Indigo's Owl [Indigo Rewrite]

Chapter 20 - An Offering of Cookies

With choc chip cookies in hand, Athira and Zoe headed to their second high-rise apartment building of the day — this time in a large, spacious area of Cyan Keeper territory that overlooked the park.

After dealing with the doorman who looked none too thrilled to see Keepers in his lobby, they rode the elevator to the penultimate floor of the building. The hallway they stepped out into was wide, with a plush, cream-coloured carpet and real, live potted plants that looked freshly watered along the edges.

"I'm starting to think we should have got the expensive brand of cookies," muttered Zoe, brushing a finger against a glossy leaf.

Athira shrugged. "The note said large, not expensive."

They reached the door and knocked.

Several moments later, the sound of someone shuffling came from the other side of the door, and a few moments after that, the peephole darkened.

The voice sounded like an elderly woman. "Who's there?"

Zoe took the lead, smiling and lifting her hand in a small wave. "Hi, my name's Zoe, and this is my sister, Athira. We were hoping we'd be able to come in and ask you a few questions?"

Athira held up the cookies. "We have cookies, if that's important."

The door latch clicked, and slowly, the door opened.

The woman on the other side looked, at minimum, seventy years old. Her grey hair was pinned up over her head in a loose, messy braid with a yellow flower tucked behind her ear. The grey cardigan over her pale pink dress looked older than she was, and the various rainbow of bracelets and necklaces that adorned her chest and forearms were probably heavy enough to account for the slight hunch in her back.

"Cookies, you say?" said the woman. When Athira handed them over, the woman adjusted her glasses and brought the cookies a few centimetres from her face to examine them. She smiled. "Choc chip. You must be special guests!" She shuffled aside, bracelets jingling. "Please, come in, come in!"

A little wary but mostly just confused, Athira went in first, closely followed by Zoe.

They found themselves in a wide hallway narrowed by far too many side tables. Each one was cluttered with a variety of ornaments that had no rhyme or reason to them, though all were neatly dusted. The rugs on the floor were the same, each their own individual slice of patterned chaos that matched nothing else in the room.

"I'm a little unprepared for this visit," said the woman as she started down the hall, heading for an open door at the end. "I knew you were probably coming, but I thought it'd be sooner or later rather than now, you understand. It's becoming harder and harder to keep track of time these days."

"Did Reader tell you we were coming?" asked Zoe, glancing through each doorway they passed, suspicious of a trap.

The woman chuckled. "Oh, hues, no, dear. That lad has a harder time keeping hold of reality than I do sometimes." She lowered her voice and said in a conspiratorial whisper, "He says the cookies are a code, but I think they're more of a reminder where I am."

The woman led them into a cosy looking sitting room that opened into a small kitchen. She gestured for Athira and Zoe to sit on one of the plush-looking sofas neatly placed around a wooden coffee table. The sofa almost swallowed Athira whole.

"Now, what can I get you two before we discuss things?" asked the woman as she placed the cookies on the kitchen bench and set about opening them. "Some milk, perhaps to go with our cookies? A hot chocolate?" She glanced up at Athira. "You'll have to forgive me, I'm fresh out of ice-cream for a milkshake this time."