Glitterati by Oliver K. Langmead

Author:Oliver K. Langmead
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags:  
Publisher: Titan

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Simone fortified his father’s house.

The garden party had come to its natural end a few hours ago. When the wind picked up enough to begin threatening hairstyles, everyone had made their polite excuses and quickly retreated to their vehicles – except for Simone and Georgie, who had decided to spend the night in the enormous house instead. The wind whirled across the gardens, swaying the trees and sending leftover sandwiches tumbling, and Simone went from window to window, drawing the curtains and shutters closed. The party had been a tremendous success, and now came the consequences. Simone had upstaged Justine so thoroughly that there was no doubt she would confront him tonight. So, he drew up the drawbridges (of which the house had three), lowered the portcullises (of which the house had five), and admired the emerald crocodiles patrolling the moats (of which the house had a multitude). Peering from the windows of one of the bedrooms overlooking the central driveway, Simone expected to see chariots thundering towards the house at any moment, but there was only the rustling of the bushes, and the stillness of the dark beneath the trees.

The house had several armouries, and Simone armed himself. This time, he dressed for a siege. Instead of plate armour, he clothed himself first in an underlayer of slick dark leathers, and then an outer layer of delicate silver chainmail, which made Simone feel as if he was wearing jewellery like a dress. He chose a silver lipstick to match, and a set of curled silver lashes the same thickness as the chainmail’s rings, which enmeshed every time he closed his eyes. Back when he had confronted Justine, his reflective sword had been the perfect offensive weapon, giving him the strength to resist her icy charm, and now he needed a defensive tool of similar power. A shield would be ideal, but none of the shields in the house’s armouries quite satisfied Simone’s aesthetic instincts. It was only when he entered the en-suite bathroom of the final armoury that he found a worthy aegis, hanging above the sink. The mirror was a large silver oval, framed with matching floral silverwork, and when Simone took it down from the wall, the wire strung up across the back was thick enough that he could comfortably use it as a shield, gripped tightly in his leather-bound fingers. Locating a second mirror in one of the hallways nearby, Simone admired his outfit – he was ready to defend himself.

The interior of the house was aglow with fireplaces, chandeliers, lamps and lanterns, and Simone found Georgie settled into a parlour positively dripping with candles. Unfortunately, there was also a second, much smaller figure in the room, dipping its fingers into the wax and smearing it across the delicate woodwork of the fixtures. “Darling?” said Simone.

Georgie looked up from her book. In all likelihood, she was not actually reading the book – indeed, she and Simone had each secretly confided in the other that

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