Sheena strolled quietly through the bustling halls, hoping that she could at least find somewhere to think; somewhere other than that musty waiting room. Not that there was anything wrong with it, but for that first hour she had found herself feeling helpless, knowing that her sister was on the other side of the door in the hands of someone else.

“Sheena,” Kayla called out, trotting over to her. “Are you well?”

“Thinking,” Sheena sighed. They stood in front of a glass window overlooking the Vice, a section of the Klocby Palace grounds marked by maroon roofs. The neighboring section, known simply as the Market Square was visible through the window and Sheena observed the deep purple thatched roofs and steeples. If the window had perhaps been a bit lower, she might have seen a myriad of people walking the streets, but as it was, a thick jungle of rooftops set against a gray horizon were the only sights to greet her. “You followed me.”

“Yes, I did,” Kayla said in her no-nonsense tone. “I worry for you.”

“You oughtn’t,” Sheena suggested. “the one to worry about is in there, on the table.”

“I disagree,” Kayla turned toward the window, overlooking the Vice with her.
I would venture to say that worries can be equally placed.”

“This…” Sheena said, a look of concern and confusion melding her features. “Is so…”

“I would say your concerns are warranted, as are mine. It has been six weeks since we came to know Lyra, who was before known as Micah Lavoric, son of a ruthless dictator who keeps his own people in bondage. You are wondering how in such a short time you came to call her sister, and whether or not it was the right decision to make. How close am I?”

“Very,” Sheen turned from the window and began to walk down the hall in the direction of the Triangle. Kayla fell in step beside her.

“It is…ludicrous,” Sheena said. “To put it lightly, I might add. How could I love someone like that? Am I doing the right thing? Could I be touched in the head? Who can even tell me?”

“I don’t think so, no,” Kayla said reassuringly. “I have seen great changes in Lyra, I am confident that she is who she says she is.”

“And yet…it seems impossible,” The argument Sheena made wasn’t meant to dissuade, but she found that sometimes throwing words off into space helped her sort out the problem in her head. “A person is a person, the way they think doesn’t change. They can adjust their behaviors, but then…it’s just an act. With Lyra it doesn’t seem to be an act, does it?”

“No, it doesn’t,” Kayla agreed. “I would be the last person to lie to you.”

“But what does it mean? How can it be that Lyra is different from Micah? Balthasar and the High Lady are keeping things from us!”

“As they do,” Kayla said as they rounded a corner and emerged into the triangle, a connector that led to thee different passages, one of which would take her in the direction of the Octagon. “You know, and know well, that some things are above our station for a reason.”

“But things regarding my sister?” Sheena demanded. “I must find out! What does it mean? Has she suffered a type of mental break? Is she truly just a different person? How could it even happen?”

“I think perhaps you ought let it go,” Kayla suggested. “You have your sister, you know she is not the same as Micah Lavoric. What more would you ask for? Return to the hospital wing with me, wait with us for news of Lyra. Love your sister as she loves you.”

“Leave me be for a while,” Sheena instructed her. “I will return shortly.”

As Kayla left, Sheena walked faster, and faster, her skirts dragging the floor as she recalled the conversation that had played out days before.

“You’re not Micah Lavoric,” She had said. “Who are you?”

Who are you?

Who are you?

Her intense desire to believe was at odds with her father’s stern logic; always the realist.

But what would mother say?She wondered.

“I’m Lyra,”Was what Lyra had said. So matter of factly, so confident.

The Octagon left her feeling disoriented; she moved to the pillar in the center, leaning against the brass and laying her head back.

“What am I going to do?” She said to no one.

“About what?” Keniel asked, causing her to jump nearly out of her skin, but as luck would have it, she jumped a mere foot.

“Keniel!” She hissed. “You cannot sneak up on people like that!”

“Woman I was just walking through the Octagon,” He rolled his eyes. “Was you that wasn’t paying attention, if I might be so bold to say.”

“It’s nothing,” Sheena straightened herself and sorted out the wrinkles in her bodice. “I should go.”

“To wait for Lyra?” He asked; she spun to meet his gaze.

“You know, then?”

“About her procedure, yes, and are you worried that she is still Micah Lavoric to some extent?”

“Is it that obvious?”

“Woman,” He rolled his eyes. “In this situation if it were not painted all over your face then I would suggest you’d be a prime candidate for an insane asylum. Such as it is, though, your concerns are warranted.”

“What have you observed?”

“That she is either a very good actress, or brain damaged.”

“You are so very funny, Keniel,” Sheena rolled her eyes.

“Would, that I were joking,” He said. “But alas, I speak in all seriousness. Whatever it is you are dealing with, it is not Micah Lavoric. Miss. Rossi, would you accompany me to the scribery?”

“That would be a touch scandalous, would it not?”

“Quite,” He said. “Come with me anyway.”

The inside of the scribery made Sheena twitch; the entire place was a stye. She stood there, staring at the piles of paper, the stacked notebooks, the disordered desks, and wondered how in Fadraiye Lyra could stand to spend so much time in here especially being in service. Even worse was the roaring hum of the machines creaking and grinding as they sputtered out stacks of paper covered in printed green letters. Did she not experience a constant urge to clean it? As it was, Keniel and the other scribes never allowed service personnel into their private domains, supposedly they were afraid of a vital document or page being misplaced. What would be the problem there? He had so many documents just lying about loose, surely he didn’t care that much about them!

“Your disgust is rather tangible,” He watched her as she eyed the contents of the room. “I assure you, this space is organized in a way that I can find what I need. Your skills are not required.”

“A good dusting wouldn’t hurt though, would it?”

“I suppose not,” He admitted. “I’ll add it to the list of other mundane tasks I need to complete before I get to the real work.”

“I did not mean to presume-”

“No,” He interjected. “You meant to commit to an abominable deep clean of my facilities all while your sister lies under the surgeon’s knife, now tell me, what is it that truly worries you?”

“She’s…said things. Phrases and words I don’t know,” Sheena admitted, her eyes still surveying the mess. “When she was in the hospital she said she ‘flipped her shit’. What is shit, and how does one flip it?”

Keniel shifted his weight, one hand on a stack of papers as he eyed her curiously as if trying to judge her level of sincerity. He opened his mouth to speak once, then closed it again.

“Miss Rossi,” he said finally. “How old are you?”

“Three and twenty, why?”

“I cannot fathom how you made it to the age of twenty-three without hearing the word ‘shit’, but as for flipping it, I have no notion. Do you recall the note you gave me? The one that Lyra wrote?”

“Of course,” Sheena nodded. “The one she wrote after her…uh…outburst.”

“That would be the one,” Keniel nodded. “As it happens, I had her write a bit more, and from her writings I could determine that what she had was a true written language. Now Miss Rossi, I am well versed in eighteen different tongues, as a royal scribe should be, and I can tell you that while her words form a complex language, it is nothing that is spoken on the content of Fadraiye, nor any of the kingdoms to the east. What I am trying to say is that either she invented her own language, which is unlikely given her mental capacity, or she is from somewhere that we are unfamiliar with.”

“That flies in the face of logic, does it not?” Sheena argued, though her argument did not hold much conviction. “We know she is Micah Laveric, at least in the physical. We know that she would have been raised in Slose, capital of Axock. These things are a surety!”

“Miss Rossi, there are strange things afoot here but there are two things that are for sure. The first is that your sister does not mean any harm. The second is that whatever answers you seek to find, you will not find them here. Now, as for the letter, I did the best I could to translate it to the common script, however as I made progress it was clear to me that she was not simply writing in code, this is an actual language, the way she writes is far different from anything we speak here or on the continent of Fadraiye. The idioms are different, the sentence structure is foreign. I translated it verbatim.”

He pulled a sheet from the table and crossed the room to hand it to her. Sheena met his gaze and stood for a moment before finally reaching out to take it. She inhaled deeply, almost wanting to resist the urge to read the note. What could it possibly say? Finally, she sunk down into one of the wooden office chairs and held the parchment out in front of her.

“Hi Sheena,

So this whole thing is a little weird isn’t it? I mean, when I lived with my father back in Slose I never imagined something like this could happen. You and me as sisters? You’re not like my other sister at all. You’re so nice, and you’re helping me a lot. It’s kind of sad that there are things I can say in a letter that I can’t say to your face, I guess that kind of makes me a coward, doesn’t it? I don’t really remember what happened in the Stormveil but I know I came out different; I came out wanting to be a better person than I was when I went in. I don’t want to be that person anymore Sheena and you’ve helped me so much even when I didn’t deserve it. What I did in the dorm was wrong and I embarrassed you. I made you look like an idiot in front of your parents just because I couldn’t control myself. It might not seem like a big deal to you - well, actually, it probably isn’t a big deal to you because you just let all kinds of stuff roll off of you, but I think that you gave me a chance to be a better person, to be the sister you knew I could be, and I failed. Do you know why I failed? Because it’s what I do, Sheena. When good things happen to me I find a way to ruin them because it’s just who I am. You’re a completely different person than me, Sheena. You’re smart, kind, caring, even happy. What is it like to be happy? No matter, I guess. I want to be your little sister, I love how much you care for me and I don’t want any of it to end but I guess part of being a better person, like I want to be, is knowing when to accept the consequences of my actions. I messed up. I made you look bad. I think you should go talk to the High Lady, and I think we should send me back to Axock. I don’t belong with someone like you. I don’t belong with anyone. I shouldn’t be around anyone. I wish things could have been better. I wish I could have been better. I wish, Sheena, that I could have been the person that you think I am. I love you, big sister. Thanks for trying.

Love,

Lyra

“It is…very difficult to read,” Keniel admitted as Sheena looked up from the letter and leaned back in the chair. She gave it another cursory glance and then let out a long exhale, setting the paper on her lap. “I hope it was readable.”

“It was,” Sheena said softly, closing her eyes and then opening them again. “Keniel I’m afraid I must take my leave. I need to be there when my sister awakens.”