Celestial Sisters

Chapter 30: Pictures are Worth A Thousand Words

With a careful eye keeping track of all that happened around her, Luna timidly opened a door. It was the sixteenth door she had tried and from the looks of the porcelain wash basin and toilet and sterling sink- it would not be the last. She groaned and closed the door as quietly as possible. Though they were on the fourth floor and carefully removed from Nikolai Delphi, Luna didn't want to be caught snooping around by one of the many wait staff or worse, one of the Delphi followers. Her sister, Twyla, was less careful, as she slammed the door directly horizontal to Luna with a loud clatter.

"Shh!" Luna covered her lips with her pointer finger. "Are you trying to get us caught."

"Caught for what? Looking around our friend's house- I hardly think anyone would give us a hard time for that," said Twyla, donning her usual expression- complete and utter disinterest for everything. Luna could hardly see what the hilariously charming, vampire- Xavier- saw in Twyla. They were like night and day, sun and the moon, winter and summer... in the midst of her analogies Luna had to hold back a laugh as she realized that Xavier was the one with sunny personality, even though he was nocturnal. Weird.

"Maybe if this were a normal family with normal friends, staying at a normal house. But it isn't- these people are crazy."

"I can't argue with that," grunted Twyla as they continued down the hall. Her stare lingered on a large oil painting mounted on the wall, a pair of familiar silver eyes stared back at her. Turning back to Luna with her lips thinned into a tight line, Twyla averted her strange, diamond-like eyes and said, "Maybe crazy wasn't the right word, insane seems more appropriate."

They tried three more doors, one that led into a sitting room, one that led to conservatory and one that led to another bathroom. So far, Luna had seen eight toilets and zero magical spell books. It wasn't until they were about to try another set of doors, did Twyla's phone vibrate and message appeared. Twyla glanced at the screen swiftly and rolled her eyes before safely tucking the cell back into her pocket.

"Was that Alix?" Luna's eyes wildly flickered as she tried to spot the nearest exit- there wasn't one.

"No. It was Kaitlyn, apparently Grand-Daddy dearest has a whole secret part of the house we haven't seen yet."

"I do not like the sound of that," Luna swallowed nervously.

"Well if you don't like that, then I really don't think you going to like the sound of this: We have to go through there, to get to it," Twyla pointed to a painting of an old white haired man with thick beard- he would have looked like Santa Claus if he wasn't so thin. Luna felt the blood rush from her face as she recognized the man. How couldn't she? After all, he was the man who took her life, the original Mr. Delphi.

Tiptoeing over to the portrait, Twyla looked at the painting up and down before pressing on the hinges. Luna held back a cringe, afraid that the painting would rip but the picture remained intact. Though it didn't rip, it did turn vertically, like a door, and revealed a hidden passageway. The passageway was dark and cold, and there was a faint smell of mildew that caused Luna's nose to wrinkle.

"Cool," said Twyla as she stepped into the passageway.

She said that at the same time that Luna said, "Creepy."

Crossing her arms over her chest, Luna huffed at her sister and climbed into the passageway. It was large enough for both of them to walk side by side, but once Twyla fixed the painting to look like nothing had happened, they were blanketed in total darkness. Luna's throat knotted as she felt herself becoming increasingly aware of every little sound in the passageway. Every creak of the floorboards and puff of exhale from her sister seemed to create a sinister little symphony which begged for her to run away.