Tangled Webs

Surreal caught the quick look Ginger gave Kester. Oh, yeah. Impress the dominant c**k by playing the bitch. Or keep the c**k impressed by squaring off against a witch. Since she’d seen plenty of variations of that theme when she lived in Terreille, she knew one thing for certain: Ginger was going to be a pain in the ass she didn’t need.

“Give me the ribbons,” Surreal said calmly. “If you don’t, I will rip them off your head—and rip most of your hair off with them.”

Ginger’s face paled, then flushed with embarrassment.

Lesson one, bitch. Don’t start a pissing contest with someone who has the strength and temper to hurt you.

Ginger pulled off the ribbons and threw them on the floor. “You’re bad! You’re just like my mother says you are!”

“Well, sugar, that’s something you should have remembered before trying to act like the dominant bitch around someone like me,” Surreal said softly. She took a step toward the girl—and felt a tapping against her fingers. No, that wasn’t quite right, but…

She brought her hand around to look at the paperweight and felt a jolt of revulsion followed by a sick tickle in the belly.

No longer solid glass. Now it was a glass dome over a solid base. Now the baby mouse, still looking slightly squashed, was on its hind legs, its front paws pounding on the glass as it squeaked for help.

Her hand shook, but she didn’t drop it. It was the only thing she’d found that would serve her purpose, so she didn’t drop it, didn’t throw it against the fireplace.

“Ew,” Dayle said, her eyes wide and excited. “That’screepy. ”

"My apologies, Lady Surreal," Rainier said. "I shouldn’t have discouraged you from showing them the closet. They’d probably find a dead body and maggots entertaining."

“What was it before the illusion spell started?” Rainier asked out loud.

“A dead mouse in a glass paperweight.” She hesitated but had to ask because there was something about the skewed nature of the illusion that made her uneasy. "When you were a boy, would you have found this entertaining?"

"The mouse? Hell’s fire, no."

"Would boys in general find this entertaining?"

Rainier studied her but must have sensed she didn’t want to share the reason for her questions. "Maybe. Our companions seem to, at any rate."

Mother Night.

She started to bend down to pick up the ribbons, but Sage scooped them up and handed them to her. Thanking the girl, she perched on the arm of the overstuffed sofa, unwilling to sit on the cushions in case the mouse’s relatives were still in residence.

The paper with the warning about the nature of the spooky house was wrapped around the paperweight. The handkerchief was wrapped over the paper. Everything was tied securely with the ribbons.

“Now what?” Rainier asked.

“See if that window is still a window.”

She watched him pull aside the lace curtains—and then jump back, swearing viciously, when black, beetlelike things fell from the curtains as they shredded.

Her heart jumped in her throat as the damn things scurried into cracks in the baseboard. She couldn’t tell if the beetles were real or illusion—and since seeing them made her skin crawl, she really didn’t want to know.

“Still a window,” Rainier said, peering through the glass. “At least, I seem to be looking out over the front lawn.”

She moved until she was just a little more than an arm’s length from the window.

Rainier studied the glass panes. “We could open the window and climb out.”

“Which might trigger a spell that will put more than glass in our way.”

“It might.”

The look in his eyes. Assessing. Considering. Weighing his desire as an escort to get her out of danger regardless of the cost against his responsibility for getting the children out safely, since they were here because of his invitation.

Just as he was here because ofher invitation.

"We walked in together, Prince Rainier. We will leave together."

Another assessment. Then he nodded.

“Stand to the side as much as you can, but hold what’s left of that curtain out of the way,” she said.

“Surreal, maybe I should…” He looked at the paperweight and didn’t say anything more.

“You wear Opal; I wear Gray.” And there was the simple fact that the Dea al Mon side of her heritage made her a lot stronger than she looked.

“You’ve already taken a hit,” Rainier said.

“Yeah.” And that was pissing her off because breathing still hurt like a wicked bitch.

Not that far from the house to the wrought-iron fence. Fifteen paces at the most. She could throw a stone that far.

She waited while Rainier fetched the poker from the brass stand on the hearth. Hooking some of the material, he pulled back the remains of the shredded curtain.

She stared at the window. Dark outside now. She couldn’t see the fence or the street. Just her reflection in the glass. If she broke the glass…

A sensation at the back of her neck, like delicate legs brushing, crawling.

Letting instinct decide, she channeled her Gray power into her hand and then wrapped it around the bundle before she cocked her arm back and threw, using Craft to pass the bundle through the glass.

Somewhere in the house, the gong sounded.

“Did it get out?” Surreal asked, stepping closer to the glass. “Can you see if the bundle got past the fence?”

Her reflection in the night-darkened glass. And then it wasn’t her reflection. Another woman’s face stared back at her and…

The woman’s arm shot out of the glass. Her nails, shaped like dagger points, slashed at Surreal’s face.

Surreal turned her face away and flung up an arm as an instinctive defense. And felt those nails tear through her jacket sleeve before Rainier yanked her out of reach.

“Should have gone through the window,” the woman said, her voice a malevolent singsong. “Should-a, could-a, too late now. Find an exit and don’t use it, it’s gone forever. Gone gone gone. Like you’ll be. You’ll join me soon enough. And your face won’t look so pretty when you do.”

“Who are you?” Surreal asked.

“He paid me. And then he killed me. And then he chained me to this house. But he’s letting me play with all the tricks and traps. Don’t die too soon, Lady Bitch. Not until you’ve seen mybest surprises.”