Euffie rocked gently back and forth in the space they'd given her. It was a small tent. Too small. Too close. The animal hair and skin all around her felt like it was pressing inward, holding her down. Jadpers’ tent was isolated from other tents - nobody wanted to pitch right next to the Prisnidine - but that made little difference within this tent’s confines.

  She pressed her hands to her forehead, trying to make it stop. She pushed her legs together, so tight they were bruising each other at the knees. It was the only way to feel safe, and it wasn't working, especially not after the saddle’s inevitable beating on her thighs.

  They’d been riding all day. Jadpers set up her tent, which she was going to share with Euffie, and left her by herself while Jadpers visited with the other Steppe Hounds. Euffie had done a relatively good job keeping it together in front of them, especially with how little Jadpers tried to talk to her, but the noise inside had to be let out. She couldn’t even rock properly; just sway back and forth on her rump with her knee stubs in front of her.

  Oppzis tried to break through the noise. Euffie pushed him away. He was inside her head, and that place was crowded enough already, even if he was pleasant. They had already talked about what they’d say to Kaanel, and what the plan was going forward with her engram. Oppzis would focus on uncovering everything she knew about Adalaant and Ecliptica, at the cost of her memories of Aleb and Barrid’s geography. She would remember everything that had happened since escaping Derek, but everything else was fair game if Oppzis needed to free up space.

  Derek was still after her. He was on the other side of the world, but Derek would still be coming. He followed her to Aleb. He would follow her to the Everwhite Seas if she made him. He might not be alive; she remembered that blood, but if there was a chance he was still alive, he was alive until proven dead as far as she was concerned.

  I’m not making him do anything, she snapped at herself. Shut the fuck up. This is not my fault. I don’t deserve any of this, and if I hear myself say that one more time, I swear I’ll erase everything inside this stupid fucking tattoo. Mists, who raised me?

  One of the worst aspects of the dread voice was that it served as a reminder that she was on a timer. If Euffie didn’t find a scriptomancer who could get the engram off one way or another, it would eventually warp and twist and send her into a coma. She’d die before she woke up.

  Derek again rushed to the forefront of her thoughts. It was like that story of a man running from an indestructible, poisonous snail. How was Euffie supposed to sleep? How was she supposed to think? He was far away now, but every moment she wasn’t moving was a moment he got closer.

  Euffie tried to get out of her head, out of her body. She focused on her clothes. Jadpers had helped her into them. She wore a Steppe Hound uniform, like the rest of Heemlik's subordinates. Orange paints, dark purple dyes. Jadpers said it looked good on her. Euffie had to agree; she looked a lot better than she did in that beat-up slave dress Derek had sewn.

  Then again, Jadpers seems to think everything looks good on me.

  Euffie wasn’t sure how to feel about Jadpers. She seemed like a nice lady, but her interest had not gone unnoticed. Euffie was used to being looked at that way.

  Except, no I’m not. That’s not how Derek looked at me at all. Not night and day difference, more like ... dusk versus dawn. One means light ahead, one means dark.

  Euffie put a hand up her shirt, on the engram above her navel. The contraceptive engram. Her breathing slowed; touching that engram was supposed to relax the wearer, unlike the engram on her cheek. She hated it just as much as the one on her cheek, but at least it had uses.

  Just slow down, she told herself. Slow down. He isn't here. He's far away. He may be coming, but he's not here yet. Now is your chance to think. They gave you your own space to think. Just … think. Breathe deep.

  She did so, several times. She dwelled on that beautiful bird Heemlik had. Sun-Beak. Euffie had plenty of experience with chickens; they were small, stupid, but loveable creatures. They were a bright spot in many of her days under Derek. Sun-Beak was none of those things. Sun-Beak was a large specimen indeed, with eyes that looked right at home with the needle-sharp rapier on his master’s hip. His tail looked like he’d dipped it in someone’s blood, only it wasn’t dripping and it hadn’t gone brown yet. When a chicken fixed Euffie with its gaze, she felt feared. When Sun-Beak fixed her with his gaze, she felt ... respected. Like one hard worker to another.

  Euffie liked that bird. She highly doubted her chances at getting to hold it on her wrist like Heemlik did; the creature was likely one of his most prized possessions and closest friends. But she could dream.

  Euffie sensed an invitation from Oppzis, like an object gradually uncovered from the sand on a beach. She took her hand off the engram, and crawled toward the tent entrance. Oppzis told her she didn't need to go outside, and to sit down and relax.

  What are you inviting me to? she asked.

  Oppzis explained that he was about to teach her a new spell.

  Now? Really?

  Oppzis asked her to trust him; now was a great time for this.

  Okay ...

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  Euffie followed along carefully with his instructions. Moon instructions were very hard to misunderstand. She raised both hands, and brought forth a small amount of silvery magic. She breathed deep, exhaled, and then pulled them apart.

  In front of Euffie, between her and the wall of the tent, appeared a small oval of magic. It expanded sharply till it was as tall as she was. She didn’t understand what she saw inside it; the image was fuzzy and half of it seemed to contain nothing at all. Oppzis told her to enter it.

  What is it? She asked, gingerly putting a hand through the portal. Her hand felt air that was perfectly cool. When she reached down, she touched a ground that felt soft like Barridian sand. Oppzis explained that this was what lunomancers call a “pocket”, and that it would make more sense if she stepped all the way through. She did, hauling herself forward with both hands.

  Oppzis's feelings didn't "sound" like they were coming through a wall anymore. Oppzis told Euffie to open her eyes again. She hadn’t realized she closed them. When she did, she wasn't inside a tent anymore.

  Euffie's eyes reflected a sky full of stars, dominated by one large planet Oppzis told her was Mekkendor. She’d never seen a map of the entire world that she remembered. Mekkendor was mostly covered in light blue oceans, but there was one continent she recognized on the side entering the light of the nearest star. Clouds decorated the huge ball like over-whipped cream. Euffie could see rolling deserts, tropics, and isthmuses she couldn't name. Her engram twinged a little, but it was hardly noticeable this close to Oppzis. At the center of the planet's continent was a large splotch of purple gas, stretching so wide that part of it was draped in nighttime. The Fade looked like a horrible bruise on the planet. More like a tumor.

  Meteors swirled down toward the planet. In the distance, beyond Mekkendor, the sun Nu'um shone in the darkness of space. Far beyond that, Euffie could see its larger blue-tinted partner Yu'um, waiting for its turn to spin Mekkendor around itself and complete the figure-eight. It was late enough in the caskerwol season that Yu'um was the largest star in the night sky. The sight took her breath away.

  Turning her head, Euffie saw other moons like the one on which she sat. Their surfaces were scarred, though not in the way a good tool was worn with use. They were scarred the way feet were when you didn't wear shoes. These craters looked deep and horrible. Not the respectable peppering any proper moon had. They made her flinch.

  Euffie sat back on her haunches and took in the view. Her legs were still missing, but she felt whole anyway with how much magic coursed through her, this close to the source. She wasn't vulnerable or exposed. She was free, here in the cool air of space, under Oppzis's sky of Mekkendor and its moons.

  Oppzis gave her the impression that this was what it felt like to be a moon-witch. To be a lunomancer. This view of herself and the heavens, this connection with her power.

  Euffie stuck a hand in the pale surface of Oppzis, and turned the dusty soil over. The lunar regolith felt soft and welcoming. It was warm like skin in the sun. Euffie looked around at the barren, pockmarked surface of her partner, her moon, her friend.

  "Oppzis, you said this spell was called a pocket?"

  It didn't seem right to think to him like it did from down on the planet below. It was like writing a note to someone you were in the same room as.

  Oppzis explained that this spell was called many things, like a portal. Essentially, a lunomancer could create a door to her moon in space above the planet, and travel to and from it. Most commonly, this travel was referred to as “pocket-diving”. This allowed her to walk and talk with her moon more intimately, clear her head, and see the world from her moon's point of view. She would return to Mekkendor in the same place she left, unless she waited, in which case the portal would move as the planet spun and the moon orbited. She could even store items on the surface of her moon and retrieve them later.

  "Pocket-diving," Euffie said. "That's what I'll call it. Like a kangaroo diving into its own pouch. Did ... "

  Euffie tried to remember the name of someone else she’d known was a witch, but couldn’t. Oppzis reminded her that she’d told him to erase her memories of Aleb to make room for Adalaant and Ecliptica.

  Fuck this stupid engram, she thought.

  "I hope nobody tries to come back to the tent and thinks I somehow ran away," Euffie said. "Even if I don’t have legs. I should go back soon.”

  Euffie dragged herself a few feet forward and lowered herself into a crater her size. Her skin felt wonderful against the texture of Oppzis's surface. She laid on her back stared up once more at her world, with all its horrors and beauties, all its Dereks and Martheras, all its Fades and moons.

  Oppzis asked if she was all right, and Euffie shook her head. When she spoke, her voice trembled.

  "Why didn't you tell me about pocket-diving sooner? I feel so much better up here.”

  Oppzis explained that he did teach her about pocket-diving back in the Thirsting Wastes between Aleb and Halfway, but that she forgot about it after her sprint through the Fade when the engram seized up. Oppzis did his best to protect what was important, but he’d only gotten her up to speed a few days before Kaanel managed to wake her up. He’d left the pocket-diving forgotten until now.

  "What else did I forget?"

  She forgot about the witchbinder the slave catchers employed. She forgot about the spray of blood when she ran out of Derek's grip. She forgot what being inside the Fade had been like. She remembered them all now.

  Euffie sighed, eyes skyward again. "Well, I might as well get back to processing shit again."

  Oppzis advised her to return to the surface soon; she’d been right to worry that Jadpers might come back at any moment. It hit Euffie just how much Oppzis did for her. Without him, she'd probably be out working near the Fade, or pressed against some surface in Derek's farmhouse right now.

  "Oppzis?" she said. Oppzis waited expectantly.

  "Thank you."

  ***

  As it happened, Jadpers didn’t return for another half hour. When she did, she had to smile at the sleeping form. She let the tent flap fall back into place behind her, and crossed to her bedroll a few feet from Euffie’s. The girl’s chest rose and fell in her sleep. Her bronze narubati skin was hard to look away from.

  I wonder how she looks with hair, Jadpers wondered. She sighed, which was saying something when you had a Prisnidine accent. Fuzz is starting to show, but still.

  As she slid into her own bedding, Jadpers rolled her eyes at herself. You're gonna go after her before you drop her off. You bubble every time a part of her turns. You’re hopeless.

  Give it a few days, actually talk to her and get to know her. See what she wants to do after Saangra’s done with her. Then shoot your shot, and get your head back where it belongs.