1st April, 1888 — Museum, Third Floor, Egyptian Department

In the dual interest of avoiding her sister-in-law in general and the ever-present possibility that something ridiculous would befall her due to somebody believing foolish japes were somehow more acceptable today than any other Elladora had taken the only sensible option and secluded herself away somewhere quiet and dry, mostly uninhabited by other people who were busy enjoying the first warm sun of the spring, and she did not regret her decision in the slightest. The sun made her eyes ache, the shrieks of people on the street as they received surprises were immensely bothersome and there was a still a lingering sense that people were looking at her and muttering to themselves.

Slander was abominable, especially when she could find no way of dispelling it other than to ignore the entire thing. How on earth was she to prove she had never known what’s-his-name carnally?

Putting the whole mess from her mind Ella instead focussed on the statue of the Sphinx that dominated the central room, surrounded by plaques of various riddles the creatures were known to have posed to wizards. There was another set of footsteps approaching behind her but Elladora paid them no mind, instead scanning her eyes over the first riddle and glancing up to the immobile Sphinx’s face with a distinctly smug smirk: she had not expected it to be quite so easy.

The smirk very quickly left her face when the Sphinx’s head tilted towards her and pale eyes fixed on her. Elladora was not above letting out a yelp of surprise and she stumbled back several steps, bumping into the other inhabitant of the room – Merlin, she loathed this day!

  

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While the allure of writing and editing for others around the world on expeditions had been grand to begin with, it was quickly fizzling out in Tuni's mind. Either the things she was sent to decode and write in a more understanding fashion were dull topics or the lull in between jobs went on for ages. As a result, she was starting to second guess the career path she'd chosen even if it wasn't mandatory for her. The worst part was the boredom. She hated sitting idle. Despised it really. So she'd decided to take her made with her to the Museum in London. The artifacts and displays always seemed to brighten her mood even if she knew most of them by heart.

She'd found her way up to the third floor to look around the Egyptian department, lost in her own thoughts as she meandered about. It didn't take long for her to get to the room featuring the Sphinx. She'd just been about to see what the riddle was for the day, knowing they often changed it out to add some variety to the display, when a yelp registered to her ears and she was bumped into by the woman who had let the sound out.

Instinctively, her hands went up to help stop and catch the woman so she didn't tumble to the ground if she were going to. "Are you alright?" she asked, concern evident in her tone as she eyed the woman cautiously in case something else were to happen and result in them both falling to the ground.

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Embarrassed and annoyed at being so caught unawares it was on the tip of Elladora’s tongue to retort back sharply and extract herself from the stranger when two things stopped her in her tracks. The first was that she turned her head to chastise her unwanted saviour in her surprise, and the dim light, she had almost, madly, thought she was seeing Ursula. Which was absurd as this girl actually sounded concerned and Elladora knew that emotion was in neither of their repertoires.

The second, rather more pressingly, was that a moment after the young woman spoke – her voice most emphatically betraying her as Not Ursula – the doors at the edge of the Sphinx room all vanished. The walls became smooth all the way around the room, not a crack between ceiling and floor betraying where a space had once been, and Elladora turned her head back towards the Sphinx just in time to see a condescending head tilt in her direction.

“Oh, you are joking surely?”

  

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Tuni continued to watch the woman but before she was able to actually respond something happened. Her jaw fell some as the walls smoothed out and left them, quite essentially, stuck within the room without an exit. That wasn't exactly a good sign. And then the sphinx seemed to be taunting the other woman.

"I think you've offended it," she said simply, perhaps too bluntly. She didn't see how any of this would end very well but hopefully it could.

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Pursing her lips Elladora shot the other woman an unamused look, but she had to admit it was not a bad estimation of the situation, although she couldn't fathom how she had done such a thing. She had simply read the riddle and... She raised an eyebrow at the Sphinx in imitation, one hand in her pocket on her wand just in case there was a pounce iminent, and took a step towards the other woman for safety's sake.

"Well, it's hardly my fault they've put a pitiful riddle in front of her. A child of five could have worked that out."

  

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Tuni couldn't help the light chuckle of laughter that left her lips at the woman's words. While she had a point, it was hardly a surprise. "I think that's often the way a sphinx works," she said with a shrug, "They lure you in with easy riddles until you feel like you can do no wrong. Then you're hit with a wrong one. And well.." She trailed off, not entirely sure what the outcome of a wrong riddle was as surely every sphinx was different but she doubted it was ever a good outcome.

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No matter how many histories and stories she had read about the Sphinx it did not quite prepare one for seeing such a beast in the flesh. Or was it? The Sphinx was notoriously intelligent but a beast was a beast and surely even on April Fool's Day the museum would not unleash an actual Sphinx upon the populace?

"Well what?" She said with a roll of her eyes. "The charm the museum has placed will wear off?" Taking a step towards what had once been the door Elladora pulled out her wand, intending to leave the way she had come in when another voice, melodious and deep and powerful, froze her in her tracks.

  

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"I am a mother and a father but have never given birth. I’m rarely still, but I never wander. What am I?"

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"Every sphinx is different," Tuni answered with a shrug as she watched the woman turn on her and head to where the doorway had once been with her wand in hand. She didn't get much further before a rather commanding voice echoed in the now enclosed room. She jumped slightly at the sound and turned warily to the sphinx. Apparently they were going to be stuck because of the woman's condescension of the beast until they passed her tests. It was terrifying but, also, exhilarating. She pondered over the riddle in her mind quietly though regarded the other woman when she thought she may have the answer. "Thoughts?" she asked, wanting to know if she should take the lead herself or if the woman would do so.

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Turning back towards the Sphinx with slow and deadly precision Elladora felt her outrage turn to a modest amount of apprehension that she absolutely intended to pass off as irritation. The creature might not be real but she certainly seemed real and Ella wondered madly whether the whole room might be charmed to make anybody inside it believe anything: she would rather be forcibly confunded than embrace the possibility that she was actually afraid of something.

"..." Her lips moved but she stopped herself before words were formed. A wrong answer, she remembered, might have consequences, and though her brain tried desperately to re-assert itself and insist the thing was a jest the chill down her spine from the Sphinx's haughty gaze was enough to make her doubt herself. It didn't help that the thing looked like her mother. "Something that moves without moving?"

  

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Tuni nodded as she watched the other woman. She found herself almost swaying in response as if mimicking a possible answer. It was quite possible to still move without actually moving but the answer still clearly was not a human being or living creature. They still moved about the Earth easily enough even if they didn't always do so.

"A tree," Tuni ended up saying, though said so quietly enough that if the woman wanted to answer the sphinx herself she'd be able to. She wasn't sure if the sphinx would accept the answer or not if it had actually been meant for the other woman.

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The answer seemed a sound one and still Elladora found herself tensing up as she waited for the Sphinx to react, though she had avoided giving the answer so there was a decent chance she would avoid being the one attacked if it was wrong. But still, one never knew.

For a split second she wondered what spell she had in her arsenal that might keep the Sphinx away from her but suddenly the creature smiled and sat, retreating to the position she had been in when Elladora had first entered the room and, as if she had never moved at all, froze still. At the same moment the doors appeared once again and Elladora, forgetting immediately that she had ever been scared, was irritated once again.

“This museum has taken a severe decline in recent months if they think that passes for an exhibit.”

  

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