Faira’s attention turned to Shawn when a sword appeared in his hand, and began [i]yelling.[/i] But she had little time to think on his choice of a can opener before the water in the portrait began pouring out. Faira inhaled and bit her lip as it drenched the carpet, turning it into a sloshing mush before rising enough to cover the toes of her shoes.
	“Oh, [i]come on![/i]” she groaned with a mix of exasperation and fear. “Not again!” When she heard the familiar sounds of hyperventilation, she glanced over to Walter. That someone else seemed to share her fear to some extent was somehow mildly reassuring.
	She swallowed and glanced to Alexandria as she spoke. She shuddered at the thought of the spiders. “Well, we have to... do...” She let the statement trail off as she noticed one of the raven feathers float by her feet as if caught in a current leading away from the door they had gone through. If there was a second current, there must be another way out. 
	As quickly as she could, she sloshed through the water, the chill of it soaking through her shoes and socks, following the feather toward one of the bookcases where it stuck in the crack between it and the wall.
	Ignoring Marianne as well as she could, she looked back to where a majority of the group was still gathered. “Conna’Cel!” she called, a franticness in her voice.
[hr]
	“I knew a guy with a talking sword, once,” Soren began, looking around the room, apparently unfazed by the water pouring from the picture as his twin scowled. “He was actually rather annoying.” He snorted irritably. “Deserved his sword getting cursed.” He stepped toward a tall standing lamp and gripped it mid-shaft. “The thing wouldn’t shut up. Even when it was sheathed. It just kept talking.”
	Beneath Soren’s touch, the lamp bent and stretched until it formed into a stepladder that still faintly resembled the lamp, Soren holding it by its handle. He picked up a brass bookend from one of the shelves beside him. The bookend, in the shape of a bust of Hemingway, stretched out into a painfully short crowbar. However, part of the bust’s face remained near the bent claw, now pulled into what looked like a pained scream.
	Soren looked at it with a frown as his stomach grumbled. “I’m telling you. This place has nothing but bad juju.” He weaseled his way through the crowd back to the picture and set up his stepladder just outside the cascading water. “I say,” he eyed the portrait as Nikolai moved the pack of food onto the fireplace mantel, “we give the portrait to the spiders. Let [i]them[/i] deal with--Hey!” He spun around when Nikolai snatched the crowbar from him.
	[i]You’re liable to get us killed,[/i] he thought to Soren, pulling the stepladder further to the side rather than nearly directly beneath. [i]I’ll do it.[/i] 
	Soren crossed his arms broodingly as Nikolai, who left no room for him to argue and stepped up on the ladder.
	[i]Whatever you do, don’t touch it,[/i] Soren warned as he stepped closer and placed a hand on the top bar of the stepladder as if to keep it steady, his watchful gaze on his brother as Nikolai carefully extended the crowbar toward the edge of the painting to try pulling it from whatever fixtures kept it in place.