The Glass Castle Read online

  © 2016 by Trisha White Priebe

  Print ISBN 978-1-63409-389-7

  eBook Editions:

  Adobe Digital Edition (.epub) 978-1-63409-762-8

  Kindle and MobiPocket Edition (.prc) 978-1-63409-763-5

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted for commercial purposes, except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without written permission of the publisher.

  Churches and other noncommercial interests may reproduce portions of this book without the express written permission of Barbour Publishing, provided that the text does not exceed 500 words or 5 percent of the entire book, whichever is less, and that the text is not material quoted from another publisher. When reproducing text from this book, include the following credit line: “From The Glass Castle, published by Barbour Publishing, Inc. Used by permission.”

  All scripture quotations are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any similarity to actual people, organizations, and/or events is purely coincidental.

  Cover Illustration: Scott Altmann

  Cover Lettering: Kirk DouPonce

  Published in association with The Blythe Daniel Agency, P.O. Box 64197, Colorado Springs, CO 80962-4197.

  Published by Shiloh Run Press, an imprint of Barbour Publishing, Inc., P.O. Box 719, Uhrichsville, Ohio 44683, www.shilohrunpress.com

  Our mission is to publish and distribute inspirational products offering exceptional value and biblical encouragement to the masses.

  Printed in the United States of America.

  05309 0216 BV

  Dedication

  To Andrew, Max, and Lincoln, who know the long road home and have enriched our lives immeasurably for taking it.

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 1

  Captured!

  Avery dragged her three-year-old brother behind a boxwood bush and listened for footsteps in the brittle leaves. She couldn’t be sure which was louder—the person on their trail or her own heart, galloping like a stallion in her ears.

  With one hand over Henry’s mouth, Avery looked down at the nicest dress she owned. Not only had she torn the ruffles and destroyed the hem, but the white linen stood out in the shadowy woods, making her an easy target.

  If she survived this afternoon and made it home tonight—and that felt like a giant if—her father would demand to know why her dress was stained with grass and mud and tinged with blood.

  She would tell him the truth.

  How could she possibly have known that a simple walk in the woods would turn dangerous? It was her thirteenth birthday, and she’d had no intention of spending the day cooped up in their small, dusty cottage, doing chores that would need to be done again tomorrow.

  Now Avery was sure she heard twigs snap. Crows bolted, and she felt someone or something watching her. Her father would understand the ruined dress.

  Clothes, after all, could be replaced.

  People, as their family knew all too well, could not.

  “Don’t let go of my hand,” Avery whispered as Henry wiggled. She squeezed his shoulder until he twisted his face and nodded.

  He looked scared, and why wouldn’t he? Instead of playing with the paper boat tucked in his pocket, he was hiding in the ghostly woods while a cold wind whistled through the trees.

  “I’ll figure a way to get us out of here,” Avery whispered next to Henry’s ear. “Just don’t make a sound, and do exactly what I say.”

  Henry nodded, tears dotting the corners of his big brown eyes.

  Normally, hiding behind a bush was a dumb idea. Tall and long legged, Avery was the fastest runner among her friends. No one laughed about her unusually big feet or made fun of her unruly inky hair, because she could outrun everyone, including the boys. She knew she could easily outpace someone in the woods—if she didn’t have Henry.

  So, while the unpleasant sounds of the woods rose up around them, Avery hatched a plan.

  They would move to the one place she had always felt safe.

  It was now or never.

  Wait, the wind seemed to whisper, but Avery didn’t obey.

  Taking a deep breath and grabbing Henry’s hand, she ducked from behind the boxwood. Head bent and body low, she pulled her brother to the next bush and the next until they reached a butternut tree deep in the thickets—but not just any butternut tree. This was where their father had built the most spectacular tree house when Avery was a little girl.

  Rising before them stood a castle tree house—two stories high with an open turret and stairs that wound through a trap door that led to a tiny chamber at its highest point. The castle included a sky bridge, a tower prison, a tunnel, and a library—perfect for a girl with a bright imagination and a hunger for stories.

  In the castle Avery could be anybody she wanted to be. On sunny days, she pretended to be queen and made Henry one of her loyal subjects. She painted watercolor castles and wrote poetry while sending Henry to collect blackberries or fetch water from the nearby stream for their snack. At night, when the sky was as black as ink, Avery would lie on the roof and imagine the stars were diamonds in her crown.

  This castle held many secrets—among them, it supposedly sat atop an intricate system of tunnels—but whether any of them were true, Avery had no idea. Most importantly, it was the last place Avery saw her mother before she left and never came back.

  Today it would be a hiding place.

  Avery decided she and Henry would stay in the tree house until night fell, and then they would sneak home where Avery would explain everything to their father. He would be angry at first but would eventually soften. He might even loan her the money to buy a replacement dress since she had saved her brother’s life.

  Avery was just about to lead Henry into the arched doorway of the thick tree trunk when he yanked free of her grasp and raced into the open.

  “Bronte!” he shouted, dropping to his knees and wrapping his pudgy arms around the mutt that was the family dog.

  As Bronte’s matted fur spattered Henry with mud, Avery’s hopes of her father’s forgiveness vanished.

  She had been so sure she and Henry were in danger.

  Dumb dog, she thought, both relieved and ashamed.

  They were not being chased as she had suspected, but she had ruined her one good dress and Henry was covered in filth. Her father would say she had let her imagination get the best of her again, and she would spend the rest of her birthday alone in her bedroom, likely without any gifts or treat
s.

  “Oh, Bronte,” Avery said, joining Henry in scratching Bronte’s floppy ears. She couldn’t stay mad at the dog for long. They were the same age and had been best friends for as long as she could remember.

  “Let’s go home.”

  “But why?” Henry said, his voice rising to a whine the way it did when he was made to eat his vegetables or take a bath. “You said we were going to play hide-and-seek. Nobody found us.”

  “Good thing,” Avery said. “But now it’s time to go home for supper.”

  This news made Henry smile. “We’ll have apple sausages and cheese,” he said.

  Avery was about to tell him they didn’t know what their father had planned but that they would be grateful for whatever they were given. But then she heard it—

  The snapping of twigs.

  And she saw it—

  The crows bolting.

  And she felt it—

  Someone or something was watching them.

  And this time, Avery knew it wasn’t the dog.

  She grabbed Henry around the waist and ran as fast as she could move toward the tree house. But just as she leapt inside and shouted, “Hang on!” everything went dark.

  All that remained was a bell clanging in the distance.

  Chapter 2

  Trapped

  The cramped, dark cart smelled like boots left in the rain.

  Avery sat with her back pressed against splintering boards, chin on her knees and her neck aching from leaning forward—for how long she had no idea, but the pain was intense. A salty, bitter rag covered her mouth, and she couldn’t move her legs. Her stomach hurt more than it ever had, though she couldn’t be sure if it was from hunger or something else.

  Worse, she had no idea what had happened to Henry. The thought of him scared and hungry in another cart sent a fresh stab of pain through Avery’s chest and she gasped for air.

  I was supposed to protect him. I was the one who took him out of the house.

  Suddenly, she realized the cart was moving.

  She struggled to raise her hands—tied tightly at the wrists—and pounded the top of the cart as hard as she could manage until her knuckles stung.

  Everything halted, and an old woman’s bulging eyes appeared between the slats. Avery recoiled from hair that looked like long white wires and a face filled with so many creases she might easily be a hundred years old.

  “So you’re still alive!” the woman said, cackling. “Wasn’t sure there for a while. I was wondering if I’d have to bury you out ’ere. Didn’t want to mess with digging another grave.” She smiled a gummy grin and added, “Looks like it might rain.”

  Another grave?

  All Avery could see in her mind was Henry’s scared face. She threw her body at the sides of the cart, hoping to break out, but the box wouldn’t budge, and the woman stopped smiling.

  “Relax,” she said. “You’re not going anywhere. This cart has been my sturdy companion longer than you’ve been on God’s green earth.”

  Avery could see the woman wore a royal-blue cloak, and the tip of her nose was cherry red from the wind. Despite her age, her voice was strong and her black, beady eyes serious as a snake. “No banging and no yelling, you ‘ear me? Or there will be consequences.”

  “I’m not scared of your threats,” Avery said, her voice muffled by the rag around her mouth. “I’m stronger than you.”

  The woman smiled again, light dancing in her dull eyes. “But your brother’s not. If you don’t want anything to ’appen to ’enry, you’ll be quiet.”

  He’s still alive. This, at least, brought Avery a small measure of comfort.

  The old woman began to laugh—a hollow, unhappy sound—revealing several missing teeth and a deep scar along her right cheek.

  She knows Henry’s name. What else does she know? How did she make him talk? What did he tell her?

  Avery knew she should scream and hope someone would come. She could easily overpower the woman. How fast could an old woman run?

  But she has Henry.

  “Are you listening?” the woman said, slapping the cart with a hand as red as blood.

  Avery nodded.

  “You kids are all the same,” the woman mumbled, wiping her forehead with the edge of her cloak. “So much trouble and so ungrateful.” Her knuckles rose like mountains against the soft, flat flesh of her hand, and Avery saw a ruby ring that looked like it could be worth a fortune.

  Who does she work for?

  The old woman shuffled away, saying, “I almost forgot. ’appy birthday. Make a wish, darling.”

  The woman laughed again, the sound sending a rush of cold up Avery’s spine. Then the woman disappeared and the cart began to bump along the road again.

  Avery rested her chin back on her knees as hot tears sprang to her eyes. It was only supposed to be a walk. This was not how she had imagined spending her special day. She wished she could start the day over and do what her father instructed.

  As her ruby flower necklace pressed against her collarbone, she knew she had made a terrible mistake to leave the house without her father’s permission. He would look for them in the tree house, but he would have no idea where to look when he did not find them there.

  A thick darkness settled, and with it, cold air.

  Suddenly, the old woman began to sing in a voice as low as a man’s—

  Tonight the moon is watching as we ride toward the sea,

  The sky above, the ground below will sing in ’armony.

  “You’re free!” we’ll sing and “free!” again—You’re free,

  young Avery.

  But Avery suspected her freedom had been left in her tree castle in the woods.

  As the night grew colder, the woman slowed and her breathing grew loud and labored. The flat, gravel roads gave way to steep climbs and craggy hills, and Avery feared the old woman might have a heart attack and leave them both to freeze to death in the middle of nowhere.

  Hours of travel felt like days.

  Suddenly, Avery’s sad and weary eyes settled on a scene that rose before the slats of the cart. Hundreds of brightly lit windows and dozens of turrets touched the sky, making the city in the distance look like a pyramid of gold perched on a pile of puffy clouds, a sort of glass castle illuminating the night sky. Its vibrant colors pulsed with life unlike anything Avery had ever seen. A thousand times she had imagined being found in a place that looked just like this—like it belonged in a fairy tale.

  Her mother had spun tales of an evil king’s castle—filled with secret passageways and tunnels. Her stories about the underground colonies, which she called “the underworld,” were the best. When she told them late at night by candlelight that cast wide shadows on the bare walls of their tiny house, Avery forgot everything else in the world, including the fact they were poor and hungry. Those moments, curled beside her mother in bed, were her most treasured memories.

  Now her stomach twisted.

  Every fairy tale has its dragon.

  She longed for the apple sausages Henry had talked about in the woods. She would even settle for the thick pea pottage that made their usual meal. She didn’t care about her ruined dress anymore, even if she owed her father a lifetime of Saturdays sweeping the endless dust from the floor of his shop to buy a new one. She just wanted to go home.

  Sloping rooftops and pointed turrets gave way to foreboding walls and dancing shadows so powerful they made Avery’s heart sink. Whoever lived in this magnificent city on a hill had money and power, so this kidnapping wasn’t about a ransom. Her father had nothing of value to offer rich people.

  Eventually, the cart halted again and the woman barked an order to someone Avery couldn’t see. Bartering ensued, followed by the clanking of coins, and the cart was pushed onto something that moved up and down slowly.

  Avery pressed her face against the slats.

  I’m being sold. To whom? For how much?

  And then another thought was slow to follow—

&nbs
p; Hopefully Henry and I are sold to the same person so we can stay together.

  And then a final thought—

  A raft. I don’t know how to swim.

  Chances of rescue looked slimmer by the second. Even if she escaped the box, she would never escape the water.

  On the other side of the raft, another box bore another frightened face pressed against its slats. Their eyes met and held briefly before the boy—who looked to be about Avery’s age—moved quickly out of Avery’s view.

  She turned her attention to the sea, where moonlight shimmered off choppy waves that made the raft bob, and she feared she might get sick.

  I cannot make a scene if the risk is a watery grave.

  The raft inched closer to the glowing city, its lights so dazzling that it looked as if it had been dusted with crystals. And it wasn’t perched on puffy clouds after all, but on its own island.

  The raft maneuvered around a thick tree trunk and glided smoothly over the glassy surface of the suddenly stilled water. The moon appeared large and lavender in its brilliance.

  Avery knew that wherever she was going was unlike anywhere she had ever been.

  For good or for evil—and she suspected evil—her life was about to change forever.

  Chapter 3

  Kate

  The raft came to a standstill, and the old woman pushed the cart onto dry land with a grunt.

  She must have gotten a second wind during their ride on the raft, because she pushed with renewed energy over the winding hills to where a steep road led to a thick wooden door under an enormous towering archway. Two burly guards with pockmarked faces and chests as round as barrels stood on either side of the door, each holding a heavy torch in his hand with flames that licked the air and spit out heavy smoke as black as midnight.

  One of the guards grunted and Avery felt the beat of her heart in her neck.

  She was thankful, at least, to have survived the raft. Now she hoped to survive these men. She didn’t have the energy to fight. And from the size of these two, she would need more than energy if they intended to harm her.

  Avery suspected people did whatever these men required.