Page 103 of House of Salt and Sorrows
How was that possible? How was any of this possible?
There is one way,a tiny, dark voice whispered in my mind.
I shook my head, as if warding off a buzzing mosquito.
None of this is real,it persisted.No one else sees it because it’s not really here to see. You’ve gone mad, my girl.
No. That wasn’t it. That wasn’t possible.
I wasn’t mad.
There had to be another explanation.
Does there?
Shaking my head, I scanned the room again, searching for Camille and the Graces. We were going. We were leaving this awful, evil place and then—
I let out a shriek only I could hear.
Where the cake had once been rested a large platter. A sea turtle—the biggest one I’d ever seen—was showcased on a bed of dead eels. His great shell had been hacked, slashed, and sliced. He had not died an easy death. Tears welled in my eyes.
I dared to creep closer to the proud beast. He was enormous and obviously quite old. Barnacles dotted his back, and his flippers were scored with battle scars. I reached out to trace one of the long lines, but my hand stopped as the turtle’s head shifted.
Was he alive? Surely nothing could have withstood the wounds racked across his body, but there it was again, the slightest spasm of his head. I rubbed his flipper, letting him know he was not alone. Even though he was in pain and scared and probably about to die, I wanted him to know someone loved him and was sorry.
The head flopped toward my touch, and I dared to dream I might save him. My sisters and I could snatch up the platter and race it back to Highmoor. I’d fill the solarium’s pond with salt water. He could live there until he recovered enough to return to the sea.
His head jerked again, and I leaned in. If he was about to open his eyes, I wanted to be the first thing he saw. The beak moved, and my heart jumped in anticipation.
The turtle’s eyelids burst open as a string of fat white maggots fell from the hole. They poured out of the poor loggerhead’s skull onto the platter. His body was full of them, ready to explode.
I turned away, certain I was about to be horribly sick, and ran into the leering dragon man. He caught hold of my elbows, keeping me from falling.
“Are you enjoying the refreshments?” he asked.
There was such a lightness in his voice, so completely at odds with what I’d just seen, it gave me hope the bloody mess was an illusion, just like the fountain. Turning back, I expected to see the cake and pretty punch bowls, but the gore was still there, spread across the tables in a sadistic buffet.
“I feel faint,” I confessed, my head swooning with the smoke. “Can you find my sisters or Fisher? Can you find Camille?”
My knees gave way, and he lowered me to the floor, his hand at the back of my neck. The room faded in and out of darkness. As the dragon man leaned over me, streaks of sweat ran down his face.
I wiped my fingers across his cheek. They came back black and oily.
The Weeping Woman.
“Dance with me,” she whispered into my ear.
My stomach heaved, threatening to lose control, and I forced myself away from the wicked wraith. The floor felt sticky as I crawled forward. Sticky and moving.
Maggots spilled off the turtle’s platter onto the dance floor, writhing in time to the orchestra’s cheery tune. The floor was thick with their repugnant bodies. There were thousands of them. They crawled on me, into my shoes, under my skirts, and I finally opened my mouth and screamed.
“Annaleigh!”
From somewhere far away, in the depths of my swoon, I heard shouting. I just wanted to stay where I was, in the deep and silent dark, but the voice kept yelling my name, louder and louder. My shoulder jerked back as if shoved.
“Annaleigh, you have to wake up!” Another shove. “Now.”
I came to with a gasp, fuzzy with confusion. My mouth was dry, and a sour, metallic funk coated my tongue. I squinted against the glare of my bedroom’s sconces.
