Pale: 2.8 - Lucy
Author: Wildbow

Lucy

Aunt Heather laughed, and Aunt Heather’s volume control knob was a bit higher than most people’s at the best of times.  She’d had a few glasses of wine tonight, and it was a louder and longer laugh than before.

“Don’t laugh!” Lucy protested, her attention divided between the screen and her aunt.  “Why would you laugh?  How can you laugh?”

On the television, Chloe was taking a machete to The Headcase.  Lucy leaned forward.  Six minute uninterrupted final encounter.  If there were any cuts, they were cleverly disguised.

“I’m not laughing at the movie, it’s you.”

Hurt, bewildered, and confused, Lucy looked at Aunt Heather, who sat sideways in an armchair.  There was a fond smile on her Aunt’s face, which didn’t line up with the comment.

“You jump every time she does something,” Aunt Heather said.

Oh.  Had she?  The feeling of being both stung and shaken dropped away.  Mostly.

Lucy tried to refocus on the film’s finale.  The moment had pulled her out of it.

Chloe hacked the killer in the groin with the machete, bringing him to his knees, pulled it out, then swung the machete at the box that encased the killer’s head, she pulled it free and began hacking, chopping the box to pieces.

“I should thank you,” Chloe told the killer, panting for breath.

The killer lunged, grabbing her by the wrist before the machete could come down again.

Lucy’s leg jerked, as she willed Chloe to jump back, to react.

Damn.  Her aunt was right.  Aunt Heather met her eyes, and then laughed at the annoyed expression on her face.  Ruining the whole feel of the conclusion.

Lucy had made a point of watching this film once a year for the last four years.  Every year she’d had a different take on it.  Year one, it had been about realizing that there were patterns in movies like this, and that those patterns could be played with.  Year two, it had been actually getting what had been going on with Christopher.  Year three it had been about deciding why she liked certain things in movies and films, and the start of her own list of rules about movies and television shows.  Why she liked what she did, what she accepted, and what she didn’t.  If a female character got sexually assaulted, a male character of roughly equivalent status needed to lose his dangle and/or tackle.

This movie, as much as it was in her top five, and as much as it had been the origin of that rule, only got a C for that.  The killer died too soon after.  There had to be repercussions.  Emotional weight.  It had to be fair, or more than.  That was the only way some people would get it.

Chloe tore off the remains of the box from Headcase’s head, revealing his face.  Tim.  He shielded his face, cringing.  The calculating monster truly defenseless for the first time.  Chloe embedded the machete in his skull.

Lucy’s arm twitched.  Aunt Heather chuckled.

“I’m not scared or anything.  I’m really into it,” Lucy said.

Aunt Heather smiled and nodded.  “Sure.”

Lucy, sitting on cushions at the base of the couch, twisted around to look at her mom.  “Mom-”

Her mom was looking at a tablet.

“You’re not even watching!” Lucy protested.

“I’m keeping half an eye on the screen,” her mom said, two eyes on the tablet.

“I told you to put that away.  Come on, please?  It’s disrespectful, if I want to show you a movie I love and you aren’t even giving it a chance.”

“I’m- fine.  Sorry.  I did warn you this wasn’t my kind of movie.”

“Maybe it could be, if you gave it a chance.  It’s a good movie, with good critic reviews, some really great cinematography and effects across long shots, solid action.”

Second to last scene of the movie.  Kai, barely alive, limping up, and looking down on the killer’s body, picking up the machete, and proceeding to methodically take it to pieces.

“I hope you’re okay with the decision we made,” Chloe told Kai.  “No getting our heads back on our original bodies now.”

“Perfectly okay,” Kai said, a look of determination on his face.  He held his injured side as he worked his way to his feet.

“I don’t know who these characters are,” Lucy’s mom said.

Lucy groaned.  “Remember Christopher from the start of the movie?”

“Was that the girl with black hair?”

Lucy groaned, getting up from her seat.

“Want me to pause it?” her mom asked.

“It’s the last scene, besides the after-credits one,” Lucy said, stretching.  She picked up the empty snack plate and bowl from the coffee table, and carried it over to the kitchen.  “Is it still okay if I go out?”

“Hold on, hold on,” her mom said, looking at the tablet.

Lucy put her hands on her hips, hips askew, giving her mom her best glare.

“She’s mad,” Aunt Heather said, a little less amused than before.

Lucy’s mom glanced back at Lucy.  “Hold on.”

Lucy shifted her weight to her other foot, her hips switching to the opposite angle.  She dialed up the glare.

The speakers of the tablet computer weren’t very good, and the ‘ringing phone’ sound was abrasive.

“Please don’t tell me this is Pa-”

The tablet display switched from a mostly-white screen to a video stream.

“Hello!  Hello, can you hear me?”

“Hello!” Aunt Heather called out, not moving from her spot.

“Hi, Auntie!  It was nice seeing you when you stopped by.  Hi mom.”

Lucy relented, hands dropping from her hips.  The frustrated, angry feeling went away.  Mostly.

“How are you doing tonight?”

“We’re managing,” Lucy’s mom said.  “We just finished movie night.  Lucy’s pick tonight.  I’ve been trying to get this program working for most of the film, and she’s made it clear I should have been watching.”

“My fault!” Booker told Lucy.  “Hey, you there, baby sis?”

Lucy approached the couch, putting both hands on the armrest to lean forward.  Her mom tilted the tablet up a bit.  “Hi.”

Booker was in his dorm room, apparently.  He had music posters and art on his wall, like Lucy had done with two of hers, even though his were bigger, with more of a theme running through them.  The place looked small, with a bed, bedside table, bathroom, and door out all visible within the camera’s frame.

Booker’s hair was long, curly, intentionally messy, and draped halfway down his chest.  In contrast, he’d put a lot of attention into trimming his eyebrows, the pencil mustache at his upper lip, and the beard that was kept to the very end of his chin.  In contrast to the attention and effort giving to what she praisingly thought of as Booker’s ‘mane’, or his facial hair, he wore a wrinkled university tee.

He looked so good.  Healthy, comfortable.  Himself.

There was a slight delay before he spoke.  Faint audio lag.  “Hey, don’t blame mom too much, okay?  I gave her bad instructions for the download, and it took me too long to catch on.”

“If you’re going into anything political, you’re going to have to get better at communicating than that.”

“Haha, ouch.  I know the schedule for movie nights, unless you guys have changed it-”

“It’s a little shaky in recent months,” Lucy’s mom said.  “My work schedule.”

“Mine too.  Sorry Lucy, I’ve got a shift later tonight, ten to midnight, and then I’ve got an activity center thing at the crack of dawn tomorrow.  So this will have to be a short conversation.”

“That’s okay.  I was going to go hang out with my friends, squeeze something in before a late curfew if I could.  Part of the deal I struck with mom.”

“About that- can we talk in private?”

Lucy looked at her mom, who held up the tablet.  Lucy took it, then headed for the stairs.

“She put you up to this, huh?” Lucy asked, once they were mostly out of earshot.

“She mentioned stuff.  I said I wished I could be there, but I can’t, so this is a bit of a compromise,” Booker said.

“Yeah,” Lucy said.  “I don’t think she knows what to do with me.”

In the background, a girl let herself in, walking very carefully with two mugs.  She was petite, wearing an oversized university hoodie that made her look smaller.  White, with bleached hair.  She navigated the various things in the rather confined room.

Lucy felt impatient.  This call was supposed to be short, she and Booker had places to go, and this was an interruption when time was limited.

The girl placed both mugs on Booker’s desk, then gave him a kiss on the side of the head, hugging Booker around the shoulders, compressing his hair.  She was short enough that standing behind a sitting Booker, their shoulders were roughly level.

“Sorry to interrupt, but there’s no way we’re getting through work tonight without caffeine,” the girl said.  “Hi.”

“Hi,” Lucy said, wary.

“This is Alyssa,” Booker said.  He rubbed Alyssa’s arm at his shoulder.  “She’ll be coming with me to visit this summer.”

“I’m looking forward to the visit,” Lucy said, picking her words carefully.

“Me too,” Alyssa said.  “I’m looking forward to seeing where Booker grew up.”

“It’s pretty boring, I keep telling her,” Booker said.  He smiled, looking at Lucy, “but some of my favorite people are there.”

“Where are you from?” Lucy asked, trying to be nice, still feeling like the conversation with Booker was being intruded on.

“Ottawa.  Ottawa’s boring.”

“It’s not Kennet boring,” Booker said.

“So you keep saying.  Listen, I don’t want to get in the way, so I’m going to do laundry.  Does your uniform need a clean?”

“No, but uh, can you throw my clothes from the hamper in?  I want to dress nice for the parents tomorrow.”

“Will do.  Bye, Lucy.  I look forward to getting to know you.”

There was a bit of commotion as Alyssa collected the clothes from the hamper. It looked like it attached to a metal rack with hooks and rods that kept the mouth of the bag open, but it was a struggle with the lid and everything.  Booker rose from his seat and had crawled halfway across the bed to get past Alyssa to the hamper when Alyssa finally got it free.  She shot them both a victorious, embarrassed smile and then carried the bag out of view.

Booker sat back down.  “What were we talking about?”

“I don’t remember, exactly.”

“I can see your wall.  Show me?”

Lucy hit the button on the tablet to use the other camera, and showed Booker her wall, with all the collected album art, posters, and promotional material.

“You gotta keep sending me your favorites.”

“I will.  There hasn’t been much since the experimental week.”

“Yeah.  I remember now, you said mom didn’t know what to do with you.”

Booker’s head turned.  Alyssa returned, ducking her head a bit, collected one of the two mugs, and jogged back out of frame.

“You’re really together.”  Lucy emphasized the word ‘together’.  “Enmeshed.  Doing each other’s laundry.”

“She’s got a roommate situation, so she’s been staying over.  But we can talk about that in a month or so, she’ll tell you.  I gotta admit, baby sister, I don’t know exactly what to say or do here, either.”

“Mom didn’t give you instructions?”

“No,” Booker said.  “I even did internet searches, looking for advice, trying to figure out how to approach this conversation.  I kept running into stuff more for white parents of white kids, preaching tolerance, acceptance.  It made it sound easy.  But I couldn’t find a good guide for when a son, daughter, student, or sibling is angry or hurting, possibly for very justifiable reasons.  How do you make that better?”

Lucy glanced at the window, checking for a certain cat, then settled on her bed.  She didn’t have an answer, or input.  She held the tablet with arms crossed, right hand at the upper left corner, left hand at the upper right, the bottom of the tablet dug into her stomach.  “It doesn’t have to be a pep talk.  It’s nice to talk to you.”

“Sure, we could make a regular thing of this,” Booker said.  He glanced to one side, seeming to consider something, and then said, “Ran into Paul, huh?”

“Yeah,” she said, her voice soft.

“I’ve been trying to forget about him.  Like, he left us, so why should I give him a second thought, right?  He hurt mom.  I think mom had the same mentality, trying to move on.  So it didn’t cross my mind that it might be any different for you, until mom reached out.”

“I don’t think she moved on.  In her head, logically, but her heart… it sucks, seeing it.”

“Oh yeah.  I’ve been wondering if I should have stuck around for a bit.  Postponed school, used the time to save up.”

“I’m not sure it would have helped any, and it would have hurt.”

“Talk to me, baby sis.  I only got the cliff notes.”

“It’s hard to explain,” Lucy told him.  It was.  She couldn’t lie, and there was so very, very little she was certain about when it came to this stuff.  She had to be so careful, and that was an additional obstacle when the conversation was already halting and hard.  “I don’t- I can’t move on, it feels like.  Sometimes little things happen and my brain sort of takes it up and won’t let them go.  Like they’re circling around in my head, and I wonder, interpret, cross-check against new things and ideas.  But there’s never a clear answer, I can’t take them from that part of my brain and put them down or leave them in the past.”

“Mom said you’re seeing someone now?  A therapist?”

“Therapist, counselor, or psychiatrist.  I’m not sure of the terms.  But even there, he asked a couple of questions about what I remembered about mom’s relationship with Paul, and what happened with mom’s relationship with dad.  Is that him trying to understand me better, or is it him gathering ammo?”

“When these types of things happen, not even with you or me or mom, but violence, or politicians saying something sketchy, or slipping in fourteen word headlines into government websites… if it gets any meaningful traction at all, there’s always people looking to defend them.  Always people out there looking to make us out to be the problem.  That guy committed a crime a decade ago.  That guy should have been more cooperative.  And if we try to be meek and easygoing and non-problematic then it feels like we’re playing into a long-term game where we don’t have teeth when it counts.  It doesn’t matter, anyway.  Because the people who want to find something will find something to point their fingers at, so long as it isn’t themselves.”

“I think it’s possible to be easygoing and have teeth when it counts.  It’s what I try for.”

Lucy’s fingers gripped the tablet harder, and it creaked a bit with the force of it.  She wanted to hug it, but then she couldn’t see Booker, and mostly she just really wanted to hug Booker right now, tight as could be.

“I think I’d rather have the teeth first, and be ready.  The people worth keeping can look past that and see the real me.”

“You’ve got those people?  Verona still around?”

Lucy nodded.  “And Avery.  New friend.  She was there, with Paul.  I was so worried she’d make a comment, like, wonder, was mom to blame?  But she’s met mom and mom’s never done anything even remotely unkind to her, so why would she think that, right?  I was so ready to go off on her, if she even hinted at it, but I guess thinking that way isn’t fair to her any more than a comment about mom would be.  And it’s like… I can’t even put it to rest?  It’s not even cathartic, because now there’s more, stirred up in my head.”

“I’m glad you’ve got friends.  It sounds a lot like you’re overly ‘ready’ for too many things all at once.  Paul, your friend.”

“I wasn’t thinking seriously about all this until I was sixteen or so,” Booker said.  “I wish I had good advice.  It’s tough, being your age.  If you were a little older, I’d tell you to go find the parties.  Network.  There’s guys as young as fourteen or fifteen who hang out, drink, mess around.  There’s not much to do in Kennet except that, or being off on your own, doing your own thing.  I know telling you to go drink beers at your age is really terrible advice, but I think it’s so important that you get out there, make your face known, make friends, find a boyfriend, if you’re into boys-”

“-Cool.  Look, be goofy, be happy, be sad with these people around your age.  Go drink a beer with them, if that’s what it takes to form those relationships.  Be thirteen, and build something better while you’re at it.”

“Man, if mom heard you giving this advice, she might uninstall this app.”

“It’s what I had to do, baby sis.  It’s the nature of a town like ours.  I wasn’t into it at first, but I did forge some bonds, made friends I still kind of keep in touch with.  People I’ll go out to drink with when I visit with Alyssa in tow.”

“Mom was looking up how to deal with problem children on her computer.  A book showed up as a product she’d looked at on a site, even though she deleted the search history.  If I came home drunk or whatever, I think I’d only be reinforcing that take.”

“Don’t get drunk.  Save the stupid stuff for when you’re with people you trust, like Verona and your other friend.  When you’re with others, be sharp enough to notice the little things.  Trust your instincts, because if you spend enough time around them, some people will show off their assholes.  Protect yourself.  Use protection, if you’re doing anything.”

Lucy groaned.  “Ugh, no.  Don’t go there.”

“Gotta say it,” Booker said.  “Mom won’t, because she’s in a bit of denial about what it’s like there.  For the next few years, there’ll be drama, drinking, driving out to nearby towns or locations for something to do, more drinking, some drugs, and doing it like they’re trying to repopulate the species.  Find the good in there, and it’s a good enough distraction for the heaviest stuff.  Just make sure you come through it all with a net gain, and a minimum of long-term problems.”

“I’m not even really thinking about all of that.  There’s other, heavier stuff on my mind.”

“I think you should let yourself think about it.  It helps.  Really.  Some stuff only feels heavy because we get stuck out on our own, nothing to use as a measuring stick to figure out how big the problem in front of us is.  When we surround ourselves with people and experiences, it gets easier.  Get through the teen years, and you’ll find you have a bit more elbow room to do stuff that needs doing.”

Lucy looked out the window.  It was dark out.

“What if there’s heavy stuff now, that can’t wait?” she asked.

“Then call me.  Or talk to mom.”

“What if I can’t?” she asked.

“I think you’d be surprised at what we can handle.”

“But what if I really can’t, because sharing stuff would make everything worse?”  If bringing up the Choir and the Trail and a dead Beast could entangle them and pull them into all of this?

It was part of what nettled her about Avery getting involved with Pam like that.  Lucy had to be this careful, and Avery had let her guard down that much.

“I think,” Booker said.  He turned his head.  Alyssa was back, carrying a basket.  She seemed to drop it off and leave.  “If it comes down to what you were talking about… even if it’s a hard subject, like wondering about Paul, you can ask, and I can share my own thoughts, and we can work it out together.”

“What do you think happened, Lucy?” Booker asked.

“I think he’s racist.  He left us because his mom and sister pressured him, saying we weren’t his, we didn’t look like his.  I called him out on it, and he didn’t say no.  He couldn’t even let me have that certainty.”

It hurt, seeing the expression cross Booker’s face.  A reflection of emotions she’d felt, on a face she was fond of.

“Where did you get that idea?” Booker asked.

“Overheard stuff.  Bits of conversation with him and his family.  It’s the only thing that made sense to me.”

Booker nodded.  He rubbed at his forehead.  “Geez, sis.  How long have you been holding onto that one?”

“Since then.  Years.  Am I wrong?”

“No, baby sis.  No, you’re not.”

“But there’s nothing that-”

“I gotta admit, I haven’t really given this a lot of thought.  I try not to think about Paul, because it puts me in a bad mood after.  But I got fragments of ideas from some family members, people who kind of stayed friends with both Paul and mom for a while before they picked a side.  Enough I had a sense of it, even if I didn’t put it all together.  Yes.”

“Yes, you’re right.  Do you have any doubts?  Comments from aunts and uncles or friends that don’t line up with it?”

“I have doubts, yes… but nothing contradicts it.  It makes sense.  Paul’s face as I called him out on it was fitting if I was caught him dead in my sights, but-”

“No buts, Lucy.  That’s it.  Has to be.  Lines up too well.  There’s no way you can spend years trying to figure this out, I can spend years picking up on the little details, and both of us agree it fits perfectly, if it doesn’t fit.  Maybe there’s a bit more to it, like job stress or new house jitters, but… those things alone couldn’t be more than a small fraction of it.  His family was and is shitty, especially to us and to mom.  He didn’t stand up for her.”

Lucy’s eyes were moist.  Just hearing that… it was a bit like a deep-set, dark place inside her chest finally had a light shone in on it.  She wasn’t sure she loved what was there, but it was so much better than being in the dark.

She drew in a deep, shuddering breath, and that breath almost shook the moisture free from her eyes.

“Okay?” Booker asked.

Talking to him felt better than the therapy, which wasn’t all bad because it was a place to talk, at least, to vent.  She was pretty sure her therapist had gone off to have a stiff drink after dealing with her for two hours, but whatever.

“Okay,” she said.  “Thank you.  Then I guess all that’s left is to see if he takes something away from this, or if he’ll be a mama’s boy coward?”

“I guess.  Mama’s boy coward.  That’s a way to put it.  I’ll call again next week.  I really should be getting to work.  Alyssa’s in the doorway now, looking anxious.”

“Booker, um-” she jumped in.

“Hypothetically, if there were seven or eight people in a lot of trouble, like, lives on the line, and you were in a position to maybe save them, but it was dangerous, or dangerous for a friend…” she started, and she trailed off.

“What’s this about?”

“This doesn’t sound hypothetical.  I need more details before I can say anything.”

“Maybe nevermind, then,” she said.  She’d let her guard down.

“What’s this about.  Are you in trouble?”

“Can I cash in all the credit I have with you, and ask you to not ask questions about this?  Trust me?  I’m just trying to figure out what to do.”

“But- what do I do?  What do they do?”

“These eight people?”

“You go to the police.  Or another higher authority.  Teachers, if this is at school.”

“What if they don’t care, or they don’t recognize the problem?  What if I really am one of the only people who can handle this?  What if I’m the police in this dynamic?”

“This sounds like a lot.  I know when I was at your school, there were some kids dealing and they were sloppy about it.  If it’s something like that…” he trailed off, leading, pressuring her to say yes or fill in the gap.

“What would you do?” she asked.

“I would say that you should ask yourself, very hard, if me and mom and Aunt Heather and Barbie and Ran got the full story, would we hug you and be proud, or would we be upset with you?”

“Got me pretty worried now, Lucy.  Stay away from the dealers.”

“Okay then,” she said, trying to make it sound like she’d come to a decision.  “Thanks.  I don’t really have any interest in the drug stuff.  I want to help people who’re caught up in bad stuff.  It’s part of why I was out past curfew on Friday night.  Keeping an eye out, trying to figure some stuff out.”

“There have to be better people for that particular job.”

“There should be,” she said.  “I’ll try asking.”

“Okay,” he said.  “You should talk about this stuff with mom.”

Someone talked from off-screen.  Alyssa again.  Lucy couldn’t make out the words, but she could hear the tone.

“Gotta get ready for work.  I’ll check in soon.”

Lots of checking in.  She had five appointments with the therapist this week, and it was supposed to taper off to two a week for a month, then one a week for the next month.  Then they’d reassess.

Checking in with mom, to reassure.

Aunt Heather swinging back by their place after doing her work thing earlier today, checking that things were okay.

Booker hadn’t closed the video, and Lucy had a bit of a window into the life he was leading, as he got stuff together and got ready.

He returned to his desk to get the mug he’d barely touched, winked at her, then shut off the connection.

She couldn’t help but resent Alyssa for butting in once or twice, and for… it was hard to articulate.  For being there?  Or not being there more?

Booker was beautiful, in so many ways.  He was cool, to the point Lucy kind of defined ‘cool’ with him in mind.  He was thoughtful and kind and smart and resilient.

Paul had left a hole in their lives by walking out.  Booker had kind of left a hole, albeit a healthier one she was on better terms with, in her heart when he’d gone off to school.  Seeing Booker get sorted out and talk about bus fare and grabbing a jacket because the temperature was supposed to drop was… it was nice.  That he was living what seemed to be a good life, and that he didn’t seem to be miserable.

It was hard not to think of him struggling with homework at the dinner table, sitting with mom and Paul.  But he didn’t look like he was struggling now, and that was a balm for Lucy’s soul, which felt a bit like it had been dragged over the rocks in recent days.

With Alyssa she felt… not jealousy.  But almost, kind of offended?  Like… Booker was all that, and as nice as Alyssa seemed to be, Lucy kind of felt like Booker deserved everything.

Lucy had to fight the urge to pick apart what little she’d seen of the girl, identifying flaws, and leveling a judgment on her.  She would have to be careful, she decided.  Because Booker obviously liked Alyssa, and it would be so very easy to be a bitch to the girl.

Lucy got her things together.  The temperature was supposed to drop, but she wasn’t sure if it was there yet, or if it would get there.

Her mom was doing the dishes, while Aunt Heather lounged on the couch, in her mom’s spot.

“Brought your tablet back.  Going out.”

“It’s already pretty late.”

“A bunch of people will be there.  We’ll have a chaperone, kind of.  I kind of explained to Booker, and I think I’m not doing anything that would make you regret letting me go, if I could explain.”

“Teenager stuff?” her mom asked.

“Some teenagers.  A lot of kids.  Some people who are I don’t even know how old.”

“I could come, then?” her mom asked, drying her hands.

“It would be… massively inconvenient and weird if you did,” Lucy said.  “You’d be in the way.  It’d be a disaster, probably.”

Lucy made a pleading gesture.  “We made a deal.  I’m not grounded if I go to the therapy and stick to being my best self.  I had the session yesterday and one today, there’s more this week…”

“Going out at a late hour isn’t ‘not grounded’ territory.  Going out late is the kind of thing you get to do maybe if you haven’t been grounded and I can’t even imagine you doing something you’d get grounded for.”

“People are counting on me,” Lucy said, maintaining the pleading gesture.

“And you are counting on me to be a good mom.  I’m not sure being a good mom would involve letting you out at eight-thirty, with an insufficient answer about what you’re up to, and no firm promises that you’ll be back before curfew.”

I want to go, I want to help.  At the same time, I think more than anything, I’d be relieved if you grounded me and didn’t let me go.

I don’t want people to die.  But this is scary, and I’m not sure I’m one hundred percent okay after the first night with the Hungry Choir, or after hearing about the second.  Forty-nine body parts eaten by one person who shouldn’t have made it through the night.

“You’re keeping things very close to your chest, Lucy dear,” Aunt Heather said, her chin resting on the armrest of the couch.

“If I don’t go then Avery and Verona might, and they’ve promised to be better, but I’m still not one hundred percent sure they’d be as okay as if I was with them.  It’s a bit of a spiritual thing, and I don’t trust Verona to not get carried away, or Avery to not be a ditz.”

Her mom seemed on the fence.  “I’m not sure if I love the ‘spiritual’ part of that line of argument.”

“It’s good to explore that sort of thing, figure out what works for you,” Aunt Heather said.

“I’m kind of trying to,” Lucy said.  “Considering options.”

“Is this tied to the Wavy Tree dance studio?” Lucy’s mom asked.  “Yoga and… I don’t know?”

“Speaking as someone who has indulged in yoga and procrastinated on a new years resolution to be more consistent with it, I resent that implication,” Aunt Heather said, to Lucy’s mom.  To Lucy, she added, “I feel like I’m taking a small step toward my resolution, defending it.”

“There was actually something last Friday, where Melissa practically snapped her ankle off,” Lucy said.  “People were pretty shaken, I think.  Kind of why we lost track of everything.  We walked and talked and didn’t look at the time.”

“You did mention that,” Lucy’s mom said.  She made a face.  “I don’t know.”

“Booker was just suggesting I make some bonds.  He asked me, like, if you and he heard the full story, would you be proud or upset with me?  I don’t want to make you upset.  This isn’t that.  The Paul thing wasn’t something I wanted to repeat.  The break of curfew was a real accident.”

“There’s a chaperone?” her mom relented.

“Plan was that Verona’s bringing one.”

“And you’re not saying who.  Fine. You’ll stay in touch?  As much as you can?”

“It’s a school night.  If you’re out too late, you’re grounded.  You’ve got school in the morning, I know you have that big project to work on for your world politics class…”

Lucy nodded, with more vigor.  “Absolutely.”

“Go.  Be good.  Don’t make me regret this.”

Lucy hurried for the door before her mom could change her mind or Aunt Heather could say something that turned the situation sideways.

Verona was waiting outside with Avery as Lucy slipped out.  It was a bright evening outside, the kind of bright-dark that she might have associated with the sunset, except the hills and mountains to the west blocked any and all trace of pink and orange.  What light there was diffused across the night sky, making it an indigo blue with furrows of deeper, darker midnight blue running through it.

The temperature was similar.  Kennet was cooling off after a warm day, but the effect of the heat still lingered in the air, like she was in an area where a lot of people had been cooking on the barbecue, and the smell of meat had faded, but the smell of smoke hadn’t.

Verona carried a shoebox.  Avery carried a canvas grocery bag.

“All set?” Lucy asked.

“Is that the same as being set?” Verona asked.

“No,” Lucy said.  She was pretty sure Avery was on her wavelength.  She touched the shoebox.  “That’s more about being ready.”

She touched her own heart.  “This is where you figure out if you’re set.”

“I’m set,” Verona said.

Lucy was glad they didn’t ask her if she was the same.

“We should consult Miss.”

“Miss,” Verona called out.

“Miss,” Avery echoed.

Lucy paused, unsure if the Miss she’d finished a sentence with would count.  It apparently didn’t.  “Miss.”

Miss leaned against a fence that bisected a double-wide driveway so two neighbors could use it, her back to them, only her shoulder and hip really visible.  As the three of them walked up to her, she began walking.

“We were thinking of using the Forest Ribbon Trail tonight, to get to the Hungry Choir’s ritual.  If that doesn’t work, we were thinking about some other options.  We wanted some advice.”

“I brought a baby possum,” Verona said.  “Does that work for a prey animal?  It’s omnivorous.”

“If it’s virginal, it will suffice.  I’m afraid I don’t know what boon it would grant.”

“But it’ll grant one?” Avery asked.

“Yes.  Even if not virginal, it would, but the walk would be much greater.  Are you going tonight, Avery?”

“I was thinking of going myself,” Lucy said.  “Because I pushed for this.”

“Why not?” Lucy asked.

“Because I just spent the full day preparing myself?  Because I want to do this.  I want to help those people.”

“If I may,” Miss interjected.

Both Lucy and Avery looked at her, the three of them following behind Miss as they walked south.

“This is an initiation ritual for Finders, those who walk the Paths.  There are many benefits, but you should be aware your first big ritual that isn’t the Awakening will shape who and what you are as a practitioner.  Many spirits and forces are out there, waiting and poised to see you identify yourselves as one thing or another.  If you do the Finder ritual, Lucy, then you may find it hard to shake the guise of being a Finder.”

“What I did with Paul wasn’t defining?”

“Not nearly so much as something of this magnitude.”

“Please,” Avery said.  “I want to go places.  I want to do this.  I want this to be my thing.”

Lucy looked at Verona, who shrugged.

It made it easier to keep her mom’s faith, Lucy supposed.  If Avery thought she could handle it…

“We discussed it last night and earlier today,” Lucy told Miss.  “Can we walk you through it, raise a few questions?”

“There’s apparently a cabin in the woods that gets used in Winter, to store emergency stuff and give people walking the trails a place to hole up.  It shouldn’t be occupied.”

“Saw it a few years ago, while playing a mega game of capture the flag,” Avery said.  “I asked and they explained what it was.  It should still be there.”

“I’m aware of it.  It’s not occupied.  Yes, quite fine.”

“Cool.  The second question would be if this works timeline-wise.  One of us does the Forest Ribbon Trail.”

“Then there’s two options we’ve considered.  Does she finish, show up all hurt and everything, and then we run through the trail again using the woven object, right after?  The Trail grants a gift, and the woven object gives freer access through the Trail.  She can bring us?”

“That would be a task.  She could bring you, but she would be in dire shape.”

“Dire how?” Avery asked.

“Bleeding from nonspecific wounds, with no scars.  Insensate.  They would have to wrap you in ribbon again, while you were unwell, then carry you through.”

“And this situation, would I need to go to a hospital after?” Avery asked, a little more nervous.

“The hospital would find nothing explicitly wrong.  You’d recuperate in days, physically.”

“And mentally?” Verona asked.

“You would forget what you needed to forget, if you kept to the ritual.”

“That feels like a non-answer,” Avery said.

“I cannot share specifics.  Rest assured, if you keep to the terms of the ritual, you will be more or less fine in time.”

“Uh huh,” Avery said.

“Then option two, does she detour, which forbids future use of the trail, and can she find another way back?”

“Difficult to find her way back, but it remains an option.”

Verona said, “Lucy and I discussed blocking her connection to her mom long enough for her to get home.  I guess we’d be blocking Avery’s connection to her family.”

“The backlash would be notable, but you could navigate it, I’m sure.”

“Backlash like?” Avery asked.

“You could distribute it, so there is a high amount of attention over a long period of time, or dramatic, high-intensity attention for a brief period.  The latter would likely be forgotten very quickly, as innocence tends to shuck memories of the strange.”

“Then those are the two options we theorized about.  There’s some other questions, but… any ideas, Miss?” Lucy asked.  “You seem to know about this stuff.”

“There are possible ways forward that are simpler.”

They had reached the southwestern end of the town.  They continued into the woods.  Miss weaved through the trees with ease.  Lucy had to pick her footing.  Now that they were in foliage, pushing through pine needles and leafy branches, the lightness of the evening over Kennet wasn’t a thing.  It was darker, in the woods.

Lucy tried turning on her Sight to see if it helped with the view.  It didn’t, but she could See less branches on trees with watercolor staining on the trunks, and she couldn’t help feel like less branches were getting snagged on her clothes.

“What ways?” Avery asked.  “Simpler is good.”

“Simpler isn’t always good, but you’re right, it may be good here.  At the end of the Path, the Wolf waits.  You will find yourself talking to it.  If you do not step from the Path and take the detour, then you should negotiate with it.  Negotiate to be deposited at your destination, with everything you need, and postpone its time with you.  Tell it that it is to take you back here once you’ve run your errand.”

Avery looked at Verona, who nodded, then at Lucy, who did the same.

“This is spooky.  I’m not sure I would be doing this if it wasn’t for the Hungry Choir thing.”

“The benefits are subtle, but important.  This is a ritual for explorers, I thought it would suit you.  On completing the ritual, you will find more doors open to you, more paths, small ‘p’, and Paths, big ‘P’.  You will find lost things and Lost things, small and capital ‘L’, and the gift imparts power, often something meaningful of forgotten origin, or something original, of forgotten meaning.  Enough things have traveled specific courses to become important, that the courses were left behind, while the things have been lost by waysides.  This is one critical confluence of courses.”

“Still spooky,” Avery said.

The cabin looked lonely in the woods.  It wasn’t big, barely more than a shack, with two windows; one on the north side, and one inset in the door, cracked.

A bit smaller than my bedroom, Lucy thought, as she circled around it.  She looked for traps using her Sight, and saw a few fragments of blades, and a bit of darkness.

Verona’s eyes flashed purple, as she joined Lucy in walking a circuit around the little building.  It looked like a park ranger or someone had taken pains to keep the ground clear around the cabin, raking up pine needles and clearing up vegetation.  It stood alone with no trees within about fifteen feet.  A ring of stones marked a campfire, but an orange sign with a weighted base had been set in the middle, sitting at an angle, warning about fire risk.

Lucy waved her arm through some spiderwebs that stretched between the cabin and the trees.

“What do we do when we’re there?” Avery asked, standing a couple of feet ahead of Miss, who had stopped at the denser edge of the trees at the clearing’s edge.

“We were thinking, at the very least, we could counsel Reagan, observe, give her advice if it looks like it was actually impossible.  That’s fair and just, right?” Lucy asked.  “They don’t have enough eyes or depth perception to really win.  Reagan has no eyes left, six of the others have only one eye.  There should be a new contestant with two.  They were gouged, bled, they lost fingers, and a lot of them were already in rough shape.”

“It’s possible.  It wouldn’t be unjust, necessarily, but I don’t believe it would be just in the way that makes it easier to combat the choir.  I can’t say more, out of concern that I would be entangled.”

“What you said about justice, that’s like how goblins find it easier to hurt bad people?” Verona asked.

“Yes.  I should warn you, you would find yourself further entangled, going this course.”

“Like, absolutely, positively screwed entangled?” Avery asked.

“Far from absolutely.  Definitely not positive.  Screwed… hard to say.  Entangled?  Yes.  Most likely they would continue to be a nuisance, attempting to resist your involvement.  Being a referee is not the worst role you could take.”

Verona had stopped to talk to Miss.  Lucy continued to walk, not looking at the cabin or the clearing, but at the woods.  Avery approached the cabin, investigating the interior.

She stopped, staring at a collection of knives, razors, and fragments of steel in the branches.

As she did, her eyes adjusted to the gloom.

Multiple eyes stared back at her.

“What you said about the Omens, how looking at them can bring them closer?  Looking with any type of Sight or Seeing runs the risk of someone seeing you back?”

“I think so.  Or someone related to her.”

The leaves and branches rustled behind Lucy.  Miss walked up to the edge of the clearing nearest Lucy.

“What happened with Guilherme and her?”

“He caught her in the woods north of the city.  They talked, and I listened in.”

“That he would let her go if she forgot the particulars.  She eventually agreed.  He then said that if she returned, he would be a gracious host and give her what she came for.  If it was wrath in her heart, he would give her violence.  If it was greed, then he would give her what she coveted.  If it was envy, he would give her lessons and raise her up, so she had no desire to take what others had.  And so on.  She’s a knowledgeable enough practitioner to know he would follow through, and what that might mean, coming from a Faerie.”

“Kind of making me reflect even more on the gifts,” Verona said, as she walked up to where Lucy was, peering into the trees.

“She was told the same went for her family, or anyone else who came at her behest.  All they had to do was enter Kennet.  Most importantly, he communicated that our business here is being seen to by practitioners.”

“What happens next?” Lucy asked.

“She left.  She remembered enough to know she has to keep out of Kennet, and keep her eyes and spies out of the area.  Now she watches without crossing the town’s boundaries.”

“We’re outside the town?” Lucy asked.

“We’re in designated parkland.  It’s not part of Kennet in anything more than spirit.”

“To brave Faerie, she must either have a mandate, or be intensely curious.  For someone who specializes in ways of Seeing, a strong sense of curiosity makes sense.”

Or an Other in Kennet tipped her off, to provide cover for the moving of the Carmine Beast’s body, Lucy thought.

She wouldn’t bring that up here and now, when the woman best suited to let a pesky practitioner slip through and cause a fuss was right here.  Miss distracted and deterred other practitioners from getting close.  It wouldn’t be hard to let one through.

It didn’t even have to be malicious.  Verona had relayed what the goblins had talked about.  If a goblin could be corrupted or co-opted and made to attack a practitioner’s child, Miss could be directed to mess things up here.

“Is there a good way to capitalize on that ‘looking back’ thing?” Lucy asked, her arms folded.

“If it were any of the other Ontario or Manitoba practitioner families, I would encourage you to.  The Belangers would have safeguards and protections.  It’s their stock and trade, after all.

The eyes peered through the gloom, sitting amidst blades of varying size and quality.

“These torn connections,” Avery said, kneeling down in the dirt.  She dragged a finger through the dirt and picked something up.  “Did you walk through a spiderweb?”

“I did,” Lucy said, alarmed.  “Why?”

“It’s tied to that, over there.”

“Aha,” Verona said, sounding excited.  “Like a motion detector light that goes on when you walk through its area.  It allows more surveillance without so much power cost.”

Lucy advanced a few steps, raising a hand.  “Hello!”

One occupant of the branch flapped wings.

As she got closer, she could make it out.  A crow, with its skull cracked open, a bit of skull still showing.  A human eye had been set in the side of its head, and it roved around, looking.

There was a spider about half the size of Lucy’s head, dangling from a branch.  The chitinous exoskeleton had similarly been cracked open at the abdomen, an eyeball set within.  A squirrel had its mouth stretched open, bearing an eyeball, its little furry arms and tail limp.

All in all, maybe eight eyes set into various zombie critters.

“Can you hear me?” Lucy asked.

The crow bobbed its head in an up-down motion.

“I know being friends might be too much to ask, but are you willing to cooperate with us?  Mutual benefit.  We’d be open to trade, to exchange favors, or just talk.”

None of the animals moved.

“We have no interest in interfering with your business if you have no interest in interfering with Kennet.  Things are in the process of being sorted out here.  Let us finish sorting this out, and equilibrium should be restored.  We have little interest in being your competition.”

The animals remained still.

“Be careful,” Miss murmured.

Lucy looked around.  There were more swords than before.  A shadow of crimson watercolor spread from the tree with the eyeball animal zombies toward her.

“What is that?” Lucy asked, backing away a few steps.

Miss answered, “You can’t see it from here with your Sight as it is, but omens gather.  He or she is looking from a few angles and ways, to try to find a way to deal with you.  Once they find it, it will be hard to shake the outcome.”

“Good to know,” Avery said, from the treeline.  “Back up?”

Lucy retreated a bit more as the blades and staining advanced, reaching out to either side of her, as if to surround her and swallow her up.

“Are you okay showing yourself, Miss?” Verona asked.  “You said you wanted to avoid giving them information about you.”

“They don’t have an angle to see me, and they won’t get one,” Miss said.

“Sending omens like this led to innocents getting hurt,” Lucy said, raising her voice for the Belanger practitioner’s benefit.  Melissa and Melissa’s ankle.  “This area is under our protection, and the intrusion the other night caused several problems, while upsetting the local systems and balances. This marks a second offense, in our area.  Stand down, disable your surveillance, and we can establish a loose working relationship where both sides benefit!”

“Belangers are stubborn,” Miss said.  “If this is an apprentice, she’ll be a Belanger as well, as a formality, and she’ll have some of that stubbornness.  It may be a trait of Augurs; seeing the future can tie an individual to a conclusion, and makes them very used to being unwavering.”

“We want to help people!” Lucy raised her voice.  “Help us, or leave us alone!”

Slowly, the ordinary crow with a very unordinary human eye shook its head, the eye disappearing from view as the beak swept toward Lucy’s right, black beak and feathers disappearing in the backdrop of gloom.

Veronoa reached for Lucy’s arm, and pulled her.

Lucy retreated from the woods, leaving the observing animals behind.  The stain and swords chased her out of the woods, and stopped at the clearing’s edge.

“Do they do anything altruistic?  Is there any chance they’d tackle the Hungry Choir on their own?” Lucy asked.

“It’s not likely.  They trade in information.  I have trouble thinking of a worse practitioner family to take any interest in Kennet.  For our sake, and in terms of personality.”

“What’s her long term plan?” Verona asked.  “What does she get here?”

“She might imagine you’re some novices who’ve cornered a share of the market, or she might be following the growing damage that relates to the Carmine Beast’s absence, tracing it to the epicenter.”

Standing between Verona and Avery, Lucy looked through the gloom.  The animals were spreading out a bit, peering through the branches and looking at the clearing.

Verona began drawing out symbols and runes around the roughly circular clearing.  Darkness, in an eye shape.

Squawking, the crow flew through the trees, turning a hard right.  Dust was disturbed, and the rune was distorted, dirt settling into a shape that didn’t resemble a darkness rune or eye.

Other animals around them made noise.

“Back off!” Lucy raised her voice.  “Seriously!  I’ve tried to be nice, here!”

For my mom, I said I’d reach out to a higher authority, and see if they’d handle or help with this whole situation with the Choir.  I tried.

“Verona?” Lucy asked, quiet.

“It’s technically Avery’s.  I used her share.”

“Go ahead,” Avery said.  “Maybe don’t use a lot.  It would be nice to have some in the Trail.”

“Stay here, don’t do anything yet,” Miss said.

Lucy turned her head, but Miss was gone.

“You’ve got the thorn in the flesh?” Verona whispered.

They’d shared the goblin gifts.  Verona had the glamour disruption stuff, Avery had the lockpick that destroyed locks, and Lucy had the thorn, wrapped up and stowed in her bag.

“I packed it.  I don’t want to be that blunt, though,” Lucy whispered back.  “If we’re going to the magic school, we may have to deal with her or her family.  If we go too aggressive when the worst she’s done is be partially responsible for Melissa and mess up a lot of ghosts, then she might be justified in coming after us or doing something.”

“And justification makes it easier to do stuff,” Verona said.  “Sure.”

They remained where they were, standing in the dark, their eyes painted in strange colors.

Miss spoke from the trees just to her right.  “Lucy, if you’d put out your hand?  I’d appreciate it if you averted your gaze.”

“You sure ask for a lot of trust while justifying relatively little,” Lucy said.

“Please.  It makes it easier, especially while the Augur is trying to see.”

Lucy put her hand out to the side, palm up.

“I brought some for you as well, Avery.  From Guilherme.  To help you on your trip down the Trail.  He’s going to check to see if our practitioner needs more discouragement.  Alpeana is on her way here.  She’s taking a short break from her nightly rounds.”

“Cool,” Avery said.  “I don’t suppose she could help?”

“She would not be able to come with you, no.  You will have your boon companion, assuming it is healthy.”

Verona cracked the box open and nodded.

“If Alpeana was my familiar, would she be able to come?” Avery asked.

“Yes.  Familiar and practitioner are tied to one another.  I would not make that decision so rashly tonight, for that small amount of assistance and company.”

“This is scary,” Avery said.

Avery had been very quiet tonight.  It tended to happen when she was spooked.  She withdrew.

“You’ll have the companion.  If anything bad happens, you can use this little guy,” Verona said.  “You could try any number of times, pulling the quote-ripcord-unquote, any time things got to where you couldn’t continue.”

“This is what makes the ritual very good for beginners,” Miss said.

“I don’t want to do that to him if I can help it, though, and I feel like even succeeding is scary in its own way.  Either the Wolf does something, or I have to run for it along a so-called ‘detour’.”

While they discussed, Lucy worked with the dust in her hand.  She ended up pulling out her wallet, pulling out her bank card, that she’d been given to open a beginner savings account, and then used the card to flatten out the surface.  She used the corner of the card to draw curves and lines.

Verona saw and took over.

“Nettlewisp, nettlewisp, nettlewisp,” Lucy whispered.  She looked at Miss, who wasn’t complaining or stopping her.  “I’ve tried being nice, I’ve tried being fair.  I’ve tried being even and I’ve tried being clear.  If that spying practitioner from outside Kennet keeps giving us the evil eye, staring at us with…”

“Ill intent,” Verona supplied.

“Ill intent and promised omens, repay them three times over in stings and pain.  And if it’s Just, if the karmic way is clear, and if the glamour heaped in my hand is enough?  Nail their friggin’ eyelids to their skull.”

The glamour twisted and shifted, gathering in her palm.  It condensed into a shape like a small flower, surrounded by twists of bristling leaves.  It looked like it was made partially of glass.

“The Faerie would call that crude,” Miss said.

“Is it a problem?” Lucy asked.

“No.  An interesting blend of Faerie magic and Goblin intent.”

“Did she hear or see?  I wouldn’t mind if she got the warning.”

“She can’t hear, and she can’t see much.  I’m cognizant,” Miss said.

“Please leave!” Avery called out into the woods.  “We’d like some privacy!  We’re taking measures!”

The animal sounds were mocking and chaotic.

“She’s not like, a really talented eight year old, right?” Avery asked.  “We’re not making plans or sending monsters after a kid who got awoken early?”

“If it is Nicolette Belanger, she’s older than you three by several years.  If it was someone younger, they wouldn’t have the talent to use these kinds of Seeings, or that kind of Ominous Eye.”

Lucy investigated the bristling flower.  It felt tense, like a coiled spring, but the spring was trapped in an arrangement of dust that just so happened to interlock and keep it in a singular shape.  It was heavy, and as Verona’s notes had suggested, it was stubborn, occupying much of her hand.  If Nicolette or whatever Augur was observing them didn’t chill out, would it be stuck like this until triggered?  Glamour washed away with water, but there was a chance this thing would backfire if it didn’t get the target she’d asked for.

Would such a backfire include nailing her eyelids to her skull?

Well, that would be the price of doing this.  Sending a monster after the practitioner hadn’t been enough.  Guilherme hadn’t been enough.  Doing this, at least, would hurt or ruin the zombie animals.

Then, depending on what happened next, they could maybe use the thorn to drive the point home.  Stick your nose in, and refuse to deal?  Lose your summonings, lose your seeing-eye forest creatures.

“Since she can’t hear, I wanted to say I really do think Alpeana would be my style,” Verona said.  “Dark?  Yeah.  Nighttime?  My favorite time.  Creepy nightmare stuff?  Heck yeah.  If I’m going to tap into any juice as a practitioner, I kinda like that stuff.”

“I think personality matters more when it comes to picking familiars, Verona,” Avery said, testy.  “It’s not just about the powers.”

“But the nature of the Other influences the personality, right Miss?”

“I think you’re interpreting the best of ‘Alpy’ the way you want to,” Verona said.

“That’s not a rebuttal,” Avery said.  “If it’s about the nature of the Other, who’s the person who chickened out when it came to giving her dad a nightmare?”

Using a stick, wincing as the end of the stick pressed against her hand, where she’d cut herself earlier in the week, Lucy began to draw the blinding runes.

The animals reacted.  They had some natural ability to disturb these things, or that ability was being communicated through them as a medium.  The squirrel with an eye in its mouth, its original eyes carved out, darted down, close to the ground, and the crow took to the air.

The swords and stain approached Lucy.  This time, she didn’t back down.  The vines of the glamour slithered around her hand, the flower becoming like a ring on her hand.

“Don’t.  Back off,” she said.

The crow with the human eye embedded in its skull dove, entering the clearing, and Lucy was reminded of the Omen diving toward Melissa.  Swords rose from the dirt, point-first, and stain swelled all around her

There was a sound like a stick being swished through the air, closer to a gunshot from a silencer than a shotgun blast.

The crow hit the ground.  The squirrel tumbled, a goat’s eyeball spilling from its mouth.  The spider swung like a pendulum from a web-strand, legs curling up.  A thousand leaves and small twigs fell in a rain.  The swords around Lucy collapsed, scattering, rustier each time they flipped over, until they dissolved into more stain.

Lucy shook the residual dust from her hand.  Slivers like glass tumbled from the folds.  No harm done to her.

“You’re liable to keep losing toys and tools if you keep this up,” Lucy murmured, looking down at the crow.  It had gone still.  This close-up, with the light of the sky reaching down into the clearing, it was evident it had been dead a long time.  White at the edge of the feathers, like the crust of saltwater or soap scum.  It smelled moldy.

“Two decisive victories,” Miss said.  “The third will matter.”

“Was I wrong to respond?” Lucy asked.

“Not at all.  Just be aware.  They certainly are.”

They did another check of the area, then moved indoors, and Avery used the goblin lockpick to get the door latch and lock open.  They’d each brought flashlights and Verona had some candles, and they broke them out, setting flashlight down on the floor so they shone up.  Candles did a lot to light up the cabin in a more ambient way, but the effect of the flashlights did make the lines of their faces and the shadows of the little cabin more stark.

It meant a lot to Lucy that Verona was putting in the extra attention and care, bringing the candles.

It meant a little less, when Verona and Avery kept up the discussion about Alpeana in the background, as the heavy moment from the nettlewisp’s response faded from recent memory.

“Would you guys chill out and focus?” she snapped.

“Focusing!” Avery said, crisp and responsive.

The cabin had some basic furniture, not all that different from Booker’s dorm room.  Desk, bookshelf, bed.  No bathroom, though.

They rearranged a bit of furniture, then broke out the ribbon Avery had brought.

Avery and Lucy worked together to reel it out and wind it around, passing it to one another to get it around table legs and bring it around to Verona, who was lifting the critter out of the box.

It wasn’t a baby, but it remained small.  Lucy tried to be gentle as she wrapped its limbs, then continued holding it as Verona and Avery handled more of the ribbon, bringing it to the curtain rod, down to the side of the bookshelf then back around to the possum baby.  Lucy held it cupped in two hands, two limbs bound, and it seemed strangely okay with the treatment.

The ribbon encircled its middle, forming the first part of the general hammock shape.

They talked in quiet voices throughout.

“I can use my practice?” Avery asked Miss, who stood outside the door, which was ajar.

“I can bring things?”

“I’ll need the gross eyeball necklace if we’re going to try giving that to them.”

“We’ll give it to you last minute,” Lucy said, “Before you wrap the last part yourself.”

“Good, that’s good.”

They took care to bind the possum’s last leg, its tail, and then its eyes.  Belly up, in a cradle of ribbons, it was suspended near the center of the room.

“I was thinking I’d make it an old wolf, so I can run more easily, if I need to run,” Avery said, as they spliced two pieces of identical ribbon together.

“Older may be wiser,” Miss said.

“Uh huh.  Can we get a verdict on this splicing of the ribbon?  Is this okay?”

“That will be fine.  There may be a bump in the path as a consequence.  Don’t trip.”

“Okay.  I’m pretty good at keeping my feet under me.  I just figured it was better to have more ribbon to wrap myself in, than to keep to one ribbon and not have enough.”

“Trust your instincts.”

Verona drew the circle beneath the possum, filling it in so it was, ironically, ’empty’.  Avery took over, penning the message around the circle border.

“Lengthen that word, or you’ll have to stretch later ones.”

“It’s a long bit of message,” Avery said.

“It is, but I think you want to be at the halfway point by the time you get to ‘and’.”

“Look at ye all,” Alpeana said, from the shadows at the door.  “Prepared fer a right war, are ye?”

“Prepared for something, hopefully,” Lucy said.

“Where’re ye off ta, then?”

“I think to pay the Choir’s crowd a visit, and see if we can’t give them the necklace,” Avery said.  “That’s the plan, right?”

“Yes,” Lucy said.  “Before the ritual starts.  They’re allowed to bring preparations, and it’s a gift they earned by being helpful to us.  I think it’s fair.  The entanglement shouldn’t be so bad, and if it works, it’ll give Reagan a fighting chance.”

“Aye.  Ye’re right out of yer minds, the lot of ye.  Goin’ alone, lassie?”

“Yes,” Avery said.  She looked at the others.  “I think so.  Going to ask the wolf to drop me off on the far side.  If I make the detour, I think I can appear where I want to, as well.”

“If ye want, I can be at tha other end when ye appear.”

“That would be very nice of you, Alpeana.  It’d mean a lot to know I had a friend waiting for me on the other side.  I might be in bad shape.”

“Aye.  I cannae get involved, meself, but I can see ta yer well bein’, at tha very least.”

“Thank you,” Avery said.

“I should be at me rounds so I’m free ta go on a trip.  I’ll see ye tonight, all goin’ well, aye?”

“Bye,” Verona said.  “Wish us luck.”

“Luck ta ye three.  I’m hopin’ ye ain’t needin’ it.”

“So am I,” Lucy said.

“I should go as well,” Miss said.  “I can’t be too close to this ritual.  Any questions before I go?”

“I did have one, kind of,” Avery said.  “I’m wondering if I should ask.”

“You did say you had a tight timeline, to run this errand.  I wouldn’t waste time deciding.”

“Are you-” Avery started.  “Are you Lost, Miss?”

Lucy and Verona turned to look at the slice of the woman, visible at the door’s edge.

“That’s why you know about the Trail?”

“Were you there, once?  Were you a Wolf?”

“No,” Miss said.  “I was by the wayside.  A memory without anyone to have it, or a person forgotten even by the Abyss, or an echo forgotten even by the Ruins.  I waited by a place called the Stairwell Web.  Someone made a wrong turn, they panicked, they ran, and for a moment, neither of their feet touched a stair.  I put my foot down before they did.  I took their place, they took mine.  I walked the various Paths for a long time before I made my way to this world.  I was trapped for a long time in the Yellow Flower Spiral, and I walked the Forest Ribbon Trail by instinct alone.”

“You said it might matter if my guess was right and timely.”

“If I run into trouble, do you think you could back me up?”

“If you run into that much trouble, that you need me, I don’t know what I could do.”

“The universe has no place for me, even in people’s sight or Sight.  It contrives to find a station for me, in a similar way to how I had a station at the Stairwell Web, and the most likely place is as part of a ritual or great practice.”

“You’re finally trusting us a bit?” Lucy asked.  “Telling us this.”

“You’re starting to prove yourselves worthy of trust, standing with us against enemies.  Good luck, Avery Kelly.”

“I hope I don’t need it,” Avery said.

Alpeana and Miss left.  It was just the three of them.

Avery finished the script, and knelt in the circle Verona had filled in.  Lucy managed ribbons, keeping everything taut, and making sure the little possum didn’t come loose or fall.

Lucy passed Avery the ribbon, and Avery wrapped her feet, then her ankles.  Lucy helped her get the ribbon to her throat, where they took three tries to find an arrangement that wouldn’t choke or interfere with the necklace of eyes.  The ribbon went to Avery’s ponytail, then encircled her eyes enough times to blind.  She wrapped her hands as best as she could, Verona and Lucy offering quiet counsel and tips.

Avery took the end of the ribbon in her teeth, then spoke through clenched teeth, “Hey, addled old wolf, bring me to the Forest Ribbon Trail, so you might eat me.”

She jerked at the ribbon, hauling it tight at her hands, and all throughout the room, floorboards ripped up, revealing more ribbon.  Furniture slid, ribbon unspooling behind, logs pulled inward from the walls, and everything closed in around her, as she was hauled up off the ground.

Lucy and Verona scrambled back as everything moved into place, clustering into a barrier that blocked the view of the circle at the center of the room.  Ruined floorboards and shifted walls made a warding barrier of splintered wood that warded off approach.  Even without that splintered wood, there was a moat, almost, of dark gaps in the floor that Lucy in no way trusted her feet to.

Verona whistled, long and loud.

Lucy backed up, head and ankles nearly catching on some stray ribbons, and surveyed the situation.

What was inside the room didn’t line up with the neat and simple exterior.

Venturing back inside, she found a seat in one corner.  Verona settled in the other corner, unpacking notebooks.

Lucy couldn’t distract herself like that.  Booker had recommended distractions but… some feelings were too hard to put down.  Even when she could put them down, like when she’d thought Aunt Heather had laughed at her, just the memory of the bad feeling stuck.  Like a sliver of the hurt was still there, unfounded as it was.  Like the Paul situation could be resolved, but the resentment that she’d felt that way for so long might be there for years.

She had a bad feeling now, about this, and no idea what to do about it.