He looks around.

" - Imrainai?"

" - oh good. I mean, not good, just - I don't know what this is - "

"Well that makes two of us. How long have you been here?"

"A few minutes. I don't know exactly."

"Is there a note, or anything?"

"Something on the table with the notebooks. I don't recognize the letters."

He examines it.

It's writing. It's not any of the languages he knows.

"Huh."

"I - really don't have any guesses."

"I have a couple but none of them explain why you're here. Unless there's something you shoulda mentioned."

"I appeared here, I looked around, I saw the note, I wandered around a little, you appeared."

"That's - not the kind of thing." He sighs. He shivers. "I guess we sit here and wait for them to tell us what they want."

"I guess."

She sits down in the grass under one of the trees. 

And after a few more minutes, a crying woman holding a baby appears. She turns around, alarmed. 

" - what - "

"Hi. ...let me guess, snatched randomly going about your business?"

"I - yes."

"Where're you from?"

- okay, this is good, a few questions are good. If they're fairies. They don't look it. 

"I - England, originally. A moment ago I was in fairyland."

" - is that even a place?"

"Some places call the First Plane that. - you're human?"

"Yes."

"Living with the fae?"

"Yes. I was - I found one in a fairy ring and he took me back home with him."

"Ah."

She holds her baby close and wipes her eyes.

"Not interested in who we are?"

" - I didn't mean - I'm not supposed to ask questions - "

"We're not fae. Just humans. I'm from Osirion and she's from Cheliax."

"Oh. I'm - not sure where that is. Do you - do you know where we are - "

"No idea. We haven't been here very long."

"I see."

"Are you, like, okay? I mean, aside from the being randomly kidnapped, you - sort of look like you were having a bad day before that."

She tries to answer this for a moment and then presses a hand to her mouth to keep from audibly sobbing.

"'m sorry - "

"No, don't be. Do you want - I dunno, a hug?"

Nodnodnodnod.

So she stands up and gives the crying lady a hug.

He should give them some space probably. 

He does that.

"You're okay. - I mean, actually you're probably not, you've sort of been kidnapped, I don't know why I said that, just - I'm not gonna hurt you and he's not gonna hurt you. And you can cry, if that helps, or whatever."

Nodnod. "Who are - not your real name, sorry, I don't need to know that, just - if there's anything else you go by - "

"I'm Imrainai. He's Hagan."

"You're - why that name - "

" - I dunno. I made it up when I was a kid. Needed something to call myself and wanted something that didn't sound Chelish."

" - I - sorry, I'm sure it's nothing, I just - I used to tell stories to my children about someone named - that - "

- she shoots a questioning look at Hagan.

" - I'm not an expert on magic? ...you look kinda alike. If you were less ...Chelish and a bit older and had northern hair -"

"You think so?"

She does not know anything about any of this and so snuggles her baby.

"Your baby?"

Nod.

"Fairy's?"

Headshake. "From before."

"Were you married, then, or - "

Headshake. "Concubine. Didn't - didn't want to be. I was given to - I don't know where you're from, whether you've heard of Scandinavia there, but - it's the most powerful nation on the continent, they've taken over everything - their emperor has at least a dozen women at any given time, and he - so when I met the fairy I thought - I didn't know if it'd be worse but I had to - had to try something, right, for her sake if for no one else - "

Nodnod. Hug.

"Is it? Worse?"

She looks down and shakes her head.

"Well, that's something."

Nodnod. "Shouldn't be sad about it. It's better, really, it is, it's just - I'm an idiot, is all - "

"Why's that?"

"I thought he loved me. The fairy. I thought - he was so kind, sometimes, and I thought - but he doesn't. I'm a slave, really, and of course he wouldn't, I just - I thought - "

"Oh, poor thing, lots of people are nice for a while. I guess maybe you wouldn't know, locked in some king's harem. It doesn't mean much."

She sobs and nods.

"Did he leave, or did he get mean?"

"No, not that, no. I - he moved on. But I can't, I - belong to him."

"Well. Only if you expect him to find you here. - do we expect anyone to find us here?"

"Yes," he says quickly, and then a little quieter. "Yeah. Mahdi'll scry and if that doesn't work he'll ask some other people because he'll figure it was the cultists - I don't really think so, though -"

Nod. "No reason they'd want just the two of us. And this one."

"If we get rescued and you want to come back with us you can."

"I - 

" - some of my children are still with their father, I couldn't leave. The fairy's going to help me get them back. - I think. He said he meant to. And there's a little one studying languages with the fairy's father, he wouldn't have anyone."

Nod. 

"'m sorry. Just - don't let the cruelties of this life take your sights off the next one, right, someday it'll be okay -"

Fervent nodding. Sniffle. "I hope so. 'm not sure I've been a very good Christian lately."

"Going back, for your kids, that's Good."

Nodnod. She snuggles her baby.

Another person appears in the middle of nowhere. Stumbles. Looks around.

" - Rána. - I'm sorry, I don't know what's happening - "

She's drying her eyes again. This really does not do much to hide the fact that she's been crying.

He glares at the people presumably responsible for this. "Get away from her."

"Did you do this? Because if not, pretty sure you're not in charge here."

"In - charge - here? I don't know why we're here or what's happening. Just back away from Cecelia and then you can tell me all about it."

He does not especially do this.

" - do you want me to go?"

"I -

" - they didn't do anything, I'm sorry - "

He glances anxiously at the two of them again. 

" - come here -"

She leaves the - other Imrainai - and comes over to him, still holding her baby tight. Sort of involuntarily looks at the ground instead of at him.

She frowns at them a little but doesn't interfere with this.

Hug. 

Whispered: "what's going on?"

She kind of leans a little. She's holding a baby anyway.

"I don't know anything about the field, I just appeared here. They were already here. The crying's - please don't worry about it right now, it's nothing to do with any of this - "

"Was my father difficult? He says cruel things sometimes but he doesn't mean them, promise -"

Headshake. "No, your father's wonderful."

"Okay." He goes back to looking at the other two of them. "Who're you - don't give your birth names -"

"Let's just stick with 'Imrainai', then. I'm from Cheliax."

"Never heard of it."

"Different plane. Why the names rule, before I decide what to give you -"

"If you give me your birth name then I shall have to take you home with me and I already have all the mortals I can feed."

"Hagan. You know how to leave this place?"

"No, I don't."

"You shouldn't just - may I tell them the rules - "

" - I'd like to know more about what's going on before I make it easier for them -"

- nod. "Okay."

"What does that mean?"

"There are a lot of rules about fairies. It's not a good idea to interact with fairies without knowing the rules. Cecelia could explain them to you but I would rather know who decided to kidnap us before giving them - one of the things they might be wishing to get out of having kidnapped us. You'd be entirely safe if you'd leave us alone."

"Easier to leave people alone when they're not being a piece of shit to their slaves. Just in general."

"He's not. Please, I'm sorry, I was very upset, I didn't - "

"What is your problem!"

"I just told you."

"I take good care of her."

With some difficulty he looks away, at the ground.

She half-hugs Rána.

"M'sorry. I might have confused them. I was - I'm sorry."

"It doesn't take much to confuse stupid people."

She does not look very happy about this characterization, but she doesn't say anything.

"There's a note for us. If either of the two of you can read it."

"I guess I could try?" 

She looks at Rána.

"Yeah, go on -"

She gets it from the table and holds it out to her from a little ways away.

She takes it.

"It's the Latin alphabet. Can't make much sense of the words."

"Huh."

"We didn't recognize the alphabet. - you didn't either, right?"

"I didn't."

"So... maybe whoever did this is closer to where you're from than where we're from."

Nodnod. "Maybe."

"Did you ask them how long they've been here?" he asks Catherine.

"They said not very long. I don't know specifically."

"How long do you think it was, before she showed up? Half an hour? I think it was longer between her and us than between me and you, or between her and him - "

"Not more than half an hour. And yeah, he came faster after that." Glare.

"Oh, did I interrupt something?"

He holds up his hands defensively and steps away. "No, no, no, I barely spoke with her. Never went near her."

- he is confused.

"I gave her a hug," she says, neutrally. This is not really new information because she was hugging Cecilia when he appeared.

"I'm not -" Sigh. "I think you have some misapprehensions here. - I don't know what they are but I think there are some of them. I don't - I don't treat her like a slave - I'm not angry you touched her unless she minds -"

Earnest headshake. "They were nice."

" - okay. Then I guess - you can talk to her some more if you want to?"

" - in what sense do you not treat her like a slave?"

"We're staying at my court overnight because she wanted to. I hate it."

"O...kay? You let her have what she wanted one time and that constitutes not treating her like a slave, where you come from?"

" - yes? I'm not making her pay for it, either, she couldn't, I'm covering it myself."

"Wow. Such generosity, paying for your slave's lodgings."

" - I have no idea what you're taking issue with, here -"

" - whatever. Sorry. I think you're confused, but I guess that's not a crime, or we'd all be in even more trouble."

"No, seriously, what do you think I should be doing? I got her and I went for help getting her other children, and we're teaching them all our language, and we're staying overnight because she wanted to, and I've taught her everything I know and no one else has bothered her and we got rid of the bed because she didn't like it and -"

"I - what? Look, I'm not an expert on your - relationship, here, I met you like five minutes ago, I just - 

" - Hagan, what did you guys mean, when you told me and Verita that we weren't slaves, what did that translate out to?"

"- you can leave if you want to. Verita can leave if she can explain how this isn't going to immediately get her killed or captured. You own your stuff -" flinch - "and get to keep money you make and so on, you get a say in where we go and what we do there, you're not alone with us -"

"Mhmm. And your Cecilia, does she get any of that?"

" - do you get the thing I'm trying to say?" he asks Cecelia.

Nodnodnod. "It's not like it was before. It's - you let me make choices. And it's good."

Lean. "Yeah."

She leans a little. She looks at the ground.

She sighs and frowns at Hagan.

" - look, buddy, I'm not clear which things it's safe to say to you and which it's not but if you actually want advice you could clear that up and I could try."

- sigh. "Fine. Cecelia can explain."

" - okay. It's important not to say your birth name, because if he knows it you're entangled. Every time he answers a question or does something for you, that magically puts you in his debt, which is a temporary kind of entanglement. Every time you do something for him or answer one of his questions, that puts him in your debt, and if the interactions even out, then you're even and not entangled anymore. I'm in his debt, a lot of debt, so I'm - I belong to him. We're entangled. Once two people are entangled, anything either of them does that the fairy magic disapproves of brings misfortune on both of them, disease or pain or death, so you mustn't do those things while you're entangled. You shouldn't lie, even a little. You shouldn't swear falsely. You shouldn't attack people whose debt you're in, though they're allowed to attack you. You shouldn't falsely accuse people of lying. And if you're in someone's debt, and they give you an order, and you refuse it, that puts you more in their debt. - I think that's most of it."

"Yikes. Okay. - then he's not even giving you food and shelter, he's just adding it to your magical - obligations to him?"

"Well - it does add debt."

Sigh. "Okay. That - complicates giving advice."

"What were you going to say?"

"Just that you can't keep a woman as your personal slave and do right by her. There's - there's lots of stories people like to tell themselves where they're kind enough or affectionate enough or well-meaning enough, or she's happy enough in the moment, and they like to say that's good enough, but it's not. The only way to do right by a woman, if you want her in your bed, is to marry her."

She snuggles her baby and looks at the ground.

"Fairies don't really have - marriage."

"Then I guess fairies can't do right by women, ever. Sounds tough. I kinda can't get married either and sometimes it makes me sad but I don't pretend that I should run off with someone and say nice things instead of promises."

"I think you're wrong. Or - maybe right about humans, but -"

"She's human."

He shakes his head.

- she's trying not to cry again. It's hard.

"What's the matter - he's never met you, you know, he doesn't know anything -"

She does not look very cheered at all. "I guess not."

"What's the matter -"

"I don't - I'm sorry - "

Patpatpat. "It's okay. We can - we can figure it out when we're alone sometime, if this isn't a good time -"

Nodnodnodnod. "'m sorry."

"It's okay. It'll be okay."

She doesn't nod at that. She hugs her baby.

She sighs and flops backward onto the grass.

- he'll go back to glaring at the man who upset her, then.

Sure, this is totally his fault.

She shreds a piece of grass.

"Look, I don't know that Hagan's right, but you seem - confused. About what doing right by anyone consists of. So - tread lightly, or whatever, I think you shouldn't assume that letting her make choices sometimes means she's okay."

"'m not confused. Just - bad at words. And Cecelia's good at them but she's scared right now so we'll just have to wait until she's not, and wants to talk about it. If she does."

"Valid, I guess."

She sets her baby down to try crawling in the grass. She wipes her eyes. She looks at the sky and breathes.

"You can't always have everything you want," she says, eventually.

"Yeah. But if something really matters to you I'll try, right, like with staying at court."

" - yes. I know. Just - some things are unreasonable to expect."

"I...guess? 

Like, that sure does seem true of at least some things but I have no idea which things you're thinking of - 

- and I thought stuff was okay - 

- we'll leave in the morning -"

She draws her knees up to herself and hugs them and nods.

"It's - not your fault, or anything, it's just - that I got confused about some things, and that - made me want things that I would not have bothered wanting if I'd remembered what I was. I guess. I'm sorry."

"Do you want a hug?"

...nod.

(The baby crawls over towards Hagan and gurgles.)

- he could pick up a baby and rock and pet her without interrupting his glaring at the fairy, sure.

Hug. "Once we get out of court and get the kids it'll be better, I think."

"Yeah. Probably."

"Do you believe that thing he said? About the only way to be good to a woman?"

"I - there are different - levels, I guess, of being good to someone."

Snuggle. "'m not human. I don't - understand - that. But I want to be good to you."

Nodnod.

...well, she kind of wants to impress upon this guy how bad this situation is for Cecilia, but also she's totally right that her options here are really limited and maybe she should take what she can get.

...Hagan and the baby are unreasonably cute. She would not really have expected unmarried Osirian men to have any idea what to do with babies, but there they are being cute.

Babies are easy, they just want attention and snuggles and to pull on your hair.

She snuggles Rana a little and watches her baby and doesn't say anything else.

And after a few more minutes, another person appears, screams, and immediately claps her hand over her mouth.

"....hi?"

" - I'm sorry, I didn't mean to - what's - I'm sorry - "

"We have all been kidnapped by unknown parties with unknown aims. That over there is a fairy, don't tell him your name or he has some kinda magical debt bondage powers over you. That's his slave, going by Cecelia. She and Imrainai and I are just normal humans."

"She and - your name's Imrainai?"

"What I'm going by. Mean anything to you?"

"I - no."

"Don't lie to me," he snaps from next to Cecelia. 

She makes a small terrified sound.

"She wasn't even talking to you."

"Sure, correction, don't lie at all. Or break promises, or swear falsely or accuse someone falsely or attack people you're indebted to."

"Just to be clear, if you try to add any terrified girls who show up here to your magic debt slavery deal, I will kill you, and if that means I die of some magic fairy retaliation I am fine with that, I like where I'm headed."

"If I were trying to get you lot it would be easy. I'm trying not to."

"Just so long as we're clear."

"If you try to kill me you will fall over with somewhere between an enormous headache and your skin peeling off and you'll belong to me."

"I think you're underestimating how dead you will be."

"If I could afford to feed you I'd tell you to go ahead and try it."

"Please don't," she says to Hagan, quietly.

He swallows and turns away, with some effort.

She heads over to the new girl, who honestly looks like she's about to faint. She takes one of her hands.

"Hey. Shh. Breathe."

Nodnodnod. She breathes. "I'm not - are any of you Wolfram & Hart Employees - "

"I don't know what that is. Today was my first day working at the local Temple of Erastil, I don't know if that means anything to you?"

She glances at the fairy and thinks. "I don't - think it does - "

"Where're you from?"

"Wolfram & Hart Los Angeles branch. It's - it's an interdimensional law firm. Uh, I guess - Earth, if you've heard of Earth."

" - like, the elemental plane of Earth?"

"...no? Like, the planet Earth."

"...are you not from Earth? I thought everyone was from Earth. Or Heaven. Or Hell."

"I know Heaven and I know Hell and I know a place called the elemental plane of Earth but the planet Imrainai and I are from is called Golarion and the plane is the material plane and I haven't been to any other ones except Axis."

"What's a planet? What's a plane?"

" - so on some planes, gravity and the environment are such that enormous collections of rock pull together in spheres, and the spheres are so big that whole civilizations can spring up on them. Golarion is one such giant sphere. 

Planes are - different places in the universe but not spatially contiguous? I'm sorry, I don't know a good way to - okay, so everywhere in the world you can get by walking or in a boat or flying, in principle, right, some places might take a really long time but they are all places connected to each other such that if you travelled for long enough you'd eventually be there?"

Nodnod.

"So there are also some places that you cannot get to that way. Not even by flying straight up in the sky, which will get you to other planets eventually. You can only get to these - disconnected places - by magic, or by dying and getting sent there. Heaven's like that. Hell's like that. There are lots of other places like that too. We call them planes."

"Oh. Okay. I - think that makes sense."

"Earth's a planet. The planet I'm from. And I guess where she's from. Maybe."

" - maybe you can read the note. Have you heard of the Latin alphabet?"

"...yes. I have heard of the Latin alphabet."

She hands her the note.

" - yeah, okay. Um. This says, 'Hi! I'm sorry to have dragged you away from whatever you were doing before. Please don't be alarmed. I didn't have another way to contact you. It'll take a few hours to finish gathering all of the people we wanted to talk to. I think I can return all of you to your home planes without any time having passed in them, so you shouldn't have any trouble on that front. You can probably guess what you have in common, but if you can't then I'll explain it to you when you're all here. We don't want anything in particular from you and you're not in danger, and once you're all together we'll put you back as soon as you want. We'd identify ourselves, except that it occurs to us that some of you may be full-blooded fairies, in which case that's a bad plan. We just think you're probably all super interesting and wanted to meet you. See you soon.'

"...it's signed 'Imrainai'."

" - okay, I can guess what you three all have in common, but -"

She looks from Hagan to the fairy.

"...yeah, I don't know. This is really weird."

"You said Hagan had to tell you, at some point, that you weren't his slave."

" - huh. 

There are some people trying to kill Imrainai's niece and we had to break into their house to escape with her. We took Imrainai too. She's - not - because we're not evil -" glare at the fairy -

"I don't know if it - means anything, I'm just - looking for commonalities - "

" - but he did sort of kidnap us. Kind of. Not without cooperation. Which I guess was true in your case, too."

(She curls up and hugs herself and trembles.)

"Did anyone - kidnap you?" he asks her.

"I don't - not really? I'm not allowed to go - "

"Well that sounds a little bit kidnappy."

"I still live in my house and everything, I just - can't quit working - "

"If I were to say you can run off to a different dimension with us if you wanna, would you say that there're kids-"

".....yes."

"Cecelia did it for the kids. Coming with me. Because - because she didn't like what the human king was teaching them, she thought they'd go to Hell -"

She hugs herself.

"I just - didn't have any money to feed them. And I was worried someone else would come by and kill me and they'd end up - in foster care, or something. So I - it's a bad plan, right, working for Wolfram & Hart, once you sign your contract it's - that's it - but at least you don't starve - "

"This is - some organization of devils -"

"I - they work with them. Maybe at the top."

"If the people doing this are fetching - Imrainais and the people who sort of enslaved them - who do you think it'd fetch next -"

"I - I don't know, it's a big organization, it might be the guy who gave me the contract or the CEO of the company or - they said we weren't in danger, what kind of person does that - "

"It's possible there's something preventing us from doing each other violence? ...regrettably we can't test this because apparently if I punch him it'll break fairy rules."

"You could test it on anyone other than me - or Cecelia, or the baby -"

"I'm not going to hit a woman!"

"I didn't mean hard, I mean, like, enough to test if we need to fear violence here!"

"You could hit me? If I'm understanding the fairy debt rules right?"

"Yeah, I could. - you prefer this to a test that involves any of them, just because of the sex they are?"

"Obviously."

She slaps Korva. It lands. Makes a loud sound.

" - ow."

"Sorry!

" - I think maybe I should run."

"I think we should just be politely hanging around enjoying tea and let the fairy use the magic fairy debt powers. I don't see obvious prospects of winning a fight, here, but I've never heard of this fairy thing and I've heard of a lot of nonsense and maybe your kidnapper hasn't heard of it either."

"I - maybe. If he's - if the fairy thinks that's a good plan."

" - it doesn't sound like a great plan but I would expect to be able to get a normal human who doesn't specifically know what I am? - especially if I'm dressed like one -"

Hagan takes off his shirt and tosses it to him. 

She sits down in the grass again. "M'sorry for hitting you."

"No big. We'll try to protect you from your - kidnapper person."

"Is there any more context it'd be helpful for us to have?"

"I, um - Wolfram & Hart's an interdimensional law firm, right, it's - very powerful and very big and a very bad idea to - give it reason to harm you - I'm really sorry for asking any of you to do anything at all - "

"I like where I'm headed."

"Okay. That's good. I don't think I do. But they - they can trap you, and things, it's not just killing you - "

He nods seriously. "I - think I'm in less danger than you probably think, for a couple of reasons. And the fairy's a dick so I don't care what happens to him. But we should definitely -" he looks around unhappily - "there's nowhere to get the rest of you to safety -"

She nods miserably.

She hugs Rana.

"...can I have the baby back."

"Of course." He hands over the baby.

She takes the baby. Snuggles her.

- and another person appears. 

He looks like the fairy except he's wearing a jacket and snow pants and muddy boots, and holding a crossbow, and there's something else off. He's not quite human.

He raises the crossbow and spins to take them all in, bewildered. "What's this - Karen?"

" - ah, fuck," says the fairy.

" - what?"

He drops the crossbow and scoops her up and hugs her.

" - um? Um. Hi."

"You're okay - god - I thought -"

"Um. Who - are you?"

He sets her down.

He looks around, more confused than ever. 

" - I'm sorry. You - you look just like someone."

"Is it someone you at some point sort of kidnapped."

"- sort of kidnapped? I - not really -"

"Huh."

"Do we have to do anything about - do you know her name now - "

"Yes, I do."

Hagan steps protectively in front of Karen.

"You're not really understanding - if she does anything wrong, it will hurt her, it will hurt me, it will hurt Cecelia, it will hurt my whole family and everyone they're connected to, I don't want her but I will destroy hundreds of lives if I let her wander off."

"This just really sounds like a problem that goes away if you die."

" - what's going on here?"

Sigh. "All of us were brought here by an unknown power that may or may not have - something in common, with me and with her and with - Karen. We were suspecting that the other people were people who had at some point sort of kidnapped or enslaved that set of people and honestly I am still kind of expecting it, though you and the fairy have more - obvious similarities, than the fairy and Hagan did, so maybe there's something else. That one's the fairy. There are a bunch of annoying rules for interacting with him. If he answers questions or does things for you then you end up in his debt. If you're - entangled with him, was the word, you can't tell lies or swear falsely or make false accusations or attack him without causing some sort of harm to yourself, up to and including death. 

"If he learns your true name then he says he has to take you home with him. He's already enslaved Cecelia and we are now arguing about what he's going to do with Karen."

He turns to look at the fairy.

" - also don't do that! Stop doing that! What are you even doing! What is wrong with all of you people!"

" - huh."

"What'd you do?"

"Oh, I can read minds."

"Stop."

"Apologize to Karen for implying you were going to enslave her."

"I didn't - look, the mindreading's putting you in my debt, not the other way around, you should stop for self-interested reasons here -"

"It is hard to describe how little I care about anything other than Karen."

She sits down and rests her head in her hands.

"New guy, do you know a place called Wolfram and Hart?"

" - yeah. They're evil."

"And you're not?"

" - not an easy question to answer. Wolfram and Hart is my enemy."

"What happened to the Karen you know - what was she, to you -"

"A very close friend. She's dead. - she's in Hell."

"If we get outta here this is a problem I can totally solve for you. Assuming she died young."

"Seventeen. Maybe eighteen, there was some travel between dimensions that made it hard to count."

"Okay. Well, the thing I want out of this whole situation is that no one gets enslaved and all the girls get to go home to their kids, and if you can help me accomplish that then my world has resurrection and I can afford one and people-who-are-in-some-vague-sense-Imrainai-and-in-Hell sound like great people to fetch."

- nod.

"Let's get away from here," he says to Cecelia.

"Okay."

They can just walk out a ways away from everyone. 

"You can afford a resurrection and you're gonna spend it on - saving some person who might have something in common with me? Just because?"

"I don't like Hell. - and we could use allies, here."

"I guess."

"I'm sure it's not, like, the objectively best way to spend money if you want to help as many people as possible or whatever."

"Obviously not. But I suppose if it's yours you can do what you like with it."

"Shouldn't be kids in Hell."

"Is there - what're you gonna do about the fairy - "

"Not let him have you. - dunno how that's best achieved. Murdering him has the side benefit of getting Cecelia freed but she wants her kids, can't do that if we don't have another way to get them."

Nodnod.

He sits down on the grass well away from them. " - should've just left sooner - but they thought we could help -"

Hug. "Yeah. I'm sorry."

" 's okay. - I want to talk about whatever's bothering you because it's - distracting, having you sitting there wilting of something. Did someone hurt you?"

"I - I don't know how to answer that - "

" - okay."

He sighs heavily. 

"I'm sorry."

"You keep saying that - I'm not mad at you - they've decided I'm terrible because of some stuff about their world, I think, not your fault -"

Nodnodnod. "Just - I didn't mean to be upset about it - "

“I just don’t understand and I want to.”

She curls in a little around her baby.

"I was working with your father and - someone was looking for you. And. Happened to mention that you were sleeping with someone else. Is all."

"I'm sorry. I don't - I don't think that helped me understand at all, actually -"

"Oh. Uh. It's - 

" - Hagan was saying that the only way to be good to a woman is to marry her, and - one can't always have that, obviously, but it's - I'd thought - I'd imagined that I - mattered more to you. Than I do. I think. It's - it's not your fault."

He's really really really tired of repeating "I'm so confused and that didn't explain anything". 

"I don't think fairies can marry people. It's not - it's not about you not being important enough to marry. I just - I don't think I know how."

"I know. I don't expect you to. I'd just - forgotten that I wasn't - special."

"You are special."

She almost says 'don't lie' and then remembers that he can't and swallows it.

She starts crying again.

- aaaaahh?

Maybe he should - go ask the angry girl who looks like Cecelia for - help, or something -

The angry girl who looks like Cecelia is flopped in the grass again, still hanging out with the others.

"Hey," he says.

"....hi?"

"I think I need your help. - I promise I'm not trying to hurt you and I don't have any reason to expect you'll get hurt and I think this conversation will probably end with me in your debt, if anything, and I'll help you resolve that in whatever way's convenient to you afterwards."

"....okay."

"Cecelia's miserable and I don't understand why. - she wasn't miserable yesterday, she's been really happy the whole last while, it's really not that she's just miserable all the time because of me. But right now she's miserable and she tried to explain why and it didn't make any sense."

"Okay. Why did she say she was miserable."

"She said, uh, she was working with my father and someone happened to mention I was sleeping with someone else. And I said that didn't help me understand the problem at all and she said she thought she was special to me and I said she was and she just started crying more!"

"...well, I'm not an expert on relationships, but I would guess that it's the part where she's in love with you and just learned that you're continuing to sleep with other people and that you don't see why this is a problem."

" - she's in love with me?"

"Yes? Obviously? Or she was, anyway."

"She was in love with me?" he says, sounding even more horrified.

"I mean, she's obviously not completely over you, or she wouldn't be crying, right, it's just, the person you're in love with sleeping with other people when you thought they only wanted you is the sort of thing that starts to knock that stuff loose, sometimes. I think."

"- that's not how fairies - I've never met anyone who cared who anyone else was sleeping with -"

" - okay, this is not a Cheliax thing here, right, does everybody else here think this is very obvious - "

"It seems likely?"

"Super obvious."

"I am kind of unsurprised that a species that works entirely off magical debt bondage hasn't bothered developing the concept of monogamy? But yes, all the peoples I know of have it."

"Well. There you have it. She thinks you don't care about her and she's over there crying about it."

"She didn't - she didn't say that she wanted me to not do that or anything!"

"Has she ever specifically asked you not to hit her? Not to murder her children?"

" - no?  - she would ask me not to murder her children if she was scared I might, I think."