(Posted December 8, 2016)

ACT 2 - LEAP

Persistent Assistant

Spring of the White Sun

The same afternoon that Sanderson obtained his gingertie training wand, and after I'd received my first pair of glasses so that I could recognize distant objects just as well as near ones, I stood him up on Ambrosine's cluttered kitchen table and dusted off his loose-hanging white clothes. "You can feel it, can't you? The raw, loose magic in the air?"

"Uh-huh."

"'Yes, sir'."

"Yes, sir." He straightened up, holding his wand far out from his body. The weight made his stiff arm sag.

I withdrew to the edge of the hallway and locked my hands behind my back. "Now, I am not going to touch you and I am not going to rescue you. Tapping into the proper frequency of the universal energy field is something every nymph of the Seelie Court has to learn to do on their own. But I will start by teaching you my way and we'll see if it fits you. Close your eyes."

He lifted the wand. "Eyes closed."

"Now, I want you to roll them back in your head so that, in theory, they are upside-down."

"Um." Sanderson opened his eyelids to slits. "Not reaching."

"They will. Dig deep."

"But they can't roll. That's silly."

"You have to try. Whenever you fall asleep, your eyes roll back automatically. You just have to do it while you're awake and push them farther than you ever have before. It's simple. It's instinctive. Forget that you are and simply be."

Sanderson squeezed his lids shut and lowered his arm. "I- I can't. I can't see you. Are you still there?"

"I'm still here, Sanderson. Can't you feel my attraction signals in the field?" I politely resisted the urge to strangle him with his own magic lines.

Opening them again, "I'm not doing it. My brain won't let me."

I crossed my arms. "You're not trying. That's your problem. I realize that it seems difficult now, but once you've learned it then it's a simple, simple procedure to repeat. Watch." Shutting my own, I flipped my eyes backwards and then parted the lids again. Several appliances and chairs had been formed of yellow magic as opposed to being crafted by hand, but otherwise I found Ambrosine's kitchen bathed in tints and shades of neutral purple, accented with chunks just waiting to be snapped up, tamed, and then released back into the world. Exception being Sanderson himself, with his pale pink core surrounded by a miserable emerald cloud. His three lines wavered above his head, drinking magic like scrawny straws from this or that concentrated patch of violet. I saw him flinch.

"Your eyes are glowing, and they're weird, I think."

"Yes, they are glowing, and they will show in the dark. Not only that, but switching them on sends light ripples through the energy field - if you're worth enough salt to summon an Anti-Fairy, then you probably felt them when I did it - and it can act as a signal to magical beings that you are nearby. This can either be immensely helpful or very dangerous depending on who or what is in the area. Always be aware of that, and never turn on your field sight in an unfamiliar location unless you are prepared to defend yourself. Now, try again."

I couldn't see anything of Sanderson's expression with my eyes turned on, but I had the feeling that he twisted up his face. "But I thought I was going to learn how to fly and do magic."

"Unless you're wishbirthed and get a heavy glob of magic stuck to your soul upon your arrival into the world, you can't learn either of those things until you master field-sight. And you'd better learn quickly, because about five years after weaning, the lingering effects of Kalysta's nursing milk will leave your body and you'll be grounded for good. There's no artificial substitute for buohyrine, fagigglyne, or cortycus yet, and you won't find a lot of lactating damsels willing to suckle a drake with his adult wings twice a day."

He bent down and set his wand on the table with a light clatter. As I returned my vision to normal, I watched him scrunch himself together with his fists balled. After a few minutes, I began to smell the sweat beneath his arms and in his dirty, sticky hair.

"Alright," I said. I picked up one of the bound stacks of bark strips that I'd brought with us into the kitchen and sat myself down in one of the chairs. "You keep focusing on your eyes, and I'm going to read this text here about nymphs and how they grow. Do not, under any circumstances, let Ambrosine know I was looking at it."

"Okay," he said, his voice still tinged with sulkiness.

"Chapter 1," I said to myself, flipping through the first pages. "Pregnancy. Skip that. Newborns. Nursing. Skip that. Post-instar… Yes, this is it. Hmm… Sanderson, where are you in your development? Do you understand how to kick a ball?"

"What's a ball?"

"I guess we'll work on that later." Sliding my finger upwards, I adjusted my glasses and began to read.

I don't know why I bothered trying; the suggestions were ridiculous. I'd have liked to learn what he was doing wrong in channeling his magic, or maybe how I could secure his absolute devotion. But all the book wanted to discuss was bonding through cuddling and feeding, and teaching nymphs how to have a sense of humor by acting like I was hardly a hundred and sticking a pair of brightly-colored underwear on my head.

That's not even an exaggeration. This was real, professional advice that Ambrosine kept on his shelf with his other therapy things. Thirty useless minutes later, I looked between Sanderson and the book, then threw it down and leaned my chair back on two legs. "Nope. I don't get it."

Sanderson continued to struggle. I checked the swinging clock in the hallway- the tall, intricately-carved one that Praxis owned before my father, and his sire before him. I'd chewed heavily on one of its chesberry legs when I was younger, which still left it lopsided, and dragged each passing hour out by an extra fourth of a second.

"Ambrosine will be back from the upholstery shop soon. I'm going to start making dinner. If Emery shows up, do not let on to her that you're having trouble. Seriously." After cracking my knuckles, I pulled out the bowls, whisks, spatulas, and ingredients, still watching him across the kitchen the entire time. He worked through our meal, and through dessert too.

"Keep practicing."

I wrote responses to some of the Dame Fergus's more pressing letters, thanking her crisply for the gloves and scarf and hesitantly stating my uncertainty surrounding the questions of Sanderson's birth and his biological mother. Ambrosine invited several neighbors over for a game of snapjik, and Sanderson worked through that too. He worked until I returned to the kitchen and found him asleep on the table with the transmitting tip of his starpiece in his mouth. Then he worked on Thursday. When Friday came, Ambrosine brought us to the Wish Fixers filing room - I carried Sanderson there in my pouch and out of sight of anyone who might contact the Keepers - then he worked some more.

"He can't do it," I told Ambrosine later that evening as I paced up and down the hall. From the kitchen, Sanderson grunted and whimpered in vain. "He can't do it. I have a nymph who can't channel magic."

Ambrosine, leaning against the nearby wall, didn't look up from his book. "He will."

"At the rate he's plodding along at, it will be too late. He'll be forced to drink nursing milk for the rest of his life if he wants to fly. Worse, what if he hits five years and he turns out to be an actual tomte? What do you expect me to do with a tomte?"

"He's not incapable of channeling like a tomte is. He's just blooming late. Remember how difficult it was for you?"

"Now that you bring it up, no, I don't. I don't remember very much of anything from that time of my life. I've just always known how to do it."

"Fergus, you're going to constrict your windpipe if you keep yanking on your bowtie that way. Let the nymph be. It's going to be okay."

"Dang it, Ambrosine!" I whipped around. "Real life is not like one of your therapy sessions. It's not going to be okay. How could we ever be so thick as to believe it would be? Pathetic. It's bad enough that he exists in the first place. What am I supposed to do with him if he can't even use basic magic? I ought to have drowned him after he was born like I wanted to. We don't need any more tomtes sucking up magic and tax benefits in this city, or anywhere. I may as well have left him for the will o' the wisps."

Ambrosine slammed his book shut and fixed me with a shining sapphire stare. Although he was shorter and thinner than me these days by no small amount, for a flash, I was a juvenile again. "Go to your room."

"What?" I folded up my wings. "You can't punish me. I'm four hundred ninety-one thousand five hundred and forty-two years old."

"I'm not punishing you, I'm negatively reinforcing you by taking away your freedom. Now, go to your room until you learn to behave yourself, or I will throw you back in the streets, since with an attitude like that it's apparently where you belong. You are living under my roof, and I expect you to honor thy father."

"I don't have my own room anymore, still. Or did you forget how you attempted to erase me from existence during a drunk night with some random damsel who knows where? Perhaps you had your fun in my own bedroom. I may not want it back after all."

"Emery," Ambrosine called without taking his eyes from mine, "Come out here and let Fergus have his time-out in your room."

I heard blankets, then feet, then wings. Emery materialized at her door, jaw dangling with the click coins that made up her earrings. "You can't shove him in here again! He'll touch my stuff."

"I probably will," I agreed, pushing past her. "Aside from my first night, when I couldn't find a candle and everything was dark, it's been over three hundred and twenty thousand years. Now, what does this thing do?"

Emery rounded on me. "If you break my springcase, I swear to Kiiloëi…"

I was much larger than she was, and able to plant my hand over her face and push her backwards. Ambrosine watched us squabble like phoenix chicks for a few minutes before he at last extended his hand. "Ferg, Em. Let it go."

Emery wrenched the facial cream dishes away from me. "Can't do it, lovely. He's my brother, for one thing."

"And she's my sister, for another. She was born in a Fire year, wasn't she? It shows."

"I'm floating within earshot, pighead."

"Fergus, give me your chesberry."

I yanked a stack of buttery lagelyn bills from Emery's snatching fingers. "Should I? I rather think I'm old enough to make my own decisions"

He cocked an eyebrow. Reluctantly, I drew my wand from its sheath and handed it over. Ambrosine took it and left the room, and Emery followed him in a huff. I flopped back on the purple bed and kicked one leg aimlessly towards the ceiling.

So, this was how it would be, then. After well over three hundred millennia spent being independent, Fergus Whimsifinado had been grounded.

After a few minutes, Ambrosine buzzed back into the bedroom and thunked a stack of clay tablets onto Emery's vanity desk so hard that several cracked at the bases. The stylus, he shoved into my hand. "Now, you will write - without magic - 'I love my child' in the tiniest scrawl you can muster until all of these have been filled."

"What? I'm not doing that."

"Then you will go without dinner tonight."

I turned my face towards the window, never unclasping my fingers from behind my neck. "Let me. I've never liked the way you pour cereal."

Ambrosine pointed my own wand at the back of my head. I could detect that much movement in the energy field without turning around. Level-voiced, he asked, "Has the time arrived for you to challenge me for my position as dominant drake in this household, gyne? You may have forgotten it, but I fought in the War of the Sunset Divide before you were born. I'm not a hopeless soldier yet."

I continued to stare through the window, my freckled face simmering.

"You say, 'Of course not, Father'."

"I am not, Ambrosine."

"'Of course not, Father'."

I rolled back and dared him on with my eyes. Ambrosine chuckled once and shrugged the blatant insult smoothly off.

"Then don't write it," he said, floating backwards towards the door. He moved his wings in warbled scoops. "Take the urvogel's way out if you wish. You can fix your own breakfast in the morning."

"I'm not an urvogel. If I won't be writing your sentences, may I have my wand back?"

He patted the bulge in his pocket. "Tomorrow. Sleeping with the thing will only give you radiation poisoning. I'll see you in the morning, ready for your second day of work. When you finish alphabetizing that mess of files, I'll have you out gathering contact information for the 'A' surname clients under forty lines of age; we lost all data back when those new scrying bowl and crystal ball updates came out."

I should have asked Lilie if I could exchange Solara's old wand for one made of milbark. Milbark comes when called.

Saturday came. It went. Sunday afternoon found me lying in the new bedroom Ambrosine had poofed up for me in what had before been the old storage room between his bedroom on the left and kitchen on the right. Cozy place, still gray and beige because I couldn't be bothered to paint it anything else. I rested my cheek against my hand, my elbow cushioned in a soft lump of my simple violet bed as I scoured the post-pooferty chapter in another of Ambrosine's child development books. But I had to shove it under my blankets and scramble beneath the pillows for something else to look at when he opened the door. My options were drastically limited.

"Evening, Fergus. Busy reading, I see. Anything good?"

"Just inappropriate things. I'll still be in heat for another nine months. Go away."

He pressed the lenses of his spectacles and peered over my shoulder. "Are those Sanderson's drawings?"

"Yes, he didn't give any of his stick figures clothes. Super inappropriate." Giving up my pretense, I lay the bark strip on my knee. "Can I help you?"

Ambrosine tucked in his wings and crashed lightly on my bed. He locked his forearms behind his neck and let out a sigh in a long, "Ah…" Then he said, "Have I ever told you that you were born the month after I started my second 'interest pursuit' semester at the Academy?"

"Was I," I said without inflection.

"That's right. Autumn break was all scarves and warm soda and slinking around the curfew rules and cuteness. Lots of cereal too. And braiding that beautiful dark blue hair of your mother's."

"Yes, we mustn't forget that part."

"No indeed. I miss those blue-hair days, with all those little white shooting star sparkles… But the same Friday afternoon that school started up again, we found out you were on the way. First try, no less! Solara was so good to me anyway. It was unexpected, but we worked around my pregnant belly. Ah, and we got smarter after that. Not that what happened that night was the first time for either of us, because your old man knew how to charm the damsels with his singing, and that's what the Year of Promise is for, but when it came to each other-"

"Your point?"

I earned myself an amused sideways glance that made me tighten my tongue against my cheek. "I'm sorry. Am I bothering you? Well. Only nine weeks later- wham! … It was a little late for Krisday surprises, but there was our beautiful preemie, wrapped up in a purple midwifing blanket without a bow." He scratched his lower stomach. "When you kicked, I was just walking into therapy class, but even at that age you'd decided that it wasn't for you, apparently. You wanted out. I thought we were going to lose you. Even if you hadn't been scrawny, your hexagonal body didn't fit very well in the fairy nymph clothes we'd picked out for you. Oh, I was mocked horribly for toting your weepy, broken-crowned self up and down the Academy tunnels. Don't worry- I defended you. I bravely ran away. Solara and I would switch off who was caretaker over lunch. She took you to her creative writing and statistics courses."

I turned away from the window that overlooked the backyard. "Solara took me to class with her? Just her? While you weren't around?"

"Mmhm, for a few weeks. Then we'd put you down for your nap while she took scary war history and I went off to self-defense."

"And she wanted to be a writer? For telling stories, with the hero's journey, character development, dialogue, setting and things?"

Ambrosine squinted at the ceiling. "Do you remember all of that?"

My fingers moved to my pink pajama shirt of their own accord as though checking to ensure it was indeed pink and not brown. "When… when I was on Earth, I met a damsel once who thought she had a future in being an author. I read a few snippets of her work to Sanderson. It wasn't too bad, but it wasn't good either. For the sake of dust, don't get me started on how out of character Queen Rachyl was in Chapter 16. She turned away the son she claimed for so long to love- it made no sense, there was no build-up, and it was awful. If I ever wrote a story, I know I could do better. Pull out all the stops, grind the nitty-gritty details into powder, and really show that damsel up in the place and the way it would hurt her most. Then I'd make her eat it."

To my chagrin, Ambrosine ruffled my hair, then replaced his hand behind his head. "Well. You were fairly well-mannered and predictable even as a baby. You would wake from napping at exactly 16:00, on the chime. Most afternoons I exposed you to business willingly, because I had to. It was the only class you never whined in. Probably because Drk. Icate was a sucker for nymphs. I always sat in the front, and when he lectured, he would pace. Every few times he paced in our direction, he would feed you a bite of his pudding or jelly or applesauce. Sometimes I wonder if that's why you turned out to be a gyne."

I wrinkled my nose. "Because I ate jelly in my pre-instar stage? That's absurd."

"It is, and I was referring to the business class anyway." Ambrosine lifted his head just enough to lock his gaze to mine. "They say nymphs forget their early memories as they age, but perhaps you absorbed too much. Maybe if I hadn't brought you there, you wouldn't have become a gyne, hm?"

"What does this have to do with anything?"

"Because I was working with an anti-wraith pilot at Wish Fixers today, with the black 'mustache and goatee' fur. We were speculating why gynes and pilots and Refract plumes crop up, and I had the thought that maybe if I hadn't taken you to those business classes, I could have had a thoughtful and obedient child who would have attended his child development lectures at the Academy in second term like he was supposed to. Then he would know exactly why Sanderson can't channel magic yet, because it probably would have been an essay question on the first of his two exams. I hope you figure it out before he hits the age of five and renders himself a permanent tomte, Fergus. Because I'm not giving any more hints."

He got up and left me then to retire early to his bed as usual. I stopped him at the door. "Ambrosine?"

"Yes?"

I sat up. "It's negative punishment."

"Interesting comment. Might I request clarification on the context?"

"Sending me to Emery's room the other day. That was an attempt at negative punishment. Not negative reinforcement. And technically, I'm not sure it was even that because it doesn't seem to have any effect on decreasing my 'undesirable' behaviors. I prefer reinforcers of lagelyn, if you were wondering. You might get a response out of me then."

Ambrosine studied my lavender eyes as I watched his indigo blue ones. "Ah," he said at last. "That was my mistake. A little slip of the tongue. Happens to the best of us sometimes. I'll see you for breakfast tomorrow."

Then he really did leave. After he had, I rubbed my chin. "Essay question. Hmm…"

For something to be an essay question, it first had to be taught in the class. I reached beneath my covers for the development book, prepared to study every line in the post-instar chapters with renewed vigor, when I heard the creaking of a hinged lid from the kitchen, and the distinctive crinkle of a candy wrapper in the small, pink hands of someone who hadn't been given permission to take it. I craned my neck. "Sanderson, what are you doing out there?"

After a chair had been shoved, a small body had hit the ground, and a series of shuffling footsteps, he poked his head around the door. "Um. I'm practicing."

"You have guilty eyes. You should really cover those if you're going to lie- you read like one of Kalysta's manuscripts. Awkward and predictable." I rolled from the bed and grabbed my lantern, snapping my fingers. "Give up the pretending; I know exactly what's in your mouth. I always know when you're lying to me. Don't forget that."

"No!" He ran away, both palms pressed flat over his lips. I waited for a few minutes, leaning my shoulder to my doorframe, tapping my toe against the lantern so the handle made a pinging noise, until he came scurrying back. "Can I have some milk?"

I took off my glasses (round and oval-shaped as opposed to Ambrosine's half-moon spectacles, the black rims extraordinarily thick) and rubbed between my eyes. "Your face and hands are smeared with chocolate. I can see the shiny wrapper in your pocket. You're not a very good miscreant if I catch you in the act."

"I didn't hurt anyone, though."

"No, but I caught you, and so you'll be punished. I'll have to take your styluses away tomorrow. How is the field-sight practicing really going?"

"Awful! It doesn't work."

"Show me."

Sanderson stared at the ceiling, buzzing his awkward wings. His eyes seemed locked into place.

"I see. And I hope those proper form techniques we started you on yesterday are coming along."

Sanderson tightened his grip on his fat gingertie wand and swiped it through the air.

"No, that's clumsy. Magic backlash would easily send your wand flying. Try the McKinley grip. I assure you, it's the best." Kneeling down, I took his wand and tilted it back, then sharply forward again. "Hold tight here at the halfway point, thumb on top and middle curled around the back, close to the bottom. Pinky underneath. Index straight behind and horizontal for support."

"But what's the point in anything? I can't make my eyes go backwards, so I won't make magic ever!" He threw down his wand so it clattered against the blue-black stone. "Oh, blitz this! Blitz all of it! I'll never get it right."

I almost moulted my wings. From the other side of the hall, I actually heard Emery fall off her (my) bed laughing. Swiping Sanderson up from the ground, I covered his chocolatey mouth with my palm. "Sanderson, you can't say that."

"Mmhm? Bleh. Bleh. I can't say 'I'll never get this'? Why? Oh…" He nodded sagely. "Because having a bad attitude won't help me succeed in life. I see."

"'Blitz', Sanderson," I said impatiently. "You can't say 'blitz'."

"Why, what's it mean?"

As I set him down, I stared at the ceiling and rubbed my throat. "It's just not a word I want to hear, even when we're alone. And especially not out in public where there are other people. You might hurt their feelings."

He tipped his head. "But you say it all the time."

"Yes, and I shouldn't. I'll fix that… Now, because you didn't know, I'm going to do nothing. I think you've learned your lesson. But if I hear that word come out of your mouth again, I'll twist your wings."

Sanderson squeaked and agreed at once, backing towards the wall. I stared down at him for a moment before upturning my hands. He came running and wrapped his arms around my torso, squealing his apologies. I scratched my chin. Then I took up the lantern again.

"I have an idea that might help you with your magic. A different approach than the wand thing. May I see your core?"

"What's my core?"

"Right. Hmm." Snapping my fingers for him to follow me, I made my way down the hall towards the washroom. Once Sanderson had come in, I lifted him to shoulder level and pointed at the mirror. "Who's that?"

Too young and shy to answer, he put his face in my pajama shirt. I turned his chin forward and said again, "Who's that?"

"Ehiyeh. Some guys."

"That's you."

"Nooo," he said, his voice tipped with patient laughter.

"Yes, that's you, and that's me holding you. This is a mirror, like in your nursery rhyme about fagiggly glands going bad and turning Anti-Fairies into food preservatives and jungle cats, before they crystallize into Fairies and their counterparts bloom to an unstable state like chocolate. For the purposes of this discussion, it shows us the way we appear to others." After placing the lantern on the counter's edge, I waved at the figures in the mirror. Then I took Sanderson's arm and used it to make him wave at his. "Now, touch your reflection."

He leaned forward and put his palm to the glass. For a moment, he experimented, touching the glass in various places and saying hellos to himself. Then he pulled back, staring at me in awe. "Did you figure out mirrors? You're smart."

"Someone else did, but I thank you for the compliment. It's very polite." I shifted him in my arms so I was holding him with just my left one across his chest, his feet dangling against my upper thigh. With the other hand, I motioned towards my head. "Now, there are three points of a magical being that form the soul: the lines, the hands, and the core."

"I have hands." He held them up. "These are my hands. One and two hands. I like the left hand best. Plus, I have eight fingers. One, two, three, four, eight, seven, six, five."

"That's right; you're very smart. Mother Nature gave you your hands, and with them, your body. Running through your body are veins of physical blood so that you might learn to walk and fly in her domain. Do you remember when I told you the story of how King Nuada lost his hand in the days of the Great Dawn, before the Sealing War? To Sreng?"

"Uh-huh. Oh. Yes sir. Then someone fixed it with silver."

I nodded. "You're a good listener. Hands are essential to any magic user. While you can perform magic so long as you remain in contact with a starpiece, hands are the only point of your body where your magic can escape in large enough doses to be useful. Injure your hands, and your magic will struggle. Actually, the hands are the only point on the body that will take real damage from a magical blow, if they're hit directly from the wrist down. Shoot someone with a magical blast or slice them across the palm of their right hand, and you can scramble their lines, effectively cancel their magic, and drop them to their knees in a matter of wingbeats."

Sanderson shivered. "Hurting hands is bad."

"Yes, hurting someone's hands is sometimes considered the ultimate offense, as having injured hands is thought to be among the biggest shames. Second only to having your soul sent to The Darkness upon your death and thus rendering your magic incapable of cycling back through the energy field for future generations to draw upon."

"What's any of that mean?"

I tilted my head to one side, then the other. "Well, the worst death for a Fairy is dying dustless. For example, if you kill a unicorn, then the universe marks you to have a dustless death, even if you don't die for a very long time after you do it. A nymph with flight casings on his wings doesn't leave dust, and neither does a selkie or a swanee who disobeys the one who wears their sealskin coat or feathered robe. Or if a cù sith steals your soul and you die in its body, which is no easy task, then The Darkness will find your core and steal you away. Did I ever tell-"

"Wait." He held up a hand and gave me that no-nonsense look he thought he was good at and really wasn't. "A nymph with flight casings on his wings dies a dustless death?"

"They say that, but I've never seen one and so I don't have proof of this. Don't interrupt me."

"But didn't you-"

"Did I ever tell you about inrita poison?" I started again. "Inrita poison is a thin, black substance produced under the tongues of brownies, and it kills all magic. The Molpa-Pel used the stuff to overcome the Tuatha Dé Danann in the Sealing War, may the Lost Ancients return from their underground prison. That's why you must never, ever kiss a brownie, Sanderson. A 'good' brownie is passive, and you could legally end up behind bars for taking advantage of her if someone chooses to sue. As for the bad ones, one brownie bite will kill you within fifteen minutes. There won't even be enough magic left in you to make lifedust. Going dusty is an honor, not always the rule."

"But why's the dustless kind like the worst death?" he asked, sticking two fingers in his mouth. "You're still dead, right?"

His weight was beginning to wear on me. I shifted him again. "Dying dustless is shameful because then the magic in your lifedust can't become useful to others. And usefulness, Sanderson, is the most important thing in the universe." I turned my attention from his reflection to his quiet square face. "All things die. Even us, whom the alien species call 'immortal' because we're resistant to so many things that would be the death of them, and we outlive them by hundreds of millennia. I wasn't going to tell you this yet, but the more you use your magic, the more strain it places upon your body, and the more your core ages, and the closer it comes to giving out."

"'Giving out'?"

"Yes. That's partly why I don't like to waste magic. It's how we Fairies age. Eventually, you will grow old and lose the ability to channel magic for yourself. Your body will decay around you. That's entropy. However, so long as you die a death of dust, your magic flows back to the energy field, so your children and others can channel it for useful things."

"I want to be useful," Sanderson whispered. "I really, really want to be useful. It's the most important thing."

"Yes, it is. What else was I saying before we were sidetracked on this topic?"

"Hands."

"Hands, yes. As for the second part of the soul, Father Time granted you the gift of your lines, and with them your magic, your mind, your experiences, and your lifeforce. If you ever see someone do this" - I held my hand in front of my nose, palm facing out, fingers splayed, thumb curled - "while they sit on their knees with their eyes shut and dome open, it means they are under the protection of prayer, meaning that it's offensive to the Tuatha Dé Danann, may the Lost Ancients return from their underground prison, if you should hurt them. You could get your soul stolen by a cù sith. Some Fairies believe that by attacking someone in prayer, you might die dustless on the spot. However, again, I can't confirm this. I don't think anybody can. We're all cowards, when it comes down to it. Cowards or prideful."

"Hands for body, lines for life, from Mother Nature and Father Time. Um." He tapped on my bristled chin. "What about my core?"

I hesitated, mulling over my options, then settled on, "You made your core."

Sanderson's eyes widened. "I didn't mean to. It was an accident!"

Shaking my head, I said, "No, there's nothing wrong with it, and you don't need to apologize for things that are biological instinct anyway. You were just doing exactly what you were supposed to. See? And it all worked out. There's lots of stuff that doesn't work out, but so long as you put effort into your life, things certainly won't be as bad as they might have been. Hmm. I know. Do you remember when you were three months old, and you woke up squealing because that swirl of golden vapor was forcing its way into your mouth and nose?"

"Maybe?" he offered, reaching towards the mirror again.

"That was the Dame Sanderson, or her 'lifemist', anyway. And the Anti-Sanderson followed suit in his purple-gray cloud of lifesmoke, although I did check with Kalysta and it would seem he missed Friday the 13th by an unusual amount of days. He swept into your head so he could absorb your soul."

"Why?"

I let my gaze trail away to the violet towels dangling from their hooks in the corner of the washroom. "He needed to, or else he couldn't survive- he's formulated out of the magic that was left over when you were brought to life. Raw, natural magic. Purple magic, meaning that he'll die when you do."

"Why?" he asked again through a yawn.

"Because you share the same core now. You're synced up. He may not necessarily take on every inch of physical damage that you do, unless your sync is particularly strong, but he'll certainly suffer larger injuries. Anti-Sanderson swallowed your core, he familiarized himself with your personality, he did what he had to in order to reflect it like this mirror in front of us, and he went on his way back to the location where his mother birthed him. All within the course of ten wingbeats."

Sanderson touched his temple. "So, magic lines help me not die, and hands help me use my magic. What does the core do?"

"I was getting to that," I said, bringing my eyes back to our reflections. My grip tightened around his chest. "Your core is a very physical thing that grounds you to this plane of existence. Without it and the lines that connect you to the energy field, you would float off into the heavens or dissipate downwards into The Darkness."

He chewed nervously on the sleeve of his pajama shirt until I stroked his black hair.

"Your core always starts out as a small, glowing speck when you're born. It's a representative of the deepest trait of your soul- the one you share with your Unseelie counterparts: the Anti-Sanderson and the Dame Sanderson, as I before mentioned."

His irises had nearly taken up the entire space within his eye sockets. "What's my core trait?"

"I don't know yet. Some Fairies never learn theirs. But when you know it… You know."

"Oh. Okay. Do you know yours?"

"Not yet."

"Well, when you know, you'll know, okay?"

I nodded and smoothed out the creases in my pink shirt. "Like I said, your core is only a glowing white dot for the first three months of your life. But after the Unseelie finish absorbing it, then it begins to grow."

"What does it grow into?"

"It can grow into anything. Anything that's not alive. Anything that's not too big. Anything your subconscious decided it wanted. An energy supply, a light source, navigational equipment, a tracking radar, a cooling device, plain empty storage space, a ring for your keys, a can opener, a cup holder. I met a goblin with an egg-beater once. Sometimes the design shifts very slightly by the day depending on your mood, but the 'what' never really changes. It just… is. It's a vague indication of who you are."

Sanderson studied his checkered blue pants and bare foot, then looked beneath his armpit. "So where is it?"

"Right here." I rested my palm on his head and, in a way I realized then that I hadn't done since the day he was born and I tied in his lines, I took his hair and used it to pull open his dome. "See it? In the mirror?"

He squeaked and grabbed for my fingers, then had second thoughts and trusted me to know what I was doing. "I think so. It's- it's that bluey-gray thing?"

"Look at that," I murmured. "You've got a stylus sharpener. That makes sense, given how much you were drawing at that age. That'll be an especially useful one now that we have Ambrosine and Wish Fixers."

"Oh, so that's my core," he said, reaching into his head chamber.

I took his hand away. "No, Sanderson. Don't touch your core directly."

"Why?"

"It's very sensitive."

"Your ears turned red like they did when I said the word I'm not supposed to say," he informed the mirror in a curious voice.

"I am not having this conversation with a nymph. Touching your core might burn or skin your fingers. Or you could squeeze it and pop your lines, or contaminate it with sickness. Basically, your core is a thing to make use of, not a thing to play with. It's just bad luck, somewhat disgusting, and most of all, simply not done."

Sanderson tilted his head to the left as I flapped my collar. "What's your core?"

Shrugging, seeing no reason to lie, I used both hands to push back my dome. With a thought and a twitch of magic, my hefty core unfolded from the fleshy red interior of my head, squeaking with enamel and calcium that had formed itself a lot better than my crown had.

"I have this laser cannon." Then my eyes rotated down and focused on him. Sanderson had instantly flattened himself to his stomach on the counter, his face a mask of panic. "Sanderson?"

"Don't point that at me!"

I withdrew my small cannon. My lid folded shut. "Sanderson, I wouldn't hurt you with my lasers."

"Yes you would! You twisted my wings! You always twist my wings!"

I took him in my arms again and rubbed behind his ear. "Oh, you still remember that? See, that's different. Sometimes I hurt you because I'm teaching you a lesson, understand. I always have reasons for the things I do. I would never, ever hurt you 'just because'. Even if I did shoot you with a magic laser, you would heal quickly. Magic has little to no effect on magical objects or other magical beings. It's a rule."

"Oh, yeah. Magic doesn't work on magic people."

"Well, it does. There are conditions and exceptions depending on what's going on; for example, you can trigger someone else's fagiggly gland with pink magic, which is the only type of magic that draws power from your core and stamina. Or, if you've disconnected a limb in the wrong place and severed your veins, then reattached the limb and shortly thereafter fallen asleep in contact with a starpiece, it's extremely difficult to remove again for thousands of years. I don't know why you would want to anyway, unless maybe you were attempting to correct the resulting shapeshifting problems. And, if a magical being is asphyxiating because there are no particles of magic in their blood, then they're technically considered to be 'not magical' and will die from a magical attack." I briefly took my hand from the back of his neck so I could wave it. "The precise details are something you'll study in the Academy one day, if not in upper school. For all intents and purposes, you would quickly recover if you took a blow from my lasers. Believe me, I've had my share of dominance fights, and I've experimented."

Sanderson clung to my neck. His noises softened. "I'm safe with you?"

"Safe as you can be, I suppose. I won't promise that you're not going to get hurt when I'm around, but so long as you're good and you listen to me, then I see no reason why I can't look after you. I looked after you in Kalysta's burrow, didn't I?"

He nodded. Rubbing his eyes, he yawned and said, "So, did your soul build your core cannon for like, attacking stuff or for defending people?"

I stared down at his forehead for several long wingbeats. "You know, I have no idea. I've never thought about it." Then I adjusted him, because he had leaned over and placed his head against my chest, fingers tight in my shirt folds. I returned him to the counter. "Now, let's get this party started. I brought you in here in the first place with the intent to help you. You're still struggling to pull energy from the field and convert it into magic, so I want to try a new approach. I just told you about pink magic, didn't I?"

"Kind of?"

"Close enough. Now, I want you to activate your core. This requires pink magic and is supposed to be more difficult than the yellow you should have managed through the excitement of using your wand for the first time, but since pink magic requires less energy from your lines and more energy from the inner store of power you use to float, it's technically a different concept and so we'll see what happens."

Sanderson scrunched his face in that way he apparently liked to do and swung one of his legs. His heel bumped against the wooden cabinet door below him. "Activate my core? How do I do that?"

"You stop thinking. Yellow magic is the color of acceptance, blue is for defense, green is panic, red is concern for life, purple is the color of natural biology, and pink is the color of instinct." I held up both my hands. "Lay your palms against mine."

"Palms?"

"The soft front, wrinkled part of your hands."

He grinned and did so. "Yeah, I have two of those."

"Yes, you do. Touch them to mine, and try not to think too hard. Let yourself relax. Don't fret too much. Just do."

After six and a half minutes, Sanderson withdrew his hands. "I'm just too hopeless, though."

I rubbed my temples. "You're not hopeless. You're just a tad high-strung. You can't be hopeless. Please oh please don't be hopeless." Then I snapped my fingers and straightened up. "Wait a minute. I know. Focus all your attention on your core, as you were just doing. But this time, I'm going to give you SHAMPAX."

"Huh?"

"I'm going to Share Magic to Prevent Asphyxiation," I said, leaning against the counter with my face near his. "Like I shared magic with you when we were walking through the snow towards the Bridge. Only, instead of keeping you from asphyxiating, I'll give you a burst of magic that you ought to be able to pick up and channel. Open your mouth."

"Li'e dis?"

"Just like that, but close it when I say. Remember to concentrate on your core. Normally I would have you close your dome to help you retain the magic, but for now we'll make an exception." When he had nodded and closed his eyes, I drew in air, ran it up through my system and down again, and then blew a thin stream of it into his mouth. "Do it now!"

Sanderson pinched his lower lip between his teeth and squeezed my fingers. After about eleven seconds, light whirring filled the air as the calcium stylus sharpener inside his head flickered into life. My face cracked in a grin as I peeked within his dome.

"Sanderson, you're doing it! Didn't I say it? I told you over and over again that you weren't a hopeless case. You just needed some practice, is all. And look at you now! If we could just get you to do the same thing through a wand with yellow…"

"I did it! I did the magic," he shouted, and then he leaned over and threw up goop that was so pale purple, it was nearly gray. It splattered over his checkered pajama pants and the rocky floor. With an unsurprised sigh, I shut his lid, placed him in the metal washtub, and pulled off his shirt.

"Well, that happens. Your body isn't used to channeling magic yet. Now, you stay sitting right there. I'm going to head out and get water to wash you."

"You're leaving?"

"Only for a minute," I assured him. "There's a well at the end of the street that draws rain crystals up from the clouds below. I can't afford to poof up water with Ambrosine on edge about my wand usage as it is." And, it had been too long since I'd really delved into my magic. I didn't want to mess up in front of Sanderson. Not the best time for his self-esteem.

Sanderson started to climb over the edge of the tub. "I want to come."

I took him under the arms and put him back inside. "No. Stay right there. You're messy. You'll get mess everywhere."

His face tightened with alarm. "Don't leave me! Bad stuff always happens when you leave. Bad people will come hurt me! Walt is mean to me. He pushed me in the water. Kalysta gave me crackers that were sharp one time. Sometimes when I nap you sneak away and I think you're dead. I try to find you but I run too fast and I scratch my hands on the walls. When you- when you- when you- when-"

"Slow down, Sanderson. I don't like stuttering."

He hit his hands against the tub wall, which stretched above his forehead. "When you go to the waste cave, Jakey says mean things about you, and Otto throws me in the sky and grabs me tight, and Ever pulls my hair, and Idona chases me, and Ambysine tickles me until I hurt. He tickled me all night until I ran away! And- And- And you were going to leave me in the hole and fly away one time after the big party, she said. Then you flewed and didn't come back for ten hours. You left me in the snow and it hurt and I felt sick for a long time and my eyes went dark and I was scared."

Rubbing my cheek, I said, "I left you in the snow because you turned around and walked the other direction when I specifically ordered you not to. It's your own fault that you hurt yourself." I snapped my fingers twice. "Just stay here for three minutes. I'll be right back."

"Don't leave!"

I floated into the hallway, but returned when he immediately started to cry in that irritating way I'd hoped he'd grown out of months ago. "Oh," I realized then, wanting to smack myself between the eyes. It had been too long since my school days (though in my defense, it wasn't a topic much touched upon). "You're the offspring of a gyne, and since you lack the freckles, you have to be a drone. That's right. Then if memory serves, drones often have limited concept of object permanence, along with a few other mental inhibitions. Urgh. Let's see what we can do about this." I stuck only my head through the doorway. "Emery?"

The background springcase music ended abruptly with a squeal. A few wingbeats later, her doorknob rattled. It sounded like she was flipping open multiple new locks. Then her pale face appeared around the frame, squinting and wary.

"Can you either poof up a bucket of water for us or draw one from the well? Sanderson needs me to stay with him."

She pursed her lips. "How about, I'll stay with him while you get the water?"

"Would you? That would benefit me greatly. He's covered in sickly sludge and if you want to watch him, all the better."

On cue, Sanderson emptied his stomach again.

"You can stay with him," Emery decided, and skimmed off after grabbing the two empty pails on the washroom floor. About five minutes later, she brought them back. "What are you doing?"

I had given Sanderson back his wand, and he was standing in the tub, leaning his entire body back so his head touched the wall, and grunting with the effort of straining his eyes. "He's still struggling to channel his magic," I sighed. "The most he's managed to do is activate his core for a couple of seconds. Then he threw up."

Emery put down the pails and took up her springcase from where she'd set it by the wall. "Still? Huh. Has he-"

"If you're about to say something insulting, I don't want to hear it."

She placed her bow against the springcase strings and made them sing. I tried to block out the noise, though Sanderson turned his curious attention towards it. "I was just going to say, that's weird at his age. Has he ever gotten them back before?"

Tightening my teeth, I shook my head. "Unfortunately, it seems to remain out of his grasp. He isn't a tomte, though. We got his core running."

"Ohh… Well, that's easy to fix." Still playing the instrument, she brought her face near Sanderson's. "You have to lick him."

I choked on my own saliva. "I have to what?"

"Lick him. Stimulate his lines to go tingle-fritzy. Nymphs can't really use magic until you shake the backup out of their lines, unless they're wishbirthed. That's why like, tomtes and will o' the wisps drakes usually can't use magic or fly. It has to be done within the first five years, before their lines seal over." Emery's eyes softened. Finally laying down her springcase, she kissed Sanderson's forehead. "Poor precious. You were squeezing out every last drop past the blockage that you could, weren't you?"

"Uh-huh."

With a laugh, she scrubbed his black hair. "It's not your fault that your daddy's an idiot, huh?"

"I'm not his 'daddy'. Please don't plant that idea in his head. I don't want him to call me that. Sanderson, call me Mr. Fergus."

"'Mr. Fergus'?" he asked.

"'Mr. Fergus'?" Emery asked.

I scowled at her. "Yes? I call Ambrosine by his first name. Now, are you going to lick him or what?"

Emery retreated to the washbasin and offered a wave of her hand. "The honor's all yours, papa. Bit too intimate of a gesture for the auntie, I think."

Groaning inwardly, I picked up the first pail as she picked up her song again. "Come here, Sanderson." He scooted over on his rear. I dunked the cold water over him, shocking him into crying again. When I snapped my fingers twice, he at least calmed down somewhat and clung to my forearm. After I'd dabbed off some remaining clumps of sickness, I leaned over the side of the tub. Then I pulled back and fixed Emery with a cold stare. "This isn't a trick to make me look dumb, I hope."

"Squeeze my core and hope to die, snip my lines and drink them dry."

"Okay, if you say so." Again, I brought my tongue near Sanderson's face. After a few wingbeats of hesitation, I rasped it over his skin. "How long do I have to do this?"

Emery let out a disbelieving noise. "Just until his eyes roll back into field-sight, duh. Nymphs can't do it themselves the first time, but after the eyes get loosened up once, it's easier. Seriously, did you never take a reproduction and health class in upper school?"

"I alternatively slept through it or worked on my math problems," I said between licks across his left cheek. "I was smart enough to pass all my classes without trying, so I never bothered to learn any of the actual material. And I never thought I'd be raising a nymph without a mother. Honestly, I don't think I missed much- Ambrosine taught me everything I really needed to know, and the class covered a disgusting topic in a room brimming with over-emotional damsels and flirtatious drakes."

She paused to kneel beside me, laying her head on her crossed arms against the tub. After a moment she said, "Well, you're doing fine. Kind of get all over the face. Just follow your instincts. See? That's exactly how it's done. You're a good father."

"I feel stupid," I said as I moved to Sanderson's parted lips.

"And his mother probably felt the same way the first time she breastfed him."

"Trust me, I know she didn't. Oh, disgusting!" I wrenched back my head, rubbing my sleeve over my mouth. "He touched his tongue to my tongue. Sanderson, don't do that."

"Why, Mr. Fergus?"

"You smell and taste like barf."

"Why?"

"Because lighting up the magic particles in your blood for the first time since you were born panicked your body's immune system and made you sick."

"Why?"

"That's just how things happen. Stop asking me pointless questions." I ran my fingers through my hair, grimacing at Emery's smothered giggles behind me. "How do your lines feel? Are you close to flipping your eyes yet?"

"It'll probably be another ten minutes," Emery said, pushing herself back into the air. Her wings hummed until they didn't, so I figured she had settled on the counter with her springcase again. "Keep at it. And when it happens, just stay and watch him on the off chance he gets so 'fritzy that he needs SHAMPAX. They'll roll back into place once his lines calm down again."

"Fine. Thanks. Don't wriggle so much, Sanderson. You're making this weird."

"Okay." He slung his wrists over the side of the washtub and drew his whole face inward when he squeezed his eyes shut. As Emery played her music, I placed two fingers behind his head and licked. Sanderson tried to help, licking my face back, until he finally scratched his tongue one too many times on my coarse chin hairs and gave up.

I was beginning to drift off into sleep from lack of stimulation when a small wave of magic brushed my skin. Upon opening my eyes, I found Sanderson's glowing light violet.

"There we go. And about time, too. You've got it now, Sanderson."

He turned his head back and forth, lower lip quivering. "I- I want it to stop. Mr. Fergus? Where did you go?"

"I'm right here, exactly where I've been this whole time."

He swung towards my voice, gasping softly, and then broke into whimpering again when he must have realized I was a shifting whirlpool of purple and yellow rather than dressed in my pink pajamas. When the crying came on, I lay my hand on top of his head.

"Stop that, Sanderson. I'm right here."

"I can't see you!"

"You don't need to see me. Feel my hand. It's not any different from when you lie in bed with me. I'm touching you, and you can hear my voice through your ears. And Emery's music- you can hear Emery's nice music, can't you?"

"I don't like how my eyes are messed up," he said. He put out his arms. I drew him from the washtub and sat on the floor with him in my lap, clinging to my collar.

"And I was just about to use the basin," I grumbled.

Emery lifted her wings. "Would you like me to take him out so you can have a minute of privacy?"

"I want to stay with Mr. Fergus," Sanderson mumbled into the folds of my shirt.

"Very well. Sanderson, I'll let you stay with me, as long as it stops your horrid crying."

His whimpering eased away. He tightened his grip around my neck, which I'd thought wouldn't be possible.

"I'm not sure that's the best thing to teach him."

I shrugged, still holding Sanderson's head with its awkward equiangular sides to my shoulder. "There are worse things he could beg for. So long as this keeps him quiet, it doesn't really matter to me. I can't stand the sobbing. I heard far too much of it over the last year."

The three of us sat together on the washroom floor until Sanderson's panic and, eventually, his tingle-fritziness faded down. His eyes slid back into place. He nearly began to cry in relief when he realized his vision had returned to its normal colors and details (Note: I should mention that my definition for what constitutes as crying is "choked gasping" because pixies, certainly, do not cry).

"I didn't like that, Mr. Fergus. I don't want to do magic anymore."

"You certainly don't need to do it every time you channel, but it's still a very important thing to know. Like… If you or someone else nearby is struggling to drink magic, you need to be able to slip into field-sight and determine what the problem is. If you want to figure someone's age, you can count their lines, subtract three, and multiply them by 11,250, and you'll be close enough. Although that's only really effective from early adolescence onward- children age too quickly and then hover about in the pre-adolescent years for far too long." Better than being stuck in their rebellious phase for extra eons, I supposed.

"I can't count to 11,250. I only know nine numbers. Or ten. I don't know how many. That is too much numbers."

"No, but you will someday," I said, absently scratching behind his ear. "Or… if you're about to mate, sometimes it's nice to keep an eye on your lines so you don't become so tingle-fritzy that you disconnect all of them from the energy field and begin to asphyxiate. Drakes have to be especially careful when mating is concerned- we always run at least a slight risk of going dusty if we don't hit yellow. If you're really good at using field-sight, then when you're even older than I am, you can use it a bit like a scrying bowl, in small doses. A scrying bowl lets you see people and places far away. Now, when you wake up tomorrow, we'll practice again with your wand."

"Time to asleep now?"

"Yes. Let's find you a clean pajama shirt and get you put to bed."

He loosened his grip on my neck. I scooped him up and made my way down the hall. Emery replaced her springcase in her room, but I suppose her damsel instincts must have been flaring up, because she came back to check on us as I lay down on my pillow beside Sanderson.

"Emmy?" Sanderson asked when he saw her. "Will you make those sounds again? They go up and down like this." He made a wave motion with his arm.

"Oh, sweetie, I took apart my springcase and locked it away for the night. But maybe your daddy- er, Mr. Fergus will sing you to sleep."

I opened one eye. "I don't sing. I've never sung in my life, I'm tired, and I want to go to sleep. You should do it. I guarantee your voice is prettier than mine. It'll sound more like his milkmother's."

As I finished, he made a choking noise that suggested the sickly gray goop from before was creeping up his throat again. Emery took him in her arms. "Back to the tub, Sanderson."

Instantly he was kicking, bubbling gray at the mouth. "No! Don't let her steal me, Mr. Fergus! Help! Help! You're letting her get away! Why do you do these things to me? Why are you like this? Rescue me!"

After three more minutes of screaming, which Ambrosine snored through as he tended to, I unfolded my pillow from around my ears and dragged myself out from under my blanket. Rubbing my temples with the forefinger and thumb of my left hand, I joined them in the washroom. While I was at least braced against the doorframe, he maintained his calm and pleasant disposition.

"He really doesn't do very well when he can't see you or taste your attraction signals and imprint," Emery observed as she wiped Sanderson's mouth with a green washcloth.

"Drones are like that."

"Oh, right. You're a gyne. You can only have drone or gyne kids- no regular, normal kabouters like me and Ambrosine and most Fairies. Eep, I hope it doesn't become a problem as he gets older."

I yawned. "He's two and a half months shy of being a year old. It's only a phase. He'll grow out of it eventually."

A/N: Text to Life - Founders of various insect colonies lick their brood to teach them who is dominant. Their offspring lick back to show submission and to familiarize themselves with the smell of their parent.

Text to Show - Poof's eyes were glowing violet for a few seconds during "The Terrible Twosome", so field-sight came to be entirely because of that. Use ALL of the canon!