Chapter Text
fWhip is only five years old, but he already knows what form his dæmon will take when she settles.
He knows because his father told him and Gem both. Their dæmons are going to be cats, just like every Count and Countess of the Grimlands. He told them because their dæmons needed to be cats and hold very, very still while their portrait was painted.
fWhip had held very, very still, his dæmon a sleekwhite cat, and thought that there must have been a faster way to make a portrait. After what had felt like forever and then more ever after that, there had been a perfect family portrait; a father sat proud and centre flanked by his twin children and three perfect cat-dæmons. Their father’s painted hand is on Gem’s shoulder. The painter forgot the wrinkles in fWhip’s shirt.
Right now, fWhip and his dæmon are sitting very, very still. Like a portrait. With shirt wrinkles.
fWhip has spent a lot of his life being very, very still. He doesn’t like being still, so he makes a game out of it. He pretends that everything will blow up in an awesome fiery explosion if he moves.
Gem says that’s stupid and not how explosions work. Gem likes to pretend she’s invisible so long as she stays still. fWhip says that’s stupid. He can run around and yell and people will still pretend he’s invisible if he’s not doing it somewhere important. So there. But fWhip is bad at games and Gem is good, so Gem always wins.
Right now fWhip is sitting very, very still and being very, very good like his father told him to. In his lap, Dunadere is cat-formed. His dæmon’s twitching tail betrays their boredom. fWhip has been confined to this straight-backed wooden seat for forever, listening to the grown-ups talk and talk and talk. Wither Rose Alliance this and Forced Retreat From Pixandria that. Even Sausage is acting like a grown-up. Sausage!
As far as fWhip is concerned, the Wither Rose Alliance means wearing warm suits that are hard to breathe in, boring old people talking about boring old people things, and being told to act his age.
fWhip had once pointed out that his age was five and he was acting like it. fWhip’s father hadn’t found that funny. He’d said fWhip was being bad again. Being bad is the only thing fWhip feels good at sometimes. He finds the heel of his boot tapping restlessly against the leg of the chair and stops it.
In the straight-backed seat him, Gem is also sitting very, very still. Gandalf is also perched cat-formed in her lap. His tail doesn’t twitch from boredom.
fWhip picks up his drink—his reflection looks back at him bug-eyed in the chalice’s convex as he brings it to his nose—then puts it back down. Picks it up again. The drink is red and sticky; sweetberry juice. fWhip brings the chalice to his lips and breathes bubbles into it. Dragon bubbles. Loud bubbles. Everyone Is Looking At Him bubbles.
“fWhip,” his father says.
fWhip puts his drink down. He tucks his hands under his thighs. No more picking up and putting down. Dunadere’s cat-ears flick back against her skull. Her tail is not flicking anymore. It is curled up against her and she is cured up into a tight little ball.
“Sorry,” he says, but his father has already turned away.
fWhip likes bubbles. He likes Bubbles. Bubbles, Sausage’s dæmon, sits attentive at Sausage’s side in the form of a wolfhound. fWhip doesn’t recognise her as the Bubbles that dog-formed chases Dunadere and Gandalf or bird-formed races them through the sky any more than he recognises Sausage. The Sausage he recognises is his and Gem’s friend. That Sausage always aims to collapse on top of fWhip when he collapses from a fake sword wound in a fake fight. That Sausage makes magic potions from mud and leaves with Gem.
This is grown-up Sausage. Lord Sausage, who at only fifteen years of age and less than a year of military service is already climbing the ranks. Just like how fWhip and Gem aren’t really fWhip and Gem, but Viscount and Viscountess, Lord and Lady, five-year-old grown-ups and supposed to act like it.
Dunadere wriggles impatiently in fWhip’s lap. He pulls one palm from under his legs to scratch between her ears. She bats at his hand, playful. Her intention is clear—neither of them want to sit very, very still or be very, very good. fWhip’s heels are bouncing again.
He glances back and forth and back again. No one is looking his way. No one would notice if Duna slipped silently from his lap to pace about at his feet. Or to bat at Gandalf’s shaggy grey tail, hanging down off the side of the chair.
Gandalf notices, so does Gem. She sends a fierce scowl fWhip’s way; be Good.
fWhip doesn’t want to be good. He wants to move! He wants to be loud!
Duna, now a beagle with floppy ears and playful paws, wriggles between chair legs to pounce at Bubbles’ feet instead. Bubbles’ long grey snout tips down. Her tail thumps once, twice against the stone floor and restrains itself.
The Queen of Mythland glances over, arched eyebrows high. Sausage makes a big deal of clearing his throat and lifting his chin and not looking at fWhip. Dunadere pounces once more. This time Bubbles ignores her too.
“Sausage!” fWhip hisses, like the build-up to an explosion. Ssssausssage. Ssss. If only Duna was going to be a snake and not a cat.
Eyes are burning into fWhip, he glances to his right and finds the burning green gaze of his sister and father upon him. Sausage, meanwhile, is still Not Looking.
“fWhip,” Gem hisses, all bossy. “Shh!”
“You shh,” fWhip says back.
“fWhip,” Gem says again, “be Good.”
She says it in the same way their father says it. Capital G Good.
But fWhip doesn’t want to be Good. He wants to run and be loud. He wants to play and blow bubbles and play with Bubbles. Not thinking, fWhip reaches out and shoves Gem as hard as he can. All of a sudden, Sausage is Looking. Everyone is Looking. Because fWhip is five years old and acting like it.
“fWhip,” his father says, all bossy, but unlike Gem he means it.
fWhip wilts. Duna retreats beneath his seat slinking, sullen, cat-formed again. “Sorry,” fWhip says. No hissing.
“Why don’t you let the children outside to stretch their legs,” says the Great Wizard. “Besides, I do believe it’s time for lunch. I for one, am rather hungry.”
The Queens and Counts and Great Wizards rise. So do their Lords and Ladys, their Viscounts and Viscountesses, their dæmons. Their sons and daughters whose legs aren’t long enough to reach the ground and who drop from their seats one and then the other. Thump-thump. Like a heartbeat.
Their father rests a hand on Gem’s shoulder briefly, then turns to his son. “fWhip, a word. Outside.”
fWhip follows his father. Outside. Gem follows fWhip, even though she doesn’t have to. Maybe she wants to hear him get chewed out again. Maybe she wants to be there because being there is all she can do to help.
“I’m sorry,” fWhip says before the door has even closed behind them. “I didn’t mean it-”
Their father doesn’t look back, just holds up one gloved hand and speaks one gloved word. “Let me speak.”
fWhip falls silent.
Narrow scars of light battlescar the corridor, cast by arrowslits. Their father’s emerald ember-eyes flicker under the lantern-light as he considers his words. He reaches out for his dæmon, she presses her tabby head against his gloved hand.
“I didn’t mean it,” fWhip says again, but this time quiet, only for his sister’s ears.
“Don’t mean it all you want,” she says back, “but you were Bad on purpose.”
“fWhip,” their father says, stopping short when he is out of earshot of the meeting room. He kneels down on one knee as if for a coronation. They are eye-to-eye but fWhip is Not Looking at his father, because his father’s eyes burn.
“Mm?” fWhip mumbles. Duna perches on his shoulder, a finch, then curls weasel-formed around his neck.
Gem is very, very still and very, very good in fWhip’s shadow, but Gandalf flits about her head in the form of a swallow.
“I’m sorry to have snapped at you,” their father says, sharp yet tempered. “But I only ask that you listen. When we meet with the Queens of Mythland and Gilded Helianthia, and with the Great Wizard, and all the other people back there in that room, you represent me, and you represent the people of the Grimlands. Good people. Think of that. Think of how you would want the Viscount of the Grimlands to present himself. Would you want to be represented by someone who makes noise and blows bubbles and pushes his sister?”
Here his father pauses, long enough for fWhip to know he’s supposed to answer. “No,” he says, even though a Viscount who makes loud noises and blows bubbles and pushes his sister sounds a lot more fun than one who sits very, very still and does nothing at all.
“I know it’s a lot of pressure, and you’re only young, but you’re very lucky to be in this position and I want you to remember that next time you want to yell or run or push. Gem can be Good, I know you can be too.”
fWhip nods.
“Have we reached an understanding?”
fWhip nods again.
“In words, fWhip. Have we reached an understanding?”
“Yes,” he says, in words.
Far behind them and far, far away, the door to the meeting room creaks open. Footsteps ring across the stone floor as Sausage hurries down the hall to meet fWhip’s father, calling out, “Count Kerr, sir?”
Their father stands to address Sausage, grown-up-again.
“Lord Sausage?” Their father asks, polite but still sharp. That sharpness has never left him. Not once for as long as fWhip has known him, and fWhip has known him for, well, for forever. It’s forged in him. A sharp tongue that cuts words as they leave his mouth.
“I can take fWhip and Gem outside if you like. Give them a chance to run around. Sir.”
fWhip’s father looks down at his children. “If you go with Lord Sausage, will you behave?”
fWhip nods. “Yes,” he says, with words.
“We’ll be Good,” Gem says.
Their father looks to her and nods, reassured. “Very well. Run along then.”
“Alright!” Sausage cheers, then catches himself. “I mean. Thank you, sir. I’ll take good care of them, don’t even worry about it, no breaks or burns or nothing. Just leave it to Uncle Sausage.” Sausage salutes, all proper, but he’s grinning when he turns to fWhip and Gem. “Alright you two, come on! Come on down!”
Sausage walks straight-backed and grown-up, and Bubbles trots along beside him, well-behaved, wolfhound-shaped. But as soon as they round the corner, Bubbles’ tail springs up and starts to wag.
“What do you think about the retreat from Picks-an-ria?” Gem asks, in her Serious Grown-Up Voice. Every word over-annunciated. The one she uses to regurgitate whatever their father or tutor or nanny said so she can boss fWhip around.
“I think that if it happens, it gives Lord Sausage a tactical advantage to see his favourite kids in all the world,” Sausage says, reaching out to ruffle whichever head of hair is closest. Gem ducks. fWhip isn’t so lucky. His already unruly red curls stick up this-way-and-that. Dunadere, finch-formed once more, begins to tuck strands back into place.
“Noooo,” Gem draws out the word, childish despite her best efforts. “Sausage, I mean it! Give me a good answer.”
Sausage laughs but acquiesces. “Alright, alright, hmm, let’s see . . . well, it’s not good for Mythland, but I’d be happy to be stationed closer to home. The real question is, what do you think, Viscountess Gem?”
Viscountess Gem thinks about this long and hard. She thinks so hard her face is crinkly. There’s a stain on her collar; she spilt sweetberry juice on her dress. Eventually, she says, “Fighting is Bad.”
The courtyard is hidden in deep shadows, the towering rooves of the castle sheltering them from the afternoon sun. Autumn chills the air. Dunadere and Gandalf surge forwards, a hare and a fox, scrabbling together in the dirt. Two dæmons become one, an inverse of their humans. Two children supposed to be one. Dæmon children, attached at the soul.
“Aww, but forget all that,” Sausage says, “I’d much rather hang out with you guys.”
Bubbles shifts mid-leap, one moment a wolfhound, the next an eagle, then into her favourite form; a terrier. Then she pauses mid-step, glancing back at Sausage, who likewise has frozen in place. His eyes are wide, face unarmed as a sort of understanding dawns over it.
“Sausage?” Gem asks. She reaches for his hand. “Are you okay?”
“I’m . . . settled. We’re settled! Bubbles, this is amazing!” Sausage picks Gem up and swings her about, dizzy and giggling. Bubbles—small and smiling and settled—scarpers about his feet, tail beating the air as it wags.
When he sets her back down she stumbles, leaning on Gandalf’s leopard-flank to keep steady. “What do you mean settled?” She asks. “You mean settled-settled? No more changing settled? That settled?”
“How do you know?” fWhip butts in.
“What does it feel like?”
“What if you change your mind?”
“Did you know it would happen?”
“Why isn’t Bubbles something big and awesome like a dragon?”
“How did you make it happen?”
“Are you happy-?”
“Alright, alright, you two! Calm down!” Sausage interrupts. “I can only answer one question at a time!”
But he doesn’t get the chance to answer any questions, because fWhip decides, “I wanna settle too.”
“No,” Gem says, “not before me and Gandalf. We’re gonna do it first and better.”
“Are not!”
“Are too!”
“Prove it.”
Gem turns to Gandalf and points one finger at the shaggy grey cat. “Settle.”
Gandalf does not settle. He turns into a bird, then a butterfly, then a cat again. He shakes his head.
“Why not?” Gem asks him. “What am I doing wrong?”
“Duna,” fWhip says, “what’re they doing wrong?”
Dunadere, who hasn’t settled any more than Gandalf has, can’t answer. Her rabbit-nose twitches as she thinks it over.
“Gem knows everything,” fWhip says, because that’s what Gem always says. Even when fWhip tells her something he knows she can’t possibly know, she tells him she already does. Duna thinks Gem is just saying it. “If Gem doesn’t know how to settle, then how are we supposed to?”
“Try anyway,” Gem says. “It can’t hurt.”
Duna shifts once again into a cat, Good and proper, and tries to settle. fWhip tries too. He holds himself very, very still and thinks about having your portrait painted and boring meetings and being grown-up and acting like it. He thinks about being Good. He thinks about how all of that is what he was born to be.
It doesn’t feel at all like who he is. fWhip is loud and chaotic and Bad when he should be quiet and still and good. His head and chest are starting to ache.
Gem was wrong. It does hurt.
Duna leaps upwards and shifts mid-air into a falcon, soaring up over their heads. She doesn’t want to settle any more than fWhip wants to sit still.
“Well,” fWhip says, “I already know what my dæmon is gonna me. Mine and Gem’s. So there’s no point in making it happen early when it will happen inventably.”
“Inevitably,” Gem corrects.
“Oh?” Sausage says, humouring them. He doesn’t believe they know, even as they believe it themselves. “And what’s that?”
“Our father says they’re gonna be cats. He says every true ruler of the Grimlands’ dæmon is cats. It’s tradition.” fWhip tells Sausage. Gem doesn’t butt in even once, which is how fWhip knows it’s doubly correct. Sausage is still looking at him though, so he continues, “It’s just how it works. Like how redstone is Dust and your dæmon disappears when you die.”
“And is that what you want to be?” Sausage asks.
“Yes,” Gem says. Her answer is immediate and unswerving; this is who I am, she says in that one simple word, make way.
And fWhip . . .
fWhip wants to run around and make lots of noise and blow bubbles in his sweetberry juice. He wants to make portraits fast so he doesn’t have to sit very, very still. He wants to be Good, even if he doesn’t always know how.
He looks to Dunadere. “Is that what we want to be?”
She should know. She is him, his soul. She knows him better than anyone. Better than Gem, and Gem has known fWhip his whole life. fWhip hasn’t known Gem her whole life. She was born eight minutes before him. When she’s cross at him, Gem always says those were the best eight minutes of her life.
He looks to Dunadere. She looks back. “What else are we supposed to be?”