Eighteen years ago. October 31. Samhain.

"Push!"

The sheets had soaked clear through, and her hair was glued to her face and scalp with perspiration. She had been in labour now for thirteen hours, and her strength was nearly spent. If not for the storm which had taken down the telephone along with the power lines, the mid-wife would have called for an ambulance hours ago.

"I can't," sobbed the woman through her gasps. Even as she said it, however, her face turned a mottled red with effort as she bore down.

Despite the blood that dripped down his hand where his wife's nails had torn into it, her husband sat quietly at her bedside, trying by sheer force of personality to will his own strength to her through their linked hands. "Just a little longer," he whispered.

A massive stroke of lightning shattered a tree somewhere close enough that the splintering of the wood could be clearly discerned, followed almost immediately by a crescendo of thunder like the universe tearing in two. A window shattered somewhere downstairs. A distant police siren rose faintly, then faded away.

And suddenly it was over. She screamed, and the mid-wife reached for the sharp scissors that had been boiled and then reboiled over the previous thirteen hours.

"Sweet Jesus," said the husband, his eyes huge and round with shock.

"What? What's wrong?" she said, struggling to sit up, her face suddenly pale with terror. "What's wrong with my baby?"

"Be quiet!" snapped the mid-wife, giving him a furious glare. "There is nothing wrong. You have twins. Girls."

"But their faces," he said, horrified.

"What's wrong with their faces?" she wailed.

The mid-wife's scissors snipped through tissue. "It's just a caul," she said. "It's nothing to worry about." The smooth flaps of skin that covered the babies' faces were cut away. Seconds later the two new-borns were in their mother's arms, suckling contentedly at her breasts. Neither had made a sound.

After making sure the afterbirth had been passed, the mid-wife went downstairs and added another log to the fireplace. A kettle was put on the fire to boil, then she eased herself gratefully into a chair. A few minutes later, she shivered and crossed herself. She had delivered many babies with cauls over the years, and she was not a supersitious woman. What would remain with her for the rest of her days, however, was the way, as she cut the cauls away, infants who should have been incapable of either opening or focussing their eyes had returned her own fascinated stare with bright, green eyes shining with the inner light of awareness. Very old, shrewdly intelligent eyes.

The grandfather clock struck midnight. Outside the house, the storm began to disperse as if it had quite suddenly lost its reason for existence.

 

Twelve years ago. A family dinner.

Two young girls with bright, emerald green eyes and hair like spun gold sat side by side at the table. They were identical down to the frilly pink dresses, and both wore the same expression of stubborn disgust. In front of each was a plate of food, each almost untouched.

"There are children starving in China," said the mother, whose own hair was a match for the girls', though her eyes were a common muddy brown. "You eat what's put in front of you."

The girls remained stubbornly silent.

"If you don't eat it now, you'll eat it for breakfast."

The father, a dark-haired man with an olive complexion, spoke up for the first time. "If they don't like it, Eilleen, there's no sense in forcing them to eat it." The girls turned a grateful look of adoration on him.

"Damn you, Blake! You're spoiling those girls," said Eilleen in a furious voice. She slammed her fist down on the table hard enough to rattle the plates. "They're damned well going to listen to me."

Underneath the table the two girls held hands. Their faces went blank for a fraction of a second.

A heavy thud sounded from the roof, followed by a loud clatter that made both adults at the table jump. A second and a third series of thuds and clatters followed in rapid succession.

"What the hell was that?" said Blake.

The thudding and clattering became a constant, rolling thunder, shaking the entire house. Blake and Eilleen rose from the table and ran to the front door, throwing it wide. Outside, a rain of stones fell from the eavestroughing on the roof, some the size of a large man's fist, and some no larger than a pebble. No source for this deluge could be seen.

"Jesus," whispered Eilleen.

As suddenly as it had started, the downpour of stones shut off. The only evidence it had ever happened was the dented eavestroughing and the piles of stones scattered across the lawn.

At the table, the girls smiled enigmatically. The plates in front of them were empty.

 

Ten years ago. A bedroom, late at night.

Both girls, curled together in the same bed, woke simultaneously and instantly. Their parents had long ago given up trying to keep them in separate beds. The girls looked up to see their father standing in the shadows at the foot of their bed.

"Hello daddy," said the girls.

The figure made a sound, like the low howling of the wind.

"We love you too," said the girls. "Do you really have to leave?"

There was a deep, dirge-like moaning in response. The smell of gasoline and smoke was very strong in the room.

The girls nodded. "Yes, we'll take very good care of her. Good-bye daddy."

The figure at the foot of the bed left as quietly as it had come. In the morning, the girls would be informed that their father had died the night before in a traffic accident.

 

Five years ago. A high school gymnasium.

Her name was Candace Meyers, and she was the captain of the football cheerleading squad. It had become her personal goal to make life as miserable as possible for Emerald and Lace, the creepy twin sisters who infested her squad and wouldn't leave. Jealousy perhaps played no little role in her hatred, for the sisters possessed an eerie, elfin beauty that had a bewitching effect on men.

"Off the beam, freakazoids," said Candace.

Emerald, closest to Candace, turned a penetrating stare on her. Lace paused in mid-handstand. "It's our turn," said Emerald reasonably.

Candace jerked her thumb. "I said off! You heard Miss Taggert, I'm in charge until she gets back from the office. Unless you'd like me to tell her I saw you both horsing around on the beam."

"We're not horsing around," said Lace.

A small crowd of girls had begun to gather to watch the excitement, sensing blood in the water. Candace just smirked.

The twins climbed down from the beam, to the amusement of the other girls, and stood watching as Candace claimed her prize. Soon she was doing a series of forward handsprings on the balance beam, displaying the lithe agility that had won her the coveted cheerleading squad. The other girls drifted away.

Emerald and Lace clasped their hands and looked at each other. Had anyone been watching, they might have felt something like an invisible arc of electricity jump between the gazes of the twins. Lace nodded slowly. They turned their attention back to the balance beam in time to see Candace take a running step forward for a jumping dismount.

For an instant nothing happened. Then there was a tremendous cracking sound, and the foot-thick hardwood of the balance beam exploded into splinters beneath Candance's bare foot as it came down. She took an awkward step into empty air as the beam collapsed, her weight coming down squarely on her shin as she hit the floor. There was a wet snap, and a white tusk of bone tore through her soft skin.

Candace began to scream in pain. Eventually the ambulance came and took Candance away with them. The compound fracture would keep her off the squad for a full six months before she recovered, and in that time, full joint control had been taken by Emerald and Lace.

 

THE PRESENT.

-I'm not looking forward to this,- thought Lace. She sighed.

"I caught that one," said Emerald, turning to her sister. Though they often heard each other's thoughts, it seemed to occur only when they were not thinking about it. "What's wrong? I mean, it's only for a month, right?"

The two stood hand in hand before the old house. They had been away at college only a year and half, and already they thought of it in those terms, as the 'old house.'

"You know what she's like," said Lace. "Why won't she give us the money? It's our money. Daddy left it for us, you know that."

Emerald shrugged. "We're not suffering."

"You mean you're not," corrected Lace with a grimace. "You have that job at the book store. All I have are the cheques from Mother."

"You do okay for clothes," said Emerald with a grin. She looked pointedly at Lace's expensive suede jacket.

Lace laughed. "Okay, I'm not exactly starving. Still, it pisses me off to think of her holding money Daddy left for us, dishing it out like we were a couple of children."

"The ties that bind," said Emerald. "How else would she make sure we come home for Christmas every year?"

Together they walked to the front door and rang the doorbell. The familiar jingle of chimes brought back a wave of nostalgia. A short time later the door was opened by their mother.

Eilleen Callahan had aged well. At thirty-seven she still had a trim figure, and did daily battle against bulges and sags with a regimen of aerobics at the fitness club. After the loss of her husband, she had no shortage of suitors, but had chosen to play the field. It was a decision her daughters had not forgiven her. Indeed, since the topic of their mother's boyfriends had become taboo, they weren't even sure if she had one at the moment, or whether they were likely to find some man fifteen years her junior living in the house and in the bed they would forever think of as their father's.

"Hello Lace, Emerald," said Eilleen. It was not exactly a frosty greeting, but it did not hold a great deal of warmth either. Too many things that could not be taken back had been said, too much water had passed under the bridge.

"Mother," said Emerald. Lace simply nodded.

"Won't you come in," said Eilleen, and the twins entered the house in which they had been born for the first time since summer break.

The three women gathered in the living room in front of the fireplace, where so many conversations had been held before, conversations that had ended in tears and recriminations. Eilleen offered each of her daughters a glass of cognac, which they accepted. They sat and began to exchange news, but nothing of any importance. Nothing that might provoke a confrontation. They all felt the tension in the room.

Anyone present would have remarked on the similarity of Eilleen with her daughters. All three were slim, fit, with a medium build. Their hair was nearly identical, except perhaps a touch less gold and a touch more butter in the older woman's. An outsider would also have noticed the similarity of the mannerisms and expressions, which would have surprised all three had they been told.

"So," said Eilleen, taking a sip from her glass. "Have you decided what you want to do with your things?"

"Our things?" said Emerald cautiously.

"Yes, your books, your old clothes, your toys, all the things you left behind." Eilleen looked over the rim of her snifter. "I had them moved down to the basement."

"You did... what?" said Lace. Her voice was incredulous.

Eilleen shrugged minutely. "You don't live here any more. I needed the extra room."

Lace opened her mouth angrilly to speak, but Emerald laid a hand on her shoulder. -Not now,- thought Emerald. Lace shut her mouth with a furious snap.

"Mother," began Emerald calmly. "You know very well that Lace and I share a small dorm room. We do not have room for half of what we have now. We certainly don't have room for anything else."

"Of course I know," said Eilleen. "I pay for it, remember?"

"With Daddy's money!" shouted Lace as her control snapped. Her body shook with barely suppressed rage.

Eilleen narrowed her eyes and smiled bitterly. "My money. Your father knew you'd need someone to keep a tight rein on you. Now, if you were prepared to move back home and attend a perfectly good local college, I'd be quite happy to give you back your rooms."

"That's what this is all really about, isn't it?" said Emerald. "You never wanted us out from under your thumb. You want us right here so you can control us for the rest of your life."

"Don't be so dramatic," snapped Eilleen. "The two of you are always making a production out of everything. I simply see no reason to put up with junk underfoot all the time for perfect strangers. Families do things for each other. We're not a family."

"You have that right," growled Lace. She dropped her snifter to the coffee table with a loud clunk and stormed out of the room. Emerald exchanged a long look with her mother, then stood up and followed her sister.

Eilleen frowned into her cognac long after both twins had pounded up the stairs to their respective rooms.

Dinner that night was a silent affair of clinking silverware and mumbled requests for the salt shaker. The tension was electric, could almost be seen crackling around the table. Everyone there could sense the brewing storm, and none wanted to be the person who sparked it.

After the meal was finished and dishes cleared away, the three women returned to the living room. All knew that some kind of resolution would have to be reached.

Eilleen sat in the wingback chair by the fire, looking like a femme fatale from a James Bond movie in her black velvet dress slit all the way up the side of the leg. The low bodice revealed a great deal of her freckled decolletage. Almost unconsciously she had chosen to wear something that she knew her daughters could not compete with, and the high heels she wore added inches to her height, increasing her sense of superiority.

Directly across from her, on the sofa, Emerald and Lace sat side by side, dressed in sweats and sneakers. Neither had felt the need to compete.

"Lace and I have talked it over," said Emerald. "We've decided to put our stuff into storage."

"If the two of you believe I'm going to pay for it, you have another think coming," said Eilleen. She crossed her legs and looked smug.

Lace clenched her fists but looked away and said nothing.

"No, Mother," said Emerald. "We'll pay for it out of our allowance from Daddy's trust fund."

Eilleen shrugged as if the matter was of no importance to her. "You do what you like. I just want it out of my house."

"So you can move a couple of your little boy toys in here?" muttered Lace under her breath, but loud enough so she knew her mother could hear her.

"What did you say?" said Eilleen in a dangerous whisper.

-This is not a good idea,- thought Emerald, but Lace, in her fury, ignored her.

"You heard me... Mother," said Lace, grinning viciously. "Or don't their mommies allow them on overnights to Mrs. Robinson's house?"

Eilleen's face reddened. Her fingers curled into talons. "You... little bitch," she hissed through clenched teeth. "Get out of my house. Get out!"

"No," said Lace, simply. "It's our house too."

And suddenly violence was in the room with them. Eilleen hurled herself out of the chair at Lace, her fists swinging in wild arcs, connecting again and again. The twins, stunned by the sudden onslaught, could only grapple desperately with the clawed harpy that assaulted them.

"You bitch! You fucking bitch!" screamed Eilleen.

Emerald, in the midst of the confused melee, grabbed for her sister's hand. The instant contact was made, Emerald felt a tingle run up her arm and into her brain. Icy calm settled on her. Something big and black like a pregnant storm cloud gathered in the whorls of her mind, demanding to be set loose. When she spoke, her voice was a rumble of supernatural thunder. "Leave her... ALONE!"

Both twins felt the shock of something massive leave their bodies in a rush, howling from their pores like a demon set free from captivity. Delicate crystalline structures in their brains shattered in the gale, to reform in entirely new configurations.

Something large and terrible and unseen picked Eilleen up in its teeth and flung her across the room like a discarded bone. She gave a single piercing cry of terror as she flew, and then there was ominous silence.

The twins laid across the sofa in a sprawl, too exhausted to move or speak. Even thought seemed painful. It was long minutes before either could pull herself into a less awkward position.

-What was that?- thought Lace.

-I... don't know,- thought Emerald. -What happened to Mother?-

"I saw her fall in behind the sideboard," said Lace in a croak as she got her voice working again.

Emerald staggered to her feet and lurched in the direction of the sideboard. She stumbled twice and had to grab hold of the mantle to keep from falling over. "She's not here, Lace." Her voice was tinged with the first stirrings of panic.

"What do you mean she's not there? I saw her fall there!" Lace got her feet under her and made her way to the sideboard.

"There's no one here," whispered Emerald. "Just her clothes."

Lace reached down and lifted the velvet dress. A bra, a pair of panties, and something heavy fell out the bottom. Lace's eyes widened. "What the fuck is that?"

"Oh shit," said Emerald.

On the floor were a pair of high-heeled sandals and sprawled across the top of them was the heavy object that had fallen from the dress -- a tiny, naked, blonde-haired woman only slightly longer than one of the sandals itself.

Lace swallowed heavily. "Is she... alive?"

Emerald licked her finger and bent down, holding it in front of the little doll-woman's face. "I can feel her breath," she said, with relief. "She's alive. I don't know what the hell we're going to do with her, but she's alive."

After some hurried discussion, Lace ran to get a towel. In the mean time, Emerald used the velvet dress to gather Eilleen into her hands, too frightened to touch her. Through the dress she could feel the very real solidity of her mother's unconscious body. It terrified her. They had never done anything like this before, and if her mother died as a result, Emerald thought she might lose her mind.

"Here, Em," said Lace. She held out the towel taut between her hands, and Emerald gently rolled the tiny woman onto it. Lace very carefully folded the towel around her mother so that she was completely swaddled like an infant, with only her little head protruding. They took her to the kitchen and laid the towel on the kitchen table. After the twins had perked themselves a cup of coffee, they sat across the table from each other with their towel-wrapped mother in between them. She had not stirred the entire time.

"Well here's another fine mess you've got me into," said Emerald.

Lace smiled. It was an old joke between them. "How big do you think she is?" she asked as she dabbed lightly at her mother's forehead with the moistened corner of a dish towel.

"Um, about seven inches," said Emerald. She shook her head. "Jesus."

"We should measure," said Lace firmly.

They found an old tape measure in the junk drawer and unwrapped the little bundle on the table. Neither recalled ever seeing their mother naked before, and the sight made them uncomfortable, especially as helpless before them as she was, like a lab specimen ready for dissection. They quickly measured and rewrapped her, determining that she was about eight and a quarter inches tall.

"What do you think we ought to do?" asked Emerald.

Lace made a pained expression. "Think she'll be mad?"

Both girls looked at each other and broke into a fit of giggling. In the towel, Eilleen frowned in her sleep and snuggled a little deeper into the plush.

Eilleen did not wake up that night, nor the next day. Lace tried as best she could to drizzle a little water into her mouth with a tea spoon, but was afraid of drowning her. The twins took turns sleeping while one watched their diminutive mother for any sign of wakening or distress. It was the following morning, 36 hours since the shrinking, that Eilleen opened her eyes for the first time.

"I've got to be dreaming," she said in a voice that was like the squeak of a cartoon character. Her throat was dry and felt like sandpaper.

Emerald's face hovered over her like a hot air balloon. Those green eyes pinned her mother like an insect on a board. "No, it's not a dream," rumbled Emerald in what sounded like the muttering of distant artillery to Eilleen. "How do you feel? What do you remember?"

Eilleen frowned. "I feel so strange. There was an arguement, I remember that. And then, I... something happened. I was angry. I was very angry and then I fell and that's all I remember. My arms, I can't move my arms." She began to struggle in the towel.

"Shhh," said Emerald. "It's okay, you're just wrapped up. Here, let me loosen that for you. There. Don't cry."

"Th- thank you," sniffed Eilleen as she wiped at her tears with her hand. "I don't understand what's happening. Please tell me what's happening."

Emerald sighed and brought a thimble of water to her mother, who greedily gulped it down. "Easy," said Emerald. "Take it easy or you'll make yourself sick. It was... an accident. Lace and I didn't even know we could do this. We still don't know exactly what it is we've done. Somehow we've made you... little."

Eilleen nodded and smiled vaguely as her eyes drooped. "Yes, that's nice," she said, as she snuggled deeper into the towel. Seconds later she was asleep. This time, though, she snored gently, and Emerald was sure it was a more natural sleep than the one she had been in.

Over the following three days, Eilleen woke briefly from time to time, drinking a little water, or eating a little food each time. She was disoriented, and seemed not to notice her surroundings. Eventually the towel began to smell, and the twins realized they would have to clean her.

"I'm not touching her," said Lace. Her tone of voice was adamant.

"Look, she's probably pissed and shit all over herself," said Emerald. "Someone has to wash her. She's starting to really stink."

"Fine," said Lace. "You do it."

"We'll both do it," growled Emerald. She took the towel which had become their mother's sickbed and brought it to the kitchen sink, where she unfolded it. The smell made her wrinkle her nose. "Get some hand soap, it'll be gentler on her skin than dish detergent."

While Lace went to the bathroom for the soap, Emerald gently lifted her mother's befouled form from the towel with her fingers, careful to support her head with her thumb. She found that the little body had a heaviness to it that made it seem more real somehow.

"Got it," said Lace, pumping some liquid soap from the dispenser into her hand. While Emerald held her, turning her over as required, Lace rubbed the soap into all the little crevices of her mother's body with her finger. -Fuck, this is turning me on,- thought Lace as her finger rubbed the soap gently between Eilleen's thighs. She turned beet red when she realized that she had sent the thought to Emerald.

-Me too,- thought Emerald. Both twins turned to look at each other but said nothing. Their shame blazed hot on their cheeks, and they quickly went back to the task at hand.

A quick rinse with luke-warm water under the tap, and Eilleen was squeaky clean. Emerald wrapped her snugly in a fresh, terrycloth towel, and neither girl mentioned their thoughts.

On the fourth day after waking up for the first time, Eilleen came fully conscious. Because she had hazy memories from the previous three days, her predicament was not a complete shock, but it was no less pleasant. For any of them.

"How dare you do this to me!" squeaked Eilleen in what might have been a roar of anger. "You're devils! Freaks! I can't believe you did this to me. I'm going to make sure you both spend the rest of your lives in a lab getting wires stuck in your brains! Jesus Christ, I look like fucking Barbie!"

"We wouldn't be the only ones in a lab," laughed Lace. "At least they wouldn't be keeping us in a rat cage, Mother."

"Oh!" squeaked Eilleen, shaking with suppressed rage. "I swear to God, I'm going to make both of you sorry little girls," she said, using one of her favourite expressions.

The twins smirked at the reference to little girls, which only made Eilleen angrier. "You fix me right now. And I mean right this God damned second, or I'm going to call the cops and have you both put away. I mean it!"

"There's the phone," said Emerald, pointing with a grin.

Eilleen squirmed out of her towel, wrapping it around her nakedness as best she could and walked to the edge of the kitchen table. She looked down from the edge with a feeling of vertigo. Looking around, she realized that the sheer scale of the kitchen had defeated her and she began to cry. She fell to her knees and crawled across the table to the twins who watched her impassively. "Please make me big again. Please. I'm sorry I said those things. I'll be good. I won't tell anyone. I promise."

Lace shook her head. "We can't."

Eilleen's eyes got big. "You're not going to make me stay like this... are you?"

Emerald sighed. "Look, Mother, we told you. We don't know how we did this to begin with. If we tried to 'fix' you we have no idea what might happen. Nothing might happen. Then again, maybe you'd explode. Or maybe you'd shrink again. How would you like to be a quarter inch tall instead of eight inches?"

"Then call the hospital!" squeaked Eilleen in outrage, drying her tears on the towel. "Why aren't I in the hospital? They can do some tests or something, right? Maybe they can fix it." She looked up anxiously at her daughters.

"I don't think they can fix it," said Lace. "And besides, you were right. Em and I would end up in some lab with wires in our heads, and you'd probably end up a guinea pig for the rest of your life."

"I don't care," wailed Eilleen. "I'm going to the hospital!"

-She's going to be a problem,- thought Lace, turning to Emerald. -What do we do?- In reply, an image formed in her mind of a tank full of tropical fish. -Good idea,- thought Lace.

And so Lace went down to the basement and retrieved their old fish tank from the storage room. It was three feet long and a foot deep, with glass sides a foot and a half high. The wire mesh that went over the top would be enough to keep Eilleen from getting out.

When she saw Lace coming in with the fish tank, Eilleen turned to run, but Emerald scooped her up with the towel. She fought like a wildcat in a sack, but there was nothing to fight against except the yielding confines of the towel. Ten seconds later, both she and the towel were inside the tank, glaring out with a mixture of terror and rage at her daughters.

A few more bath towels were added to the tank for bedding, and a soft tea towel for a blanket. Since neither of the girls had been much for playing with dolls as children, they had nothing for their mother to wear, but it was warm enough in the tank with the towels and blankets that it didn't much matter. At least, not to them. A tea cup was filled with water. A shot glass was half-filled with water and a nice- smelling surface cleaner for use as a toilet. The twins pronounced it satisfactory, and put the tank over the mantle in the living room, where they could check it regularly. Eilleen's alternating threats and crying jags did not appear to bother them in the least.

For the first week, what bothered Eilleen the most was the boredom. There was nothing to do. She would have asked for a radio or a novel, but the girls never bothered to stay long enough to listen to her. They gave her food, changed her water, cleaned her toilet, but it was almost as if they were afraid to be near her. Eilleen wondered why.

One day, after that first week, Eilleen decided to try and attract some attention. She knew that when the twins were separated, they were much more pliant and easier to browbeat. For this reason, she deliberately waited for a time when Emerald was out on an errand to waylay Lace and ask for some concessions. Until she could think of some way to escape, she decided that she might as well be comfortable.

As usual, Lace reached into the tank to grab the tea cup for refilling, but this time Eilleen was ready and grabbed hold of Lace's hand as she lifted the cup out. Before Lace could shake her off Eilleen shouted as loudly as she could. "Lace! Wait! Please, I need some things!"

Lace paused, looking uncomfortable. "What do you want?"

"I'm bored. I have nothing to do all day. Can I have a radio, and maybe a book?" Eilleen smiled and tried to look friendly.

"Yeah, I guess," said Lace guardedly.

"And I stink, Lace," said Eilleen with a laugh. "I haven't had a bath in more than a week. I could really use a bath."

Some conflict of emotion played across Lace's face. She blinked a few times, nervously, then licked her lips. "Um, okay," she said, reaching into the tank. She threw one of the bath towels over her mother, and used it to scoop her out.

Eilleen made squeaky panic noises as Lace carried her to the kitchen, trapped in the folds of the towel. Lace tipped her gently out of the towel into the sink. "What the hell are you doing?" demanded Eilleen in a furious chirp.

"Giving you a shower," said Lace in a monotone. She ran the tap and switched on the aerator, until she got a frothy stream of warm water. "Be careful of the drain."

Covering her nudity with her hands, Eilleen glared angrilly up at Lace. "I've been taking showers on my own since I was a little girl, thank you. I don't need your assistance."

Lace said nothing, but moved the tap over so Eilleen found herself in the middle of a thundering deluge. Self-conscious, but realizing this was the only opportunity she'd have, Eilleen began washing herself. The way Lace stood at the sink and stared at her made her feel very uncomfortable.

"Here," said Lace, smearing a long streak of liquid soap down her mother's back with her thumb. Eilleen yelped and jumped away as the thumb continued down her bare buttocks. "Sorry," said Lace. She took her hand away, but there was something intense in her stare that brought a shiver of fear to her mother.

Eilleen finished her shower, and Lace wrapped her up in the towel again. She was returned to the fish tank, and Lace said nothing the entire time. A few minutes later, she set an old transistor radio outside the tank, tuned to a classical music station, and dropped a handful of novels inside. Then she left the room, and Eilleen didn't see her again for two days.

Another two weeks went by, and during that time, Eilleen could not help but sense a dark undercurrent of tension in her captor daughters. They rarely talked, and when they did it was in monosyllables. There was something eating at them, and whatever it was drove them to neglect her as much as they could get away with. Eilleen had the eerie sense that there was actually a great deal of conversation going on, but in some way that she was not privy to understanding.

Christmas day went by almost unnoticed. Eilleen spent most of the day crying, wondering what would become of her when the twins' winter break was up and they went back to college. Perhaps, she thought, they would simply leave her in the tank to die of hunger and thirst. The next time they came home, they would find a tiny skeleton in the tank and their problem would be solved.

On the last day of December, Eilleen became aware that there was some sort of excitement building. The phone rang nearly constantly, and both Emerald and Lace were busy in the kitchen. At noon, Lace came to her. "We're having a big New Years Eve party, Mother. Everyone is going to be here. For obvious reasons we can't have you sitting around on the mantlepiece in your birthday suit, so you're going into the basement until it's over." She grinned evilly. "Into storage with the rest of the junk."

"You can't get away with this," said Eilleen, as Lace picked up the tank and started down the stairs. "Everyone will wonder where I am. You'll have to tell them."

Lace hid the tank behind a box, then covered it with a horse blanket just in case someone should sneak downstairs. "I don't think so, Mother," she said. "Give us some credit for intelligence. Everyone thinks you won the lottery and are travelling the world."

Lace went back up the stairs, the light went out, and Eilleen was left to sob her self-pity into the darkness.

Guests began arriving in mid-afternoon, and by ten that night there were two hundred people in the house. Everyone seemed to catch a sense of the wild abandon which was nearly despair that Emerald and Lace were exuding, and the party became darker, almost Dionysian, with everyone drinking too much and laughing too loud. Couples were having sex in every room, in every corner. It was a desperate coupling that gave their partners neither joy nor satisfaction. And at the centre of this maelstrom were Emerald and Lace, both of them drinking more, laughing louder, and dancing wilder than anyone else. When midnight came, it was with an almost orgasmic sense of release, that effectively broke the back of the revel.

It was 4am by the time the last guests had stumbled for their coats and left. All that remained was the colossal detritus of the party that covered the floor like the aftermath of a victory parade. The twins stood in the living room together and surveyed the mess.

"S'a big mess," said Lace, swaying gently, a champagne flute in her hand. Her face was flushed, her eyes bloodshot.

Emerald blinked owlishly. "I think you're right," she said very seriously, pronouncing her words carefully with numb lips. "Mother's going to be angry."

"Fuck 'er," said Lace, frowning.

"Yeah," agreed Emerald. She lurched over to the stereo and slipped a compact disc into the player. Squinting at the buttons, she hit play on the second try and music blasted through the house. A few more seconds of fumbling brought the volume down to a more reasonable level. "Wanna dance," she said, and began gyrating across the room.

Lace watched her sister for a little while. "Mother never dances. Mess up her make-up," she muttered. A few minutes later she left the room and made her way to the basement, where she pulled the blanket from the fish tank. "Hey! Hey, wake up!" she shouted, tapping on the glass with her fingernail.

Eilleen sat up, holding her little blanket to her, rubbing at her eyes. "What? What time is it?"

"Why don't you ever dance?" said Lace, leaning right up to the side of the glass and staring at her mother.

"You're drunk," snapped Eilleen, glaring at Lace's bloodshot eyes.

"I am drunk," agreed Lace. She nodded and smiled. "I am very, very drunk. But I'll be sober t'morrow, and you'll still be a teeny weeny little dollie."

Eilleen scowled at her daughter but said nothing.

Lace straightened and looked thoughtful for a moment. "You're gonna come and dance with us," she said, and reached inside the fish tank. Eilleen, suddenly alarmed, burrowed into her blankets, but Lace dug through them doggedly until her fingers closed around her mother's torso. She pulled the struggling little body out in her fist, with Eilleen's legs hanging below, and her arms beating ineffectually at the clenched fingers.

"Let me go!" squeaked Eilleen.

"No," sneered Lace, and lurched up the stairs with her mother still clutched in her hot hand.

By the time Lace had returned to the living room, Emerald had taken off her dress, and was dancing in an increasing frenzy dressed only in her panties, her body slick with perspiration. There was something frantic about the way she danced, as if she was desperately trying to sweat some terrible disease out of her pores.

"We gotta visitor," said Lace over the music. "Catch."

Eilleen screamed as she suddenly found herself airborne, her arms and legs windmilling as she tumbled over and over. At the last second, Emerald saw the hurtling little pink body and grabbed for her with clumsy fingers, snatching her mother out of the air. Eilleen gave a sob of relief.

"Hi Mother," said Emerald. "Let's dance." And with that, she began her whirling and gyrating afresh, her breasts bouncing heavily and her sweat flying in droplets. As she spun, she tossed her mother into the air and caught her, driving the breath from her.

"Please, don't drop me!" screamed Eilleen, as she grabbed in terror at Emerald's fingers, her tiny hands losing purchase in the sweat that slicked Emerald's body.

Lace stripped off her own dress, kicked off her shoes, and began dancing around Emerald, occasionally colliding with her as they both lurched and spun in random directions. Eilleen screamed herself hoarse as she was tossed from sister to sister like a ball, avoiding a fall only by fractions of an inch each time. "Stop it!" she cried, "please, you're hurting me."

But Emerald and Lace were lost in a world of their own, caring only where they stepped, how their arms moved, how their breasts, heavy with sweat, swayed and bounced and heaved with their exertions. When the compact disc ended, both sisters stopped where they stood, panting, their sweat rolling down their bodies in rivulets.

Emerald handed Eilleen to her sister and changed the disc. The deep, smoky sound of a blues saxophone filled the room. Emerald sighed.

Without discussion, Emerald and Lace pressed their bodies together and began dancing slowly, rocking gently back and forth. Their arms went around each other as they danced, Lace pressing Eilleen into Emerald's back in her fist. Their heads rested on each other's shoulders.

It was Lace who began lightly kissing her sister's bare shoulder, tiny kisses that felt like feather touches. As they continued to dance, she ran her tongue along the soft skin, salty with sweat, to Emerald's throat and nibbled. Emerald moaned softly. The closeness of their bodies, the feel of each other's heat became unbearable. Lace lifted her lips and pressed them against her sister's. Their lips parted and their tongues joined briefly.

"This is wrong," whispered Emerald when their kiss broke apart at last.

Lace used her free hand to gently stroke the curve of Emerald's buttocks through her panties. "I don't care," she whispered back, nibbling gently at Emerald's ear.

"But what about..." Emerald let her voice trail off. Her hands came around to stroke the soft sideswell of Lace's breasts.

Lace lifted her mother around from behind Emerald's back. Eilleen found herself held in Lace's hand between her daughters' faces, Lace to her left and Emerald to her right. The smell of alcohol from their breaths was nearly asphyxiating. To her shock, she felt Lace's thumb begin rubbing gently at her breasts. "No," she squeaked. "Stop it. You can't do this."

Emerald's tongue darted out like a huge, hot slab of meat, lifting and caressing her mother's tiny breast, leaving a cool trail of glistening saliva. "Please," squeaked Eilleen, turning her head away. "I'm your mother. Don't do this. Please." She began to cry when she felt Lace's tongue on her other breast.

"Taste good," muttered Emerald. Her nipples had swollen up hard and round as small grapes. Hooking her thumbs into the waistband of her panties, she pulled them down and stepped out of them, letting the air cool her smouldering pubis. It was neatly trimmed, the fine blonde hairs nearly invisible. Sinking to her knees, she pulled down Lace's panties to reveal a soft blonde thatch the twin of her own. When Emerald placed her lips against her sister's mons in an open-mouthed kiss, Lace made a sound halfway between a purr and a growl.

While Emerald's tongue made little thrusts, sliding wetly between the moist folds of Lace's labia, Lace carefully began nibbling at the tiny, sobbing body in her hand, nipping gently with her teeth. She sucked each arm entirely into her mouth in turn, aroused by the feeling of the tiny fingers moving on her tongue.

"Why are you doing this to me?" sobbed Eilleen in her cartoon voice.

"So tiny," said Lace in a mixture of awe and lust. She took both her mother's legs into her mouth and sucked at them, rolling her little feet with great care between teeth like millstones that could have crushed them to jelly. Eilleen held her legs together as tightly as she could, but Lace's tongue easily forced them apart, sliding like a fat, pink serpent between them.

"No!" squeaked Eilleen, who beat at Lace's nose with her fists until Lace was forced to pin her arms to her side with her fingers. When Lace's tongue reached her groin, Eilleen groaned. Despite, or perhaps because of her disgust, Eilleen was humiliated to find herself grinding her hips into Lace's probing tongue. She became aware of the warm softness of Lace's lips, the great, wet heat that radiated from the inside of Lace's open mouth against her legs.

Lace gave a sigh, shivering as an orgasm rippled up from her lap, where Emerald's face was still pressed, her tongue making longer and deeper forays inside her. Fragrent fluids shone around Emerald's mouth and dripped down her chin when she lifted her face away, leaving a smear of red lipstick on her sister's swollen labia.

"Here," said Emerald. "Give her here." She reached up and took Eilleen from her sister's hand.

"Stop this, Emerald, this is perverse," said Eilleen, looking up into her daughter's face with a confused mingle of emotion.

"You seem to be enjoying yourself," sneered Emerald, using her index finger to rub lightly at her mother's damp cleft. Eilleen arched her back in Emerald's hand, her legs spreading wide.

"It's wrong," said Eilleen through her tears, but there was no conviction in her voice. She bit her lip to keep from moaning, but could not keep her legs from bicycling in the air as Emerald slid her fingertip up and down her mother's pubis. Eilleen's eyes were closed. Had they been open, the suddenly crafty look on Emerald's face would have panicked her.

"I can't believe I came out of there," said Emerald, working the very tip of her finger between her mother's labia. "Lace has one too. You think turnabout is fair play, Mother? Look, it's almost the same size as you. Go ahead, have a closer look."

Eilleen's eyes snapped open, and she had time for a single squeak of terror before Emerald pressed her mother's face into the hot furnace heat of Lace's sopping vaginal lips.

"Ooh," said Lace, moaning. Her fingers scrabbled at her sister's hand, trying to push Eilleen's head deeper inside. Eilleen's whole body jerked and twisted in a frenzy of fear, but she was helpless as Lace got a finger in her back and pushed her whole upper torso inside, until only her mother's buttocks and thrashing legs could be seen protruding. Lace's legs went weak and she lowered herself to the sofa, bringing her knees up and spreading her legs.

"Jesus," whispered Emerald, who couldn't believe how horny she felt watching her mother's legs kicking helplessly from her sister's wet slit. "Can she breathe in there?"

"I don't give a fuck," said Lace. "Oh Em, you won't believe what this feels like. I can feel her moving inside." Using two fingers, Lace grasped Eilleen by the hips and drew her halfway out, then plunged her deep inside again, so that even her buttocks vanished and only her legs alone could be seen. Lace gasped with pleasure and repeated the action.

Emerald bent her head again to her sister's groin, and took her mother's little feet between her teeth. Slowly, she lowered her lips to Lace's labia until nothing at all could be seen of their mother. Then she began to suck, drawing Eilleen's tiny body, slick with Lace's juices, slowly from inside her sister and into her own mouth with wet slurping noises. When she felt Eilleen's feet kicking feebly at the back of her throat, she pushed with her tongue, sliding her back inside Lace. Over and over she did this, slowly pumping her mother's body in and out.

After a few minutes, Lace seemed to vibrate, and her vaginal muscles spasmed uncontrollably, gripping her mother in a hot bear-hug embrace that threatened to snap her tiny bones. Emerald gripped Eilleen's waist with her teeth and slid her completely out with a wet popping sound before she could be crushed. The sensation was enough to send Lace over the edge, and she let out a deep, protracted groan of sheer lust. Her climax sent her fluids spurting from her, to soak into the fabric of the sofa.

"Holy fuck," panted Lace when she could speak again.

Emerald had Eilleen in her hands, and was lapping at her with her tongue. Eilleen was completely limp.

"Is she okay?" asked Lace.

"Just passed out from lack of air, I think," said Emerald. She stroked her mother's smooth body with her finger. "When she wakes up it's my turn."

Lace nodded. "Hold on, I'm going to make this a little easier." She stood and padded from the room. When she returned, she had a small white rectangular box in her hand.

Emerald raised an eyebrow.

"Dental floss," said Lace with a grin. Carefully, she tied Eilleen's hands behind her back and bound her legs together.

"Wow, that's really hot," breathed Emerald, her green eyes fixed on the tiny, bound woman lying limp in her hand. She ran her thumb over her mother's breasts, causing the little nipples, no larger than the nib of a pen, to stand erect. She rubbed the limp form against her own nipples, sliding it in and out of her cleavage, savouring the unbelievable feeling of total domination that it gave her.

It was pressed into the soft flesh between Emerald's breasts that Eilleen awoke, coughing Lace's fluids painfully from her lungs. When she found that she couldn't move her arms or legs, she began to squeak loudly and writhe with as much violence as her little body was capable of. "You're deviants!" she screamed as loudly as she could, which was a shrill chirp. "You're degenerate little sluts! I wish I had smothered you in your sleep, you, you freaks!"

Lace sneered. "Then try not to enjoy it so much... Mother."

"Just ignore her," said Emerald. "Come on, let's do it. I want to feel her inside me. That looks so fucking cool."

Eilleen's eyes opened wide in horror. "No, not again! I'm sorry, I didn't mean it. Please, you don't know what it's like, I can't breathe, it's horrible! No! Nooo!"

Lace lifted her little doll-size mother and pressed her to the entrance of Emerald's womb. Eilleen's screams of terror became muffled sobs as her head and shoulders slid inside. Unable to do more than wriggle, she slid smoothly all the way in until her face pressed smotheringly into Emerald's cervix. There was almost no air and, unable to clear the fluids away from her face, she began drowning, inhaling Emerald's juices.

"Ooh, that feels good," said Emerald, throwing her head back and closing her eyes while Lace shoved their mother in as deep as she would go. Only her bound shins, ankles, and feet could be seen waving violently past Emerald's damp labia. "All the way, push her all the way."

Lace pinched Eilleen's feet between her fingers and forced them entirely inside Emerald. Eilleen, half-curled, filled her daughter completely. Coughing and screaming and thrashing helplessly, held in a wet, fleshy embrace, Eilleen was overtaken by blind panic as she felt herself trapped inside a living prison, its sopping walls more impregnable than a mountain of stone. A wave of claustrophobia washed over her, sending her mind into a spinning vortex of endless terror and darkness, from which she knew she would never emerge.

Emerald pinched herself shut with her fingers, trapping her mother inside. "Uh," she grunted, as her tiny prisoner kicked and squirmed in panic. Emerald sucked on her lower lip as she felt a volcanic orgasm building in her gut. Lace kneeled before her, nipping with her teeth at her sister's breasts. When she climaxed at last, Emerald could not restrain a shout of total ecstasy.

Already half-unconscious, when the rippling walls around Eilleen turned rock hard and squeezed like a car crusher from all directions, she blacked out completely, away from the world of pain and fear.

Emerald and Lace laid entwined together on the sofa, the sweat of their bodies mingling. Every once in a while they would press their lips together in a passionate kiss, exploring each other's mouths. Eilleen, still bound and unconscious, laid across their breasts, and they took turns licking at her, biting at her little breasts and washing her clean with their tongues. Eventually, still clasped to each other, they fell asleep.

 

Three months later. A dorm room, late at night.

"You done?" asked Lace.

"Mmmm, yeah," said Emerald with a lazy smile. "That was good, Little One. No punishment tonight."

"Thank you, mistress," said Eilleen with great humility, loud enough so her little chirp of a voice could be heard from under the covers. She was exhausted and wanted nothing but the sleep which had become her only release from the eternal nightmare her life had become, but she knew she had other duties to perform. A single tear tracked down her face, and she brushed it away, annoyed. She hardly ever cried any more, except when she could be sure she was completely alone.

"My turn," said Lace.

Eilleen squirmed out from betweem Emerald's legs and climbed over her thigh to Lace. The twins watched with amusement as the small lump under the blankets struggled its way between them. Eilleen kneeled between Lace's thighs and saw she was already wet with anticiption.

It was going to be another long night.