Read Changeling for Free Online Page A

to live with me, Mr Laporte.’
    And with that, Trey gave himself up to the creeping sleep that encroached at the edges of his consciousness like some amorphous fog, and placed himself in the charge of Lucien Charron.

4
    ‘Trey, wake up. We are here.’ Lucien was leaning back between the gap in the two front seats and gently shaking Trey out of the sleep that he was in.
    ‘Unghh, where are we?’ Trey said. His neck ached from the uncomfortable sleeping position that he had adopted against the car door. He opened his eyes and looked out of the window on to a bleak open space of concrete pillars and sickly-coloured fluorescent lighting. Twenty or so cars were parked in various bays, their colours difficult to make out under the garish green hue of the strip lights.
    ‘We’re in the underground car park beneath my apartment block. You’ve slept the entire journey here,’ Lucien said.
    ‘I’m sorry . . .’
    ‘Please, there is no need to apologize. You have been through an awful lot in such a short space of time, it’s understandable that your mind would want to rest. Come along.’ Lucien climbed out of the front seat. He moved around the outside of the car, then, like a chauffeur, he deferentially swung back the rear door on Trey’s side and made a grand sweeping gesture with his other arm. ‘Your new home awaits.’
    Trey climbed out, suddenly feeling very wary of his surroundings. The underground car park smelt of acrid exhaust fumes, and even the smallest sound was transformed into a harsh echo as it bounced around the walls. The sickly feeling of fear welled up within him again as the stupidity of his actions suddenly crushed in on him. He jumped slightly at the sound of the car locking behind him, but if Lucien spotted this he didn’t comment. He simply turned his back on the boy and walked towards an elevator set into a wall on their right.
    ‘Do come along, Trey,’ Lucien said over his shoulder, pressing a small button in the wall next to the doors. ‘We live on the top floor.’
    Trey walked over to the doors as they slid open. His mind slowly cleared of the sleepy fog that had dulled it moments before. He was fully alert again now and on edge as he got into the small lift compartment. Lucien stabbed at the uppermost button, and the doors slid shut on the pair.
    ‘I am guessing that you are hungry?’ Lucien said.
    Trey hadn’t even thought of food, but the mere mention of it caused his stomach to groan noisily and twist as though some parasitic beast living within him had suddenly been awakened. ‘Ravenous. I could eat a horse with a soup spoon . . . but I feel sick at the same time,’ Trey replied. The tall man next to him laughed for the first time since they had met. It was a deep, wonderful sound that seemed completely at odds coming from such a stern, alarming-looking individual. Trey found himself smiling in spite of the creeping worry-worm that wriggled and gnawed away inside of him.
    He’s not what he says he is, the worm whispered. Run now while you still have a chance.
    ‘Well, I can’t promise any horse tonight, but I am sure that we can find something that will satisfy your appetite.’
    The lift finished its ascent, the metal doors sliding open to reveal Lucien’s apartment. Trey stood in the opening and stared, wide-eyed, at the opulence of the room before him. It was a huge room that he guessed must have been at least forty metres in length. The white walls were crowned with a dark blue glass suspended ceiling that hung impossibly above the entire space and reflected back an image of it in its surface. Rugs broke up the expanse of cream carpeting that stretched from the lift to the far side of the room, where huge floor-to-ceiling windows allowed the last of the early evening sunlight in, filling it with a golden hue. Trey could see the towering form of Canary Wharf rising behind some of the buildings that faced them from across the other side of the river. Everything inside the