Scourge: A Grim Doyle Adventure

Chapter 24

What?!” Grim exclaimed, stunned at Quinn’s revelation that he was responsible for the Scourge. “How is that possible?”

The boy grimaced. “There’s something I need to tell you. My grandmother was a Changeling. My mother is a half-breed.”

“A half-breed?” Grim asked.

Quinn nodded. “True Changelings can change their form willingly. Half-breeds can’t. My mother suffers hallucinations and minor changes at the full moon. I have dirty blood, but not enough to change me fully. Usually I just get ill and bad coughing spells leading up to the full moon, but there are times when I can get a little long in the tooth and a bit hairy, especially when both moons are full.”

Grim shuddered at the thought. He’d been sleeping in the same room.

Does Quinn ever get hungry in the middle of the night?

“All right,” Grim said, “but I don’t understand how you’re responsible. I thought it was Veerasin.”

Quinn shook his head. “The last elixir I had was very strong. I think it had Marmorite Blue.”

“But your cough syrup was green.”

“Usually my elixir is made from the essence of buttercup. If you add Marmorite Blue what color do you get?”

Grim didn’t like where this was going. “Green.”

“And because I have Changeling blood I don’t get infected by the disease, but I’m a carrier just like the book said. Who was the first person to get sick?”

“Sam.”

“Exactly, someone I know. And who was the second and third, and who were the first of the students?”

“Ellen and Treena, and then Halriette and Oslo — all people you’re friends with,” muttered Grim, realizing Quinn could be right. “Then why didn’t Rudy or I get sick?”

They both rolled up their sleeves. Their skin was bare, not a spot.

“There’s something different about you two,” Quinn said.

Rudy looked at him hard. “Have you come into contact with anything of Master Galan’s?”

“Not that I remember.”

“Nothing at all? Even by accident?”

Grim stopped to think. He rubbed his hand. “Well, Scarlet bit me in his lab.”

“When?”

“When the room filled with smoke, just after she’d been tasting the elixirs.”

Rudy looked pensive. “When I was reaching up for the Marmorite Blue I thought I stabbed myself on something. I’ll bet Scarlet bit me as well.”

“And it was just after Treena had found the blood,” Grim said. “I’ll bet that was the antidote.”

If they were right, Grim would have to apologize to Scarlet. The spider creature may have bitten them to save their lives.

“But your siblings were bitten.”

Rudy tugged on her pigtails. Finally she spoke. “But they were bitten later than us. Likely the antidote had mostly worn off by then. It was probably only enough to hold off death. Aunt Patrice said it was almost a miracle that they’ve lived this long.”

Grim shook his head. “Something about this still isn’t right. Why wouldn’t Master Galan offer the antidote?”

“There’s something else,” Quinn said. “Rudy and I worked through this while you were gone. Don’t you find it peculiar that you were chased from your world when the only person who knew you were there was Master Galan? He had the stones to take himself there. And don’t you think it’s strange that he was summoned from my father’s Manor just before you came to this world? My father’s manservant, who was the only witness to my father’s murder, was poisoned to death the night Master Galan departed. And isn’t it funny that Master Galan showed up at Madam Malkim’s with you, and that he is one of the only people that would know how to make an elixir like this? He is one of the very few people that know that I am of bad blood. He knows that I would be the perfect carrier for such a disease.”