Over the ensuing months, Hyacinthe continues to think about winged mice. She does not ask for one, not even for her sixth birthday.
A week after she turns six, she is walking through the castle lost in thought, and when she looks up she is not in the castle at all.
"Hi, um, alt of Ariel," says Glass, who hasn't seen Ariel in person but is guessing from attractors.
"Rose's?" says Juliet, inspecting Hyacinthe's world signature via her torchabling power.
"My maman is Belle Cygne and I am Hyacinthe Avril Cygne," says Hyacinthe. "Who are you, besides more mamans?"
"We are," says Aurora, and she points with every name, "Aurora, Juliet, Shell Bell, Tab - she's new, you won't have heard of her - Stella, Golden, Pattern - that's Pattern's boyfriend Ripper - and Glass. We're collecting all of us to sync up the worlds again. Wanna take us home with you?"
"What is a boyfriend?"
Pattern says, "We're together, like your parents, except we aren't married."
"Oh," says Hyacinthe. She nods. "Okay. Would you like to see Maman now?"
She turns around back the way she came, and opens the door, and leads many mamans (and one boyfriend) through it.
[Rose!] calls Shell Bell, with Hyacinthe and the other two rosebuds and Beast and all the Bells and Ripper conferenced in. [We have an alternative timesyncing solution and then we're going to see if we can fetch the welcome committee.]
[I found many mamans,] Hyacinthe contributes. [They were in a place. Now they are here. One of them has a boyfriend.]
[I was out for sixteen years,] says Pattern. [It happens. Beast, Ripper; Ripper, Beast.]
[And a new Bell. I am novel and exciting and come bearing the alternative timesyncing solution. I'll just stick it in your Janepoint if you don't mind.]