“Damnit.” Sam’s heart had sunk through the floor when she realized the living room, and by extension the kitchen – because she could see clearly into it from right fucking there at the door – were clear of monsters. “You know this means that it’s either in the bedroom or the bathroom.” She kicked at the floor in frustration.

But just to be sure she cleared the kitchen anyways. Yeah. Nothing there. It was quiet and – relatively – clean. Even the dishes she hadn’t done the last time she was home were still in the sink and the trash, yep, smelled like regular trash. She opened and closed the lid hopefully. No monsters in there. Then just for good measure she checked the fridge, freezer, and all the kitchen cabinets.

“You hoping it’s really small and hiding in here?” Gleipnir supplied as he followed her around the room closing cabinet doors behind her.

“Because I don’t want to have to deal with the financial destruction of there being a monster in my bedroom.”

“How would – ?” Gleip began before Sam cut him off angrily.

“All my clothes and expensive stuff are in there.”

“Ohhhh…” After a second of silent reflection, he started speaking again. “But shouldn’t our renters insurance cover that? And anything thats really irreplaceable is at your parents’ house.”

“Huh!?” Straightening from the floor where she’d been checking the inside of the oven, Sam relaxed a bit as she contemplated the suggestion. “Renter’s insurance might indeed cover that. That would rock. Let’s go kill a monster.” Suddenly, much more jovial about the whole situation, Sam led the way to the hall with the bathroom and bedroom beyond.

“Ohhhhshhhiiittt!” Sam and Gleipnir hopped back against the wall of the hallway as a tongue or something lashed at them through the bathroom door. It splashed messily on either side of the bathroom door leaving running trails of what must have been saliva streaking down the off white walls in multi-colored bubbly rivers. “Gross. Ahhh.” The tongue came lashing out of the door again and Sam hopped out of its way while Gleipnir dodged in the air.

“Is that the shower curtain?” Astonishment rang in his voice. “Our shower is the monster? This is just some unbelievable hogwash.”

“Okay.” Sam edged further from the open bathroom door that she had just carelessly barreled past in her rush to see what damage, if any, was in her bedroom. “How do we kill a showe – are those my toiletries? No! That’s hundreds of dollars worth of shampoo, conditioner, and bodywashes. Ahhhh, man.” But her disappointment only grew with her pact item’s next words.

“It’s your new alchemical moisturizer,” He sniffed loudly in the direction of the rainbow smear. “…and facial cleanser set also from the smell of it.”

“For fucks sake” Sam screeched up at the heavens with an inquiring gesture. “Is nothing sacred? Really?”

“I don’t think now’s really the time to be beseeching the Gods, Sammy.” But the look that Sam threw his way had him backpedaling in an instant. “Or I could be wrong about that. Clearly, very wrong.”

“Let’s just kill it and be done with it.” She pointed her wand into the dark bathroom and prepared to summon a spell.

“How? We can’t burn it?”

“Why not?” Because that had been exactly what Sam had been planning on, a nice tightly woven fireball or fire thread spell.

“Because it’s literally part of the building, made out of metal with a clay or enamel coating, and any heat strong enough to kill it will also set the building on fire.” Well when he put it that way.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Fine. Ice? Can’t just stab it. Or can I?” The thoughts started turning over in her head and she wondered at how quiet the bathroom monster was when it wasn’t actively trying to eat someone. “Creepy how it inherently seems to have made itself into an ambush predator.”

“Yes,” The thoughtful way Gleipnir spoke caught Sam’s attention and she turned back to find her wearing his googly eyes and stroking his ‘chin’ with the end of his ribbon. Sparing a quick facepalm for her partner in everything, Sam turned a flat look on the dark bathroom before tossing another light spell in there. “Kynda.”

Her aim was careless and confident and the flight flared to life near the spot in the ceiling where the bathroom light used to be. Now that area was a pulpy mass of rainbow-oozing squishy bits of falling popcorn texture. Because her apartment was renovated by assholes who thought popcorn ceilings weren’t a sanitation and allergy nightmare for tenants to deal with.

“The whole room?”

“Damn. Look at how it incorporated the design, fixtures, and supplies into a semi-coherent whole.” Shooting another disgusted look at Gleipnir, Sam shook her head belatedly.

“You can’t wait to tell Kyle all about this, can you?” Because her pact item was just as much of a nerd about the mysterious ways magic manifested itself as her younger brother was.

“Come on, do you really think he’s seen something like this? The faucets are producing the saliva, which had to have originally come from bottles, which are now teeth. But the liquid in them is now coming out of the faucets which should be filled with water, but aren’t.” He gushed the way he did when he was really excited about things. “Don’t kill it yet. I want to get an essence imprint for my Satchel Beasts collection.”

“Holy shit. I haven’t even though about Satchel Beasts this whole time. I’ve missed so many opportunities to get monster essences for my deck.” Shoulders slumping with disappointment, the warlock leaned against the wall while her pact item rummaged around her personage and produced a deck of cards from the Gods only knew where. “Don’t worry, I’ve had my satchel on me this whole time and I’ve been getting essences for you as well. But you do owe me thirteen blank essence collection cards.”

Though she didn’t know when, or how the industrious Gleipnir had managed to do what he’d done, Sam was at least grateful.

“It’s gross.” Her comment was inane but felt like it needed to be said. Of course it was gross. It was an entire room which had become a mouth. Vibrant colored saliva pumping out of salivary glands shaped like the faucet fixtures they had once been. The floor and ceiling were pulsating and soft like the lining of a mouth. A little army of shampoo bottles, a hard pallet of ceramic and metal from the tub. And it was all in shades of pale grey, off-white, and silver. Except for the saliva and the toiletry bottle teeth. Which were floppy because they had come from plastic.

“So, gross.” Gleipnir replied as he activated the enchantment on his satchel and captured essences of the monster for his favorite magical game. “Okay, done. Go ahead and kill it. I suggest freezing it until it can be shattered. That should do it.”

“Fine.” Sighing, the Warlock of Frigg raided her wand and wove a spell of ice and binding and frost. “Vefa ok sauma. Kaldr ok kaldr.” Weave and sew. Cold and cold. Elemental spells weren’t really Sam’s forte. But she’d done more than one in the last week and that was saying something. Frigg was a wonderful patron for a magitechnican. She was a goddess of creativity and making things. Mostly of weaving, most notably, wyrd.

In English, Frigg was a weaver of fate.

But fate didn’t have to be big important events. It could be small. And weaving, spinning, and other fiber related art concepts could be nudged, twisted, and manipulated. Like fate, one could spin, weave, and sew other materials. Or things that didn’t have a physical form. Like cold. There was more a Warlock of Frigg could do, but Sam didn’t need more. Just enough to follow her passions.

From her wand cold grew. It flowed into the gaping maw filling it with frost and terror. The monster knew it was dying. It could sense and feel in its twisted and warped existence. So, it knew it hurt, it was feeling a sensation that it disliked, and which hurt it. It started thrashing, the walls and ceiling spasming as its tongue lashed out again seeking the only thing it knew, food to satiate its unending hunger.

“Come on.” Gleipnir nudged Sam in the direction of her bedroom. “Let’s get some stuff to take home or over to Kyle’s for a bit. You don’t have to watch this.” He nuzzled along her side and wrapped his ribbon protectively around her, guiding her to their bedroom and wiping at the tears running down her face as they went.

“I’ve gotten good at killing, haven’t I?”

“You are a child of a long and great line of warlocks,” Gleipnir chided her softly, “you were all meant for grander fates than you chose.”