#guys the amount of times i nearly accidentally wrote 'ghost' forgetting they don't have their name in fic yet...

[sergeantsporks]

Gilded Family

Rating: Teen and Up, Gen

Ch 30/?: Unfamiliar

Ch 1, Ch 2, Ch 3, Ch 4, Ch 5, Ch 6 , Ch 7, Ch 8, Ch 9, Ch 10, Ch 11, Ch 12, Ch 13, Ch 14, Ch 15, Ch 16, Ch 17,  Ch 18, Ch 19, Ch 20, Ch 21, Ch 22, Ch 23, Ch 24, Ch 25, Ch 26, Ch 27, Ch 28, Ch 29

In which none of the previous golden guards or wittebro died, actually, they're all fine and living happily together as one big dysfunctional family

Ao3

Phoenix’s blanket had fallen off in the night; he could tell by the chill over his shoulders. However, something warm and solid pressed against his chest. The warm, solid thing pinned down one of his arms, and he blinked at a head of blonde hair pressed up against his chin, his head still too foggy from sleep to figure out what it was.

“Mrgh.” Phoenix reached up and rubbed his eyes with his free hand.

His free hand.

His free flesh hand.

Phoenix sat up, abruptly waking the baby grimwalker that had been curled up against his chest. “Hey,” he spluttered, “It’s normal!” And, after a beat, “Why did someone give me the baby?!”

The little grimwalker grabbed his shirt for balance, speaking to him very seriously and completely incomprehensibly. They wore one long shirt that Phoenix was relatively certain belonged to Caleb and was much too big for them, the sleeves eating their little arms. Phoenix checked his own arms again—even the original wounds had vanished completely, leaving no sign of the mud underneath his skin.

Cherry poked his head out of the closet. “They wouldn’t quit fussing and reaching until I put them with you. Your arms were already back to normal, and I’ve been monitoring, it was fine.” He shook a shirt and a pair of overalls at Phoenix. “Achsah’s baby clothes. Hold them steady, they are. Very wriggly.”

“Hey—are you okay?”

Cherry tried to pull the new shirt over the grimwalker’s head, resulting in a head AND an arm poking out of the collar. “How did you—that had to have been harder than just putting your head through.” He struggled to pull the grimwalker’s arm back down into the sleeve, only breaking concentration to glance briefly at Phoenix. “I’m fine now. I was worried, of course, but it’s fine now. I’m fine.”

“Are you sure? I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked you to keep that secret for me. Especially not when you were already struggling.”

“Well. It worked out. You came back. You didn’t die of infection. You’re… are you okay? How are you feeling?”

“Cherry.”

Cherry let go of the shirt, leaving the little grimwalker a head sticking out of a sack. “It wasn’t good,” he said shortly, “I’m past being catatonic over it. I’d rather focus on something real and solvable, like getting this little guy into a pair of pants.” He managed to pull the grimwalker’s arms through the sleeves. “Can we just leave it?”

“Okay,” Phoenix said quietly, “We can leave it. If you’re sure you’re alright.”

“I am. You?”

Phoenix examined his arms, twisting his hands back and forth to check for any mud. “Better than yesterday.” His stomach growled. “Maybe a bit hungry,” he admitted. A lot hungry, if he was being totally honest. He’d been too exhausted yesterday to notice, but now his stomach snarled for food. When had he last eaten?

Cherry managed to half-wrestle the baby grimwalker into the overalls, getting their chubby legs through the leg holes but unable to buckle the straps over their shoulders. “We can fix that.”

The baby made grabby hands towards Phoenix, and Cherry held them out. “They want you.”

Phoenix didn’t reach to take the kid, instead checking his arms again. “Is that a good idea? I mean with…” he gestured to himself. “This.”

“They want you, Phoenix,” Cherry said quietly.

“Nee-Nee!” the grimwalker cheered, “Nee-nee!”

“They’re calling for my knees.”

“Sounds like it.”

Cherry didn’t make any move to pull the baby closer to himself, so Phoenix delicately took them, half expecting his arms to immediately collapse into mud at the touch. He held them out at arm’s length, wincing.

Nothing happened. His arms didn’t change. The little grimwalker kicked their legs in the air as if trying to scoot closer, and Phoenix gingerly balanced them on one hip. The baby grabbed his shoulder for balance, solemnly sucking on one hand.

Phoenix could feel their heartbeat against his ribs, small, but steady.

They’re so little. The little grimwalker fit so easily against him. He could probably dangle them off one arm with no effort. And they were so delicate; he could break them in half if he wanted to. Not that he ever would.

But what if someone did want to hurt them someday? They were so small and squishy; it wouldn’t be hard. Phoenix held the little grimwalker closer at the thought.

I’ll protect them. I’ll keep them safe.

A niggling worm of doubt whispered that he hadn’t managed it for Darius, or King, or Jason, or Hunter; what made him think that this time would be different?

I have to try.

I can do it this time

I can protect them.

The things that happened to us—I won’t let it happen to them.

“See?” Cherry said briskly, “They want you. Come on.”

The little grimwalker stared at everything around them with big, curious eyes, occasionally bracing their feet against Phoenix and pushing, their weight pulling Phoenix sideways towards whatever it was that had caught their interest. This mostly consisted of doors, but they did shriek in delight at the sight of a window and a bird that sat outside of it, kicking their legs and grabbing for it.

The low hum of conversation drifted out of the dining room, accompanied by the smell of cooked griffin eggs, and Phoenix’s stomach growled again. The toddler giggled and gurgled, imitating the sound.

The moment Phoenix walked into the dining room, conversation came to a screeching halt. Phoenix almost backed out, but his stomach growled again, and he pressed onwards, magenta eyes tracking every movement.

A squeal of excitement broke the heavy silence, and Clara shoved her chair back, dashing up to Phoenix. “They’re so cute! Can I hold them, can I hold them please?”

Muted conversation resumed. Phoenix slowly crouched down. “Are you sure?”

“I won’t drop them. I promise.”

Ram shuffled up next to Clara, giggling and whispering in her ear. She batted at her sibling lightly. “Be nice! They tried!”

She took the little grimwalker out of Phoenix’s arm, making a cheeks-puffed-out face at them and blowing a raspberry. The baby laughed, and Clara quickly buckled the overalls over their shoulders while they were distracted. “There you go, little guy.”

The baby held their arms out. “Nee-Nee.”

“Awwww, they know your name, Phoenix.”

How on the isles had she come to that conclusion? “What?”

“Nee-nee. PhoeNIx. They’re saying your name.” Clara blew another raspberry at them. “You’re learning words? Huh? Are you? Can you walk?”

“Walk?!” Cherry spluttered.

“Yeah, they’re big enough. I can teach them; I helped Ram learn to walk.” Clara cooed, bouncing the baby up and down. “Yeah! Let’s go practice walking. You want to practice walking?”

She wandered off with the baby, Ram at her side. Phoenix slowly stood up. “I’m… sure that’s fine?”

Cherry chuckled humorlessly. “She seems to know more about what she’s doing than we do.” He nodded to the table. “Breakfast?”

Phoenix slowly edged his way towards the table, taking a plate from the end. Eggs were still on the menu, and he spotted fruits and vegetables from the garden.

Phoenix’s stomach growled again, and he grabbed a plate, leaning over Venari to scoop eggs onto his plate.

“No,” Evelyn was telling Venari in an exasperated voice, “You, Meleager, Horus, and Hamlet may not go out on patrol on the west route until we’ve found the scouts. I know how you four get.”

The scouts. Maybe they’d tried to trap, kill, and eat him, but still, Phoenix’s stomach churned at the idea they might have been seriously injured. “You haven’t found them?”

“Probably means they scurried off,” Venari piped up, “Or the Collector found them. If you’d killed ‘em, there would have been a very easy-to-spot body. Unless you ate them, I guess. Belos never ate people, I’m betting you don’t eat people, right?”

“Venari,” Evelyn hissed.

“What?”

“I don’t. Eat people,” Phoenix replied slowly, “Can I please eat those eggs, though?”

Evelyn wordlessly passed him the bowl.

She wouldn’t look at him.

Phoenix scooped a small spoonful of eggs onto his plate, but before he could put the bowl back, Cherry took the spoon from him and added more. “You need to eat,” he insisted.

Phoenix flushed. He hadn’t missed the lack of toast on the table, and the absence of the butter that usually went with it. With the town’s people gone, they’d have to rely entirely on what they grew here, or whatever prey was left after the Collector’s sweep. And with extra mouths in the house, those resources wouldn’t go as far as they usually did. “I’m fine.”

His stomach unhelpfully chose that moment to rumble again.

Cherry added another scoop. “You’re not being a hero by not eating. The food’s already made. Eat it.”

A plate clattered to the floor behind Phoenix, making him flinch. His arms shuddered, rippling into green mud and back to flesh. He clutched his arms closer to himself, badly attempting to hide them under his plate.

Right. I guess it was too much to hope for that this would disappear with one good night’s sleep.

He slowly turned around. Ash scrambled for their dropped plate, eying him warily and squeaking when they noticed Phoenix looking. They scooted out of the dining room and into the safety of the kitchen, abandoning the plate.

“Ash,” Evelyn sighed.

Phoenix gestured after them. “I should… talk to them?” It didn’t sound appealing, but he’d have to figure out how to live with them eventually. They couldn’t just avoid each other forever.

“No.” Evelyn pushed her chair back. “I’ll go. You’ll just make them worse.” She stopped next to Phoenix for just a moment, still not looking at him. “It’s not your fault.”

The words seemed to ring hollow, and Phoenix couldn’t help remembering how hesitant she’d been to approach him last night, even to take Caleb. But Evelyn disappeared before he could quite process the thought.

“I need to control this.”

The words left Phoenix’s mouth almost of their own volition.

Cherry dumped a dragonfruit on his plate, already cored and no longer spewing fire. “Hm?”

“This.” Phoenix nodded to his arms. “I can’t—I’m scaring people.”

“You’re not scaring me.”

“I don’t want reassurances, Cherry. I want…” Phoenix shook his head helplessly. “I can’t help anyone like this. I don’t know anything about the curse, except what I saw from Belos, and that’s not exactly a great example to follow!”

“Yelling,” Cherry said quietly.

Phoenix glanced at the table. All of the grimwalkers immediately looked at their plates and away from him. “I just… need to get a handle on it. At the least, I want to keep myself from melting every time I get overwhelmed or mildly startled.”

“Okay. I hear you. Loud and clear. And I’m warning you in advance, you are not going to like what I have to say next.”

“Which is…?”

“Eat breakfast. Take a second to get something in your stomach so that you’re not running on empty.”

Right. Phoenix probably could have predicted that would be his advice. And, to be honest, the smell of food right now made him want to scarf down the eggs on his plate like a feral animal. Eating was definitely on his to-do list. “And then what?”

“How do you feel about a thousand needling questions and possibly actual real needles?”

xxx

Phoenix rapped on the door to Sam’s lab. Much as he hated to admit it, the problem of his new condition did seem much smaller now that he’d eaten. Still not manageable, but not as bad. He still had no idea what to do about Ash, though. And he wasn’t looking forward to Petro making snide comments while he struggled to control this.

But when Sam opened the door, Petro was nowhere to be seen. “I cleared him out of the lab so that he wouldn’t make things difficult,” Sam explained at his questioning look, “He’s being guarded by Lake and Locke right now. A cruel and unusual torture outlawed by the Latissa Convention, I know, but a necessary evil.”

“Did Cherry tell you I was coming?”

Sam snorted. “No. But, I mean, come on, really, who else were you going to go to? Come on, let’s get this thing figured out.”

He held the door open and Phoenix edged into the lab. Evelyn’s remaining explosive potions now sat on one of Sam’s tables, accompanied by Belos’ journal. A quick flip of the front pages showed that none had been ripped out.

I guess he decided it didn’t matter after all

Or he just thought there was no point.

Sam swept the bottles to the side. “I was playing with potion dosages,” he explained, “One drop can put a pretty good crater in stone. By the way. In case you were interested. She wasn’t playing around when she made these. Anyway. Let’s see it.”

“See what?”

Sam gestured impatiently at his arms. “The curse. Let’s see it. Come on, goop time. I’m assuming that’s why you’re here, right? Are you willing to do whatever it takes to figure it out?”

“Yes.” Phoenix hadn’t ever been more sure of anything in his life. He needed answers.

“Okay. Then show me.”

Phoenix held his arms closer to himself. “I can’t just turn it on whenever I want! That’s the problem, it just happens randomly!”

“Wrong.”

“What?”

“It doesn’t happen randomly. Curses aren’t random, they have very specific triggers.”

Phoenix looked away. “Fine, yes, it doesn’t happen ‘randomly.’ But the point is, I can’t control it. I can’t make it happen, and I can’t make it stop. I’m just… stuck whenever it happens.”

Sam tapped a pen against his chin. “Hm. Okay. No direct tests for now. Tell me more about it.”

Phoenix watched the back-and-forth movement of the pen. “Are you… recording what I say?”

“How else am I supposed to analyze and review your answers? Don’t even worry about it, just talk, ignore the writing. When did the symptoms start? What are the symptoms?”

“Yester…” Phoenix trailed off, thinking. When had it first started? He hadn’t ever checked under the bandages when he’d been with the Collector. But there had been some nightmares… “What counts as a symptom?”

“Well, the… oozing… is definitely a symptom, but I’m guessing you know a few more. Ones that you didn’t share with the class earlier.”

Phoenix winced at the reminder. Maybe they really could have caught this earlier. But would they have found the baby grimwalker if he had told them?

You’ll think yourself into circles. Just answer the question.

“I think it started with weird dreams. Nightmares.”

“Liiiiiiiike?”

“Um.” Phoenix scratched absently where the infected wounds had been only yesterday. “I started seeing—just remembering his attacks. But from his point of view.”

“Uh-huh.”

“And it was things I knew,” Phoenix continued, “It was things I was there for, experiences I had but flipped around, and then…”

Sam paused writing, peering at him over the journal. “I’m not a mindreader. I need you to tell me what happened.”

“I saw memories of other golden guards. Things only Belos would have seen.”

“Mmm. Makes sense.”

The calm, easy statement hit Phoenix right in the gut, and he completely forgot what he’d been about to say next. “It does?”

Sam rolled a hand. “Magic holds memories; each individual has their own unique magical signature. Perceptive enough people can tell who cast a spell just by looking at the aftereffects of the magic.”

“Really?”

“Oh, sure. And similarly, curses will hold parts of their past bearers. Records of hereditary curses often come with reports of residual memories, occasional strange bursts of emotion—why do you look like you’re going to be sick?”

Often? All of the memories, the strange feelings… “That’s—it’s normal?”

“Yeah?” Sam hissed in. “You didn’t know. Oh, boy, no wonder you freaked out.”

Sam was right; Phoenix felt sick to his stomach. “That’s normal?! It’s supposed to happen?!”

“Ehhhhh ‘supposed’ is a really odd term for it. Considering. Cursed. And all of that. But yes, it’s extremely common. That is, among curses that are passed from person to person.”

Phoenix wrung his hands, trying unsuccessfully to shake off that deep feeling that he’d irreversibly screwed up. “But Caleb said—we didn’t know why it was happening!”

“Caleb arrived in the isles long before the more extensive research into curses was conducted. And all his experience with a cursed individual comes from someone who was the original bearer of the curse. Of course he didn’t know.” Sam shook his head. “Even I don’t know everything about curses. Each one is different for each person, so they’re hard to pin down. But I looked into it enough. Almost every grimwalker here did. You didn’t?”

Phoenix shook his head. “Belos always shut down any questions, so I left it alone. It didn’t take a lot to set him off.”

“Mmm. Remind me to give you some pointers on general sneakery. Point is, I can’t tell you everything. I don’t know curse trajectory, I can’t tell you how or if this will spread, what the timeline is, etc. But we can get some answers. Mostly about what we’re dealing with and how it’s going to affect you in the present. Right now, seems like a standard infectious curse. Carries some memories, some emotions, similar end result to the last person who had it. And it’s triggered byyyyyy?”

“I don’t know what happened yesterday. It was slowly building up in my arms, spreading under my skin, and then it just sort of… took over.” Phoenix thought about how his arms had briefly relapsed at breakfast. “And it showed up again when I was startled.”

“Ah, okay, okay, startled, that makes s—BOO!” Sam lunged at Phoenix, throwing his arms up to make himself bigger. Phoenix instinctively flinched backwards, but his arms didn’t shift or even liquify a little.

“Huh. Worth a shot.” Sam jotted down a note. “Anything else?”

“It sort of… burns? Like it’s eating at the skin that isn’t already taken over. It’s exhausting when it happens, but I don’t know if that was from the curse, or from everything else that was going on. And… it got worse when I was worried. When I was trapped, and when I thought Caleb was going to get eaten, I couldn’t control it at all.”

“Emotion based. Got it. And you’re sure you can’t activate it on command?”

“Positive.”

“Any emotions, or just the more distressing ones?”

“Distressing ones.” Well. As far as he knew. Phoenix hadn’t exactly had enough exhilarating joy to know if that would trigger a change.

“Ehhhh okay. It would really be best if I could see it in action, but… I’ll be right back. Don’t go anywhere.”

Sam slipped out, leaving Phoenix on his own. He gingerly picked up one of the explosive potions, turning it over in his hands.

I wonder what Evelyn did with that mask she picked up.

“Planning on burning the house down with that?”

Phoenix jumped, the potion bottle slipping through his fingers. He fumbled, snatching for the bottle and returning it to its place on the table.

Dagger watched him. “Wow,” he said flatly, “That was hard to watch.”

Phoenix shifted to stand in front of the bottles, hiding the embarrassment from view. “Do you need something?”

Dagger shrugged, fluidly moving around him. “Just wanted to know if it was true.”

“What?”

“That you’re turning into Belos.”

“What?! No, I’m—” Phoenix took a deep breath. “I’m not turning into Belos. It’s just… his curse.”

“His curse? Oh, wait, you mean the thing that made him lash out and hurt us? The one that turned him into a raging monster? That curse? Not super comforting.”

“It’s not—I’m not—” Phoenix shrugged helplessly, “It’s not going to be like that. I’m not going to be like that.”

“Are you sure? Because Ash isn’t. They’ve got a special personal connection to that curse, and here you are flaunting it around. I thought they were going to puke all over the kitchen floor last night. And this morning. Seriously, they are terrified of you.”

“I’m not flaunting it,” Phoenix protested, “It’s—I can’t control—I know he said that, too, but I swear, I’m not going to hurt anyone if I can help it, I swear—”

“Yeah? Whatcha gonna do with those, then?”

Phoenix’s gaze slowly, slowly traveled down to his arms. His fingertips had turned to claws, and mud swirled lazily around his wrists and forearms. The mud wasn’t burning yet, so he hadn’t even noticed the change. He shoved his hands in his pockets. “Nothing.”

“Aaaaaaand that’s enough.”

Sam stalked back into the lab, scooping up a jar, tweezers, and a swab. “Thanks, Dagger. You can get out, now.”

Dagger shrugged. “Have fun with… whatever it is you’re trying to do. That stuff is going to kill you, by the way.”

“Okay, thank you Dagger. Bye. Get out now.”

Dagger shrugged again and left. Phoenix gestured weakly after him. “What—he was—”

“Deliberately triggering the curse. No one can put someone in emotional distress like Dagger. Well, maybe Petro can, but he’s annoying and he probably wouldn’t do it on command. Sorry about that, but—” Sam scraped some of the mud off of Phoenix’s arm and into the jar. “—Like I said, it’s best if I see the curse in action. Get some samples.”

Phoenix gaped. “Are you serious?!”

“I was right outside. I would have stopped him if I thought he was going too far.”

“What if it lashed out on its own again?!” Phoenix sputtered, “Dagger could have gotten seriously injured! Also, hey! I’m not a test dummy!”

Sam sighed, closing the jar and setting it aside. The mud inside drifted around, squelching across the jar like a worm. “Phoenix. I’m sorry. I would have told you what I was up to, but then it probably wouldn’t have worked. I promise wouldn’t have gone that far if I thought I could gather data another way. But you said you were willing to do anything when I asked, and if that conversation was any indication, the biggest stressor that’s triggering your curse is the idea that you’ll turn into a monster. Finding out more about the curse is how we’ll stop that from happening, which will also eliminate the stressor, making attacks less likely. Information is our best chance against whatever is going on with you. This is how we get that information.” He tilted his head. “Can you… turn them back? Do you know how?”

“I just woke up with them normal. Short of going to sleep…” Phoenix shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“Huh. Oh, there they go! Because you’re calming down?”

Phoenix held his hands up, examining his skin. Still scarred—but now a red gash marred his arm right where Sam had taken the mud from, dripping blood down his arm. “…Do you have a bandage?”

Sam seized his arm. “What. What. What.”

“What?” Phoenix echoed, “What’s the matter?”

“Why is your arm bleeding?!”

Phoenix tugged his arm out of Sam’s grasp. “Probably because there’s a chunk of it in your jar.”

Sam grabbed his shoulders, shaking him. “Belos didn’t do this!”

“What?” Phoenix tried to think back on any time Belos had gotten hurt, trying to think of ever seeing blood—but he’d foiled most assassination attempts, and his own run at killing Belos had been disappointingly unsuccessful.

“Belos didn’t do this!” Sam repeated, “He didn’t bleed after getting cut, it was just goop all the way down!” He examined the jar, still containing the mud. “You’ve got—okay, look, Belos is a goop sack in a humanoid form. It’s a disguise, it’s pretend. He’s got some human bones in there, I think, maybe, but he doesn’t bleed. You’re not goop in grimwalker form, this is—you’re actually transforming between mud and flesh!”

“…Thanks?”

“I think!” Sam amended, “I don’t. Actually. Know. For sure yet. Wait.” He shook the jar slightly. “Do you need this to fix your arm?”

“I don’t know. Do you need me, or can I go find something to cover this up before I get another curse infection and we have to wait and see which one wins?”

“Better idea! Third option! Let’s go find Mom!”

Phoenix balked, remembering how Evelyn wouldn’t look at him at breakfast. “I don’t know if that’s such a good id—”

“Go! I am not waiting for this to heal naturally to find out if you need the mud to heal!”

“We can’t do that. Evelyn has to keep the shield up, she can’t be wasting her energy healing a tiny cut.”

“Figuring this thing out. Need more information. Preventing further curse damage, making everyone’s lives better. Let’s go.” Sam pushed Phoenix out of the room. “It’ll be fine.”

“I don’t know about ‘fine’,” Phoenix mumbled.

“It. Will. Be. Fine. I’ll make sure of it.” Sam pushed Phoenix all the way to the temporary first aid station. “Mom. Mom. Mom. Mother. Mumsy. Mom.”

Evelyn set down a potion, this one a soothing blue, rather than the bright gold of her explosion potions. “Sam. Samuel. Samantha. Samara. Sammy. Sam. What.”

“Heyyyyyyyyy, how are you feeling? Good? Great? Well-rested? Up for a healing spell?”

“Nee-Nee!”

Before Evelyn could respond, the new baby grimwalker lurched into Phoenix’s knee, gripping his leg for balance. They babbled incoherently, occasionally punctuated with a delighted “lara” that Phoenix assumed referred to Clara. Phoenix reached down to pick them up.

“Wow. She really did teach you how to walk, huh?”

Evelyn twitched uneasily, her hands flexing like she wanted to grab the grimwalker, but she didn’t protest when Phoenix lifted them up. “Clara was very helpful,” she said shortly, “Sam, what did you need? A healing spell? What happened?” She eyed Phoenix a little too closely for comfort. “Who’s hurt?”

Sam held up Phoenix’s arm. “I know it’s not a big scratch! Hear me out!”

“Sam.”

“I know, I know, I know, but I’m testing regenerative aspects of the curse!”

“You didn’t scrape up your brother’s arm just to test if he could regenerate, did you?”

“Not intentionally. This was sort of a side effect. But Mom, this is important! Can we try?”

Evelyn shook her head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Sam. Last time I tried to poke at Phoenix’s arms with magic, that… thing… ate my spell and drained my energy. I’m not eager for a repeat.” She swirled her potion around. “We can try this, though.”

Sam made grabbing hands at the bottle. “What is it?”

“Experimental potion,” Evelyn told him casually, “In theory, it mends minor wounds. I was thinking for Caleb… but we can try it out.”

Phoenix eyed the bottle, pushing down a pang of guilt at the reminder about Caleb. He needed to check on the ortet. Thank him for coming after him. And apologize for getting him hurt. “Experimental?”

“It won’t hurt you, Phoenix. Nothing in it is dangerous. Besides, even if it did blow your arm off, you could just…” Evelyn made a slurping noise and mimed molding something together. “Right?”

“I don’t know!”

“Relax. Like I said, it’s not dangerous, I just don’t know if it works.” Evelyn held up the bottle. “Trade you.”

Phoenix begrudgingly shifted the little grimwalker’s weight to Evelyn’s arms. The toddler gripped his shirt for a moment, but let go and nestled against Evelyn, watching him solemnly. Phoenix took the potion. “Do I drink it?”

“Pour it on the wound. Uh, it might feel… weird.”

The droplets were already splattering against his skin as she added the last statement, and Phoenix’s hand wobbled. “What?!”

“It’s fine, it’s just skin regrowing very quickly.”

Phoenix’s arm itched and crawled, like a thousand bugs were clambering around underneath the surface, stitching his skin back together. And it did stitch back together, new skin forming at lightning speed and staunching the bleeding. All that was left behind was a small reddish mark, one Phoenix recognized from countless nicks and scratches as a temporary scar that would disappear within a week.

“Yessssssssss,” Sam crowed, “Is that part of your cursed mud still around, or is it dead? Could you reabsorb it? Would it turn into a weird extra blob of flesh on your arm?”

Evelyn winced, taking the potion back. “Sam… please be careful. We’re trying to keep the curse from getting worse, not make it even bigger. Was that all?”

“What happened to the mask you took from the pit?” Phoenix blurted out.

Evelyn blinked, obviously taken aback by the question. “I suppose it’s still in my bag. Why?”

“I was just… wondering… if I could have it?”

Evelyn’s eyes narrowed. “Why?”

“I…” Phoenix struggled to find the right words. He had a vague idea of what he planned to do with it, but would Evelyn agree?

No more lying.

“I think… I know someone who might like to have it? Someone who isn’t me,” he clarified, “And… I don’t know, did you need it for something?”

Evelyn chewed her lip. “I suppose not,” she admitted, “I don’t know why I kept it, really.”

“Because you’re a magpie attracted to shiny objects,” Sam stated matter-of-factly.

Evelyn swatted at him without looking. “I suppose you can have it,” she said slowly, retrieving the mask, “Don’t let the baby have it. I don’t want them exposed to all of… that… just yet.”

“They’re not old enough to understand what it is.”

“Hm. Still. Make sure… whoever you plan on giving it to… knows.”

She definitely thinks I want to keep it.

What she thought Phoenix might want with it, he didn’t really want to know. He took the mask and followed Sam back to the lab without another word.

The mud in the jar was still… Phoenix didn’t know if ‘alive’ was really the best term for it, but the stuff was still moving around. He rubbed his arm where the healed gash had been.

“That’s… weird, right?”

Sam examined the mud. “I don’t know. Do you think you can still control it?”

“Sam, I can’t control it regularly.”

“Fair enough. Hm.” Sam rotated the jar. “It’s moving independent of you. But it usually responds to you, doesn’t it? What if…” Sam trailed off, moving the jar to the left of Phoenix.

The mud shifted its position to plaster the jar wall facing Phoenix.

“Ah.”

Sam moved the jar in front of Phoenix. It moved towards him again. And did the same when Sam moved it to the right, above his head, and behind him.

“Okay. So it knows it wants to go back to you. I guess because it’s technically a part of you. But… it’s not really, is it? You can generate the mud infinitely, as far as we can tell. Belos’ mass was finite, he had to break open more palisman when he started losing bits of himself, but…”

Phoenix shifted back and forth on his feet. “Sam?”

“Yeah?”

“Is there a quick way we can fix this?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean… I know you want to study the curse. You want to look for long term solutions, and I do, too, but… I need something now. You wanted to do thousands of flower tests to even THINK about reversing petrification.”

“I wish you’d let me,” Sam grumbled, “Would have saved us a lot of trouble.”

“Okay. Yes. But the point is, right now, I don’t need to know everything about the curse. Maybe when we have time. But for now, I just want to keep my arms from melting off. I just want to have some kind of warning. I just need something to keep it under control for now so that I can function well enough that we’re not in imminent danger. So that I can take care of people here, and… maybe some people I left behind.”

Sam’s eyes darted over him in quick, analytic movements. “A rescue mission? For who, your puppeted mentee?”

“Maybe? I don’t know what I’m doing yet.”

“That should be your motto.”

“Sam. Please. A quick solution. Something to just… keep me together until we can get the information we need to come up with a more long term plan.

Sam nodded up and down.

“…Okay?” Phoenix said slowly, “Do you have something?”

“Hm. Ah. No.” Sam bobbed his head up and down a couple more times. “I don’t have an easy fix for you. It’s going to take time. But! I do understand what you mean.”

“And?” Phoenix ventured.

“Hrm. Yes. Right. I can’t help you.”

Phoenix sighed. He supposed that was asking too much. Belos hadn’t been able to come up with a more effective fix than inhaling palisman over centuries; what was Sam going to find in a day? “So I just have to wait?”

“Eh. I didn’t say that. I can’t help you.” Sam heaved a long-suffering half-sigh, half-groan, setting the jar down. “But I think I know who can.”