Instead of dragging things down with a long-winded author's note, all ramblings, trivia and behind-the-scenes goodies will be found at the end of the story.
For the next week, I'll be posting one chapter every night until Halloween.
As always, comments are deeply appreciated.
Enjoy!
Peter found his things at the Manhattan Bridge incinerator, right where the sanitation dispatcher had suggested. Well to be fair, the guy had suggested a lot of places – the depot, several trucks in Chinatown, and the municipality garage at Bower and Grand – but the main thing was, he'd got his stuff back. Some of it anyway.
Peter squatted to pick through the contents of the duffel. A quick inventory revealed a rude ball of mismatched clothes, one dirty Nike, half a dozen textbooks, and what Peter assumed to be the complete contents of his desk, pencils shavings and all. He scooped Emperor Palpatine off the bottom of the bag with a sigh of relief. One of his lightning bolts was missing, probably off starting a new life with the AWOL shoe.
An ambulance hurtled past down on the street, sirens howling, inconvenienced cabbies cussing it out as it went. Peter sat back to think. Summer was disappearing 'round the bend, and a chill gust of wind scattered cellophane wrappers along the asphalt in sparkling dervishes. It wasn't freezing, but it was going to be an uncomfortable night on a park bench if he didn't think of something.
Which led back to his current predicament, the bright yellow eviction notice tacked to his apartment door. Getting it removed would require a sizable amount of cash monies, which he obviously didn't have - not since the pizza delivery gig had fallen through last month - and Peter didn't think plea-bargaining would work with his landlord. Despite getting on in years, Mr. Ditkovich was the type of guy that could find himself alone in Mott Haven, surrounded by muggers asking what he was doing on the bad side of the hood, and he'd joke in his thick Eastern European accent, "You dink dis bad neighborhood?"
MJ & Ned had moved to Boston at the end of August. Even if they hadn't, he couldn't have gone to them anyway. He'd only just gotten back to the whole "awkward acquaintance" stage with Ned, but he'd visited the doughnut shop so often, MJ had started giving him the hairy eyeball every time he came in. He obviously hadn't been quite as subtle with his feelings as he'd thought. If he'd showed up unannounced at her place, she'd have maced him for sure.
Then Peter thought of home, even though he tried not to. There'd been several apartments over the years, starting with cramped walk-up where Mr. Stark had swaggered into his life. Home wasn't attached to a location. "Home" was the smell of smudging sage and vanilla candles, and coffee perking on the kitchen counter. Certified fair trade, of course.
"Always have coffee ready, Peter," Aunt May had told him on more than one occasion. "You never know when somebody might need some."
Peter's eyes watered and he fought against the sudden knot in his throat, trying to swallow it back down before it crawled all the way out. He didn't even know what'd happened to Aunt May's place. With no spouse or living relatives-
Peter defiantly wiped his face against his sleeve. The struggle was real, as Ned would say. Blowing his nose was really inconvenient in costume. He took a deep breath and briskly zipped up the duffel. Even through the mask, he could tell it reeked of Lo Mein and spoiled tuna. He pinched a moldy noodle off the strap and flicked it against the dumpster. It stuck there with a wet fwip. Peter cracked a smile.
Oh, well. Wasn't that nice of a place to begin with. Pretty sure the guy next to me was doing drugs. Or selling drugs. I mean, wasn't reeeeally sure, but… damn, that would've been awkward if I'd actually saw something. Seriously, what am I supposed do in that situation? Change into my costume, crawl over to his window and knock? "Hey buddy, can't have ya selling blow in the apartment building. Sorry, Spider's rules."
The thought cheered him up considerably. He slung the duffel over one shoulder and took to the rooftops. Eventually he came to the corner of Bowery and East Broadway. Seeing that he had no particular place to be, he decided to perch where he could observe a good deal of Chinatown proper.
Traffic was relatively light – by New York standards anyway – but the sidewalks were swollen with pedestrians coming and going. Teenagers in Doc Martins and grungy hoodies, oblivious to the bite in the air, mixed in with lawyers and bankers muffled in expensive carcoats and leather gloves, while Jack-o-Lanterns leered out from every storefront.
A horn blared somewhere. A man hollered obscenities in response. The street throbbed with the deep, bass pulse of rap music fading out of hearing as the car playing it rolled around the next corner. Strings of Chinese lanterns bobbed in a sudden swell of wind, crimson against the deepening purple sky. A faint whiff of sewer wafted up on the same breeze, quickly blown away by the rich umami scent of a hundred noodle joints and twice that number of coffee shops selling pumpkin-spice everything.
A bell jangled somewhere below, and Peter followed the sound to see a woman exit the shop on the other side of the street, both hands bunched into the collars of two school-age children as they moved to wait at the crosswalk. The youngest was holding a brown paper bag with a fistful of joss sticks poking out the top. Peter's soul ached for his aunt again. His eyes roamed back to the shop, thinking about buying one or two for himself.
A glowing yellow awning proclaimed the establishment as the Aum Shanti Spiritual Bookshop & Crystal Gallery – Jewelry, Incense, Yoga Supplies and Gifts for the Soul. The storefront window was artfully cluttered with figurines, polished gemstones, dangling strings of mala beads, and an elaborately carved teakwood partition with a price tag asking more than double Peter's monthly rent. A small Buddha sat on the sidewalk just beside the door, fingers gracefully arranged with middle-finger and thumb lightly touching. It was that gesture, latent with the subtle power evident in both wrists frozen at the exact moment of momentum, which drew Peter's attention.
Stephen! I could go to Stephen's place and ask if I can couch-surf for a couple of days… except he doesn't remember me either.
Peter's shoulders wilted at the realization.
It was hard enough having to stand there and talk to Happy like- like none of that stuff ever happened. Except it did happen. Just because nobody else remembers, doesn't mean it all just- just evaporates!
He vaulted onto the rooftop and began to pace, pea-gravel sifting beneath the thin soles of his shoes.
DID it just evaporate? My social security number is totally bogus, so as far as anybody's concerned, I guess I wasn't even born, but- no. No, the "things" happened. It's "me" that didn't happen. Well, I mean me as in Peter Parker, not Spider-Man. Argggh this is so confusing! Magic sucks!
Peter went to rake both hands through his hair, then stopped as he realized his costume didn't have hair – which made it look all the weirder when he suddenly transitioned to the frozen pantomime of somebody who'd just stepped on his glasses.
Wait. Peter Parker doesn't exist. But Spider-Man exists. That's it! I'm Spider-Man. I was in the Avengers. Stephen still knows Spider-Man. Ha! He clapped his hands together loudly. That'll do, Pig. Er, Spider. Spider-Pig.
He flicked a web across the street and swung off.
Half a minute later, he came back for the duffel.
By the time he reached the other side of SoHo the skyscrapers had dropped away, becoming nightclubs, cafes and museums, shrinking lower and lower until the skyline had transformed into a low sprawl of turn-of-the-century brownstones. Purple fairy lights twinkled in the phalanx of trees running up and down the street, bathing the district with a deep, eerie glow suitable for October – or calling on a wizard's house after dark.
Peter touched down on the sidewalk with hardly a break in momentum, transitioning into the casual walk of a university student leaving one of the many nearby campuses. He'd have passed for one, too, if it wasn't for the costume.
Case in point, the dark blue sedan creeping around the corner just in time to cut him off. The windows were tinted, and he couldn't see inside, but he was sure the driver had slowed down to rubberneck at him as he passed. Peter flapped an awkward wave.
"Yeah, hi. How ya doin'? Just your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, standing here with a scuzzy bag… obviously casing the joint. Seriously, dude, take a picture. It'll last longer. You know what, on second thought don't take a picture."
The car didn't come to a full stop, but it was a near thing. Peter decided not to make further eye contact with a potential predator, and instead observed the Sanctum across the street.
He was a little surprised to see it was still there. He'd only been by that one time, but it'd been with the expectation to find a ragged gap in the street where the old Victorian had sprouted legs and walked off like the house in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. And then there was also the question of why he was never overcome by the crippling realization of having left a curling iron on the bathroom sink, or his kids in the backseat of a hot car.
The sedan crept on. Peter checked both ways, then jogged across the street. The fancy double doors had taken on a decidedly spooky cast, glass panels winking like the glare of disembodied eyes. Peter adjusted the duffel over his shoulder. He lifted a finger towards the doorbell.
...Is this weird? This is weird. I think the school's empty this time of night. I can borrow the teacher's lounge for a couple hours... yeah, you know what. It's late. He's probably in bed, and I don't wanna put him out or anything. I'll just-
The doors abruptly split open. Peter snatched his hand back.
Forgot it does that. Why bother even having a doorbell at all?
Motionless again, the traitorous house silently beckoned him inside. Peter cautiously peered into the foyer. It wasn't exactly lit by torches, but between the subdued orange lamps and the fire crackling invitingly in the hearth, the effect was close enough. He itched the back of his leg with his foot.
"...Hello?"
A moment passed, then another. Peter shuffled backwards on the stoop, buoyed by the thought that his arrival had gone unnoticed. See? Nobody's even home. I'm gonna just-
"Spider-Man. To what do I owe the pleasure?"
Peter whipped around so fast it was almost comical. He'd taken his eyes off the grand staircase for one second, one measly second, and suddenly Strange was just there – floating three feet off the ground with his cloak spread out like dark red wings. Peter cocked his head to one side.
"How did- Seriously, when did you get there? Did you portal in? Cause I honestly didn't hear it. Can you make yourself invisible, or have you got like- like a secret entrance up there or… some- something?"
His rambling trailed off as Strange levitated down the stairs to meet him. Honestly, the whole thing was quite a bit more intimidating than he remembered from last time, mostly due to the lack of a North Face parka and unlaced snowboots. Or maybe it was because this time they were meeting as strangers. Well… maybe not "strangers". More like coworkers. Okay, that sounds weird. Work buddies? That's even weirder.
Strange settled on a ground a few feet away and Peter struggled to look him in the eye. The older man's gaze was cordial, but that was it. There was a distance there that Peter noticed right away, a sense of formality that hadn't existed that morning atop Lady's Liberty's torch. Peter swallowed the lump in his throat. After Happy, and MJ and Ned…
It hurt.
"Hi," he managed lamely.
"Hello," said Strange amicably.
The silence dragged on for so long Peter felt as though the air was getting sucked out of the room. Strange lifted a finger to point at him.
"You have something on your shirt."
"I do?" Peter's chin dropped to look down at himself. "Oh. Must've stuck to me when I was going through the dumpster. Hang on-"
He flicked the soggy piece of lettuce off with one hand. It hit the floorboards with sound not dissimilar from a loogie, like something he'd just hocked up from his chest and spat. He and Strange stared at it for a minute. Peter flushed beneath the thin fabric of his suit.
"S-Sorry! I'll totally clean that up-"
Strange held up a hand. "It's fine, Spider," he said, lips twitching suspiciously.
His eyes raked Peter up and down, a furrow slowly forming between his brows as he took in the duffel. Peter went to say something, couldn't figure out what, and closed his mouth again. The urge to die of cringe had never been as strong as it was in that moment.
Dude, you gotta say something. Don't just stare soulfully into his eyes until he asks if you want a kiss. Use your words!
"Are you in some kind of trouble?" Strange asked softly.
"What? No! No, of course not."
Both of Peter's hands flew up and began to gesticulate, trying to weave some nebulous concept out of thin air. "I mean, no more than usual. Trouble always seems to be scoping me out, know what I mean? Course you know what I mean. You're probably busy fighting, like, necromancers all the time, cause you're- well, because you're..."
He trailed off again. Strange was still looking at him evenly. After a long moment Peter let his hands drop back to his sides, forearms clapping his thighs with a soft whump of finality.
"I got kicked out of my apartment," he admitted. "I was wondering if I could crash here for a couple of days, just till I figure some stuff out."
There was a slight pause.
"Well, why didn't you lead with that?" said Strange. He gestured towards the stairs, cloak flaring with the movement. "Come in. Make yourself at home. Full disclosure, however: if you find a little closet where there really shouldn't be one – don't go in there. Just leave the door open and come find me."
"Why? That where you keep your enchanted rose?" Peter quipped.
"Ha. No. It's because that particular closet has a tendency to… move around. And I have no idea where it goes in the interim. Moreover, it has taken the vacuum with it and Wong's been riding my ass on how I don't clean around here."
Peter sniggered. The stairs creaked softly underfoot. "Listen, Stephen… thanks for not making a big deal outta this. I, uh, I really appreciate it. And I'll help out! I'm not a mooch or anything."
Strange threw him a sideways glance. "There's more than enough room for you to stay as long as you need to," he said dismissively. "The Sanctum is always open to people that require it, let alone someone that's done as much as you have. And don't call me Stephen. Feels weird."
Peter's expression crumpled a little. "Yes, sir," he said quietly.
They climbed to the second floor in silence. The parquet tiles underfoot were the color of dark honey, burnished smooth under the passage of hundreds of footsteps, and shining warmly under half a dozen old lamps spaced up and down the hall — which between the bookcases, cabinets, bronze astrolabes, and antique settees with dusty velvet upholstery, was also deceptively narrow. Peter carefully sidestepped a full suit of armor.
"Whoa, what is that? Like, mid-thirteenth century?"
"Fourth Crusade, yeah." Strange waved one of the side doors open. A lamp flared on inside. "You can stay in this one. Also," he turned stared at Peter for a beat. "Look, I don't know a nice way to tell you this… but you stink."
Peter winced. "Oh. Yeah. The dumpster was pretty rank," he gave a self-depreciating laugh. "Honestly, I thought it was just the bag."
"It's definitely not just the bag."
Peter held the duffel away from his body and surreptitiously tried to smell his costume. "I've kinda gone nose-blind to it. Sorry."
"No worries. Laundry's in the undercroft. Head back down the hall and take a left at-"
"At the big tapestry, then go down the stairs. Yeah, I know. I've been before."
"…Right."
Silence flooded in again. Uncomfortable with the sharp look Strange was giving him, Peter inched backwards down the hall.
"I, uh- I'm gonna go now."
And he hustled off before Strange could figure out whatever he was trying to figure out.
Like he'd said, he knew the way.
Standing in the dark at the bottom of the stairs, however, Peter suddenly hesitated. The place had a weird, shivering weight to it, much more than just laundry detergent and dust, but that wasn't why he'd stopped. Without the light to solidify reality, he could almost imagine MJ and Ned hunched together over a laptop, framed by a gallery of semi-psychotic rouges lining the walls like some kind of weird zoo.
"Gotta catch 'em all," Peter joked weakly.
Osborn's smirk cut across his memory like a slap, lips peeling, stretching wider than nature had decreed they should, to reveal a mouthful of too many grinning teeth. The image was replaced just as quick, morphing to a broken man teetering on the edge of tears, but the glint in his eyes, the twist of his mouth – the threat of both lingered.
It was you that did it, making everybody forget, the Goblin whispered. Ya know that? Ah, of course you know that. Poor Peter Parker, never satisfied with what he had. Trying to have it all.
Peter shook his head to dislodge the evil thought. He reached up and gave the pull-chain a yank. And just like that, the undercroft went back a normal basement instead of a mausoleum of ghosts. Well, as "normal" as a wizard's dungeon got, anyway, what with the ancient, crumbling granite sepulcher and all. Peter smiled at the recollection. He missed MJ so hard it hurt, but he'd made the right call – for everyone's sake – and he was okay living with that.
Peter slipped his mask off with one hand and set it aside. The cool, dry air of the dungeon felt good to breathe unimpeded. As for the repugnant mélange perforating his nostrils – that not so much.
"Whew. Ah- goddamn. Strange wasn't kidding about the stink."
He dumped a capfull of Tide into the washer, paused, then added a quarter cap more. The basin filled sluggishly while he sorted the duffel, separating books, Sharpies and loose change from things that could actually be washed. He sniffed his costume again, just to confirm the obvious. Rotten vegetables… a hint of yeast… oooh, is that undertones of diaper I'm detecting? A fine vintage, Mr. Parker. Would you like me to open a bottle for you?
He took some sweatpants and an I 3 Trigonometry t-shirt from the duffel – having judged them to have escaped the worst of the ordeal – and lobbed them into the dryer with a crumbled sheet of Snuggle before peeling off his costume and loading it into the washer with the rest. Everything but the mask. He stood in his boxers while the creaky machines tumbled and chugged, blotting it with another dryer sheet. One minute dragged into five, the smell of detergent diffusing into a warm halo. Peter stifled a yawn.
"Spider!" Strange's voice abruptly hollered down from above. "You want something to eat?"
Peter snapped out of his doze. "Whaaaat?" he hollered back.
"Do you want something to eat?"
"Oh, yeah sure. That sounds good, thanks!"
"Five minutes," shouted Strange.
Peter opened the dryer and donned his lukewarm clothes, which – while not exactly clean – at least smelled civilized. He considered the mask for a long moment. One side eventually won out, and he bunched it into his pocket.
Peter roamed the first floor for most of his allotted five minutes, partially because he didn't have a clue where the kitchen was, and partially because he was dying to get a look around. He hadn't really gotten a chance to tour the place last time.
Shards of Byzantine stone looked down from the walls, while bronze urns with elaborate geometric designs beckoned to him from inside locked curio cases. Peter firmly kept his hands to himself. He wasn't an idiot. The last thing he wanted was for Strange to come out and find him caught in the loathsome grip of a Monkey's Paw – or levitating six feet off the ground and speaking in Klingon. Whispers followed him around the next corner, but when he looked back, the hallway was empty. The puff of air that reached him then smelled positively antediluvian, with traces of sacred incense, tea leaves, and the earthy, attic-y fragrance of old books.
It also smelled like chicken.
Peter followed the smell deeper into the house. After a few more twists and turns, he opened the door to a surprisingly tiny kitchen with a scrubbed wooden table, almond-colored appliances, and a backsplash of supremely terrible wallpaper straight out of the 1970s. Strange swiveled towards him and froze, dark eyebrows drawing together in a frown.
"Who the hell are you?"
"Who am I? I'm your sense of adventure, Stephen," Peter fired back with a devilish grin.
No response, not unless he counted the subtle alteration in Strange's posture that suggested he was getting ready to blast him back out into the hall. Peter gave him an exasperated look.
"Seriously? It's me. It's Spider-Man!"
Strange blinked so hard it looked like he'd been reset to factory default.
"Oh. I am- so sorry! I didn't recognize you without your-" He gestured impotently, then put his eloquent grasp of the English language to good use by adding, "You're just a kid!"
"Yeah, I get that a lot. Anyway, hi. I'm Peter. Peter Parker."
He extended his hand towards Strange. The clock above the sink ticked out the seconds. After a moment, Strange closed the distance and put a hand into his. He had a gentle grip, Peter noticed. Gentle, but unsteady. He could feel the uncontrollable flutter of the older man's fingers, the raised scars on the back of his hand.
"A pleasure to meet you, Parker," said Strange, earnestly.
Peter felt a odd sense of relief at being called by name. Not "Spider" or "Spider-Man", or any of the Daily Bugle's personal favorites. Parker. Just Parker. And for a moment, everything was alright again. Then microwave uttered an absolute clarion blast of a DING.
"Well," said Strange, quickly recovering his equilibrium. He gave Peter's a hand a squeeze and let it fall. "Hope you're not a vegetarian. If you are, there's some salad in the fridge."
"I'm not picky. Whatever you've got is fine."
Strange opened the microwave and reached inside, only to snatch his hands right back out. Peter eased himself into a seat, watching as the sorcerer proceeded to grab two handfuls of his cloak and use it like a pair of oven mitts. He slid a TV dinner in front of Peter, who up until the moment the fragrant curls of steam wafted into his face, hadn't realized how hungry he actually was.
"Thank you, sir. Smells good."
"Eh, it's easy," said Strange, taking another tray from the freezer. "So... Parker," he seemed to be testing the feel of the word. "What's going on in your neck of the woods?"
"Not much," said Peter, peeling the plastic off his food with two fingers. "Some guy blew off a couple of smoke grenades on the subway today. Stabbed a couple of people. Could have been a lot worse. Is there butter?"
Half a stick soared out of the fridge as Strange retrieved the box from the trash, read the back of it again, and began punching numerals into the microwave.
"Thanks," said Peter.
"Don't mention it. Did you catch the guy?"
"Yeah. What about you?"
"There was an incident in Kathmandu involving a legless fakir and several walking corpses."
"Ah-ha! So there was a necromancer," said Peter, balancing his chair on two legs as he rooted around in a nearby drawer for a fork.
"Hardly. The corpses weren't reanimated, which by definition would be the work of a necromancer. These people were alive up until the fakir used them as vehicles to move from one place to another."
"Because he didn't have legs?"
"Presumably, yes."
"Nasty."
"Very nasty," said Strange distastefully.
Peter set out an extra fork and dug into his TV dinner. After a few minutes Strange joined him at the table. The quiet had a starched edge to it, like interacting with an estranged relative, but all in all, the mood was a companionable one. Peter, living alone and cramming for his GED at the doughnut shop just to have an excuse to hang out, felt more relaxed than he had in months. Strange scooped up some of his brownie.
"You know, I remember when these had cobbler," he muttered. "I miss the cobbler."
"I know, right?" Peter grinned across the table at him. "My Aunt May raised me as a vegetarian for a little while. Said I didn't need any growth hormones while I was in my "developmental stage". She'd let me have the cobbler whenever she had one of these."
When the silence opened up again, the obvious question dangling between them like a fat elephant, Peter added quietly, "She's dead, if you're wondering. 'Bout a year now."
"I'm sorry."
"It's okay."
Strange made a deep noise in his throat, not necessarily agreeing with that statement, but not pressing for another, either. Peter was grateful for it. He finished the last of his corn and got up to throw out the tray just as the unmistakable sound of a portal shimmered into existence somewhere nearby.
"Strange! I know you're in here. Look at the state of this place. Never looked this bad when I was caretaker. Have you finished with these books? You know you're not supposed to take them out of the library. How many times have I told you?"
"Fuck," Strange swore, billowing to the kitchen door. He opened it a crack and peered down the hallway with one eye. Peter stifled the mad urge to laugh as he rinsed his fork in the sink.
"Popular guy tonight, aren't ya?"
"Yeah, uh-" Strange glanced frantically around the room, found it sorely lacking in terms of exits, and twirled his left hand in the direction of the cupboards. Embered sparks skipped across the linoleum.
"Strange!" bellowed the voice.
"Quick, out!" Strange hissed. "I, uh- just remembered someplace I've got to be."
"No, I get it. You've got other duties. Totally understandable!" said Peter.
He stepped through the portal, glancing back just in time to see Strange open another one in the opposite direction and go through before the orifice sealed itself, taking his view of the kitchen with it. Peter looked around to see where he'd ended up.
The room was bigger than the entirety of his former apartment, with a massive four-poster bed, paintings in heavy gilt frames, and other antique furnishings that looked as though they'd been lifted from Dumbledore's office. Most of one corner was taken up by an enormously tall vase stuffed with dried pampas grass. Peter noticed the door was ajar and peered out into the hallway in order to confirm his suspicions. The Crusader armor stood just a few paces away.
Peter gently closed the door and made his way over to the bed. It was made with a dark blue quilt that looked almost as old as the room, but it was soft and smelled clean. It was also, as Peter discovered as he shed his pants on the floor and burrowed beneath it, quite warm. He switched off the lamp. A clock ticked softly on the mantle. The room had its own fireplace, although it was currently unlit.
Peter expected to lay awake for several hours, mulling over where to find a better job, a cheaper apartment, or some combination of both, but he was asleep within minutes.
Several hours passed and the moon rose steadily in the east, gleaming between scudding patches of cloud. A cat yowled somewhere at the end of Bleecker Street, next to the apartment building where a couple married too soon were having an argument, their four-year-old son trying not to listen under his bedroom door. Sirens strobed in the distance; police and EMS on their way to a fender-bender in SoHo. The Window of Worlds twinkled, moonlight flashing with a dangerous green edge that slithered, electric-like, down the sweeping lines of the Seal. Glass splintered softly, just a tiny crack.
Peter jolted awake.
He shot from the bed in a tight coil, kicking off the mattress so hard the bed moved by several inches. He hit the ceiling in a low crouch, one hand poised, breathing hard. The tingle was so strong it felt like ants marching up and down his spine. Somebody in the room? No, the door's still shut. Portal? No. Something else- something invisible?
Peter cocked his head to one side, listening hard. The house around him was silent. He was alone in the room. Nothing was moving, not even mice trying to take a crap in the walls. Carbon monoxide? Could be carbon monoxide. I don't feel dizzy. Maybe it just started.
He dropped to hang upside down over the bed, quickly donning his web-shooters and the mask sticking out of his sweatpants. Then he made his way to the door.
"Stephen!" He whispered loudly. "Stephen, do you feel dizzy?"
No answer. Of course, the sorcerer probably just hadn't heard. Peter had no idea where Strange's bedroom was, or even if it was on this floor.
He eased over the lintel, moving along the ceiling on all fours, testing every finger-and- toehold with the same slow, deliberate motions of a cat prowling through the veldt. Somewhere in the belly of the house, a grandfather clock chimed out the late hour. Come to think of it, this house had a lot of clocks in it.
Downstairs, said his tingle without words, like a magnet telling another magnet. Hey, that sounds like a joke. Two magnets walk into a bar…
He crept on.
Below in the foyer, something was happening to the doors. It started with a tiny flare of green light. It probed the keyhole for a minute, peering in like an intrusive eye, and disappeared. Then the latch started to glow. Softly at first, then hotter and hotter, until the metal radiated with heat. Globules of molten brass dripped on the floorboards, spitting and hissing. There was a sound like every mirror, in every dimension, suddenly shattering at once. Arcane mandalas surged to life like flaming brands, burning across the door and onto the walls.
For a moment, they held.
Then they quivered. Once. Almost imperceptibly. A verdant pinprick appeared near the center, spreading through the design like poison until the protective orange glow bathing the foyer turned emerald green. Mandalas snapped. Unraveled. Winked from existence as thought they'd never been. The latch dropped to the floor with a dull clunk. A moment of silence, then-
Delicate fingers nudged the doors open from outside.