Spell Of The Times

Chapter 3

With trepidation Harry placed his foot onto the first step hearing the wood creak as he started to descend beneath the bookstore. The stair railings were wrapped up with twinkling fairy lights twisting down with each small step covered in a different colour of fabric. The stairs alone were whimsical enough to lead Harry further down until he reached what he could only assume was the speakeasy. The room was a startling display with up-tempo music blaring and lights dazzling the room from every corner. Harry expected the place to be a themed cocktail bar, maybe prohibition-styled with some jazzy music, expensive drinks, and retro decor. This place, however, looked less like a cocktail bar and more like a club for a secret society. Girls twirled around Harry and Chuck in vibrant purple dresses, their faces covered by Venetian masquerade masks and shimmering veils. They were each holding a golden tray which had a bottle of green liquid and a glass bowl filled with small white pills. Daphne plucked one of the pills and placed it on her tongue and began to tilt her head back while one of the girls in purple grabbed the bottle and began pouring the green liquid down Daphne's throat. Daphne licked her lips and began to smile as she put her hands on Harry's shoulders.

"Your turn H." She said.

Harry took in everything going on around him; the girls in purple with their ornate masquerade masks, the decorated gold trays, the colourful strobe lights, the booths full of wealthy politicians and recognizable celebrities. What was this place? He wondered. The strangest part of the entire scene, Harry thought, had to have been the fountain placed in the centre of the club. The fountain stood right in the middle of club, splitting the entire space into four: the staircase entrance from the bookstore, a section in the back which looked like like a bar, a set of booths on the fountains left with a wall covered in mirrors, and to the right of the fountain people were dancing and socializing. Harry thought it was strange to see such a big fixture right in the middle of such an intimate space, especially if the club was designed with privacy and secrecy in mind. Harry thought the fountain was kind of out of place too, considering he was in a club and the fixture looked almost religious. The fountain was made up of four women looking up and holding hands. One of the women had horns, one had wings, one had a crown, and one had a rose behind her ear. Each statue of the four women was wearing a thin dress that cascaded down their bodies, meant to hug the contours of their curves with each pinch of skin delicately on display. In between the four women sat a statue of a man's body with a goat's head, sitting on a giant chalice-like fixture wrapped in snakes. Harry took in the peculiarity of the liquid that was pooling out of the chalice into the fountain's base, and streaming from the womens eyes. It was the same shade of green as the liquid that the purple girls were carrying. The entire display was beautiful, but unsettling.

Daphne, noticing Harry distracted by his surroundings, grabbed a white pill and placed it on her tongue. She gently kissed Harry, transferring the pill from her mouth to his. Harry, noticing Chuck, Tom, and Sadie all doing the same thing, tilted his head back and let one of the purple girls pour the green liquid into his mouth. To Harry's surprise the pill tasted fizzy and sweet.

"What the hell was that?" Laughed Chuck, obviously not too concerned with that he had just drank.

"They call it Belladonna. It's not actually Belladonna of course, it just makes your eyes twinkle. I think it's just absinthe?" Shouted Sadie over the music.

Tom and Daphne gave each other a knowing look and began to walk away from the purple girls with bottles who were now passing out shots of silver liquid. Harry could feel his heart begin to race and he felt a jolt of energy surge through him as he was making his way through the haze of people in the speakeasy, which Harry decided was really just an underground club. The music, which was playing fast trance music since he arrived, began to slow down as Harry made his way across the room until everyone except for Chuck slid into a black leather booth. Chuck was still near the staircase taking one of those silver shooters from one of the masqueraded girls in the purple dresses.