Some time later...
The east court of the Targon estate was built for one purpose... to serve as a teleportation anchor.
Simon materialized in a bloom of spatial pressure, and the four attendants were already bent at the waist before the light finished fading around his boots.
Simon had the anchor moved twice just to get this angle right... so that any man stepping out of the light would emerge with the entire House rising behind him, all forty spires of black stone towering against the colorful void.
"Young Master."
"Is he in?"
"The Patriarch is at the table, Young Master. He asked for you."
Simon straightened his cuffs and walked toward the eastern gate of the mansion... Above it, a small ghostly spider sat at the center of a web.
The moment Simon reached the gate, the spider dropped down and slipped inside his soul, scanning every inch and corner at an unprecedented speed.
A few moments later, the spider emerged from his hair and climbed back onto its web... no reaction.
