Mare Finale

TIMELINE: AUGUST 25, 2017. FOUR DAYS SINCE THE ECLIPSE.

The carnival house feels empty with Luis and Isabella gone.

Roger gave them the keys to their new house this morning, apologizing profusely that it had taken him so long to find something suitable. Erin had rolled her eyes and muttered about him being completely out of touch with the way the world worked for literally everyone else if he thought finding a house in Berkeley in six days was a long time, but she'd been smiling as she said it, so Kelpie supposes she wasn't actually annoyed.

Isabella invited Kelpie to come with them, but Isabella's still grieving, still choked by her loss and waking screaming in the night. Luis is even worse. Once he realized his father was dead, he started crying, and didn't stop for two days. He's just numb now. They've both been damaged by their brush with the alchemical world, and they may never recover. Kelpie thought it was better if she stayed here with the other constructs, and the blackberry tangle in the yard that never scratches her or runs out of fruit. Still, she's going to miss them, even Bobby and his endless begging for table scraps.

She's in the front room, looking for something to read, when the doorbell rings. Dodger's out at another of her seemingly endless farmer's markets. There's one every day of the week, or at least it seems that way. She never seems to buy much of anything, but spends hours browsing and returns looking fulfilled in a way Kelpie can't understand but isn't going to question.

Roger and Judy are in his office, and Kelpie's not going to bother them just because someone wants to sell them cookies or something. The lab is gone, destroyed by the alchemists themselves, and she's seen no evidence of lingering activity. That doesn't mean there isn't any, just that she doesn't know about it, but it certainly feels like they're getting a chance to catch their breath.

She has a lot of learning to do, about who she is and what she is and who she wants to be. But she's safe here while she does it, and there's time. Finally, there's time.

Kelpie pauses to pat the ancient orange cat—he's sitting on the stairs, much happier now that the dog is gone—on her way to answer the door, and she's unsurprised to find Artemis waiting on the porch. There's been no sign of Anna since the underworld, and even Roger thinks that going to another layer of reality, apart from the everything, may have been enough to knock her loose somehow, letting her go to the afterlife she'd been consigned to by one James Reed decades before.

Artemis has been keeping busy since they defeated Diana. With access to Diana's records on the local Lunars, and her notes about Diana's dealings with the alchemists, she's finally figured out the disappearances of newer Lunars that have been plaguing the community for the past several years. The alchemists have been taking them for building materials, apparently, and won't be doing that anymore now that the pantheons are on guard. Kelpie isn't sure she quite understands what's been happening, but that's all right; as long as no one else has to die.

Artemis has also been keeping her distance, giving Kelpie space. Now, the goddess looks at the Hind awkwardly, rubbing the back of her neck with one hand, making no move to come in off the porch.

"Um. Hi, Kelpie," she says, awkwardly.

"Hi," says Kelpie.

"I was wondering… now that we're not running for our lives, you want to get coffee? I feel like we should figure out a few things."

Kelpie pauses, then slowly smiles. She didn't want to be compelled to spend her life with this woman, but a compulsion and a choice aren't the same thing, now are they? There's no reason she can't try it out, see how she likes it.

"Let me get my coat," she says.

There's hours to go until moonrise, and the City stands.

Through everything else, the City stands.