Page 66 of The Monster of Hotel No. 7
After I send it, I close my eyes and see Karia. I open them and watch Maude type. If I could flee, there is only one of them I would run to. I dart my gaze to my closed bedroom door. I know I am losing precious moments of peaceful sleep, but this is my only time to… breathe. Besides, this mindless chatting takes away from the smarting sensation in my thigh; the burn of a blade dug into skin. It’s a distraction from the paranoia that this might become infected, ooze through my body and end me.
Perhaps I want it to.
But first, I want her.
MadMaude:I want to kiss you
I grind my teeth and turn over in bed, bowing my temple to my pillow, feeling the wound shift against my mattress in a slice of agony.
I have seen Karia kissed by Cosmo. The saliva between their mouths. I clench my fingers tighter around my phone as I shiver in my bed and think of pouring a vat of formalin over Cosmo’s head.
Chapter26
Sullen
The small lobby is dark. There are heavy, plum-violet curtains over the front street-facing windows. The scent of something shadowy and linen is thick in the air, and only a sliver of sunlight spills onto the rough hardwood floors.
Karia is quiet behind me as she closes the door, a too-cheerful bell chiming our arrival. We didn’t speak much as we spent an hour keeping our heads down and searching for this place.Serpents Emporium;I knew only that it was beside a doughnut shop and had an emerald green door with the number four inked across it in black.
With no phone and no map, along with the fact I know nothing of the city due to my confinement, I’m surprised we arrived at all. But Karia, once I described the doughnut shop next door—purple signage, blue awnings—knew where to go.
Every time I have called her stupid, it has been a lie.
“May I help you?” A woman’s voice spills from somewhere deep inside the shop. Past the circular lobby, there are rows and rows of…things. From where I am standing, I see books on some of the shelves, seashells cloistered along others, bags of black sand, a basket of what might be hooves. Somewhere I can’t see, something bubbles viciously, and I wonder if it gives the Emporium its peculiar scent.
The shelves tower toward the ceiling, dusted in dark gold paint. The walls are black, lending the space a sinister sort of coziness that vaguely, for reasons not entirely logical, remind me of my labs.
“Where are you?” Karia asks the question with a bitterness as she steps up next to me in her heels. She still only reaches my shoulders and if I’m not careful, I’ll be smiling over the fact. As it is, her question is valid. Aside from deep burgundy lounge chairs dropped with black velvet pillows and a staircase disappearing to a second level at our right, I don’t see the woman who spoke.
But I hear her moving, rustling amongst the shelves, and a moment later, a shadow appears along the row with hooves, then the woman herself steps out.
I understand then what all the rustling was about.
She is wearing a red and black dress, all taffeta and lace, short, puffy sleeves, a long, elegant train covering her shoes. She has thick black hair twisted up into an intricate bun high on her head, porcelain skin, ruby red lipstick, and heavy eyeliner. I know from our brief exchange years ago she is only a couple of years older than me, and her name is Maude. Rings adorn her hands, long, black-tipped taloned nails grace her fingertips at her sides.
Karia rolls back her shoulders beside me, her arm brushing mine.
“Hello,” Maude says, her gaze on me. “Are you looking for anything in particular today?” She does not look at Karia at all.
Karia Ven, of course, does not like this.
“Are we?” she echoes, nudging me with her elbow. “If so, please do tell.”
I glance at her and find her cerulean eyes narrowed into cat-like slits, her ridiculously expensive sunglasses pushed up onto her head, all the baby blonde strands of her hair away from her pretty face.
I do not know why she’s so angry. This isn’t a permanent solution, but if I’m right, it’s at least one for the night.
“Yes,” I answer Maude, tearing my gaze from Karia, pouting at my side. “We’re looking for The Creep’s Attic.” My voice comes out a croak, and for a moment, Maude only blinks at me, as if she might not have heard me.
Frustration starts to swell inside my chest. I do not have any patience left.
I want a place to be alone that isn’t a cramped car. I want more darkness. I want to eat Karia alive. If this is all the time I have with her, I want to pick and prod and poke at her until there is little left to dissect.
I want cramped quarters. A room to briefly call my own. A space to think.I am not used to all this freedom. It makes me feel itchy.
Maude’s gaze flickers to my throat, which is covered by the same shirt I wore yesterday, but my heart drums a warning beat all the same. What if I’ve gotten this all wrong? I thought perhaps this was the one place inside the city Writhe did not reach. I could be the stupid one, though.
But then Maude says, very softly, “Scully?”
