Page 86 of Whispered Warnings: Part Two

“Neith killed me and cursed me to this form forever for betraying her,” Ethel replies seriously.

I shrug, “I didn’t think it would work.” Their shocked expressions make my lips twitch, and I can no longer keep a straight face, “I’m joking and so is she, I didn’t kill her. Although, getting an honest answer out of her about how she came to be a talking skull, and in this house is very unlikely.”

“So, you have a sentient house,” Doc starts and the drawers open and close as if to say, ‘yep that’s me’. Doc’s eyes widen slightly, “Right, a sentient house and a talking skull.”

“Well, technically I don’t have anything, they don’t belong to me,” I reply. “I’ll tell you the story over dinner?”

“Oh, food,” River says and then adds. “I can see why Niamh put that enchantment on it.”

As we walk over to the table and take our seats, Reed hands out everyone’s food. I nod, “Yeah. I’m actually surprised that House let us in so quickly. It doesn’t like letting anyone inside except for me usually.”

“And me,” Ethel adds.

I roll my eyes with a smile, “Yes, and you, but you don’t technically leave, do you?”

“Well, no,” she replies.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Neith

Once the food is passed out, Reed asks, “Okay, so how did you manage to find this place?”

“By accident. I was over here doing something for Dimitri, and I got caught in this storm and was being chased, or rather hunted, by a rogue pack of shifters. I stumbled across this place, and I was sure that someone lived there, but no one answered the door. I could feel the magic in there, so I went in to escape the shifters. House helped me take them down, and then I called Niamh, and she explained how the house wouldn’t letanyone step foot on the grounds, let alone in the house itself, and that was pretty much the end of it. From that point on, whenever I was in Ireland, I stayed here. I’m still learning things about it, but yeah, House now lets people on the grounds if I’m here, but we’re still working on letting people in the house,” I explain.

“So there was a chance that it wouldn’t have let us enter?” Ransom asks.

I nod, “Yeah. Good news, House obviously likes you.”

“Thank fuck for that,” River says, “I don’t want to sleep outside even shifted it would be too fucking cold.”

“It seems really modern in here,” Raiden says, and I assume that there’s a question in there somewhere.

I nod, “It wasn’t when I first arrived, but gradually, it started to change, and now it’s got all the modern conveniences that you could hope for without compromising on any of the charm. I love it.”

The doors in the kitchen open and close again.

“That’s going to take some getting used to,” Van says as he takes a giant bite of his burger.

“Do you know how rare it is to find a sentient house?” Raiden asks, excitement and interest sparking in his eyes.

“I have no idea; I didn’t want to do any research on it and end up flagging it somewhere or something. If HID knew about this place then there is a good chance that they would have tried to possess it in some way, and they certainly wouldn’t have let me back here. I didn’t want to risk that.”

“That makes sense,” Griff agrees. “This is a thousand times rarer than your sword, and your sword isn’t exactly common.”

I nod, “I kind of figured.”

We all fall silent as we eat our food, the conversation pausing.

“Okay, so what’s the plan for tomorrow?" Doc asks after a while.

“We need to head up to the guy’s parents' place on the edge of the moors and see if there is anything there that could give us an idea about where he is,” Griff suggests.

“Yeah, I agree. I think we should probably get a fairly early start, we’re losing light quite quickly at this time of year, and from what little I know about the moors, I don’t imagine that there is an abundance of streetlights, if any,” Evander says.

I nod, “You would be correct.”

“I hope that there’s something there,” Ransom says. “Anything.”

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