Looking for Higher Ground
Hitting the ground, though nowhere near as hard as he expected, he rolled perfectly, coming up onto his feet fluidly and running, leaving tiny little wet footprints in his wake. For whatever reason, none of the women around the circle moved, or even seemed to take note of him. Not that he cared, the only impulse raging in him was the instinctual imperative to flee. Passing between an incredibly huge Cerys and another lady he didn’t know, he scurried toward the door. Fortunately for him the lone door leading of the room was partially ajar, giving him more than ample space to sneak out and into the hall. Skirting the edge of the plain white baseboard at the bottom of the wall, he tried to retrace his path back toward the stairs. How much time did he have before the women came out of their trance or whatever the reason was they weren’t moving? Didn’t matter, pure survival instinct pushed him forward.
Reaching the base of the stairs, he paused and looked up, counting fourteen, each riser more than twice his height. He suspected they would look for him in the basement. If he could get up the stairs, it might buy him some valuable time to figure out just what was going on. With enough speed, he might be able to springboard upward enough to catch the lip of the stair. Maybe. Running directly at the stair, he leapt, pushing himself upward and getting enough height to easily grasp the leading edge of the step. Pulling himself up, he climbed back up onto his feet. “Lucky thirteen to go,” he muttered, repeating the process. Stair after stair he climbed, arriving at the second to last, he heard the sound of heavy footsteps approaching and an unfamiliar female voice from the other side of the door directly above him, “Come on, they’ll be coming out of the swoon shortly.”
Scurrying forward, he pressed himself into the corner of the stair, back to the riser, heart thundering in his chest as he craned his head to look up over his shoulder.
The creaking of grating metal on metal rang in his ears as the door opened and light from the kitchen spilled down the stairs.
“Sersei is so lucky,” cooed another voice. Brooklynn? Was that Brooklynn?
The first girl snorted, a massive foot dropping down onto the step in front of him, “What are you complaining about? You had Sersei’s brother,” she said.
“Abbreviated, on account of my stupid bloody uterus,” Brooklynn replied.
Another foot flashed passed, going to the step immediately below him, “I’m sure Kandi will give another go round with him before handing him off to Allie,” advised the girl, taking another couple of steps.
Another stockinged foot appeared, Brooklynn’s, “I wouldn’t mind a little fun with Oliver though,” she said with a sigh.
Oliver’s mind screamed, ‘WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?’ as Brooklynn passed directly over top of him. Run.
Before the duo of giant-sized girls reached the bottom of the stairway, Oliver was pulling himself up onto the lip of the main floor near the gap under the door leading into the kitchen. Getting down on his stomach, he slid partway under the door, peeking out into the kitchen proper. There was another huge girl at the sink, her back to him.
He knew any moment Brooklynn and her friend would discover him absent and that the luxury of time was something he did not possess. There was no way he could make it to one of the appliances near the sink. Going back toward the front of the house, or using the set of back stairs to get up to the second floor seemed to be his only options. If there were still some of the girls in the sitting room, they would see him for sure. He needed to get out of sight. Crawling out from under the door, he ran as fast as his little legs would carry him to the narrow stairs. As before, he scaled the stairs, hoping and praying none of the house ginormous residents would use them. Luck was on his side, though there appeared to be a commotion arising out of the kitchen below him.
Ascending the stairs, he paused at the top to catch a quick breath. Like the stairs, the floor was a dark polished hardwood, with a runner carpet down the center. There was one door to the right side, two on the left before the hall turned to the right. There was also a slender curio table against the wall between the two doors on the left.
Beelining for the nearest door, he heard the booming sound of feet coming rapidly up the stairs behind him. Nearing the door, he dove headfirst, like a baseball player trying to beat a tag, sliding through the gap under the door and into darkness beyond.
Feet silhouetted by light emanating from the hall flashed by as whoever it was traipsed passed.
Rolling onto his back, he lay there in the darkened interior of the room, chest heaving as he fought to catch his wind. There were so many questions in his mind, not the least of which was how could the girls possibly do this? Was he hallucinating? Was this all part of the drink they fed him? It had to be, like the 1960’s government giving unsuspecting college students LSD or something. Had to be, because shrinking people just wasn’t possible, practically or theoretically. Right? Right? There could be no other plausible explanation, except he didn’t feel doped, or drowsy. What did they do to him? Bringing his hands up, he examined them in the diffuse light seeping in under the door. They looked normal. He wiggled them and touched each finger to each of his thumbs. Nothing strange. This was too weird, too completely bizarre. With the adrenalin wearing off, he suddenly realized his nakedness and vulnerability. Cam! Brooklynn and her friend talked about Cam. Was this what happened? Did they do this to him? Like so many other things, it didn’t make any kind of sense. Why would Sersei allow this to happen to her brother, or worse, lie about it to cover it up? What about Bear? Was the brute around here somewhere too? More questions than answers.