Anne Bishop - Tangled Webs

Unfortunately, her relatives thought being snarled at meant her health was improving and that only encouraged them to be bigger pains in the ass.

They had her well and truly chained. Oh, they were giving her breathing room and the illusion of independence, but until she was fully healed, Lucivar and Daemon would continue circling, would continue to keep watch—and anything that was perceived as a threat would disappear before it got close enough for her to be aware of its presence.

So she would go to Ebon Rih, and she would find a way to break the chains family had woven around her. She had a better chance of doing that with Lucivar, of getting him to agree to back off. If Daemon, on the other hand, felt a need to tighten those chains…

The look in his eyes. The sound of his voice when the tone was both seduction and threat.

Chilled to the bone, she stretched out on the sofa, put a warming spell on the blanket Helton had brought in earlier, and tucked it around her.

Was Jenkell still alive when the fire took the house?

Sadi hadn’t answered her question.

Maybe that was for the best.

“Don’t write in the dust, darling. That’s rude.”

“‘Hello, pree.’ What does ‘pree’ mean?”

“It’s ‘prey.’ ‘Hello, prey.’” Pause. “Oh, dear.”

“Mama, that’s a mouse made of bones.”

“Mouse? Where? ”

“Bwaa ha ha!”

Surreal bit her lip as the ghost boy reached for the door he’d been told not to open. She wanted to scream at him, rage at him. But there was no one to scream at, nothing to rage at, so she turned and stared at sooty layers of cobwebs that were clotting one corner of the dining room ceiling.

She felt Rainier come up beside her, positioning himself so that he blocked even her peripheral view of what was happening.

“I know it’s just entertainment,” she said. “I know it isn’t real, and I know Jaenelle and Marian created it before we walked into that trap, but…”

“I can’t watch it either,” Rainier said. He tipped his chin toward the cobwebs. “What do you think those are supposed to do?”

As if in answer, two spots began to glow and became eyes within a cobweb face shaped by a breath of air. Pieces of cobweb extended out, becoming an arm—and a hand with its fingers curled. The arm turned. The hand opened. And…

Surreal blinked.

“Bats?” Rainier asked. “Are those tiny bats?”

“Sparkly, Jewel-colored bats,” she said. “Must be one of Tersa’s spells.”

By the time the last sparkly bat winked out and the cobwebs once again looked like sooty, clotted cobwebs, Surreal was ready to follow the rest of the guests who were leaving the dining room.

She found her balance as she wandered through the spooky house with Rainier at her side. Despite Jaenelle’s skills as a Healer, he was still walking with a noticeable limp and needed the cane that had been a gift from Daemon.

He was lucky he was walking at all. Jaenelle had told her the Eyrien Warlord’s war blade had cut halfway through the bone as well as severing the muscles in Rainier’s leg. But he was healing, and she was glad he’d felt well enough to come with her to see this spooky house.

Jaenelle and Marian had created a house that was humor with a bite, scary with a wink. And some things were hauntingly lovely, like that voice in the upstairs hallway.

She saw the other illusions Tersa had added—and after watching eyes open up in the grapes, she was very glad she’d avoided those in the other spooky house.

In a way, this house poked fun at landens and Blood alike. And while some of it gave her a jolt—like that damn voice on the staircase—it really wasn’t…

Sylvia rushed up to them, looking wild-eyed and horrified.

“They think we live like this?” she said. “Landens really think we live like this ?”

All right. Maybe it was scary for some people. Just not for the expected reasons.

Rainier turned his back to deal with a sudden fit of coughing.

Sylvia turned in a circle, and in the course of that turn changed from wild-eyed woman to flame-eyed mother. “Where is Mikal? Hell’s fire, if that boy has tried to make off with one of those giggling spiders, I will kill him flatter than dead.”

Surreal watched the Queen of Halaway plow through a knot of stunned landens.

«They don’t know if she’s part of the entertainment or a real mother,» Rainier said.

«Kill him flatter than dead?» Surreal said. «What does that mean?»

«No idea. But said in that tone of voice, it sure sounds impressive. And I think the landen mothers are committing that phrase to memory.»

Surreal snorted.

They had seen most of the spooky house. Since they were family, they hadn’t been required to follow a ghostly guide—and hadn’t been herded back into a group by the shadow Scelties. It had been amusing to watch the other guests view the surprises, and she’d been entertained by watching rowdy landen boys come face-to-face with Lucivar. Even more amusing was watching the adolescent girls watch Daemon as he glided through the house. Unlike Lucivar, who had dealt with the boys by threatening to rip off all their poking little fingers and shove those fingers down their throats, Daemon had put a fading spell over a sight shield, so he simply faded away as he walked down a hallway, leaving all those girls wondering if he was real or illusion.

“So,” Rainier said. “We’ve seen the woman in the cobwebs and the giggling spiders. We’ve heard the snarl in the cellar and—”

“The damn laughing staircase.” She’d almost wet herself when she stepped on a stair and that voice rolled up from beneath her feet.

Rainier grinned but wisely said nothing. “And the eyes in the attic.”

They had skipped the bathroom with the popping beetles. Thank the Darkness.

“That’s the only room left to view.”

They approached the door as a group of landens, led by their ghostly guide, also came to that part of the tour.

“This is the scariest room in the house,” the ghost said.

The ghost stepped aside. The door opened without a creak or a squeak.

Surreal and Rainier entered the room and stood to one side. They would be able to stay and view the “surprise” in the room as many times as they wanted, so it seemed fair to let the “guests” have the better view.

«Any ideas?» Rainier asked.

She shook her head.

A beautifully decorated sitting room. Something she would expect in an aristo town house in Amdarh—or any of the sitting rooms at SaDiablo Hall.

Seconds passed. Nothing happened.

Then she heard the music. Faint at first, but growing stronger. And with the music, the dancers slowly formed out of mist until they became almost solid, almost real.

Jaenelle and Daemon, dancing. Just watching them, she could feel the heat of their love, could see their happiness at being together.

“Please tell me that gown is an illusion,” Rainier whispered. “Jaenelle doesn’t really own something like that, does she?”

“I’d heard she had to make the gown in the illusion more opaque,” Surreal teased. “The real thing is even more sheer. But it’s only to be worn for very private dinners.”

“Thank the Darkness. If she wore that at a public gathering, Sadi would kill every male in the room just for looking at her.”

The truth of that shivered through her bones.

She pursed her lips and looked around the room. What was…?

“What’s so scary about this room?” a boy asked.

The dancers stopped suddenly. Their bodies were still pressed together, but their heads turned toward the voice and they looked straight at the people in the room.