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“Why not use magic to expand the house?” Reynauld asks innocently enough. However, a grim silence passes over the serpent witch’s expression when the words leave his lips.
Zoey turns to him, and speaks in solemn voice, “That’s a long story.”
“I’ve got the time,” he replies.
“If you insist . . .”
—--
Zoey the Witch’s house is rather small. Too small. Too small for a witch of her caliber, both by principle, and the ever encroaching necessity. As she slithers her way through her kitchen, she winds past the dried herbs, dream catchers, recipes, paintings, runes, scrawlings, and plain old scuffs covering every inch of the wooden walls. Out of the kitchen and into the foyer is no different, magical protections carved into the walls, trunks on the floor, and piles upon piles of rugs. Among which lies a welcome mat, positioned before her front door. Further still, the logs for fueling her hearth monopolize the majority of her living room. She hardly has any room with which to enjoy the warmth of the fire. The witch has to duck her head to avoid the enchanted ornaments and magical mobiles that hang from the ceiling. So cramped!
The stairway on the far end of the living room is certainly not meant for man-serpents like her, the repeating steps are far more conducive to legs, of which she has none. Instead Zoey’s scaled, but otherwise human, torso terminates in a long serpent tail. She has to sort of average out the incline to a very bumpy ramp to practice the flight. She’s gotten quite good at it though, in all her years living in this cramped, crowded house.
The story is much the same once Zoey winds up the stairs and into the attic bedroom. The attic is built right above the living room, hosting a window that overlooks the path up to the front door. Clutter upon clutter, stuff lines the walls, hangs from the ceiling, and makes her path to her witching circle more than a chore. But with persistence, she makes her way to the spot in front of the window where she’d drawn the circle for channeling her magic. Now, after much mental preparation, she’s finally ready to use it.
Zoey pulls the blinds on her window shut, the little loops holding them in place clinking as she does. For as nice as the sunlight feels on her scaled skin, she needs to concentrate as well as she can for this piece of magic. For over a week now, the man-serpent has been preparing to cast a complicated ritual, and now she is finally ready to cast it. She wears her wide-brimmed, purple-colored, nifty-nice, fully-fledged, witch hat over her hooded head, and nothing else. Reptilian biology and her set of scales don’t leave any shame for her to cover. She keeps her long winding tail wrapped around her in a pseudo-seat, and holds out her claws in front of her. The spell itself doesn’t require any gesturing on her part, but the motion still feels proper to do.
She closes both lids over her slit-pupiled eyes, and imagines the spell. It’d been a nightly ritual to do so each day, and now she is able to wrap the whole magic into a many-syllabled mental word, a vehicle for her to manifest her magical will. She crystalizes the letters, considering them from every possible angle. When the moment feels right, and the word is cemented, she lets her will manifest, and the word becomes reality. She opens her eyes, to be greeted by the same bedroom she began with.
To test the success of her spell, Zoey slides open the blinds. Instead of the view of the street, the window provides a clear look at another set of blinds, same as hers, but closed. She grins widely, far too widely for a human. She flips the latch with a click, and then shutters open the window. Reaching through, she pulls away the second set of blinds to discover the parallel bedroom beyond. Except for one difference. There are no furnishings nor any clutter! Without hesitation, the witch attempts to slip through to the other side of the window, only to be prevented by the brim of her hat. How annoying.
The window frame forces her to fold the hat in half and push it through first, then follow it, slithering right through the window into the alternate attic beyond. Her shoulders prove themselves to be a tight fit, but by angling herself diagonally, she is able to fit without issue. The room is nearly an exact replica of the first, except mirrored. The stairs that go down to the living room are on the opposite side that they were in her original attic.
No matter, she thinks, gliding across the hardwood to explore more of the new space. The stairs are the same, creaking the same song as she slips down into the living room. Here the hearth stands empty, along with the remainder of the room. The space is so empty that Zoey cannot help but stretch her arms and tail out about it, extending herself from one wall to the other. She lets out a sigh, imagining all the things she’ll use the room for.
Yet there is still more to see. The doorway to the foyer invites her further into the mirrored space, where she must now choose between the front door to her left, which should lead back into the correct house, or continue along into the kitchen. She opts for the latter, happily swaying into the kitchen.
The counters are empty, the walls unadorned, the atmosphere thoroughly spacious. It’s like a weight lifted from her shoulders, and she allows herself another contented sigh, this one even longer than the first. Magic done right, a problem solved, is there a better feeling anywhere to be found? Perhaps, she thinks, her eyes drawn to the window behind the kitchen sink. This one looks into the backyard of the building. Or rather, the one in her original house did. Instead, as she unshutters the blinds over this window, she’s met a view right back into her own, cluttered, cooking space.
That’s not right, she thinks. Though she hadn’t really known what to expect, spatially, her own kitchen should be beyond the front door. Her serpentine smile unfaltering, she slithers to the front door and swings it open. The hinges creak, surprising her. She supposes that the oil she put on them is only in her proper house. The door opens to reveal another door, the same door, closed in front of it. She tries it, and finds it locked. Of course, this would be her front door, on the outside, which she’d locked. A bit of telekinesis sets that right. The latch clicks, the pins turn, and with a loud creak, the door swings open.
The foyer on the other side is empty of furnishings or clutter. Worry colors the serpent’s face, extinguishing her smile. She slips over the threshold, missing the feel of the welcome mat on her scales. To her left should be the kitchen, but instead, is the living room. To her right is that kitchen, also empty. She periscopes her head round the corner to check, and finds the blinds on that window closed. She hadn’t done that. Just to be sure, she slithers back through the front doors and right into the previous kitchen. Those blinds are still open, still opening into her own, cluttered kitchen.
With that modicum of relief, she slips back through the front doors, this time opting to go left into the expectedly empty living room. Further she continues, up and up the stairs into the attic. The front door is now to her right as she turns into the attic, located as it is above the living room. But that window is on the left. In fact, the whole attic is mirrored. Had she eyebrows, her expression would certainly raise one of them. Maybe even both!
She slithers up to the attic window and racks the blinds across, to find the window already open. Instead of the cold gusts it would typically bring, the window leads right into her own, cramped bedroom. The dream catchers hanging from the ceiling, previously so annoying, are now reassuring. She decides to crawl through the window again, trusting that folding her hat to fit it through again won’t damage it. She smooths out the crease when she dons it on the other side, and places it gently atop her head.
She slips down the stairs, and glides through the small path she’d left in her own living room. Through the foyer, and into the kitchen, she finds the blinds on her kitchen window open, revealing the empty reflection of it beyond. It’s what she had expected, but is nonetheless unnerving. Unheimlich, as it were. One opening left to check. Crawling over her own coils to reverse, Zoey comes in front of the front door. With a shaking hand, she opens it. Slowly, the hinges silent, she swings it open. Instead of the snowy town streets, she finds herself face to front with the same door as before. Oh no.
The upstairs window, the kitchen window, and the front door. All leading to places distinctly inside her home. Terror looms, but Zoey can think of one more exit to her home, as ungraceful as it is. She crosses claws on both her hands as she makes her way in front of her lit hearth. Setting aside her hat, she ducks her head into the flames. They don’t bother her, she’s just that good at pyromancy. She turns to look up the chimney. Up and up the cobbled walls continue, twice what they should, until at the very end, the upside-down, unlit ashtray of an empty hearth.
Her eyes wide, she pulls her head out the flames, and dons her hat. The front door, the chimney, the upstairs window, and the kitchen window. There’s no cellar, no other windows, no other doors. Turning to one of the walls, covered as it is with clutter, Zoey wonders if that is her only option of egress. Maybe, but she’d rather not damage her home. Unless . . . Zoey retreats back into the foyer and slips into the mirror of her house. She’s a powerful witch, for certain, but there’s no way the space is infinite. Any one of these walls should lead outside.
Through the foyer, and into the empty living room, Zoey finds a good spot next to the hearth. The wooden wall is two layered, with insulation between, so she’ll need something strong to get through. Closing her eyes, she finds the word for her magic, and unleashes her will. The resulting crash startles her eyes right back open. The wood has splinted back, sawdust rises in the air, and a gaping hole has been blasted right through the wall. A hole which gives the Witch a good view of another empty living room. Well, not quite empty. Wood scrap and sawdust clutters this floor. She’s careful to avoid the larger pieces as she solemnly slithers in, her mind racing for a solution. Is she truly trapped? No, she can’t be!
To her right is the foyer, to her left are the stairs. Across from her is another hearth. So if this house is the same way as the previous, where does the front door lead? Nowhere, right? Right twice more, Zoey’s in front of the front door. If the space works out, this door should open to the kitchen wall. To test her hypothesis, she creaks open the door. Instead of the exterior wall she’d expected, or rather, hoped for, the door opens to another front door. No way. Trying not to think about it, Zoey tries the door. Locked. A bit of telekinesis fixes that and she's right through into a foyer.
To her left, is the kitchen. That’s how it is in her first house, which this isn’t, judging by the stark lack of junk. To her right, is the . . .kitchen? That is not how it is in her first house, or any house for that matter. Left or right? Right, she decides. The kitchen blinds are closed, so she reverses, climbing over her own coils to do so. Past the front door and into the left kitchen, the blinds are also closed. Ok. Now . . . ?
Zoey glides across the kitchen and tears open the blinds with a snap. A snap which echoes on the other side of this strange, two-kitchen house. The sound shocked her to stillness. What was that? Before confronting the source of the noise, she peers through the blinds. Same kitchen, same blinds so messily removed. Same foyer on the left. Does that mean . . . ? The witch sprint-slithers back through the foyer and into the other kitchen. Just as she thought, the blinds here are now ripped open, same as before.
“What?” she mumbles, staring straight through into the kitchen that ought to be far to the right of her. She can see the same foyer. She decides to conduct an experiment. She stretches and slides her tail as far as it can go, while still maintaining her view of the mirrored living . Once the tip of her tail gets as far as it can go, she looks back through that window. Sure enough, a little copper tail-tip is visible in the foyer. She gives it a wiggle, and sure enough, the action is visible through the window. Wiggle wiggle! It is at once comforting and extremely uncanny.
Relaxing into a less stretched-out position, Zoey considers her next move. Either she can retrace her steps back to her true house, or she can press on, knowing that the house mustn't be infinite. It will either loop round on itself, or terminate at an exterior. No other options exist. It would require an infinite source of will to create an infinite space. As much as she wishes it were the case, Zoey the Witch is not, in fact, omnipotent. So with that unfortunate thought in mind, she chooses to continue and see if the place loops or ends.
She retreats into the last version of her house, that being the one with a gaping hole blown into the living room wall. Up the set of stairs, and into the attic. Through the window, and into another, unadorned attic. Down the stairs and . . . these stairs lead directly to the kitchen. No foyer, no living room. Very well, it must be an error with her casting. She opens the blinds of the kitchen window and finds the bedroom blinds beyond. Except, the kitchen window is far bigger than the attic one. But now, it seems they are the same size. Removing the blinds, she finds that the whole attic has been expanded to accommodate this impossibility.
Crawling over the counter and through the window, Zoey finds that the whole attic is twice its original size! It makes her feel like a hatchling again, but without any furniture with which to compare herself, she can see that she’s just in a larger building. The slither over to the stairs takes twice the typical time, causing in her a very strange feeling of uncertainty. Pushing that feeling to the back of her mind, she continues down the stairs. But when she reaches the end of the flight, she hits her head on the doorframe!
Rather, she hits the brim of her hat, but the stiff lining of it might as well be an extension of her crown for how often she wears it. Sliding down on her belly, Zoey slips under the half-high doorway into a living room. Except this uncluttered room is nonetheless cramped, being only half the size of the original. It’s like being a giant! Oh, how she’d terrify the township if she really were this big. The idea of being that long brings a rose colored blush to her cheeks. Or rather, it would’ve, had her scales not been opaque. Even imagining the most scandalous hand holding fails to change the copper color of her armor. Oh course, the size would have its problems too, problems she experiences first hand as she struggles through the foyer and into the doll-house like kitchen. She can practically reach across the whole room with just an-
—--
“Are you certain you're not making this up?”
“Of course it’s true!”
“Really?”
“Reynauld, has doubting me ever proven you right?”
“Oh, I can think of a few-”
“Fine! Let me continue.”
—--
With just an arm! She pushes the blinds out of the way as if she were batting a fly, revealing what’s beyond this shrunken kitchen window; an attic window, appropriately sized. Unfortunately, finagling is required to fit her hat through the portal, but Zoey is nothing if not determined. It feels nice to occupy an appropriately sized room again. Appropriately in the relative sense, as the attic ceiling doesn’t leave the room to property stretch out. It is more than long enough to accommodate her length though, all fifteen or so feet of tail plus torso. Stretching out she estimates she could fit lengthwise, two, no, three, four? Five? This attic is far too long!
In fact, looking down either side, she cannot see the ends! More than that, the window she’d just arrived through seems to be the only one here. Now, she could either retreat back through the cramped quarters opposite the window, or press on left or right down this infinite attic. She opts for the former of the latter, slithering off leftwards through the attic. The floorboards creak as she passes over them, implying the existence of an extending living room beneath. However, the slats between the boards are far too tight to confirm this, and the witch would prefer not to make a habit of blasting her way through the house.
She continues left and left, through and through the room. The roof-walls are featureless as she goes, just as with the floor. Except, what's that? She spots something off in the distance. She swiftens her slither, her curiosity ablaze. Soon she slides up to the thing hanging from the arched attic ceiling. A dream catcher, one of her make. Laying a finger delicately upon it, she can feel her own magicks within it. How exactly it got here occupies her thoughts for the next tail of her trek, until, there! On the floor, a felt scrap. She’d discarded that bit of wool after pricking herself one too many times with the felting needle.
She’d traveled quite a distance between the dreamcatcher and the felt, but looking back, the dreamcatcher seems to have caught up with her, hanging where it should be, at least in relation to the felt. Zoey tilts her head in puzzlement. She decides to continue, perhaps there will be more clutter to collect? Looking down the attic-way, she cannot see an end. Even if she cranes her neck, holding a hand over her eyes in that sun-blocking salute, and squinting as slitted as she can make her eyes. She cannot determine where the passage terminates. However, she can see a slight, slight curve to the left. It’s so slight she hadn’t noticed it before. Is the attic one great big loop? It must be, given that infinite spaces are strictly prohibited by the laws of magick.
The witch continues on her way, her sidewinding stride refueled with purpose. She keeps her eyes set on the vanishing point, so implied by the converging walls. As she continues, that theoretical point moves left and left. The curvature is getting more aggressive over distance. This house is no circle, but rather, a spiral! Her discovery is joined by another of its ilk, a pillowcase, crumpled up where the slanted attic wall meets the floor. The silken case is dyed purple, of course. She hasn’t the heart to get rid of it for that, but the fine silk is unfortunately not up to par with her scales. Shifting in her sleep loosens those threads a mite too fast to use.
Looking back, the dreamcatcher, wool scrap, and pillowcase all align in their relative locations. Has she been traversing her original attic this whole time? That makes no sense, but then again, few things have been making sense during this escapade. Unfettered by unreality, Zoey presses on, watching as the vanishing point creeps left wards towards an inevitable center. Inevitable, unless there is a vertical incline uncounted for. She prays that isn’t the case. While it's been fun, frustrating, scary and stimulating, Zoey the Witch would rather like her house back, please.
The next item to emerge from the attic-tunnel is a discarded sock. She’d left that there . . . Zoey can’t actually remember how that got here. It obviously isn’t hers, nor is it any shade of purple. It probably snuck in with the rest of the clutter somehow. She watches it join the rest of the items once she passes it, then presses on, anxiously encroaching on the spiral’s terminus. If she pauses, and strains her eyes, she can just barely see how the floorboards have bent to accommodate the spiral. Onwards and inwards!
In less than a minute of slithering, Zoey happens upon a little purple mat. While this item, along with all but one of her pieces of junk, has a story; A story she’ll spare, given that it has no bearing on her mission. Sooner than the last she passes another dreamcatcher, this one twice the circumference of the one before. Then a blanket from her unmade bed. She passes a little box of buttons, a patch for her hat. A set of sewing needles, a tackle box and a fly swatter. Painting brush, carving knife, pillow feathers, rug. Trinkets, baubles, jewelry and more. All of them find their place behind her as she continues. The curve has increased to the point where she can count when she’s made a full circle.
Blocking most of her path, but with enough room to pass, her bed stands in the middle of her path. She slithers past, hastens her pace. The section of attic where her items collect is not curved, but behind and before it the curve only grows. Pocket lint, fish hooks, golfclub, whittling knife. Magick wand, empty bottle, full bottle, herbs. She’d never been so relieved to see her attic in such disarray. However, an item unlike the rest catches her eye. A little copper string that fattens along its length. Scales, her scales, decorate the rope. When she grabs it, she feels her hand on her tail. The curve is so strong now she cannot see the next bit of attic.
She tugs. Then yanks, then pulls with her might. She can feel a stretch through her tail, but doesn’t budge. She pulls, pulls, pulls and pulls more. Coils of tail she piles beside her, until out through the attic, she retrieves her reflection. She sees herself looking at a wall. She looks back, looking for the hand on her tail. There’s nothing but the attic wall, and a set of familiar stairs. She turns back, expecting her reflection, only to be met with the opposite wall, and her hand unexpectedly empty. It’s just her in her homely attic. She fills her lungs, then expels a great big sigh of relief. This is an experiment she will not repeat!
—--
“Now that’s quite a story. I’d be better if I believed it,” quips Reynauld.
“Not a word of exaggeration, falsehood, or fabrication, I swear on my scales!”
“Oh, fine, then. I believe you.”