ARCANE

031

After the longest drive in history, they get to the cottage.

Cara drops the others off, parking Eden's truck around the corner. Not that it will save them from getting caught, but it's better safer than sorry. Meanwhile, the others carry Lee and the bags inside. Everybody shuffles up the stairs to find their rooms. Erik notices that June's cottage is much larger than his own house.

While the others get settled, June puts away the groceries in the fridge. She figures that she will take a bunkbed in whatever room is left. Now, it's down to figure out what to make for dinner. If she couldn't hear his feet shuffling above her, June would just ask Jamie to cook. Instead, she begins to pull out corn.

How they are going to manage to feed eight people until they decide where they are going to go is beyond her.

Once everyone has thrown their stuff down (and once Jamie and Wesley forcefully accept that June has ordered them to take the master bed), everyone trickles downstairs. They find their way to the dining room table, pulling chairs up to it.

Hope goes out to stand on the balcony. It's more of a porch, really, because there are stairs which lead to the ground, but still. She's never been on a real balcony before. This is the farthest she has ever been from home. The air up here is freezing; her breath is so thick that Hope wonders if she can grab it and steal it back. It seems that June's cottage is not supposed to be visited this late in the year. Hope wonders if the waterfall that is practically in June's backyard will freeze soon, forming shards which threaten to pierce the Earth.

Almost like a stroke of lightning.

When Cara comes inside, Erik gets up from the table. He taps on the glass back door, beckoning Hope to come and join them. Reluctantly, she leaves.

"What's going on?" Cara asks as Erik pulls out a chair for her. She obliges, sitting down between him and Percy.

Everyone looks around. The issue is, there is nothing going on. They've been trapped in a car so long that it feels as though their brains are stuck in the past, clinging desperately to time as they try desperately to catch up to their still-moving bodies.

June gets up from the table. She opens a drawer in the kitchen, and then another. Eventually, she finds a deck of cards and brings it to the table. She brings it over to the table and throws it down.

"Has anyone ever played Eleusis?" June asks, bringing the cards to the table. She has a faint smile on her lips. "It was my brother's favourite game. Basically, the dealer makes up a secret rule which explains how cards can be played. It sounds confusing, but it's supposed to. You just go in a circle playing cards until someone has gotten rid of their hand, or figures out the rule. Sounds good?"

Since no one protests, June deals out cards. Everyone takes their hand, and June begins as the dealer. The game is messy and complicated, and the rules seem to be flipping around out of control, but they all manage. It's frustrating and funny and fantastic. Once it's June's turn to be dealer again, no one wants to stop playing even though they can feel the weight of yesterday pressing against their shoulders.

"How long can we stay here?" Wesley asks, since he can feel Cara staring at him. Even if she wants to ask the question, she can't. That's where Wesley belongs. He exists in the space that others don't dare to fill.

June shrugs. "I don't know. The police will probably figure out my connection to Erik before they figure out mine to Eden's. If we're lucky, two days after they find Erik's Dad."