witches' daemons can travel alone

[dark_light]

With an alethiometer and a reader at her disposal, Isabella is never still. She barely sleeps, catching brief naps only when Path falls into a doze and she's pulled after him. The rest of her time is spent placating Metis with enough apprenticey tasks that she doesn't get kicked out, working on plans to take over the world, and working off the resultant uncontrollable excitement with Kas (in the nude, and Petaal dividing her time between Path and the non-daemons).

Metis goes on a long trip, and apprenticey tasks are no longer called for. Isabella blesses a cranberry bog in exchange for a large stack of cheap notebooks, and she writes trees of questions in them - if this is true, she needs to know that, in which case this could also be relevant. She passes them to Kas as fast as he'll take them; Path supervises and clarifies what Isabella meant where needed.

The alethiometer can make suggestions about spells. It doesn't communicate in words, and Kas doesn't know enough about ritual magic to interpret it very specifically, but it can point Isabella in the right direction. When she fails six times in a row to figure out what it means about a certain powerful defensive blessing that it thinks she'll want soon, though, she needs something that was better optimized for her use. The alethiometer describes the location of a witch from a non-Olympic but friendly clan based in Texas, an expert in such defenses. Isabella is busy: she sends Path to go talk to her about the spell, and stays in Metis's house herself, catching up on sleep now that Path is too far away to be stubbornly shaken awake, contemplating the unification of the clans as a preceding step to the attempt on human society, and eating mostly what the cornucopia can make for her.

After Path has been gone for just shy of a day, Isabella, collapsed sleeping on top of Kas, jolts awake with a strangled scream.

Comments

[truthwright]

Kas looks away from Petaal long enough to ask, "You guys okay?"

[dark_light]

"Better," says Path, as Isabella scoops him up again out of the disappeared diagram.

"We'll be sore for - a while," says Isabella. "And I don't think he'll be able to fly until his feathers grow in again and that could easily take weeks even if I pour coconut milk and lavender over him every morning. But better."

[truthwright]

He lets out a relieved breath.

"Good. Better is good."

[dark_light]

"Are you okay? I don't even know how - how you did that. Witches have to go to a wasteland that daemons can't go into and drag ourselves across a mile of it and it usually takes hours and some people have to try four or five times - I don't understand how Petaal just flew away like that."

[truthwright]

"I had to," says Petaal. "You were hurting."

[dark_light]

Isabella's sitting on the floor; she scoots closer to them. "Thank you," she whispers.

Path can't fly. But he can walk. He edges his way to the end of Isabella's arm. He presses his face - with his healed beak - into Petaal's side.

And then, timidly, into Kas's.

Isabella closes her eyes and gasps but she doesn't pull away.

[truthwright]

"Sweetie," Kas murmurs, and he uncurls from Petaal far enough to lean down and kiss the top of Path's head.

[dark_light]

"Thank you," Path whispers.

[truthwright]

"We love you," says Kas. He strokes Path's remaining feathers with his fingertips. "We love you and we're sorry you hurt and we're glad you're okay."

[dark_light]

"We love you too," whispers Path, leaning into the touch.

Isabella is still breathing strangely, gasping and exhaling unsmoothly. Still not pulling away. She opens her eyes slowly. Path closes his.

[truthwright]

Petaal reaches out a paw and rests it near Isabella. Not close enough to touch accidentally, but close enough that she could, if she wanted to.

Kas kisses Path's head again.

[dark_light]

Isabella looks at Petaal's paw.

She reaches out and completes the circuit.

And then she has to close her eyes again and make a tiny noise in the back of her throat.

[truthwright]

"Love you," breathes Kas.

"I just want to hug you and hug you and never let go," says Petaal.

[dark_light]

"That sounds pretty good right now," breathes Isabella. "Forever-hugs. Yeah."

[truthwright]

Petaal shifts to some large constricting snake with iridescent black scales, and she coils around Kas and Isabella, careful not to squish anyone.

[dark_light]

Isabella sighs tiredly, and makes sure Path is situated in a gap between her and Kas with plenty of breathing room, and leans her head on one of the coils and closes her eyes again.

[truthwright]

Kas likewise snuggles up carefully and closes his eyes.

The world is full of love and closeness. It's the most perfect thing he can think of right now.