Cat stood, staring up at the shade, still a wispy black smoky colour, a worried expression on her face. She knew shades could be dangerous sure, but they weren’t usually this persistent. She wondered if they should all make a run for it. Shades could move fast though, and the furniture littered throughout this room wouldn’t prove as much of an obstacle for the shade as it would for them.
“Separate out,” Coal instructed.
“That seems like a really bad idea,” Zephyr replied.
Cat had to agree. She looked at Coal to see if he was being serious.
“I want to see who it goes for.”
“Why?” Cat asked.
“Just do it. Shield, duck or throw something at it if it comes for you.” Coal moved away from the two woman.
Indi glanced fearfully at Amanda to see if she agreed.
Amanda hesitated momentarily and then gave a quick decisive nod. Indi and Amanda took a few steps away from each other.
Cat rolled her eyes. She thought this plan was stupid. Why did it matter who it went for? She stayed where she was given she was far enough away from everyone else anyway. She waited, ready for it’s next attack.
Zephyr stayed crouched by his desk.
He needn’t have worried. The shade picked it’s target. It went straight for Indi.
She gave a yelp, backed up, tripped onto a white-cloaked couch and then remembered to shield just as the shiny flash of the shade’s blade struck out at her. It was so fast she couldn’t tell how the shade was holding the blade or even if it was a normal blade, or some part of the shade.
Coal took a few steps froward until he was standing next to Amanda. Then he stood, watching the shade circle once more.
Amanda made to move to Indi but Coal held out a hand to stop her.
Cat was wearing her puzzled expression again and stood with her hands placed on her hips loosely as if unworried about the shade rushing at her.
Cat’s instincts were right as once more the shade took a dive at Indi.
She was ready this time, with her shield raised high. The shade crashed into it and then paused in the air for a moment as if puzzled. It flew up and over the shield and then rammed it from the other side. Again and again it tried until it flew off and away, picking back up with it’s circling pattern, only faster this time.
Cat watched it both puzzled and worried by this behaviour. Coal’s gaze was fixated on Indi.
“What have you got?” he asked.
“Huh?” Indi looked back at him, confused expression on her face. She dropped her shield hesitantly, half eyeing the shade. Then she fixed her glasses.
“What did you take?” Coal varied his question slightly.
“What?”
“You took something from this house? What was it?” He spoke with a fierce almost scary tone.
Indi looked so confused and afraid that Amanda butted in. “Coal,” she warned in a hard tone of her own.
He held up a hand and repeated his question once more. This time his tone softened, became an asking one rather than a demanding one. “What did you take?”
A look of realisation crossed Indi’s face and she reached for her bag.
“Whatever it is, get it out and throw it away,” Coal told her.
The shade circled closer, preparing for another dive bomb.
Indi’s focus was on her bag as she rummaged through, looking for the thing she had grabbed earlier, that pretty puzzle cube.
She pulled it from the bag, fully prepared to throw it away, but the moment she lay her eyes on it she found herself fixated.
Nothing could draw her attention. She didn’t see the dark wispy shape as it descended upon her.
In two strides, before the shade could reach them, Amanda snatched the cube from Indi’s loose grip and hurled it to the far corner of the room. The shade chased after it, disappearing behind rows of furniture.
They all stood silent for sometime. Frozen, waiting for it to return. Then Indi blinked and she looked at her empty hand. “I didn’t even know what it was.” She frowned, obviously puzzled by this.
“It was probably cursed,” Coal remarked.
“Are you alright?” Amanda asked Indi.
Indi nodded then noticed the cut on Amanda’s arm. “You’re bleeding.”
Amanda shook her head. “It’s just a scratch.”
Coal leaned forward to take a look and seemed equally unworried.
“I can’t believe you took a random item from inside this place,” Cat remarked as Indi reached her side and started to walk beside her.
“I didn’t mean to, I think, it was like it wanted me to take it. Besides, we’re here to find an item, the will remember?” Indi replied.
“That’s not the same, and I’m sure Kass could just get away with a photograph if we do find it, not that there’s much hope of that anymore,” Cat replied.
Zephyr, eager to get further away from the shade, scurried on ahead for once, scouting their path to the exit.
Amanda, out of earshot of the others, waited for Coal and walked along next to him.
“How’d you figure that out?” she asked.
“Lucky guess,” Coal replied. When he noticed her still looking at him he added, “I have a few items with defensive spells cast on them. Basic thief protection. I’d heard that sometimes shades can be used that way, not that I have any myself.”
Amanda raised an eyebrow and gave him an assessing look. “Right.” Finding his reply acceptable she said nothing more and the two walked along together in silence. Somewhere up ahead Indi and Cat chatted while Zephyr cleared a path.
After a couple of corners, and one scramble over the top of a sheet-covered desk, Amanda paused and turned to Coal. “How’s the wound?” she asked.
He stopped an lifted up his shirt to check. “Not bleeding anymore thanks to you.”
Amanda nodded. “Why’d you come in here?” She stared him dead in the eye.
He met her look and and his expression hardened. He nodded at the winding path ahead. “We should keep moving.” He didn’t look back.
Amanda gave his back a sour look and caught up to him.
As she reached his side he remarked casually, “They always say you should pick your battles but no one ever says which one’s you’re supposed to pick.”
She didn’t press him any further. She doubted she’d get anything more useful out of him. Was he after something? A treasure? An item? It wasn’t unlikely. But the question remained, had he known they would be in here? Was it coincidence or had he come in after them? And if so, why?
Indi chatted away to Cat vibrantly. She’d already forgotten about the encounter with the shade or how the pretty puzzle cube had made her feel. Even the ever present dangers that were lurking in the shadows were keeping themselves hidden in her mind. Instead she was just enjoying just talking with her friend.
“He’s actually quite nice you know.”
“Uh huh,” Cat replied skeptically. “Don’t be fooled into confusing politeness with kindness. Coal is as ruthless as they come. He’ll serve you a five course dinner with caviar, clams, and private quartet and then stab you in the stomach just as dessert arrives if it benefits him to do so.”
Indi shook her head. “I don’t think so. I think that part’s just an act. Like how he lets people think he killed his own parents... I mean he did, but it was an accident. He just a little kid who couldn’t control his powers so he accidentally summoned a monster without meaning to.”
“Who told you that?” Cat asked.
“Coal did.”
“When?”
“Earlier today.”
“Why?”
“Because I asked.”
“You just asked an aristocrat if he killed his parents or not?” Cat gave Indi a bewildered look.
“Yes.” Indi replied not understanding why Cat was making a fuss about it.
“And he just told you?”
“Yes.”
Cat was silent a moment, thinking it through, and since Indi hated to waste silence, she continued talking.
“You know it’s sad really. I think he’s lonely don’t you?”
Cat scoffed. “No, I think he’s got plenty of rich pretty people to hang out with at fancy cocktail parties.”
Indi grinned at the thought of it. “What do you think they’re like? The parties aristocrats go to?”
“Probably really boring and full of politics and trying to kill one another or trying to get one another to kill one another. And you’ve been to one remember? Back when we first met.”
“Oh yeah, that was nice. I wasn’t really paying that much attention to the party though cause you know we were focused on stealing information and stuff. You know I kind of imagined Coal’s parties as fancier than that one.”
“How do you get fancier than that one?” Cat vaulted over a desk effortlessly.
Indi paused, briefly wondering if she could do the same. Deciding it wasn’t worth the injury risk she climbed over carefully instead. “I don’t know, just fancier. Maybe with like... a giant blow up castle or something and floating fairy lights, and drinks that refill themselves.”
Cat raised an eyebrow.
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Indi shrugged. “Hey, all of those things are doable.”
“Doable or not I can’t imagine a bunch of aristocrats like Coal in some kind of blow up bouncy castle.”
“Hey, I didn’t say bouncy, I just said blow up, but if there were one I bet they’d all love it. Nobody hates bouncy castles.”
They caught up to Zephyr who stood waiting at the exit to the room. “Figured I’d wait for everyone to catch up before we head back into the other maze.” he eyed the door warily.
“Smart,” Cat replied, her tone neutral for once.
They joined Zephyr in waiting for the other two.
Indi shifted from foot to foot then spoke quietly to Cat. “What do you think our chances are of finding a working bathroom in this place are?”
Cat shrugged. “Probably depends on what kind of mood the house is in.” She replied in an offhandish tone but she had to admit, she kind of needed to go to. She crossed her arms and hoped the others wouldn’t be too long.
Amanda and Coal rounded the corner a moment later. Amanda nodded at the door. Zephyr hesitated and then reached for the handle.
They piled into a hallway they hadn’t seen before. It was just as dusty and dark as the rest of the house. No one had any idea what time it was anymore. The light that spilled into the large ballroom behind them had seemed like afternoon light, although the opaqueness of the windows had made it hard to be sure, besides no one trusted what they saw through those windows anymore anyway. The hallway was darker but a few open doors up ahead let through enough natural light that they could make out their way. Zephyr turned the torch back on anyway, just to be on the safe side.
“Promising,” Coal remarked but he was met with a grunt in reply from Amanda and a soft snort from Cat. “Lead the way Zeph,” Coal commanded.
Once again Zephyr hesitated but only for a moment. There was no getting out of here by standing still after all.
Cat peaked in all the rooms that they passed, hoping one might be a bathroom. No such luck though.
“Try that end door,” Coal suggested, indicating a slightly smaller shaped door at the end of the hall. Its top edge was curved and it was obvious most of them were going to have to duck if they went through it. On its front a pair of pretty pink faded flowers were engraved against green tinged wood, their stalks wrapped around one another.
Some of the other doors closer to it were also shut and Cat attempted to open each one as they went past them.
“We’re not going to get anywhere if you insist on opening every door,” Coal remarked, annoyed at having to keep stopping. This hallway was narrower than the others had been, and the ceiling lower. He didn’t like it.
Cat ignored him and frowned as one of the doors opened to reveal nothing but a solid wall behind it.
“Maybe it was boarded up,” Indi suggested.
But there was no hint of a seam and Cat couldn’t be bothered searching for one.
Zephyr reached the door at the end of the hallway. As Amanda joined him he remarked, “It’s like they made the door just for you.
“Mmm,” Amanda replied but her tone suggested she was unimpressed with this observation. The height of the door was only a little above her head height.
She reached for the handle but the door was locked. She tried twisting it again and gave a good solid push but it didn’t budge.
“You could just burn it down,” Cat remarked impatiently.
“But it’s such a pretty door,” Indi complained.
Amanda looked at the door and sighed. She turned to Cat. “You can lock pick right?”
“Sure but...” Cat held out her hands to indicate she had no tools for lock picking on her.
Coal handed her a small black case.
She opened it and rolled her eyes. The case was filled with exactly the right tools for the job. “We could just kick it in.”
“Better to be gentle with a house like this. They have shades to protect their treasure, you don’t know what else they’ve got,” Coal told her.
Cat grumbled some more but pushed her way through to the front to take a look. “Good gods, it’s a warded lock.”
“Problem?” Coal asked.
“No, one of these skeleton keys should do it, just need to try a couple. Warded locks are old though. I didn’t think anyone used them anymore.” Cat slipped different long pieces of metal that looked like trimmed down keys into the lock. On the third try the key spun all the way around and the door opened with a click. “Easy,” Cat remarked. She pushed the door in.
They all peered through the tiny door as best they could, trying to get a look at the room. Like many of the others it was filled with junk, vases, and candlesticks, and various music boxes. On the other side of the room lay another door, this one more normal sized.
“I guess this is the back entrance,” Amanda remarked as they all trailed in one after the other.
Coal, who was last through, closed the door behind them. It had no handle on this side and the edge almost blended into the wallpaper each side.
“Which part of the house do you suppose we’re in now?” Cat asked.
“No idea,” Amanda replied.
The group spread out, looking at all the various items in the room. A large table and several other shelves blocked their way directly forwards forcing them to take either the left or the right hand path around the table. Indi, Cat and Coal went one way, Zephyr and Amanda went the other.
Cat ignored their surroundings and moved to the other door as fast as the structure of the room allowed. Zephyr met her there not long after she reached the door.
Indi took her time. Even though she did want to find a bathroom, her need was not so great that she could be so easily torn away from such mysteries. It was like getting a glimpse into another life.
“There’s so much junk in this place,” Cat remarked as she wished for them to hurry up.
“One person’s junk is another person’s treasure,” Indi replied, her eyes found every little thing and studied it, marvelled over it, remembered it.
Coal didn’t mind her slow pace, from the moment he’d walked in he’d spotted something, the thing he’d been meaning to find. It was smaller than he’d expected. Of that he was glad too. While Indi distracted herself and the others he delicately and stealthily slipped the small red vase into his pocket. He hoped it would not draw the shade back again, at least not too quickly. If it did they’d just have to find another way to destroy it.
Finally Indi finished her lollygagging and reached the waiting group. Coal followed behind her, confident that no one had noticed him take the object.
“Finally,” Cat remarked with an eye roll.
Amanda nodded at the door.
Cat reached for the handle.
A loud crash erupted from the wall to the left hand side.
Indi gave a yelp in surprise as something pushed through the wall, shattering pottery as it did so. A cloud of dust filled the air.
Coal raised his sword. Surely the shade wasn’t back that quickly?
It was Amanda who recognised their new guest first. “Wolf!” she cried happily.
“Wolf?” Indi repeated in a puzzled tone as she struggled to make out the animal shape beneath all the dust. Her words quickly turned into a cough and then a wheeze. She struggled to get a breath. She backed up quickly, away from the cloud of dust and pulled her newly acquired inhaler from her pocket.
“You alright?” Cat asked in a concerned tone, half reaching for Indi but not sure how to help.
As Indi felt the medicine fill her lungs and the dust cloud settled further away from where she was, she nodded.
Cat pulled her arms back to her sides but watched Indi just in case.
Amanda went to greet Wolf who pulled back hesitantly at first, but upon seeing that this was the real Amanda he shifted back into his human form.
“I heard you were lost in the basement?” Amanda inquired.
“I was for a bit,” Wolf replied. “What happened to you lot?” He surveyed the group then added, “Where’s Sirius and Kass?”
Amanda’s face fell and her shoulders drooped. “Cat pulled me out of a dream but she couldn’t reach them. I don’t know how to get back to where we were.”
“I did not,” Cat interrupted. “Amanda says she saw me and that I pulled her out but it wasn’t me, that’s for sure.”
“A different you?” Wolf asked, his brown eyebrows knotted in concern.
Amanda shook her head and rubbed her face with one hand. “I don’t know. I was pretty sure it was Cat.”
“Hmm,” Wolf rubbed his own chin.
“Time seems a bit messed up here though,” Amanda added.
“I don’t have a watch,” Wolf replied and then glanced at the window in the side of the room. It was lighter in here now there was a huge hole in the side of the room. He looked back at the hole. “I think I can get you back to them. I went past them earlier but there were some pretty thick bars in the way, and that’s assuming it was them. I couldn’t smell them and this house has been playing tricks. I thought it might have been just another illusion but if they’re dreaming as you said...”
“Show me, anyway,” Amanda told him.
Wolf nodded and transformed back into wolf form. He’d be able to retrace his own path better that way.
They climbed out through the hole given the door quite obviously didn’t lead to the room Wolf had come from.
As they climbed through Indi turned to Coal. “So what exactly is a shade?”
Cat answered, “It’s a creature from the dream realm, they’re kind of like nightmares. They make you see things you’re afraid of.”
“How come they didn’t do it before?”
This time Coal got their first. “They did, in the mirrors. They create illusions.”
“Illusions that can hurt you,” Cat added
“I thought shades usually take on other forms themselves?” Amanda asked.
“They do,” Cat agreed but she was frowning as if confused by the same thing.
“Shades are adaptive,” Coal replied, “we’re probably not the first people in this house and a lot of people find mirrors creepy. It’s also something that draws the attention.”
“Maybe if you’re Cat,” Wolf remarked so quietly and deadpan that the others almost missed it.
“Hey!” Cat objected but it was more a cursory objection than a serious one.
“So you ran into a dream shade?” Wolf asked.
Amanda nodded.
“Are there other kinds?” Indi asked, noticing his wording and tone.
Amanda answered. “The thing about shades is they have no form except that which resembles things that people fear. They don’t read minds mind you, they pick up on what shapes to become through experience and observing nightmares. They usually fear light and will attack it. But the more often a shade takes on a from the more real that form becomes. Fire shades are the worst. They are made of fire and they’ve lost all fear of light. If they touch you they’ll burn you up.”
“You’re talking bullshit,” Cat interrupted.
“I am not.”
Cat looked at Wolf to see where he stood on the issue. He huffed and shifted back into two-legged form.
“I have heard of them...” Wolf started.
Amanda shot Cat a triumphant look.
“...although many of them are unfounded rumors. And the light thing is an exaggeration. It only applies under certain circumstances.”
Cat replied to Amanda’s look with a raised eyebrow.
Wolf continued. “Fire-shades are in the realm of namons, anyone who’s seen one didn’t live very long after.”
“Except namons are real.” Cat insisted with a frown.
“If no one survives an attack by one then where do the stories come from?” Indi asked.
“I always thought shades in general were just an urban legend,” Zephyr admitted.
“Well we didn’t exactly see the shade the first time it attached us,” Coal pointed out in reply to Indi’s question. “But they aren’t uncommon.”
Wolf glanced sideways at Coal and frowned. He left the question that was bugging him for now and instead asked another one. “So what happened to you two earlier?” He looked from Cat to Zephyr.
Cat sighed and rolled her eyes. “Timey wimey bullshit.” She reached for a doorknob. She was keeping her tradition of opening and closing every door as they walked. It was earning her the occasional sideways glance from Coal. No one else really paid it much attention though.
Zephyr added in his own explanation. “We thought you guys had disappeared and you thought we had disappeared but in reality who the fuck knows.”
Wolf grunted in acknowledgement.
Cat slammed another door to a useless room. “You know, there’s got to be some permanent dream magic in this house if there are shades about. They need a doorway kept open to exist here.”
Wolf paused. “I thought they can still haunt people in the daytime, when they’re awake I mean, not outside literally.”
“They can, do both, but only for a short time. And this house’s owner’s been dead awhile right? So unless someone is coming back here regularly or they’re keeping unconscious people locked up here in the house...”
Amanda stopped walking which caused Cat to stop talking. She turned around and met Cat’s eyes, a question haunting her own.
Cat shrugged.
“How else would you do it?” Coal asked matter-of-factly.
“A dreamwalker or borrower or infused item,” Amanda replied.
“It’s still going to wear off eventually.” He spoke thoughtfully.
“We saw some runes downstairs,” Amanda told him. She relaxed a little at remembering that.
Coal nodded. “A good infusement then.”
Amanda nodded and turned slowly to start walking again. She still seemed hesitant and unsure though, and maybe a little worried.
The others followed with Coal taking up the back. Cat rattled the handle of a locked door, momentarily considered picking it but decided it wasn’t worth the effort and moved on to the next one.
“Cat, quit opening and closing doors,” Amanda requested with a glance back as Cat let another on slam shut loudly.
“I might find something,” Cat replied.
“Yeah but that’s not necessarily a good thing,” Zephyr remarked.
Cat ignored them both but she did shut the doors a bit quieter for the next room.
Three doors on she got lucky, opening it to see black and white tiles and surprisingly tidy bathroom. She paused.
Coal stepped past her then leaned against the wall as if waiting. Cat glanced at him, noticed his amused raised eyebrow and promptly ignored him. Looking further down the hall she called, “Hey Indi, how haunted do you think their bathrooms are?”
The others turned to look back at her.
As Amanda opened her mouth to reply Cat slipped inside the bathroom and locked the door.
Indi retraced her steps down the hall, stopped next to Coal, and complained at the closed door, “Oh, but I need to go to too.”
“I’m not sure that was the wisest idea,” Amanda remarked with a touch of worry.
Zephyr sighed and copied Coal’s act of leaning against the wall. “Well it’s probably better it’s Cat, she can best deal with what ever spirits this place has haunting it’s plumbing or any dreamwalker magic that’s floating around.”
Amanda looked at him sternly but she didn’t reply.
Indi shifted restlessly. Now she was standing so close to a bathroom she found her need much more urgent. She wobbled from one foot to the other, back and forth.
Amanda gave her a sympathetic look.
They waited outside until they heard a toilet flush but when after a few minutes there was still no sign of Cat they started to worry.
Amanda glanced at Coal, who raised one eyebrow in reply.
“Cat?” Amanda called gently, “Are you alright?”