and my ears will listen

[truthwright]

Time goes by. Shura's mother lets her cut a cloudpine branch, and she and Helen go flying together.

Helen celebrates her eighth birthday by baking all her favourite people a cake again. And then she goes away with Kas, to Iceland and Russia and back by way of Alaska.

When they fly in, Kas on Petaal's cloudpine and Helen on her own, Helen is wearing blue jeans and a pink T-shirt.

Comments

[carillons]

Helen frowns.

[alicornucopia]

"Don't you even want to be a witch? You're gone all the time and you don't even have a mom and now you're wearing jeans and a t-shirt."

[carillons]

"I am a witch," Helen insists, scowling unhappily. "No matter what I do with my clothes."

[alicornucopia]

"Then why don't you act like one?"

[carillons]

Helen turns away and hugs Kas. Kalavar flutters to Petaal's shoulder, where Petaal strokes her feathers.

[alicornucopia]

Kaydi has her own cloud-pine with her; she hops onto it and streaks away.

[carillons]

Helen clings to Kas and cries.

[alicornucopia]

Meanwhile, Ranata is in the Midwest, visiting Isabella's old house in a fit of nostalgia.

[pythbox]

There are piles and piles of old letters; the place hasn't been touched in decades.

And—

A boy with a face like Kas's but none of Kas's witchlike agelessness - he looks about sixteen or seventeen - appears out of thin air in one of the spare rooms. He's wearing some kind of unfamiliar uniform that looks both futuristic and military.

"Holy shit," he says, staring around at the abandoned house. "How long has it even been?"

[alicornucopia]

"...Kas?" Ranata asks. It's not, but she doesn't have a better guess.

[pythbox]

"No. Sue," he says distractedly, turning in circles one way and then the other. "This is their house, right? How long—?"

[alicornucopia]

"This was Isabella's house," says Ranata slowly. "I suppose Kas lived here too. Where did you come from?"

[pythbox]

"Peace," he says. "One sec."

And he flickers out of view, and back again a few seconds later.

"How long has it been?" he asks, looking straight at Ranata for the first time since he arrived, intense and a little worried.

[alicornucopia]

"Peace? How long since - what?"

[pythbox]

"Since she left!" exclaims Sue from Peace.

[alicornucopia]

"She's been gone for - sixty years now," says Ranata, "but Kas says she's coming back - look, who are you?"

[pythbox]

"I'm Kas's alt from Peace," he says. "My girlfriend's Aegis, she's one of Isabella, she's gone too but it's only been a couple of minutes for me - sixty years? Fuck. I can't stay, then, not if it's gonna be anywhere near that long." He runs both hands through his shortish curlyish hair.

[alicornucopia]

"Alt? Peace? One of Isabella? What are you talking about?"

[pythbox]

"...Wait, do you not know? Shit," he says. "Look - I'm sorry but I have to go, the clock is fucking ticking on this, I'm probably not gonna get any sleep this month - "

And he vanishes again, this time for good.

[alicornucopia]

[Kas?]

[truthwright]

[Yeah?]

[alicornucopia]

[I was just - visiting Isabella's old house - and a boy who looked like you appeared out of nowhere, and said some bewildering things, and then left.]

[truthwright]

[...was he wearing a kind of uniform jumpsuit thing?]

[alicornucopia]

[Yes.]

[truthwright]

[What exactly did he say?]