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"Um... no." You try to imagine Richard getting married. "Don't worry about it. Where's the trapdoor, again?"
The trapdoor for the attic is in the ceiling, indicated by a dangling cord, which Lottie's fingers barely scrape even as she jumps. You stand on your tiptoes and grab it, opening the hatch and exposing the extendable ladder. You tug it down. "Ladies first."
"You're a lady too!" she protests, but doesn't need to be told twice: she's scrambling up there before you can release the ladder. "Watch the dress," you call up after her, then follow.
—
The attic is how you remember it, except there's two inches of dust on everything, not one. The boxes are stacked two or three high, except for a few scattered on the ground, ripped open. Everything is labeled in the same cryptic pen in the same unfamiliar handwriting. Only it isn't unfamiliar, is it? It's Richard's handwriting. Probably not Richard's. Your father's. Except for the few boxes stacked apart, the things up here are his.
"Whoa," says Lottie. She probably hasn't been up here before. You can't remember what you were looking for when you found Richard, except that you weren't looking for him. Maybe your father asked you to get something. That'd explain why it's a blank. You sigh, scan the rows, and spot it immediately. A smaller box. "Dangerous" printed in red pen on the side. No wonder you went straight for it.
"Does that one have keys in it?" Lottie asks, as you haul it down. "Is that why you...?"
"Shh," you tell her, and draw The Sword. "Go look at some other stuff."
Lottie frowns, but sidles off. You must've brought scissors or a kitchen knife up with you, to cut the triple-layered tape, but today you hold The Sword two-handed and slice delicately through the cardboard. You hesitate then, rubbing your fingers across The Sword's hilt, but reach down and tear open the box.
There's no snake inside. There's paper inside, crumpled paper, like a nest for it, but no snake. Dammit! You thought it'd be too easy, finding Richard again. Unless he's hiding. He would do that. You stick your hand inside, considering and dismissing the prospect of a snakebite, and rummage around. Paper, paper, paper. No snake. Something else, though, something small and cold. ...Baby Richard? No. It's a key.
Huh. Lottie was right, you guess. It's an iron key, severe and sturdy, but more of an art piece than anything functional: somebody has wound a filigree brass snake around its bow and down its stem. You feel funny looking at it. Oh well. A key is a key is a key, and you got what you came up here for, you guess. "Lottie!" you call. She's out of sight behind the boxes. "Guess what I—"
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