View Flat HTML
View Metadata
Search Post
It turns out that there was really not much point to making a schedule. Kas and Helen visit the witch clan whenever Helen feels like it, and stay as long as she wants, and go when she wants to be somewhere else, and it all adds up to plenty more time spent with the clan than away.
After the aquarium jaunt with Ranata, it's a little more than a month before they visit the clan again.
+ Show First Post
truthwright
It's about six hours later when a sudden shock of cold descends over Kas and Petaal, freezing them solid and stuck together.
carillons
They are all asleep by then, so Helen doesn't notice until the next morning.
She shouts. She cries. She hugs the parts of Kas that are not too close to icy Petaal. She inventively boils the kettle and pours hot water over them. It freezes.
She curls up in bed with Kalavar as a fluffy viscacha, and she tries to think.
She wishes Ranata were here. Ranata could protect her from the scary witches, and maybe even fix what happened to Kas and Petaal, or bring them to the clan and find someone else who could.
She closes her eyes, and—listens...
She shouts. She cries. She hugs the parts of Kas that are not too close to icy Petaal. She inventively boils the kettle and pours hot water over them. It freezes.
She curls up in bed with Kalavar as a fluffy viscacha, and she tries to think.
She wishes Ranata were here. Ranata could protect her from the scary witches, and maybe even fix what happened to Kas and Petaal, or bring them to the clan and find someone else who could.
She closes her eyes, and—listens...
Ranata is asleep, apparently, and snores whuffly little snores.
carillons
"Ranata!" says Helen, putting her voice where her listening is. "Wake up, wake up! Something scary happened and I don't know what to do!"
"Wh- huh - Helen?"
carillons
"Kas and Petaal froze all up," she says, sniffling, "and I don't know how to melt them, and the scary witches who tried to kill him might be coming for me again!"
"How - I - where are you exactly?"
carillons
"In our hotel room in Toronto," she says. She even has the hotel address and room number memorized.
"...I can come for you, but it will take me hours to fly there. Are you all right right now?"
"Okay. Don't you open up the door until you see Castarilan at the window telling you it's okay, all right? Call the front desk from the hotel room, and tell them that some witches from another clan cursed your daddy, but that someone from your clan is on the way, and they shouldn't let any witches except me in, tell them Castarilan's a broad-tailed hummingbird."
carillons
"I'll do that," says Helen. She gets out of bed and finds the phone and calls the front desk.
"Are you still - how are you talking to me?" Ranata asks. There are the sounds of silk tying on and cloud-pine brushing against and lifting from the floor.
carillons
"I dunno," she says to Ranata, "I can just do that, it's a magic thing," and she explains the situation to the front desk person. She doesn't know how to make her voice heard where Ranata is and over the phone at the same time, so Ranata does not get to hear what she's saying to them.
The front desk person agrees not to let any witches past the lobby unless they have broad-tailed hummingbird daemons, and asks if Helen wants a staff person to come sit with her while she waits for her clanmate.
carillons
"No, that's okay," says Helen. "I'd just be scared if it was more people I don't know. I'll wait for Ranata Ekamma by myself."
"All right. Call us if you need anything," says the front desk person.
carillons
"I will," says Helen. "Bye now."
She hangs up the phone and curls up in bed and cries, still listening to Ranata.
She hangs up the phone and curls up in bed and cries, still listening to Ranata.
The wind is whistling past Ranata; she's flying fast, murmuring to Castarilan about possible spells that could have afflicted Kas in spite of his largely mysterious protections from Isabella.
"I don't know what she did," Ranata is saying. "I don't know anything about what she did, or how. It sounds like any number of curses - why wouldn't she have - or couldn't she? - but if she could make him immortal -"
"Helen's the important thing," says Castarilan, "even if he's not fixable we can look after her."
"Helen's the important thing," says Castarilan, "even if he's not fixable we can look after her."
"You're still - how does this work? I can't tell when you're listening or not," frets Ranata. "I love you too, Helen."
carillons
"I don't know how it works," she says. "I just - listen for you, and there you are. And it helps me not be scared."