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“As I’ve said before, when you find it in you to stop offering unwanted commentary and advice, you can join me. Obviously, today is not that day.”
She’s still cursing at me when I make it to the front door; it’s a blessing humans can’t hear ghosts, or she’d have the neighbors calling the cops. Before opening the door, I take a deep breath. There’s no doubt as to who’s on the other side — the pull of the curse buzzes under my skin. Yet, my stomach ties even tighter seeing Esmeralda. Shoulders curled inward, she keeps her chunky cardigan closed with her balled fists. She’s fidgety, foot tapping on the stone stoop. I attempt a smile, but her expression only darkens in response.
Stepping aside, I motion for her to come in. The air whooshes out of my lungs in a sigh when she does.
“Can I offer you anything to drink?” I ask as I guide her toward the parlor.
She ignores my offer. “I didn’t know this house was habitable. Everyone always said it was haunted.”
I can’t help but snicker, because that’s not far from the truth. This house’s resident ghost is currently down the hall, screaming her lungs out. “I am a monster after all. I do find that fitting.”
She shakes her head. “That’s not the kind of haunted I’m talking about.”
“Right,” I say, keeping my tone light. “Grim grinning ghosts is more what you have in mind, right?”
She stops walking, her next step never landing on the Persian runner rug lining the hallway.
“Don’t you dare mock me,” she growls. “You literally come from the afterlife. You can’t tell me you don’t believe in spirits.”
“That’s not what I said. Obviously spirits exist, but the concept of haunted places is ludicrous.”
Mei’s paranoia about Esmeralda must’ve gotten to me, because there’s a sneaking suspicion in the back of my mind that her questions may be leading. I shake it — Esmeralda was catapulted into a dangerous and unknown world a matter of days ago. It’s rational for her to be looking for explanations wherever she can get them.
She waves a hand in the air, as if that’s rebuttal enough, then resumes walking, storming right past me. It takes me a whole of three steps to catch up. “What is the interest with spirits, anyway?”
Her back goes rigid for a moment, before she answers, “my whole family is dead. Forgive me if I want to know about their fate.”
Right, her family. Her mother. The reason she’s here, willing to bargain her life.
I point to the arch leading to the parlor. Behind it, two red velvet couches sit across from each other, separated by a low, carved wooden table; a writing desk and elaborate marble fireplace are the only other furnishings in the room. It’s smaller, more intimate, than a lot of the spaces in this massively cold house.
I sweep an arm toward one of the couches. As if to spite me, Esmeralda ignores me, deciding to sit on the other. The slight doesn’t bother me; in fact, it brings a grin to my lips. I wasn’t lying when I told her fire was the hottest thing about her; it makes me want to jump her, letting my glamour go and showing her the real monster. Matching her strike for strike.
With a deep breath to contain the excitement building inside me, I take a seat across from her, leaning my elbows on my parted knees and lacing my fingers.
“I take it that if you’re here, it means you’re ready for my game?”
After a long pause, she nods. “I’m willing to play. But first, I want some answers. I want to be prepared.”
That’s a fair enough request, and a smarter approach than most of the challengers who came before her. “I can’t say a lot of things. Some, I won’t be able to reveal until the puzzle is in your hands. But I’ll answer what I can.”
She seems to mull that over, chewing her bottom lip and plucking at dead skin, before sighing. “Okay, fine. The other day, you said we were on the same side. That you need me to win to be free.”
I nod. So far, not a question.
“What do you need to be freed from?”
I run a hand over my chin, looking for the right words to explain this without mentioning the wench who got me in this predicament in the first place. “I don’t play this game because I want to. Having to deal with the same puzzle, over and over again for centuries…” I look up to gage Esmeralda’s reaction to the allusion of my age, but if she’s surprised by it, she doesn’t show it. “It’s not something I’ve enjoyed. I want to be rid of this arrangement just as much as you do.”
Esmeralda’s laugh has an edge of mockery, something I’d expect more of myself than my little prey, and I must admit I’m impressed by her unwavering hatred. “If we lose, you just have to do this again with someone else. I die. I really don’t think our predicaments are even. Unless you’re telling me the lives you’ve taken weigh on you?”
I answer with a wicked grin. “Of course not.” The words don’t taste true, but I’ve repeated them enough that at least they feel practiced.
“Right, like I thought. What do you even need freedom from? You look fine to me.”
My jaw ticks. She can’t even begin to imagine. To be away from home, for centuries, with no mean to return… it’s torture in its own right, which I guess was the curse’s intent to begin with. I can’t exactly say all of that to Esmeralda; she expects me to fish her mother’s soul out of the Beyond, and I can’t do that if I’m not able to enter it. Granted, my curse will be lifted if she wins the game, but it still doesn’t inspire confidence that I’m not currently able to fulfill my end of the bargain. “This game keeps me from my birthright, from everything I’ve ever wanted and worked for. I need it gone.”
“That’s a half answer.”
