Chapter#13

"Well, I was wondering..." Beth shifted uncomfortably. "I mean, you do turn into a giant snake and all."

"Indeed I do. Were you thinking I could maybe go devour them?" Ratu grinned, her canines temporarily elongating into snake fangs. "I try not to eat things I don't know anything about. I also hate the taste of rat."

"It didn't hurt to ask. Well, so far anyway." She smiled weakly. "However, the problem persists. We have a colony of rats led by a king that we need to find a way to be rid of. Maybe you know a spell, or something like that?"

"Perhaps. It is something I would like to think on. It troubles me that they were able to chew a hole into the house. You see, if I were to take a hammer to one of the walls, I would find myself in the next room. The way the house has unfolded itself tells me that time and space have been compressed. If I could do what they have, then I would find myself in between the walls of an infinitely large space as well."

"The house is infinitely large?"

"In a way. The same way it has been compressed to conceal rooms, it can be decompressed to make everything much larger. That, and the home itself is a nexus for many other places, this Labyrinth being one of them. It wasn't constructed in the home, rather, it existed somewhere else first and then was connected here. If we were to dig a hole deep enough or perhaps get a ladder large enough, we may be able to find the edge of this space and stumble into the next. Much like the greenhouse, except I am fairly certain that the greenhouse is a constructed world existing in its own dimension."

"Wow."

"Indeed. The Architect was, at the very least, a demigod, or great friends with one. The walls of this home may be made of wood and plaster, but the fabric of reality has been stretched tight and stitched together in a way that even I can't fully understand. That's why cracks were appearing when the Society was assaulting the geas. They were unraveling those magical threads."

Beth's head swam with the implications. "So if you can stitch two places together, it's like a shortcut? Like, I could stitch my closet to somewhere in Hawaii and just go there?"

"Yes. However, the Architect didn't just make a shortcut. Using your analogy, imagine that you stitched Hawaii to your closet, and then cut it away from the rest of the world. The only way to get there would be through your closet and you now have your own private island. Well, if you decide to kill off the population anyway."

"So what happens if my closet gets destroyed?"

"One of three things. Hawaii returns to where it used to be. Hawaii ends up somewhere else. Or complete annihilation." She held up a finger for each. "Atlantis was an entire continent that vanished. The Atlanteans were infamous for their ability to tie two places together. It took them several years, but they were able to cut themselves away from the world by slowly stitching their eastern borders to their western borders. Somewhere out there in the universe is an island nation that cannot be reached from the outside world save for a couple of loose threads in the fabric of time and space. To step through those gaps would take you to the lost continent. I worry that these rats may have the ability to loosen the threads holding the house together. Doing so could expose us to nearly anything or anywhere."

"Shit."

"Well said." Ratu sipped at her tea. "My recommendation for the problem is extermination. I would suggest fire, but the last thing you want to do is set fire to a part of the house that hasn't revealed itself yet."

"Extermination." Beth frowned. Was that something Mike would do? He seemed to take his position as Caretaker fairly seriously, but she wondered if he would even consider such a thing.

"Something else to consider. You don't just end up with magical rats, not in a house like this. Someone had to let them in. I'm thinking your resident nymph should have some information."

"Mike is taking care of that now, I'm sure." Beth stood up. "I mustn't stay long. If you think of anything, please let me know."

"Of course. Leave the rat. I can make use of the remains." Ratu bowed her head, then turned to leave. She walked inside of the small pagoda, disappearing from view. Beth finished her tea and stood, picking up her backpack. Asterion waited for her at the edge of Ratu's lair, his dark eyes watching. He led her back into the Labyrinth, neither of them speaking much on the long walk back to the entrance.

Beth thought about the missing objects and the list of items in the storage unit at New Castle. She had already made arrangements to have it all brought back tomorrow before the Society could find out anything about it. Obviously they would catch on the moment a moving truck arrived, but once it was in the driveway, they wouldn't be able to do anything.

They stepped through the gate together and Asterion walked her over to the reflecting pool. Beth let out a sigh. This was the part that she hated the most. The shortcut was convenient except for the part where she got soaking wet.

"How did you and Ratu get out last night?" It suddenly occurred to Beth that Asterion was terrified of water, and wouldn't have been able to pass through.

"Through the closet. She used magic to open it from the other side."

"Oh." Well, so much for that plan. She didn't think Ratu was generous enough to let her out that way. "Well, I guess I'm off." She gave the minotaur a big hug, smiling at the feel of him against her body. He hugged her back with one arm, his other firmly gripping his ax. "I might drop in on you tonight or tomorrow, just so you know."