aleguille: I'm not sure where you got the idea that I'm going to make wizards the epitome of everything is bad considering that in the hags' story, humans were the victims. But, the answer to your question is that I'm not going to embellish the behavior of wizards towards their non-human neighbors compared to what is depicted in canon. Wizards could be terrible just like people in real life can be terrible, but no species is purely good or bad.

CaneVerde: We are entering December 1990. Just six months or so before Hazel would get her Hogwarts letter. …Which entails two more chapters after this one. We're getting REAL close to the end of her Germany jaunt, which I'm both happy with and not. Happy with because I know everybody's excited about Hazel crashing into canon settings and it's going to be so weird and so much fun; not happy with because I have very much enjoyed not being obligated to have anything even resembling canon.

Oh well. That's what the summers are for. ;-)

drakonpie250: I did not directly base the Tale of the Serpents on anything, no. There are certainly parallels to other stories in myth, but that's just because "gods give humanity a gift, people get greedy and want more, gods punish people" is a fairly classic pattern.

quattzblade12: Ha ha ha ha ha! If you're worried that Hazel will "struggle with nothing magic-related", I think you can put your mind at ease.

Chapter 24
The Convocation

A soft pop heralded Hazel's return to the cabin. Appearing next to the front door, she looked out the nearby window at the thick layer of white blanketing the ground before shaking her head. The last couple of months had been rather mild and dry based on what the hags had told her, but now winter was catching up with them and the snow had moved in with a vengeance.

Deeper in the room, Hedwig's eyes shot up from the book she was reading only to relax once she saw the source of the noise was Hazel. "We wondered where you had gone this time." Taking in her appearance, the hag's smile dropped off into an expression of mild confusion. "You were not wearing those earlier, were you?"

'No, they are new,' Hazel replied. Strictly speaking, the long wool coat that reached down past her knees and the heavy boots that were both meant for a man and several sizes too large for her were not 'new'. She had picked them up out of a donation box sitting outside a building in Stuttgart. It was not theft, she told herself. Sure, she knew that technically they were put out specifically for people who needed them like her, but she had also performed more of a trade than a taking. In exchange for the coat and boots, both large enough to have plenty of room for her to grow into in the future, she left behind her puffy pink coat – grown too small for her within the single year since she took it from the Tesco – and her school backpack.

Hazel had decided it was finally time to admit to herself that she would never need her old backpack again. Not when her satchel still had so much room to fit everything she had and more. She did not know if it would ever run out of room, but at the very least getting rid of her backpack freed up a little space for later.

"What is the point of me going?" she heard yelled from the back of the house, and within just a few seconds she saw Elfriede literally dragging Gertrud into the main room. Their clothing immediately caught her eye. She had never seen Gertrud wearing anything but homemade smocks and tunics, but now the hag wore a blue, almost wraparound dress or robe with tapered sleeves. Elfriede's clothing was similar although of a more greyish blue than her sister's and with a thin shawl wrapped around her back and shoulders.

It was far fancier than anything she had ever seen them wear, and so she turned her head to stare at Hedwig in a silent demand for explanation. Instead of answering, however, the youngest of the hags stood up from her chair to reveal that she was also wearing a dress, though of a different make than her mother's and aunt's. This was sleeveless and low cut, red with multicolored thread tracing almost runic designs in two rows down the front of her dress and along the hem at her ankles. She also wore a shawl, though this one had tassels dangling from it and was decorated with spiderweb designs all the colors of the rainbow. All three hags were barefoot, although Hedwig's ankles and feet were wrapped in strips of white cloth that glimmered when she took a few steps as if they were covered in sparkly glitter.

'Going somewhere fancy?' she asked when nobody volunteered any information.

"It is the time for the Convocation," Elfriede told her. "It is a time every year when the various covens of Europe meet to exchange favors and find matches for our daughters. It is also a time when we can most easily interact with friends from other covens or even cousins from more distant lands. I would not be surprised to see a few families from Great Britain, in fact, and it might be worth talking to them for a bit," she added to herself. "We will be gone tonight and most of tomorrow. The first couple of days are always the busiest, with less and less happening over the rest of the week."

Gone tonight and tomorrow? There was only one explanation for why they would need to tell her that, but just to be fully clear on the subject Hazel wrote, 'You expect me to stay here, yes?'

"More or less," Elfriede agreed. "The Convocation is not somewhere a wand-waver would be welcome, and we would not have the time or safety to prove to everyone else there your true capabilities nor explain our suspicions of your heritage. The last thing we need is for someone to grab you and try to eat you."

'I suppose, although if that happens I could always just jump back here. Not to mention, I can use my magic to hide myself.' Elfriede looked doubtfully at her. 'I have done it before.'

"That is true," Hedwig muttered. "She really would not be in that much danger then, Mother. And it would be nice to have some moral support through this. I do not believe I can count on you two to provide that, not if last year was any indication."

"Can you show us?" prompted Gertrud. "I am curious just how well you can disguise yourself. Can you make yourself not be a human? It would be safer if you don't smell so good."

Hazel frowned and looked into the distance. Cloaking herself in her ignore-me smoke was the idea that had come to mind, but would her spell even work when the hags were intentionally looking for her? She had never pushed the limits of her ignore-me smoke before, and really it was past time she did so. Just maybe not today when she was trying to convince the hags to let her go to this once-a-year event.

As that said, it was nothing they would let a wand-waver attend, which meant there were all sorts of interesting things to see that were mysteries to wizards. She just had to come up with a different way to walk about unseen and unnoticed. There had to be many other options she had never looked into before. Her mind drifted back to other ways she had read about magicians hiding themselves. Invisibility, shapeshifting, illusions…

The last one struck her, and she rolled it over in her mind. It was not nearly as impressive and just plain wicked as actually changing herself, but she could definitely see where the usefulness lay in covering herself with an illusion. It would mean she had her ignore-me smoke when she did not want to be seen and her illusionary self when she wanted to be seen but unrecognized. It gave her options.

Options were good.

She could not breathe out a cloud of grey smoke if she wanted to do this, but there was no reason she could not breathe out something else. Even better, she had a good idea for what she wanted to look like. Fixing that image clearly in her mind's eye, she took a breath in and slowly blew it out.

Unlike all the other times she had done this, it was not a cloud of smoke that came out. Instead it was a thick cloud of green dust. The individual specks and grains caught and reflected the light in an almost golden sheen; not dust, then, so much as a cloud of glitter. The cloud swirled around her, but while her ignore-me smoke was content to drift and hover just an inch away from her, the glitter instead settled onto her skin and stuck here. Hazel shifted her arms around and swiveled her neck. Even knowing that the glitter was all in her head, she still could not shake the feeling that she had something physically on her skin. It was tickly.

"What in the world?" The hags' thoughts were quiet, as if they were whispering in their own heads. Elfriede took several slow, cautious steps over to her and reached out with her steely claws to gently turn Hazel's head back and forth. "You… you look like you are half-hag."

'Mirror?'

Hedwig ran into the bedrooms and brought back a small hand mirror that she passed over. Tilting the mirror this way and that, Hazel reviewed her work. She had not changed anything about her facial structure or her hair or her clothes or her monocle or the scar over her throat. What she had changed was more her overall coloration. Her skin was now a pale green, several shades lighter than even Gertrud's but still distinctly recognizable, and her left eye was a dark yellow like honey. She was unclear what color her right eye would be beneath her faintly lavender-colored monocle, so that she left alone, but the difference she could always chalk up to the effect of the lens all on its own.

She had to hold her hands up to the mirror to make sure her nails were the proper grey color. Just looking at them with her eyes was not enough because she could tell that she was colored with her mental glitter.

'Do you think I will be overlooked like this?'

"Not overlooked. You could not be overlooked. You are too different. But," Elfriede allowed, "looking like you do, it will be simplicity itself to explain why you smell like a human. Your human heritage is fully on display. This… It is incredible, Hazel. And frightening in its own way. It is a good thing no wand-waver would think to disguise themselves as a hybrid of human and hag, else they could try to gain access to the most vulnerable of our kind."

Most vulnerable? Hazel blinked her yellow eyes at Elfriede. Were there going to be a bunch of little kids at this Convocation or something?

"It is a good thing the number of people does not impact how the portal works," Gertrud pointed out.

Her sister sighed and nodded. "You are right about that. I think we still have some of Hedwig's clothes from a previous Convocation when she was little, but I do not know where it is. You will have to go as you are, Hazel."

Hazel nodded, and that was when Elfriede walked over to the kitchen and picked up two items to carry them over to the main table. One was a simple, rather plain glass vase already filled with water. It was the other item that was interesting: a flower, but not a real flower. Rather, it was a delicate sculpture of a flower forged from copper or bronze. Seeing her curious look, Elfriede gave both of them a tiny shake. "This is how we will travel to the Convocation. When I set the vase down, you need to grab it firmly and hang on. If you let go early, there is no way to know where you will land."

Looking left and right, Hazel saw that this was not a surprise warning to the other hags. It was only she who was visibly worried, and her left hand latched onto the vase as soon as it was placed. Hedwig gave her a knowing look and a faint smirk before doing the same. Even without the youngest hag's thoughts, Hazel knew she was being laughed at.

Once they were all holding the vase, Elfriede positioned the stem of the flower above the mouth. "Ready? Three… two… one."

The flower fell. As soon as the tip of the stem hit the surface of the water, a pale mist started pouring up and out of the vase. The mist, the fog, washed over her and swirled all around, until soon she could barely see her own hand let alone the hags beside her. That was when a gust of wind come from nowhere, blowing against her face and chest with increasing strength until she had to close her left eye and rely only on her vision through her monocle.

"Hold on!" she heard through the fog, the yell dull as if it were coming from a great distance.

Her fingers were turning numb, but she squeezed them as tightly as she dared. The wind blew harder and hard. After half a minute, it had reached the point that she honestly thought her feet were trying to slide backwards on the floor. The vase was vibrating in her grip, making it all the harder for her to keep still. She gritted her teeth and leaned forwards against the wind—

The vase vanished. Not shattered; it was simply gone.

With nothing left to hold, Hazel could not stop herself from being pushed backwards. She had to take a step back to keep from being shoved, and then another. As if that were a prearranged signal, as soon as her foot touched the ground for the second time, the winds stopped and the mist faded away. She blinked, blinked again, and then turned her head this way and that to look at her new surroundings.

This was not the hags' cabin. It was a large cave, one with many natural shelves that were covered with candles and piles of old wax. A single tunnel was visible over to her left side. And, thankfully, three hags were also present.

'What was that?'

"A special artefact, one only a few hags have the talent to create." Elfriede readjusted her gown and then did the same for Gertrud. "I know you do not want to be here, but do you have to act like such a child about it? Most of us can only use the Making to craft things that have special properties. Crafting artefacts that have special abilities? It is a very rare talent indeed.

"Anyway, the way it works is that when it is put in water, it will transport us from our home to this mountain. The water is gradually used up, and when it is all gone, we will immediately be pulled back home. That vase contains enough water for us to stay here for a full day, which should be enough for the first part of what we need to do, namely finding a proper Hexerin for Hedwig."

Hexerin? That was not a word in her dictionary, of that Hazel was sure, but nevertheless she could not help thinking she had heard it from Elfriede's mind before. She just did not remember when.

The tunnel leading from the cave wound left and right as it descended deeper into the mountain, and a couple of minutes later they emerged into a much, much larger space. It was still within the mountain, but Hazel had to blink as despite that fact her eyes were still surprised by streams of sunlight coming into the heart of the rock. Blinking a couple of times, she was finally able to make out several wide windows cut into the mountainside itself. That light shined throughout an immense pocket, one that might have been a natural cave or cavern once upon a time but had been greatly expanded over a period of time she found impossible to guess.

And throughout that cavern? Hazel looked around and around at the dozens, maybe more than a hundred, hags who were ambling back and forth throughout the space. Some of them had set up small stands for food and drink; others were chitchatting with friends or family members. Almost everyone was dressed in clothing similar to either Elfriede's or Hedwig's but in a veritable rainbow of colors. Only a few were not, and nearly all of them were instead wearing thick leather outfits and carrying some kind of weapon. Guards, maybe, to make sure nobody got too rowdy? She could not say for sure.

One of the many hags had started walking up to them as soon as they emerged, this one wearing floor-length robes in the same grey-blue color as Elfriede's dress and carrying a large, thick book. "Good afternoon, Wilhelmine," Elfriede said as she came closer.

The new arrival gave them a nod. "Elfriede, Gertrud, Hedwig. Welcome to the Convocat— Who in the world is she?" she asked when her eyes alighted on Hazel. "What is she? You I do not know."

"This is Hazel." Elfriede waved for her to come a little closer, and when she did she saw this Wilhelmine's nostrils flare as they caught her human scent. "She wandered up to our cabin a couple of months ago. As best as any of us can determine, she has both hag and wand-waver in her blood."

"That would explain her appearance and her smell. May I?" asked Wilhelmine, reaching out toward Hazel. She gave the hag a nod and then had to keep from rolling her eyes when Wilhelmine tilted her head this way and that. "I must admit, I have never heard of a hag bearing a wand-waver's child. Do you know to which coven your mother belongs, child?"

Hazel shook her head and started writing with her sparkler, 'Both my parents died when I was a baby.'

The glowing letters caught Wilhelmine by surprise, but after a quick jerk backwards she glanced over at Elfriede. "I see now why you are so sure she is partly wand-waver."

"And yet she is also talented in the Making. She created her staff and her bag before she even learned what the Making was."

Wilhelmine's eyes lit up with surprise that was followed by… greed? "A budding crafter, perhaps? Our coven has not had one of them for nearly ten years, and here comes Elisabeth's daughter with a coven-less child. I almost wish I could add her to the rolls myself, but until I speak with the Elder I will place her down as being of unknown coven for now. I am sure the Elder will want to speak with you later," she added with a look towards Elfriede that Hazel supposed was meant to be subtle. "In the meantime, your daughter was the primary reason you came, yes?"

Elfriede only nodded.

"Unfortunately," Hedwig thought with a huff. "The coven this and the family that. What if I don't want to get pregnant yet? No one asked me for my opinion."

Hazel whipped her head towards Hedwig. What did she mean, get pregnant?!

"The Elder has granted permission for you to acquire and transfer debt on the coven's behalf," continued Wilhelmine as she flipped through the book. "My records show that her father belongs to the Quiet River coven. Is that correct?" At Elfriede's nod, she slapped the heavy book closed. "Excellent. I hope your search is fruitful."

"Thank you for your time," Elfriede told her with another small nod. "Let's move along."

Once they were a dozen steps away from Wilhelmine, Hazel started writing only to immediately wipe away the words as questions pelted her mind one after another. Finally she decided on the first question that needed to be asked. 'What did she—'

A rolling drumbeat caught her by surprise, dispersing the sparks of her words. The hags looked over to the side, towards one of several other tunnels that were visible now that they were in the cavern proper. All of them had different expressions; Elfriede's one of excitement, Gertrud's of boredom, and Hedwig's of resignation. The mother of the family turned to Hazel and waved towards the source of the sound. "This is wonderful timing. Hazel, you are about to see something no wand-waver is or will be ever allowed to see. One of the Hexerin has just arrived."

Before she could ask for more clarification, movement became visible at the tunnel's mouth. A hag wearing a set of drums strapped onto her emerged first, the tune becoming more lively now that everyone could see her. A second hag was behind her, this one wearing white and light grey clothing and a shawl much like Elfriede's. Was this the Hexerin they were talking about?

"Oh, right. I forgot Franziska had a son," Gertrud muttered almost to herself.

Son? Hazel's gaze flicked towards the hag for a moment before returning to the procession. Sure enough, another hag was coming out, and he – for he was definitely a he – looked entirely different from the women in front of him and those standing around watching the event. The first thing that caught her eye was, surprisingly enough, how small he was. He had to be a full head shorter than his supposed mother, and he was slim and lithe as well. Over his chest he wore not a wraparound dress or shirt the way the women hags did but instead a bright white vest, one that was laced up to his neck with pinkish-red laces rather than buttoned. His trousers were also white and oddly shaped; they were very baggy from his ankles up to about mid-thigh, and then the narrowed dramatically until they were only attached to a belt around his waist right above his hips. Everything more in the middle was not covered by his trousers but rather a patch of a bright red cloth that visibly bulged out.

She was too far away to pick up his thoughts and what his opinion on this event and his clothing were, and she could not tell from his facial expression either. The lower half of his face was covered by a thin gauzy veil the same pink as the laces. His eyes and the top of his head were visible, but even from this distance she could see the shining gold eyeliner and purple eyeshadow and blush painted onto his face. It was more makeup than she had seen any of the hags she already knew ever wearing all put together.

More hags followed after the man dressed in similar outfits to Franziska, but watching where the hags' attention was, it was clear that this man, this Hexerin, was the focus. Hazel tugged lightly on Elfriede's sleeve and pointed to the question she had written in the few seconds before that. 'He is a Hexerin? Are they in charge?'

She was not sure what reaction she was expecting, but she knew it was not laughter.

Elfriede's quiet laughter made Gertrude and Hedwig look at her and her words, and they soon started giggling as well. "What a silly child she can be sometimes," thought Elfriede as she mastered herself. "Wand-wavers may put their males in charge of things, but you will never find a Hexerin making decisions."

'Then why are they special?'

"They are special because they are precious. Not for their capabilities; Hexerin are physically weak and frail, and almost without exception have little to no skill in the Brewing or the Making. It is because they are few in number and shorter lived than proper hags. Only one in five births is male, and they rarely live past thirty." The smile on Elfriede's face faded away at the morbid turn of the conversation. "At the same time, without Hexerin it would be impossible to bring about the next generation of our race. They therefore have to be protected, and raising a Hexerin to maturity is an achievement worthy of praise. Their presence is also one of the main purposes of the Convocation."

Hazel turned her head to look meaningfully at Hedwig. She had not forgotten the younger hag's thoughts just a couple of minutes ago. 'That is why we are here? You want Hedwig to have a baby?'

Her question earned her shocked looks from all three. "I sometimes forget how scarily insightful you can be," Hedwig ultimately told her, clearly summing up the opinion of her mother and aunt if their nods and thoughts were any indication.

'Do you want a baby?' she continued, underlining the word of greatest import to her. If Hedwig did not, if she was being forced to do this…

She had many reasons for leaving the Dursley home a year previously, but most of them ultimately boiled down to keeping herself safe and to becoming who she wanted to be, not whatever empty husk her aunt and uncle wished she was. They wanted to break her and keep her from becoming the sorceress she was meant to be, no matter what steps they had to do to achieve it. She liked Hedwig, and if Hedwig told her she did not want to go through with this, there were ways to get both of them out of this situation.

Elfriede had said that flower thing would only recall them tomorrow. That meant they had an entire day to collect whatever Hedwig felt she needed before anyone would be able to chase them down.

"Why do you need to ask hard questions? Even if it is nice that someone finally asks my opinion." Hedwig sighed and shrugged her shoulders. "I do not mind the idea of having a child. Do I want one right now? Not necessarily, but I know it is important to have one eventually. And," she added with a sigh to mask the relief now entering her mind, "it is not as if a child is guaranteed. If I do not get pregnant this time, there will not be another Convocation for a year. That is time to get my head in the right frame of mind."

"No one feels ready when it is their time to have a child." Hazel and Hedwig both looked over at Elfriede. The eldest of the three hags was not looking back at them but rather down and to the side. Several seconds of silence passed before she sighed and looked up to meet Hedwig's eyes. "I most definitely did not feel like it when I became pregnant with you. I remember asking my mother if I really needed to go through with it or if I could avoid it."

"Begged, really," Gertrud cut in.

Elfriede nodded reluctantly at her sister's commentary. "Yes, I did. I am not too proud to admit that, although she did not need to hear that right this minute. At the time, I only went through with it because I knew it was expected of me and because I was the only one who would continue our family. But after? When you were born and I held you in my arms for the first time?" She reached out and clutched her daughter's hands, and tears started welling up in her eyes. "I would not trade you for the world. You are the best thing in my life, and I just want to you be happy like I am happy. Just because this is a duty to the family does not mean that I would push you towards anything that I did not think was good for you too."

Hedwig started getting teary as well, and soon both their thoughts were swimming in self-recriminating circles.

Hazel sidled over to Gertrud as mother and daughter started murmuring quietly to each other. 'She said only she could have a child. Why?'

The question made Gertrud frown for a moment as her thoughts turned darkly inwards. "No one knows how the Hunger is passed on. It seems like it is more common for children to have it if their mother has it, but it is not a guarantee. So while it is not frowned upon for someone like me to have a child, it is not expected like it is for them. I never had any interest in having a daughter anyway, so it worked out for the best I think."

Elfriede wiped her eyes as she pulled back so she and her daughter were not face to face. "I am sorry you felt like I was pushing this on you, Hedwig."

"And I am sorry I never brought it up before. I just… I thought that you would not listen if I did." Hedwig took a deep breath. "But I also know this is expected of me. Not just by you, but the Elder and everyone else. I… It cannot be that bad. It is not as if I am the first and only one."

Laying a hand on her shoulder, Elfriede waited until Hedwig was looking at her again. "Do not feel like you need to be pregnant by tonight or the end of the week. Just because the Elder gave permission does not mean you are obligated to do anything. All I really wanted you to do was to peek at some of them and see if any catch your fancy. If you found one you liked, wonderful. If you were undecided, that would be fine too. There will be other Convocations, and it is not a decision that must be made this year."

"Just look?" Elfriede nodded, and Hedwig gave her a weak smile, still watery from their earlier emotional moment. "I think I can manage that. I cannot guarantee anything else."

"I am not asking for anything else." At the nod from her daughter, Elfriede moved her attention back to Gertrud. "I planned on keeping Hazel near me, but perhaps you should take her so Hedwig and I can—"

"No. It is all right." Hedwig gave her mother a nod. "I will be fine with Aunt Gertrud. With Hazel's heritage, she will be safer if you are the one nearby."

Looking between the three of them, Hazel quickly told them, 'I am fine either way. I just want Hedwig to be okay.'

Elfriede's hand came down on Hazel's head and ruffled her hair. "You are making me regret not giving Hedwig a little sister. Very well. You stay close to me. I have something in mind that I needed you for anyway, and I have no doubt you have many more questions." The last bit was said with a smile, removing any potential sting others might have heard.

Giving the others a wave, Hazel and Elfriede started walking away from the tunnel entrances and toward several of the stalls that had been set up. As soon as they were a bit farther from the mass of hags, Hazel started writing the first of her many questions. 'What did you and Wilhelmine mean about permission and debts?'

"The most important exchanges, transactions you could say, that occur in our culture are not done through currency like pig-humans and wand-wavers. No, vital exchanges such as access to another coven's Hexerin or the services of a crafter require a more lasting kind of trade. Instead, we take on a debt to the coven whose help we need, but in doing so we place our coven as a whole into debt. That means that an individual family or even a single member of a coven must have requested and obtained permission from the elder of the coven before such promises can be made, and the creation of the debt must be overseen by the designated record-keepers of each coven."

'So covens just owe each other all sorts of debts? Would it not get hard to remember who owes whom, even with records? How are the debts repaid?'

Her questions earned her another faint grin. "There sometimes are piles of debts, you are correct. However, instead of creating a new debt oftentimes covens will trade debts, or providing the same service that would create a debt can instead be used to pay off a debt that coven already owes. And sometimes, just sometimes, a debt will be called in when one coven truly needs a task performed that is not typical. This again is all up to the discretion of the elders, thankfully. I would not want to be the person who makes all these decisions.

"But that is the answer to your question about how we keep track of debts. There are not so many that it is an impossible task, but still enough that it has to be carefully documented. It is a complicated task that I hope you never need to be involved with. And here we are. Hello, Dagna."

Hazel turned away from Elfriede and glanced around. While they were walking, she had been led to one of the many stands within the cavern. Dagna, apparently, was the hag standing behind the counter of one of these stands, one of the larger ones as far as Hazel could tell. It had actual walls on all four sides and a tarp or cloth of some kind draped over the top. It was not dedicated to food or drink, however. On the walls were instead a number of strange iron tools as well as all number of different kinds of leather and other tanned hides.

"Elfriede," Dagna said in response. "This the girl you wrote to me about? Does not look like much. Funny-looking kid, honestly."

"She is."

"Fun. See what you mean, too. I do not know why anyone would want to wear something like that, but that thing looks like it is on its last legs." Dagda held her hand out and made an impatient grabbing motion. "Give me your weird eye-thing, girl."

That demand earned a silent request for confirmation and explanation directed at Elfriede. "We all noticed how ratty worn the strap of your lens is. It looks like it will break sooner or later, and it needs replacing." She shrugged. "Originally I planned on just buying a strip of leather and attaching it when we came back, but since you came here with us instead…"

"I prefer this. It will look nicer if I sew the strip together instead of you just tying it," threw in Dagna.

That was all well and good for Dagna, but her monocle-eyepatch? Her fairy lens? Hazel reached up to touch it possessively. She only had one of these, and it would be impossible to replace if anything happened to it. She would be blind.

'Are you sure? I do not want it broken.'

"Dagna will be careful, I promise." Elfriede then ruined any confidence in her statement when she turned a mild glare onto Dagna. "Won't you?"

"Yeah, yeah. Careful as can be."

It was with slow and cautious movements that Hazel reached up and pulled the strap forwards over her head and let the lens fall away from her face. Everything immediately became blurry, but that did not interfere with her fingers as she felt the shoelace she had first used to tie the lens on. Sure enough, she could feel several spots where the texture changed and the shoelace was thinner than in others. She had not realized how close it was to breaking free, but from what her hands told her, Elfriede was right about that.

It was time to replace the strap, and leather should hold up better than her shoelace had. And leather could likely be repaired with her fixing spell. She was not willing to bet the same on the artificially made shoelace.

She held out the eyepatch and lens to Dagna. The hag took it in her hands and held it close to look at the details. "Huh. That smell." Hazel heard Dagna take a breath and hum thoughtfully. "Is this spirit-touched? How unusual. I can fit a little strip of leather through here, but you might want to take it to Jarvia to get a thicker frame. It will be safer that way."

Hazel could not see either Elfriede or Dagna, but she nonetheless shook her head. 'Not today, thank you. This is enough for me. Maybe I will look into doing that later.'

"It is your lens-thingy. You get to deal with it if the frame breaks sometime later. Give me ten minutes. If I am going to sew it together, Elfriede, it will hold better but I am going to charge you more. Three hundred Zauberpfennig."

Her eyes widened at that. Three hundred?! 'That is too much, Elfriede!'

"What? No, it is fine. A few hundred Zauberpfennig is not much. I do not know what currency pig-humans use, but I know wand-wavers use these coins as well. This is likely cheaper than a leatherworker in Mainz would request for the same commission."

"Maybe I should charge you more!" yelled Dagna.

Left unable to see anything close to her clearly, Hazel had little to do but people-watch as best she could on everybody who was farther away where her eyes actually could focus. That was the only reason she ultimately spotted a couple of hags in what she had to assume were Elfriede's coven's colors walking with purpose in their direction. 'Are those friends of yours?' she asked, pointing towards the approaching but still far-off pair.

"Oh no. Why did it have to be her?! No, they are not friends," Elfriede said, hiding her sudden surge of anxiety. "It is the Elder and her guardian. Astrid does not like wand-wavers, albeit with good reason. It might be for the best that you avoid drawing attention to yourself as much as possible while I speak with the Elder."

Another couple of minutes passed before the pair arrived, leaving Hazel looking at a couple of colorful blurs. "Elfriede, welcome to the Convocation," one of them said, her voice cracking only slightly as evidence of her more advanced age. The Elder the other hags had mentioned, perhaps? "Are you enjoying yourself? I think I remember you saying you were bringing your daughter to examine the Hexerin on display."

"Indeed, Elder Freya. She is with Gertrud at the moment. We needed to split our duties so I could bring Hazel here to have her… glasses? Her lens looked at and the strap patched up."

"Hazel, was it? Yes, Wilhelmine was quite excited when she told me about your guest. I assume that would be you, my dear?"

'That is me, yes,' she wrote back. She could hear both the Elder's and this Astrid's mental sounds of surprise, but one of them was laced through with threads of anger as well. Unsure of what else she should say, she continued, 'I hope you are enjoying the Convocation.'

That startled a laugh out of the Elder. "I always enjoy our get-togethers. Wilhelmine told me you could do that, but a description does not do it justice. She was right in that it looks like nothing I have ever seen a wand-waver do. I am curious, however; why do you write instead of speak?"

Hazel tilted her head back and raised two fingers to the scar on her neck. She lowered her head so she could look in the vague direction of the Elder and then pointed at her mouth before shaking her head. That should, hopefully, be clear enough not to need further explanation.

From the burst of pity coming from the Elder, she supposed it was. "Poor child. How did that happen?"

'I do not know. It happened when I was a baby, but no one ever told me more than that.'

"Intentional, then? Someone who recognized that she was only partly human? You have my sympathies."

The Elder might be sympathetic, but strangely Astrid standing next to her was not. There was no change in the vague, wordless anger and feelings of distrust coming from that woman. Finally she spoke, her voice harsh and gravelly. "Elder, I must protest this wand-waver being permitted here. You know well that her kind are not trustworthy."

"Now, Astrid, be kind. She clearly has wand-waver in her heritage, but she just as clearly is the child of a hag. She is one of us."

"No wand-waver could ever be one of us," Astrid thought with a snarl. "She nonetheless is a potential risk to our security. If she told other wand-wavers where we come to gather… they could try killing us all," she finished silently.

The Elder and Elfriede understood the unspoken train of thought regardless. "Hazel would not do that," insisted Elfriede. "She may be descended from wand-wavers, but she has never behaved like one of them. I doubt she will start doing so now unless you push her away."

"Oh. How do I interrupt this?" Dagna thought to herself. Hazel glanced over towards the craftswoman how had been doing her best to ignore the building conflict. That was good enough for Dagna, who carefully held her lens back to her. She needed to spend a moment feeling what had been done to it, including finding a small buckle on the end of one of the two strips that were now attached to the circular metal frame. Positioning her lens back over her right eye, she looked over the now-visible stalemate while working to thread the strap through the buckle.

What really caught her eye were not the expressions on Elfriede and Astrid's faces but instead all the scars, both thick and thin, that spiraled up Astrid's forearms. One hand was tightly clenched around the haft of a short spear – and how she was making the edges of the spear's tip flicker green like that, she would love to ask much later – while the other was equally tight but gripping a knife sheathed at her waist.

"I'll get this," Dagna said from behind her. The woman's hands batted her fingers away and quickly buckled the lens back onto her face.

With her own hands free, Hazel started writing before anything was said by the arguing hags that could not be taken back. 'I do not want to cause any trouble. I would not tell the wand-wavers anything about this place. All I want is to see and learn and understand.'

"As you should," the Elder said once she saw Hazel's words. "All hags, full-blooded or not, should know where they come from. Admittedly, I did not know that mixed-blood hags existed until today, but that changes nothing worth mentioning. I appreciate your dedication to our secrecy and our safety, Astrid, but I think you are worried about nothing in this instance."

"But Elder—"

"Astrid." The warmth was gone from the Elder's voice, and with no little mental grumbling the enforcer took a physical step backwards. The Elder gave Elfriede and Hazel a smile, and although both of them noticed it was strained, neither said anything. "Please, enjoy the rest of the Convocation."

The pair started walking away, and after a minute or so both Hazel and Elfriede finally relaxed. 'That was stressful.'

"You have that right."

'Why does Astrid dislike wand-wavers so much?'

Her question caught Elfriede by surprise, although not because of the root of the issue. "You noticed that, did you?" Hazel gave her a disbelieving look and nodded her head, prompting a sigh. She was pretty sure she could have put that together even without her mind-reading. "Astrid's interactions with wand-wavers are traumatic… complicated. I recognize that there are decent wand-wavers just as much as there are terrible ones, and probably far more of the former than the latter, but Astrid's first experiences with wand-wavers were with the worst of the worst that humanity has to offer. It takes a particular kind of monster to experiment on another living being just because they can."

Hazel's eyes widened as she stared wordlessly at Elfriede. Experiments? Did that really mean what she thought it meant?

Elfriede caught Hazel's look and cleared her throat. "I might have said more than I should. Thankfully, her distrust does not matter. You have the Elder's approval to be here, and that is all that matters. Let us move on, shall we? There is still much to see, and hopefully that will be enough to get your mind off this."

She gave Elfriede a short nod. She did not think she would forget it as quickly as the hag hoped, but she could see the sense in not dwelling on it. Not here and now, anyway.

Terrible as it was, that was something she could do nothing about.

This chapter ballooned out of control rather quickly and went into territory I was not expecting. All the family drama between Elfriede and Hedwig? That caught me completely by surprise.

Silently Watches out.