Author: Wildbow

Crossed with Silver – 19.11 | Pale

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“Imagine the cred!” Tatty proclaimed.  She’d taken some finger traps in Christmassy colors and strung her noodle-boobs through them, red ones for the left, green for the right.  The arrangement looked stiff, and she moved with the grace of a very excited four year old with her upper body, upper legs and lower legs each in individual cardboard boxes.  She scrambled over snowbanks and pushed snow out of the way to keep up, moving on all fours until she could find a position to start moving on feet alone, at which point she would often lose balance and slip and fall.  She found a fencepost ahead of Verona to stand on, putting her little hands in the air.  “The cred!”

Peckersnot, perched on Verona’s shoulder, head pointed down, fingers and feet gripping her, nodded with enthusiasm.

The position he was in aimed his rear end at Verona, so she poked one butt cheek to turn him to one side.  “Peck.  Do I need to go over this again?  Goblin butts have the same rules as guns.  Always considered loaded-”

Peckersnot turned around, looking up at her, miming, his little clawed fingertips moving into a gun shape as he followed along with the rules.  He opened his beaked mouth and gave her an awed expression as he pointed to the gun shape, which was pointed off to the side, at the same time his rear end pointed the opposite way.  He shifted position, each hand in a gun shape, claw-tips forming an ‘x’.  He did one ‘x’ in front of him and one at his behind.

“-and yep.  Do not point them at anything you don’t wish to destroy, double check your target and surroundings before using-”

He held his hands, switching rapidly from a gun shape to tucking the thumbs in and having two fingers extended.

“-Make sure there’re no obstructions-”

Peckersnot made a cork popping sound.

“-and those who are loudest about theirs need to go the heck away before making their asshole noises.”

Tatty leaped from the fence post onto Verona’s coat sleeve.  “Cred!”

“Get off!  You don’t have riding privileges.”

“Pecker!  This is how small goblins get big!  We have to build a legend!  Do things that they tell stories about!  The blue angel Blue Angels!  The tiger thing!”

Peckersnot, Tatty, and Verona all did the gesture, to commemorate the dead.  Forehead, bellybutton, nip, nip, groin.

“People still talk about stuff other goblins did!  Through stories, we become immoral!  And this one’s easy!”

“I wouldn’t say that,” Verona added.

“So easy!” Tatty screeched, evading Verona’s reaching hand.  “All we have to do is try an’ we’re legends!  Legends!”

Peckersnot nodded more vigorously.

“Price’s helicopter jump!  Humans talk about it!  It’s on messed up internet sites!  Drunk rando jumps through helicopter blades!

Tatty tried to climb up Verona, scaling her bag, but the additions to her boob-noodle weave dress made her clumsier.  Verona was able to grab her by one foot, dangling her.

“He failed but the fact he even tried!?” Tatty screeched, hanging upside down.  “Legend!  And we can do that!  Easily!”

Verona moved to put Tatty down, and Peckersnot scrambled around to her other shoulder, looking down, excited.  He made sounds like a small tone-deaf bird might.

“Again,” Verona said.  “I wouldn’t call that easy.”

“Trying is easy!  It’s the stuff that comes after that’s hard!  Some of us might even live!”

“Just to be clear, you want to pester one of them?” Verona asked, pointing at one of the Wild Hunt Fae that was perched on a high branch above the Arena.

Her hand twinged as she pointed.  She rubbed it through the fingerless glove she wore inside her glove that acted as a partial brace.

“Yas!  Not just pester, humiliate!  Then we scatter!  Glory to all, more glory to the survivors!”

“You probably wouldn’t survive, wearing this getup,” Verona said, flicking a finger-trap from Tatty’s dress.  “Slowest to move?”

“I lead from the back!”

“Hold off for now, okay?  Or keep that in the back pocket until you’ve developed skills and trained, and figured out how dangerous these guys are, then reconsider?”

“We must strike out while the bell is hot!”

“You’re going to get my friend Peckersnot killed.”

“We can annoy an immoral!  One who will remember our deeds for months!  Lots of months!  Forever months!”

Peckersnot tapped Verona’s cheek, pointed, then nodded.

“If you all die trying this, which you almost certainly will, then there’s nobody to carry on the story, the story dies, the Faerie you humiliate gets to go off and clean up or whatever, and pretends nothing happens.”

“You pass on the story!” Tatty proclaimed.

“No.  For a lot of reasons, the first being I really don’t want to encourage this and get my friend killed, no.”

“We gotta tell more people!” Tatty said, twisting around to try to face Peckersnot as she dangled.  “And we have to work out what we’re going to do, so they can tell people what happened!”

“Tatty, very seriously, I am telling you to chill the fuck out,” Verona said.

“No!  For a lotta reasons, no!  The first being I don’t wanna!”

Verona flung Tatty into someone’s backyard.  The three foot deep snow cushioned the impact.

“Wait.  Don’t go!” Tatty screeched.  She floundered, her stiff ‘dress’ obstructing her ability to get up.

“You and I should chat,” Verona told Peckersnot.  “Ideally without that going on.”

Peckersnot nodded.

Verona walked fast so Tatty couldn’t catch up.

It was a full day after Lucy had been attacked.  Already, it was getting tricky to move everyone in squads and groups and have protection every step of the way.  Verona was sticking to Kennet below, but she felt nervous that a Fae could swoop in and come after her.

Which was probably what they wanted.

She exhaled in relief when she reached the House on Half Street.  Not complete relief- the space between the trees and the house itself were hers, but it was a fuzzier claim than four exterior walls.

Lucy was inside.

“Verona,” the voice came, strained, choked, and faint.

Verona turned.

Tatty was catching up.  Somehow, despite barely being able to move through the snow.

“Let.  Me.  In,” Tatty gasped, flopping over, crawling a bit, then pushing herself into some staggering steps.  “Gotta.  Plan.”

“You lost your House on Half Street privileges, Tatty,” Verona told her.  “Same way you lost your riding-on-Verona privileges.”

“Is.  Important!”

Verona put her hand on her hip, looking down at the goblin.

“Gotta plan,” Tatty managed, as she reached the bottom stair.  “It’s gonna be so cool.”

“You’re not listening to me, and you’re liable to get my very cool goblin friend killed.  If you want inside, you need to be good.  I don’t want you pulling anything like what you did the other time.”

“But-”

Verona shot Tatty a look.

“Okay.”

Verona made Tatty climb up the stairs herself, pausing only to hold the door open, using her control over the Demesne to keep the draft from coming in.  “Lucy!”

“Heard you come in!  Coming down in a min!”

“And now that we’re away from prying ears-” Verona started, turning to Tatty.

“We can plan it!”

“No.  But I don’t need to self-censor.  This is a moronic idea.”

“But imagine!” Tatty shouted, following behind Verona as Verona went to the kitchen, dropping her bag and pushing it with her foot so it would slide over to the dining room.  “Imagine we do something so horrible, so amazing, it makes them all go away in shame?”

“I think they’re more likely to burn Kennet to the ground… or freeze it to the ground, I dunno.  Cover their tracks, protect their reputation.”

“That would be so cool!  Imagine-”

“-if we messed with them so bad they destroyed a town.”

“Our town.  Which everyone present has sworn to protect and uphold standards for.”

“But imagine!”

“You said you’d listen.”

Tatty huffed.  “But-”

“And this is my turf.”

Tatty deflated.  “Yah.”

That worked.  Verona set about getting snacks, setting some aside for Peckersnot.  She bent down to give some chocolate to Tatty, then drew it back before Tatty could grab it.  “Seriously.  No manure, no honey, no pranks, you respect the turf.”

“Respectin’ the turf starting now!” Tatty proclaimed, reaching hands overhead.

Verona gave her the chocolate.  “And I want you to protect your goblins.  Especially the one I named.  If you were going to go after the Wild Hunt, which you shouldn’t-”

Tatty’s beady black eyes, above a mouthful of chocolate she was pushing in with both hands, managed to look far from innocent.

“-it should be a coordinated effort with the rest of Kennet, with council permission.  And you need to loop me, Lucy, and possibly Avery in.”

“But that’s hard!”

Lucy came down the stairs.  She was still wearing pyjama pants, along with an oversized sweatshirt.  Verona hadn’t been sure if she was changing, using the toilet, or doing her hair, and wasn’t going to use her Demesne sense to pry with Lucy any more than she would with McCauleigh or any other guest, but it looked like it had been a post-nap hair thing.

“What’s going on?”

“Tatty wants to pull her classic tiger or cat lady ploy with the Wild Hunt.”

“Don’t,” Lucy said.  She thought about it for a moment.  “Actually… definitely don’t.”

Tatty sighed, long and loud.

“I thought you had exams,” Verona noted.  “You seem chill for an exam day.”

“I did the one, first thing,” Lucy replied.  “Bunch of parents complained about things with holiday plans and everything, and Mr. Sitton was lazy, I think, so he’s going to take our marks as they are.  Sucks for anyone hoping to rescue a bad mark.”

“Would’ve been me, I think,” Verona said.

“Maybe they’ll allow some options for people like that.  Sucks all around.”

Verona nodded, rubbing at her hand.  “Chocolate?”

Lucy reached out, then stopped.  “Is this that bitter chocolate?”

Verona nodded.

Lucy went for the pepperoni instead.  “It’s okay I came over?  I kind of didn’t want to deal with my mom, and I didn’t sleep that hot at the hospital, so I napped.”

“For sure!  Yeah.  You have access.  It’s our Demesne, kind of, until you and Ave get your own, if you do.”

“Felt kind of weird, when I’d come by to grab the notes on spells or extra notecards for spell cards, and it’d be like, awkward chat time with McCauleigh, or Mal here in the kitchen looking like I flicked the lights on in the garage and there’s a raccoon with a mouthful of trash, cheeks bulging out, making a mess of things.”

Verona growled her frustration.  “I rescinded her open invitation a while back, she gets in on a contingency basis.  Like this creature.”

Verona toed at Tatty with the tip of her boot.  Tatty bit into the sole.

“Quieter,” Lucy said.

“Bit lonely,” Verona said, looking around.  “Pigeon and squirrel come and go, they’ve got the side shed.  Luna will drop in sometimes to help with the bookstore, but I think she came in wanting to help a few times and then I was busy, so she left, and now she’s waiting to be invited for a day with more free time to do stuff.  McCauleigh’s gone, Mal’s doing her thing.”

Lucy nodded.

“Glad you’re here,” Verona said.

Lucy came over and put her arm around Verona, slumping down a fair bit with her back against the counter to lean her head on Verona’s shoulder.

Which was nice.  Sad-nice.  Except then Verona looked down and saw Tatty looking up at her, with a very pointed nose, lipless mouth with skin growing over triangular teeth, beady black eyes, wild hair and her boob dress in Christmas colors.

Verona reached for some chocolate, then tossed it underhand into the dining room.  It went under a cabinet.  “Shoo, Tatty.  Give us a bit.  We’ll talk soon.”

Tatty scrambled off, reaching under the cabinet to fish for the bit of chocolate.  Verona had the doors to the kitchen swing closed.

“You okay?” Verona asked Lucy, the two of them next to one another, fridge humming a little too loudly, because it was a shitty, shitty fridge.

“You don’t like whining,” Lucy mumbled.

“Whine,” Verona told her.  “Or whatever.  I can take it.  I want to take it.  Dish.  Tell me what’s going on, or what’s gone on, or what’s going to-”

“Okay,” Lucy said.

Verona nodded.

A few seconds passed, Lucy there with her head on Verona’s shoulder, in an awkward way because she was a fair bit taller.

“How are you?” Verona asked, again, because it felt like Lucy wouldn’t say anything without a prompt.

“Really fucked up, actually,” Lucy murmured.

“Your arm?”

“It’s supposedly going to be fine.  Cut deep enough to almost fucking exsanguinate me, but no nerves, they think.”

Verona rubbed at her hand.

“Other stuff’s got me fucked up,” Lucy murmured.  “I’m not good at this.”

“What part of this?”

“This… shitty, fucking- fucking awful, unstoppable, too-big-to-fight shit.  I think, uh-”

She paused.

Verona’s instinct was to fill in answers, but she let Lucy find the words.

Lucy continued, “-when Miss came to us, you know, mysterious woman whose face we couldn’t see?  And it wasn’t quite automatically supernatural, but it was close?  And she told us to hang with Avery?  Then started talking about the practice, in general?”

“I remember.”

“Feels so long ago.  But it hasn’t even been a year.  When she started talking about possibilities, and what we’d be able to do, I think we each… we came up with these ideas of what we’d be doing, a bit fantastical, naive, but like… Avery wanted to travel.  She heard about Other realms, right?”

“And she remembered Ms. Hardy talking about places she’d been to around the world, and she knew she wanted to do that.”

“Yeah.  I thought you wanted to approach magic like you’d approached art.  Except it’d be out of your dad’s reach.  He couldn’t ruin it, you know?  And I knew you’d be good at it.”

“Thank you.”

“But that wasn’t exactly right?”

“I mean, it’s exactly right.  But I wanted something else in the background.”

“Yeah.  Maybe we all did.  Maybe in the background, Avery wanted to fill a hole in her heart.  You wanted to escape…”

“Humanity.  Escape humanity.”

“And I wanted to be strong,” Lucy whispered, voice quieter now.  “So I didn’t have to be scared.  So I could hold onto…”

Lucy didn’t say more for a second.

A tear fell from Lucy’s face to Verona’s sweater sleeve, catching on the fibers to leave a dappled line of tiny droplets of moisture leading down to one bigger one that hung on.  Verona couldn’t move or reach around to do more without jostling Lucy, so she kissed the side of her friend’s head instead.

Lucy’s voice had found a bit more volume as she resumed talking.  “…Hold onto people.  I know John and I weren’t super close.  We didn’t hang out a lot.  I’m probably making such an ass out of myself, dwelling on this like I am.  I feel like sometimes I look at Grandfather and he looks at me and he knows I’m a fraud.  That John’s- I dunno.  More important to me dead than he was alive, because of what that represents?  And that’s so fucking immature and fraud- fraudulent, and fuck me, I guess?”

“Nah,” Verona murmured.  “Don’t fuck you.  Not for that, at least.  Only for fun.”

Lucy sniffled.

“Sure sign the goblins aren’t listening, they didn’t react to that.”

Lucy nodded.  “I just wanted to hold onto people.  And I didn’t.  Booker’s only barely stopping in for Christmas and I almost died from getting sliced open and why the fuck are these two things equivalent in my head?  What’s wrong with me?  Why the fuck am I this defective?”

“You’re not defective.  You love your brother, because your brother is really awesome, he’s a key part of your family, and your family is awesome.”

“My mom’s pulling away, she doesn’t get it.  And you’re doing your own thing, and Avery’s gone, and Guilherme’s basically gone, and Mia’s not part of what we’re doing, and Wallace is…”

“Mm?” Verona grunted quizzically.

“His mom doesn’t like me and he called earlier and- I don’t know.  I felt like I had to answer because I didn’t want to do what he’d done to me after his surgery, and ghost him when he’s worried and shit.”

“Yeah,” Verona said, quiet.

“But it’s like… I like him.  He’s a sweetie, he’s a boy and sometimes even just the word ‘boy’ sends sparks and thrills through me.  Possibilities, you know?  He’s fun to talk to and I like showing him music and movies, and I like thinking what he’d like and what he wouldn’t like, even when he’s not there.  I like him.”

“You like him,” Verona repeated, because Lucy had repeated it, and it felt like that deserved reinforcement.

“But then there are times I wonder like, maybe I would’ve broken up with him by now if I wasn’t stubborn wanting to stick it to his mom?  When he called after my hospital visit, I didn’t really want to talk to him.  It felt like a thing I had to do.”

“Emotional day.  I wouldn’t sweat it that much.”

“But what if… I dunno.  What if I end up breaking up with him, and it’s like it was with John.  Like, I enjoyed his company, I saw possibilities for the future, maybe.  Like, John had the Carmine contest thing coming, and Wallace- his mom?”

“Bit of a snarl.”

“What if the breakup ends up being a bigger deal than the relationship was?  What if that’s how I am?”

“Then that’s how you are.  I don’t think it means you’re defective or there’s anything wrong.  It means you feel loss.”

Lucy’s voice was that quiet whisper again.  “I got into this to be strong, strong enough to not be afraid, and I’m scared, Ronnie.  Strong enough to hold onto important people, but I’m losing people.  And if I’ve got something deep down I really wanted and needed, that lurked under it all, like some secret shit I had to wrangle, like Avery’s hole in her heart and you not wanting to be human anymore?”

“Yeah?”

“I wanted to give the magical middle finger to- to so many people.  The Logans, the Mr. Sittons.  The fucking kids at the beach who practically drowned me.  Cowards like Paul.  Musser, for being a smug fuck who thinks the world is his and should go his way.  The Wild Hunt, for their fucking anti-revolution bullshit philosophy.  The fucking kids at St. Victor’s being so casually shitty and hostile.  All of them and it still feels like I just… can’t actually do anything about it.”

“We can.  We gotta.”

Lucy nodded, head rubbing against Verona’s shoulder.  “The way it feels, though.  They’re going to hurt me and people I care about, they’re going to make everything worse, all the other stuff I’m talking about?  Worse.  Scare the shit out of my mom and make the distance between us bigger, and getting me thinking about practitioner husbands instead of letting me be to be excited about a boy, and so many other things.”

“Fuck them,” Verona said.

“Fuck them,” Lucy growled.  She lifted her head up and raised her voice.  “Fuck them!”

Tatty, halfway across the house, heard and made a ‘graah’ sound.  Pecker was with her and made sounds of his own.

Lucy sighed.  She looked over at Verona.  “Thanks.”

“Absolutely.  Sorry, didn’t really know what to say or do.  Do you want to hash out the whole me getting distant thing?”

Lucy shook her head.  “It’s good.  You’re finding yourself.  It’s frustrating, with everything, but like, logically, I know it’s natural, right?”

Verona nodded.

“You did good,” Lucy said.  “I know listening to people complain isn’t your thing.”

“You’ve had my back, I’ll have yours if you need it.  Only gets to be a problem if it’s complaining a lot over a while, I think, with nothing changing.”

“So what do we do?” Lucy asked.  She flipped around, still leaning into the counter, and bent over the sink, turning on water to rinse her hand and then scoop water into her face to rub it dry.

Verona tore off a paper towel, handing it over.  “That’s the problem, isn’t it?  Three big threats.  The kids we can’t touch right now, but at least they’re not like… overt.  If the video game alien guy was a mistake, we can maybe take their word for it that they don’t want to mess with us.”

“Yet,” Lucy said.

“Musser isn’t here yet, he’s supposed to send a scouting party and maybe poke his head in early, but we don’t expect him to make a move for a little while.  Not a lot we can do except be ready to respond.  Expanding and extending the market was my idea.  Bit more claim, bit more intermingling of the various aspects of Kennet.  I’m hoping there’s a way we can make this something that’s too big to eat in one bite.”

“Choke the asshole,” Lucy muttered,  She patted her face dry.

“Except he’s got Toronto, so we know he can take a pretty huge bite if he needs to,” Verona mused.

“I guess I’d say…” Lucy mused.  “He had to vomit up all he ate, to put it basically, when Charles did what he did.  He hasn’t been able to get much ground back.  And he relies a lot on momentum.  It was a big part of what he argued to the Judges, on his last try at Kennet.”

Verona nodded.  “You been reading up on Law practices?”

“Yep.  Some.”

“If we can make ourselves a metaphorical bitter pill that has to be eaten with a full meal, knowing he can’t eat a full meal with the situation being what it is…”

“Verona, please,” Lucy groaned.

“Okay.”

“I want to slow him down,” Lucy said.  “That’s the thing, I think.  Avery says Musser has less friends than he did, people who were with him because he was strong and doing well aren’t with him now.  He’s strong, but he’s stuck.”

“So we slow him down…”

“If he’s in a bad place where it’s tricky to move around, hard to get his buddies all together, hard to get here, hard to eat Kennet in one bite…” Lucy mused out loud, eyes not focused on anything in particular.  “My mom says that when you’re disabled, or a person of color, or even a woman, the hills you have to climb in the course of your life get higher.  And anyone will hit these points in their life where they feel like they almost can’t do something.”

Verona thought of school.  Hitting the wall.

“But you add that extra five or ten or fifty percent of extra difficulty, the hills others seem able to scale become insurmountable.  You get stopped when others just barely struggle by.  That all rolls forward: the opportunities you miss out on, when the hurdles are five percent higher, and the things you miss out on because you missed out on that other thing.”

“And you want to do that to Musser?”

“Five or ten or fifty percent extra difficulty, when things are rough?” Lucy asked, turning to Verona.  “Fuck yeah, I want to see that man deal with that.  I bet he’s coasted all his life.”

“How do we do that, then?”

“I have ideas.”

“Can you show me?  Do you have the books here?”

“No,” Lucy said.  “At my house.”

“You want to hang out here, avoid your mom?  I’d like to see that stuff, but if you don’t want to…”

“No.  It’s something we need to handle.”

“Cool.  Let me get changed?  I changed for my nap.”

Verona nodded with some vigor.

“You’re excited.”

“I want to get into the cool magic ideas.  See if we can do something about one of these swords hanging over our heads.”

Lucy momentarily turned on her Sight, as if that was a kind of expression she could make beyond the usual, then said, “Getting changed.”

Lucy went upstairs.  Verona opened the door, then walked around to the living room.  The fire was burning in the fireplace, and both Tatty and Peckersnot were sitting there, still with traces of partially melted chocolate on them.  Tatty gave Verona a wide-eyed look.  In her screechy voice, she shouted, “You!”

“I have prepositions!”

“I hope so.”

“Let it be known!” Tatty shouted, hands over her shoulder.  “This is a cool plan!”

“It’s a cool plan, maybe, but it’s a plan that’s going to get you all killed.”

“You should help me do it, and I’ll tell you why!”

“Tell me,” Verona said

“Toadswallow is a gentleman goblin, smart and good at teaching kids and boring crap like that!  Gashwad messes stuff up!  Ramjam has his spit and nails!”

“And headbanging,” Verona said.  She leaned against the doorframe.  “Where are you going with this?”

“Butty is weirdly smooth!  Nat has a nasty punch!  Kittycough has a knife!  Biscuit delivers the booze and drugs!  Doglick dogs and licks!”

“All true.  And you, Tatty?” Verona asked, in a voice pitched to hype her up.  She gestured wildly, arms extended out, which made Peckersnot bounce with excitement, hurrying to copy.  “What the hell do you do, Tatty!?”

“I.  Am.  A strategist!”

“No you’re not!” Verona told her, still overdramatic, flopping a bit, arms going limp.  “Not a good one!”

“Get bent!”

“You, Tatty Bo Jangles, screechy, small and dangly, are an idea goblin.”

“Hey!”

“I’m telling it like it is.  You are a brainstormer.  A hype-goblin, a promoter.  You have big ideas and you’re so bad at seeing them through I’m surprised more of you aren’t dead.”

Tatty looked a lot like she wasn’t sure if she wanted to be angry or if she wanted Verona to keep going.

“You, Tatty, have a talent.  But it’s only one piece of the picture.  To do the things you’re talking about, you need another goblin to be your strategist.”

Tatty pointed at Peckersnot.

“No.  Peck is an artist.  He’s organized enough he can help me sort out my shit, but he’s not your strategist.  What you need, Tatty, is a goblin who can think ten steps ahead.”

Tatty narrowed her eyes.

Verona continued, trying to play up the hype, putting energy into her words, “You need a goblin that’s not just a bit organized, but one that organizes crap on their own because that’s just how they are.  He or she or they need to be able to think shit through, figure out what you gotta do, and above all else, super important, they need to be excited enough about what you’re doing to stick around but they also need to be scared.  Chickenshit.”

“What!?” Tatty cried out.

“You need a coward who’s always thinking of an escape route, you need a goblin who’s first thought on hearing one of your ideas is that they don’t want to die and they don’t want you or their friends, like my buddy Peckersnot here, to get massacred either.”

Peckersnot nodded.  He was buying into Verona’s energy and positivity, nodding along.  But of course he was.  He wouldn’t be with Tatty’s gang in the first place if he wasn’t easily influenced.

“Know any goblins like that?” Verona asked.  “Maybe some that fit most of the bill?”

Tatty narrowed her tiny eyes.  “Toadswallow.  Except he’s not interested in my stuff.”

Verona nodded.  “He’s a strategist.  It’s part of how he got where he is, despite not being the biggest goblin around.  You need another Toadswallow, one that’ll go along with what you want.”

Tatty glanced around.  Then she looked up at Verona.  “Can he be sexy?”

“Sure.  If any goblin is sexy.  Actually, maybe it’s not even a goblin.  Who knows?”

“Lots of goblins are sexy,” Tatty said, pacing, thinking.

“Not exactly our priority here.  You might be getting sidetracked.  Just think, maybe there’s a goblin you know or one you’ve seen around, they might’ve complained about your ideas, or poked holes in them?  Or, again, a non-goblin?”

“There might be one.  A bit of a Toadswallow.  Smart, complainy.  Not very sexy.”

“Again, that’s not a priority.  Consider it a bonus if you get it.  Not being dead because of a stupid plan getting you killed is really a prerequisite to being sexy, I think.”

“There’s gotta be better, but he’ll do for now.  He might not want to come, but I’ll twist his arm.”

“Be nice.”

“I’ll be nice to him after.  Okay!  I’m getting a worse Toadswallow!”

“Strategist.”

“I have ideas!” Tatty proclaimed, as she marched her way toward the front door.  “Open the door, Peckersnot, come!”

Peckersnot looked up at Verona and motioned, peeping.

“Yeah.  Go for it.  Do your thing, stay safe.  I’m heading out with Lucy anyway.”

“Open the door!” Tatty screeched.

Verona, having walked through the living room, leaned against the doorway that led from living room to hallway.  She folded her arms.

“Now!”

“My turf.  I give the orders.”

Tatty turned, then narrowed her eyes.  She turned to look at the door.  “Then I don’t know what to do.”

“There are other ways out.  Peck could show you.  Or you could ask nicely.  Say please?”

Tatty looked at the door.  “I want to go that way.  But I don’t know what to do.”

She looked like she was planning on being stubborn.

“Answer a question for me, in exchange for an easy exit?” Verona asked, moving to the door.

“Yas.”

Verona opened the door and watched Tatty walk out onto the porch, facing a stretch of snow taller than she was.  “With your, uh, dress, being made of your chest…?”

Tatty turned and looked up at her.

“Doesn’t that mean your nips are basically dragging against the icy, snowy ground?”

Tatty nodded, then she smiled, a wide, jack-o-lantern smile.

“Figured I’d ask.  Sounds uncomfortable.”

Tatty smiled wider, then leaped off the top stair and into the snow.  Peckersnot followed.

Verona shut the door.  I bet she’s been doing that uncomfortable arrangement for all this while, hoping someone would ask a question like that.

Lucy came down, they got themselves sorted with coats and boots.  Verona reached up, sensing claim with her Demesne.  Lucy had left something behind.

“Ditched the huge sweatshirt?  I kinda like the aesthetic.”

“Figures you would.  Yeah.  It’s for naps and lazing around.  Special occasions.  Can’t use it too often or it loses smells and shape, I guess.  Not that there’s much of anything, but you know.”

“Booker’s?” Verona guessed.

“Dad’s,” Lucy replied.

“Felt like a special occasion, where I needed it.”

Verona nodded.  She couldn’t quite relate, but she did take a moment to lament how empty the house felt, without McCauleigh around.  Even when McCauleigh was gone, there was stuff she’d leave around, that Verona could sense, with its own claim.

“Have you heard from her?” Lucy asked.

“Am I that obvious?”

Lucy shrugged.

“Nah, haven’t heard anything.  But I didn’t figure I would.”

Verona opened the door, squinting into the glare of sun on snow, and she shivered.

It felt like she was being watched, but her bracelet was quiet, and the way out was clear.  Her sense of the Demesne told her that the goblins were out in the snow, partway out, but that was all.

“Um,” Verona said, quiet.

“Yeah,” Lucy agreed.  “We’re not alone.”

“And it’s not the goblins.”

Lucy nodded.

Verona heard Peckersnot sneeze.  The way he sometimes did around Guilherme, to be annoying, like someone coughing too loudly around a smoker.

“Glamour.”

Lucy nodded again, eyes moving.

“Does your earring pick up anything?”

Verona touched Lucy’s arm, and the two of them retreated into the house.

Verona shifted the intention of the door so it would deposit them in Kennet found, then opened the door.

The issue was the same, but from different directions.

She tried again.  Kennet below this time.

Same issue.

Verona put them back in Kennet above, and stood at the top of the stairs with Lucy, looking around.

Surrounded in all three realms.

“We’ve got the goblins here,” Verona whispered, hand covering her mouth, Demesne keeping the sound from reaching.  “Other route to go would be Kennet found, but that doesn’t get us home.  Not easy, and Miss was saying she didn’t want to test the Law of the new-ish realm against the Law of the Wild Hunt.”

“Yeah.  Here works for now, I guess.”

“I’ve got the stuff for summoning in the house.  I could throw something together.”

“I’ve got these.  In case there was trouble,” Lucy said.  She pulled at one of the two chains around her neck, judging the weight, then pulled the other one off.  Unclipping it, she threw a tag down at the stairs as she descended.  Then another.  Then another.

Grandfather, Doe, and Ribs rose up out of the snow.  Ribs wore no shirt beneath his winter camouflage jacket, and carried a heavy gas tank and nozzle with a pilot light pre-lit, his face half-melted, teeth exposed on the one side.  Doe wore all black, wore a white scarf, with long hair partially trapped by it, and she carried an old rifle.

Grandfather wore winter camouflage as well, with a hood, and carried another rifle.  He clapped a hand on Lucy’s shoulder as he passed.  “Trouble?”

“Yeah.  Unless they’re screwing with me and there’s nobody there.”

“They’re not,” Doe murmured, eyes scanning the trees.  “There’s at least three out there.”

“Do we want that summon, still?” Verona asked.

“Dunno,” Lucy said.  “That takes time, and I feel like if you do go inside and prep something, they’re just going to leave.”

“Yeah.  Damn it.”

“Sure finding ourselves in some strange situations,” Ribs said, voice distorted by his facial wound.  “How bad is this?”

“If it’s bad, it’s pretty bad,” Verona said.

“Like, our worst patrol this side of the ocean bad, or-”

“-or like all your patrols around Kennet up until now have been leading up to this moment,” Verona said.

Ribs nodded.

“Hope you’ve been brushing up on how all this works, Ribs,” Grandfather said, voice low.  He paced through the snow, not taking his eyes off the trees, scanning for details.

“Bits here and there.  Fire works most times.”

“Sure.  If it gets the job done,” Grandfather said.  He turned his head without taking his eyes off the trees.  “Does it get the job done?”

He was asking Lucy.

“I have no idea.”

“They can’t get in?” Grandfather asked.

“They can, but like, it’s mine.  My place,” Verona told him.

“How far can you reach out?” Lucy asked.

“Only as far as I claimed, technically.  But like, I can do this…”

She felt out for the weather with what she kind of thought of as her heart, and an expectation that things would go a certain way.  The wind picked up, picking up the topmost layer of snow.  The wind didn’t magically stop at the Demesne’s borders- cause and effect were still there.  And she could push out with a cold, unfriendly wind that made lumps and chunks of snow fall from tree branches.

A slender figure stepped out, hands in pockets, long hair blowing in the wind, looking for all the world like it was a summertime breeze and he was some skinny fabio on the beach.  His coat was long and white, with a panel over the breast and no apparent buttons or catches.  It was so simple and minimalist it looped back around to being fashionable, drawing attention to his features.

She liked skinny, but she didn’t like skinny with smug.  She liked Jeremy, and Avery’s cousin Kyle, who didn’t even seem to know they were kinda nice to look at.

He stopped at the borders of the Demesnes, his toes grazing the edge.

Grandfather and Doe leveled their rifles at him.

“Careful.  Illusions and tricks,” Lucy murmured.

“Arright,” Grandfather muttered.  “We need a system if we’re going to do this again.  Knowing there’s tricks is good, but how bad?  Our entire reality is fucked bad?  Will I know?”

Lucy shook her head, looking around.  “You won’t necessarily know and if you aren’t careful to shatter the illusion before you shoot what looks like an enemy, it could be a friend.  Just to play it safe.”

“It’s a good solid nine or ten on the bullshit scale,” Verona said.

“B.S. ten,” Ribs muttered.

“Okay,” Grandfather said, like he was digesting that.  “B.S. ten.”

“Is this a siege?” Verona called out.  “You’re keeping us from leaving?”

“You’re free to leave.  It’s your Demesnes.”

“Then what are you doing?” Lucy asked.

“We’ll have some questions for you after you make your exit.”

“Questions where the answers very pointedly matter?” Lucy asked.

“More than most things you say and do, yes.”

Lucy glanced at Verona.

“I already hate this psy ops, mealy-mouthed diplomacy coke and dagger B.S. ten crap,” Ribs muttered.  “I vote to kill it all with fire.”

“Easy,” Grandfather told him.  “First off, the squad isn’t a democracy.  It falls to rank.  Second off, that kind of talk can make a bad situation worse.  So go easy.”

“Killing things with fire is me going easy,” Ribs muttered.  “Me going hard is killing things with explosions.”

“Go easier than easy, then.”

“You’ve already asked Lucy questions,” Verona called out.

“We have.  We have questions for you now, Verona Hayward, third witch of Kennet.”

“Can I ask you to submit your questions in advance?”

“There are ideas in law magic that say you can demand to know the rules of an engagement or contest,” Lucy said.

“As Lucille suggests, you can make such a request, we’d consider it.  But the consideration and response will take time.  You might as well treat this as the siege you imagined it to be, the result will be functionally identical.  Faced with outside deadlines, you’d break and give a rushed answer.”

“What?” Ribs asked.

“They’d drag it out,” Lucy said.

“Then stuff happens and we’re forced to come out and answer, I guess,” Verona said.  “Same end result as if we tried to hole up here and wait them out.  Stuff happens and we’re forced to come out and answer.”

“Give desperate answers, no less,” the Wild Hunt Fae corrected.

“Sir, this sounds like paperwork, sir,” Ribs adopted a more military tone, voice low.  “Recommending fire, sir.”

“Stand down,” Grandfather said.

Doe wasn’t saying anything, but had a look in her eye.

“Okay, but why not just give me the questions straight-up?” Verona asked.

“Because this is about intimidation more than it’s about fact finding,” Lucy said, when the answer didn’t immediately come.

“The facts were found before we came, or else we wouldn’t be here,” the Wild Hunt fae told them.  “You’re not wrong, but you’re not right, either.  Intimidation is fact finding.  Set a prey animal to scurrying and you find out a great deal about what it is, how it moves, how it thinks, what it wants and prioritizes, and more.”

“Ugly,” Lucy murmured.  Her voice carried before Verona could use the Demesnes to slow it.

Shit.  Lucy was still upset.  Still pissed.

“You’re ill-equipped to see the elegance of our approach.  A crisis of character that is part of why we’ve come.”

“This is about me, not her, right?” Verona asked.

“Yes.  You are ill-suited as well.”

Doe, as one of the Dog Tags standing between them and the Faerie who’d stepped out of cover, looked over at Grandfather.  He gave her the smallest nod.

Doe bolted, dashing for the trees.

At the same time she did, one of the hidden Fae acted.  He was huge, long-limbed, lanky, emaciated, with a full-face mask like an old fencer’s mask, a cage of silver over the face, features hidden.  But for the helmet, a cloak of silvery feathers that draped down like a broken wing and a white cloth at the waist, his body was bare and skin damaged by cold.  Sitting down, he could have had Guilherme sit in his lap, and hidden most of him in a cradling embrace of folded legs and bent arms.  He was that big.

That big, still completely hidden, like a paradox.  He moved from a sitting position to a lunging near-flight, going after Doe.

“Why?” Lucy asked.

“Trust,” Grandfather said.

“Does she know what we’re up against?”

“No.  We rarely do.  Doe doesn’t like to sit still.  But trust.”

“What you’re doing doesn’t seem elegant,” Verona told the Faerie.  “It seems more like you’ve got way too many of your fellow Fae on stakeout, redundant, wasted manpower.  It sure seems like you’re after us for small issues, and I don’t know about you guys, but to me, making a big deal over minor crap seems like a move that gets you less respect, not more.”

“As I said, you’re not equipped.  In the short term it may seem that way, but we play a long game.  Our Hunters are doing more than your senses can detect.  Guarding multiple realms at once.  Investigating spiritual flows while taking notes on your actions.  Studying echoes.  When you see one standing watch, ten more are conferring and comparing notes, another is talking to someone you didn’t even know had information, and more hone their blades.”

“Seems easier to just run your questions by us.  Did we use Winter glamour?  Yes.  Are we perfect?  No.  Are we doing our best to uphold standards and respect the gift we’ve been given?  I’d like to think so.”

“Ronnie,” Lucy said, quiet.

Verona stopped there.  “What?”

“Don’t want to say while they’re there…”

Verona reached out to her Demesne.  Weeks and months of fine tuning temperature and managing the leaves and grass had been training for this.  A bit of visual clutter, sound management… she kept the sound from reaching the Fae.  “Cover your mouth so he can’t see, then it should be safe-ish.”

Lucy covered her mouth.  “Don’t over-volunteer information to a cop.”

“Right.”

“They’re looking for ammo, don’t give it to them.”

Verona nodded.

The Faerie was smiling.

“What next, then?”

“That is up to you,” the Faerie said.

“What if I step outside my Demesne?  If I answer your questions, will you let us go on our way?”

“It depends on the answers.”

“Fire,” Ribs muttered.  “Just saying.”

Verona shook her head, then looked over.  Lucy was tense, one hand gripping her arm, where there was a bandage under her coat and sweatshirt sleeve.

“Goblins?” Verona asked.

She could feel them startle, in the same way she’d feel someone she was sharing a mattress with moving to get up to pee.  A shaking of the firmament, kind of, a very small, personal firmament.

Tatty proceeded to move with surprising speed away from this.  She dragged Peckersnot after her, but at the halfway mark, to move faster, she left him behind.

He remained where he was, bewildered, mostly hidden by snow.

You complete and utter dickass motherfuck screechy little annoyance.  You wanted to annoy a Wild Hunt Fae, you made a huge deal of shit, and the moment you’re near one and any attention’s drawn to you, you run off?

“Take another route out, let Toad and the others know things aren’t great?” Verona asked Peckersnot.

“They shouldn’t come,” Lucy said, quiet.

“Tell them they shouldn’t come,” Verona said, letting the Demesne carry her voice.  “But they should know and be aware.”

Peckersnot left.  He found Tatty along the way, and then both were gone.

“This is a test,” the Faerie said.  “A measure of your character and capability.  That you thought of goblins first, and of their escape routes?  It doesn’t count in your favor.”

“Sure feels like a test with a weird grading scheme,” Verona said.  “Start at a D-minus, and the teacher’s looking to take marks off for any reason she can make up?”

“The reasons aren’t ‘made up’.  You have a narrow slice of information-”

“I’ve asked for more info and been denied,” Verona pointed out.  “I want to figure out this system and how you guys work, so I can work with you and let you move on to other things.”

“You’re not equipped to know.”

“We are, in fact, given our involvement with all sorts of Others, and how we were awakened into Kennet-”

“A process with prevarication baked into it from your very announcement.”

“-we know this stuff, dude,” Verona told him.  She glanced at Lucy, and saw how tense Lucy was.  “We know goblins, we’ve met Fae, good and bad.  We’ve met Fae related stuff, we’ve been to a market, I think I’ve got the grounding to tell you… you’re off base.  I know you’re Winter Court, but you’re behind the times.  This racial hatred of goblins is icky.”

“Icky?”

“Succinct but it gets to the heart of what I want to get at.”

“And racial hatred?”

“I’m guessing you’ll quibble, but it basically covers it.  You’re a Fae, they’re goblins, you hate them, they hate you, or whatever.  Fine.”

“I’m not Fae,” the Wild Hunt man in white told her.

Verona glanced him over.  There was a Fae aesthetic to him, his hair was long, he was pretty, he wore odd clothing that transcended aeons, but…

She thought of Daniel Alitzer.  The Glamour-drowned who’d come, stabbed Guilherme, and sped his descent to Winter.  Who’d taken stolen glamour and overdosed on it.  Who’d built a tower out of glamour and almost made it real.

This guy was similar, just… calmer.  Winter-ish.

“I’m human.  In word, in spirit, in sentiment, I call you gainsaid,” he said.

The House on Half Street slipped out of Verona’s reach.  She felt it go, felt that familiar space go cold, unresponsive, and numb.

She closed her eyes, then opened them, then tried opening them again.

“Well, that’s… annoying.”

“I imagine it is.  This can conclude our business for now.  We can continue at a later date.”

“Wait, you’re just leaving now?”

“I’ve gathered enough information to make a report.  Others will carry this forward.”

“That’s it?  That’s all you wanted to do?” Lucy asked.

“It’s enough for the time being.”

“Is that the plan then?” Lucy asked.  “You show up, at random times, you act polite and like you’re doing formal interviews, but really you’re just looking for chances to hurt us, wound, gainsay, psychologically mess with us?  Until what?”

“If your quarry is fleeing toward a cliff, encourage them.”

“Unless you want to eat, or take captives,” Verona added.

“We have sustenance handled.  We don’t typically take captives.”

“So you’re coming after us like this, whittling us down, until the cliff?” Verona asked.  “Musser?  The invading practitioners?”

“Or others.  You can know what we’re doing, it doesn’t change things.  You approach the cliff at a breakneck pace, and jagged rocks lie waiting.  One of my colleagues will see you in a few days, Verona Hayward.  Lucille-”

“Lucy.”

“Before your arm is healed, we will come again.”

“What’s your story?” Lucy asked.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“You ride with Winter’s Wild Hunt, despite not being a Winter Court Fae?” Lucy asked.

“This was explained to you already.  We are not a branch of the tree.  We’re the hounds and hawks invited to guard it.  Be glad that we’ve not found excuse to blow the horns, and most hounds and hawks remain with the tree.”

He turned to go.

Verona rubbed at her palm, watching.

“Seems to be the way things are going,” Lucy said, quiet.  Tension still stood out in her neck.  Her hand was pressed to her sleeve, at the part of her arm that had been cut open.  “Can’t do shit, right?”

“I dunno,” Verona said, quiet.  “Work in progress.”

“Where’s Doe?”  Lucy asked.  She used her Sight, turning her head.

They ventured out, and they found Doe sitting against a tree.  Three spikes of ice penetrated her chest, nonlethal, and one penetrated her wrist, pinning it to a tree trunk.

“Doe,” Grandfather said.

Doe was, like Horseman, supposed to be a step up for the Dog Tags.  Closer to being a supersoldier.

Doe sounded like she was breathing through liquid, raspy.  “Faster than he looked.  Started to crucify me, got bored, I guess.”

“Seems like they got what they wanted,” Grandfather said.  “They wanted to get a lick in.  Took Hayward’s magic.”

“Ah.  This hurts.  Mind pulling some of it out?  I’ll bleed out fast when you do.  Put me out of my misery?”

“Sure,” Grandfather said.

“Take care of my body.”

Grandfather pulled a spike of ice out of Doe’s chest, then one out of her side, and by the time he was pulling the one out of her wrist, she was dead.

“Fuck,” Lucy swore.

“She can normally handle herself.  Thought it’d be worth the chance she gets an angle, does her thing, surprising them.  Negotiations go a lot better if the other side’s got a gun to their necks.”

“Don’t think it would’ve changed anything,” Lucy said.

“They had a third, right?  One we didn’t see?” Verona asked.

Grandfather nodded, then sighed.

Lucy shook her head.

Doe jerked, coughing, spitting out blood with each cough.  Grandfather offered her a hand, helping her to her feet.  She brought the rifle with, then coughed again.  Less blood.

“You alright?”

“For the future… if they wanted to, I think they could’ve glamoured you dead to stay dead.  They’re prodding around the edges,” Verona said.  “Closing the net.  When they make a move, they’re really careful about it.  Like someone playing chess, every piece covered by two other ones.  Except, like he said, we don’t see the whole-”

She saw Lucy’s hand shake as Lucy brought it up to her neck, rubbing where lines of tension still stood out.

“-board.”

Lucy, noticing the pause, glanced at Verona.

“Hey-” Verona reached out.

“Sorry, no, but fuck this!” Lucy swore, pulling her arm away from Verona’s hand.  “Just wanted to go home, can’t even get that far.”

“We got some info, at least.  Stuff that’s not in books- I guess if you write about it, you get a Wild Hunt inquisition after your ass.”

Lucy shook her head.

“I get it though,” Verona said.  Quieter, trying for reassuring, she said, “I get it.”

“I know we were going to go over some stuff at my place, but can we postpone?  My head’s not right for it.”

“We can, but should we?”

“I know we shouldn’t,” Lucy said, with an edge of frustration in the words.  “Cliff, whatever.  I know.  But-”

Verona nodded.

“I’ll talk to you after?  I’ll talk to Dr. Mona if I can, see if I can get my head around this.  I know I’m like… really shitty right now.  I barely slept.  Sorry, I-”

“I get it.”

“Sorry, Grandfather, Doe, Ribs,” Lucy said.  “Sorry, thank you for coming.  I hate you’re seeing me all touchy.”

“Been there.  Don’t worry about it,” Grandfather said, voice quiet.  “Glad to come, wish I could’ve done more.”

Lucy shook her head.

You coming and being available like this is a bigger deal than you know, but she can’t say it and I can’t tell you.  Because it’s complicated, Verona thought.

“I’ve been there too,” Verona added.  “Different issues, different buttons being pressed, different pressures, but I’ve been there.”

Lucy, hands pressed down over her eyes, muttered, “I don’t want pity or sympathy-”

“Been there too.”

Lucy dropped her hands and gave Verona a murderous look.

“Just saying.”

“Fuck.”

“And I’m going to say this too.  Let me handle this?”

“You’re gainsaid.”

“Let me handle it anyway.  You picked up the slack for me when I had to go away to stay sane.  Let me have a turn.”

“You’re already-” Lucy met Verona’s eyes.  She didn’t finish the thought.  Because she couldn’t.  Not without being heard.

Verona thought it, but didn’t say it: I’m already cribbing from your share of responsibilities.  Because I’ve been thinking about what to do about Charles.  And the closest thing I have to an idea is something that intersects your idea.

But we have to get that far.

“Just do what you’re doing,” Verona told her.  “You guys good to see her home?  Wild Hunter said they’d see her later, that could be five minutes from now, could be a week.”

“You need a bodyguard too, Ronnie.  You’re gainsaid, you’re vulnerable.”

“They said it would be a few days.”

“And they’re not the only issue we’re dealing with.”

Verona nodded.

“I could,” Ribs said, “I can wear a mask for my face, but can’t do a lot with my kit.”

Giant gas tank at his back, flamethrower in hand.

“Want to clear my dad’s driveway with that thing?” Verona asked.

“Don’t burn your house down, on top of everything,” Lucy said, and she sounded very weary.

“Go.  Sleep.  Doe can take me back.  Handle your thing.  Talk to Avery.  She needs info, and you need a listening ear.  Talk to your mom.  There’s no wrong answer.”

Lucy looked tired enough she was just nodding, accepting it all.

Verona watched her go.

“You’re not going with?” Ribs asked.

“Could go partway with, but… stuff I need to tackle.  Shit.  I was thinking I could use my Demesne to get you to Kennet below, ask you to talk to people, pass on messages.”

“Happy to.”

“Except I’m gainsaid- no practice.  Can’t.  Shit.”

“I know routes.  Where am I going, and who am I talking to?” Ribs asked.

“I think Tashlit is key here.  But we need to catch people up and fill them in.  Peck’s already on it, but… let’s do this right.  Let’s start by communicating to everyone that Lucy’s down, and I’m out.”

“You’re out?”

Verona nodded.

“With Tashlit?”

Verona wasn’t sure if there was any merit to the idea at all, but she was already going this direction, so she figured it was worth giving it a try.

She wasn’t sure about a lot of this, actually.  But here they were.

She laid the sticks down, along with her clothes, including her old winter jacket, spare boots, an old sweater she liked, and various other articles of clothing.  Bit of hair, and then the papers.

She checked the coast was clear.  They weren’t far from the Faerie cave Guilherme and Alpeana called home.

Maybe there was more residual glamour here.

Charles had done what he’d done with the Choir while forsworn, using tools that had latent magic and power to them.

Verona did the same thing with the sticks and twigs, twine, papers, and clothes.  She couldn’t work it herself, but even an Aware-ish Innocent could do some stuff if they had the right stuff in place.

Tashlit, wearing heavy winter clothes to disguise things, including ski goggles and a neckwarmer, covering most of her face, stood by and watched as Verona bent down, gloved fingers scraping through brittle ice-crusted snow to pick up the sticks she’d laid down.

Hugging them.

She closed her eyes, letting that glamour and arrangement of twigs and twine just soak up her.  They’d done things often enough.  The glamour knew already.  It just needed a prod, and hopefully, hopefully, it would follow its usual courses.

She felt the lump she was hugging shift position to something a little more comfortable, hugging her back, hand moving to her back to pat it.

“It’s winter,” the Fetch whispered.

“Yeah.  Sorry.”

“If you’re going to wait a while to bring me back, I’m glad it’s sweater weather.”

“Trueee.”

Verona broke the hug.

The Fetch tugged clothing into order, where it had been twisted around, hiking up her jeans a bit.  She then stood back, looking up at the sky, then back at Kennet.

“Thought about bringing you out again when I was struggling with school, but… felt like that’d be greasing the slide, you know?”

The Fetch nodded.  She seemed a bit melancholy.  Absorbing a lot.

“Don’t, uh, murder me or take my existence or anything, okay?”

“For the existence part, you know, we were trying to run away from ours?”

“True.  I notice you skipped over the murder part.”

“We were always pretty good about not hating ourselves, right?” her Fetch asked.  “TV and movies telling us teen girls all hate their bodies, saying it over and over again… but we’re okay.”

She and Verona made finger guns and mouth clicks at each other, simultaneously.

Verona smiled.  The Fetch didn’t.

“So what’s the deal?” the Fetch asked.  “Emergency?”

“Lucy needs us, and I’m gainsaid.  Yeah.  Emergency.”

The Fetch nodded.  “Do I go to her?”

“If she asks.  Don’t hide you’re the Fetch, though she’ll know.  Just… if she needs something?”

“Of course.”

“Of course.  Anyway, I can’t use connection blocks right now, I don’t want to hassle Lucy, so… keep it calm, keep my dad from getting suspicious?”

The Fetch nodded.

“I’ll be a while.  Hold down the fort?”

“Alright.  Verona?”

Verona paused.  “Yeah?”

“If I’m doing this, if you’re bringing me out… you can’t put me away again like you did last time.”

“I figured… you were on the cusp of becoming an individual.”

“You were right.  But now I’m post-cusp.  Cusped.”

“Figured,” Verona said, quiet.  “But I can’t give you a whole life.  I can’t give you school.  I found another way.  A me way.  I- I don’t want kids.  That’s a responsibility, and then there’s you, but…”

“If it’s for Lucy you gotta.”

“Yeah.  I owe her so much.  So I’ll suck it up, I’ll figure something out.  If we need to, I’ll talk to you after.  You can drive a hard bargain, I guess.”

“I’m self-sufficient, you know?”

“We keep saying that, and I think we’re way more self-sufficient than most adults would guess, but way less than we think we are.”

“Hm,” the Fetch replied, sounding a little displeased with that.

“But if you can forge your own space… there’s a lot of extra room.  Ask people to show you Kennet found.  When you’re not, like, covering for me being gone.  And there’s Kennet below, and the House on Half Street.”

“Stuff’s changed.”

Verona nodded.

“Okay.  On the job.”

“Take care, be safe.  Watch out for the Wild Hunt.”

The Fetch widened her eyes then shook her head.  “Yeah.”

“Like seriously, maybe start with going in that cave to Guilherme and Alpeana, and go with an escort.”

“Got it.”

Verona glanced around.  She hadn’t seen any Wild Hunt watching her, specifically.  She wondered if they were even bothering, now that she was gainsaid.

A movement in the corner of her vision made her jump.

The Fetch.

Wanting to hug.

“Is this kosher?” Verona asked.

“What else could it be?”

“Stealing my Self?  Sorry, but…”

“Nourishing both our selves.  We need more hugs than we get.”

Verona relented, hugged the Fetch, then parted ways, letting her walk over toward the cave, while Verona backed off, going to Tashlit’s side.  Tashlit gave her a one-armed hug around the shoulders.

They continued on their way.

Past the cave, away from Kennet.  South.  Past some old buildings by the river, some made of logs and rotted to the point they were barely recognizable as buildings.  Shacks that were log and tin roof.

Then past a bit of path that had been worn down by weather and broken in one spot by a rock rolling down the hill- that rock was blocking a bit of the river, which was frozen right now.

Just past all that was the opening of the little river that stabbed through Kennet, and Lake Superior.  So vast it looked like ocean, and most of it was frozen over, with snow on the ice.

Tashlit found the boat she’d tucked away, put some luggage and cases down inside it, and pulled off some of the extra winter stuff that hid her Other-ishness from Innocents.  Then she dragged the boat out toward the ice, stopping at the shore’s edge.  Verona unloaded her stuff as well, and at Tashlit’s indication, she climbed in.

Tashlit walked on ice, and after a bit, the ice started to crack from the boat’s weight.  Then it cracked under her feet.

And then she broke through, falling within.

Tashlit got them away from shore and away from any prying eyes who might wonder what a fourteen year old girl was doing out in a little dinghy in the middle of Lake Superior in late December.

“You can ride inside the boat if you want.  No pressure to get anywhere fast.”

Tashlit stuck a hand out of the water with a small splash, gesturing.

She wanted to swim for a bit.

Her mother was a sea serpent, after all.

Verona got herself squared away.  Blankets, Hot Lead, flask of liquid alchemy for warmth, cap removed and wedged beneath her seat, with blanket draped around to trap the heat it generated within.  Some stuff to drink and eat, a doofy hat to keep her head warm.

Away from Kennet.  Away from the Wild Hunt and everything else.  She couldn’t help much right now.  Not there.

The lake was big enough that when they were far enough out, she could look in every direction and there was no land.

Gray sky with light at the horizon, and steel gray water.

Going by land, she had to deal with Lords.  But the claims had all ended at the water.

The moon was briefly reflected in the water, and Verona stretched, looking out and over.

Another watchful eye, courtesy of a request from Avery.  The Lord of Thunder Bay extended a bit of attention and reach out to Verona.  A shield from the worst weather and Other interference.

Which meant she could relax some.

She fiddled with batteries, fumbling because she was wearing two sets of gloves.  Then she got the music playing.

She sorted things out, using extra blankets and clothes for padding, felt the boat rock, and found a bit of peace in the storm.

Twelve hours out, reverse direction, about twelve hours back.  A long way to go for a hail Mary play, but she knew that any attempt to pay a visit would probably see her gainsaid, and if she was gainsaid already… well, might as well, right?

It still took a day of travel to get proper audience with the Carmine Exile.

It was a bullet she’d known she would have to bite sooner or later, if she was going to flip the table on the four Judges.

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