"Thaumaturge Flora said that a girl from a search and rescue squad dropped you off here last night and that it seemed like you'd run away from some bad people. Do you know if they'd be looking for you?" murmurs Winona.

Probably. She's not sure. They might not think it's worth it.

"There are a couple of things we might need to know to make sure they can't find you," says Winona. "Did you use to look like this especially in the face, did they know you were magic, are you far away from where you came from, is Janet the name they know you by -"

Deep breaths. (Oh no oh no she made a mistake... it might not be unrecoverable, though... deep breaths don't panic, Denice, that helps nothing... assume it is recoverable, how does she do that...)

They don't know she's magic. She changed her face but only a little, maybe she should change it more. And her name. She's not sure how far is far enough but this might be, she biked like a week to get here.

"That might not be far enough depending on how hard they're looking. Out of state would be better," Winona says. "We live here, but we often stay at my sister's place in Colorado. If we get you there and pretend we met you there, and stay there a couple of months, then we could probably move back. - I'm already talking like we're going to adopt you, of course Thaumaturge Flora was talking to several families -"

She should - she should meet the others, yeah - she really doesn't want them to find her -

"The Thaumatologists aren't going to turn you in," says Julie firmly. "We used to help escaping slaves, like Quakers - Abigail Lydia Claremont was raised Quaker."

She doesn't know what that is.

"Quakers are a kind of Christian. Anyway, you're safe with Thaumatologists as long as the police don't actually break into the church," says Julie. Flora, lurking behind her, nods.

She doesn't find that as reassuring as they'd like, maybe, but she makes an effort to calm down.

"Am I right that you don't really want to talk about where you came from?" Julie asks.

Yeah.

"All right then. What do you like to do? What are you looking forward to?"

She takes a second to think about that one, relaxing a bit as she does.

She likes reading. She really likes poetry. She thinks she likes cats but she's never gotten to interact with one. She likes being around other kids but she thinks she'll be okay on her own, too. She liked riding the bike she made. She likes being outside at night, it's pretty and quiet. She hasn't really thought about what she wants to do next; she was too busy getting away. She doesn't really know what her choices are, anyway.

"We don't have any other kids. Or a cat, but I had a cat as a kid, I could see getting a cat again," muses Julie.

That would be nice.

"Do you like school?" asks Julie.

Her body language reverts immediately to withdrawn-scared-cautious, but she doesn't panic, she's had enough time to think about how to handle this one.

She doesn't know what school is like out here. It was really bad where she was before.

"Do you know what kind of school it was? There are a lot of kinds - and public schools are only all the same kind in name," says Julie.

She shakes her head: No, she doesn't know.

"Well, we've got enough money for the private schools, we can shop around if you turn out to hate public," says Julie. "- and if you come with us, I mean."

Okay.

Did Flora tell them about her hands? She can only sort of hold a pencil, that might be a problem.

"Can you type, have you tried that?" asks Winona.

She hasn't tried it.

"Does it help if you make the pencil with your spell?" Julie asks.