#virtually no lentils in this chapter

[jomiddlemarch]

what it is to be a thin crescent moon

Chapter 31

On the first day of December, according to the moldering old book Ana Kuya kept in her private sitting room, its scuffed leather binding secured with two cords that the orphans averred on the safety of their immortal souls resembled nothing more than pair of knotted rat’s tails, Alina and Mal came of age. They had arrived the same day, memorable only for their silence amidst the squalling and shrieking of the other children, and so Ana Kuya had given them the same name-day, though Alina had even then been slight enough to be deemed a year or two younger. What Ana Kuya decided was as irrefutable a decree as anything the Tsar might announce, at least when it came to the denizens of the orphanage, and there was no one to argue with her, even if someone might have been so inclined; the only nurserymaid had just run off with a shepherd or a soldier in the First Army, no one was ever quite sure, so Ana Kuya was short-handed and had jotted down Alina and Mal’s names in her census without the usual degree of solemnity or ceremony, her frown at their sallow Shu coloring overlaid with a general harried expression. It was a year she would recall as overly burdened with an influx of orphans, inadequately sustained by cabbages and the puniest of potatoes, punctuated by wheezing with an especially bad season of the winter catarrh. She had not honestly thought Alina would survive and had not shed a tear over the prospect of her death, though later, much later, she would say that she wore out two well-made chotki, praying through the long winter nights that Alina would wake each morning to greet the dawn with her answering light.

If the Saints had cared much for candor, she would have been struck down for her impiety.

Mal had been her favorite and everyone had known it.

Alina had known it and had been in whole-hearted agreed. Mal was hale and hearty, with a good color in his cheeks and a shine to his dark hair that the homemade soft soap could not dull. He grew broad shouldered and tall on the orphanage’s plain fare and no one begrudged him an extra helping, even though it was common knowledge Alina gave him most of her portion at every meal. It had been nothing to her to wound her hand so they might escape the Grisha assessors and she had been glad to carry the small scar on her palm as his talisman. 

Mal was cheerful and as fond of jokes as footraces, excelling in both, and by the time he’d reached his majority, there were any number of girls at Keramzin who’d have happily given him a kiss without requiring him to steal one. There were a number of girls who’d happily have given him more than a kiss behind the barns if they thought they could escape Ana Kuya’s searching gaze and almost certainly one or two who did, their eyes turning dreamy and abstracted when they were asked, stroking the ends of their braids between two fingers or touching their upper lips very gently in what might have been fantasy but was assumed, widely and with reason, to be memory. 

Mal enlisted in the First Army a man in all the ways the orphans of Keramzin believed counted. 

He gave Alina a brotherly peck on her pale cheek and told her he’d write if he had the chance. 

She knew that meant she’d likely never hear from him again.

She wrote him every week, laboring over the letters, understanding he either glanced at them briefly or tossed them away without opening them. It gave her something to do that did not involve wiping up dirt and snot and shit from the orphans left in her care. Writing him reminded her she had been a person, Alina, before she was Miss, before she tied the voluminous pinafore around her drab blouse and skirt, her lank hair bundled back beneath a kerchief.

The nurserymaid.

She had tried to enlist along with Mal, albeit as the most junior of map-makers instead of a tracker as he had done, but the officer had taken one look at her narrow shoulders and short stature and told her that the Tsar appreciated her willingness to serve, but she was not suited to First Army life and would do best to stay where she was, repaying the Duke whose generosity had kept her alive. He’d spoken in the dialect used in Keramzin and hadn’t expected her to understand the remark he made to his fellow officer in proper Ravkan, that the Duke hadn’t been generous enough, the girl was as scrawny as a plucked pullet, twice as pale as a boiled parsnip, which was evidently all she’d ever been given to eat.

Alina, who had spent her every spare minute in the Duke’s dusty library, had understood him perfectly and had held her tongue, though she longed to make a retort in Suli blank verse or Skritje shastra to wipe the pitying half-smile off his face. He would never have understood her but word might get back to Ana Kuya that Alina had been disrespectful or over-bold and she’d give up her precious free hours to mending the endless pile of shirts or scrubbing out the chamber pots the children used at night. She nodded and walked back to the field where the youngest children were been barely minded by the ones old enough to feed and dress themselves. The sun was bright and she had a sudden, blinding headache which coincided with her realization that if she didn’t do something about it, she had seen the breadth and depth of her entire life and it was bounded by a clothesline filled with small, stained fraying breeches and vests which would never be quite clean no matter how vigorously Alina scrubbed them or how hot the water in the laundering vat was. Small, stained, fraying, that would be Alina herself until she died, worn out like a rag, tossed aside in a grave no one bothered to lay a flower at, Miss in fading memories and then nothing at all.

She had to do something, but her first attempt, the First Army, the maps she would have traced in properly prepared ink, not the walnut gall concoction Ana Kuya brewed, had failed and she’d been sent back. Back and not home. For Keramzin had never felt like home—that had been Mal, before he’d left, and sometimes, the sunny patch beneath the oak at the far corner of the property. She’d lie flat on her back, ignoring the roots and stones beneath her spine and hips, and feel something in her answer the sunlight’s strength before a cloud passed or a child cried out, loud enough she could not dismiss it. Alina was determined she’d find some way out or forward, but after being dismissed by the recruitment officer, she had no idea what her salvation might be.

In the meantime, there were children who needed her, all day, all night. She was not as brusque as Ana Kuya, not inclined to cuff someone who was slow to finish a task, and she didn’t shame anyone who wet the bed. She was not old enough to seem like a mother, nor did her frail frame suggest the generally agreed upon wide-hipped and buxom figure of a Ravkan matron, but as Miss, she received the love of an elder sister or spinster aunt, and as she had not been given leave to punish the orphans for any transgression, she was regarded as a protector if not a partner-in-crime. The general mild affection she was able to evoke was largely responsible for what happened during what was later referred to as the Terrible Winter, a season that began early with torrential rains that ruined half the harvest before changing to a never-ending mix of sleet and snow which kept the children indoors and the rooms dank with the scent of damp wool and the thin millet pottage they had to subsist on.

Alina, too exhausted to actually muster a sense of desperation at the children’s fractious boredom, found three Shatranj sets in the Duke’s library. They were old and worn, the pieces rudely carved, though handled long enough there would be no splinters. She and Mal had played with the good set that was laid out on a table before a window, the pieces ivory and jet, but she would not risk the punishment that would surely come if she removed it to the orphanage. The boards she’d found no one would miss. She told herself that and even when Ana Kuya finally noticed, the mistress did not scold overmuch, the tattered equipment incongruent with the Duke’s eminence. She’d said it so and Alina had not rolled her eyes. It meant she was getting accustomed to Ana Kuya and that was too fearful to contemplate.

She turned her attention to teaching the orphans the rules of the game.

If they had been better fed, they might have learned more readily, but then the machinations and stratagems required to survive Keramzin lent themselves to the comprehension of gambits and unlike in real life, someone was guaranteed a victory; they were too young and inexperienced for the outcome to ever be a draw. If the weather had improved or the snow had turned that that variety best suited to sledding and snowball fights, they might never had gotten good enough for the idea to cross Alina’s mind, but there was nothing else to occupy Bisera and Dako, Nazar and ´Zeli and from that quartet, the team was created, Alina serving as coach and opponent, Grozim willing to play whoever had lost worst, in hopes of ever getting good enough to win.

Alina had filched the few books on shatranj from the Duke’s library but soon enough, they were creating their own gambits. Or rather, she was and occasionally Bisera had an idea good enough to incorporate. The Boiled Frog was one and the Ketterdam Market, Summer Crossing helpful when the pawns were plentiful, Sankta Milena’s Blessing almost unbeatable unless countered with the Summoner’s Arm. Alina, who admitted she had too much concern for the state of the advisor’s piece, would force herself not to open every game with Hivekeeper’s Disgrace, but she could not help from smiling to herself when the victory was achieved with Midnight Sun and frowning at Zygitai’s Tears. They played match after match, using an old hourglass to time the games, the early prizes of an extra ladleful of porridge soon superseded by the win itself. The stimulation and entertainment would have been enough for them all, except that a peddler came by with his wagon of needles and jars of dried beans and figs and saw them playing, remarked they might hold their own at the regional tournament and perhaps even be asked to go to Os Alta, for the country’s grand competition, where the Grisha played on behalf of the Tsar himself.

It took far less pleading to convince Ana Kuya to allow the children to try than Alina had expected.

“The failure will be good for them,” she’d said. “They must learn their place, how to be contented here.”

Alina was not very surprised by Ana Kuya’s assumption of their imminent and conclusive failure. It didn’t even merit a shrug in response. She asked only to be allowed to find the least poorly darned cloaks and sweaters for the children to wear to the competition. As their appearance would reflect on the Duke, it was not hard to get Ana Kuya to agree.

The first round of the tournament was a rout.

Alina’s team arrived, squinted at the boards, and demolished their opponents.

The other teams were so taken aback by their defeats that they offered to pay for the evening meal for the Keramzin orphans, the rich food and local milk punch almost as wonderful as the trophy they were awarded with a small stipend to allow them to attend the next level of the competition.

Alina, who had no taste for the carved meats, honey-soaked pastries and heavily spiced drink, was gladdened most by the money and what it represented. A chance to go farther, to get out.

To leave Keramzin behind.

The second round was a bloodbath. For their challengers, who’d strutted into the hall that had been provided and took their seats as if they were Lantsovs upon their thrones, who could not imagine an arguably rag-tag assortment of orphans, however thoroughly scrubbed they were, could ever prove an obstacle in their path to victory.

There was not one draw. A slender blonde girl who wore a finely embroidered tunic and had bright silk ribbons woven through her braids, dangling over her shoulders so she might fidget with them while she contemplated her next move actually upended the board as she flounced away from the table when ´Zeli murmured Checkmate. A stolid black-haired boy who had clearly never missed a meal in his entire life kept gazing the pieces left after his defeat, his brow furrowed and something like respect evident in the way he pressed his lips together and made his left hand into a fist.

None of the other players offered to stand them dinner, but the cook in the tavern they’d lodged in put together a plentiful repast of lentil stew and fresh rye bread, some flagons of kvas, and three dishes of jam, which Nazar ate spoonfuls of without the interruption of a slice of bread or any pretense to manners.

It was after their resounding success in the third round that Alina began to believe they might actually go to the final championship in Os Alta, where the Tsar’s own team, made up of the best Grisha students of shatranj and any nobles’ heirs who could keep up would be playing. It was said the Tsar and his courtiers came to watch the play and placed bets, as if any loss could touch their coffers. It was whispered that the General of the Second Army, Kirigan himself, might be seen to observe.

Alina, who knew herself for a naïve rustic at best, did not believe for one second General Kirigan would attend the national shatranj competition. Sooner would a stone recite the evening prayer, as the saying went in Keramzin. She was so certain she didn’t bother to worry about being wrong and the night before the final round, she slept more deeply than she had for years.

In the morning, she woke as close to refreshed as she could recall being and almost had an appetite for the curd cakes and sausage that was offered to all the players in a dining room adjacent to the great hall where the matches would be played. She managed a few bites and most of a mug of strong tea she sweetened with one small spoonful of honey. She saw that her team was as neat and tidy as possible, their best clothes fit for the ragbag in the Little Palace, based on the glimpses she’d had of the Grisha players in their finely embroidered jackets, and ensured that the Keramzin orphans were all standing behind their assigned chairs in a nearly military stance, hands held clasped behind their backs, chins up. She herself stood apart where the other advisors milled about, none of them taking much notice of her which didn’t displease her. Her own appearance was at best unprepossessing, and her tension only made her sallow cheeks more pale, her lips chapped, nails bitten to the quick. 

The play was swift at first and then slowed, as the weaker teams were defeated, the losing players walking away from the tables where the boards were placed in a variety of manners—some defiant, some dejected, a few shaking their heads as if they could not believe what had just happened.

No member of the Keramzin team rose and walked away.

The play became more intense. More members of the Imperial court drifted into the room to watch and such was the reverence in which the Tsar held shatranj that only whispers and the softest muttering were heard as moves and gambits were assessed and debated.

The field narrowed. First Grozim was knocked out and then Bisera. Nazar, grinning as if he’d won. Dako, his eyes filled with tears, who bowed to Alina very formally, as if she were his patroness, as elevated as the Tsarina.

´Zeli was left, playing against the last of the opponents, a Grisha named Artem with peach fuzz on his cheeks, wearing a coat the color of a violet. He did not always use his hands to move the pieces, a bit of showman’s-ship Alina chalked up to his less effective use of gambits, an attempt to unsettle ´Zeli into an error.

For an instant, during which Alina felt as hot as if the sun had taken up residence in her chest and was burning her from the inside out, it seemed he might succeed. And then ´Zeli used the first gambit Alina had invented herself, Sashenka’s Sunbeam, and in an utterly graceful, unbroken gesture, delivered the final blow.

“Checkmate.”

There was a moment of complete silence and then a roar for which Alina had no comparison. She had never heard a tidal wave crash upon the shore nor the tumult of the cavalry overtaking an enemy. There was only the sound of her own heart, beating terribly hard, and then a sudden dizziness, as if she might faint. She felt a hand at her elbow, steadying her, a man’s low voice murmuring Have a care before she could turn to face him.

There was no one next to her and then, the orphans for Keramzin swarmed her, their joy animate, as potent as the powers the Grisha wielded. They laughed and shouted, talking over each other, recounting their victories and losses with equal glad abandon and Alina could not deny that it was a relief when one of the Grisha, a tall, hatchet-faced man in a crimson coat which somehow looked finer than any of the others she’d seen, approached her and without introducing himself, announced that the General wished to meet with her, as she had done the impossible, defeating his star Grisha player.

Alina nodded and quickly told her team to go to the dining room for the victory feast and not to shame her or despite their achievement, she would write to Ana Kuya that very night to have them all sent home on the next available Crossing. She then followed the laconic Grisha who could only be the attaché to General Kirigan to a private room whose door she would never have noticed.

The General, whom she could never imagine referring to as simply Kirigan, was sitting on the far side of a table with a shatranj board on it, each square enameled and all the pieces exquisitely carved from jet and a cloudy white stone she had no name for. He rose as she entered the room, following the old ways, at least according to what Ana Kuya had told them. He wore a jacket of a black silk dark as a moonless night, the same hue as his hair and when she dared to look at him directly, craning her neck a bit, his eyes. He appeared serious rather than punitive and then his lips curved slightly, in what must be a smile.

“I would ask you for a match, if you are not still overset,” he said, his voice one she recognized, the man who’d kept her from stumbling. “I am Kirigan. General of the Second Army.”

“I know who you are,” she said. He waited and she realized she hadn’t agreed to play. She sat down, studying the board. He’d offered her the white pieces, had placed himself behind the jet.

“I’m Alina Starkov. Of Keramzin,” she said.

“I didn’t know the Duke had a daughter. Or a niece,” he said.

“I don’t think he does,” Alina replied. She moved a piece forward, not yet having decided which gambit to open with, choosing a piece that gave her the time to evaluate the General’s style. “I’m one of the orphans his estate supports. No one special.”

“You created the majority of the strategies your players employed I think. I haven’t seen them before and I’ve played since I was a boy,” he said. He moved a piece with the sort of confidence that suggested he’d rarely been bested. “It’s special, to have a mind constructed to see such…possibilities. To engineer their execution.”

She reached out to move the next piece, a tower, and her sleeve fell back, revealing her wrist.

“The Duke ought to support you more generously. You’re skin and bones,” he said, glancing up at her face and examining her intently. “You’ve gone hungry—have you been ill?”

“There’s plenty to eat, even if it’s a bit dull. I’ve never had much appetite,” she said.

“You can’t be more than twenty. If you haven’t had an appetite, you’ve been ill, perhaps so long you can’t remember being well,” he said. He moved another piece, the shape of his attack becoming perceptible, the way a creature might come forth from the shadows.

“Perhaps,” she said. She looked at the board and decided she would employ Stag’s Wisdom, moving her rider definitively, then letting her hand hover above the piece for the heartbeat.

That was when General Kirigan grasped her wrist, his lips parted in the beginning of a remark, shock evident in his silence, the sudden blankness in his dark eyes.

“Who are you?” he said, very softly, after regaining something like composure.

Alina had lost hers, but knew better than to let it show, assuming she had any ability to fool the General.

“I told you, I’m Alina Starkov, I’m an orphan. I’m nobody,” she said.

“You are either lying or you have been deceived yourself,” he said. He slid a heavy silver ring from his smallest finger, placing upon his thumb. She saw it was crafted as a talon, the tip sharp enough to draw blood. “I would know the truth,” he said, the talon poised a hairbreadth from her skin, waiting for her to respond.

He wanted her consent.

She thought of the pain that led to the scar on her palm, the way she’d drawn the shard across her hand, that bright instant of agony. She thought of how the scar felt now, like nothing at all.

She nodded.

The claw tore.

The room was flooded with light, the brilliance of high noon at the summer solstice. She would have closed her eyes but she couldn’t. She could only choke back the cry she’d almost uttered, in her mouth the taste of honey, the giddy intoxication of medovukha that she’d once sipped at a feast-day.

“You are Grisha. The Sun Summoner,” General Kirigan said. He sounded astonished, exalted. He looked at her as if she were precious. “I’ve waited so long—"

“General—”

“Aleksander,” he interrupted. “Call me Aleksander.”

“I feel odd. Ill,” Alina said. He fumbled the heavy ring off his thumb, let it sit on the board like another piece, and traced his forefinger along the bloodless wound. He closed his eyes and hummed, some fragment of melody she could not place. She felt a soothing warmth where he touched her and then surging through her.

“You’re very ill. It’s a miracle you’re alive,” he said. His eyes gleamed and she realized they’d filled with tears, though she wasn’t sure of the emotion behind them. “You were not tested as a child?”

“The Grisha came to Keramzin. I—we hid. When they came to test us. I cut my hand so they couldn’t tell when they found me. I was afraid,” she said. “I didn’t want to be left behind. Or taken.”

“You’re not alone. You’ll never be alone,” he said. He turned his head, barked out a demand, “Ivan! To me, now!” his voice that of the battlefield commander. He let go of her wrist and put the ring back on. Alina felt cold, too cold to even shiver, the chill of the stone that froze, not the snow that fell.

She guessed Ivan had not been that far away, given how swiftly he arrived. 

“Fetch Liucija and Svilen, tell them it is urgent. Tell them it is the worst case of wasting sickness I have ever seen, tell them to send a stretcher and a Heartrender with a gentle touch, she won’t tolerate much—"

“Moi soverenyi?”

Alina would have laughed at how confused Ivan sounded, despite his effort at formal obedience, if her head had not begun to ache horribly and the small of her back, her hips. Her knees. Every joint in her hand ready to break.

“Miss Starkov is Grisha. She is the Sun Summoner,” General Kirigan said. She could not call him Aleksander, not even to herself. Not yet. “I will not lose her—”

“Of course, moi soverenyi. I’ll send Fedyor, he’s in the great hall,” Ivan said and moved so quickly it seemed he did something other than running.

Alina took a deep breath. It felt like a blow and her hand, resting on the shatranj board, trembled, knocking over the queen. General Kirigan got up from his chair and came beside her, crouching over her. He was so tall he still loomed above her or that was how it seemed to her.

“It won’t be long,” he said.

“No. I don’t think—I’m so tired and my head hurts, it hurts—” she broke off, her vision dimming.

“Blessed Mokosh have mercy,” he ground out, but though the words suggested supplication, his tone was that of a man cursing in desperation. She felt his hand at her cheek and then at her throat, light, with a tenderness she’d never experienced before. “There’s not enough time—”

He leaned over and picked her up in his arms, adjusting her so her face as nestled against his breast, the steady beat of his heart like a tether. 

“I’ve got you, moya golubka, stay with me now,” he said, holding her very close. She felt a delicate warmth and it eased the pain a little. “Rest a while, I’ll be there when you wake.”

*

Alina woke up, her cheek pillowed on her forearm, shadows beginning to collect in the corners of the room. She expected her head to throb but realized that other than the crook of her elbow, nothing about her body hurt. In fact, she felt quite well, refreshed to a degree she couldn’t recall.

There was, however, some drool drying at the corner of her mouth.

“Sorry,” a familiar voice said. “All this time and I haven’t devised a way to prevent some mildly embarrassing consequences.”

“I don’t understand,” Alina said, sitting up and blinking. She cleared her throat. She’d sounded like a frog croaking and what would General Kirigan think—

Not General Kirigan. Aleksander. 

What would Aleksander think? Where was he, where was Liucija and the whitewashed hospital wing…

“I’m in the Library,” Alina said, the warm hue of the leather-bound books on the walnut shelves resolving into detail. Togtuun, as was their wont, was not seated directly across from Alina but remained at an oblique angle, leaning back against their massive desk whose wood was the same color as Togtuun’s kefta. “I was reviewing that manuscript from Fjerda, I fell asleep.”

“You dreamed,” Togtuun said. It was uttered as a correction, not hazarded as a guess. 

“You made me dream,” Alina said, unsure if it was a question she was asking. If she truly wanted an answer.

“It was necessary,” Togtuun said. “Those are the only dreams I can call forth in the dreamer, the ones they need to dream. To reflect upon—”

“You made me fall asleep. You entered my mind and, and…mucked about,” Alina said.

“Mucked about? Your mind is a stall in the stable? Really, Alina, there was nothing clumsy about it,” Togtuun replied with what was possibly pique, an emotion Alina would not have imagined Togtuun feeling. “And I believe you might be called to account for how you behaved with Aleksander, if you will take umbrage at my intervention. You might have awoken at any time you chose. You dreamt as long as you wished.”

“How can I argue with you? You have powers I don’t understand to any degree and you’ve lived far longer than I have.”

“Just so,” Togtuun said. “Was it so terrible a dream?”

“Don’t you know?”

“You’re deflecting,” Togtuun said.

“Perhaps I’m trying to grasp how present you were, are, within my mind. Perhaps I want to know if you saw everything, if you controlled everything,” Alina said.

“If I controlled everything, how much simpler would life be! And how much greater would the funding for the Library be as a percentage of the total Little Palace budget, though not at the cost of yet more herring on the menu for the younglings. I should have that collection from Samarkkant for the third archive and David might have completed that project for the portable heating device, so that I could have hot tea whenever I liked,” Togtuun said.

“What was I supposed to learn then?”

Togtuun smiled.

“You know that is not something I can answer,” they said.

“How about this then. Does Aleksander know what you can do?” Alina asked.

“He knows as much as he may,” Togtuun said.

Alina made a sort-of harrumphing sound of irritation.

“You want guidance. Keep a dream journal. Begin with this experience. Start now. Don’t edit,” Togtuun said and walked away into the stacks. Alina harrumphed again, because it was beyond irritating how silently the Librarian could walk and disappear.

“Fine,” she said to the receding back of Togtuun, “Fine,” she muttered to herself, opening the new folio embossed with her initials that had been placed right next to the elbow she’d been sleeping on. Togtuun didn’t miss a trick. She went to untie the leather cords keeping it closed and something caught her eye.

At her wrist, a scar, slightly raised, faintly golden, the color her skin turned when she’d been out in the sun all day. Where dream-Kirigan had cut her, where he’d healed her. 

The only thing keeping Alina from screaming in terror was the vivid memory of how good it had felt when he had used his power to mend the wound.

She did yelp a bit.

And then she started writing. It was the first day of December…

[apathbacktoyou]

here’s the masterpost for my second card!

all of it is kasinara;)

B1: Mood music as tradition demands - chapter 2

I1: Licking up come as tradition demands - chapter 7

N1: Roleplaying Cowboy til i can’t no more

G1: Character has a piercing pierced through the heart

O1: Clitoral Stimulation as tradition demands- chapter 8

B2: Hunger Games AU the cost of a crown

I2: Character is a student as tradition demands - chapter 3

N2: Creampie as tradition demands - chapter 9

G2: Hickies as tradition demands - chapter 6

O2: Roleplaying Servant traitor’s kiss

B3: Kegel balls the importance of accessories

I3: Riding Crop winner takes all

N3: Free Square as tradition demands - chapter 10

G3: Character enjoys being slapped as tradition demands - chapter 4

O3: Speed Dating fun facts

B4: AU: Elementary School it’s not about lentils

I4: Hand Fetish as tradition demands- chapter 5

N4: Pokemon AU friend code

G4: Character is a vampire forever

O4: Setting: Grocery Store mission critical

B1: Bondage equipment: harness as tradition demands - chapter 1

I5: A/B/O Pining sickness my heart aches for you

N5: Virtual reality sex is this just fantasy?

G5: Character is a naga half and half

O5: Character is an actor playing charades

[chefbarry]

The Foodie Files, The Final Chapter, Zucchini Bellpepper, Writer of Wrongdoing, Takes a Knee

My last case almost did me in. I was still having nightmares about it and my left big toe was broken for some reason I cannot recall. I don’t really want to get into it here, as I’m trying to move past it, or some other gobbledygook my therapist calls it, but it involved a large shipment of oysters that were way past their prime, the Reno chapter of the Chicago mob (more on that later), and an underage health inspector working his way through community college.

I’ve been thinking it’s time to retire, or whatever retired people do, when they go back into the workforce — run a sketchy private eye firm that moves offices every six months due to questionable arson and fake subpoenas and overdue bills that keep showing up in the mail — and then try to retire again. Take my gal, Raspberry Cardamom, on a long trip around southeast Asia, maybe even open up another office there in some old abandoned warehouse on the edge of sketch, but I’m digressing, and daydreaming again, or what my therapist calls, “dis-projecting”. My lady. She saves me from myself, I’m thrilled to know her — yet disturbed why she wants to hang with me — but I’m trying not to ask too many questions anymore.  

So, I had to move to Reno after the previous warehouse incident. I wasn’t even there at the time, but am being sued by my landlord now. I’m trying to work off the damages by helping his college dropout son get into the business. Another reason to skip town, more like skip country, close up shop, maybe write my memoirs, or at least eat a good taco. Plus, the Chicago mob has their eye on me for some reason. Maybe it’s that old hot dog case I never solved. I know it stirred things up back in the day when I was first getting gum on my shoe.

I had to leave before another fire broke out. My landlord would be happy to see me go anyway. There was a clause in the lease about maximum undesirables on the property in a given day, something my lawyer couldn’t even explain. I was packing up my things, and getting ready to seal the envelope with my office key, when they waltzed in. Three of them. Long multi-colored hair, nose rings, Crocs, and “the ‘tude”.

I said, “Sorry, I was just leaving, actually leaving for good, I don’t take any new appointments.  “Are you Zucchini Bell-something?”, one of the somber ones said. “Yes, I am”, I said, not bothering to correct her. “Who are you?” She spoke up, obviously taking the lead, “I’m Kite, these are my friends, Vikan and Paolo. We heard about you from Avocado Toast. She says you straightened things out for her, saved her from the paparazzi, and such.” Avocado used to be my secretary, and was best friends with Raspberry. If she recommended these stragglers, I could at least hear what they had to say.

The taller one, Vikan I think, spoke up. “We’re all from California, Orange County. Our parents all went to high school together, and we sort of all grew up together. Lately, we have been having some real problems with all the actors, musicians, fitness instructors, so-called nutrition experts, and models out there. We came here to get away, but we have to keep moving. We think they are following us. You’re our last hope, Zucchini!”

I sat down. “OK, what’s the problem?” I asked. Vikan continued, “So we all sort of are in this band, play small clubs from time to time, so a lot of people know us, but lately it’s been getting out of hand. After a set we get bombarded with crazed and scary-looking folks. They’re obviously not fans. They look hungry and angry.” “Describe them to me”, I said, getting intrigued. He said, “Well, they talk really fast, are not in the clubs to drink any alcohol, and don’t even snack on the free pretzels at the bar. They come over to us and start blaming us for waking up hungry, having nightmares, and one of them said on time, that she stared at her cats for too long one time, whatever that means.

“We’ve never seen these people before, and the celebrities started to have their people call our people, really our parents, to complain about something called self-cannibalism, cravings for Cuban food, and the boredom of lettuce wraps. We have no idea what they are talking about. We’re trying to put out some good music, and, sure we all eat at different restaurants, which we’ve always done, but...”

“Wait a minute!”, I said seeing where this was going, “I think I know what’s going on. Why don’t you all have a seat?” Paolo spoke up, “Do you really think you can help us? I mean, we have to get back to California, we have shows lined up, but are kind of scared to go back there.” I said, “Here’s what’s happening. I don’t think you know what kind of effect you have on the world at large.” Vikan got excited, “Do you mean our latest record? I know it’s just a demo, but wow!” “No”, I said, “This has nothing to do with music. It’s your names and what they are causing. Do you know why your parents gave you those names?” Paolo replied, “I mean they said they wanted to name us after something special that happened in their lives, but never really told us about it. They seem like normal names to us I guess.”

I went on, “You see there are these food fads that have been out for some time, and though they might help people at first, they aren’t sustainable, and can actually do some damage. Paolo, you were named after the Paleo Diet, which your parents probably were on at the time you were born. It’s very confusing, it’s supposed to mimic what humans ate during caveman times. It makes some good points about how agriculture wasn’t developed yet, and food was hunted and gathered for survival. But we have adapted since then, our digestive system has developed, our DNA has evolved, and there weren’t any food processors back then, so how did they make orange sesame sauce or zucchini noodles? Plus, there can be many vitamin deficiencies related to this diet, and high levels of saturated fat and protein, which can be toxic. Plus, I don’t trust any diets that say you can’t have hummus and pita chips.”

I turned to Kite next and said, “You have it a little harder, toots. Imagine being on a Paleo Diet, then being forced to live inside a garbage bag with no air circulation. You were named after the Keto Diet, sadly. This diet has everyone turning into zombies. It’s even more restrictive with higher levels of saturated fat and protein, and only the lowest-carbohydrate vegetables like lettuces, greens and broccoli. It forces your body to lose weight artificially from not only stored fat being used as fuel, but your body losing muscle and tissue mass as well. So, you think you are losing weight, but some of the weight is actually part of your body. After a couple weeks there could also be permanent liver and other organ damage. 

“A lot of these diets were created by “nutrition experts” that were trying to sell books and supplement programs, and not really concerned with an overall healthy lifestyle eating program. Plus, I don’t trust any diets that say you can’t have your morning oatmeal with blueberries, c’mon! I gotta keep regular ya know?!”

Vikan turned to me and said, “What about me, Zucchini? I mean my parents seem like they eat normally, we just don’t eat any meat or fish or seafood or turkey or dairy or eggs or anything fun. We seem to have a lot of potlucks, though, with foods that come in oval-shaped ceramic baking dishes. I love me a rockin’ scrambled tofu!”

I had texted my squeeze, Raspberry, after these scoundrels first walked in, and had her stand in line for a couple of hours at one of these joints that sells chicken sandwiches. I knew we’d be here awhile. I said to the group, “Well, certainly she was named after the Vegan Diet, which is virtually the opposite of both Paleo and Keto Diets, so I’m not sure how all your parents got along back in the day. While there is certainly nothing wrong with eating a mostly plant-based diet, with foods from every kingdom, including mushrooms, vegetables, fruits, legumes like lentils and peas, beans, sea vegetables, and whole grains, which I call “smart carbs”. These are slow-burning foods that don’t raise your blood sugar, and take a long time to digest, so your body uses the calories as fuel in a sensible and sustainable manner. 

“The problem is most people don’t eat all of these foods, or know where to buy them or how to cook them so that they taste really good. Plus, you have to eat complete proteins like quinoa, wild rice, and other grains mixed in with legumes, seeds, nuts, and beans to get a complete nutrition profile. Most vegans or vegetarians simply don’t eat any meat or other animal products, but are not necessarily making good food choices, like eating organic, local and sustainable whenever possible, or eating plant-based proteins, and a wide variety of foods.

I like to eat this way, but after a day’s work, I don’t have the time to cook for hours. I like to eat like a vegetarian, but with meat on top! And Raspberry, well, she tries, but we try to at least eat organic and so on. And... oh, look, here she is now!”

We were all starving at that point and dug into those controversial chicken sandwiches, even Vikan. I made a mental note to have a really good walnut salad for dinner. I looked around and thought, I know how we can get these kids back to California without anyone bothering them anymore. We made a plan. We called up all the agents and fitness instructors, and got them to agree to put these chicken sandwiches in everyone’s trailers, green rooms and lockers. This way, the aroma attacks them when they come back from training or performing, and they can’t resist. Afterwards, they’ll rethink their fad diets and come to their senses, fire their nutritionists, and even the vegans will have a cup of bone broth once in a while maybe.

I closed up the office for good this time for real. Said goodbye to our guests, and refused payment. I was good, clear-headed and ready for my next adventure. A couple days later I got a check in the mail from one of these chicken franchises thanking me for increasing their stock valuation. Raspberry and I took the money and, well, I can’t tell you where we’re going, because I think the nutritionists’ union is after me.

[weeklyhumorist]

Bold Predictions for the 2020/21 NFL Season

Arizona

The Arizona Cardinals will claim that the dry Arizona heat kills the virus…and football talent when they come in last in the NFC West.

Atlanta

The Falcons will hold out hope that the pandemic causes fans to forget all about the whole blowing a 28-3 lead in the Super Bowl thing. It wont. 

Baltimore

Jim Harbaugh will fill in for a sick John Harbaugh and absolutely nobody will be able to tell the difference.

Buffalo

The entire Bills mafia will be allowed in the stadium during home games after the CDC reveals they’re achieved herd immunity to coronavirus and all viruses in recorded history. 

Carolina

As a tribute to the late Chadwick Boseman, The Carolina Panthers will change their name to the Carolina Black Panthers. In response, Republicans call for a season-long boycott of the team. 

Chicago

Stadium security for the “lawless democratic city of Chicago” Bears will be replaced by members of the National Guard. 

Cincinnati 

Joe Burrow, the franchise’s most exciting rookie in recent memory, will NOT contract COVID-19. He will contract food poisoning from Skyline Chili and miss time.

Cleveland

The Browns will win every single game of the regular season but will miss the playoffs due to them being cancelled. 

Dallas 

Thinking he’s on mute, Jerry Jones will refer to COVID-19 as “the chinavirus” on live broadcast.

Denver

Due to rising sea levels, The Broncos are forced to change their stadium’s name to .89 Mile High Stadium.  

Detroit

Matthew Stafford will contract COVID-19 and will stage an improbable comeback recovery only to die in the final seconds of the 4th quarter. 

Green Bay

The virtual version of the Lambeau Leap will be cancelled when Aaron Rogers dives into the Zoom computer during week 1.

Houston

To show solidarity with the people of Texas who are not wearing face masks, the Houston Texans decide to play without helmets and declare them unpatriotic.

Indianapolis

Former Colts QB Andrew Luck will reveal that he retired because he knew coronavirus was coming. And that he used his Stanford engineering degree to engineer it.

Jacksonville 

Jacksonville, FL will somehow become the global epicenter of a different pandemic after the Jaguars prematurely allow fans into their in-stadium swimming pool.

Kansas City

The Kansas City Chiefs owner will recognize the need for social change and have his team adopt the name The Washington Football Team.

Los Angeles

To attract more fans, the Los Angeles teams will merge and rebrand as Coachella. 

Las Vegas

The Raiders will hire a new Offensive Coordinator mid-season when theirs is mauled during the half-time tiger show.

Miami 

The Replacements will be made an official NFL team after the entire Miami Dolphins roster tests positive for COVID-19. Starting at quarterback, Keanu Reeves. 

Minnesota

Kirk Cousins will change his mind about saying “If I die, I die” when the Vikings decide to play without an offensive line.

New England

After the NFL issues a league wide mask mandate, Bill Belicheck will only wear one after cutting the sleeves off of it. 

New Orleans 

Drew Brees will make headlines again after saying he will never agree with anyone disrespecting our country’s pandemic. 

New York

To ensure they have enough players to last the season, the New York teams will join forces. Their new name will be the New York Giant Jets Who Play in New Jersey For Some Reason.

Philadelphia 

Knowing that they are scientifically unable to spread the virus, all the players from the Philadelphia Eagles will be replaced by actual eagles. 

Pittsburgh 

Ben Roethlisberger will emerge from the cave he’s been hibernating in since the end of last season and have no idea what’s happening in America. 

San Francisco

The 49ers will exceed the salary cap after they adjust all players’ pay to a livable wage for the Bay Area.

Seattle

Pete Carrol will be forced to spend most of his post-game interviews answering questions about being a “COVID Truther”.

Tennessee

Following in the NBA’s footsteps, the Titans will offer their stadium to be used for a more noble cause, then reveal that cause to be increased production of Nashville Hot Chicken.

Tampa Bay 

Tom Brady will publish a health and fitness book that includes a chapter about how lentils are the real cure for coronavirus

Washington

Dan Snyder will be mob killed by the Washington Football Team cheerleaders.

NFL

The 2020/21 NFL season will not happen.

Bold Predictions for the 2020/21 NFL Season was originally published on Weekly Humorist

[trentstarns1-blog]

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We understand that activity containers (GameCards) - and also not discs - will certainly be the kind from physical media the Shift are going to make use of, taking after the transportable 3DS rather than higher capability disks like the Wii U. This was mentioned in 2016 with a trademark for The Legend of Zelda: Intimation of bush that featured cartridge-based activities, so doesn't come as a large unpleasant surprise.

[jomiddlemarch]

what it is to be a thin crescent moon

Chapter 29

It came to Alina, suddenly, the way a cup overfilled overflowed, that everything she knew about merzost was wrong. It followed, with the subtlety of sugar stirred into tea, that everything Aleksander believed about merzost was wrong. Between the two of them, her studies and his experience, they encompassed virtually the entirety of the body of knowledge on merzost. The realization was so daunting, so dazzling, that she couldn’t help speaking aloud.

“Everything we know about merzost is wrong.”

Her voice was pitched quietly for the Library, but it seemed to ring in the space. She was sure to disturb anyone who might be reading or walking through the stacks. As it was, there was only Togtuun at their desk who looked quite the farthest thing from disturbed. They rose, their chestnut brown kefta unbuttoned at the throat, revealing a necklet of enameled links in a style Alina had never seen at court, among the Grisha or even on the otkazat’sya in Os Alta.

“I shouldn’t say it took you long enough, when you have gotten further faster than anyone before you,” Togtuun remarked. They sat down across from Alina, resting a slender hand on the table top; Alina was convinced that beneath their kefta, Togtuun had crossed their legs with the sly grace of a courtier. There was nothing avid in their gaze, but some warmth was there that did not call its power from light or pressure.

“But you’d like to,” Alina replied.

“I haven’t been impatient as much as hopeful,” Togtuun said.

“You’ve been a little impatient I think,” Alina said. It was a relief that Togtuun could be so, when Alina would have said their chief attribute was a certain unbreachable remoteness.

“Perhaps a little,” Togtuun said. “Perhaps far too much, but there have been too many interruptions, too many difficulties that you have had to deal with, and the bond between you and the Shadow Summoner has been…unanticipated.”

“You didn’t think we’d fall in love,” Alina said, when it was clear that Togtuun would not offer an explanation without prompting. It startled her to hear the words she’d chosen instead of either other constructions she might have said, that she’d fallen in love with Aleksander or he with her, though she wouldn’t speak of it to him over their blessedly herring-less dinner; it would unsettle him now as it wouldn’t in a decade, when he would smile, curious, or in a century, when he would grin over it.

“Not so easily. So completely,” Togtuun said. “I suppose that time you spent alone in the woods was an idyll, a recalibration.”

“Both of us nearly died, several times,” Alina said. “It wasn’t a romantic tryst with moonlight and loads of silk cushions and wine flagons with platters of grapes heaped about everywhere. It was freezing and there were so many lentils, it beggared belief.”

“How disappointed General Kirigan will be,” Togtuun said.

“To hear me speak the truth? He’d never be disappointed by that,” Alina replied.

“To have missed your description of a perfect tryst,” Togtuun said. “He would never have guessed you felt so strongly about grapes.”

“I thought the grapes were part of the standard Grisha seduction,” Alina said, seeing Mal’s face as he tossed her a few after his evening with Zoya. Decadence hadn’t suited him and she’d had no appetite then, but she remembered the scene so vividly, she had to pity her former self.

“You were wrong about that as well,” Togtuun said. “But that doesn’t matter.”

“And merzost does,” Alina said, as she was supposed to. It could be this way with Togtuun, a lesson that became a dance, a debate that became a puzzle, an embroidery, Togtuun’s gifts those of a Durast and an Alkemi, with a quality all their own, a quicksilver manipulation of thought instead of particulate energy or matter. Alina couldn’t guess when a conversation would proceed in this fashion with the Librarian, but she’d learned to be watchful and ready; she’d learned that Togtuun would not scold her if she made a misstep or birch her if she fumbled, but their praise was nothing like Aleksander’s nor Master Botkin’s.

“It does,” Togtuun agreed. “Tell me what you know.”

“So you can tell me if I am right?” Alina said.

“So we can make the next leap,” Togtuun said. Their face was so serious, so open and unreadable, the wisdom that of the ancient fern and its freshest, furled fiddlehead. “It wasn’t only General Kirigan who has needed you for a time beyond time, Starkova Kirigana.”

“I hardly think you need me to solve the mysteries of merzost,” Alina said.

“You’re the only one who has questioned Morozova’s texts since the Little Palace was founded,” Togtuun said. “Most of the Grisha quail at the least mention of merzost.”

“That seems, well, foolish,” Alina replied.

“The otkazat’sya do not have a monopoly on folly. And the Shadow Summoner has impressed upon the younglings that they risk the gravest harm to themselves and their fellows should they peer into the abyss,” Togtuun said.

“‘Peer into the abyss?’ That has got to be a direct quote from Aleksander,” Alina said, shaking her head in fond exasperation. “He can be so dramatic, I think sometimes he’s really missed his calling and he should be writing three-act plays for the Imperial Theater and shouting at the lead actress that she has put more feeling into her monologue. Simply exploring whether the theorems about merzost are valid isn’t dangerous. It’s more dangerous not to, to just accept that whatever Ilya Morozova wrote was sufficient and correct. And it wasn’t as if there aren’t other people who considered the possibilities.”

“No one reads those books and treatises,” Togtuun said. “A very few have begun and none have finished. I had hopes of Kostyk, but his small Science has compelled him elsewhere.”

“I think David has some idea. About merzost and that we’re wrong about it,” Alina said.

“Perhaps. He knows Kirigan would not listen to him though, not in the way he would need to be heard,” Togtuun said. “And he doesn’t trust me.”

“He doesn’t trust many people. Probably because Dame Baghra tortured him,” Alina said. She thought the Librarian might argue the choice of words, but evidently the one constant in the world was that everyone knew Dame Baghra to behave monstrously. Togtuun sighed, just a little, and Alina decided not to try and interpret the meaning behind that soft breath, softly released.

“You do, though. And now, you will trust me enough to tell me what you have discovered,” Togtuun said, making the words tremble between question and command. There was a trick to it that Alina wasn’t sure she would ever master herself.

“Morozova conceptualizes merzost in material terms, the power and the sacrifice needing to be balanced on a scale, as if he were bartering for a sack of flour with the miller,” Alina said. “There is only duality, good and evil, dark and light, whatever is taken must be paid for and the transaction, the act of payment itself, is inherently wrong. To desire is wrong, to fulfil desire is wrong, to be satisfied and whole an impossible state. I’d almost pity him if he hadn’t cocked everything up so terribly and caused such torment.”

“You mean in the Shadow Summoner,” Togtuun said.

“Aleksander, yes, of course, but he’s not the only one who’s suffered because of Morozova’s errors,” Alina said. “So many lost, so many incomplete. Such a waste��”

She broke off, aware that whatever she meant by the word would pale in comparison to the comrades and friends Togtuun had seen maimed or killed, exiled or enslaved, feeling impossibly young and far too authoritative. Togtuun saw it and as was their wont, exercised the most pragmatic mercy.

“What is right?” Togtuun asked. “If we agree Ilya Morozova was wrong, how should we understand merzost?”

“I think…I think understanding merzost is comprehending the incomprehensible. I know, that sounds specious and silly and anyone else would tell me it’s a load of Volcra shit, in varying degrees of politeness, but I think there is no direct way to understand merzost. It’s unconfrontable…it requires you to occupy a liminal space, present and ephemeral, approaching and waiting. It’s about potential and how it can tip into being. And also, there is a tremendous amount of mathematics built into it,” Alina said. “I can’t emphasize that part enough, because I nearly went mad trying to get some of the equations to work out.”

“A pity Ninochka was not here sooner. She has a particular facility in that area, though few realize it,” Togtuun remarked, a bit of astonishing information shared casually, as though Alina would not remember that Togtuun was nearly always imperturbable but never casual, never speaking without some greater purpose. She would not care to face Togtuun across the shatranj board.

“You said, once I told you what I’d learned, there could be a next leap.” Alina wouldn’t have referenced an abyss, but her sense of what lay ahead was indistinct, misty instead of dark, though dangers could easily hide within both obscurities. She’d only ever been a mediocre map-maker, but she still trusted a map, a bottle of ink, the squinting in the distance required for leagues and mountains, the key etched into the bottom left corner.

“Merzost may be used to serve our purposes,” Togtuun said.

“There’s a lot to unpack there,” Alina replied. “May and not can or will. Who is included in our—you and I alone, General Kirigan? The Grisha as a people or only those in the Little Palace? And what are our purposes? Do you mean to use merzost defeat Prince Nikolai and his coup?”

Togtuun laughed. There was delight in the sound and pride. Relief and trenchancy. And power, a power that came neither from light nor darkness, not from release or restraint, but owed something to the vastness of the ocean Alina had never seen herself and the space between notes in a chord.

“Nothing so little as an overthrown coup. We might change the world, Starkova Kirigana. But only if you will allow it. And that demands we work in secret, within silence. That liminal space you have discovered you create,” Togtuun said.

“In secret? You mean I have to lie to Aleksander,” Alina said.

“Shall we philosophize over omission and falsehood? I’m sure it would prove an interesting discussion, but there will be other costs,” Togtuun replied.

“He’d try to stop us. Me,” Alina said.

“Naturally,” Togtuun said. “Would you keep him from hurting himself, if you could?”

“I would. I have done, since he rescued me,” Alina said. “He makes it very hard though.”

“It would not be forever, I think. There would be a time when you could tell him. When we would need him,” Togtuun said.

“He will be very angry. Even if it’s not a long time,” Alina said, seeing his face, the bleak expression that would twist his lips. The way his shoulders would rise and his kefta billow, a second shadow meant to demonstrate his wrath, his need to be concealed.

“Less than you imagine,” Togtuun said. “And between you, there is a communion that cannot be compromised. He will know without knowing and once he realizes that, it will not be a matter of forgiveness, but only wonder.”

“Only wonder? Aleksander is not capable of unalloyed marveling,” Alina said.

“You haven’t seen him watch you when you Summon,” Togtuun said. “Or when you laugh.”

It came to Alina that perhaps Togtuun was, among many other things, a Heartrender, but one who worked not directly upon flesh, their aim unerring, unsparing.

“You said nothing as little as an overthrown coup. But that would be included, right?” Alina asked. “We would remove Prince Nikolai as a current and future threat.” She didn’t specify what remove meant and Togtuun wouldn’t ask for clarification.

“You won’t care about something so small if we succeed,” Togtuun said.

“I’ll always care about something small. I’ve been little all my life and I know not to underestimate small things,” Alina replied.

“Like lentils,” Togtuun said, fluttering the fingers of their left hand in a way that recalled the spill of the beans, the ticking they made against each other like seconds passing.

“If I ever become a Sankta, I guess that’s what I’ll be the patron saint of. Lentils and other small things,” Alina said. “How Aleksander will crow over that!”

He was asleep when she returned to their rooms. She’d come back much later than she had intended when she’d left to go to the Library but it was earlier than he usually fell asleep. Alina could count on one hand the number of times she’d found him dozing in his armchair by the fire. In retrospect, it was an indication of how grievously wounded he’d been that he’d slept so long and deeply when they were in the woods; she suspected even the cabin’s utter remoteness wouldn’t have allowed him to relax enough to keep him from standing watch over her every night. To see him now, his head tucked against the wing of the chair, his bare feet propped up on the flocked velvet hassock he’d first called an abominable Imperial affectation before claiming it, almost made her second-guess her decision. She could wake him and guide him to their bed or go about her own nightly ritual and wait for him to rouse to the sound of the water poured into the bowl, the jeweled hairpins dropped into their silver casket. The fire danced in the hearth, drift-wood brought from the harbor at Os Kervo burning violet and aquamarine. The light flickered across his cheekbones, the line of his throat, his kefta unfastened, the linen shirt beneath unbuttoned far enough the faint scar above his heart was visible through the scattering of his chest hair. It was rare for him to permit himself such license, rarer still for her to observe it, and she wished it could only be a night she remembered for this moment, this tender, exquisite peace and the look of drowsy desire his dark eyes would hold when he opened them and saw her in front of him.

She wasn’t sure it would work. She couldn’t be sure. If it didn’t, she wouldn’t have to explain anything; she could wait a hundred years before she mentioned it to him, an anecdote shared over honey-cakes and tea, the time leaching any bitterness from the action. And if it did work, if it exceeded her wildest hopes (not her dreams, because she would never have dreamt of this for them), she would say, in all truthfulness, that she hadn’t been certain of what would happen, other than that the risk she took was for herself alone and he couldn’t take her to task for that. Plausible deniability, that was how Togtuun had framed it, head tilted to one side, evidently prepared for Alina’s response,

“Plausible deniability. Yes, that’ll be about as convincing to Aleksander as me wishing for a herring syllabub.”

There hadn’t been any rejoinder, though Togtuun had grimaced, properly, at the prospect of such a repulsive dessert. And so Alina crept onto Aleksander’s lap, nestling her face against his neck, feeling his arms come around her even as he slept. She took a long breath and thought and chose.

“Sashenka mrinyk, minii oyuun ukhaan tany khüch chadald tavtai moril,” she said, striving to match Togtuun’s inflections in the incantation. Her attempt would have had no chance of working at all, save that Aleksander was an amplifier, perhaps the most formidable amplifier living, and her husband, who had already pledged himself to her, in every regard and dimension.

When the Librarian had uttered the words, Alina had first laughed, remarking This is why the drüskelle call us witches. Togtuun had answered And this is why you do not know the name of my Small Science.

Aleksander stirred beneath her and she pressed her lips to the delicate skin of his throat. He murmured something incomprehensible, likely in Ravkan so old she couldn’t recognize the words. Alina closed her eyes and turned inward, where it was not dark, nor light, but only a place between and then she sent herself forth as she would Summon and waited to find out if Aleksander would answer and how.

Across the city, Prince Nikolai sat at his gilded desk, candles lighting the room to the brightness of a summer noon. He signed his name to the last page before him, cast a glance at the papers strewn about the floor. He shrugged and leaned back. Success was never assured, but he felt it, near as a stalking beast about to strike.

(@tortoisesshells, please consider this your prompt-fill for “liminal space” and everyone else!)