Summer Break – 13.1
Author: Wildbow

Summer Break – 13.1 | Pale

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The summer heat pressed on her, bugs kept landing on her, both flies to sip at her sweat, and mosquitoes, to go one layer deeper.  She wanted it to be cold again.  Thick sweater weather, mosquitoes in hiding… she didn’t want it to be cold again.  The end of summer brought things she didn’t want to think about.

It felt like the only way to view that point in time was to hold it in her mind’s eye, an image like a mirror with a crack diagonally across it, one portion showing one scene, the other with its angle changed, showing something completely different.  There was no way to bring that scene into clear focus.

The start of the school year.  Leaving the Long Sleepover.  Whatever happened, however things happened, it would change so many things in this world of practice, here in Kennet.

The bracelet clicked.  The group of them were being watched as they walked from Avery’s house.

Zed was wearing a black t-shirt with sleeves rolled up a bit past fair-sized biceps, black jeans, and a belt with metal on it.  His hair was glossy, he wore sunglasses, and carried a heavy bag.  Riding the line between Grease and that 90s movie she’d never gotten around to seeing.

Beside him, Brie was wearing what was probably the most sensible summer clothing out of all of them, a red summer-weight dress that blew this way and that.  The tattoos were visible on her arms, legs, and neck, bold striking lines and text, circles depicting the phases of the moon running from the soft part of her inner elbow to her wrist.  Her face and hair didn’t quite match the dress, when it looked like she’d be more comfortable somehow in more casual clothes to suit her ‘pretty girl next door’ look, but confidence closed the gap.  To Verona’s annoyingly blurry, limited Sight, Brie looked a lot more like the individual parts of her aligned together.  Less of a shattered mirror, maybe.

Jessica’s hair was wet.  She’d dipped into the river, even though the water level was low, and then she’d changed into denim shorts, a tank top and sandals.  She’d left her hair wet but braided, letting the morning heat dry it.  The checkerboard ‘loon’ tattoo encircling her arm had been joined by another, currently under a bandage.

Verona bumped her shoulder into Lucy’s arm.

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Lucy said, elbowing Verona away.  “Don’t cling.  It’s too hot out.”

“Hm?  What are you ‘yeah-yeahing-I-know’ing about?” Avery asked, peering past Lucy at Verona.  “And tell Snowdrop that.  Little ball of heat in my backpack.”

There was a noise from the bag.

“Isn’t she hot?” Lucy asked.

“I have a bunch of stuff from the fridge and some water frozen in water bottles in there.  It’s going to have wiry opossum hairs on it when I go to drink.  She gets to be cool and I get a cold lower back and a ball of heat up closer by my shoulder blades.”

There was another small sound from the bag.  Verona smiled.

“What were you and Lucy yeah-yeahing about?” Avery asked.

Verona adjusted her bracelet, tapping it.

“Oh, yeah.  For a little while now,” Avery agreed.

Yeah, but it’s a problem since we’re getting closer to the destination, and we can’t enter until the coast is clear.

“What’s this?” Zed asked.

“I’ll text you,” Avery told him.

“I just had an eerie flashback,” Brie said.  “Seeing you three together…”

“The night we met you for the Hungry Choir thing?” Verona asked.

Lucy elbowed her.

“Yeah,” Brie said.  “That was my first time here, then I came back, but it felt dreamlike.  Still does.  Like that night was real and the rest of this is pretend.  And you three are so- you’re at home here.  My brain keeps going from seeing you together in this weird place to remembering you together in a weird Choired version of this place.”

“It’s going to get weirder later today, if we pull this off,” Zed said.

“Woo,” Verona replied.

“So, Verona,” Avery said.  “While you were sleeping in…”

“Resting in advance of a difficult major ritual.”

“We’re doing the ritual too,” Lucy told her.  “And Avery and I got up early.”

“Your choice.  Technically the shrine thing doesn’t have to be done at ass o’clock in the morning.”

“Getting back on track,” Avery said.  “We did the shrine thing with Jessica.  So, for your benefit, and Zed’s, and Brie’s… we’ve been doing it a bit wrong.”

“Oh no,” Verona said.  “How wrong?”

“It’s fixable,” Jessica said.  “But doing one quarter at a time leaves you with weak points.  Imagine… imagine you’re filling bowls with water every time you visit the shrines.  At the same time you’re doing that, the other bowls are evaporating.  You’re doing two a day, one quarter at a time, and by the time you get back to one… it’s been getting close to empty for a little while.”

“Not enough water to put out fires,” Zed said.

“Yes,” Jessica said.

“We could visit more, I guess?” Avery asked.

“You could, and that would help, but only because it’s more attention and attention is power.”

“Isn’t that the whole point?” Verona asked.

Jessica nodded.  “Yes, but balance is part of the point too.  A table supported by twelve legs is harder to topple than one with four.”

“Humans build tables with four legs… pretty much all the time,” Lucy said.

“They do, but our worry with these sorts of diagrams and shrine arrangements is that there are people out there who want to knock over the table.  If all they have to do is take out one leg that hasn’t been attended to recently…”

“Right,” Lucy said.

“When we did the awakening diagram, way back at the beginning, we were told it was something like a surface or a spinning plate that was tilting one way or another, depending on the emphasis,” Verona said.

“Yes.  And you’re adjusting it purely by lifting up an edge by one of four general directions.”

“Warding stuff gets pretty complicated,” Zed said.  “Some things, uh, you really want to keep them stuck under a ward for a few centuries or a few thousand years.  And when you’re talking about caging stuff that big, for that long, even the smallest weakness will be exploited or magnified over time.  I’ve been looking into this stuff for Brie and her tattoos.”

“All good right now, though,” Brie said.

“I’m glad,” Avery said.

Jessica went on, saying, “The big issue is that by dividing it into quadrants and treating it as quadrants, you’re setting up individual legs, each with four spirits, that can be knocked down.  It would be better to distribute it more.  Help the spirits to get to know each other, by including them together in a night’s routine.  It’s better to do four, then offset.  Introduce some messiness and overlap, and keep tabs on the ones you’re neglecting as a result, maybe make the extra time or make it a once a day or once a week thing to swing by them and give them special attention.  Create weak points and turn them into strong points.”

“It is extra work,” Zed said.  “And what you’re doing isn’t wrong.”

“It’s simple but simple to beat, too.  If I did something like that during one of my trips to the deeper Ruins, waking up every hour to reinforce protections around my camp, I don’t think I’d be standing here.  I get the impression you want to protect this town.”

“We do,” Lucy said.  “Okay, yeah, alright.  That’s something we can do.”

“Introduce some clean salt to the ritual.  You can create a little furrow of salted ground between the shrines as you visit them.  You don’t want to use too much, don’t go killing trees, but… something for the echoes, while you’re looking after the spiritual side.”

“Perfect, that’s just the sort of advice we needed,” Lucy said.  “The kind of advice we’d probably have gotten from one of our culprits, if she hadn’t been keeping the outer barrier weak on purpose, maybe.”

“Do you guys want to take a shortcut?” Zed asked.  “My laptop’s running hot so I can pull it out and give us an escape route if we hear a motorcycle or if Witch Hunters show up, but… maybe we can use that to make a shortcut to where we’re going, and then I can give my laptop a rest?”

“Can the Witch Hunters get in there?” Brie asked.

“I don’t think so,” Verona told Brie.  She thought back to when she’d arranged this with Ken.  “They seemed pretty darn sure that you need the key.”

“Tell you what,” Zed said.  He pulled out the laptop, looked around, then sat on a lawn that was elevated above the sidewalk, with a short retaining wall of rough stone.  He put the laptop on his lap and began typing.  “I’ll set this up, you type in the address…”

Verona nodded.

“I think it’s goblins,” Avery said.  Snowdrop poked her head out of Avery’s bag, then made the little sneezing sound.  “So does Snowdrop.”

“When Biscuit was speaking through Jabber, she said she didn’t mean Kennet or Kennet’s people any harm,” Avery said.

“I remember that,” Zed replied.

“I wonder how much they’re just following orders, or if we’ve been misled by Cig.  Or does her pretending to be Jabber let her lie?  Can you be an actor and say your lines, even if they’re technically untrue?”

“I don’t think pretending to be Jabber lets her lie.  You can be an actor and say your lines, but the key parts of that are that you’d want to be an actor, first of all, and you’d want to avoid making any oaths.  Helps a hell of a lot if you pitch yourself to the spirits as an actor when you awaken.  Otherwise you’re probably going to gainsay yourself a ton before the spirits catch on to your rule of discourse.”

“Same with music and stuff?” Lucy asked.

“Same with music and stuff in that vein, yeah,” Zed told her.  “Helps if you develop a ritual.  Something you always do to get into character.”

“Clap your hands three times and spin in a circle on the spot, before the big ‘action!’?” Verona asked, smiling.

“Sure,” Zed said, fixated on his laptop.  “Or something slightly more normal.  I think we’re good to go.  I need an outlet to plug into…”

He typed something.

“Over there.”

They quickly walked to the end of the street, though technically Verona let the others do the quick walking, and then she caught up.  She grimaced and plucked at the back of her top, which was clinging to her, a bit clammy but not really helping with the heat.

She hated that she’d drawn the mental association between this and the idea that when this was all over she’d…

She glanced back over the river, in the direction of her dad’s house.

“Verona,” Lucy called out.

Verona hurried the last few steps.

As she approached, there was a doorway that looked like a bit of an optical illusion.  From a distance away, there was nothing, then a jumble of textured paint and steel.  All of that jumble came into alignment as a doorway as she approached.  It smelled like her dad’s old laptop had gotten, before he’d replaced it, buzzing and making the air smell sweet and thick in the nose.

“Coordinates?” Zed asked.

Verona leaned over, then typed the street intersection.  The old computer screen showed the general layout of the area, and placed a silhouette of a person down in the middle.

“Yep.”

Zed hit the key.  The door cracked ajar.

They went.  In through the door, down a passage of drywall and exposed wiring, floor unfinished, prepared like it was waiting for floorboards or tiles to be laid down.  The smell got worse as they got further into it.

The door on the far end was similar, though red.  Zed, first one to reach it, pushed it open and held it open.

“Thank you, sir,” Verona said, as they passed through.  She checked the bracelet, then hurried over to the street sign.  She put the key through the screw-hole for the bracket that kept the street signs rigid.

“Wait,” Jessica said.

Verona stopped.

“What sort of practice is that?”

“City magic?”

“Let Zed close up what he’s doing first,” Jessica said.

“Wait, what?” Zed asked, holding his laptop in one hand and typing with the other.  He looked over.

“Finish,” Jessica told him.

He did.  The door fell over, landing on a lawn.  The individual pieces and parts of the door weren’t there when Verona glanced over.  The smell was thicker in the air.

“What was that about?” Zed asked.

“It’s city magic,” Jessica said.

“Oh.  Yeah, huh,” Zed said, but his eyes were a bit wider.  “In case they didn’t tell you, don’t mix realm-type practices.  Any rituals or powerful items that open doors to the Warrens, don’t blend that with doors to the Ruins.  Or paths you make with technomancy.  Or Avery’s Lost stuff.  That’s 101 type Realm stuff, front of the books for beginners, in the Essentials text that any family dealing with that stuff would get when they come of age.”

Verona glanced at the others.  “…why?”

“Gets gnarly,” Zed said.

“Gnarly,” Lucy said, “That doesn’t explain a lot.”

“I’m trying to figure out how to put it gently,” Zed said.

“Don’t be gentle.  Not with this,” Jessica told him.

“Plicate spirits!” Verona exclaimed, snapping her fingers a few times.  “Messing with forces of an area and messing up the spirits?”

“Montague,” Avery said.

“Yeah, like…” Verona lost her momentum.  “Oh crap, like Montague.”

“I think you’re jumping straight from 101 to fourth year, special topics stuff,” Zed said.  “But yeah.  Horrors and derivative things.  That’s a good way to go from being a practitioner who’s trying to make a quick portal to Paris or wherever, to having your arms and legs broken as space folds around you.  If you’re lucky.”

“And if you’re unlucky?” Lucy asked.

“Being a broken creature stretched out across two realities at once, infused with aspects of both.  If you’re really unlucky, your Self or the spirits that drive you, uh, corrugate, at the same time.”

“Don’t do that to Zed,” Brie told them, stern.

“Right, okay.  Uh.  Super good to know.  I feel like the Blue Heron should have taught us that.” Verona replied, a little wide-eyed.

“I think they reinforce it at the start of every class, when they’re teaching students to open gates and portals.  This might be more of an issue of, uh, learning like you guys seem to have learned.”

“How’s that?” Avery asked.

“You’re learning lots of individual, little things from specific Others.  Maybe some of this is second nature to them, to the extent they think you should be able to feel or know some of this already.  But more likely, they don’t run into it because they work with a single discipline.  Lost stuff for your Lost Other, spirit stuff for Edith, Oni stuff for the… well, she’s more likely to be cross-discipline.  And they don’t open the big doorways or pathways in the way we do.”

“Right,” Verona said.  “So… is it a problem if I open this?”

“No.  My stuff’s done.”

“And is it a problem if we’re opening an Alcazar?  Or if we have Avery in there some time in the future and she opens a gate to some Path?”

“Shouldn’t be.  The big moments of weakness and stress on everything are when the doors are opened, a little less so when they’re closed.  Don’t open two doors at the same time, definitely don’t stand between them while you’re doing it, and practice extra good ritual hygiene and practices while you’re making a door.”

“Right,” Verona said.  She thought of the various times she’d made haphazard doors.  The Warrens, the door to the Ruins in the fight with Shellie…  “I’m good to do this?”

Zed nodded.

She put the key in.

“Roughly half the time it won’t do much more than screw up the ritual and scare the crap out of you,” Zed said.  “For the other half, well, half of those times it’ll go wrong, but wrong like being hit by a car and maybe things aren’t as straight or proportioned as they should be after.  But you can keep going down that rabbit hole of bad ends and half of the times you’re not that lucky, horror.  Then horror with a corrugated spirit, then a chance of being something that would make you wish you’d gotten off as easy as being a horror with a corrugated spirit.  And so on.”

“Right,” Verona said.  “Let’s not do that.”

She moved the sign.  The street adjusted, the scenery shifting.

Brie whistled.

“That’s a pretty big effect,” Zed said.  “Nice that it seems to operate on one hinge.  Less an opening, more of a single mechanism.  Probably want to play it safe, still, but I think chances of becoming a horror are pretty slim, just with this.”

“Right.  I don’t suppose you can weaponize that, huh?” Verona asked.  “The gate thing?”

“Would you want to weaponize it?” Jessica asked, her voice holding an odd tone.

“I’m just trying to get my head around what the practice is and what people out there are doing with it.”

“Right,” Jessica said.

“Could you?” Verona asked.

“I think someone out there probably has, with how humans work,” Zed said.  “But if they have I haven’t heard of them.  I don’t think most would want to.  Chance of getting caught in a fold is pretty steep, especially with the way karma and connections would probably make backlash very… backlashy.”

“You’re rambling a bit,” Jessica said.

“I love the ramble,” Verona said.  “Font of info.”

“I’ll stop,” Zed said, as the street clarified, settling in.  “Let’s focus.”

“Go in,” Verona said.  She withdrew the key, then jogged through, very aware of the space that was folding around her now.

Into the House on Half Street.

Verona opened the door, and they made their way into the hall.  Her alchemy setup was visible in the kitchen from the front hall.

And just off to the side…

Zed, Brie, and Jessica stopped in the doorway to look.

Zed spoke, tone of voice a bit different from before.  “You know the powers that be, judges, whatever, they’re the sort of entity a person on a big, universe-mandated quest would visit or meet with for a bit of an adjustment to their trajectory, four-fifths of the way into their journey or so?”

“Oh yeah?” Avery asked.

“Yeah.  Often the Alabaster, for guidance, but sometimes the Sable or some other deathly gatekeeper will bring them back for one last shot.  Sometimes a lady in gold to give them a treasure, equip them for the final confrontation or whatever.”

“And the Carmine?” Lucy asked.

“Kick their asses, knock them down a peg, maybe.  I dunno.  Maybe the Carmine’s meant to be the sort of thing that looks after the monsters, puts them in the right places for the quest?  Doesn’t get covered a lot in our books.”

Zed, Brie, and Jessica stood in the doorway, like they weren’t willing to approach the furs.

“Differs by area,” Jessica said.  “Not every place has the white, black, red, gold.”

“True,” Zed said.  “Point is… you three approached this world from the wildest angle.  You awoke in spring and you’re dealing with something that’s usually at the last part of a big story, what, two or three months in?”

“We met with those guys on day one,” Avery said, quiet.

Zed laughed, so sudden it kind of broke the spell for Brie and Jessica.

“I feel like I shouldn’t get too close,” Brie said.

“Trust those feelings,” Jessica said.

“You’ve got the murder weapon inside you,” Lucy said.  “And that’s the victim.”

“The Choir?” Jessica asked.

Lucy nodded.

Jessica crossed the length of the living room, and approached the cube.  She glanced back to check, then set a hand on the furs.

Furs stirred and moved in reaction, hairs pointing toward her.

She visibly shuddered, whole-body, and backed off.  “I’ll get started on the wards.”

“Okay, yeah, let’s get started on the boring part,” Zed declared.  “Complicated diagram.  You got chalk?”

“Yep,” Verona said.  “And I have a hard time seeing how this could be the boring part.  Learning new practice?”

“Given how interesting the rest of this is going to be?” Avery asked.

“Point,” Verona said.

“We’re meeting her, in a way, in the middle of a big universe-supported quest,” Lucy said.  “Maybe we’re four-fifths of the way along?”

“I hope not,” Verona replied.  “Because that’d mean a whole lot happens in the next eight days.”

The diagram was rigid, lots of straight lines, overlapping geometric shapes, and symbols at the intersections.  Verona sketched it out, and as she did, she was left with the distinct impression that this could be an artistic rendering of a church or some really fancy architecture, if drawn from above.  A circle for a round tower, lines for the walls, but inside it would be something of a mess.

Except for the vast open area that the furs occupied, sitting in the center, inside a two-dimensional cathedral, drawn out in chalk.

“How are the wards?” Zed asked.

“Trustworthy,” Jessica said.  “I might be diving into this to try to rescue them, right?  I won’t be worrying about the ward part of this when I dive in.”

“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” Zed said.  “Brie?”

Brie put a hand on her shoulder and flexed it, drew in a deep breath, then sighed.

The Hungry Choir began to sing.

“I’ll keep them outside, and out of earshot,” Brie said.

“When we do this, it’ll be eleven minutes, but it might feel like longer, depending,” Zed said.  “So you’ll only be sitting outside on your own for three eleven minute intervals, alright babe?  Watch our backs, do what you can, let’s avoid a repeat of Jessica’s ritual at the Blue Heron.”

“Alright,” Brie said.

A child outside peered through the window, blood on her face.

“We’re intentionally avoiding twelve as a number,” Zed said, glancing at Verona, then Lucy, then Avery, before addressing them as a group.  “At eleven minutes, I’ll signal you.  If you really need an extra moment, extra question, we can stretch it out to eleven thirty.  But outside of that, we’re going full-on emergency mode.  That’s Jessica coming in, us pulling on connections, me shutting this down.”

“Thirty seconds of extra time?” Avery asked.

“Don’t joke around with this.  I’ll be pissed if you scare me by going over the time limit.  If I force the ritual to end while you’re in the middle of it, there’s a chance it messes you up, leaves you… very unstable, Self-wise.  But if we’re that far gone, and you’re not responding to signals or if you’re too caught up in the world inside these furs, we’re probably already in big problem territory.”

“With these things, it helps to punctuate them,” Jessica said.  “It doesn’t have to be time, if it’s very fluid in there.  It could be marking out eleven landmarks.  You don’t want to get to the twelfth.  Or eleven tolls of the town clock.”

“Keep in mind, if you actually go through eleven hours, it’s going to take you longer to get back into reality when you come back.  And we have dinner with your mom later,” Zed said.

Verona joined Lucy and Avery in nodding.

“Do you know what questions you want to ask?” Zed asked.  “Time periods or general scenes?”

“We talked about it,” Lucy said, glancing at Verona and Avery.  “We were thinking to start with, we need to know something more about this ritual that’s happening at the end of summer.  So we thought we’d cover that.  The very beginning, who she was, the taking of the throne.  It might give us some inklings about how they’d try to rope us in, and get one of us to potentially take the seat.”

“Okay,” Zed replied.  He reached over to his computer and made a note.

“This is more open-ended, but why her?” Avery asked.  “Why the Carmine, exactly?  And did the Carmine know?  Because she’s supposed to be aware of everything in her domain, right?”

“To an extent,” Jessica said.

“So we figure, moments she met the local Others, or moments she was aware of them.”

“That has the potential to get sloppy,” Zed replied.  “Or run out of time.”

“Can we start with the important stuff and then spiral out, and we leave on the signal?” Lucy asked.

Zed made a note, nodding once, but he didn’t look happy.

“And the end,” Verona said.  “Why didn’t she fight back?  What happened?  What are we missing?”

“That’s going to put you pretty close to something very violent and ugly,” Jessica said.

“Yeah, we talked about that,” Verona replied.  “But… it’s pretty important.”

“Who does which one?” Zed asked.

“We had ideas but we wanted to ask, any suggestions?  Are different scenes better for different members of our group?”

“I think it’s mostly about what you can do and what you can take.  That last one will be rough.”

“Arrivals and departures,” Avery said, quiet.  “Give me the first or the last.”

“I can do the last, if it’s tougher.  Hit me,” Verona said.

“I’d be worried,” Lucy said.  “I feel like you’re only just now getting fully okay again after, you know.  After you came to stay.”

“What happens if it’s too much?” Avery asked.

“It might bruise your Self, or diminish you.  You’d get swallowed up by the scene.  It’d be hard to pull you out.”

“I can’t pull you out, Ave,” Snowdrop said, from the background.  She’d been sleeping on the crappy furniture that had been left in the house.

“That’s possible,” Avery said.  “Isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Zed said.  “That’d mean she isn’t in there with you.  But can you take it?  Watching something that rough?”

“I’ve seen bad stuff,” Avery said.

“Let me do it,” Verona insisted.

“If it’s bad then we’ll have Snow to pull me out.  I think I should,” Avery said.  “For reasons I don’t want to get into right away, I think I need to.”

“That’s… cryptic,” Verona said.

“Trust me?” Avery asked, eyebrows all the way up in the middle close together.

“I’m worried about Verona getting lost in tangents in the middle one,” Lucy said.

“I kinda really don’t like that we’re talking about me in terms of my weaknesses,” Verona said.  “It’s a bit of a running thing, you know.”

“You’re crazy good at practice, and you understand this stuff really well, you do really good spell notes,” Avery said.  “Go first.  Then give us tips?  Help explain it?”

“That’s better,” Verona said, still pouting a bit.

Still hurt a bit.

A bunch of unresolved stuff about Jeremy and family and feeling like the charity case stirred through her.

“Some people will do this naked, but I’m not going to suggest that,” Zed said.

“Uhh no,” Lucy replied.  “We weren’t for the awakening ritual either.”

“Should we don our cloaks and wizard hats?” Verona asked.  “We awoke in those.”

“For a major ritual?  For sure,” Zed replied.

Verona fished in her bag for what she needed.  The hat folded up nicely, and she had to unfold it.  She shook out her cloak.  Then she got her mask.  The three pieces of her mask.

“I regret including the witch hat,” Lucy said.  “Bit dorky.  We rarely wear it.”

“Excuse you,” Verona retorted.  “Dorkiness is a social construct.”

“What does that even mean?” Avery asked.

“Having regalia you keep for rituals is fine.  Maybe you’ll feel a bit silly as adults, but… I think living with your mess-ups as a kid is part of being older,” Zed said.

“You’re like, seventeen,” Verona told him.  “Who are you to talk about being older?”

“Do you guys need to do any prep?  Anything more you want to cover?” Jessica asked.

They shook their heads.  Lucy and Avery held their masks but didn’t wear them.  Hats and cloaks on.

“Verona, here,” Zed indicated a spot.

She walked over, and when Zed motioned, she sat.

“No phones or anything on you?”

Verona got her phone out of her pocket, put it on the floor, and pushed it Lucy’s way, then did the same for spell cards, glamour from the flower, one of the knives, her keys, and wallet.  Lucy collected it and put it all aside.  She adjusted her cape and hat, three pieces of her mask in her lap, and looked up at Zed, then flinched because Zed was bending down beside her.  She watched as he used a tool to draw a circle around her where she sat.  He drew a two-foot wide path between her and the diagram.

“I’m going to pour clear water over you, to cleanse you and this entry-space.  It’ll be cold but put up with it.”

She nodded, hat shifting.

It wasn’t all that cold.  It was warm out and the water had cooled to nearly room temperature.  But it was a shock.  She tried to take it as refreshing.

The water that poured down didn’t pass the chalk, instead filtering through the floorboards.

“Power to the diagram…” Zed said, absently.

The computer kicked in.  Machines hummed.

Smaller parts of the ‘cathedral’ diagram began to lift up off the floor.  The furs stirred.

“Anything you guys can do to help this along saves me some trouble,” Zed said.  “Ray’s been too busy with Charles to really communicate with me, and I get the sense he doesn’t want to get too involved so he can stay impartial, but I’d rather not have to explain too huge a power deficit.”

Lucy knelt by Verona, Avery taking the opposite side.  Both put fingers to the very edge of the chalk.

“For Kennet,” Avery said.

“So we can finish the duties we’ve been asked to undertake,” Lucy added.

“Open the way,” Verona breathed, looking forward.

That kickstarted it.  Bigger pieces of the diagram lifted up, and as they did, the furs shifted and changed position.  Light played on light, shadow on shadow, and the floor vibrated enough that specks of dirt and sand were kicked up.  Verona could have swiped a hand beneath some with the height they got.  Fans on computers redoubled their efforts, roaring like little jet engines…

And the furs sighed.

Tense, Verona held her position.

Like something alive, the furs moved, lengths of them extending like legs planted on the ground, pushing the body to its full height.

The furs lunged up, the ceiling parted, the sky became visible, and it was as red as anything Verona had ever seen, in multiple shades.

The edifice in front of her wasn’t furry or furred, but it had the same coppery-red gleam.  Damaged, it was shored up by ropes that shouldn’t have supported some of the structures that were there.

“The countdown starts from the moment you enter.”  Zed’s voice sounded far away.  “Announce your intent on entering, with authority.”

“Pick your battles, on what you want to fight or change,” Jessica intoned, voice coming from nowhere in particular.

“You’re primarily a spectator,” Zed added.

She put a hand on the ground and it was slick with blood.  All of it was, as far as she could see- which wasn’t too far.  The edifice took up the entire space in front of her, and trees stood on either side of the two-foot wide path before her.

Blood, thick as anything, covered her legs and arm, from where she’d been sitting.  The ground was tacky with the thick blood beneath her shoes as she walked.

Wind whipped around her, blowing the ends of her hair into her face.  Trees rasped.

The door was wood, and it resembled the floorboards of the house.  Recognizing that point of structure and similarity made it easier to make sense of this world.

She pushed the door open, and there was only darkness inside, hot like a wolf’s breath in her face.  It smelled like meat and it stirred feelings deep in her stomach and brain both, where her headaches and stomachaches tended to dwell.

“Take me to the beginning, show me when she took the throne!” Verona shouted into the darkness.

Liquid, thinner than blood, welled out of the dark space, washing over her blood-soaked shoes, over legs.

It touched bare feet that were no longer feet.  Water as black as anything washed over her legs.

The traction beneath her failed her, the ground was slimy, the surface uneven.  She was dragged by that small tow, at the same moment it intensified.  Water washed over her, practically pulling her into the dark.

Underwater, trying to find her bearings, the smell of a meat-eater’s breath thick in her nostrils and mouth, she floundered, fingers and claws dragging against rock.

She found a flat patch, the rocks still slick with slime beneath the running river, her claws digging in, and then she stood, back arching to thrust belly and chest out, eyes widening in a way that opened them past where her usual eyelids would have had to stop.  Joints popped as she stretched out her limbs, femurs grinding against pelvis.

The meat-eater’s breath was her own.  Her jaw cracked as she opened it wide, and fangs clacked together as she slammed it shut.  She looked out at forest and river, grass and nearby hills, dusted gray with snow.

I’m her.

“Don’t get swallowed, Verona.”  Zed.

I’m Verona.

“Hurry up, you’re so slow!” Lucy shouted.

She was Verona.  She was slow.

Running down the streets of Kennet, hair long.  Lucy just ahead of her, hair looser, longer, bouncing with running steps.  They carried stupid crummy plastic ball-throwing toys that would break after a few days of play.  Verona’s wrist was scraped a bit by a piece of wood she’d had in her pocket as her arm rubbed past it.  A section of tree trunk, where branch had met knot, that had been sitting just underwater.  Pulled from the log, it came away shaped like a retro ray gun, edges smoothed down, streamlined, the ‘barrel’ drawn to a swooping point.

Later on, after it was dry, she’d paint it.  She’d do a bad job and get discouraged, but it would sit on the back of her art shelf.  Until her dad shoved everything off the shelf in a fit of pique.

That was for later.

The sky was somehow bigger, the town massive, the no-go zones imposed by parents tantalizing, waiting for her in the future, like the north end of downtown and the factories at the southeast end.

Focus.  This isn’t what I’m meant to be seeing.  I don’t know why I’m seeing this.

She was the Carmine Beast before it was Carmine.  She ran through woods, nose close to the ground, smelling the world in a thousand flavors, hearing the sound of it, each sound an adventure.  She could the feel of the earth through her paws, in her paws.

The river was there.  She was dimly aware of it.

Steering this, driving it toward where she needed it to be, it was hard.  She couldn’t get out of the river.  If she followed it, waited to pick her battles, then she was running, almost always with one paw in contact with the soil, feeling that thud far away.  Something big.

A man on horseback.

She lunged from the woods, just in front of the rider, from trees to trees, her paws barely touching the path itself.  She leaped from one point of river to another, hurdling a rock that she might otherwise have slid into.

The horse reared up, eyes wild, and threw its rider.  The man fell, the bags he’d been riding with spilling over.

“You’re so good at this,” Brooklyn said, leaning over.

Her head turned.

She was in class.  Her artwork was picked up by her teacher, which annoyed her because it wasn’t done.  It was a cat, drawn with only tight zig-zags, each one carefully arranged to suggest shape.  No nose, no mouth, just very big eyes.

“Very nice,” the teacher said.

She was the Beast, and she moved through the woods, aware of the attention she got.  The fear, the respect, the amusement from goblin things.  She moved naturally, following a course she couldn’t pull away from, a train on its rails, but she was fur, paw, and something vulpine.

I need to get on track, I need to find a middle ground.  So I can steer without retreating into myself or falling into the Beast.

She navigated the river.

She had paws, but they were black-furred.  Claws, but they were retractable.  Her body was dressed in shadow, not fur, lithe and graceful.  She could move on all fours and she could move on her back legs.  A Cat-Beast Verona, a middle ground between the Carmine and her.  Easier to manage.

She couldn’t leave the river.  The landscape wouldn’t let her

Forks of the river showed themselves, and she took those courses, running between concrete edifices.  Buildings with strange, unscaleable rooftops, with canals running between them, in various sizes and shapes.

She created her art, spirits and cats dancing around her, but many of them were more of an extension of what she was, a creative spin on her own shadow, than anything of its own.  She picked up a cat and threw it into the wall, and it turned into images, sprawling, intense graffiti.

Doing harm, yes, but in a way that was needed.  Bringing something to a stale place.

Spirits stirred, showing interest, more cats appeared, peering down and around, and she painted the area black and red, eyes wide on a face without a nose or mouth.  She was agile, she loved moving, she created, and she loved that too.

“You need to focus.”

Her mom leaned over her.

She’d taken some of the materials in front of her, and started drawing, homework left aside.  Her mom took the work in progress away.

“We’ve been at this homework for hours, Verona,” her mom said.  “This isn’t meant to take this long.”

“I want to draw.”

“But you need to do this work-”

Materials from ongoing construction in this concrete canal city made navigating the river hard.  Pipes and bits of concrete threatened to stab her if she wasn’t careful with her movements.

She leaped up, scrambling to scale a rooftop and find a bit of flat ground.  A balcony sticking out the side of a building.

The concrete edifices were growing, being built up, cranes throwing up more walls, throwing down more debris.

She saw people crossing a bridge, took a running start, and she leaped.  She took three different forms in the air, before landing in an explosion of cat and shadow, fur and snarl.

Scaring them.  A couple, they scrambled away, jumping from the bridge, ten or twelve feet to the water below.  They were faced with the debris, the mess, the ruin.  One was even hurt and the smell of that hurt filled her nose, mingled with the taste of meat she’d eaten a day ago, still heavy on her breath.

She had no mouth until her lips parted into a wide, fanged smile.

Back to the woods.  There were noises and cheers, and spirits stirred around her, giving her life.

She smelled a male and he was willing, and she pounced on him.

“You have so much potential, Verona,” the teacher said.

Parents and teacher together, addressing her on a parent teacher night.

“You need to apply yourself,” her father said.

She felt bad and she couldn’t articulate how things had come to this, how she’d failed when apparently she was supposed to do so much better.  Her teacher was a jerk and that was a failure but that never got addressed and it wasn’t fair.

Tearing up, she pushed her chair back, standing, and fled, running into the hall where she could cry on her own.  Except people were there.  She headed for the bathroom.  Her parents followed.  Her father stopped at the door while she pushed her way in.

She pushed her way past the flimsy doors and fences.  Into this place where the building was happening.  She terrified the people working, saw one challenge her, and she snarled a dangerous sort of cat snarl, hair all over her standing on end like needles, waiting to see if they weren’t afraid.

The fear was the point.

They weren’t afraid enough, so she stepped in, past the pipe they were using as an improvised cudgel, and made like she was going to kiss the side of the man’s neck.

The taste of blood exploded into her mouth as the blood did, jugular neatly severed.

She made a spectacle of it, clawed fingertips digging into the wound, pulling it open wide, letting the blood spray onto the plain concrete walls beside her.  Cats danced and she bid them to jump onto the scene, a wholesale mural mingling with blood.  Black and red.

People fled and people ran.  She tore through heavy machinery, she demolished the delicate, she toppled the neatly stacked, she threw everything into disarray.

She raged and she couldn’t put words to that rage.  Water welled and began to flow as she knocked down retaining walls, the river flowing and painting the path for her.

She took this little construction project apart until there was no way it could resume, then she fled, before men with other weapons could arrive.  Over rooftop, into canal, gliding on ink that flowed like river.  Through building, and out again.

New obstacles- grates, gates, levers, fences.

She reached the settlement’s edge, returned to where the canals became rivers again, the forest beside her.

She expected the amusement, the applause, the rallying around her.  Even fear and respect.

There was silence.  The trees had thinned out, and spirits had too.  Even here, there were signs of civilization.  Signs bolted to trees that the spirits obeyed.

She looked back, and she was stunned-

Already, they were resuming the build, cleaning up the damage.

And while she’d been working on that, the horizon had changed.  More settlements springing up, more construction projects.  Projects that had started when she entered had become concrete cubes and towers in the meantime.

As the Beast, she could see the palisades, the logs with rope lashing them together, some torn, some in ruins, but people hurried to rebuild.

She slipped into being Verona again.

“Do you ever feel like a last minute addition?”

“Huh?” Lucy asked.

“To the world.  Like, here are the leftovers, it’s going to make a weird human, but we’ll just jam her in there, here are two people we’ll pair them up, they can be her parents.  But every step of the way, you’re not supposed to be here, there’s one person too many, ugh, this upsets the existing plans, this should be simple and easy and now it’s a mess?”

“You are messy.”

“But really,” Verona said.  “Like you don’t fit in with family, like you don’t fit in at school, and you’re meant to do all these things and the world doesn’t let you?”

“I dunno.  Do you feel that way with me?”

“Maybe.  Maybe like we’re a happy accident, like oops, these two humans got stuck together.”

Lucy grabbed Verona’s arm, tight,  “Don’t pull us apart!”

Verona let Lucy tug on her arm, making her rock side to side.

“My mom left.”

The lump in her throat grew.

“My mom told me,” Lucy said.  “I wasn’t sure how to bring it up.”

“My parents are separating, they might split for good.  And that feeling like there’s no place for me is so, so much worse right now,” Verona whispered.

As the Beast, she sat on a ridge, and it felt like every time she blinked her eyes, the world was changing.

A light flickered, the very first gas streetlight igniting in Montreal.  She was joined by many others, but she didn’t belong to them.  They didn’t cheer her.

They only marked the occasion.  The smarter among them recognized her for what she was and pitied her.

No place for a beast to remind people about the dark anymore.

She ran as the Beast, finding the river that wasn’t a river.

She ran as Verona the Cat Beast, trying to find her course.

A limited number of routes she could take, less forks, less branches.

“You need to focus on your education, or you can’t get into University,” her dad said.

“Do I even want to go to University?”

“I’d hope you do.  If you ever want to get a job-”

She looked at him, uncomprehending.

“You have to get a job.  No guy is going to want to marry a mooch.”

“They might if I’m cute enough.”

“You are cute,” her father said, smoothing her hair down.  “But being cute and smart is better, and when you stop being cute-”

“Plastic surgery?”

“-being smart will be what counts.”

Less forks, less branches, a treacherous path.

As Verona the Cat Beast, she ran, testing the fringes of civilization, but every time she turned, cat-shadows dancing around her.  She drew when she could, but the time grew increasingly fleeting, the effects smaller.

“You’re a candidate.”

She paused, looking up.

The Carcass in Sable stood on the rooftop, flesh alternately exquisite in beauty and in rotting tatters, wearing a black dress.

“For the Carmine Throne.  A place for you to be.  Give it some time.  Consider.”

As the Beast, standing in the woods.

“Nothing I do matters,” Verona groaned.  “I get the same grades no matter what I do, whether I study or not.”

“There’s no way that’s true,” her mother told her.

Sixteen year old Verona groaned again, exaggerated.

The television was on in the background- “…employment rates are down, even having a bachelor’s isn’t sufficient anymore.  There’s less opportunities even for the educated, housing prices are skyrocketing out of control, food prices are on the rise…”

“It feels like none of this matters,” Verona told her mom.

“This?  Getting this education?  This is how you get to a place where what you do can matter.  Take this opportunity.  Not everyone gets one.”

Verona swallowed.

“Pass these exams, get good final grades for your last semester, go to University, get a good degree, get a job, find someone to marry, buy a house, have kids, worry about money, get divorced, worry more about money, find someone else, have more kids, raise them, worry about them, get old, scrape by in your retirement, die.”

“I’m not sure I want to ever get married.”

“You’ll change your mind,” her mom said, absently, while sorting through mail.

“I’m not sure I want to bring kids into this world.”

“You will, just wait.  You have a letter from Lucy.”

Verona took it and opened it.  A birthday card.  She wasn’t sure what she was expecting, and when the disappointment seized her like a big robot hand around her neck, it wasn’t because the message inside wasn’t sweet and heartfelt.

One message in the last year.

Two from Avery, but Avery was even further away.

“Isn’t that sweet?” her mom kissed the top of her head.  “You should write back.”

Some of the messages back had gone unanswered.

This is the Carmine’s version of events, mapped to me, it’s not-

“But first,” her mother interrupted the thought.  “Study.  Exams, get good grades, go to a good University, get a degree-”

“Degrees count for less,” the television declared.

“I know, Mom.”

“-get a job-”

“Unemployment rates are skyrocketing.”

“-find someone to marry, buy a house-”

“Housing prices are increasingly unaffordable for the younger generations-“

Verona got up from the seat, away from that, away from her mom, the television, the study materials, the letter.

“What else are you going to do, Verona?  It’s your only option!” her mom called out after her.

She stepped out onto the balcony.  The card had left her more heartsick than anything else.

What else am I going to do?

She was back in Kennet, a decaying, sad, lonely little town.  Behind the fast food place where Melissa worked part-time.

Melissa flicked the lighter-

“These wrongs are coming in your lifetimes.  And I damn the lot of you to it!” Bristow’s voice shouted from the void between Verona’s older self and the Cat Beast version of her.

Hairs standing on end with goosebumps up her entire body, Cat Beast Verona stepped out onto a cliff’s edge, looking out over the distance at the sprawl of plain, uninteresting concrete.

Lonely.  The last spirits she felt any kinship to had moved on.  Her shadow had no cats in it.  She was diminished.  She wasn’t sure where she was supposed to be or what she was meant to do.  The world seemed too large.

Anything she did would be scrubbed away.  No impact to be made.

This is how you make your impact.

“Okay,” she said.

“I’ll tell the others.  You have our support,” the Alabaster told her, from a seat high above.

As the Beast that predated Verona by hundreds of years, she prowled her way forward.

A man covered in wounds sat naked on the throne.  He stared at her, his gaze level.

He was retiring, she knew.  Partially out of expectations.  Partially because he was done.  He was tired, and it was clear in the gaze and the way he sat, even though he was strong, blood-slick, deep brown skin stretched over taut muscle.

She padded her way forward.  He didn’t move or take his eyes off of her.  She had a sense that in this circumstance, if she had to fight him, she’d lose.

But there was no fight in him.

She took his head in her jaws, forcing him to lean forward, and she bit deep enough that bone crunched and severed.

She tore, one paw in his lap, pulling meat free, she ate, chewing, swallowing, taking some of that power, and then she howled.

Declaration made.

In other versions of events, her mother egged her on, urged her about midterms, finals, grades.  Moving out was too expensive so she stayed at home for a while.  She sent out envelopes, handed them in at desks.

The fight had begun already- midterms, finals, job search-

Teeth in a human’s throat, biting in deep, past practice-wrought protections.  In some small, hollow way, she wasn’t sure if the fact she was going through the motions and the fact she didn’t care about the outcome was giving her an edge.  A man who took too deep a wound to his arm looked down at the damage, and she knew from years of experience as the teeth in the dark that made people afraid of the woods, that was a fear of capabilities being taken away at a critical moment.

He rallied, reached for a weapon, but that small delay had bought her the opportunity to bite deep before his axe could meet her side.

The battlefield was hers.  It moved under her feet like she wanted, and in a way, she already sat on the throne.  It wasn’t a flat surface, but a ground that tilted metaphysically in ways she needed it to tilt, because of three figures who stood by watching.  The Alabaster Doe, the Carcass in Sable, and the Gold-Furred Mouse.  They expected her to take the role, that expectation had power in itself.

Focus.  We wanted to learn-

She tracked the other challengers who waited, judged them.

The practitioner tried to bind her, and the Judges overseeing this process disallowed it.  This was to be about combat, not entrapment.  She was close enough to the throne to have a sense of how this worked.  To know that the rules were different each time, as much as they could get away with.  Most contests were spaced so far apart, unmonitored by those who weren’t judges or participants, that the rules could be changed, adjusted.

Being chosen by the Judges gave that little advantage.  They wanted someone they could work with.  And they’d chosen her.

She killed the practitioner, as he reached for other tools and practices, and she shook him violently.  She was as powerful as she’d ever been, and it was a power derived from being on the brink, the potential…

As Verona, she put the phone down.

“Well?” her mom asked.

“I guess I got an apartment.”

She felt okay about it.  Her mom seemed happier about it than she was, which, of course, given she was still at home at twenty-two.  She could almost get a sense of what she was meant to be feeling, like she was on the brink of-

Of success?  Of taking the role?

As the Cat Verona, she tore out throats with claws.  She painted pictures of teeth and claws on the pavement and walls, and she gave them life.  She ripped, tore, fought-

A group of goblins, bound together into a cohort, they wanted to hold the throne together as a quartet.

She reduced them to a trio.  Then a pair.

Her bloody shadows crept across the arena, formed open jaws, and  swallowed the last one whole, as he used his vulgar parts to help make an even more vulgar gesture.

A bogeyman, Verona knew what to call it, even though the Beast didn’t.  He was one who cast others into the Abyss.  The floor was fragile around him, the barriers between here and that dark place thin enough that one firm kick or toss of his opponent would send his victim through, for a long fall.

He was a powerful breed, once a Scourge, he’d gone down with his demesne and he’d come back angry, that space a tool he could use and shape.

The Judges tried to push back, because this was an arena for fighting, victory by combat, not by banishment, but he knew better.  He changed the space to be pit with walls and floor festooned with spikes and blades.

They allowed the combat to happen like that.  He had the right, even if they had the ability to put a toe on the scales.

She cut the bogeyman, nipped at him with shadows.  She blocked his way, frustrated him, fed that anger that made him so unsuitable to the role.

He changed his pit once again, as she fought him, because he wanted to be meaner than spikes and blades, and the Judges acted, barring that option.

Verona the Cat Beast crashed through the barrier with the bogeyman, biting, clawing, slashing, and he didn’t react much to the pain-

But the landing, a solid bottom to the pit, no spikes, he was beneath her, and the jarring landing helped her to drive claw points and teeth deep enough to matter.  She tore as she rose to her feet, and brought enough of his throat and heart with her that he didn’t get back up.

There were more, but she was less and less worried.  She should have been tired, but she was presently the closest to the throne.  She could drink of its power now.  She could use it.  She healed, scaled the wall of the pit, and let the next challenger come.  Another beast, a bear twice the usual size, with a man’s spirit and mind inside it.

It was weaker than the others.  The most important challengers had come first.

The ones who followed were ones who couldn’t turn down a fight, because of what they were, or because of stupidity.  Fewer and fewer of them had power.

A sea of slaughter.  A sacrificial rite, killing all comers, to take the seat.  Each defeat drenched the ground in blood and with her having the advantage, that power flowed to her.

“Any more?” the Carcass in Sable asked.

There was silence.  Blood had reached branches overhead and now it oozed and dripped down.

Blood on the new Carmine Beast’s snout dripped down as well.  A tongue licked some of it away.

The Carmine Cat licked from elbow to hand, cleaning.  She licked again, tongue moving through the shadows she was dressed in, now red.

She looked at the throne.

Wounded, hurting, the Carmine Beast loped over.

Wounded, hurting, the Carmine Cat limped over.

She pushed open the door to her house, chased by the worries of the day, the responsibilities of being a manager.  She kicked off shoes, then walked down the length of the hallway, wincing with the soreness of being older, facing the accumulated aches of a long day of sitting.

To be followed by a long night of sitting.

She settled on the bed,

The Carmine Beast sat in the throne, adopting a human form.  The metaphorical river stretched out ahead of her.

The Carmine Cat seated herself, curling legs up beside her.  There were no branches or forks in the way forward.  This was it.

She didn’t turn on the television, sitting in her bed.  Her expression, distorted from a bit of weight gain, was there, pale, in the reflection on the screen, lips pulled down by cheeks, outer edges of her eyes pulled down in a similar fashion.  An expression of perpetual sadness, highlighted by the contrast of being reflected in the black screen.

“Even winning feels like losing,” all three of them said, in unison.  The Carmine Beast’s thoughts, given voice.  “When it’s by the rules of that world.”

Outside the window of her bedroom, kids ran down the street.  One shouted, “Hurry up, you’re so slow!”

The Carmine Cat dreamed of being an ink-black cat, painting the walls, free, wild-

The Carmine Beast remembered old hunts and slipped into a doze.  The work would begin later.

Zed’s voice was distorted, as if through a bad sound system.  “You’re about five and a half minutes in.  This marks the halfway point, Verona.”

She looked at her middle-aged face in the television screen.  She could push this further, but she was certain that if she did, it would consume her.  Not because the Carmine influence was so strong, but because the versions of her would be more and more diminished.

She stood, stretching, joints popping in all three forms.  Then she stepped aside from the single course that lay ahead of her.

“It’s easier if you pick a path and commit to it,” Zed explained.

Verona smiled to herself at the irony of it.  She felt very, very tired.

She’d just finished recounting the broad strokes.

“So the fight is rigged?” Lucy asked.

“No, not exactly,” Verona replied.  “It’s… more like they pick someone who has their favor, and the contest is skewed to bias those who have their favor.  Most don’t see enough consecutive Carmine throne contests to really say anything about it.”

“There’s a bit of a quantum physics angle to this,” Zed said.

“That’s maybe wayyyy over my head, buddy,” Verona said, smiling a bit.

“When you observe something, you change the outcome.  If you’ve seen that and you know that, you reserve the ability to call them out, it ties their hands?  Like jury nullification, it’s… even knowing is pretty potent.”

“Way over my head again,” Verona told him.

“Good if it’s anyone but John, but if it is John…” Lucy trailed off.  “We want him to have the advantage.”

“Yeah,” Verona replied.

“Are you okay, Ronnie?” Avery asked.  “Everything intact, not too shaken?  You seem quieter.”

“Just… very close to where it hurts, somehow,” Verona replied.  “I think on purpose.  It’s like the furs wanted to paint a picture that really helped me get it.  So it used my life.  And I’m getting really tired of the universe telling me there’s no future, while it takes my options away.”

“I don’t get it,” Lucy told her.

“I think I’m not necessarily that enthusiastic about becoming Other,” Verona said, smiling a bit.

“That’s admittedly a bit of a relief,” Lucy told her.

She felt a weird kind of anxiety at that.  Frustration.  It mingled with other feelings.

But what if you aren’t around?  She wanted to ask.  But Zed and Jessica and Brie and Avery were here and she didn’t- she didn’t want to be like her dad, and be all plaintive, dwelling in the worst case.  She knew what Lucy would say and it didn’t change the feeling.

She wasn’t that enthusiastic about being human either, and it felt like the courses and forks ahead of her were being taken away.

Gotta figure out what the heck I’m doing, then, Verona thought.

She picked herself up.  She was still wet from the river water Zed had used to clean her, though she wasn’t dripping anymore.  She used fingernails to adjust wet hair and get everything where it should be.

“There was nobody like us,” Verona told them.

“Hm?” Lucy asked.

“We talked about it.  What Charles said.  There was nobody like us.  I could see how Charles might describe it or paint the picture of what this event might look like, but seeing the people who decided to fight for the throne… you’re the most capable in a fight, Lucy, and there’s no way you’d… even angry, I don’t think you’d step into that arena.”

“You think Charles was lying?”

Verona nodded.

“We thought it was possible,” Avery said.

“Yeah,” Verona said.  “It’s a place for those who are willing to wade through blood to get to the throne.  That’s not us.”

“Okay,” Lucy said.  “That… that might help John, then, right?  We know the Judges set the little rules for the contest…”

“Very carefully picking the rules that determine what’s suitable for a trial for the Carmine Throne…” Verona said, trailing off.

“And if we know that, if we know John’s fighting, we can stay clear, keep the coast clear.  If we know someone else is somehow going to get that favor…”

“Or be closer to the throne,” Verona added.

“And we know Charles lied,” Avery said, sounding upset and looking frustrated.  “And we should work out why.  Misdirection?”

“Could be,” Lucy said.

“Okay,” Zed said.  “Let’s, uh, get water, eat a bite, I want to make sure Brie isn’t too anxious sitting out there alone, use the washroom-”

“Facilities work,” Verona said, pointing up.

“Fantastic.  And then we’ll douse you in water, I guess, Lucy.”

“I’ve got a lot of ground to cover, but it sounds like time moves slower there?”

“Might’ve been my approach,” Verona replied.

“Okay,” Lucy said.  “This is… it has me optimistic, for the first time in a bit.  There’s-”

“Be careful,” Verona interrupted her.  “I don’t think she’s very happy.  That taste I got of the future?  Rough.”

“I think it was painting a picture for you,” Avery said.  “Hmmm, of the closest thing it could find to a thing in your life or your imagination, to an option-less future.  There’s almost always options, right?”

“Right,” Verona replied.

“Even if you got that far, you could pick up painting, you could exercise, you could change things up.  Your dad- that was a lot like your dad, from what you describe.  He has those options too.”

“I don’t think he can see them.”

“Which is why I’ll be there,” Lucy said.  “I’ll smack you upside the back of the head if I have to.  I’m not going anywhere, you tit.”

Verona smiled.

“I’m going to make sure Snowdrop hasn’t eaten all the snacks,” Avery said, turning away and stretching, one hand straight up, other at her elbow.

“Good call,” Lucy said.  “Let’s get centered, figure out what’s up.”

“Be careful,” Verona said again.  “Okay?  Be careful in there?”

“I’ll try,” Lucy said.

“Can I ask?” Zed turned to Verona, as Lucy left the room.  “How’s your Sight?”

Verona blinked, turned on her Sight, and she looked.  She was a bit surprised.  “Less gainsaid than before.”

“It was us doing the practicing, me primarily, for the Alcazar, but you did the journey.  For the sake of oaths you swore.  Counts.”

“Good to know,” Verona replied.

“I was convinced you’d be in there for the full eleven, maybe twelve minutes.  I’m glad you weren’t.”

They were so optimistic, glad to be figuring things out, glad the ritual had worked.

She looked at Lucy’s back as Lucy chugged water, and prepared to be doused in river water.  She stared at her friend’s back, wishing she could convey what she needed to convey.  But words failed her.

What would Lucy see?  They wanted Lucy to see who the conspirators were, and verify if the Carmine Beast had actually helped create the Choir.  But what else?  If this whole ritual thing tapped into them, as much as it tapped into the historical events, to convey things with their full gravity, what would Lucy get hit with?

What would Avery see, if she was the one to witness the death?  They hoped she’d see some explanation as to why the Carmine hadn’t fought back.  Some explanation as to why she walked to the middle of town.

It wasn’t angry.  It wasn’t even that it was sad.  For Verona, she’d seen a lot, and what she’d seen had been hard to grapple with.

She didn’t want Lucy to deal with that kind of hardness.  She didn’t want Avery to.  Especially when they had tougher tasks ahead of them.  Reaching further, facing a death.

That was hard to shake.  Even if she objectively knew Avery was right, yeah, obviously there were more options than she’d felt like.  Yeah, she could trust Lucy to stick around, even if both an special Alpeana-branded nightmare and an Alcazar had portrayed futures where they’d been separated by some events in the past.

She’d tried to warn Lucy, but she couldn’t articulate it further without possibly injecting anxieties into Lucy’s head that would taint the scenes she saw.  Avery looked at her, and Avery looked lonely, somehow, in a way that it had felt, being the Carmine.

One week and one day, she thought.  I’d call this off if I didn’t think we needed the answers and details to get through to the other side.

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