Pale: 6.6 - Verona
Author: Wildbow

Cutting Class – 6.6 | Pale

The summer rain came down as they were in the midst of dinner.  Half of the students fled inside, while the rest hurried to finish.

Verona hunched over her plate, feeling the cold droplets touching her back where her shirt didn’t extend far enough down her back and her overalls-dress didn’t have enough coverage.

They hadn’t talked much since the thing with Shellie.  Avery had gone for a walk to cool down with Lucy, and Verona had holed up in their room, taking notes and reading up.  The relative lack of conversation even after they’d reunited meant they’d made it further into their meals, and by unspoken agreement they shoveled the last few bites of food into their mouths rather than carry everything inside.

Pork tenderloin, stuffed with pesto and wrapped in bacon, grilled with wood fire, from the faint smokey taste to it.  When her dad did pork chops, they were usually dry enough she had to use applesauce or something, which made them clammy.  The vegetables here were grilled too, and they had life.

“Want me to take your glass?” Lucy asked, as she finished, standing from the bench.

Verona shook her head, finishing the last bites, then chasing them with a swig of water.

“I don’t have the appetite,” Avery said.  “Want to finish this, Leftover-vore?”

“Yeah,” Snowdrop said.

“Too bad,” Avery said.

They stacked up their dishes, glasses and salad bowls, and carried them over to the carts by the door, Lucy pulling her hood up.

Verona shivered, waiting impatiently as a pair of boys took too long to get through the door and water beaded her arms, legs, and lower back.

The humid gloom and the confines of the hallway were a bad mix with the way the students were.  The layout of the school didn’t really lend itself to being indoors and also being able to steer clear of the other students.  In the hallways, students were gathering in clusters that had to be navigated around, and sometimes the looks they shot at Verona, Avery, and Lucy weren’t friendly.  Or they looked like the type who might have a beef with a student.

The end of the hallway near all the storage rooms and stuff had students sitting in the hall.  As they walked by the library, Verona could see that students had taken up residence at tables, and there was a tension in there that was like what was in the hallway, if just a bit quieter.  The librarian Nina looked stressed, picking at her cuticles with her fingernails.

At the far end of the hall, some were hanging out in the student lounge, and others in the big classroom.  Only the senior students were really suppposed to go to the west hallway unless they were going to talk to the headmaster, so that was out.  Kitchen was out.

The babble of conversation changed all at once, as Mrs. Durocher stepped from the big classroom to the main hallway, in view of most of the student rooms and the cushy student lounge.  She walked down the hall, saying ‘hi’, apparently, to the occasional student.

As the babble resumed, it was more subdued.

“We’re going to our room?” Verona asked, realizing she wasn’t walking forward as fast, now that she was walking toward Durocher.

“I guess,” Lucy said.  “Unless you have other ideas?”

“Yeah,” Verona said.  “Unless, like, Ave mentioned wanting to go swimming.”

“It’s raining,” Avery said, raising an eyebrow.

Verona gave her a look.  “You’re going to get wet anyway.  It’s still warm out, and there’s probably less kids out.”

“Aw, but there’s less birds,” Snowdrop commented.  “Gotta love the birds, especially the big ones, they do that cool stuff with sudden movements and flying off in a way that totally makes sense.  I love it.”

“Less birds,” Verona said, seriously, to Avery.  “I guess it makes hunting harder.”

“And it keeps the bugs underground,” Snowdrop said.  “Yucky bugs.”

“I think I’ll pass,” Avery said.  “I mean, if we were already out there, or if we were camping, that’s one thing, but…”

“I think that’s weird,” Verona said.

“Something’s weird here,” Avery said.

“It ain’t me,” Snowdrop said.

“You had your thing you wanted to do?” Lucy asked.  “The Alcazar?”

Verona nodded.  “But I don’t know if the workshop is free.  I put our names on the sheet.”

“Let’s prep, at least,” Lucy said, opening the door to their room.

It felt weird to do it.  Like going to bed at six.  Which was weird because Verona spent a lot of her time in her room when she was home.  This was different because… because the world she wanted to participate in was out there, here.

“What’s the plan?” Avery asked, collapsing onto her bed, pulling her phone out in the same motion.

“You’ve got the book?” Lucy asked.

“Here,” Verona passed it to her from the bedside table.

Avery had to shield her face as Snowdrop threw herself onto the bed a second later, then used her elbow to nudge Snowdrop away as Snowdrop crawled across the bed, up to the pillow and the window.  It was gloomy outside, and the window was fogging a bit from the temperature changes.  Snowdrop breathed on it, then traced the outline of a figure outside in the condensation.

Verona walked over, leaning in, and cupping her hand over her forehead to block out the light so she could see.

Drowne, one of Reid Musser’s two familiars, was standing out there, taking in the rain. He was soaked through, wearing a black sweater and black slacks, his hair long, shaggy, and plastered to his head and shoulders the face behind the long black hair looking as though the flesh was being pulled back from the sides, like a plastic bag pulled against someone’s face.

Blackhorne was out there pacing near him.  Blackhorne was horned, with a curly mane of hair and a beard.  He was wearing a heavy coat even in the summer warmth, but the nature of his hair and coat didn’t seem to absorb the downpour.

Snowdrop changed from human to opossum, to get smaller fingers for more detailed drawing in the condensation.

“The Alcazar is a complex tool for any of the practices that use tools,” Lucy recited.  “It is, at the same time, a crude tool for the beginner who wishes to perform changes with the same care one might employ when swinging a hatchet, and a tool of nuance for the expert who seeks to work with more than mere stone and wood, but with the whispers the wood catches and the heart-impressions laid beneath stone.  These books are so long winded.”

“If you don’t like it, you should take it on yourself to do a book, plain and simple language.”

“My dad always complains about the recipes being buried behind people’s life stories,” Avery said.  “It’s sort of the same thing, right?  Like, I was looking at the Familiar text last night-”

“Why?” Verona asked, sitting on the bed opposite Avery.  “What’s the point in you reading about familiars?”

“Go bite her, Snow,” Avery said.

Snowdrop abandoned the window-drawing and scampered across the bedside table, leaping onto the bed.  She mock-bit Verona’s neck.  Verona feigned thrashing and dying.

“I was looking and it’s like, ritual’s wayyyy at the back.  I just wanted to know what the materials and prerequisites were, in case we needed to start early.”

Lucy turned the page, reading carefully.  “Probably some dumb kids would do the ritual without thinking if you didn’t put a bunch of stuff in front of it.”

“Wouldn’t the really dumb kids just flip ahead anyway?  What are you really doing, except adding a few extra seconds of effort?” Verona asked.  She made a different face and contorted as Snowdrop repeatedly ‘bit’ her, touching teeth to flesh.  “Scroll to the end of the terms of service, kind of?”

“At least the reader is acknowledging they’re missing stuff if they flip ahead like that,” Lucy said.  “It makes it harder for them to be angry at the author, instead of being angry at themselves.  The introduction is saying that the difficulty posed by the ritual escalates as you try to do more dramatic stuff.  What are we trying to do?”

“If we did this, we’d be looking to make the photo into something we can use for materials, in making your implement,” Verona said.

“Something glass,” Avery said.  “Could we make the photo into a photo in a frame?  Then use the glass?”

“Book said maybe,” Verona said, as Snowdrop seized her ear.  “There’s a few other possibilities.”

Lucy adjusted her grip on the book, forearms across the pages, hands over the top end of it.  She frowned.  “How sure are you that you’re willing to give up these objects?”

“Do you not want us to?”

“I’m really touched that you’re offering.  And I like the idea of having you guys with me.  But…”

“But?” Verona asked.  She picked up a struggling, nipping Snowdrop, sitting up straight.

“Okay, let’s say we divide up the rituals.  We’re giving this one more ‘us’ weight, right?”

Verona nodded with some emphasis.

“Do we do that with demesne and familiar too?  And if so, how?”

Verona lowered Snowdrop to her lap.  “Well, putting aside some possibilities that are a bit touchy…”

“Touchy?” Lucy asked.

“You not being human anymore?” Avery asked, quiet.  She twisted around so her head was closer to Lucy as she lay on the bed, more able to face Verona.

“I don’t- I don’t think it’s touchy, exactly,” Avery said, voice soft.

“Weird then, or sad, or- I know it bothers Lucy.”

“I don’t want you to change, like that,” Lucy said.  “You wouldn’t be you.”

“It’s so I can stay me that I’d want to do it, though,” Verona said.  “Nevermind.  It’s not the primary plan anymore.”

“I want you to trust us that we can help more than you trust that that would help,” Lucy said.

Verona nodded.  A second later, she jumped, nearly dumping Snowdrop out of her lap.  “Geez, Snow!”

“What did she do?” Avery asked.

“Tried to nip my thigh, and her whiskers tickled me, too.  Okay, enough.  Go bite Avery now.”

Snowdrop climbed out of her lap, then made halting progress climbing down the sheet that draped over the side of the bed, head pointing down as she climbed.  Verona put a hand on the sheet to keep Snowdrop’s weight from pulling it off the bed, which would have dropped Snowdrop face-down into the floor.

“So how do we balance it?” Avery asked.  “How do we do the familiar thing in a way where we’re all contributing?”

“We could work it into the ritual,” Lucy said.  “One person takes the familiar, the other two are like… ministers at the wedding, or something?  Handing off or giving permission?”

Avery raised her head up to watch Snowdrop as the opossum reached the floor, nails clicking on wood.  “It would be cool if, I dunno, if we tied things together so we can say, hey, Alpy, want to go be Verona’s sorta-familiar for a bit?  Or Lucy’s?”

“We’re tied together and we draw on a similar pool of power, right?” Verona asked.  “We don’t really know a lot about how that works, but I remember reading about something like it in the Famulus tome.  How things are shared.  One person can be depleted, then the others are drained.”

“And the Familiar would be something tied to that three-way pool?” Lucy asked.

Verona shrugged.  “Might make it easier.”

“We’d want someone all of us can connect with, then,” Avery said, smiling like she was up to some mischief.

Verona felt the mattress shift, and she jumped a bit.  The bed was breaking?

Snowdrop tackled her, human-size, and pinned her arms to her side as she bit into the softer part of Verona’s shoulder where it met her neck.

“You were supposed to bite Avery next, you little beast!”

“I have no loyalty!” Snowdrop shouted.  “Especially when it comes to someone as terrible and lame as Avery!”

“Did you crawl up between the bed and the wall?”

“Demesne is easier,” Avery said.  “I figure however we do it, we’re all getting an access pass and some ability to change it, right?”

“Oh yeah, anything else would feel weird,” Lucy said.

“We’d-” Verona started.  Snowdrop leaned on her, full-weight, and she collapsed onto the bed, Snowdrop pressing her down.  “Stop!”

“We’d have to pick a good place,” Avery said.  “Which is tricky.  Even if we wanted something more freeform, with the ability to get there from a lot of places, it’s still gotta be somewhere.  Right, Ronnie?  If I’m taking the familiar, you need to decide these things about the Demesne.”

“You-” Verona started.  Snowdrop grabbed the pillow and pressed it down over her head.

“Verona’s not saying no,” Avery said.  “That’s progress.”

Verona, unable to speak, settled for a gesture using her free hand, before she started tickling Snowdrop to get her to relent.

“How are you losing a fight against a five pound opossum?” Lucy asked.

“She’s human right now, and she’s goblin-trained!” Verona protested, as she got her head free.  “Wait, wait, wait, Snowdrop, wait.  Important!”

Snowdrop stopped, eyes narrowed suspiciously.

“We were talking about balance,” Verona said.  “Whether you become a familiar or not, it’s important to balance things between our group, like we balanced the Awakening ritual.  Focusing too much on me and Avery is unbalancing things with Lucy.  Really, I think you’re pretty much obligated to go bite Lucy and show her how someone can struggle when ambushed by an opossum.”

Snowdrop looked over at Lucy.

“It’s a good argument,” Avery said.

“Is it, though?” Lucy asked, making a face.

Snowdrop climbed off Verona.  She straightened herself out before facing Lucy.

“Counter-argument,” Lucy said, looking very serious.  She put her arms out.  “Pets are also a way of forming a bond and balancing things out.”

“Terrible argument,” Snowdrop said.  “Pets are annoying.  Scratches are even worse.”

“What about if I said I’d try to get that doll going again, too?” Lucy suggested, pointing to the shelf above Avery’s bed where the horrible doll was poised.

“You’re the second-worst human I’ve ever met,” Snowdrop said, sullen.

Lucy, arms still extended, gave them a shake.

Snowdrop approached, turned opossum, and settled in Lucy’s lap.

“Avery stole what I was going to say, about needing to position the Demesne.  But that has to wait until we’re back home, anyway,” Verona said.  “Question is… can we say, with reasonable confidence, that there are options we could explore?”

“Yes,” Avery answered.  She looked at Lucy.  “Right?”

“Then are we cool going forward with this?  Using items personal to us to help fabricate your implement?  Then we shore up the other things in some way later?  Figure that out when we get to it?”

Lucy moved her head around in about five different ways and directions as she mulled it over, settling on a nod.

“Yes?” Verona asked Avery.

“Cool,” Verona said.  “Then back to the alcazar.  Such a cool word.”

Avery motioned for the book, which Lucy couldn’t even hold while scratching Snowdrop, so Lucy handed it over.

“I want to ask stuff,” Lucy said.  “Asking the teachers some of this risks giving stuff away.”

Lucy leaned forward, fingernails scratching Snowdrop, and looked at the markings they’d put on the floor and around the light fixture, warding off the evil eye and the various forms of Augury and connections.

“Contacting Miss is tricky,” Avery said.  “I got the impression it was a bit of a setback for her, getting dragged out and then rebounding back to where she was.  I wouldn’t want to make it a regular thing.  Emergency thing.”

“Charles?” Verona asked.

“I’m not even sure he has a working phone.  And I don’t want to.”

“Fair,” Verona conceded.

“Matthew and Edith?” Avery asked.

Lucy considered, then nodded.

She dialed.  “Putting it on speaker.”

The ringing aborted with a fritzing crackle.

“That’s… that’s pretty alarming,” Lucy said.

“We have enemies here,” Avery said.

“We do, but how did they know we were calling?  We used protections to block their view of this room.”

“Some of those enemies are really good,” Avery said.

Lucy tried again.  The phone rang.

“I hope they’re okay,” Avery said.  “Things were bad when we left.”

“I think someone would have let us know if they weren’t,” Lucy said.

“Hello?”  Matthew’s voice came through on the phone, but it crackled and was distorted.

“Matthew, hey,” Lucy said.

“I imagine it’s you three,” Matthew said.  “Is everything alright?  Something’s interfering.  I can’t hear you.”

Verona sat up straight, then hopped off the bed.

“Does it help if I speak clearly?” Lucy asked, louder.

Chalk, chalk chalk chalk…

Lucy used the chalk.  It was by Lucy’s stuff.

Verona dropped to her knees on the floor, then began scribbling to modify the diagram they’d painted on the floor.  She had to think back to what they did when they’d reached out to her dad, bypassing the connection blocks.

In this case, though, they’d made the entire room a connection block.

Exception.  Specify date, time, and place… name…

“Trying again,” Lucy said, watching Verona work.

Verona finished with a dramatic strike of chalk against the floor.

“I can hear you.  Are you okay?”

“We’re managing.  Someone we liked had a bad day, so we’re in a funk, I think…”

Avery nodded.  Verona followed suit.

“…but we’re managing.  Had some practice questions.  But are you okay?”

“Edith’s in a bit of a funk, too, but it’s for such silly reasons that the mood is relatively good.  We had a very full day, and things aren’t quiet yet, but something resembling peace and equilibrium are…”

“We can see the way to get there,” Edith filled in, sounding like she was a few steps away from the phone.

“Why the funk, Edith?” Avery asked.

“We had a big dinner planned using the barbecue pit outside, then the weather forced us to abort.  We had to put it all into containers for another night and do a pasta dinner instead.”

“You like your barbecue, huh?” Verona asked, sitting on the bed again.

“Edith, the body, needs rest to recuperate.  I like my big fires, and they serve the same purpose for me.”

“I took the day off work again,” Matthew said.  “We have the savings to coast through a bad patch, and this counts.  Spent the day organizing, had Others in our house for about nine straight hours.  That Other you liked was there, Verona.  Tashlit.”

“Her name’s Tashlit?”

“She doesn’t talk or write, so communication’s tough, but Alpeana and her get along and Alpeana translated some of it from dreams and some questioning.  Sounds like an Other of divine lineage.  Complicated.”

“Too complicated for a phone call?” Verona asked.

Matthew answered, “Pre-biblical king offended a god by refusing to let them marry his eldest daughter, so the god threatened the daughter’s well being.  King dressed up his youngest daughter to look like the eldest, god transformed the youngest daughter, King got his big a-ha moment, do you really deserve her enough to marry her if you can’t recognize her?  The god was forced to concede, king got wealth and riches, and his eldest daughter eventually married another King.”

“And the youngest daughter?” Avery asked.

“Apparently that wasn’t undone.  She was made Other by the transformation, shouted epithets at her father over his treatment of her, and was thrown in the deepest, darkest hole they could find.  She lurked there, cursed to bear a monstrous enemy of her countrymen from her flesh every time word, water, or stone passed from her.”

“Water and stone?” Lucy asked.

“If she spoke, urinated, or defecated, she also had an Other tear itself free of her,” Edith interjected.

“Ohhh.  Wow.  That poor woman,” Avery said.

“If it’s any consolation, we’re fairly certain that kingdom and nation no longer exist.  I do believe the Others did their work in the end.”

“That’s not really a consolation at all,” Avery said, frowning.

“If there’s no country anymore, do the monsters at least stop sprouting from her?” Verona asked.

“We can assume so,” Matthew said.  “One of the Others, a many-eyed serpent capable of swallowing ships, had its mind exchanged with that of a young lady of high standing.  There’s a whole other story there and even if I’ve spent enough time around Alpeana to follow what she’s saying, it gets worse when she’s tired, worse when she’s excited, and it was a very long tale at the end of a long and bloody day.  I didn’t have the capacity to take it all in.”

Edith chimed in.  “I would simplify it and explain it away as, well, sometimes Sleeping Beauty doesn’t get woken up by the prince.”

“A… very enterprising laborer figured it out and tried three times to prove his love for that lady.  Tashlit and her older sister came about from two of those, uh, tries.”

“What.” Lucy said, more statement than question.  To Verona, she asked, “Just what is she again?”

“She’s an Other with a neat aesthetic and a great backstory,” Verona said, smiling.

“So she’s really old then?” Verona asked.

“Old?” Matthew asked.  “No.”

“No, her mother is, but she’s seventeen or so.  Hatched from an egg, grew up human with only minor weirdness, until, well, she came of age, essentially.  She seems to take it in stride.”

“This sea serpent and laborer thing happened recently?  There are real sea serpents?” Lucy asked.

Matthew answered, “As with many things Other, you have to travel a ways off the beaten track.  A lot of the time, it’s not enough to just go to a faraway place, but you have to reach a faraway place by an uncommon manner of travel.  There are some shores that you can only reach if a storm blows you there.”

“Knotted places?  Crossways places?” Lucy asked.

“That’s one scenario, yes,” Matthew said.  “You are getting an education.  That’s not the worst thing.”

“Speaking of.  Can we ask some questions?  Some stuff’s tough to run by the teachers here.”

“Alcazar.  Familiar with that?”

Matthew answered, “I am, but that’s only where you’d be turning yourself into one.  And that’s in a book my dad had me read more than half my lifetime ago.  I’d think guidelines are similar.”

“We read the book.  Verona and Avery want to treat Avery’s photograph from the awakening ritual to turn it into something else, so we can use it to make my implement.”

“Is Verona contributing too?”

“Yes,” Lucy and Verona said at the same time.

“With something of equivalent value?”

“My scissors,” Verona said.

“Good.  Okay.  Book should have covered something like how, when you’re inside, you need to be very careful what you say or do.  Even small actions and sentences will leave their impressions.  If this a gift is for Lucy, then be nice and be Lucy-positive.”

Verona nodded.  “Cool, alright, book did say something like that, but not in that context.”

“The more of a change you’re doing, the more it’s going to fight you.  You’re inside a house and you’ll be rearranging where the rooms are, the walls, some are going to be load-bearing.”

“What do we do about that?” Lucy asked.

“Standard rules.  A lot of that is going to be metaphor for spirits transforming, or flooding in, or washing out.  Picture being in a spaceship and someone puts a hole in the hull, or you’re in a submarine, same scenario.  Standard measures for dealing with spirits work.  Barriers, diagrams.  Reinforce before you undertake anything big.”

“Yes.  What does the book say about means of escape if things go poorly?”

“There are instructions on a circle we can put inside a paper.  It makes a door.”

“There are also some papers for containing and moving certain objects or aspects of objects.”

“Bring more than you need.  I never did that ritual, but I know my father did, and he explained it.  I was young and too stupid to listen as closely as I could have, but I remember it was tough for him.  He had to face his demons, looking inward, and he had a lot.  Even in the easiest, most mundane case, I think the regret of not having enough is far, far more than any regret of spending the time to prepare more papers.”

“Matthew’s the type of guy who brings three extra fishing rods when he drags me out to the lake,” Edith said.  “I don’t even really fish.  I watch him and enjoy the sun.”

“And fuss over the campfire,” Matthew said.

“I’m really glad you two are managing okay,” Lucy said.  “And Kennet’s still standing, apparently.”

“It’s been hard,” Matthew said.

“I won’t lie,” Edith said.  “I almost cried when I didn’t get my dinner tonight, and if I’d started crying I can see myself sobbing hysterically.”

“You really like barbecue,” Verona remarked.

Avery kicked out in the direction of Verona’s knees, Verona moved her leg to avoid it.

“It’s all I was looking forward to over the past few days, we barely had any time to ourselves.  We’re spent, and when you’re that spent, it doesn’t take much to make you break down.”

“Ah.”  Verona digested that.  “Sorry.  Yeah, I was kinda at that same point, toward the end of the night we were there.  I get it.”

“Look after Edith, will you, Matthew?  And yourself?” Lucy asked.

“That’s the plan.  About your Alcazar.  Who’s going in?”

“We were thinking us four, or maybe us three, if Snowdrop might unbalance us.”

“You should see about getting someone to stand guard.  While you’re inside the Alcazar, you’re not especially aware of the world outside.  You’re vulnerable from the item, but also if someone on the outside happened to decide to tear the photograph while you’re inside it…”

“Someone messed with a ritual in progress earlier today,” Lucy said.  “It wouldn’t be too surprising if someone did the same to us.”

Matthew made a ‘hmmm’ sound, then went on to say, “I don’t know that I would rely on the practitioners there.  Have you befriended any Others?”

“No,” Snowdrop said.  “Nobody.”

“Goblin riff-raff of Cherrypop tier might not be the best guardians for a sensitive ritual,” Avery said.

“I wish I was better equipped to help,” Matthew said.  “It makes some of the other Others uneasy, here, but I don’t personally see much wrong with binding and using the more mindless Others, if you need protection in a situation like this.  But if you don’t have any and I can’t send you any…”

“Charles?” Lucy asked.

“We’ll try to figure something out,” Lucy said.  “Thanks.”

“While we have you on the phone,” Verona said, “We’re considering the other key rituals, besides implement.”

“Alpeana’s happy to work with any of you three, if that’s your inclination.”

“Wow,” Verona said, eyes widening.  “Are we that much of a broken-”

“Yes,” Lucy said.  “Very yes.  Oh my god yes.  Yes.”

“I think maybe,” Avery whispered to Verona.

Verona made a so-so gesture, then said, “I was going to ask about the demesne.”

“Any objections?  And do you know of any spaces that are in Kennet, but not already owned?”

“In the modern world, that gets tricky,” Matthew said.  “If it’s not the province of the city, it’s often Parks Canada.  That’s a hard one.  Normally a practitioner gets around it by owning the space they claim.”

“I don’t think we’d want to use our parents’ homes.”

“You’d need the permission of your parents, because their right to the space exceeds yours.”

“We’d definitely not want to use our parents’ houses,” Verona said.

“For the challenge,” Edith said, “the ten new Others in Kennet, not counting the goblins, who are being treated as one entity, are being given limited vote and the expectation they’ll obey if our core group of Others give them instructions.  They get one vote, which they work out among themselves, and Tashlit brings it to us.  But we’d ensure the Demesne ritual goes as unchallenged as possible.  We’d fight alongside you against anyone who slipped the perimeter and questioned you.”

“How big exactly a space are we talking?” Lucy asked.

“A lot depends on what we could get, in the way of property the government doesn’t have a claim to,” Matthew said.

“The book suggested one room was pretty normal.  A handful of rooms if you’re really good.”

Matthew said, “My instinct is that we could get an empty lot or a foreclosed house.  Empty lots here can go for thirty to ninety thousand dollars, depending on how close we are to the city center.”

“I don’t think we have five hundred dollars, let alone that much,” Lucy said.

“It would be a gift from us to you.  Edith is nodding like she agrees.”

“We’ve had our reservations in the past, but connecting you to Kennet and making you stronger is a good thing,” Edith said.  “We don’t have a lot of money, particularly if we keep missing work like we have been this week, but we have some.”

“That’s a lot of money, though,” Lucy said.

“Our-” Matthew started.  “Our unique life circumstances, let’s say, they make for a unique long-term financial situation.  Let’s leave it at that for now, and if you want to discuss it further I’ll discuss it with you three at a later date.  For now, I’ll look into it.”

“It’s worth it,” Edith told them, her voice slightly muffled, like she had changed position to lie down or hug Matthew.

“Okay,” Lucy said.  “Okay, thank you.”

“Tell the Others we say hi?” Avery asked.

“You too,” Lucy said.

“They’re just giving us a property?” Avery asked.

“Unique financial situation,” Lucy said.  “No kids?”

“And they maybe don’t expect Edith to live to the point she needs to retire,” Verona said.  “The vibe I get is that the Doom’s going to escape eventually.”

“That’s really freaking grim,” Avery said.

“I think some Others live a crazy long time, like Alpeana or Tashlit’s sea serpent mom,” Verona thought aloud.  “And others don’t last long at all.  Only rule seems to be that they don’t get ordinary human lifespans.”

“Hey,” Avery said.  She looked up in Lucy’s direction.  “Can I have my opossum to hug?”

Lucy leaned out of her chair, handing Snowdrop over.  Avery handed the book on Alcazars over to Lucy, as part of the same exchange.

For a short bit, they didn’t really talk.  The rain drummed against the window.

Verona looked down at the diagram on the floor.  “We’ll need to tweak this so we can get incoming calls from them.  It’d be bad if there was another emergency.”

“True,” Lucy said.  “Good thinking.”

“Could that be why the thing from Sheridan isn’t coming through?” Avery asked.  “Except I’ve been outside of the room more than I’ve been in it.”

“Maybe she tried?” Verona asked.

Avery stood, holding Snowdrop against her chest with one hand, phone in the other, and got the door open, striding out into the hallway.  She stood out there, her screen bright.

“Maybe call her?” Lucy asked.

Avery walked back inside the room.  Verona knelt down and began tweaking the diagram.  They’d painted it onto the wood of floor and ceiling, and what she was doing in chalk would need to be painted over again.  She began to make alterations, for the reception of calls.  A select few names.  They had to be careful about the connection blocker, or their parents would start connecting the dots and start wondering where exactly their daughters were.  ‘We sent them to summer camp, but what kind of summer camp?  Where?’  Panic.

“What do I even say?  I haven’t heard back from you, I really do appreciate this, but what’s going on?  Let me know?”

“Something like that,” Lucy said.  “I honestly don’t know how you guys normally talk to one another.”

“In my house?  We don’t talk normally to one another.”

Verona talked while sketching in chalk on the floor, “I’m the only only child here.  I can’t give much input.  Give me a bit before you hit that send button, Ave.”

“Okay,” Avery said.  “I just realized my phone wasn’t working one hundred percent, so if you tried to get in touch and couldn’t, that might be why.  Did you end up talking to dad like you said you would?  Thank you for helping out.”

“Sounds good,” Lucy said.

“Why am I giving this much credit to Sheridan?” Avery asked.  “If you’d said this would happen to me as of last year, I’d have thought you were smoking drugs.”

“Says the girl holding a magic opossum, a few days after traveling across a light tightrope, fighting some naked exploding pig man…” Verona said…

“…While her friend draws a magic diagram on the floor…” Lucy added.

“You’re good to go,” Verona said.

“And… sent, before I second guess myself,” Avery said.  She sat back down on the bed.  “Hoof.”

“Hoo and oof.  Hoof,” Avery said.  “Man, I wish the weather was nice enough to go for a run or something.  I’m restless.  And Snowdrop is squirmy because this is normally when she’s waking up.”

“Ahh, that’s why she was so bitey.”

Avery’s phone was buzzing.

“Sheridan just sent me a message.  ‘Ya’.  Y-A.  Ya.  Two letters.  Thanks, Sheridan, that’s, uh, that’s really a reply right there.  It’s a message.  I’ve been waiting about a day and I get ‘ya’.”

“Give her a second,” Lucy said.  “Does your phone do that thing that tells you someone else is typing?”

“Probably wouldn’t work with how remote we are, anyway,” Verona said.

“She’s probably typing up more,” Lucy said.

“She’d better be,” Avery said.  “I swear, if this starts and stops at ‘ya’ I’m going to-”

Verona clenched her fists, and squeezed them between her thighs, sitting on the edge of her bed, studying Avery’s expression: eyebrows drawn together, eyes flicking left and right as she read.

“What does it say?” Lucy asked.

“She says she doesn’t know how to interpret it.  She didn’t have trouble getting through, she just didn’t know what to say and she wanted to figure it out before she messaged me.  I guess a day wasn’t enough to figure it out?  What was she figuring out?”

“She didn’t say?” Lucy asked.

“She ended with three periods, whatever it’s called, she’s still typing.”

There was a knock on the door.  Verona stood at about the same time Lucy rose to her feet.  Lucy sat back down, and Verona got the door, because she was closer.  She glanced back at Avery.

“Uhhh…” Verona said.

“Hi,” Lucy said.  “Excuse my friend’s manners.”

“Hi.  I’m doing some errands for the B.H.I.,” Nicolette said.  “You were on the signup sheet for the workshop tonight.  Were you still interested?  The kids above you on the list decided not to, I think because of the weather.  So you’re bumped to next in line.  Do you want it?”

“I…” Lucy hesitated, looking at Avery.

“Yes,” Verona said.  “Please.  We’ll be doing a ritual, or if they’re preoccupied, I can do some enchantment stuff.”

“Cool.  You have it for an hour and a half.  Let me know if you finish fifteen minutes or more ahead of that time.  Be sure to clean up.”

“I don’t suppose you’re free?” Verona asked.

“We need a guardian, while we’re doing the ritual.”

“What’s the ritual?” Nicolette asked.

“And you don’t want a repeat of today’s incident.  I’m busy, I have work to do for Alexander, we booked it a long time ago.  Um, but you should ask Zed.  I think you trust him, and he’s really upset about today.  He’s the kind of guy who loves to help out.  It’d lift his spirits to be useful.  And he knows a lot about that sort of thing.”

“Okay,” Verona said.  “That’s pretty great.  Where do we find him?”

“I think he and Brie are in their room for the rest of the night, mostly.”  Nicolette turned her head to look off in the direction of the main classroom and west hallway.  “Want me to give him a heads up, tell him to change out the pyjama pants for jeans?”

“I think we need to figure out where we’re at and if we’re even doing that ritual.”

“Alrighty,” Nicolette said.  She glanced at Avery.  “Everything good here?”

Verona looked at Avery as well, who looked up to return a tight smile.

“I won’t pry,” Nicolette said, in response to the silence.  I should go.”

“Thanks,” Verona said.  “For the Zed recommend and info.”

Nicolette gave them a smile, then turned, raising a hand.  “Zachariah!”

Verona closed the door.  She turned on Avery.  “Well?”

“Dad laughed it off, cracked some jokes.  That’s what Sheridan had to figure out.  Like why, and what did he mean?  Mom, um, she said if there was anything to what dad’s coworker said, it was for me to tell the family, not for Sheridan to pry.  Um, and that if there was anything and Sheridan chose to give me a hard time over it, she’d be well and truly disappointed in her.  Then Sheridan said she wouldn’t, if there was anything, dad stopped joking and sided with mom, and Sheridan hugged mom.”

“Sounds like mom’s being cool,” Verona said.

“Yeah,” Avery said, watching the phone, not even seeming to notice as Snowdrop continually licked her chin.  She gave Snowdrop a stroke. “I kinda sorta figured they might react like, finding someone to talk to about it, and maybe giving that person’s opinion wayyy too much credit.  But now it’s like, was my mom cool, and then my dad chose my mom to latch onto in that way, giving her opinion credit?”

“Not sure,” Lucy said.

“I don’t get the joking thing at all.  What sort of jokes were they?”

“Ask Sheridan?” Verona suggested.

“She says she asked dad about the laughing, but he was very firm about it being for me to talk to them about.  That she shouldn’t pry.  Was it like, uncomfortable joking, do you think?  Sheridan would tell me if it was really mean, I think.  Or she wouldn’t, but she said she had to figure it out and I think she didn’t know how to interpret it either.  Do you think it was lighthearted in a ‘ha ha, sorta figured, it’s so normal I don’t really think twice about it’ way?  Or like, Sheridan went in serious so he tried to get her to relax, because it’s cool, nobody cares, and it’s ridiculous to treat it as serious?”

“We don’t really know your dad, Ave,” Lucy said, quiet.

“I’m sitting here trying to figure this out and I feel like I don’t really know my dad,” Avery said.

“It sounds like he’s taking your mom’s lead, or he’s on the same page as her.”

“But if he’s uncomfortable and he’s going along with mom because he doesn’t know what to do that’s…”

“Sucks?” Verona tried.

Avery swallowed.  “…Crushing.”

Lucy moved over to Avery’s bed, taking Avery’s hands in hers.  She checked the phone, then put it aside.

Conversation over, Verona assumed.

Lucy talked to Avery, “I’d tell you not to overthink that stuff, but I would be such a hypocrite I can imagine the practice turning me inside out as punishment.”

Avery huffed out a one-note laugh.

“What can we do?” Lucy asked.

“Your mom’s being cool.  Sheridan is being… shockingly cool, based on everything I’ve heard about her,” Verona said.

“And your dad’s- I imagine he’s in this situation that’s really hard to figure out.”

“I’m his daughter, I don’t think this should be hard to figure out.  You love your daughter first and that should be the number one thing, and if this being hard to figure out is bigger than that-”

“No, no,” Verona said.  “No, not what I meant.”

“What did you mean?” Lucy asked.

“I mean, coworker springs this on him.  Assume he didn’t know, he has to deal with coworker, right?  He has to deal with office politics, and you said he got mad?”

“So he’s really mad that this guy’s spouting crap.  And he’s put in this situation where anything he says to this shitty coworker might get back to whoever that coworker got the info from.”

“Daughter, I think,” Avery said.  “Can’t remember.”

“So what can he say or do, that doesn’t go back down that same chain, right?  And make life harder for you at school, when he knows you’ve had a rough time?  And then he goes home, talks to your mom, then a bit later Sheridan knows, and he knows Sheridan and you… you’re like… I’m trying to think of an apples and oranges thing, but really cool and sorta gross.”

“Sheridan’s not gross.  She’s been cool.”

“Right,” Verona said.  “You’re like an apple and an orange then.  And if he says the wrong thing to Sheridan, that’s the kind of thing that makes your life harder.”

“You think he’s okay with it, then?”

“I don’t know,” Verona said.  “I don’t know your dad, I mean, you know him and you’re not sure.  But I can believe he cares, and part of that caring is being careful about how he navigates that, especially if he can say or do the wrong thing and hurt you.”

“You said your parents are a little gunshy about stuff since Ms. Hardy talked to them,” Lucy added.

“Yeah,” Avery answered, glum.

“I can see, like… laughing Sheridan off is safe.  And he cares about you, so he goes that way, until your mom takes a firm line, and it’s like, okay, let’s go with that.  Maybe.  I do think he cares about you.  I think that makes this weird and wonky and hard to know what to do.  I’m rambling.”

“Maybe I should’ve taken the offer to let him drive me here,” Avery said.  “We could’ve talked, then I could either feel great and relieved or feel horrible for the whole summer, until I got home.  And we’d have had to brainwash him after or something…”

“I don’t think it was really an option,” Lucy said.

“You could call him,” Verona said.  “I think we should be careful with the connection block and everything, maybe do the big and proper diagram.  But it’s not out of the question.  We have the workshop space available.”

“Nah, let’s do the Alcazar,” Avery said.  She stood up, stretching a bit.

“Cool.”  Verona nodded, standing as well.

“We’re dropping it like that?” Lucy asked.

Verona frowned at her friend.

“It’s just- this is diving into an item rooted in a pretty tough event.  And we’ve had a crummy day,” Lucy protested.  “You almost went after Shellie earlier.  Now you want to do this?”

“Back in Kennet, with that pigdog man, he threatened some good people.  Guilherme has been telling me to focus on the person I want to be, check off the good moments and good traits.  But part of it, something I know I want, is that I don’t want to stew in anxiety.  I don’t want to freeze when good people are in need.”

“That was what the Jessica thing was about?” Lucy asked.

“The Jessica thing was impulse.  And Verona got me to back off, yeah-”

“It couldn’t have gone anywhere good,” Verona said.  “You can’t deal with people like that, who won’t budge.”

“Sure.”  Avery nodded, almost like there was a thought she’d had and she was nodding in response to it.  She looked over at Lucy, “Look, I want to help.  I want to help with your implement, I want to help people like Jessica when others ruin something truly good that they’re doing, I want to protect people like the people that pigdog man almost attacked.  I don’t want to sit here, stewing, thinking in circles.”

“Are you going to be okay, going back to a tough memory?” Lucy asked.

“I came out in one piece from a prolonged stay with the wolf on the Forest Ribbon Trail.”

“A little different, though,” Lucy said, quiet.  “A little shaken?”

“A lot shaken,” Avery said.  “And elderly people like my Grumble and unhinged people like Daniel, they freak me out now.  It catches me off guard.  But I can work through that.  I know it’s irrational.  I can- I don’t regret it.  I did the Forest Ribbon Trail that night to try to help Reagan and the others and it didn’t work and that sucks… Zed said it was hard enough to bind Yalda that I probably couldn’t have done anything but it still sucks… and I don’t regret it.”

“‘Cause you helped people?” Verona asked.

“I tried, at least.  I think no matter what I do, so long as I’m doing that, so long as I’m not going quiet and paralyzing myself with anxiety, I can’t really regret what I’m doing.”

“Maybe, uh, let’s do that, but you let Verona and me know what you’re doing or let us keep up with you before you go confronting any Bright Eyed berserker girls?” Lucy asked.

Avery made a face.  “After all of this, I think it might have been the most evil thing I’ve ever seen.”

“Yeah,” Lucy said.  “I’m not sure I can say the same, but… yeah.”

“And it was so pointless, so senseless.  So dumb.  Arrogant.”

“Evil usually is,” Lucy said.

“It was like it was designed to push my buttons.”

“Don’t let it?” Lucy asked.

“Or,” Verona said.  “Another way to look at it?  That glamour-self you’re making with those little rewards of glamour checkmarks you’re handing yourself?  Make a lack of pressable buttons part of it.”

“Sooooo… Alcazar?” Verona asked, eyebrows going up.

“I would like to introduce you to some marvels of modern technology,” Zed said, as he walked across the workshop.

“Somehow I’m not surprised,” Lucy said.

Nicolette had been right.  Zed had been in a bit of a mood, surprisingly grim in expression, when they’d knocked on the door to his room.  He’d had music blasting.

But they’d asked for his help, and that grim mood had lingered at first, only to improve until he was smiling by the time he was stepping out of the rain and into the workshop.

Verona hung back, toweling off moisture from her clothes so nothing would drip on the floor and ruin the diagram they were drawing.  She watched as Zed opened cupboards.

He pulled out a large frame, then a wooden circle.

“Your modern invention is boards?” Verona asked.  “Not even motherboards or chipboards…?”

“We’ve got a bunch in here,” Zed said.  “Standard Alcazar?  Regimented square?”

“That’s the plan,” Verona said.

He pulled out some more stuff.  A heavily notched square, a heavily notched frame.  He then retrieved a can of what looked like spray paint. He gave it a shake, kicked the wood across the floor until it was centered in the room, and then used the width of his shoe to help center the smaller bit of wood within the frame.

“Spray paint?” Avery asked.

“Spray chalk,” Zed answered.

He sprayed, filling in the void, using the wood as a stencil.  It formed a thick border, edges and lines already worked out.

It sped things up considerably, which was great since they’d spent a bit discussing Avery’s family after Nicolette had left.

The serrated square border was the center of a diagram that got compass points marked out around it; long thin triangles with lines down the center sticking out of each side, smaller, filled-in triangles sticking out of the corners.  Then notation, a circle to enclose it, a sun, moon, and star circle each with a ‘comet tail’, like they were shooting outward from the diagram, as celestial expressions for physical space, expanding.

After that, it was ten more minutes of adding small details.

“Photo?” Verona asked.

Avery lifted up her shirt and pulled the photo from the waistband.  “You said to keep it close to my skin, after the tempering.”

“Should be good.  Hopefully the you that you’ve been putting into it is the good stuff.”

“Hopefully,” Avery said.

Lucy, arms folded, paced.

Verona had sketched out the very simple diagrams while Lucy had gone to find Zed.  She handed them out.  Three ‘net’ sheets, and one ‘escape’ sheet.  All sheets were on pieces of paper that had been folded into quarters.

“Good vibes, remember,” Verona said.

“Best vibes possible,” Avery said.  Snowdrop was perched on her shoulder, looking out and over at the proceedings, alert.

“Without stepping within, place it in the center,” Zed said.  “I’ll watch out for trouble, guard your backs.”

Lucy took the photograph, then, balanced on her toes, sitting on her heels, she stood by the central square, leaned forward, and placed the photo in the center.

The diagram throbbed, the individual parts beginning to move, like gears were turning.  The sun, moon, and star part of the circle moved, starting their orbits, and as they turned, the proportion of circle, room, and photograph changed.

The photograph moved as if caught in a wind, then stood up on end.  The border blurred white, the photograph expanded as the perspective skew of sun, moon, and star continued in concert with their orbit, and it became like a cube, each face a door, with a lot of two dimensional images on the far side.

Verona handled the connection blocker and Augur prevention stuff, once she was sure the diagram was done.  She stood back, triple checked her work, then glanced at the others for confirmation.

“In you go,” Zed told them.

Without really coordinating it, Lucy, Verona, Avery, and Snowdrop each picked one of the sides, stepped carefully across the chalk, and passed through.

We should have dressed warmer.

They were in the Kennet Arena.

Verona’s breath fogged faintly.

It was weird to move around.  The scene showed more than just the photograph had, but details that hadn’t been caught in the picture were just a bit blurry.  Every step she took made the blur worse, like it had to take a second to figure out what the backside of the boards looked like, or what was behind a guy who was in the camera’s shot.

Snowdrop, Avery, and Lucy had entered from different points of the same picture.  Avery behind the photographer.  Snowdrop in the stands.  Lucy on the far side of the rink from Verona.

As Verona walked, there was an illusion where everything looked like two dimensional cutouts, carefully arranged and painted to look like three dimensional objects.

As if in response to the thought, the coach who was taking the picture turned his head, looking at Avery.  His face blurred as his lips moved, unable to decide if the lips should be unblurred and the face blurred, or vice versa.  Whatever Verona focused on was less coherent.

“I should have called it quits when two of my best players went to Swanson,,” he said, his voice thin.

“Yeah,” Avery said, in response.  She looked out over the crowd.  “There you guys are.”

Sure enough, in the stands, rising to their feet, were a Lucy and Verona.

“Rooting for you, classmate,” the Lucy-image said.

“It means so much to me.  I was too stuck inside my own head and the Olivia situation to recognize it.  I’m so glad you were at this game.  I love that you cheered.”

“So painful, seeing how bad the team is,” the Verona said.

“It was worse being on the ice with them, believe me,” Avery responded to the photo-Verona.

“You skated so fast,” Verona told her friend.  “That was one of my big takeaways, after the, uh, less than stellar performance of some of the girls on the team.”

“I was and am so jealous of that coat,” Verona said, pointing.  Lucy was wearing a red duffel coat with little black horn shapes stuck through leather loops at the front.  “I’d wear a coat like it if it wasn’t weird to dress so similarly to my best friend.”

“I think I grew out of it,” Lucy said, smiling.  “I’ll have to see next Winter.  But you can have your turn wearing that style, if you want.”

“It was a good night,” Verona said.  “Sucks we lost, really sucks it was rough for you, Ave.”

Avery shrugged, and looked over at Olivia, just barely in ‘the shot’.  The entire Arena was depicted around them, but the stuff caught in the coach’s camera was clearest.

“This was rough,” an audience member said, as Verona walked by them.

“There’s no rush, honey.  Traffic always takes a while to leave the parking lot anyway.”

Verona stopped, checked, and followed the gaze of the person in the audience, looking at Lucy.

Didn’t want to address it, because that would give it prominence and fill this space.  Matthew had warned about that.

She walked.  A lot of the thoughts were inane.

“So much sugar, they’re going to take forever to fall asleep tonight.”

“That red mark on her skin hasn’t gone away in a week.  Will she be mad if I bring it up?”

“They’re taking a picture to commemorate this?”

“If she was on the team we might have won.  They’re naturally more athletic,” one of the audience members said.  A passing thought about Lucy, captured in the moment of the snapshot.

Verona stopped, looking at the middle aged woman who was rising from her seat, turned, and saw Lucy was close.

“It’s not a surprise,” Lucy said, her expression a bit sad.

“We shouldn’t dwell on bad.”

“Maybe.  Maybe ignoring the bad makes the item less Lucy, though?”

Verona wasn’t sure how to respond to that.

“Everything’s good here,” Snowdrop called down.

There were some shadows.  Omens.  Or something omen-like.  Snowdrop backed away as they drifted over the seats.

Avery, starting out on the ice, had been forced to circle around to where she could hop over, and was now catching up, picking up a hockey stick.

She smacked one omen-thing, and scattered it into smoke.  She hit the next, and it wasn’t scattered so easily, so she kept smacking at it.

Lucy picked up a beer bottle and hucked it.  It crashed into one of the omens, which twisted, contorting like a snake poised to strike across three rows and two columns of seats.

Avery hit it again and again, beating it down toward the seats and images with each consecutive blow.  When it lay across the seat-backs, the next strike dissolved it.

“Some catharsis there?” Lucy asked, deadpan.

“Some,” Avery said.  She rubbed at her arms for warmth.

Verona looked around, then frowned.  There was the faintest of red hazes around Avery.

“Have to be careful.  Looks like violence stains the area a bit.”

“It’s quiet,” Lucy said.  “More stable and motionless than I pictured.”

“I think because we tempered it,” Verona said.  “It did leave a hollow.  I’m surprised more badness hasn’t slipped in over the day.”

“Maybe because I wasn’t thinking of it much?” Avery asked.  “Some chafing against skin, but I’m not sure chafing’s a taint that’s going to really alter this area.”

“Hmmm,” Lucy murmured.

“We should get materials,” Verona said.  “Uhhh… you wanted item three?”

“Yeah,” Lucy said.  “If it’s no trouble.”

“So,” Verona said, reaching into her pocket for a paper.  She unfolded it, and it had a hole in the center where the diagram had been, the paper’s edges frayed.  She held the paper up, walking around, and elbowed Lucy to get her to follow.

It worked best when they were all together.  Snowdrop joined her.

Verona centered the hole on the light from above the rink, then carefully folded the paper.  Containing the light within.

The rink was noticeably darker, without those lights.

“So… something crystal-y, some fine chain or wire or tether, glimmers, glass…” Verona mused aloud.

“I got it,” Avery said.  “Let me make sure the plexiglass isn’t fogging it up.”

Taking little elements out of the scene in the picture, storing them in paper folds.  Avery jogged back around toward the ice.

“Uhh!” Verona called out.

There was a woman with tattoos, but her hair and tattoos were canary yellow, her skin a smokey black-purple.  Her eyes were unblinking and surrounded with folds and wrinkles that made it hard to tell where the points of the iris, the eyelashes, and the natural folds of eyelid were.  She moved with a good speed, striding toward Avery.

Avery held up the hockey, stick, ready.

It was Snowdrop who came running, tackling the woman.

“It’s not a spirit!” Snowdrop called out.  “It’s super smart, it’s really rare too!  I’m gonna die!  I can’t do this, auuuugh!”

The encounter was brief and ended with Snowdrop’s hands and face spattered in that smokey black-purple with specks of bright yellow.

Verona took the eyeglasses of a man wearing glasses who was positioned in a way to catch the light with the edge of the frame.

Lucy found one of the skates, slung around the neck of a kid on the Swanson team, the blade’s edge catching the light.  She pulled the paper away, the edge caught in the circle.  She folded it up with care.

The three of them gathered more than they needed as they walked around.  Stuff they wanted to emphasize for the implement.  Zed was going to help them do the actual transformation, using these captured aspects.

More omens turned up, but they were dumb, aimless, not even doing anything except polluting the space.  They handled them.

It seemed like they got more common, the longer they spent here.  Verona worried that it was a trap or a time limit being enforced on them in reality.  Like they were trespassing in this space and that trespass got bad sorts of attention.

Snowdrop, meanwhile, walked over to the ice, then to the stands, then back to the ice.

“What’s going on, Snow?” Verona asked.

Verona looked, and she didn’t see anything.

“You can’t start here where I am,” Snowdrop said.

“We don’t have a lot of time.  Is it important?” Verona asked.

“It isn’t important to me, at least,” Snowdrop replied.

Verona decided to look.  The other two joined her, making their way across slick ice.  Verona was wishing she’d dressed warmer.  Her legs were going numb.

Standing on the ice, looking through the plexiglass, she could see Miss, sitting in the stands.

“You have to focus on her face, so she stays there,” Snowdrop said.

“Makes sense,” Avery said.

Avery put her hand out, blocking out the view, then made her way around.

Verona and Lucy followed suit.

Off the rink yet again.  Into the stands.  Toward Miss, keeping their hands up so they couldn’t see her face.

“Fuck,” Avery said, as she tripped over an extended leg.  She looked up and around.  “If you’re in a position to see, she just disappears.”

“Nah,” Snowdrop said.

Avery was quick enough going back and catching up that she was only a few steps behind Verona and Lucy as they reached Miss’s side.

Verona took a seat behind Miss, looking at the back of her head.

“So she was here before,” Avery noted.  “Watching us before things went bad for Kennet.”

“Keeping tabs on a few candidates for the local practitionership,” Lucy said.  “Before anything went wrong?  Or did she know?  It’s so weirdly convenient and coincidental that she was here.  Watching us.”

“Watching…” Verona paused.  She carefully reached around, touching the sides of Miss’s head just to figure out where her head was pointed.

Not looking at the three of them.  No, she was looking off to the side.

They walked over and around, following her gaze.  To the window.

To the space beyond the window.

It wasn’t in the picture, so it was filled in with context, maybe the minds of the three of them and maybe Snowdrop, if Snowdrop had even familiarized herself with this space.

There was a lot to digest, in what was out there.

To begin with, the mountains and trees of the background were gone.  A vague silhouette that looked like Zed was out there, looming over them.

And the sky, dark, had three different constellations pinned in it, faint, pale, dark grey stars on black.  Eyes, belonging to three different Augurs. Each was missing components.  No iris, no pupil.  Just ‘x’ marks or a smear of stars across the center, blinding the eye.  Their anti-augury marks had helped.

Outside the window was the outdoor rink, people collected around it.  There were a lot of kids, siblings of hockey players, maybe.  Or members of the choir.

A bunch of college-aged guys, and some figures standing in the parking lot, talking.

The figures in the lot were people who’d abandoned the rink, which was stained with blood.  Had they seen the blood?  Or had something else happened, that drove them from that rink?

“The Carmine Beast dies partway through the game.  Lies there.  Time passes, parking lot empties…” Lucy spoke her thoughts aloud.

“Kennet Others gather to discuss their game plan,” Verona noted.  “And for Miss, we’re fresh in her mind, after, well… this.”

She gestured toward Miss, sitting in the stands.

“There might be more to it than that, but sure,” Lucy said.

“Miss is here early.  That’s not the most shocking thing in the world.  She moves fast,” Avery said.

“But some of the Kennet Others don’t,” Verona said.

“Yeah,” Avery said, quiet.  “Some were already here.”

Points of light were in the parking lot, close together and far away, and they could have been mistaken for lit cigarettes in the gloom.  But they weren’t.

Two glowing orange eyes, Edith’s, surrounded by children.

Edith, outside and near the bloody body of the Carmine Beast, so soon after the murder.  She would have had to leave and come back.  But she was here.  She was here and she was okay giving them money?  She was here, but she’d taught them?  Were there traps in the teaching, or was she playing it cool?

She’d just said she felt good about supporting them.

“I’m trying to tell if there’s anyone else from the Kennet Others in that crowd, but I can’t,” Lucy said.  “But those glowing eyes…”

“No more omens around,” Snowdrop said.  “They’re close.”

Lucy glanced back.  “Annoying.”

“We should clean those up and go, then,” Verona said, not looking away from the scene.  Edith was out there at this point in time?  It wasn’t a trick?

“I don’t get why scenes so far out of the photo’s frame are here,” Avery said.

“Because Miss, I think,” Verona said, aloud.  “She’s here, watching, it’s important to her, so it leaves an impression.  Or because certain things filter through, and anything important leaves its impression.”

“I’ll get the omens,” Avery said.

“Thanks,” Verona said.

Avery headed off.  Snowdrop followed.

“You good, Luce?” Verona asked.

Lucy held up her paper.  She centered the image of Edith, the kids, and the bloody rink in the circle.  Verona and Avery moved to help it focus, because otherwise it wouldn’t center right.

“Snapshots of this scene for evidence?” Verona asked.

“And for fine tuning my implement,” Lucy said.

“Works,” Verona said, after a bit of thought.

She partially unfolded the escape paper.  A reversal of the expansion sign.  She waited until Avery had dealt with the gathering negative forces, then finished.unfolding to make the door.

The door widened until it passed over them, then shrunk again.  It fluttered to the floor once more.

“Not too bad,” Lucy said.  “Any issues?”

“Get what you came for?” Zed asked.

“More than,” Lucy said, her expression serious.

“Maybe later.  You’re on the shortlist of people we’d tell stuff to, I think, the moment we can get away with it,” Lucy said.  “We really appreciate you helping us out.”

“No, it’s cool.  Can I see the trophies?”

They brought the papers around, placing them on a table, and placing them into a loose configuration.  Each paper had what looked like an ultra-high-quality illustration, an optical illusion trapped in the page.

“We can use this to turn the photo into an image in glass?  Or ice?” Lucy asked.

“Yep,” Zed answered.  “I can work with you on that.  You’re sure that’s the shape you want?”

Verona moved the pages around, then placed her own scissors down.  She had illustrations depicting the end result, and she placed things so they were in rough alignment with the illustration.

The handles of the scissors, taken apart and filed down to something subtle, would become ornamentation, fitting to the curve of the upper ears, sitting just inside the rim.  The inside of each would be more framing and decoration, hooking around the side of the ear to hold the ornament in place.

But in the end, it was earrings.  The crystals and glimmers they formed using Avery’s photo would decorate the dangling portion, and be decorated further with the blade.  An earring to let Lucy shine, to be proud of her appearance, because both of those things mattered.  A creative working poised around the ear for the girl who loved music.

And, perhaps most critically, captured on the last page Lucy had snared, a scene.  A distant, captured conversation to adorn the ear of an eavesdropper.

“Yeah.  It’s what I want,” Lucy said.