If I did not know her better than I knew myself, I would have been certain that Anna lied to me about why she had cried.

She blamed it on being tired and everything else that had happened that day, but there was a look in her eyes that begged me to not press her further.

I listened and pretended to accept her excuses. It was Anna, she would tell me when she felt like she could. I knew that like I knew my mother's hair was red.

After Jasna's warning, she had dried her tears and changed the subject to what her little brother had been up to while she started braiding my still damp hair.

It turned out that Arthur had been very busy since he had left the manor.

Everyone else was drinking, so I drank too, and fell into listening to the tall man.

The wine did not make me feel any better, but it did make feeling easier to not do. In the state I was in, feeling nothing was about the best thing I could hope for.

Thankful that my hair was long enough to shield me from the horrid fabric Anna was robed in, I eventually laid down on my back and rested my head in her lap.

"No, anyone can try to become a knight. The Right Hand Path takes most of them out though. We started with over a hundred, but it was just me and Thom by the end of it." Arthur carried on, his and his sister's cheeks blushed red from the wine.

"Don't tell him I told you this, but Alexei was the only one of his group of pledges to walk the path. He wasn't even fully grown yet," Jasna began and fell into a laugh as she looked out her wall of windows. "He was so cut up when he finally reached the top of The Thorned Tower, I thought he was going to bleed to death."

"You've been there? They told us that no one could come and watch." Arthur complained.

Jasna shrugged her delicate shoulders. "Mother Nami, well, she was Lady Nami at the time, we were given special privileges."

"The Right Hand Path, The Tower of Thorns, Mother, Lady, why does everything you two say sound like a bad fairytale? Go back, who is Thom?"

"Can a fairytale really be bad? Isn't the point for them to be wholly good?" Jasna asked as she tired her downy hair back with a band of her sky blue aura.

She really was beautiful, too beautiful for my absent guard, but I had been in worse places and around much worse people. The fact that I felt as bad as I did made me feel even worse.

I wanted to go back to the manor, but at least I wasn't under a mountain of sand or drowning in an underground cave.

Despite how hard it was for her to do, Anna made an ugly face. "Of course they can be bad. All stories can if they aren't written right. Who is Thom?"

I raised my head and asked my own question. "Why isn't there a Lady in Blue?"

My words brought an uncomfortable silence between us all as any thoughts of Thom or fairytales vanished.

"That is not something that I can answer," Jasna said slowly. "Not because I do not wish to, but because I do not know. That is something you would have to ask Mother Nami."

In my short time with Mon Zetta, I had learned many things, but there was one lesson that did not require a battle to be fought.

Asking the right question became far more important when there were few opportunities to ask anything at all.

Mallory had wasted her question about what was in the chest inside Zetta's classroom. If she had been patient, she would have learned of its contents when we next returned to class.

There were countless things she could have asked instead, but because her question had been impatient and ill formed, she had gained nothing.

When was the next time I would be locked in a Precept's quarters? Hopefully never, but if it did happen again, I held serious doubt that they would be as open as Jasna had been.

Beginning to return to myself from my rageful longing, I asked a question that Jasna had to be able to answer. "Why are you not The Lady in Blue? Mother Nami said you should be."

"Because I am like you, Underwitch Ire. The reason that I cannot become The Lady is the same that you will never be allowed to. Even if you achieve your transformation and manifest your implement, you are still the daughter of a sorcerer. And for that, you will never be trusted fully." Jasna said, her sky blue eyes filled with care and compassion.

I wasn't, my father had been a warrior, but her answer was far more true than she knew it to be. All she had done was have the misfortune of being made by the wrong person.

I had stolen The Well and fled to the mortal plane with it.

If they did not trust Jasna, there was not a word for what they felt about me.

"If you could be, would you want to be?" I continued, thinking of all the pain that The Lady in Red had gone through, and all the memories I had seen that Nami had been in.

Jasna answered without needing a moment to think as she tried to time a lock of her hair that would not stay back. "Oh, yes. There are very few things I desire more than that."

"Why?" Anna asked. Her cheeks were still flushed from the wine, and I knew her well enough to know that she had drank enough to be put to sleep, but I saw in her dark eyes that she recognized the opportunity we had stumbled into.

"To one day be The Mother." Jasna smiled.

There was something to her face, in her cheekbones or the brightness of her eyes maybe, that brought Katarina to the front of my mind. They didn't really look like each other at all, The lost Mother had the look of being cut from stone. Jasna's features were not soft, but they were delicate in a way that Katarina's wasn't.

"That was what I wanted at least. To be for others what The Mother in Blue was for me. A home, something solid, an anchor. When I came to this place, chaos had not been kind to me."

I felt all of us glance towards where Blutmalir still stood hidden behind the open closet door.

She continued. "If it were not for her, there is no end to the darkness that would have worn itself around me like a cloak. Because of her, I have a home, a path, and a proper family. So while I know that I can never be what she was, wanting to be a Mother is enough to make me great."

There was one last question that I needed to know, but I hesitated to ask it.

Jasna noticed. "Please, whatever is on your mind. You are safe here."

She had said that several times, that we were safe. At first I thought she had meant that we were safe physically, but I understood that her protection was not only skin deep. She thought that I was like her, and she was trying to be for me what Katarina had been for her.

I sat up fully and leaned back against Anna for support as I swallowed and spoke. "When you talk about The Mother, you don't mean Nami, right?"

"Right." Jasna nodded in agreement.

The question that I had spent so long wishing to ask Alexei did not come quick from my lips, but I forced it out through the anxiousness that had crept through me.

"What happened to her, to Katarina?" I asked in barely more than a whisper.

I was nearly certain I had seen the answer to that question in her memories, but pain had been all there was for me to remember.

"Ah," Jasna said as the brightness in her eyes faded. "I wish I knew. All of us do."

"She's just gone? No one knows where she is?" Anna chimed in before I could ask the very same thing myself.

"Whe know where she went, but we do not know if she is still there. Let's return to happier things," Jasna said as she shook her head. "Arthur wishes to be a knight, what do you wish to be, Anna?"

Anna placed the bottle of wine that she had emptied on the big table we all sat around and took one of the others that had been opened. "Drunker."

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"A worthy goal, and you, Ire?" Jasna asked as I took a drink after Anna.

No one had ever asked me that before.

That was no great shame. Even if someone had, that would not make my answer matter more. I was a prisoner. I was only allowed to go where The Mothers allowed me to. I was only allowed to do what their binds permitted. The possibilities for my life were buried beneath the mountain of debt that I owed them.

Still, I spoke honestly, and hated how weak such a beautiful word sounded coming out of me. "Free. I want to be free."

"Of my quarters? Have I not been a good enough host?" Jasna asked as her lips turned down into a worried frown.

"No. I want to go wherever I want to go. I want to do whatever I want to do. There is this place called Merrowcrest, it's a little town on a beach and a shark named Jotuza lives there. I want to see Amber's Rush and the everblossom with my own eyes. Go to Don Viven or to the subseas under my own power. I want to know chaos for myself."

I had not meant to raise my voice, but once it had, I could not bring it down again.

"I want to go back to Erosette" My voice cracked and if Anna had not placed her hand on my back, I would have cried once again. "I want to sit by the fire with the manor guards and have fried potatoes at seven columns. I want to wear my sandals and my maiden's dresses without having to fear that my feet will freeze. I wanna waste the day away in the well house."

A silent sob struck my chest.

"I want to see my mom."

I pulled my knees to my chest and let my glamorless hair fall over my face.

In truth, I was embarrassed that I had let myself slip back into my anger so easily, but no one else seemed to mind. They all gave me several moments to collect myself before any of them said a word.

"I thought you were from Don Viven." Precept Jansa said quietly and broke the small silence I had been given.

The downy haired sorceress might know what I really looked like, but I had to remember that she knew very little beyond that.

"That's just the wine talking. She's a lightweight and it's past her bed time." Anna answered for me and saved me from trying to find a way to cover up what I had said.

In a sudden movement that was entirely too fast for someone his size, Arthur jumped up to his feet and grabbed the table in both of his hands. "I can move this right? We'll need the space."

"Stop it! You'll spill the wine!" Anna shouted at her brother as he placed the massive table down by the windows without spilling a drop.

"Yes, you obviously can, I would just like to know why you wished to?" Jasna's face had turned up into a curious expression that was so striking it hurt.

Arthur did not answer her.

Instead, he turned to me and lowered himself into a stance that I knew like the back of my sealed hand.

Not even my anger could defeat the smile that began to turn up the corners of my lips. "Right now?"

"Unless you are scared?" The tall man smiled.

Jasna sprang up from the floor and for a moment, I thought that she would not come back down. "You all know how to play points?"

Anna let out a weary sigh. "Am I the only one that thinks this game is stupid?"

"Yes." The three of us answered in unison.

With swift gales of her sky blue aura, Jasna had cleared the floor completely before I could climb to my feet. I was not ignorant of what the tall man was doing. All we did when we were in Erosette was play points. He had heard my longing for those sunny days in the manor and found a way to remind me of them. His efforts were not in vain, we played until I was sweating and red in the face. I took a moment to breathe and let the small soreness I still felt in my ribs fade as I watched Jasna and Arthur. When I had recovered, I faced off against the precept and lost myself in learning how to beat her.

Anna drank.

When my legs were shaking and it was all I could to stay standing, I drank a full pitcher of water and laid down on one of the big pillows that had been pushed against the wall. Arthur and Jasna continued to play, but I had reached the point that I could no longer keep my eyes open. Anna brought me a blanket at some point, but I had already begun to fade. I never really slept, some part of me was aware that the three of them were still talking, but their conversation was only a gentle melody that reminded me that I was not alone.

After what felt like no time at all, a shout came from Precept Jasna and my eyes snapped back open. "Mothers help me, we are going to be late!"

"This is what I was saying," Anna started and interrupted herself with a hiccup. "You would think that a sorceress vanishing and the town being attacked would be enough to cancel something that was planned for the next morning."

I rolled over and was taken by a yawn that stretched me to the full length of my body. My eyes burned and it felt like it took me twice as much effort to move as it should have. A trace amount of sunlight had turned the nearly black forest outside the window to a dark shade of blue.

Zetta had told us to be at the ballroom before dawn when she had been giving us our robes from the chest in her classroom. Precept Jasna was right, we were late.

"The Dawn Ball cannot be canceled. It is only possible once a year. Goodmorning, Ire. I hope you slept well." Jasna called out an answer as she shrugged into one of the billowing black robes that I was supposed to be wearing.

I groaned as I threw off the blanket that I had been covered with and took the hand up that Arthur had offered me. "My robe is in my quarters, I have to go get it."

"There is no time. Here. My classes never have enough underwitches to wear them all." The Precept said as she threw Anna and I each a robe. Arthur got two, and that was still not enough to cover him fully.

"Sam?" I called out, wondering where my missing familiar had gone.

Jasna skipped to the doorway of the second room. "I think I saw him go in-oh, that's not good."

I followed after her.

A painting hung on the wall. It was not one of M.D.G's, but it was still detailed enough that I knew I was looking at Jasna. She wore a yellow dress that was the same color as the sun that would soon rise over the horizon. There were no feathers in her hair, and she was surrounded by roses that were as white as the snow outside.

The painting hung open on unseen hinges, and one of the cramped tunnels that Alexei had taken me through after I had found my blue lay on the other side.

"Would he have gone in there?" Jasna asked with worry on her face.

"Yes." I said simply, knowing that the big blue cat would do anything if it pleased him or her thought it would displease me.

Jasna sighed. "Well, students are not supposed to know about the inner halls, so if you do not see him soon, come to me and no one else. I would rather not get in trouble."

"Right." I nodded as another yawn took me.

Getting Anna onto her feet was impossible for me, but thankfully, Arthur was strong enough that he found no such problem. I did not get the chance to hear Caerulus's lullaby in full because the tall man carried both of us down the singing stairs far faster than we could have made it down on our own.

The halls were empty.

The quiet that had filled Lun the night before remained, and Jasna hushed us as we came to the hall the ballroom lay at the end of.

Nothing was like it had been the first time I had come to that place.

There was no light except for the dim glow of what looked to be uncountable stars above us. It was so dark, that even the places that Arthur's thrown together cloaks did not cover were almost invisible. There was no hum of excited conversations like there had been for the new moon ball. It was so quiet that it should have been easy to hear all of our footsteps, but the darkness at our feet kept the sound within it. The hall itself was cold, as cold as it was outside of the grey stones of the school, but there was no wind to carry it through.

It was like everything inside the school had gone to sleep.

"Good, we aren't too late." Precept Jasna said under her breath as she tried to hurry us all along.

"Late for what? Are we going in there to go to sleep or something?" Arthur laughed.

"Do they teach you manners in that place or are you only learning how to be violent? Be quiet." Anna said to her brother. The sound of a bottle being raised and wine being drank punctuated her sentence.

Jasna broke her own imposed quiet. "You brought that?"

"It seemed like such a waste to just leave it. Besides, this is much better than what I steal from the kitchen." Anna whispered in the darkness. The sweet smell of the wine disturbing the stillness of the pitch black hallway.

"Why do you steal from the kitchen? Jasna asked as she stopped and turned back to us.

"It's not stealing, it's lying. She says she works for The Mother in Blue and they do whatever she wants." I muttered.

Jasna took the bottle from Anna and drank. "Why would you not just go to the dining hall?"

"Because I don't think I'm actually," Anna hiccuped again. "To be here."

"If Nami knows you're here, then you have just as much of a right as anyone." Jasna said.

Blinding light shone out of the ballroom doors and all the darkness that surrounded us was cast away.

A voice rang through our sudden shouts and I had never been more mad to hear someone speak.

"If you all hurry, you can make it before the star has risen. Having your robes change is the whole point."

I turned around and met the single eye of Alexei.

He did not look as he always did.

His long white hair was down and his feet were bare. There were great tears in his shirt, and bloody cuts beneath each of them. My guard had returned, and he looked like it had cost him much.

What was most different, what took the anger that was boiling up in me and froze it solid, was his eye.

It was not the cold white stare I had grown so used to.

It was burning Alexei's perfect blue.

"It is a disgrace that the headmistress is still performing this useless ritual." The white haired man said as he wrapped his arms around Jasna.

I felt my feet leave the ground as Arthur pulled me into his arms. "Come on, Autumn. We have to beat Anna."

I watched them as I was carried away.

They embraced fully and a smile I had only seen on my guard's face once before returned.

For as ragged as he looked, I had never seen him look more like his mother.

Just as the black robes around me began to become washed in pure white, Jasna leaned up on the tips of her toes and planted a kiss on Alexei's cheek.

"It is hardly useless. It's my favorite day of the year," The downy haired sorceress said, her cheeks blushed and her eyes full as she looked at my guard. "Happy birthday, Alexei."

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