Chapter 22: Recovery

"...and so," the hallucination read on, "having independently verified the depth of your network, the sophistication of your cover identity, and your willingness to invest personal capital at a scale unmatched by any operator in this kingdom, I hereby formally petition to join your operation. My assets include: standing invitations to eleven noble houses. A private courier. Four servants of proven discretion... And also my classmate, Wilhelmina."

The room kept swaying the whole time she read. The dragon was gone, at least.

[Gotta admit, it’s a good Marisol. Very detailed.]

"My terms are modest," the Marisol continued. "Full disclosure regarding the operation’s true objective. A seat at strategy discussions. And appropriate advance warning before you do anything like that again. What do you think?"

"Sure," I said.

"...Sure?" she repeated. "You accept? All terms?"

"Mmhm."

[Eh, maybe if I agree with the hallucination it’ll go away. That’s how dreams work, right? You realize you’re in one and before you do any cool lucid dreaming stuff you just wake up?]

Marisol took a breath, and drew herself up.

"Then it must be confirmed," she declared. "A partnership of this magnitude cannot rest on words alone. In the old families, an accord is sealed."

"Cool," I said, to the ceiling.

Then, she leaned over the bed and kissed me.

[Oh. Oh, okay. It’s this kind of dream. Dope.]

The fake Marisol gave me a stiff, formal kiss, like she was stamping a document.

[She’s not real. And you can’t be held responsible for what you do to a hallucination. That’s just basic dream law.]

So I did what any red-blooded fox would do to a figment of her own imagination.

I grabbed a fistful of her hair and pulled her in properly.

She squeaked. The stamp-a-document kiss fell apart on the spot, and I gave her a long, sloppy tongue-down, too drugged to rush it. She grabbed the headboard. The scroll she’d been carrying hit the floor and rolled under the bed. Somewhere in there she stopped squeaking and started participating. A bit clumsy about it, clearly running on theory alone, but with enthusiasm.

[Ohhh, wow, she tastes nice.]

When I finally let her go, she straightened up, face scarlet, perfect hair wrecked on one side, lips still wet.

"THAT," she announced, at a volume unsuitable for an infirmary, then caught herself and dropped to a furious whisper. "That was. That is not how the accord is sealed. The accord is sealed with a formal kiss. That was. What WAS that???"

"G’night, fake Marisol," I said warmly, and passed out.

---

{Lily}

I was asleep.

Officially, I was asleep. The healers said I’d sleep for days after what I did in the forest, so nobody questioned me lying in the next bed with my eyes closed.

They weren’t really closed, though. I was peeking the whole time.

Kohaku had woken up a little while ago. I’d been working up the courage to "wake up" and talk to her, and I was almost there, I was one deep breath away, when Lady Vantecca let herself in and started reading a scroll about operations and assets, and I lost the thread entirely.

And then.

AND THEN!!!

[She... they... in the infirmary??? In front of- well, no, not in front of anyone. They think I’m asleep. But still, my body’s right here, and yet Kohaku just... with her hand and... what just happened!?]

I remained perfectly still, heart hammering, and listened to Lady Vantecca gather her scroll from under the bed, fix her hair, mutter the word "magnificent" to herself in a strangled voice, and leave.

[I’m never falling asleep again for the rest of my life.]

---

{Kohaku}

The week after that settled into a routine.

A few more potions did the job. My ribs mended, the rest of me caught up, and on day four they carted me down to the Appraisal Hall for mandatory re-appraisal, since apparently forming a spirit contract and gaining an affinity legally obligated the academy to re-measure me.

The crystal thought about it, the way you’d re-examine a coupon you were sure had expired.

[RANK: E]

The clerk read it twice.

"Uh... Congratulations," he said, confused.

[E-rank,] I thought, getting a little misty. [I’m actually E-rank. I’m no longer the floor. There’s a whole letter of people below me now. Well. Statistically there’s probably nobody below me. But the LETTER exists.]

And, at the end of the week, I was good to go. Plus, the exam office scheduled Lily’s retake for the next morning. Every first-year needed a contract or they washed out. Rules were rules, apparently, even for the girl whose first attempt had gotten a meadow leveled.

So the two of us stood at the Spirit Forest gate at dawn with an assigned proctor.

"Standard retake," he recited. "Enter, form a contract, return. I’m required to accompany you. The, ah." He checked the forms again. "The resident entity has been assessed as dormant."

[The resident entity. Sure. Let’s go with that.]

Lily had my sleeve in a death grip before we even passed under the arch.

[I guess she’s not too mad at me for the whole "personal space" thing.]

"What if it doesn’t come? What if I wake something else up instead? What if the supervisors have to..."

"Lily. Sweetheart. Just walk."

This time, the forest stayed quiet the whole way in.

The Warden’s remains were gone, hauled off or reclaimed, and the grass had already grown back over the trenches. We walked Lily up to the spring, the proctor hung well back, and I gave her shoulder a push.

"Same as before. Plant your feet. Call. And, uh, yeah, that oughta do it."

She planted her feet and closed her eyes, and nothing happened. Ten seconds. Twenty. Her brow scrunched up.

The spring stirred.

For a second, I wondered if that serpent was about to come back. Maybe it had just... forgotten to sign its contract with Lily.

A gentle breeze came instead.

It looked like a little orb flying in the air, and it slid in low over the meadow grass, circled Lily twice, and gathered itself up in front of her into a spirit about the size of a housecat. Then, it bumped into her and just casually went into Lily’s body.

[Ah, good old canon spirit. There you are.]

[CANONICAL EVENT COMPLETE]

[Lily Everdawn forms her Spirit Contract during the Spirit Forest Exam]

[+40 MP]

[Finally,] I thought, watching the numbers tick up. [FINALLY. Do you know what I went through for this payout? I have a rowboat-shaped dent in my skeleton.]

---

That night, back in my dorm while Lily went to the restroom or something, I got to work.

Here’s the thing I kept circling back to, lying there with my weasel loafed on my chest: everything that had gone wrong in that forest, the meadow, the cut hill, the improvised everything, happened because I was navigating off fifteen-year-old memories. I’d almost died for the crime of trusting my own recollection of my own trash.

Never again... Well, I would absolutely have to do it again, given how my System worked, but never again, as long as I can help it.

So, anyway, I had some MP to work with now.

[MP: 65]

The Duel Festival was next on the academy calendar. The Duel Festival arc was, and I say this with love, a structural disaster. I remembered maybe a third of it and what I remembered was embarrassing to say the least.

This time, though, I had a plan.

[We spend it all,] I decided. [Every point. Manuscript, you and I are reading the entire Duel Festival arc, cover to cover, before I so much as look at a training sword. I am never getting bodied by my own foreshadowing again.]

I was reaching for the Manuscript when the door opened.

There was no knock, just unhurried heels in the hallway. Whoever it was had clearly never needed permission to be anywhere.

Sabine stepped into the room in her teaching coat, hair down, carrying a clipboard, and shut the door behind her, locking it.

"Miss Sakana," she said, pleasantly. "I’ve reviewed your file. Grievous injury in the line of duty. As your mentor, I’m afraid the academy’s duty of care requires me to personally verify your recovery. Thoroughly."

[...The MP can wait until tomorrow.]