There was a pedestal perched next to the door, one that had once held a fern, but now sported a blood-red scripture box with twin dragons on each wooden side, a lone bright spot in the long bare hallway. That was one difference, Zoe thought. She hadn't seen any living thing—plants, animals, humans—in the house. Because Shadows didn't count, she thought as Lindy slid open the box's ornate lid, and pulled out a pair of gold-rimmed aviator glasses. "Put these on."
Zoe screwed up her face. "I'm not going to meet the Tulpa in glasses that make me look like I'm stuck in the eighties."
"Put them on," Lindy repeated, her voice brittle.
Zoe sighed, shifted her gift to one arm and accepted the glasses, her confused gaze winking up at her from the mirrored lenses. "Why?"
"Because I said so." Lindy rapped on the door twice with her knuckles and it immediately swung open to reveal a dim and deep interior. It wouldn't have been intimidating… if there'd actually been someone manning the door. Lindy saw Zoe hesitate and the cruel smile was back on her face. "Have… fun."
Zoe wondered at the deliberate word choice, but slid the glasses over her eyes like she hadn't noticed, and smirked. "We always do."
Zoe would've given her life just then to be able to smell the bilious jealousy she knew was seeping from the woman's pores, but the cursing and chattering behind them told her the other Shadows did scent it. Knowing an impending riot when she saw one, she stepped smoothly into the room and watched as the door swung shut on the demonic faces glaring at her from the hallway.
Then the vacuum of silence was absolute.
The glasses accentuated the room's dimness and Zoe thought that was their purpose. So she emptied her mind and tried not to let it unnerve her; tried, too, not to think of all the empty space around her, or how she could be cut down where she stood without even knowing the blow was corning. She knew fear stank like something pickled and old, and the Tulpa fed on that fear.
Zoe was determined to make him starve.
Still, she jumped when a movement flickered across from her, freezing as she did. Swallowing hard, she cradling the curved horn like it was a talisman that would ward off injury, and took a step forward. Three beings across from her mirrored the movement. None of them spoke.
"Babe?" she said, using the same endearment she had all those years before. No answer. She stepped forward again. The Shadows across from her drew closer as well, still silent. She tilted her head, and saw two of them imitate the movement. Cutting her eyes to the third, she realized that figure, also clad in owlish lenses, had as well. She lifted her hand as if in greeting, and they did the same.
Mirrors. A relieved sigh scuttled from her throat, but caught when a wispy shadow rose up behind her, kept rising in a tower of smoke that burned even in her mortal nose, and was tripled before her eyes. She froze as it suddenly retracted, leaving vaporous tendrils to dissipate in the air as it solidified over her right shoulder like ash caught in a mold.
Even as she strained through the dark glasses to make out his features, she knew she was the one creating them, expectation and memory joining forces to construct the man she remembered, like an architect building a house from the bones up. He wasn't much taller than she, and slighter than one would expect of a man of great power. His hair was a sandy color—not quite brown, but not blond, either—and he had deep hazel eyes, like the moss of a clouded swamp. With a wide face and full lips, he couldn't be called unattractive and that was no accident. Zoe remembered thinking that if she had to bed down with unadulterated evil, he could at least be good-looking.
Once he'd fully materialized, he slipped his arm over her shoulder, around her neck, his fingers coming to rest on her opposite arm. He squeezed lightly, pulling in tight to whisper in her ear.
"Darling," he said, his endearment for her returned. His voice was raspy, pure male, and honed.
But his embrace wasn't as cold as she remembered, his breath not as septic sour, and though Zoe knew it was only because her senses were blunted with mortality, it made it easier to ignore the rot she knew lay ready to engulf her if not for the fragile membrane of his skin. Before she'd been able to scent out festering venom and bacteria, and at the end she'd even begun to expect infection, like she too was contaminated, even though she was super. But now she could anticipate nothing about him, including this unexpected welcome.
Realigning her thoughts—and Zoe was a pro at that—she let go of the knowledge that he could kill her with a swift snap of those gentle fingers, or crack her like a walnut between the lever of his strong arm and body, and turned into him instead. The sigh that flew from her body was one of relief, not fear. Her arms clung to him with gratitude, not entreaty, and she lifted her lips to his icy ones as she'd done countless times all those years past to utter her heartfelt lie.
"I knew you'd allow me to return."
He pulled away to study her face, taking in the changes since he'd last seen her—few, as she'd aged well—though he studied her eyes in particular.
No, not her eyes, she realized. His reflection in her glasses. Her thoughts as they materialized on his face. So she let memories wash over her, easy now that she was seeing and scenting and touching him again, and his features sharpened further. His brow grew in smooth, the whorls of his earlobes became delicate and defined. She thought she saw his eyes flash dark, but his expression brightened as the room did, degree by degree, until they were standing face to face in a room of reflected angles and light.
Have fun, Lindy had said, and now Zoe knew why. This was the one room in the house that had undergone a complete renovation, and it was why he hadn't needed to move. Here—in the place that'd once been the Tulpa's bedroom, where Zoe had lied time after time, and betrayed him the night she'd gone to kill his creator—he'd built a funhouse, full-sized mirrors to reflect a true picture of the inhabitant's intent. Reflect it upon, and for, him.
It explained why no one had accompanied her inside. It was harder for the Tulpa to solidify when multiple people projected their expectations upon him, and it was uncomfortable for him to exist under the weight of too many people's expectations at once—he'd actually feel himself mutating and changing under their conflicting emotions. So only the person he was most interested in reading could initially face him directly. Now that he had fully solidified the others could come in, pick up on it without risking influencing the image, or causing any embarrassing mutation. But she hoped they wouldn't. She had a better chance of convincing him to spare her life if they remained alone.
So they stood as a couple, reflected back on themselves in dozens of shapes, sizes and angles so that not an inch was omitted or hidden from his sight.
"You are the most clever man," she said, letting her realization play out on her face as she caught his eye through one of the mirrors and smiled seductively. "In addition to being the most handsome, of course." She whirled back toward him, intending to draw him closer again. "God, how I've missed you."
He caught her arms, stopping her short—again, gently—and held her in place. It was something Zoe had forgotten. He didn't move from one position to another. He glided. And that wasn't something she had to imagine. He had the ability all on his own. "Oh, I've missed you as well, Zoe," he said, smiling back.
She shut her eyes and held her breath as panic threatened to thread through her veins. She let him sense her uncertainty. It was only natural for her to question whether it'd been a good idea to come here, so she let him feel that hesitancy as well. When she opened her eyes again, he was staring over her shoulder at his mirrored self, waiting to see what emerged. But there was only the Tulpa as she'd always seen him, and she suddenly felt like she'd never been gone, or escaped him, at all. "Please, baby. You have to let me explain."