Hotel Sanguinaria

Chapter Six

The next two weeks passed in a blur of Latin and laughter.  Neith’s paper was still lying in her backpack, and Shiloh had a habit of taking it out and looking at it, hard, before going to bed.  It still made no sense to her.

It was one evening about two weeks into her stay that she was called in by Renée to ask if she wanted a permanent room.  Shiloh had immediately agreed, and had been directed to go back to her room.  To her bewilderment, a lot of her old stuff from home was there, sitting neatly stacked, some of it in boxes, in the middle of the floor.  She’d smiled and decided that she’d sort everything out in the morning.  Then she’d laughed at the thought of her parents wondering where all her things had gone.  Her old room would look so very empty.

“Shiloh?  Shiloh, you in there?” Lily’s voice brought her back to reality.  Shiloh was pleased to see that, even when distracted, she could still understand the Latin Lily was speaking to her in.  She’d begun speaking regularly in the language last week.

“Sorry, yeah?  Zoned out a bit there.”

“I was just asking how you’re doing.  Three weeks and you’re almost fully fluent in Latin, so I’d say you’re doing pretty well.”

Shiloh laughed.

“Yeah, I’m good thanks.  Rachael and Neith have been good to me.”

Lily’s face darkened a fraction.

“I’d be careful of her.  Neith, I mean.  Sure, she’s funny, but Rachael’s a lot steadier.”

Shiloh’s brow furrowed in confusion.

“Neith’s a bit of a wildcard,” Dylan explained.  “Unpredictable, impulsive and more than a little self-destructive.  You’ll want to be careful, okay?”

“I will be,” Shiloh promised, wondering just how far Neith could have fallen and give no hint of it on the surface.

“Cool,” said Dylan.  “Now how about I teach you how to play the greatest game of skill there is to know in this place?”

Shiloh laughed.

“Go for it.”

*     *     *     *     *

Darts.  That’s what she was learning to play.  It wasn’t bad, either: especially not with people around her who laughed with her, not at her, if she missed or hit a low score whilst she learned to play.  It was a pretty packed game – six players – but she didn’t feel like she was being left out.  Quite the reverse: alongside Rachael, Dylan and Lily were two faces, both new to her, who laughed and joked and threw darts with expert grace (or none at all).  One of these new faces was Kylee Heron, the Native American girl whom Shiloh had bumped into on her first night at the Hotel.  Kylee was allergic to kiwi fruit, had an intense love of Vanilla Coke, and had always wanted to work as a professional photographer.  Well, thought Shiloh, at least she could actually make a living out of the photography thing.  Kaylee had worked hard to make herself a small reputation as someone who used the light that only the night could offer, and as such could make a small but decent wage out of it.

The other new face that Shiloh was learning to play alongside was Seraph.  Seraph was so pale, they were almost albino, but their icy blue eyes betrayed the fact that they were just, in fact, very fair-skinned.  They had shoulder-length blond hair and a shy, kind smile.  Whilst playing darts with them Shiloh had asked a lot of questions and Seraph had asked plenty in return: Shiloh had revealed bits and pieces of her past and her favourite colour (aubergine purple) and how old she was when she first learned to ride her bike and why she didn’t like bananas.  In return, Seraph had offered up how they had been eighteen and a half for about three years (“It’s actually kinda trippy”), about discovering and learning to understand their being agender, and why they had run away from home after a silent, icily cold rejection from their parents.