The car stopped. The door swung open. Sean scooped me up, shifted me in his arms so I leaned against his shoulder, and ran to the inn. The front door opened and he ducked inside.
The inn shuddered. Every wall, every board in the floor, every rafter and beam creaked, popped, and groaned in unison. The sound was deafening. The walls stretched toward us. The entire building curved. Somewhere to the right, Beast yowled in her high-pitched, small-dog voice.
Sean squared his shoulders, trying to shield me.
"It's okay," I whispered. "It's just scared. Put me down."
Slowly, his gaze still on the ceiling, he lowered me to the floor. My back made contact with the wood. A warm, soothing feeling flooded me. Years ago when my family had gone to the Keys, I'd lain on a sandy bank during a high tide. The ocean water, so warm it might have been taken from a hot tub, had gently washed, at first under me, then over me, until the rising tide lifted me from the sand and I floated with the setting sun and the newborn moon above me in the sky. That's exactly what it felt like.
"Can I do anything?" Sean asked.
The floor bent. Thick, striated tendrils of polished wood wound about me, lifting me up. Sean took a step back.
"Bring me my broom. Please."
He turned around and grabbed the broom from its spot in the corner. The tendrils wound together, forming a cocoon, sliding and winding about each other, holding me up a foot off the ground. Sean turned, saw the cocoon, and took a step back.
"It's okay," I told him.
Slowly Sean held the broom out to me. A tendril swiped it and thrust it into the cocoon, next to me. The cocoon bent toward him, bringing my face to his face.
"Thank you," I whispered.
For a moment we stayed there with two inches between us, and then the tendrils pulled and carried me quickly across the floor, through the new gap in the wall, deep into the heart of the inn.
*** *** ***
I opened my eyes. Around me soothing darkness waited, soft and warm. Faint blue lights floated past me like a swarm of dim electric fireflies on the way to their nest.
The tendrils that held me had formed a pillar anchored to the floor and the ceiling. A warm energy flowed through them, the lifeblood of the inn pulsing like the beating of a giant heart. It lit the tendrils from within with a faint green glow, turning the wood translucent so the grain was only barely visible. The air smelled fresh and clean, the way it would smell deep in the woods on a sunny day.
Another swarm fluttered by. The magic was so thick here you could scoop it with a cup.
I had come here once before when I first arrived. I'd walked deep into the inn --it had been asleep and I'd had to force my way through the walls --and then I had sat down here at the inert tangle of the inn's roots, put my hands on them, and fed it magic until they stirred. Gertrude Hunt had been asleep for years, its stasis so deep it was a kind of death. Bringing it back from deep sleep had taken a long time.
Now the tendrils hugged me, sharing the magic of the inn with me. We had come full circle. I had been lucky. My injuries had come from magic expended too quickly. The inn had given me some of its power. If I had suffered severe physical injuries, my recovery would've taken a lot longer.
"Thank you," I said. "But it's time. I stayed too long."
The tendrils tightened a little more, protective, gentle but firm.
The innkeepers have never officially agreed if the inns could feel or not. We knew they reacted, but whether they loved us or simply served us out of a symbiotic need had never been determined. I had my own opinion on that.
"It's time," I whispered again and petted the roots.
The tendrils pulled apart. I slid down and stepped onto the warm surface. All my clothes were gone and my feet were bare.
Something small lunged from the shadows and licked my foot.
"Hello, Beast."
The tiny dog dashed about me in a frantic circle.
A tendril rose. My robe hung off it. It hovered, waiting, as if hesitant. It was so nice to stay here in the serene darkness. But I had an inn to protect. I slipped my robe on and took my broom.
The darkness parted in front of me, walls and dimensions compressing and spinning in a dizzying rush. Looking at it would be enough to send an entire university's worth of string-theory physicists into fits. Sounds of distant male voices arguing filtered through. Of course. I'd left them alone for a few hours. I took one last look at the heart of the inn behind me, sighed, and stepped through the chaotic mess into the hallway leading to the foyer.
*** *** ***
"If Dina dies, I will eat you, dear." Caldenia said it with complete aplomb.
"You may find it very difficult, Your Grace," Arland answered.
"No, she'll find it easy once I'm done with you," Sean said.