The first episode of Fate was better than I expected! Of course my expectation was really, really, really low from reading the preview of the novelization. I'm keen to see the rest, tease out the good stuff and the bad stuff and decide if I'm gonna do my own novelization or just dive back into more Fallout.

4 152 Vera ~Secret Mission~

It's been a few days and the whole school is on edge. Madame Sophie isn't being as obviously terrible as on the day of the test but she's still not herself. She's skipped a lot of classes claiming headaches. A lot of my classmates just think she caught the flu. Nobody else has noticed she's not casting a shadow because she hasn't gone near any light sources that would make it obvious.

"Do you think her shadow could just… come back by itself?" I ask Shimmergloom one evening as we finish our homework.

She shakes her head. "It'll have to be sewn back on, if we could catch it."

I see another problem with this. Two more problems. "And if we can catch Madame. And, um, you can't sew something onto a person!"

"Onto her socks."

Maybe we could glue it. There is such a thing as clothes glue, for if you're worried your strapless top will fall down. Or maybe there's another way to re-shadow someone, a way that's less weird. The person who'd know is my sister, who fund a book on shadow magic but had to go off to a royal ball before she could read all of it. She'll probably call… I check my phone. Nothing yet. "Should we go look for her shadow? Is it around somewhere? I haven't seen an extra shadow."

"I don't… really… know." Shimmergloom admits, leaning back in her desk chair. "It be not a common problem! Only dark and secret magic can sever someone's shadow, or a rare sort of accident. But it isn't dangerous! If it were we'd already know."

I'd somehow missed how scary a free-roaming shadow would be, because the whole thing is so unreal. Now I have several terrible imaginings all in a row.

Thankfully my phone chimes, and projects a hologram of my twin sister sitting with the shadow magic book on her knees and a notebook beside her. "Ready for the cliffnotes on the creepy stuff?" She asks cheerfully.

I grab my own paper and pen. "Ready! What does the book say?" Shimmergloom scoots up next to me to listen.

"Ok, this shadow stuff is super dangerous even for the person who's using it. You can get basically eaten by the shadows if things go wrong. That's why it's forbidden. So if someone's using shadow magic in Paris that's a problem."

"Oh great." Is all I have to say to that.

"Shadow magic users have the power to manipulates shadows—that's, make shadows move and grab things, I think, travel between shadowy areas, and cut people's shadows off. If you cut off the whole shadow you get like your teacher and then turn into a vampire. If you cut off only a little part of someone's shadow you can use it to grow a Nemesis, but I didn't get to the chapter on what that is."

"It be a person's magical opposite, determined to destroy the original. Mama found a spell to do that, she felt bad about it later."

"Nobody's come after Madame. I think we'd know if there was a big magical evil around. I hope we would."

Twig says, "If there's a Nemesis I'm coming to Earth to help you fight it! But there's other stuff about cutting off someone's shadow..." She flips some pages, muttering, "And you have to cut it off, like with a sword, scissors don't work."

"The book says scissors don't work?"

Twig nods. "Someone whose shadow has been cut off will get 'sensitivity to light, moodiness, headaches, and a tenancy towards evil.' And if they don't get their shadow back they turn into vampires."

"What?"

"Really?"

Shimmergloom and I look at each other in mutual disbelief. Vampires. Of course there are vampires. "If we don't get Madame's shadow back she'll turn into a vampire?"

"That's what the book says. But not right away, it takes a few weeks."

"Does it say how to put the shadow back on? Or catch it? Or find it?"

"In me Mama's story Peter Pan lost his shadow and Wendy sewed it back on."

Twig's hologram nods. "That works, the book says. It says fairy dust works too, and some… I think these are the names of advanced healing spells. Or people can pull their shadows back by… it's not super clear. Something about remembering your dream and your true self. I don't know how you do that in real life. And that's really all this book says about putting someone's shadow back on them. It's not a very fat book—I think not very many people were dumb enough to mess with shadow magic and then survived to write about it. There is a note here that people's shadows can come off by accident, it takes a weird situation but it might happen."

"So there's probably not an evil witch in Paris targeting school principals? Maybe?"

Twig shrugs. "There aren't very many magical people on Earth."

I feel my shoulders relax; I hadn't even realized they were tensed up. This is just a one-time thing that we can fix. Or Mom and Dad can fix it if we can't. But we can try first. "Ok, we'll try catching Madame's shadow, then call the grownups for help."

Shimmergloom nods enthusiastically. "I'm sure we can find it if we look hard!"

I nod, still not totally thrilled but not about to let Shimmergloom go off and do risky things by herself. I'm sure we'll get back to this but first I have a question for my sister. "How was the party? Did Princess Amber like your dress?"

Twig lights up. "She loved it! It looked so good next to hers, Queen Stella said again she wants to hire you, and she gave me… where'd I put it… this is for you! It was Madame Sophie's, I guess, and she gave it to Stella and Stella was so impressed with my dress she thought you should have it."

Twig puts something up to the phone on her end and the hologram in front of me crackles and fizzes and something pops through. It bounces off my desk and Shimmergloom and I both grab for it. She gets it and holds up a shiny silver thimble with a flower pattern around the normal little dips to catch the needle.

"Cool."

"You could wear it." Shimmergloom holds the thimble to my chest like where she wears her little silver bell, which the thimble does resemble. I take it from her. "It's a thimble, for sewing."

"I don't think Queen Stella does a lot of hand sewing, sitting on her throne!" Twig dissolves into giggles at the image. "Anyway. I'll read the rest of this book and see if there's anything else interesting. Hey… do you need me to come over and help?"

It strikes me how sweet she is. "Thanks… I think we can handle it but if we can't I'll call you right away! Anyway, doesn't Amber need you?"

Twig runs a hand through her curls, one of Dad's gestures. "I'm a little worried, Amber's the greatest person and I don't know if… her being friends with Jamie, and the whole fiance thing—I met him, he seems nice and his brother danced with me three times but I'm not sure everything's all right for Amber, and it's not like I even know anything about how it is for royalty."

"We're barely older than princess Amber." I point out, sensibly I think. "If you were on Earth they'd say talk to the school counselor."

"Yeah… I'll ask Miss Faragonda, if I get too worried. I better go do my homework—potions test coming up!"

When we hang up I look around to see Shimmergloom unfolding a black catsuit with gloves. Clearly ready to suit up to go hunting Madame's shadow. I only have one question: "Where did you get that outfit?"

"From your sister in the last box she sent. I think you have one too."

I do have a box from Twig, spring and summer clothes from our Gardenia house that I didn't bother to look through since it hasn't been warm enough until just now. I take a quick dig through now and sure enough, I have a similar catsuit with purple accents. A note safety-pinned to it says, 'Surprise! Present from Mom, a stealth suit for doing sneaky things when you can't transform!'

Well my fate is sealed. I strip off my school clothes and put on the catsuit—which is at least two parts so I won't have to take the entire shirt off to go to the bathroom. It's velvety soft, with three-quarter sleeves, a cute chunky belt, and mesh pockets for holding spy gear. I don't have any spy gear so I put the thimble in one and my phone in the other, and grab a flashlight. "Have you ever tracked down a shadow?"

"Nay. Mama gave up all that bad stuff before I was born. But sneaking around the school will be fun!"

I can't argue with that. I find myself smiling. This will certainly be more interesting than doing some sewing and then going to bed.

We stuff pillows in our beds to look like we're asleep, turn off all the lights and sneak from our dorm into the hall. It's after lights out so the only illumination comes from the night lights along the hallway. The lights lead down to the exits on the first floor.

Where would Madame's shadow hide? It would stay around, right? If it decided to go run around Paris we'll never find it. And hopefully it's not in Madame and Miss's private apartment because we cant go in there of course. All we can really do is check out the classrooms where Madame teaches. An adventure with no actual danger except the danger of staying up too late and being tired tomorrow.

We tiptoe down the stairs, past the infirmary and into the big empty entrance hall. It's really dark in here and I'm not sure we should turn on our flashlights. Or make a magic light, which I haven't done since coming here. I think I could still do it. "Hey—can your magic bell track down Madame's shadow?"

"Hmm." Shimmergloom holds out her bell, turning this way and that. After a few directions it makes a tiny chime like it knows we're trying to be sneaky. "This way."

All the classrooms and practice rooms are this way so it's our best option anyway. "All the rooms are going to be locked." I whisper.

Shimmergloom gives me a look. "Vera. We have magic powers. We can open locked doors. I know three different unlocking spells, for if I be finding a treasure chest."

"Did you ever find one?" We're far enough from anywhere that we can stand up straight and talk in almost normal voices.

"Nay. Earth people don't dream of treasure often enough. Papa has four, and I haven't even found one!"

"We found the wraith's treasure in Coventry." I offer.

"Aye, but I had to share it." She pouts, then grins and her ears pop back into points with a gold ball dangling from one, the earring she kept from the wraith's treasure. The 'booty' I kept was my phantoblade sword, which is back in my room. Hopefully I won't need it against a shadow.

We pass the big doors to the main auditorium and I'm glad Shimmergloom doesn't try to go inside. There's a half-build set in there and I think it would be really creepy in the dark.

"Um… what would you do with treasure? Does the World of Dreams have anywhere to spend it?"

"I'd wear it all." Shimmergloom tugs on the door to a classroom, frowns, and taps the knob with one finger. It clicks open.

I gape.

"These locks are wimpy. I'll teach you later how to do it."

My first thought is that I could steal from the rich and buy fabric. My second thought is shame at my first thought.

I have a class in this room, it's a drawing studio so the desks can be tilted up to become easels and they're all still tilted at different angles. We look around with opur flashlights and everything looks normal. Teacher's desk. Cans of extra paintbrushes. Bin of colored pencils, the expensive brand Monique calls 'Priceycolors.'

Shimmergloom crouches down and shines her flashlight up from the low angle. Shadows leap up the walls, but the only human shadows are ours.

I had not fully appreciated how creepy it's going to be if we actually find Madame's wandering shadow. What are we even going to do if we find it? Shimmergloom doesn't seem to think lost shadows are dangerous, but we don't really know. I rub the thimble in my breast pocket for luck.

We check the next few classrooms with no luck but Shimmergloom says, "We're getting close."

"What do we do if we find it?"

"We'll think of something." Shimmergloom is having a great time and I kind of am too.

We finish the art rooms; the rest of the hall is music. There's a row of little practice rooms with windows in the doors and we peek into each one. I've heard people sometimes sneak in here to sleep if they're fighting with their roommate, or to smoke, but nobody's here now.

Shimmergloom points to the door to the big practice room, which would be a good place for a shadow to hide. there's all kinds of weird stuff in there: two pianos, a bunch of music stands and instruments, several drum sets and the giant dishwasher for cleaning the brasses between different students. Lots of things to cast weird shadows.

So we go in. It's just as shadowy as I expected. I turn on my flashlight and shine it around, making shadows of cymbals and music stands bounce on the walls.

"Hold it still." Shimmergloom's got her flashlight covering one side of the room and I turn to cover the other. I start to identify the shadows around us. that's the shadow of a trumpet hanging on the wall, that vase on top of the piano is casting a weird shadow because of the corner of a cabinet distorting it. A mirror on one cabinet door throws the light back at us, casting our own faded shadows on the wall behind us.

Then something moves. I jump and my light bounces. "There's something there!" Not a mouse. Something people sized.

Shimmergloom snaps around and catches it in the beam of her flashlight.

It's Madame's shadow. It turns and we see her haughty profile. Shimmergloom squeaks a muffled whoop of delight. The shadow makes a disdainful gesture, waving us off, and ducks out of the circle of light.

"Catch it, catch it!" We wave our flashlights around and I get the shadow pinned in my flashlight beam. "Hey, can you please go back to Madame Sophie? She's not doing so good without you."

The shadow shakes its head. It sits on top of the shadow of a piano and kicks its feet. Not something Madame would ever do. Maybe her shadow just wants to goof around for a change.

Shimmergloom notices the same thing. "Be ye tired of being the shadow of someone who works all day?"

The shadow nods, jumps off the piano and twirls like a ballerina against the back wall, distorted by the shapes of the instruments hanging there.

Do we have to convince it that Madame's going to goof around more in the future? Because she probably won't. Madame Sophie's passion is designing and her fun looks a lot like work.

The shadow bends, its head vanishes and it's a moment before I realize it's leaning forward to look at me, flowing along the floor. Looking down I see a hand shadow going up my suit just like in Dracula and I jump back.

"Vera! Ye be such a landlubber, you've lost it again!" Shimmergloom grumbles.

"It might've strangled me!"

"It be Madame, she be not strangling ye!"

Ok, Shimmergloom certainly knows more about these things than me but I'm going to make her watch some horror movies so she can see where I'm coming from!

If the shadow wasn't going to do some creepy Dracula thing what was it reaching for… the thimble? It did used to be Madame's a long time ago. I get it out of my pocket and hold it out, turning so I've got a blank wall for my shadow to be cast on. Madame's shadow reaches for it, long witch-fingers stretching across the wall. I try not to flinch.

The shadow fingers reach me and the thimble begins to glow. The shadow lights up with swirling colors and I see a ghostly image, a younger Madame Sophie, a blonde girl with her arm around Madame's shoulders. "...so get out there and show them what you can do!" Then the shadow, colors and all, dives into the thimble in my hand.

Did we just..?

"Yessss!" Shimmergloom whoops, "You did it!"

"I didn't actually..."

The door slides open behind us and we both jump. Miss Nadine, with a blue knit cap over her bald head, folds her arms and looks down at us. "Mademoiselle Hume, Mademoiselle Barrie."

"Ah..." what did she see? How much trouble are we going to be in for being in a locked classroom in the middle of the night?

Miss Nadine looks us over, arching an eyebrow at our spy suits. "What are you doing in here?"

I offer her the thimble. "Here, this was Madame's. I'm sure if you give it back to her she'll feel better."

Miss Nadine takes it, looks at the flower engraving, then looks at us thoughtfully. "You know Estelle? Are you fairies?"

"Um… my sister is, she met Queen Stella. You know about fairies?"

Miss Nadine shakes her head a little. "Mi amie Estelle, when she saw me after treatment, said she was a fairy and would I please let her cast a spell to grow my hair back. I thought she was making ze joke, I said only my eyebrows. And the next morning...' She arches one perfect dark eyebrow. "What can I think? Mi Amie must be a fairy."

"Well we're… um..."

"I be Shimmergloom, a fairy from the World of Dreams. Vera is a witch."

I smile because Shimmergloom's real name sounds so funny when she says it to any ordinary Earth person. Miss Nadine's eyebrows tick up even higher. "Shimmergloom?"

"Well Shirley Barrie be my real name too."

"I think… I think I will forget I heard any of that. And I will forget I saw you here."

"It's all right, we're going back to bed now anyway."

"Good night Miss Nadine." Shimmergloom says with a cherubic smile that doesn't match how we're dressed for spying. She yawns and leans on my shoulder, and we go back to bed.

In the morning I'm barely even awake when the noise starts. It's not emergency sort of noise but it's clear everybody else is up before the usual hour. Since I got to bed after the usual hour I'm still sleepy but I drag myself to the door and peek out. "Catherine? What's going on?"

"Madame's back! She's finally feeling better and she wants to see everyone's sketchbooks again and redo a bunch of grading. And she ordered pastries for breakfast for everyone! Get dressed and come get some!