"Merry Christmas!" Nanny Mingostone shouted, stepping through the door with mistletoe-flavored lollipops.
Jack frowned, actually it wasn't merry. Mairin was missing. "Nice to have you back," he said. "My socks need a wash."
"Can’t you just, like, fill them with grass and put them in the freezer?" Mingostone asked.
He couldn't, and didn't. And he didn't find Mairin. Over the next few days she was nowhere. He'd checked the places they knew, the church, the forest, a Babbett Cole meeting. He'd even gotten an ex-ray of Dandan's stomach but found only a tin can, a bale of hay, and a mophead.
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