Author: Wildbow

In Absentia – 21.5 | Pale

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Fat white snowflakes fell, at the same time the trees began to blossom- even trees that didn’t normally blossom.  Verona raised her eyebrows as she saw pinecones split, pushing wooden bits out and away as flowers pressed out and unfurled from within.

The sun shone out from behind the clouds, the light stark and brilliant, then redoubled, as if it what had been shining had been coming through hard cloud cover and those clouds had parted.

In that glare, the Alabaster wore many forms- a white deer with antlers that reached toward the sky, legs bigger than any building Verona had seen on Earth, that stark deer with black tears from moments ago, that had expected them to chase, the white-haired woman with long white eyelashes wrapped in white furs, with antlers at the shoulders, and bones hidden beneath the furs to give it structure.

Behind it all, another aspect of herself, like an old woman, but wizened to the point that she was almost tree-like, but animal, not human.  Bent like the Bitter Street Witch, but not in a pained, ugly way.  She was curled up into herself like something- like a fetus in the womb.  Like a mother cradling her dead child, but she was also the child.  Like someone elderly passing easily, lying in a field in the sun, knowing a rest and peace in her last moments that was the envy of a hundred and twenty billion human deaths across all of history.

Verona wasn’t sure how she’d come to that number but it felt righ-

The Alabaster- that part of the Alabaster, opened eyes that were very deep and very dark, and Verona almost took a step of back from the impact of that gaze.  Lucy’s hand reaching out for her back stopped her from actually moving away.

“Reminds me of the Beorgmann,” Avery murmured.  She shivered visibly.  “Old.”

The Alabaster was silent, but she raised her chin slightly in response to that.

Snow melted, grass sprung up, then narrow stalks shook lightly as they budded, and displayed more tiny white flowers, until there was a carpet of them.  The area warmed.  It smelled like spring.  The wind blew and it was warm, flower and grass smells filling her mouth and touching tastebuds when she breathed in through her mouth because her nose was still slightly congested from the cold.

It felt like a hug.  It felt like this place was becoming that restful field, it felt like being a little kid in comfy p.j.s, nestled in her parents’ bed, between Mom and Dad, warm and safe and good, too young and dumb to have anything to worry about.

Was that a feeling she was supposed to be hungry for?  Was it meant to make her want a house of her own, where she could choose the four walls around her to build that security and coziness?  Was it a feeling that was meant to fling her into the arms of boys and men, where skinship, love, and strong arms wrapped around her made her feel whole?  Or to become the next part of that cycle, offering that warmth, security, and love to some little kid that was pushed out of her nether regions like shoving a bowling ball through a garden hose?

She rolled spit around inside her mouth, as she considered it, then leaned forward a bit, and spat on a patch of flowers.

Whatever you’re trying to do, intimidating us, distracting us, this part isn’t working on me.  I’ve got a demesne.  I can protect myself.  I’ve got big striped sweaters instead of cozy p.j.s and I can wear them where I want.

The spitting seemed to stir Avery and Lucy out of the… spell?  It wasn’t that overwhelming.

The Alabaster’s people ventured through the trees, toward the warmth.  They’d been back there, but now they were here.  Wearing togas and wraps that were almost transparent, lightweight, p.j.s in Mom and Dad’s bed comfortable.  Attractive, in their own way.

Bet they aren’t going at it like rabbits in her domain.  Probably some lowercase-i innocent bullshit where they lie around and fiddle with each other’s hair, cuddle, and trail fingers along skin without actually following through with anything that’d get them sweaty, messy, and panting.

Because that wouldn’t be peaceful, would it?

“Are you trying to guilt us?” Avery asked.

“I’m setting the table.”

“We have our own table setting,” Lucy said.  She pulled paper out of a pocket inside her jacket.  They’d translated everything onto paper before going to Ottawa.

One thing that could be said about the Tedds, the sisters did enough wild projects that they had a wardrobe with clothes suitable for Lucy, Avery, and Verona- even if Verona’s options for jeans had been a little big, and it was possible to say, hey, we need a tablecloth-sized piece of paper, a mess of rulers, protractors, and maps, and the girls would be like, we got you, babe.

The breeze stirred, and the air was filled with petals and snowflakes fat enough to equal the size of the ‘o’ Verona could make with middle finger and thumb.  The paper flapped.

“Release it,” the Alabaster said, gesturing.

Lucy glanced back over her shoulder at Guilherme, who lurked in the back, who nodded, before she did.  The paper was caught by the breeze, then suspended there, drifting and flapping, caught in a crosswind that wouldn’t let it waver much.

Verona’s eyes darted over the paper.  Even now, even after two revisions, she could look at it and see imbalances, flaws.  Parts that were too dense, parts that could’ve used more diacritics, and one part where she’d meant to invest a bit more time into things, that had fallen by the wayside when looking at the bigger project, sharing out the workload, and trying to just get it done- without tipping off Charles, initially, then while collaborating while copying it over.

Forming a shape that, while eaten by partial circles and Lordships that extended to the outer bounds of certain cities, loosely resembled Ontario.  Filled in with intricate diagram work.

“This isn’t my domain,” the Alabaster said.

Verona felt her heart trip over something, stumbling.  Metaphorically.

“This is more representative of the Carmine’s domain than my own.  It betrays your motivations, and is betrayed by them, for it weakens the result when I take this…”

The paper slapped down against a bed of flowers between them.

“…and distort it to accommodate this region.”

Flower petals blew across the paper, and caught on paper and areas around the paper, the ends that had once attached to flowers now caught on the surfaces below them, standing up.

A pale fence that snaked out into other regions, covered whole bulges to the west, presumably south of the city.  A whole area to the north.

Easily thirty, forty percent larger.

“Why?” Lucy asked.  “Wait, why is that bigger?”

“To the north, other figures hold sway, that aren’t Judges, nor Lords.  There, nonetheless, for reasons expounded on in texts I’m sure you had access to, it is still possible to travel twenty-four hours to see and pursue an Alabaster for matters of Law.  There, I had kin.  A brother, not by blood, but in spirit.  Once.”

“Killed?” Lucy asked.

“Killed.  Most areas have the like of me and my brother in spirit – we hold some of the Seal’s excess and manage it, we fill in some of the gaps left not filled by resident Incarnations, and provide a touch of divinity where there is no deity.  Think of us as small, nourishing flowers, finding purchase in neglected spots that other plants have not, until something stronger comes along.  Supporting the cycle.  Something stronger came along, plucked my brother from his place, and did not take up the responsibilities or position.  Therefore…”

The flower petals moved, blowing away, swirling, reconfiguring, to once again surround that wider region to the north of the spot the diagram had outlined.

“…I extended my focus and attentions that direction.  Similar things have happened in other neighboring areas.”

“Including Lordships?” Lucy asked.  “You count Thunder Bay.  That’s Thunder bay’s area, right there, that you’ve got flowers around, right?”

“Yeah,” Avery said.

The Alabaster replied, “The Lords have priority, but I have power underlying that.  If the Lord cannot or does not deign to act but a decision needs to be made at a higher level, I make that decision.”

“But not Ottawa?”

“They have developed a system that covers sufficient ground that I have nothing to underlie.  Toronto was similar prior to its surrender to Musser.  Most established Lordships of larger cities are this way.  But Thunder Bay is not that populated, nor does it handle enough of its business that I am not needed.  You yourself recognize this- is it not why you avoided seeking sanctuary in Thunder Bay, after evading the Carmine Exile’s gainsayings?”

Damn.  It was hard to argue against that.

The paper began to rip again.

“Hold on,” Lucy said.  “The points we have to address have to do with to the area covered here.  Use the diagram we presented here, without any tears or changes you just made.”

“If this is an audit of my work, why should it not be a full audit of my work?” the Alabaster asked.  “You would leave out this much?”

“Every point we want to make is covered by this area we’ve marked out.”

“Nonetheless.  Would you want to be judged by a group of people I hand-picked from your town, Lucy Ellingson?  Reaching across my entire territory, picking the right seventy percent, putting the question to majority vote, I could accuse you based on nothing at all and see you condemned.”

“In the geography part of our world studies class,” Avery said, “That’s not- our diagram doesn’t cover seventy percent of things, does it?  Because if you go by population, most of Canada lives by the border.  How many people are you bringing in by adding that thirty percent?  A few hundred?  If we go by people and intelligent Others, doesn’t that skew a lot?”

“Shall we distort the image to represent population instead of place, then?”

“Stop distorting and tearing my nice province-scale city magic diagram,” Verona protested, running fingers through hair.

Her eyes darted over the diagram as her mind free-associated through the possible things that could apply here.  Shamanism, claim, coup, establishment, geography, history, government, Lordships, the little guy, tyranny, democracy, no, no, no, no.

What connected the places in her diagram?  Types of practice.  Technomancy, astrology, heraldric diagrams, too far off track, go back.  Technomancy, technology spirits, shamanism, already ran through that–

“We’re talking about the value of that space you’re adding,” Lucy went on, as Verona’s mind raced.  “You’re screwing up this entire process in your favor by altering a diagram- established precedent, by the way.  Precedent that was established by a large number of families and standalone practitioners using these markings, lines, and symbols to do city magic.  That’s nailed down.  It’s meant to be how the spirits handle things.  It’s wrong to just radically reinterpret it before rushing it into effect.  You represent the spirit world too, right?”

“I do, in places there isn’t a system of leadership to arbitrate spirits.  You had Edith James in your area, managing spirits to various degrees, once, so I had less reason to be active there and then.”

“It’s messed up to abuse that authority over spirits to go against establishment over spirits, at least without better reason,” Lucy said.  “You need more.”

“I’m only applying what you’re giving me.  Avery suggested population distribution mattered, I was applying that.”

“Wait for us to finish giving it and our other answers to you then.  If I cut you off mid-sentence I can’t then call you a liar based on the half-sentence.”

“You can try.”

“But it won’t work, in almost all situations.”

“As you wish.”

“And when you get around to applying this?  Don’t let the tears and any other alterations count.  You’re rushing, it feels like you’re rushing to cheat a bit, and I want to get out ahead of that.”

Lucy could do the free-associating thing, but in a way where she did it while talking, without sounding like a blithering idiot.  Verona could listen to Lucy and hear it happen.  How Lucy started with something in the right ballpark, talking about the value of the territory the Alabaster was saying counted, and the moment she found the right word, diagram, she’d do a sharp turn onto the right track and go after establishment and other stuff.

It was warm, now.  Springtime warm.  Verona shrugged off her coat, hanging it on a peg formed by a broken branch, inside-out so she’d have access to the pockets, and then pulled off her sweater.  She tied it around her waist.

Free-associating still, all the while.  Area, acreage, farmers- no.  Wait, farmers, fences, huge tracts of territory with fences around them.  Who defined the territory?

Go back go back, there was an idea that cropped up earlier.  Space, territory, remove the fences.

Astrology.  Practices having to do with massive, wide areas, often using architectural fixtures.  Stonehenge had once been theorized to be a remnant of old Astrology practice.  Big, city-covering diagrams.  Laila, the girl who’d died at the Blue Heron, had done astrology-like stuff with wide-area curses.  Hell, the perimeter around Kennet was kind of in that ballpark.

And what happened when the fence was down?  What happened when the perimeter was screwed with?  Disaster, leakage, ruin, invasion, ex-vasion.  Happened when geography changed over time, with long-running rituals over wide areas.

Blurry boundaries, time and space, time.  Time, time…

She cinched the knot of the sweater tighter at her waist, then hooked her thumbs in at the sides of the knot.  She borrowed a page from Lucy’s book.  “How long?”

Start in the right ballpark, get her thoughts together with the time that allowed.

“How long to?”

“If I wanted to chart your territory, how long would it take?”

“You have my word.  I cannot lie.  This is my role.”

“You shouldn’t be the judge of your own auditing,” Lucy said.  “Your word and the job you’ve done fitting the role and the possibility you’ve bent the reality and facts is exactly what we’re challenging.  You going somewhere with this, Ronnie?”

Verona nodded a little, quickly.

“Answer her question,” Lucy asserted.

“Answer,” Avery joined in.  Maybe to make it the three of them asking.

“It would depend on the tools and method you used.”

“Days?  Weeks?” Verona asked.

“Yes.”

“And in that time it took to finish, would the borders change?  I could walk the perimeter of one area, marking it out, and by the time I finished the circuit, it could be different?”

“Often.  Usually marginally.”

“Alabaster,” Verona said, moving her hands to her hips.  “How many not-marginal places could you move into that you haven’t already?”

“Much of it is automatic.”

“But some isn’t?” Lucy asked.

“Some is not.  It’s a complicated world.”

“So, just to name one scenario, you could hold off until the boundaries are nearly worked out by an uninvolved, neutral third party, then snap up another territory you’ve put off claiming, so their assumption about borders is wrong?” Verona asked.

“Theoretically.”

“Would you?” Avery asked.

“I cannot know, I would have to know the situation.”

“But you want to survive, and that’s a way of surviving – you’re using it to foil a challenge against you here,” Lucy said.

“You made this challenge against me.  If you want to define my area by borders, that is not my area.”

“Can you deny you’d use this?” Lucy asked.

“No.  I could see myself using it in a specific circumstance.”

“So…” Verona spoke up.  “You’re defining your borders based on something hard for someone that isn’t you to measure, subject to change, and subject to you pulling a stunt to say ‘gotcha’ and mess up anyone trying to call you out on what’s happening inside your borders?  I’d rather use my thing.”

“Which is established by precedent,” Lucy said.

Avery put a hand out toward Verona, in what was kind of a high-five, but Avery clasped Verona’s hand at the end, holding it and not letting go.  It looked like Avery was doing it for Lucy as well.

“Established by precedent, yet it does not represent me.”

“But it’s enough to answer the problem we’re articulating.”

“At the moment we’re talking, your summoning is asserting its rights to use its full power and name its titles for karmic power in a challenge to come.  I reserve a similar right.  I took on responsibilities, in a mostly thankless role.  One of the few ‘thanks’ I have as a result is that when challenged on this, I can say those additional responsibilities count, be they people, Other, spirit, or other forces now under my purview.”

“Then extend this diagram out in a favorable way to the borders of your domain,” Avery said.  “No warping, tearing, just keep the same principles in a way that doesn’t disadvantage us.”

“I am not a practitioner, there are no less than sixteen major ways I could draw this out to the borders.  For example, here, at the edge, you chose to draw a circle to anchor things.  Should I place that here?  Here?  No.  I could not know how to do it in a way that doesn’t disadvantage you.”

“Let us redraw it?” Avery offered.

“If you would like to, I will not object, I estimate that will take another two hours minimum.”

“And you won’t fuck with anything while we’re doing that?” Lucy asked.  “Redrawing borders?”

“I may ‘fuck’ with many things while you’re doing that.  I would leave, handle other matters, and return.”

“Like Charles?  Let him do what he’s doing,” Avery said.

“Believe it or not, while you have my attention, I will have to do other things in my domain to keep balances.  Even beyond you and Charles.”

“Promise to not change the actual borders while we draw them out, or do anything that affects this contest or Charles.”

“I will not.  To do so would be potentially catastrophic.”

“Catastrophic?” Verona asked, surprised.

“The Carmine is currently embroiled in a contest, the Sable watches and counsels.  Hostile outsiders stand at our borders.  Should an attack happen or a vacuum emerge in this vulnerable time, while I’m committed to not adjust the borders of places I control, it may be ceded to other powers like myself, who fill in gaps, which could have wide-reaching consequences.  Many very bad for myself and yourself alike.  It could mean pocket worlds forming, inversions like your Kennet below, changes in how power here is structured- not ones you would like.  Catastrophic works as a word.”

Verona folded her arms.

“I feel like you’re fucking with us,” Lucy said.

“You do.  I can see into your heart to judge your word and that is a strong sentiment you hold.  But I’m only doing what I must, in keeping with the Law and my role.”

“There’s a lot of wiggle room there,” Lucy said.  “If we suggest something that works and you can’t find a way to wiggle out of it, you have to hold to it, right?”

“Yes.  I’m suspicious it will be a compromise between us.”

“I suggest we use that ritual as spelled out, and if there’s an outside element from elsewhere in your region that is relevant and important in a way that changes things, you can name it, and it can count against us,” Lucy said.  “In a way judged by the regional spirit.”

The Alabaster nodded.  She extended a hand toward the paper.

Avery was quick enough to leap forward and grab it.

“Wait,” Lucy said.

“You’ve laid out your terms.”

“You’re rushing this,” Avery said.  “Let us finish talking before we move on to the next phase.”

“Haste makes waste.  We would rather it not make waste of us all,” Guilherme intoned, from the back.  He’d sat down in flowers with his back to a tree, melting snow around him.  Snowdrop was off to the side, moving closer to a kid in a tree, who climbed to other branches and avoided her, settling back down to watch after Snowdrop moved away.

“The issue of playing games with moving the fences of your borders, making it out to be about area when it’s really about population and then rushing things after, and defying establishment,” Lucy said.

“What of it?”

“I wanted it noted for the record,” Lucy said.  “Going into this.”

“As you wish.”

“And you pay for the practice.”

“It is customary for the accusers to pay their share, for me to pay mine, and in the end, the costs are distributed according to the share of victory.”

“We can pay if we have to, depending on how this ends,” Verona said.  “But to start with, you’re paying for the creation of the province spirit.”

“That is your intent, I know, but things are not so simple.”

“Then to arbitrate, I suggest the use of a city magic diagram, province-wide, to create what is basically a provincial spirit to arbitrate on the question of that.”

“Circular.”

“You underlie the Lordships, but other forces underlie you,” Verona said, hooking her thumbs in her pockets.  “Spirits and seal.  The old practice of asking three times to get an answer, it’s rooted in this.  Solomon wanted to avoid traps and circular oaths.  Ask three times, a being of lesser power has to answer.  That applies if a creature like you is acting as an authority against a wrongdoer.  It applies when a practitioner binds an Other, and it applies here.”

“You think I’m lesser?” the Alabaster asked.

Again, she showed a hint of that other self, old, wizened, with deepest, blackest eyes, defying scale and space, here.

The men, women, and children with flowers in their hair stood at the places where trees ended and the clearing started, where there hadn’t been a clearing before the Alabaster had altered the space.  Men leaning into trees and children sitting on branches averted their eyes.

“No,” Lucy replied.  “But you’re the accused wrongdoer here, and with that as a big factor, we know that if we go around this circular argument three times and you haven’t suggested an acceptable way out of it, it’s on you.”

“There are multiple interpretations.”

Verona nodded.  Here they went.  “Then I suggest calling on a regional spirit with awareness of all of the goings-on in Ontario, of you, and the current situation, to arbitrate those interpretations.”

“That’s two full circles in the circular argument after the starting point,” Avery murmured.

“Cease,” the Alabaster said.  “As I said, there are multiple interpretations.  We can put it to the spirits to decide-”

“And the Seal,” Lucy interrupted.

“-and the Seal.  Or we can compromise here; I will pay for it.  If you cannot successfully convince the spirit you summon of your case, you return the cost to me, along with three percent interest.”

“To be paid promptly but not right away,” Avery said.  “We’d have to go get the power source.  We couldn’t bring it in case you’d draw power directly from it without asking, like you almost did by tearing the paper and wrecking Verona’s diagram.”

“And you secure the power after,” Verona added.  “No collateral damage.”

“I’ll do you a kindness,” the Alabaster said.  “You should know the goat is insufficient.  With the three percent interest in particular, the cost exceeds what the goat can provide.  It would be drawn from your reserves.  From the Others that grant you power, or from your Selves.”

Lucy exhaled slowly.  “What are the consequences of that?”

“You would have to choose and name Others you draw power from to be so drained of power they die, let all the Others be drained proportionally, leaving them so weak they are unable to hold onto anything they value for several months.  Or you nominate yourself, and if you do not die, the damage to your Self will be so great you will likely never fully regain the power or potential you once had.  You would be physically and mentally injured in a way that never heals.  If you lived.”

Avery shook her head.

“I suspect I know the argument you’d make.  You’ve studied Law, you’ve invested into this line of attack.  You would have researched me.  You should know that to come after an Alabaster invites backlash.  Few get what they truly desire, when they pluck the likes of my brother to the north from where he does his work.”

“If the auditing says you’ve screwed up,” Lucy replied, “you brought this on your own head.”

“Maybe so.  But if not, then the price should be paid.  The consequences will be bitter.”

“Lucy.”

Verona turned her head to look.

Guilherme.

“If it comes to it, you can name me as one of the Others to die.  I’ve died in many ways, I’m of a certain power and stature.  You’d lose glamour.  But you’d be able to reduce the damage done.  To yourself and the rest.”

“What?” Lucy asked, voice hollow, sounding and looking like there was a lot of emotion that was supposed to be in there, that wasn’t.  “We organize another situation to deal with a problem with the Judges, and another idiot gets in their head to sacrifice themselves?”

“Better me than you.  Because if I did not speak, you’d choose yourself,” Guilherme said.  “And that would be too bitter.”

Lucy shook her head.

“It’s unorthodox, but you may withdraw,” the Alabaster said.  “I’ll allow it if you agree not to pursue this line of attack against me again.”

“Lucy,” Guilherme said.  He shifted his position slightly, settling into that resting position, one leg bent and flat against the flower-ridden ground, and the other bent with knee up, wrist on knee, back to the three.  “That, too, would be too bitter.  I mentored you.  I trust you.”

“We- it’s more complicated than that,” Lucy replied.

We made an oath to the Wild Hunt that we’d look after Guilherme. They were concerned he’d run amok or embarrass them, or lower the esteem of the Winter Court.  What does it mean if we make that oath and then he sacrifices himself for our sake?

Lucy had to be thinking about that, and about so many other things.  John.

“Better to put yourself in the position where you’re negotiating that against the Wild Hunt, than to put Miss, Louise, or Toadswallow in the position of having to tell your mother why her daughter is less than half of what she once was.”

Lucy shut her eyes.

“The important thing is he believes in us,” Avery said.

The Alabaster added her own two cents, saying, “The Winter Fae is a shell, trapped in his ways.  He replays events from the past, not entirely in alignment with the events of the now.  Do not put too much stock in his word.  He is not as fond of you as you wish he was.”

“Wow,” Avery said, turning.  “That’s the most unkind thing I’ve heard you say.  I regret ever calling you nice.”

“Oftentimes, mercy is the cruelest thing you can give someone.  I’m once again offering you the chance to abandon this line of attack.”

“I’ll tell you now,” Guilherme said.  “If you leave, you won’t get another chance.  Not like this.  They will be ready.  Trust yourselves.”

“Well then.  If mercy is the cruelest thing we can give someone, we should sure not to be cruel to you, then, huh?” Lucy asked the Alabaster.

“Are we in agreement?”

Lucy paused, feeling the weight of the decision, then nodded.  So did Avery.

Verona stared at the diagram.  She wished she could make small edits.  But as she did those, she’d notice others.

This was something she could spend five years on.  She wouldn’t.  She knew how her brain worked.  But there was five years of work that could be done here.

She said it with more clarity and volume than she felt it in her chest.  “Yeah.”

The map fluttered, folded into a loose, narrow triangular shape, then speared upward.  A dart of paper with diagram on it, flying skyward.

Piercing the sky above the Alabaster’s domain, established here.  The sky rippled, in a way that made Verona think about the ocean above.

But it was more mirror than liquid.  Once cleared of its ripple, it hung over them, vast, reflecting the area outlined by the diagram’s boundaries.  Reflecting the domain of Alabaster, Carmine, Aurum, and Sable.

The diagram expanded out from the key points, and everything else acted.  Celestial diagram work.  Intricate, detailed, using measurements.  It was like building a machine where it needed to work on the first press of the button.  A machine that spanned the entire region.

Identifying the key individuals.  Distilling them.

Permission from the council in Ottawa helped, and seeing key parts of that diagram grind against one another, that help might’ve been crucial.

The mirror did turn liquid, a drop of quicksilver that reached down, oozing out of that mark made by the dart against the fabric of the sky.  Reaching, filling in, folding into itself.  Spirits swirled, stirred, and took on additional forms.

Verona had taken pains to include Others in this.  She’d screened out the ones who couldn’t understand the full picture or who didn’t have the breadth of experience to be able to stretch out their Self and touch on key elements of reality.  So the ambient spirits were out.  The most one-note of goblins wouldn’t be included- like Windowlicker or maybe even the Cherrypops who’d never had a Snowdrop.  Babies weren’t included, nor the old and infirm.

But there were practitioners in there.  There were Others.  There were people, citizens, non-citizens.  Every thinking soul that contributed to the fabric of this region.

She chose the form of a woman that Verona could’ve imagined as her mom’s coworker, or Louise’s sister.  She had light brown hair pinned back into an almost-bun, a black winter coat, and a tartan scarf, with light makeup.  She seemed like she’d dressed up a bit -that was probably the chunk of Toronto influence- but like she’d done it while two kids had been pulling at her and forcing her to rush through her routine.

A bit like Avery’s mom, but a bit gloomier.  Verona wasn’t sure how much of that was just seasonal affective disorder in play, Ontario mid-winter, or if it was the darker Other influence finding its way in there.

The solid spirit looked around, taking in the scene, silent.  As she glanced at Verona, Verona saw that instead of eyeballs, what was behind her eyelids were white trillium flowers – three fat leaves with a small clustering of yellow… pistils? in the center.  Little pollen-y stem things.

As she turned toward the alabaster, they changed shape, dilating.  More yellow in the middle, almost a little fuzzball, three white petals becoming six.  Smaller grass-like extensions poked out of the gaps.  When she turned back to the girls, glancing over Guilherme, blinking, they were trilliums again.

She wasn’t the spirit of Ontario, exactly, even if Ontario was a big part of it.

That would be the Other influence, then.  The flowers in the eyes.

Way to look as serious as the Judge who oversees Death, Verona thought.

“Hello,” Avery greeted the spirit.  “Do you need an explanation about what’s going on?”

“No.  I’ve been watching longer than I’ve existed.”

Verona felt pretty good that her diagram had worked this well.  The spirit had a good grasp of things, hadn’t fallen apart… awesome.

Just had to hope this worked the way they wanted.

“How do you want to do this?” the spirit of the region asked.

“We raise our points, each side gets to put forth an argument, scenario, illustration, Alabaster gives you full view of her books, past records, recollections, scenes.  If they’re confidential, then all who see it keep the secret,” Avery explained.

She’d wanted to be the one to talk to Ontario.  She had the most cachet with city spirits and city mage stuff.

“If there’s more than one argument?” the Alabaster asked.  “Or demonstration to be made?”

“I decide when we get that far,” the spirit replied, gloved hands in her coat pockets, flowers in perpetual bloom behind her eyes, resetting when she blinked.  “Make your first arguments and demonstrations good ones.  If I can’t come to a firm decision, I’ll ask for another round.”

“Acceptable,” the Alabaster replied.

Verona nodded along with Lucy and Avery.

“Initial argument.  Go ahead.

“Can I make a change?” Lucy asked Verona and Avery.  “To our arguments and calls?  I think this works.”

“I trust you,” Verona replied.

Avery nodded with emphasis.

Lucy stepped forward, eyes on the ground for a second, lips moving, like she was mentally rehearsing for this very important statement.

She stopped a bit short.

One of the Alabaster’s people had stepped out in front, opposite Lucy.  Someone a bit older than them, a teenager in a white toga, flowers in her hair.  She looked like she was about to cry.

“If they can put representatives forward, so can I,” the Alabaster said.  “They have reason to be invested.”

“If she dies, we die,” the teenager in white added, voice soft.

Lucy looked over her shoulder at Verona and then Avery.

“That’s fine,” the regional spirit replied, standing off to the side, listening and watching.  She looked at Lucy.  “Go ahead.”

“The issue I’m having,” Harless said, with special emphasis on the ‘I’m’, like there were a lot of issues, but this was his big personal one, “is how much you’re putting on the provincial spirit.”

“Not quite provincial but yeah,” Lucy said.  “What do you mean?”

“I mean… do you have faith that a spirit pulled together from all of these regions will be on your side?  Maybe it’s just me, but I’ve found an awful lot of people to be awfully disappointing, these last few years.”

Lucy sat back in her chair.  A little ‘honk’ made her reach behind herself, behind a useless little decorative cushion, and pull out Clownstick.  He scampered off.

“Oh, they’re playing this game where they know we only allow a few goblins in the house at a time, due to Daddy’s rules,” America said, upside-down in the chair.  “So they hide to stick it out as long as they can.  I think some have been around for a year, in one of the other houses.  I figure if we can’t find them then Daddy can’t either.  But they should be careful because if Daddy uses an auto-targeting combat practice and they’re in the area, it’s going to take a really good hiding place to fool the spirits.”  She pitched her voice to be heard throughout the house.

There was a distant honk and a rummaging sound from Clownstick.

“I was kind of hoping the spirit would hate what’s happening as much as we do,” Lucy said.  “The way it’s constructed, they get the full picture?”

“And we’d want them to get the full picture of any situations they’re looking in on.  Kind of a trial run at being Alabaster,” Verona said.

“The way I look at it,” Avery said, “is like, my Grumble- my grandfather, he’s-”

“Oh gosh, I still love the Grumble thing,” Liberty cut in, hands at her heart.  “It’s adorable.  Can you marry me just so I can have a Grumble too?  No wait, don’t answer, I don’t want to get in the way of your current relationship, damn.  Fuck.”

“-into shitty politics.”

“What if you adopt me?” Liberty asked.

“Liberty, seriously?” Avery asked.  “Come on.  We’re doing something here.”

Liberty pouted, then nodded.  “I’ll go make cookies.  That’s how I’ll contribute.  Where are the goblins?  Who wants to help me make cookies for the first time?  You guys keep going, I’ll be in earshot.”

“He’s into shitty politics,” Avery repeated herself.  “And like… I’m not super into that stuff, but it sure seems like half the country is too.  But that’s an illusion, right?  It’s really only a third or a quarter who are, but the way the vote splits three ways, two thirds don’t agree with the shitty people?  I’m explaining this badly.”

“The split vote and the first-past-the-post system does mean certain voices are amplified, and a vote for a third party is somewhat wasted, and is thus invisible, or not as represented by numbers or by the system as you’d hope,” Harless said.

“I understood some of those words,” Verona said.

“I think you’d like that stuff if you got into it,” Avery said, “I mean, not like-like, because I don’t think all that many people really get into following along with this stuff and walk away happier or anything, but as a system?  Anyway, my point is… aren’t the numbers kind of encouraging?”

Harless hissed in between his teeth.

“I mean… aren’t they?” Avery asked.  “One quarter or so of Canadians into the shitty politics or whatever, or willing to go along with the shitty stuff if it means their side has a shot of winning, and then the other two-thirds are at least, like, hey, let’s get out of the last century and let kids learn homosexuals exist in health class, so maybe some kids won’t be so confused or intolerant.  Just as one thing.”

“I would…” Harless hesitated mid-sentence, eyes moving across the room, pausing on J.T. for a long moment.  “…hesitate…”

“You’re taking a long time to get words out,” Lucy said.

“…to suggest that there’s a direct parallel between politics and being a good person.”

“Hmm.  I always get a feeling when politics or stuff comes up, that it’s a minefield, even with family,” Avery said.  “That someone I know could turn around and-”

“Show their ass?” Lucy asked.

“-reveal themselves to have disagreeable views.”

“Showing their ass,” Lucy said.

“Welcome to growing the fuck up, the adult world sucks,” America said, still draped sideways and upside-down across an armchair.

Verona sighed.

“America, America,” Liberty whispered.  “Fleshmongler practices to speed up the cookie making process, yes or no?”

“Libs, are you for real?  With cookies?  That have no meat in them?  Yes.  All the way yes.  I’ll help,” America said, leaping to her feet.

“Are you showing your ass, Mr. Harless?”

“I’m- no.  I don’t think I am.  I agree, kids should be fully equipped for the changing world.  I devote my life to serving the disadvantaged who would otherwise be in tough legal situations and situations in Practice.  I’m worse than a bleeding heart, I’m a bleeding wallet.  If I wasn’t in so deep fighting for the little guy, I’d have less gray hairs from worrying about the power bill.  I’m not showing my ass, I hope.  I don’t think anyone here is?”

He’d sort of glanced at J.T. as he asked.

“No,” J.T. said.

“You’re cool, Mr. Harless, for what it’s worth,” Verona told him.  “I don’t envy you any-”

“I don’t envy me either.”

“-but you’re cool.”

“Thank you for that input, I will probably take that one comment from someone young for way more than it’s worth.  I don’t get many compliments, but-”

“You are cool,” Avery chimed in.  Lucy nodded.

He laughed softly, running fingers through his hair.  “Three thirteen or fourteen-”

“Fourteen,” Lucy said.

“Three fourteen year olds apparently think I’m cool, I will take that for what it’s worth, sad thing to be this happy about-”

“I barely know you but I looked you up, glanced at some of your Law writings, I think you’re doing good things,” J.T. said, pushing glasses up her nose.  “And I’m curious what you were going to say before the interruptions.”

“I- I have barely any recollection of what I was going to say,” he stammered.

“Politics, people…” Verona offered.

“Oh.  Of course.  Maybe the best way to phrase it would be to say… hm.”

He paused.

“Is there a better way to get a sense of what direction the population of the area might lean?” Avery asked.  “I mean, just in terms of, you know, the little guy against the ruthless tyrant.  Broad strokes.”

“You’d hope, but in reality, gods, people can really fucking disappoint you, and surprise you.”

“In a bad way?” Verona asked.

He nodded, sighed, then said, “I’d say good and bad people fall in all areas of the political spectrum.  Some politics make people act badly, or even become bad people, as they buy in.  Sometimes people hold to bad politics but are charming, kind people who-”

“Won’t give me the benefit of a doubt, in a pinch?” Lucy asked.

“I- yes.  Some of them.  More or less.  People are creatures of routine, of group mentality, that’s not to excuse, but it can take a jarring situation to break people from their stride when they’re striding down bad paths.  I’m sorry.”

Lucy nodded.

“I guess the way I’d phrase it,” he said.  “Is this isn’t about good or bad, but about justice.  As someone who’s been working in law and Law most of my adult life, I’ve… I’ve got very little faith in the average person’s ability to be just.”

“Even breaking them from their strides and dropping them all into a magic spirit blender to poop out a big regional spirit?” Verona asked.

“Even then.”

“Fuck.”

“I want to think that at least two thirds of people are good and just,” Avery said.

Verona shook her head.  “I want to think all people are good and just, but Sebastian’s right, at a certain point you have to get real.  Politics might be a hint about the directions people might lean with justice and all that, but, like… Jeanine.  That girl who liked you who got super shitty.  I don’t think the way she’d eventually vote would be any clue about how awful she’d be.  And McCauleigh?”

Avery nodded.

“But,” Lucy said.  She shifted in her seat.  A ‘honk’ made her pause to raise her rear end off the armchair’s cushion, reach beneath it, and pull Clownstick out again.  She tossed him lightly at Snowdrop, who caught him.  Lucy sighed.

“But?” Verona asked.

“But there’s one thing I’d trust about the average Canadian.  Being overly critical about people in charge.”

“Unless they’re their people, maybe,” Avery replied.

“Is the Alabaster theirs?” Lucy asked.  “It’s a lonely role.”

Avery considered that.  “That feels like a shitty weakness to target.”

“It’s the issue we’re having in the first place, right?” Verona asked.  “We’ve talked about this, where you really need people to keep your head straight.  The Carmine Beast didn’t have that, and it did her in.  The Alabaster has some, but… I don’t think her head’s straight.  Especially after all these years.  What we’re doing, summoning?  It’s people.  To call her out on her shit.  To question what’s going on with people in charge, when apparently a bunch of even Others and practitioners don’t know about Alabasters and Carmines and contests.  Right?”

Avery nodded.

“People as a group can be dumber than individuals alone, though,” Lucy murmured.

“True.  But this is only part one of our attack.  Either way, people, to call her on her shit.”

“People, to take a possibly overly critical look at the one in charge,”  Lucy said, looking at Harless.  “Does that change the math?  Move the needle?”

“It does.  It’s cynical but yes.  You’re very right.  The question is if it moves the needle enough.”

First Point of Order

“Go ahead,” the regional spirit told Lucy.

“For the first point of order.  Subverting this very process.  I made special note before the Alabaster that she was gaming things on three different counts, just in the process of us getting here.  Playing games with shifting borders, ignoring establishment in favor of personal convenience-”

“Survival,” the teenager from the Alabaster’s domain said.  “Hers and ours.”

“Don’t interrupt,” the provincial spirit said.

“-and playing around with wobbly definitions of area and population only to immediately rush the process, a thing she did repeatedly.  Not even letting us get a full argument out.  We litigated it already, you can look back and see.”

“She’s trying to survive, as is her right,” the teenager said.  She looked nervous, and heartbroken.  Her hands toyed with the toga-style dress she wore, tied at the shoulders.  “If she dies, we die.”

“Why?” Lucy asked.  “That’s not-”

“Please,” the spirit interrupted.  “I have my limitations.  Let me address this point first.  I will see those arguments.”

The Alabaster nodded.  She gestured.  The light changed.  The spirit turned her face skyward, into the light.  The sunbeams flickered and moved, and Verona could look down and see how the shadows cast by those sunbeams had silhouettes and images.  A fast-forward replay of the prior conversation.

“I don’t think you die when the Alabaster does, by default.  That wasn’t in the books.  There’s even a reference of a Lord of the Forest in white, in the Fae courts, who took in children in a time of need, he died, the mantle passed on, the children went with the mantle.  That was an Alabaster, we’re pretty sure.”

“It was.  Our Alabaster has told us of him.”

Avery asked, “So… why say you die?”

“We’ve all chosen to die if she dies.”

“Why?” Verona asked.  “That’s dumb.”

“It’s one of the only powers we have.  To lend additional weight to her death.  We’re not fighters.  She gave us so much.  This is what we give back.  All of us.”

Verona looked at the girls and boys and men and women with flower crowns and sad looks in their eyes, bare feet in soft beds of tiny white flowers and clover.

“That’s fucked up,” Lucy said.

“Fucked up enough to be a point of order, replace one of our weaker ones?” Verona asked.

Lucy shook her head.

“Might go the wrong way,” Lucy murmured.  “By the way, using this one to replace our third, which was kind of weak-ass.”

“It was,” Avery said.  “Appreciate Sebastian suggesting it though.”

The light shifted.  The spirit moved, lowering her head.  The flowers in her eyes were radiant, still, bright with the energy they’d held.

“Okay, that will do,” the spirit said.  “Next point of order?”

“No verdict?” Lucy asked.

“There is one.  I’ll consider everything together.  Make your next point of order.”

“…I am he who was was gifted and given four annoying sounds by the most annoying noise winners of the Teddtacular Fall Festival of twenty-nineteen, the first noise of which is eeeeeee- uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh- uuuuuurrrrrrrrr- uuuuuurrrrrrrrr- -eeeeeee- pft, the second noise of which is moyyyyst-uhhhgh, the third sound of which is-”

Percival dragged a spirit-fingernail along a tooth, producing a chalkboard noise with a faint but definitely audible grinding sound as he damaged the tooth.

Charles shifted uncomfortably.

“-and the fourth sound of which is-” Percival drew in a deep breath, then launched into a rapidfire rendition of, muhbuhminnibinnibahbahmuhbuh- binbuhahbahahhahhbinnybinny- binnybinnybuhmeebeegeeheehee- heeheeheeheeheeheeheehee- hidiebuhmuhbinnybuhbahmuh- buhbinnyginnymuhheegeeheehahahhahhahahh-“

Second Point of Order

First point of order: Subverting this very process.

“Second point of order,” Avery said, stepping up.  “The Alabaster has gone against what she’s meant to do by giving power to the Carmine Exile.  She is meant to protect innocents and Innocents, but she gave power to the Carmine Exile at the same time the Carmine Exile was gainsaying kids at the Blue Heron.  That’s like a firefighter siphoning fuel from their truck to give gas canisters to an arsonist.”

A man from the Alabaster’s camp who’d stepped forward to represent the Alabaster answered, “By way of gainsaying, many were removed from an area that was under immediate threat, taken out of the region.”

Avery shook her head.  “They were removed from one of the only areas that’s remained consistently safe, relatively, at least, compared to most of the region.  When it wasn’t safe, it was because of the Carmine Exile’s actions, including one invasion which, again, he borrowed of your power to do.  You pushed Talia Graubard back into her very abusive mother’s embrace when she’s not equipped to even recognize what’s happening.  McCauleigh Hennigar went home.  Sol Ferguson went to his overbearing mother.  The Blue Heron was, for a lot of these kids, a sanctuary.  I’m still in touch with those people.  Including Liberty Tedd, who was taking care of the kids so they wouldn’t have to go home.”

Lucy stepped in, adding, “The Alabaster, in her domain, is meant to have a quarter of newly manifested Others, karmic balances, Incarnate balances, practices, Aware, Innocent-Other interactions, pocket worlds, and more in her purview.  To get this out of the way, each of the four is contrasted against the other three in different ways.  She is life and growth and beginnings, including youth and children, opposed by the Sable who is death and endings.  She is nature and subsistence against the Aurum’s handling of society and capitalism.  And she is meant to protect kids, youth, innocents, the prey, against the very likes of Charles and she fucking fed him.”

Verona thought about McCauleigh.  Still no word.  It kind of ate at her.  “Sanctuaries and protected spaces are your domain and you, by proxy, pushed them out of it.  You let them go.”

“That’s your argument then?” the regional spirit asked.

Lucy nodded.

The man standing in for the Alabaster replied, “We cannot know what happened to them.  They’re not in the area.  Anything we heard would be hearsay.”

“It’s hard to know or decide in full,” the regional spirit said.  “It’s true, none of the gainsaid are still in the area.”

“Is that an invitation to put forward another argument?” Avery asked.

“Go on.”

“I can put you in touch with Liberty Tedd, who looked after the kids, who knows more than I do.  I can put you in touch with Zed Sadler, who was apprentice under Raymond Sunshine, who definitely has his flaws-”

Lucy nodded.

“-but who Zed can testify really truly believes in creating a safe space for children and teens to be children and teens, to find other viewpoints, grow, escape homes where they’d be turned into victims or copies of their parents.  You can add that to whatever you ask the Alabaster to show you to supplement all of this.”

“Then I’ll ask you to also include Abraham Musser in what you witness and look into,” the man added.  “Because Raymond Sunshine might’ve believed in creating that space for kids, but he gave custody of the school to Abraham Musser, and that undermines those beliefs.  He was in charge for some of the events.  The school was later abandoned to the Belangers, who recent events will show you were not very good at looking after youths.”

“Some were,” Avery retorted.  “One was willing to make a great sacrifice.”

“Enough.  I’ll look into it.”

Avery got her phone out, dialed, and handed it over.

The spirit stepped away, phone to her ear.

Verona tilted her head.  “Might’ve been good to screen the call, let Liberty know it’s not you.  In case the first thing out of her mouth is…” she left the rest of that sentence unsaid.

“Oh no,” Avery whispered.  Her hand went out, like she wanted to take the phone back.  She dropped it back down.

The regional spirit turned around, eyebrow quirked, and looked at Avery, before stepping further away, replying to whatever had been said.

“…rude, or weird, or something,” Verona concluded.

Lucy looked over at the man.  “You guys seem weirdly informed about all of this.  Doesn’t seem like the heavy stuff you’d talk about in this peaceful, perfect domain.”

“We wanted to.  To support her, be a sympathetic voice for her.  All of us are prepared to throw it all away if it means protecting her.  Throw everything away.  Giving up one night to learn the facts and learn all of this, to be able to defend her now?  To be able to welcome in those who come to us in need?  Easily.  I went to her domain in the hopes of getting five minutes of real respite and peace.  She gave me fifty years.”

He did not look fifty years old.

“What was so bad?” Avery asked.

“I was out of my mind.  She gave me sanity.”

He said that with so much emotion in his voice that Avery looked away.

Verona watched it, looked at the others waiting in the wings.

She was next up for the next point of order.  She hated public speaking, she really did.  She was already dreading it.  Gods and spirits, if she fucked this up…

Who out of these people from the Alabaster’s sanctuary would be arguing against her?

“uhnibbinibbinahnahwahwahwin- wuhahwahahhahhahhbeebooweewoo- nimmyurpburpherpderpnuhwee- zeedeeheeheeheeheeheeheeehee-“

Third Point of Order

First point of order: Subverting this very process.
Second point of order: her power was used to hurt the children in her domain.

“Third point of order,” Verona said.  “The Alabaster hasn’t made her domain accessible to those most in need.  Milly Legendre told us about a trussed- a man condemned to hold a jar of Other-poison for what might be centuries.  The Beorgmann has a huge number of children in his grip.  Children that need rescue.  Gilkey is distillation of poison, miserable, isolated.  We’ve heard about-”

She hated public speaking.  It didn’t help that the last time she’d really had a big audience in front of a group of peers was when she’d been questioned about Alexander’s murder in front of the Blue Heron students, and she’d kinda broken down.

Something about being in front of a lot of people made her defenses crumble.  It sucked ass.

“-um.  We’ve heard about how in other regions, Judges have set up time loops to deal with a massive problem.  We’ve heard from experts about Alabasters and how they will find and assign champions to key tasks.  We’ve seen Charles- the Carmine Exile go out of his way to find the Forsworn and rescue them, which is problematic in its own way-”

“Why?” the regional spirit interrupted.

Interruptions didn’t help either.

“We’ll get back to that, if that’s okay?” Verona asked.

The spirit nodded.  She’d manifested a big travel-mug of coffee out of the aether and took sips from it, leaning against a tree, watching everything with eyes that had flowers instead of orbs.  Listening.

Where had she been?  What was-

“Charles rescued the Forsworn,” Avery murmured.

Thank you.

Verona picked up where she’d left off before the interruption, “Charles went looking for the Forsworn, but there are people who’ve been in the most awful situations for months- Gilkey.  For decades, at least?  Like the Gu-jar Trussed guy?  And god, what, centuries, for some of the kids the Beorgmann got?  She can’t get off her ass?  The only people who get her fancy sanctuary and flower crowns and white linen dresses are the ones who find her?  Who even know to find her in the first place?”

Verona shrugged.  “That’s balls.”

One of the flower-crown people from the Alabaster’s domain was a woman with heavy scars.  The kind of scars that came from being hurt, on purpose, by another person.  She had hair that had been washed and was glossy and she had the nice linen dress and flowers in her hair, but the scars and a bit of a mumble that came with regional dialect and maybe missing teeth or an injured tongue really made for a contrast.  She replied, “Askin’ ‘er to find and look after erry person who ain’t able to look after thesselves or find the strength or faith to ask for help-”

Verona cut in.  “A lot of these people don’t have the knowledge on how, or they have the knowledge but they don’t have the ability to go on a one-day hike to meet some white deer in the middle of nowhere.”

“Don’t interrupt,” the spirit said.

“It ain’t a fair burden and it ain’t a fair ask,” the woman with the scars said.  “She does too much already.”

“We’ve been Carmine by using Alcazars,” Lucy said.  “You can split your focus more than that.”

“It ain’t about splittin’ anythin’.”

“And she’s been Alabaster for a really long time,” Avery said.  “The Beorgmann’s been there for a really long time too.  She couldn’t find a couple hours on a Thursday to organize champions to find a better solution than fencing it in, knowing it’s going to escape someday?”

“That thing is too strong.  It was the best way, leavin’ ‘im alone.”

“A gargantuan primeval beast attacked the east coast, and that’s about as ‘too strong’ as you can get,” Verona replied.  “But that’s not even the point.”

“What is your point?  Summarize,” the regional spirit told her, steaming coffee in hand.

“The vulnerable shouldn’t- shouldn’t be expected to ask for help.  Help should be given.  Especially when someone’s in a position to give that help and- I dunno.  When you’re-”

Shouldn’t say I dunno when you’re making a practice statement.

“-when the people suffering can’t even ask.  Because they’re young, or prisoner, or hurting, or whatever.  We’re talking about magic.  There have to be solutions, so many things are possible.  You, regional spirit, exist because we believe in the possibility of better.  We’re challenging the Alabaster because we believe in the possibility of better.  We- look them in the eyes.  That’s all I ask.”

The Alabaster spoke for the first time in a while.  “The Beorgmann’s domain is outside my own.  It’s one of those instances I talked about earlier, that making my borders too firm because of an oath lets other things occupy the space.  I cannot give a clear look into the eyes of his children.”

“Your counter-argument?” the spirit asked the woman with the scars.

“There’re commromises.  If you kill that burgerman thin’?  Not easy, but if you do?  Those kids’re his, his!  Through and through!  ‘N they’re free now?  Tha’ll do a lot more harm.”

“But how many problems are caused by letting it sit?” Verona asked.  “Trying to clean it up now might be a clusterfuck, but leaving it means the future-clusterfuck is worse.”

“Interrupt again, and I’ll give this one to the Alabaster,” the regional spirit told her.  “I don’t want to, that’s not who I am, but I don’t know what else to threaten.”

Verona sighed.

“It’s about the future,” the woman with the scars said, voice level, intense now.  “You talk about balance, Alabaster does this, Sable does that, Aurum does sommin’ or other?  She’s careful.  What the Carmine’s doin’?  There’s no avoidin’ that.  Say no, don’ give him the freedom to do wha’ he said ‘e was goin’ to do?  He’d do jus’ what you’re doin’.  She’s plain’ the opposite of what he is, he’s reckless, she’s savin’.  She’s threadin’ a needle, she’s been threadin’ a needle all this while.  Savin’ today so she can do more good for cennuries to come.  The lesson to take away from this isn’t that you want less of the Alabaster!”

“That’s not-” Verona blurted out.

“Interruption?” the spirit asked, arch.

“That wasn’t an interruption, was it?” Verona asked, suddenly alarmed.  “Was it?”

She turned toward Avery, Lucy.  Lucy shook her head.  Avery said, “She was done, I think.”

Guilherme stared at her, gaze cold, from the back.

“I was done,” the woman with the scars said.

“Let me reply?” Verona asked.

“You’ve made your arguments.  I don’t want this to be an eternal back and forth.  There are literal centuries of history to dig through.”

“I know,” Verona said.

“I’d rather you equip me to take in the big picture.”

Verona wasn’t even sure what she wanted her response to be.  But she couldn’t leave it at that.  She pressed hands together.

“Go on.”

“We don’t want less of her.  We want more, more active Alabaster.  We want her to stand up to wrongdoing.  Because I think if you look at the math, if you look at raw facts, tally up the harm done, the way those kids are accumulating in the Beorgmann’s realm, and staying there, becoming his, like she talks about?  Whatever she’s saving for, whatever she’s threading?  I think we’re trending downward with her.  That’s ignoring all the other stuff we’re bringing up, like her powering the Carmine, specifically.”

“Power now so he can get done sooner, one way or the other, and we can carry on at the other side?” the woman with the scars asked.

“We’re trending downward with this, with this conservative help we’re giving, is my argument here.  We could be helping so much more, like other places are, we could be trying, reaching out, and it doesn’t feel like she is.  I’m not perfect, we’re not perfect, but we’re trying, here, we’re taking people in, in Kennet, I’m- in my house, my Demesne, we’re experimenting, we’re connecting people and Others, we’re trying.  We need an Alabaster that tries too.”

“You wanna talk facts?  I’ll talk somethin’ else,” the woman with the scars replied.  She looked angry, now.  Hurt, like she herself had been personally attacked.  “You came here an’ you high five each other?  You’re jokin’ around?”

The Avery high-five into handhold thing?

That hadn’t been-

Verona couldn’t interrupt.

“You send some goofball thing at the Carmine, to distract him?  We heard.  She told us, on the way here.  You think it’s funny, what you’re doing?  You come here, you attack us, attack this?  This peace?  An’ then you act surprised we’re going to die too?  No.  You’re guttin’ our peace.  We die when she dies, an’ we do it ’cause when she’s gone, we’ll know there ain’t no peace, that you can do everythin’ right, play it safe, and you’ll still lose what you got.  All we get is peace and you take that away?  Leave us fearin’ the peace could end any day?  Nah.  That’s not fun, it’s not funny.”

Didn’t think it was, Verona thought.

The woman’s voice was anguished.  Anger etched her features, her face red in a way that made little scars stand out.

“You want to attack this?  You think this ain’t enough?  What she’s doing?  Threadin’ the needle, best she can, to get us through to the other side?  We’re trendin’ downward?  We’re trendin’ that way ’cause of you.  You talk about what you’re building.  Look at your town.  Look at what’s happening right now, today, to what you built.”

We can’t, Verona thought.  We’re not in a position to.

“You can’t, can you?  You don’t know.  They’re changin’ it, they’re tearing it down, not wastin’ any time.  You want a counter argument to what she’s sayin’?  Look at what they built, look at what the Alabaster’s kept going for cen’ries.  Trendin’ downward’s better than being held at knifepoint.”

The regional spirit nodded.

“So make your jokes, high-five yourselves, do this, but if you win, I hope you know, those jokes, they’re chasin’ us to our deaths, and those laughs and jokes won’t seem so funny when it’s all finished fallin’ to pieces.”

“Alright,” the spirit replied.  “I’ll take that into consideration.  Let me deliberate, and we can move on to the next point.”

What’s going on? Verona thought.  What were they missing?  What had happened in Kennet?

She shifted anxiously.  There was no good way to know, was there?  They’d been blind, and now they were tied up in this.

Had to see this through.

“-aybaywaywipbipahwahah- hahhahhdeedoodeewoo-panty.”

Percival drew in a deep breath.  “…and the thirty-ninth of which is…”

“Why panty?” one of the men who’d gathered asked.  “Why- why?”

“It’s a goblin noise, it’s meant to throw you off,” another of the contestants said, a squirrel knight.  “They’re right bastards.”

“Is that an interruption, sirs?” Percival perked up, midway through panting breaths.  “Sirs?  I should start over so you can be sure to get the full effect of my titles.”

“Percival,” Charles said.

“What?  Huh?  Sir?  Another interruption?”

“Huzzah,” Charles said, leaning forward.

“What?  Huzzah?  Huzzah!”

“Huzzah!” Charles said, with feigned enthusiasm.

“Huzzah!”

“Thirty-ninth title, you like this one, as much as you can like anything, you barely-a-person-spirit, you.  Go.”

“What, but-”

“Huzzah!  The thirty-ninth of which!  Huzzah huzzah huzzah!  The thirty-ninth of which!”

“Huzzah!  Yes!  The thirty-ninth title of which is that I am someone who is gracious and happy to have been graced with those four annoying sounds by the most annoying noise winners of the Teddtacular Fall Festival of twenty-nineteen, and overjoyed to have heard the two runners up, the first noise, I’ll remind you, was eeeeeee- uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh- uuuuuurrrrrrrrr- uuuuuurrrrrrrrr-…”

Charles dropped the feigned enthusiasm and slumped back into a sitting position, shooting the man and squirrel who’d interrupted an unimpressed look.

“Much weaker crop this time,” the Sable murmured.

“A farce,” Charles replied.  “The last event caught the strays like the Mimeisthai, Faceful. The non-strays don’t want to attack an established Carmine, even me, if they can sense I won’t be weakened before they get to me.”

“…the second noise of which, I’ll remind you for your annoyance and benefit, was moyyyyst-uhhhgh…”

The Sable leaned over, murmuring, “I hope you know, I don’t take amusement in enforcing the procedure they’re abusing.”

“I know.  You mind telling me what’s going on, on the outside?  What are they doing?”

“Not according to procedure.  You already know that.  For now, your focus should remain entirely within this contest.  Continue deciphering this little figure so you can move things along faster-”

“Over forty partial repetitions and four complete ones, so far.”

“-and we will take over where we can, as we must,” the Sable said, with enough emphasis Percival seemed to hear, perking up, slowing down.

“Huzzah,” Charles chimed in.  It was like goading a horse to keep running.

Charles drew in a deep breath, sighing as Percival carried on.

“…muhbuhminnibinnibah- bahmuhbuhbinbuhahbahah…”

Blind to what was going on elsewhere.

Whatever was being attacked, whether it was Maricica, or Lis, or the students, or the new knottings, he couldn’t do anything about it.

Had to see this through.

First point of order: Subverting this very process.
Second point of order: her power was used to hurt the children in her domain.
Third point of order: Failed to reach out to those in direst need

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