#scarsdale

The package is from one Ms. Carolos

Slender hands pluck it from the porch and whisk up to a bedroom for inspection.

Within the box is a wrapped package. Zara would know in her sleep it's a book. Leather bound, yet it smells new? Custom made? Could be a large journal, but no, there's too much scent of ink.

Of course, technically it is not her birthday yet

She is... careful. Kenning the book first, making sure not to touch it with bare skin...

While it might be low level dross in a pinch, showing creative energies, it is not in itself magical beyond that.

And so, she unwraps...

Oh it is new, but made in an old way! bookbinding like this isn't done anymore, well, not in mainstream publishing. of course among her circles it's not unheard of .Fine dark leather, and a title The Witch's Winding Way: A Story of Dark Delights. The book is illuminated and scripted! not as well as August would do it, but still, the lettering is lovely, with a gothic tilt

A soft coo as she eagerly flips through the volume - apparently, she is not spoiler averse.

It's... an erotic which way book! Oh, huge with so many pages! This is a choose your own adventure but with erotica, and the basic plot is that of a young woman entering a strange manor with others who have been 'invited to a party'. She soon learns the manor is hers, and it is awakening her power,a power she did not know she had! Each perspective lover has a secret! Make the wrong choices, and you never learn! Make the wrong choices,and a tryst is missed. But make the right choices...

Even alone, she blushes, terribly.... but she doesn't put the book aside, either...

Parts of this are disturbingly (Delightfully?) akin to the very themes she touches in her own fiction attempts, but take it perhaps still further. Oh, who should she pursue? The dashing aristocrat? The kindly poet? The often sour horsegroomer who cannot keep his eyes from her? Oh so many choices, and that's just the fellows. And the mysteries solved are their own reward. There is no glamour in this, least wise, no more than any other well written and lovingly crafted book. But it is a combination of proper and racy, with riddles laid in and secrets scattered in a way that would keep an Eiluned lass riveted as much as the romance (Probably more so), and it's up to her if she can find them all. Wait...what's this?

What's what?

She's.. missing something, perhaps because it's so engrossing as it is. Or maybe she isn't and she just imagined something. For now, perhaps time to take her young witch to be through the halls of the manor and see where delights lead. Coy games of shy witch with passions waiting to be set loose.

For hours, she's engrossed, and if she had teeth, she might end up biting her own lip as her choices lead her to rejection even death or ...deep secrets inside each character's soul, and encounters in dark archways where lips press against the heroines, and more is longed to be pressed and can if she just turns the page and makes a choice.

And someone calls her down for dinner.

"Mama, I'm busy!"

"Be busy at the table!"

Siiiiiighhhh

Zara obligingly goes downstairs. And is a good, dutiful - and distracted - daughter during dinner.

Time passes quickly, though it sure doesn't feel like it to Zara. Finally, she asks to be excused, dinner closing up, and she can race back to her book. Oh dear, did she leave it open where Bronte might find it?

Oh, that dragon...

She scurries up the stairs, bare feet barely making a sound.

Bronte has been good! Whimpering a bit she clearly realizes she's too young for the book and has behaved but it's been hard “The Fremen were supreme in that quality the ancients called "spannungsbogen" -- which is the self-imposed delay between desire for a thing and the act of reaching out to grasp that thing.”

"I know, darling... when did you get Dune?" A pat on her head.

She says "The sleeper must awaken" and enjoys the pat

Zara browses her shelves, and pulls out a dusty volume. "Ah - Vanity Fair. This might be racy enough to compensate." She sets the book out before the little dragon. "Becky Sharp is infamous."

"ooo" Bronte coos and gives a lick of gratitude to her sluagh, then advises "And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don't believe in magic will never find it" And she looks to the moon out the window, then to the book

She raises an eyebrow. "Did you see something, my dear?" And, in the moonlight, she looks over the book once more...

Invisible ink! How could she have missed it? By the moonlight, with her nightvision especially, it is more noticable, but only if you tilt the book just so...but Bronte, clever bookwyrm, must have noticed. Even with her gifted eyes, Zara must squint. But she can read whole new options at some of the chapter choices... and more tricky, the whole new options don't give the page number straight, but rather as math choices and equations.

"Oh!" Delighted... and, yes, there's scrap paper involved.

....Zara does not get much sleep tonight.

Oh but it's so worth it! Secret pages between other pages that steam can slip open? No wonder the book seemed so thick. In thosage pages carnal delights yes, but also hints at true magic. At one time, CC offered to mentor her a bit. Now, Zara realizes she is doing just that. Oh it is ..certainly a touch too tantric in parts, but the basic theories can be incorporated to.. blush yes. Some of this rituals suggest a partner for bunks. Rather elaborate, but the point is, it has promise.

Good thing it is dark, because her cheeks are glowing. Satyrs. Of course, satyrs. Earl would never... would he?

Oh draft Miss CC for putting these ideas in her head, and bless her for these notes.

Yes, it maybe Zara will lose a lot of time as brain and blood both are ...stirred.

Well, what is a bit of time?

And by that standard, tis time well spent. One thing this book knows how to do, make one appreciate the setting of a scene.

(End Scene)