Orenda was so weak she found moving difficult. Honey removed the tube and tied a white cloth around her arm to stop the bleeding, and Orenda held it as best she could, but she was amazed how much blood they had taken from her.

While Honey had been working with her, Bunni had been rubbing some sort of tincture all over the stitched up flesh of Gareth’s abdomen- it had to hurt; Orenda knew that touching the flesh there had to cause an intense pain, but Gareth hadn’t moved in the slightest, hadn’t woken up, hadn’t registered it.

He was all she had left. He was the only family she had ever known, and she had known so little of him. She should have shown more interest in him- she should have asked how he met Bella, about his life at sea, about how he went from the safe space at his godmother’s house to being on the run, how he had met the Knights of Order the second time- she should have taken an interest in his life, because now it was likely that she would never get that chance. It was possible that he was a good man, more or less, that all the terrible things he had done, the fires he had set, the murders he had caused, the destruction he had wrought, had all been for noble causes. The Urillians were right about him being a criminal, but Orenda herself was a criminal, and she wished she had asked him so many things about his life, not because she particularly cared, but because it would have meant so much to him that she took an interest.

Bunny rolled out long strips of white cloth and stuck them over the goo she had rubbed on, pressing down so they would stick, and again Gareth did not awaken, did not even stir. Orenda watched the hazy world through blurred vision, and contemplated how weak she was with how little blood she was missing compared to Gareth. She wasn’t sure she would be able to stand up on her own.

Honey turned the glass vile upside down and slotted it into a strange contraption beside the table where Gareth lay on the right side. She tapped his arm and frowned. Orenda heard her mumble something, but could only make out the word ‘flat’ because she wasn’t exactly feeling amazing herself. The world was fuzzy and Orenda desperately wanted to drift to sleep.

“Here goes nothing,” Honey said, and Orenda inferred from the way she tied off the tube that the needle was firmly inside his arm. She watched how slowly the liquid began to drain from the jar, but she couldn’t focus on it for very long, and her world faded to darkness.

“Hey, Rendy,” Orenda focused on the soft voice speaking to her and tried to will her eyes to open. As she blinked the world into existence she looked up into those soft, silver eyes and recognized Sonny’s face. “I want you to try to eat something for us, ok?”

Someone had thrown a knitted blanket over her, and as she pulled herself upright it slid into her lap. She took the bowl from him and had to admit that it smelled delicious- it was the first time since stepping foot on the earth continent that she had looked forward to eating something.

“Crumble the bread up in it,” he said with a smile, “I brought your staff down here, and the mask, and everything is more or less alright.”

“What time is it?” Orenda asked.

“It’s nearly daybreak,” Sonny told her, and Orenda frowned.

“Has anyone heard anything from Bella?” She asked.

“No,” Sonny admitted, “Not from Bella, or Lappy, or Sharon… god I hope… my stepmom’s been so good to me…”

He slid a tray onto her lap and Orenda sat the bowl on it and began to break the bread into chunks as she had been instructed. Sonny turned his back to her, and she could see that he had brought significantly more food with him than he had served her. He poured something foaming from a bottle into a glass and brought it to her.

“Here,” he said, “I thought you could use a drink.”

“Thank you,” She said, but her heart wasn’t in it. Her focus was on Gareth.

He still lay on the table; his head was propped up by a pillow and he was covered by a quilt, but he still looked painfully pale. The blood and the contraption it was in were gone.

“He’s not in great shape,” Sonny admitted. He pulled another chair from the table where he had set up the food and drink closer to Orenda and sat down with his legs spread, leaning forward with his elbows resting on this thighs, watching Gareth. “Your little friend, Anilla, has been up and down the stairs pumping potions into him, and he’s not dead yet. If he’s not out yet, he’s probably fine. How do you feel?”

“Weak,” Orenda said because she didn’t see the point in lying. She looked beside her chair at the staff twinkling in the dim light and asked, “How did you bring it down here?”

“I picked it up and carried it,” he shrugged, “I think that whatever you were afraid would burn me must be magic. I don’t have to fear magic. Did you know that thing is made of sterilite? Why the hell would you make a mage staff out of sterilite?”

He reached into his pocket and produced the strangest fruit Orenda had ever seen. It looked a bit like an apple, but the flesh and stem were both a strange, metallic silver. He bit into it with a tangy crunch, and she saw that the inside, while it didn’t look as manufactured, still shimmered like the colors that flowed through her staff. He didn’t seem ashamed to eat it in front of her, didn’t seem to think it was a strange thing to do.

“What the hell is that?” Orenda asked.

“Oh-” Sonny’s eyes darted to the apple, then back to her, “I thought you… this is the starfruit.”

“How… where did you get that?” She asked.

“You can’t have any,” he said seriously.

“I wasn’t asking to eat it,” Orenda remembered how frantic Lapus had been, how Gareth had held the bag out of his reach and told him that he was addicted, that Xaxac should have never given it to his kids. “I was asking where it came from.”

“Oh,” He said, and she felt his face heat, “Yeah, I’m sorry, I just… we only have so much and it has to last us. And it’s super poisonous. Like… really, really poisonous. Shifters heal faster than most people or we wouldn’t be able to eat it.” He paused, took another bite, and stared down at the fruit, “Honestly… part of me wonders if that wasn’t part of what was wrong with dad. We don’t really know what this stuff does… I mean, we know it gives us magical immunity, but we don’t know what kind of… side effects it has.”

“Where did you get it?” Orenda asked.

“We grow it,” he said, “Here, in the orchard, mixed among all the other things so it isn’t glaringly obvious. But… we’ve never had a proper inspection because my dad was blowing the commander. Which… I guess somebody else is going to have to do now.” He made a disgusted face, “Somebody’s gonna have to take that one for the team and pray it’s good enough. Agalon’s not a Knight of Order he just… really liked my dad. He’s not converting for us; he genuinely doesn’t know about the starfruit. He knows something… He’s not stupid. This is gonna blow up and I’m not looking forward to it.”

“If that sort of thing was growing wild here,” Orenda said as she stirred her beans and cornbread, “The empress would know.” She took a bite and was pleasantly surprised- the first actual flavor she had had on the continent danced across her tongue, salty and sweet, with complex oniony hints and perhaps honey in the cornbread. Finally this continent had produced something worth eating.

“They don’t grow wild,” Sonny said as if the idea was ridiculous, “Dad brought the seeds back with him from the Crystal City.”

“Oh,” Orenda said.

“I’ll be honest,” Sonny said with another crunch, “I expected a bigger reaction.”

“I’m sorry,” Orenda told him, “I’ve become a bit jaded to whimsey, I’m afraid. So much has happened with the shifters and zombies and pirates and whatnot that it’s… I’m just so tired, Sonny. I would have given you a bigger reaction but I’m a bit… worn down and concerned.”

“I get that,” he said, and Orenda appreciated how thoroughly he ate the piece of fruit. She had always been annoyed by the dainty way that earth elves ate, but Sonny took big, full bites with his- she giggled.

“What?” he asked with a grin.

“All of you have the same teeth,” She said.

“Oh,” he put a hand over his mouth, “Yeah, I know. We do. I’m well past twenty and it’s… it gets old being told how cute you are. Lots of guys my age have a shitton of kids by now, living in some shack on a plantation with their not-wife and 13 kids or someshit. But I look fourteen with my big eyes and buckteeth and baby face. Does the beard help at all? I’m trying to just project adulthood and I don’t know if it’s working.”

“It isn’t,” Orenda told him, “But I’m not human. Are beards an indication of age? Elven mean don’t grow them.”

“Yeah,” Sonny said, “You can’t grow a beard until after you’re damn near grown.”

“Learn something new every day,” Orenda said. “I’m sorry you’re all so cute.”

“At least we’re not somewhere it can hurt us anymore,” Sonny shrugged, “You don’t want to be a good-looking human, Rendy. Only pain comes from it.”

He sat the core of the starfruit onto the table and reached into his other pocket to pull out a pouch of tobacco and began to roll out a cigarette. Orenda watched, impressed by how skilled his hands were as he licked the paper closed. He held it between two fingers, leaned forward and asked, “Can I get a light?”

Orenda lit it for him and he leaned back in the chair to inhale slowly, then exhale a long, smooth cloud.

“Your father,” Orenda said carefully, “Had… an uncommon arrangement with my parents.”

“He was an unrepentant whore,” Sonny said, “That’s not going to insult me. He wasn’t particularly shy about it. He couldn’t really afford to be, I don’t think.”

“It’s… it’s different than I thought it would be,” Orenda said.

“We’ve got to clean the nursery,” Sonny ashed into a tray on the table and leaned forward again, “We’ve got to. We can’t leave a corpse in there- the kids need somewhere to sleep.”

“He was beheaded in a nursery?” Orenda asked, “Thesis’s glowing eyes, Sonny that’s…”

“In front of the babies,” Sonny said, “Yeah. As bad as you think it was, just keep piling on. One of us is gonna have to kill Lappy. I knew there was something wrong with him, but like… it’s my baby brother, you know? And when it’s your baby brother you just keep telling yourself that he’s not that bad, that he’s going to get better, that it’s stress and it’ll pass.”

“I never had any siblings,” Orenda said.

“Well,” Sonny shrugged, “You never knew you had any siblings. We’re serious, Rendy. Dad loved your parents. He always told us that if you ever came around these parts we were supposed to treat you like a sister.”

“I don’t know that I’ll ever understand what they had…” Orenda said.

“Love is… weird,” Sonny took another long drag, exhaled, and stared at the smoke, “For some people, like my dad, and like your parents, I guess, they just had a lot of it. Dad was… wasn’t allowed to have emotions, didn’t know what actual love was for so long, I think... I think he just… wasn’t able to contain it. And if you were going to be with him you just had to accept that, had to seperate it in your mind. You couldn’t be jealous. It just… couldn’t be something you allowed to exist.”

The door opened, and Anilla poked her head in.

“How’s he doing?” She asked