Page 76 of Shadow Fall: Part Two

With Wane’s shadows, we didn’t need a key to the front door. By the time we’d scaled the white steps up to the front door, he’d already slipped shadow into the lock and got it open.

I shot him a grin, impressed by his skills even all these years since we first met. I was so distracted batting my lashes at my mate that I didn’t realise there was a heavy ward on this place until we’d walked through it.

“Shit!” Kai hissed, surrounded us with a swarm of snakes as golden light burst from my hand and Wane slammed a wall of shadows in front of us. But the magic didn’t attack us. “Huh.”

In my hand, the bone pin began to vibrate like crazy. “What the fuck?” I breathed, my hand dragged out in front of me, the key literally leading me. “This isn’t creepy at all! We’re going upstairs.”

Wane kept his shadows around me as we travelled up the wide steps, the carpet lush under my feet and the whole place smelling of expensive florals and wealth. A chandelier hung above us, the walls decorated with artwork of the ocean, cresting waves, and when we reached the landing at the top, family photos.

“Any idea who these people are?” I asked, squinting at the two people in every photo—a man with deep gold skin and curling surfer hair in a pure white shade, with smile lines around his eyes and a distinguished yet friendly air to him, like a CEO who was a total teddy bear at home; and a girl with pale skin and black hair like Snow White, mischief glittering in her eyes as she smiled up at the man, presumably her father. She grew older in each picture until we reached a photo of the two of them with their arms thrown over each other’s shoulders, the girl now in her early twenties with a tribal tattoo on her forearm like she’d picked it up while at college or backpacking around New Zealand.6

“It’s a family home,” Wane murmured, voicing my unease. “What are we doing here?”

I shrugged, following the key’s pull down the white and gold hallway past closed doors to one cracked open, like the key had already got here first. It felt creepily sentient.

“Let me go in first,” Kai ordered, his magic trembling around us. “Stay back, my rose.”

“And let the big, strong psycho handle it?” I asked with faux sweetness.

“Ignoring the sarcasm,” Kai quipped, sending the door creaking open—to reveal what was clearly the bedroom of the woman in the photos. It was decorated with a mix of classy elegance and punk rock, which I appreciated. I followed Kai into the room and gave a reverent nod to Joan Jett where she hung on the wall. My bone key was less interested in Joan, which was rude. It dragged me across a very plush rug I contemplated stealing, towards a dresser that sat in front of a bay window looking out on the ocean.

“Search for traps,” Wane told Kai with the air of a command. It went right to my clit and made me throb, but the key dragged me forward in a rough jerk, and I hissed, trying to get it out of control.

It didn’t stop until I stood right in front of the dressing table and then—it fell from my fingers onto the silver surface with a plink and settled there innocently, like it had never ordered me to come upstairs.

“Well, that’s not weird,” I muttered, ignoring the soreness in my body as I frowned at the table—

Both Kai and Wane startled when I began to laugh, loudly and wickedly. You have got to me fucking kidding me.

The dressing table held a few different knickknacks, telling me I was right about the backpacking. There was a Faberge egg, a gilded music box, several animals carved from wood, a hand mirror embellished with real gemstones, and a snow globe with a gorgeous clay base painted to show a stormy sky. I wiggled my fingers in a wave at the figure who stood within it, on a bank of glittery snow, his suit especially out of place in the snow globe and his signature grumpy expression in place.

I tapped a fingernail on the glass and asked, “Can you hear me in there?”

“Wait, he’s in a snow globe?” Kai demanded, leaning over me to frown at the big snow globe. Wane pressed in on my other side, a mix of nervousness and excitement in his expression.

“How did he get in there?”

I shrugged. “Someone must have trapped him. Stand back.”

When Kai and Wane gave me space, I picked up the hefty snow globe and, with a thrill in my belly, threw it at the floor hard enough that it smashed. I felt it—the collapse of an enchantment, the unravelling of power—and then Busty was kneeling on the floor, the knees of his dark grey suit wet and his hair plastered to his forehead. When he glanced up, there was true warmth and fondness in his eyes.

“Hello, Halwen.”

I grinned. “Hi, Busty.”

His eyes went flat. “Please stop calling me that.”

“Good luck with that,” Kai drawled, reaching out a tentative hand to help the man to his feet—this legend he’d grown up hearing stories about. “How did you get trapped in a snow globe?”

“That,” Erebus replied, “is a very long story.”

“Wanna come back to ours and tell it to us?” I offered. “I bought a pub. It’s called the Cock.”

Erebus laughed, low and rusty and a little dry. But I didn’t judge the guy; he’d been trapped for fuck knows how long. “I would love to visit the Cock, thank you. And to meet your daughter.”

There was something in his eyes, something in the slant of his smile.

“What are you up to?” I demanded, narrowing my eyes.

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