Sam laughs. “Good one, Kane.”
Kane laughs too, lifting the helmet. “I’ve been getting people with that all night.”
I glare at him as we pass through the threshold. We enter a sitting room with plush red couches, and mahogany bookshelves lining the walls. A wet bar sits in the corner and a flat-screen tv hangs on the wall opposite.
“Where’s the party?” Asher asks.
“Through here,” Sam says, pulling down a red book on one of the shelves, causing the bookcase to open.
“Now that’s cool,” I say, thoroughly impressed.
A party is in full swing beyond the bookcase. Strobe lights flash all around the open space and it’s crowded with people dancing.
“This literally looks like a dungeon,” Asher says. It makes me wonder what this place was originally built for. What it was meant to keep down here...
I spot Bryce almost immediately, dressed in some kind of toga situation and mask, talking to two girls on a couch across the room.
“He’s here!” I say. I would normally feel relieved, but since I haven’t felt an ounce of stress all night, it’s more of a statement.
“You guys hang out here for a minute,” Sam says. “I’ll be right back.”
“Ooh, refreshments.” I spot what looks like a fountain of alcohol. Grabbing one of the goblets set out on a table, I fill it with the liquid from the fountain, taking a sip. I don’t recognize the taste. It’s part punch, and part something else. Maybe black licorice? It’s not bad, I determine, drinking the rest of what I poured and getting more.
“What is it?” Asher says, grabbing a cup for himself.
“Some kind of punch,” I say. I take another gulp as Asher fills his cup and Sam comes back.
“Oh, I wouldn’t drink that,” Sam says to Asher, not seeing the cup in my hands or my squirrel cheeks holding in what I just drank. “It’s like ninety percent absinthe, ten percent shrooms.”
My eyes go wide as I swallow what was in my mouth. Asher’s eyes look from me to my empty cup.
“Great,” he says.
“Absinthe and shrooms?” I ask Sam. “Like the stuff that makes you hallucinate?”
“Yep. We always serve it. If you stick around until three or four a.m., shit will start getting real strange down here.”
Asher looks worried, but I still feel like I’m floating on a cloud. One where nothing bad happens to me ever. And I love this cloud. I want to stay on this cloud forever.
“Oh my god, I love this song. Let’s dance.” I grab both of their arms.
“I don’t dance,” Asher says.
“You two have fun with that,” says Sam. “Just keep the masks on.” He disappears down another hallway off of the open stone room.
“I’ll just sit and watch.”
Asher takes a seat on one of the couches that surround the dance floor, but I don’t care if he won’t dance with me. Strobe lights flash and dry ice pumps smoke onto the floor as I spin around, moving my hands up my body, into the air, feeling carefree. I almost don’t even remember why we’re here. When I open my eyes, Asher is watching me dance. My head starts to feel fuzzy, my inhibitions at an all-time low as another masked man comes up behind me and pulls me to him. I almost shove him away, but when I glance back toward the couch, there’s a girl talking to Asher. To hell with it, I think, as I dance with the stranger. When the song is over, I feel Asher’s hand wrap around my arm.
“Bryce isn’t in here anymore,” Asher says.
I look all around to find that he’s right. I took my eyes off him and he disappeared. Asher grabs my hand and leads me down the same dark hallway Sam disappeared through. There are doors all the way down the hall. Some are locked, some aren’t. Asher opens one that contains glass cabinets of alcohol. Most of it absinthe. We pass more people in costume as we walk farther down the hall. When someone in a Darth Vader costume walks by, I turn my head to follow. Asher doesn’t seem to notice. Am I imagining it? The person turns their head back to look at me, and it’s the same voice-changing helmet that Miles has, I’m sure of it. I grab Asher’s arm as he opens another door to a room hosting a full-blown orgy. We both stand there wide-eyed as men and women fornicate before us. I don’t know if I’m hallucinating now, or if that’s really Sam in the back of the room with two other men.
“Will you two be joining?” someone near the door says to us while a girl’s head bobs up and down in his lap. The whole thing feels wrong to look at but I can’t stop looking.
“Sorry.” Asher closes the door. We take a moment to process before he clears his throat and we keep moving. I wanted to tell him something before that, but now I don’t remember as we get to the end of the hall and there’s another sitting room similar to the one we entered through. It’s decked out in Halloween lights and cobwebs. There are more knights in armor and other relics inside.
“Oooh,” I say, taking out my phone and recording around the room. “I love the dead birds they hung from the ceiling for this.”
