As we traveled, Sally and I practiced trading places up top, practiced keeping the others down. As far as we could tell, practice was overkill. At no time did they seem able to control as little as a pinkie toe. Effie hadn’t climbed; she’d been pulled. The trigger remained unknown to us, baffling our joint mind.

Alternating between rail and carriage, we saw much of the American landscape. People from all over the world came here searching for better lives. Sadly few of them found what they looked for. Most lived in communities made up of their own kind, keeping separate from others and each treated as second class to the next. The only thing that separated the poor from each other was skin color. They naturally lashed out at each other, attempting to elevate themselves on the backs of those darker or more foreign than themselves.

Each group fascinated me, but none so much as the Chinese. These hard-working people built the railroad, falling off in clumps as the tracks moved west. Every city had a Chinese section. I found them to be the least violent, the most innovative, and serious yet fun loving. I played mahjong at every opportunity, often at tables with men and women three times my age who for some unknown reason treated me with the respect and reverence usually reserved for royalty.

On one such night, the tiles were not being kind to me and yet I was winning and I suspected my opponents let me win. Languages come to me easily. Scarcely had I set foot in some new place but I began to understand those around me. I kept up the ruse of ignorance as it suited me. That night I found it nigh impossible not to react as their conversation went to my nature and the weapon.

Very few of even my own men knew of the weapon given to me by Ning Shiru. The object had baffled me for months and then, when I suspected it might save my child and husband, I opened it and released this illness, this cleansing of the Incola power. Sally kept it on our person at all times just in case it held some ability or further use.

Even with my secrecy these people native to its country of origin knew of it and of me. In their language the man to my left, ironically closest to the secret pocket that held it, said, “I wonder if she carries the weapon right now?”

The woman—at least I believed her a woman though she had hairs on her chin—on my right teased him saying, “You believe it brings her luck, enabling her to beat you?” and then murmured under her breath that no such trinket was necessary to defeat so weak an adversary as he.

He defended himself. “Not at all,” he said. “It is only that I wonder how long it will take to cause us illness. You know I only worry about my granddaughter. She may be born here but I fear she will never be safe from…”

The third player cut him off with a sound. The man—I was fairly certain as he not only had hair on his chin but celebrated its existence by braiding its wispy strands—studied me as I lay down my next tiles. He suspected I understood more than I should. I purposefully played the wrong tile to throw him off. The others laughed at my mistake and continued their conversation.

“Perhaps she has yet to open it. Maybe the monks failed to deliver it.”

“Impossible. They swore to end Xia’s reign.”

The third player again cut them off with a sound. He grew agitated when they used the name Xia. I had never heard of that person. The evening went on with no further interesting conversation and the game ended.

I used the mews my men brought with them. Dawn remained with Theodore but now traveled the wilderness with his men in tow. I sketched any landmarks and showed them to locals as we traveled but no one recognized her location. Then I got lucky. I watched as she exited a cone-shaped tent only to see her surrounded by a dozen of its like. She and Theodore resided with American natives.

I knew that this land had once been covered by these people but they were not all one group. Many tribes made up the population and I had no idea how to differentiate between them and so I thought I was no closer to finding them. But some trinket or style of hair, recognized by one of the many men I showed my drawing to, pointed me in the right direction.

No tracks cut the land where we crossed wilderness. Coachmen were hesitant to take so fine a lady as I into wild territory. The caravan impressed our severity to all who witnessed us. My men appeared an army, as heavily armed as any in the known world.

The native people intrigued me. They were unlike any I had never seen. They lived life naturally and I imagined joining them would be bliss. My exposed legs caused them no pause. I know now that I romanticized their existence, glossing over their trials and hardships. I viewed them not as they were but through my Victorian sensibilities, filtered through my prejudice.

As we neared Dawn, I began to sense her. I had never before been able to sniff out Incola so I attributed the new ability with our familial closeness. I wondered if she could sense me in return. As we did not know her true motives, her reaction to our approach remained a quandary. Would she run to us, fleeing her captors or would she run from us, taking her captives with her?

Her real choice was something I could never have guessed.

 

When we caught up to the tribe identified by the unique hairstyle recognized by the local, Dawn was no longer with them. She had fled. Alone. Into the wilderness. I could feel it, but I could also feel that she left something, or many somethings to be exact, behind.

We entered the village unmolested. Some of the women even offered us food and drink. The men stood back attempting to appear large, stern, and arresting, but not intimidating. That they all wanted to impress us was my assessment. At the center was a more elaborate tent, which I now know is called a teepee.

All around the dwelling’s perimeter, men sat facing out. Some wore shirts but most did not. That would not have been strange if they were native men, but they were European. Each one wore either a light colored leather pouch around his neck or a band of the same color leather around an arm. The dirt under them was darker than natural. The smell told me that the men had not moved in some time, not to wash or rest or relieve themselves. The stain growing beneath them was their own excrement and bodily fluids. I did not know what would enthrall them so. I understood that I was invited to enter even without speaking the native tongue. I did so, leaving the men outside, as I had no indication that any here wished me harm.

It was a mistake.

Light penetrated the dark interior only by the small hole at the peak of the tent, where the poles stuck out into the sky above. A small dark man wearing only trousers and a leather mask crossed that column of light when he lunged toward me. My eyes had not yet adjusted to the dark and so I struggled with him blindly. He had no weapon that I could feel and so I did not even think to call out to my men. We exchanged a few blows but mostly our fight was nearer to wrestling than boxing. His strength was a good match for my own. We could have hurt each other if that had been the intent but as the objective seemed to be subduing me, I did not attempt to harm the man. I refused to be subdued. In the skirmish, I managed to push his mask from his face.

It landed in the beam of light. Even as the struggle continued, my eyes were drawn back to the mask. It haunted me. Something about it reminded me of my own face. Had it been made to represent me? The boy’s, for extended contact with his body told me that was what he was, struggle lessened, almost as if his heart was no longer in it. Most fights stop abruptly, when one opponent is bested. This one slowly stopped. He and I stood on either side of the fall of light, breathing deeply.

Assuming the boy was a native, I did not attempt conversation. After all, he had not spoken a word. After I caught my breath, I called out, “Ed! Andrew! Auley!”

The three men entered with Paetus following close behind. No matter who I called, Paetus would not be denied. He’d had too many centuries of being in charge to do anything but exactly what he wanted. I would do well to remember that. Father and son held weapons drawn. Ed moved his head only, looking around with his mechanically enhanced vision, taking in all the details he could. The lack of light seemed no issue to his “eyes.” I made a mental note to ask him about inventing a set of goggles for me, to aid my vision at night.

When they moved to apprehend the boy, I stopped them with a word and pointed at the mask. “Who does that look like to you?” I asked them.

Ed shrugged, making me question my internal praise of his vision inventions.

Andrew answered, “You.”

Auley commented, “It could be modeled after any fair skinned woman.”

The voice from across the light beam startled me. “It is Lady Dawn.” The accent was a strange conglomeration from around the globe, but something about the voice made me think of home.

“It could be modeled after Lady Dawn. She is, after all, a fair skinned woman.” Andrew reasoned, using his father’s logical thinking.

Once again the boy spoke, “Not modeled after. It is Lady Dawn’s face.”

That voice radiated through my memory, and even though I had never heard it before, I felt certain I knew it. “Step into the light,” I ordered him. He obeyed without hesitation.

The boy who stood before me could be none other than my brother’s son. Theodore looked more like Thaddeus in person than he did through Dawn’s eyes. Perhaps that was because she never knew her uncle and saw Theodore as his own man.

Ed leaned down to pick up the mask but Theodore yelled, “No! Don’t touch her skin!”

At that, we all froze. I felt the pull of the darkness at the horror of the coming realization but battled the fall. The mask was the skin of Dawn’s actual face. Sally fought me for control. She brought up every painful memory she could muster attempting to trigger a switch. She raged inside me, snarling at Theodore through my eyes. She thought he had killed Dawn and stripped her of her face, wearing it, but I knew the truth even before Theodore said it.

“She forces us to wear her skin. There is something strange about it. Touching her makes us do what she wants. Pleasing her is all that matters when you touch her.”

My demented daughter had her own gift of touch and she had weaponized it.

 

Using great caution, I approached the first man sitting in a circle around the outside of the tent. My gloves made from Julian’s calming skin helped both the man and me. I couldn’t have him get excited as I removed the Dawn-skin band from his arm. Likewise, I could not risk coming in direct contact with her flesh.

“No, you mustn’t,” he said. “She doesn’t want us to take them off.”

I laid my gloved hand on his cheek, calming him. “Dawn told me,” I lied. “It would please her very much if you would let me remove it. You want to please her, do you not?”

He had been there for many days. His body weakened by the lack of self-care. The calming touch took root quickly. He fell asleep muttering about pleasing Dawn, and I removed the commanding leather. It was a bit more violent than I wished because the leather wasn’t dried at all. It had begun to attach to the man’s arm. Tearing it loose meant ripping the man’s own skin underneath. I tossed it into a waiting basket and moved to the next man. The exchange with him, and every man after, went almost identically to the first. They needed to please Dawn but were weakened and easily convinced of a change in her will. Some did not fall asleep but fell unconscious.

The natives wore similar pieces of my daughter’s flesh. They had been allowed to carry out their daily needs and were not weakened. Therefore they took more direct methods. It did not help that we did not speak their language. A few of them had to be removed by force from a couple of men. Once or twice, I thought I saw a flash of anger from inside and wondered if the flesh was not only a way of continued contact and therefore an extension of the gift of touch, but also Dawn’s Incola method.

Each Incola had their own means of gaining access and control of his own Carriers. This could very well be Dawn’s. The way some of the flesh had taken hold made me worry. Was it just stuck or was it actually healing itself and attaching to the man? Could Dawn not only heal herself, but any piece of herself, even if it was separated from her body? I hoped not.

The lot of them, along with a macabre basket filled with fresh flesh strips meant for me and my men, were burned. The sun set while we waited and listened to Theodore’s story. I kept Sally from killing him until we could hear his side. I sat in the only chair to be found. Theodore and Paetus sat together. His hand on the boy’s bare shoulder ensured nothing but the truth could be told. My men stood watch around us, their backs to the fire so that Dawn could not sneak up and influence anyone with her touch. They rested inside the circle of warmth in shifts.

I started with an important question. “Do you have a gift of touch?”

“No, not that I am aware of.”

I looked to Paetus, who nodded while keeping his eyes on the boy. Paetus thought it the truth. “But what if he has a gift similar to Leon’s?” I asked him.

Paetus’ face went blank and he turned his attention fully to me. “That weak, worthless excuse for an Incola had no power. He squandered his life and I am glad it was not an immortal one.”

With that insult, Effie came to the front. She couldn’t take control of my body but they were her words that came from my mouth. Through gritted teeth I said, “Do not speak that way about either of my husbands ever again.” I felt that if I had opened my mouth, the screaming might never stop.

“What gift…” he started to ask.

“Ever. Again.” I repeated. Sally pulled Effie back down. Paetus and I stared at each other.

“I would never speak ill of Julian. Archelaos was everything to me. You are the one who killed him.”

Thankfully, Effie was too distracted by Sally to have heard him.

Andrew, who was very close to Leonus for much longer than I had been alive, turned and answered Paetus’ previous unfinished question. There was no doubting the pride in his voice. “His was the ability to negate every other gift.” He smiled at Paetus. “Leonus could lie to you. He could remain alert even with Julian’s touch.” He glanced at me shyly before adding, “He could be in contact with his wife without becoming enraged.” Andrew stepped back into his lookout position with a smug look.

“Horse shit!” Paetus exclaimed. “I would have kno… He couldn’t have hid… He would have been a very smart man indeed to hide such a thing. If I had known, I would have killed him, slowly, enjoying his pathetic screams.” His jealousy must have overridden his sense of self preservation.

I stood. I hadn’t decided to; it just happened. Effie wasn’t at the helm of my body. She somehow found a way to control my emotions. I could feel it happening but couldn’t care. I didn’t walk to him because she wanted me to. I didn’t pull a knife from my skirt because she wanted me to. I stabbed him in the leg because I wanted to. A knife to the meaty thigh would have been too easy on him. Expertly, I slid the blade between the bones of his knee and its cap, slicing tendons and skin so quickly that Paetus didn’t react until I withdrew the weapon.

He was the one screaming then. Leon’s men chuckled. I had warned him. He cursed and spit, blatantly avoiding any mention of my husbands. He reached down and grabbed his kneecap, which hung down, barely connected to his leg. Holding it in place he growled at me. “Have you any idea how long it will take me to heal this damage!”

“Long enough to hear my nephew’s story and confirm the truth of it,” I answered what had to be a rhetorical question. I could see defiance in his eyes. Paetus was unaccustomed to being at a disadvantage. He questioned his promise to help me. “You will help me because if you do not, I will strip the skin from your hands and use your brain to tan them, just as you did to Julian.”

As soon as the words came from my mouth, I knew I should not have said them. Effie stiffened and grew inside me. Talk of hurting Julian enlivened her.

“Just as you would have done to Leonus, had he any real gift of touch.”

I did not readily recognize the one to turn and step toward Paetus at this. He looked to me, the knife glittering with reflected firelight. “Shall I give him a matching pair?” I shook my head no.

I had inadvertently made Paetus a touchable man. Remembering that many of my men had belonged to Paetus or had been abused by him, I made a mental note to speak with them. Paetus had lived for too long, had too many connections, and too much information to be needlessly killed.

“I did not treat Leon’s body so, because I love him. I loved Julian as well. You will remember that you were the one to destroy his body and strip him of valuable parts.” I gestured toward Theodore, who watched us with wide eyes that made him look much younger than his years. “Your touch, please, Paetus.”

Once his hand lay on Theodore once more, I asked, “Did you kidnap Dawn?”

“Yes, but I…” he began but Sally rushed to the front.

She screamed, “Did you rape her?”

Theodore’s dark skin paled. He threw his hands up in defense. “No! I swear. I had planned to…mate her as we are the last of our line but I would never hurt Dawn. Even if I had wanted to, I couldn’t. When she touched me, pleasing her was all I could think about. Nothing happened that she didn’t want.”

“Did she want you to rape and kill all of the Dowager’s people?” I clawed my way back only because his answer had thrown cold water on Sally’s rage. We knew what the skin she put on these men had done. How much more potent was the effect when her skin lay attached to her body?

He shook his head. “My men were as drawn to Lady Dawn as I and we had been trapped on a ship for a short while.” He shrugged, but somehow it managed to be apologetic. “Being a good Incola means certain compromises must be made, indulgences allowed. Julian taught me that. He would say, Sometimes,” Paetus joined him in unison, “‘A man has needs to be met that seem vile to others.’”

Paetus laughed. “The boy isn’t lying. He knew Julian. Most of the time, Julian said that about his own needs.”

Effie asked, “How well did you know Julian?”

“As well as you can know a person, I suppose,” Theodore answered. “Julian was as close to a father as I had. I cannot remember a time when he was not in my life. He was my benefactor, my confidant, my teacher. He gave me my first Carrier, long before I was able to ride.”

Paetus snatched his hand away just as I was about to ask Theodore his method of riding. I could have made him tell me but it mattered not. In a few short days he and the men with him would fall ill and find themselves locked in their bodies.

“Then you do ride them,” I said, making the question a statement.

He answered all the same. “Of course. How else would I keep order? Without the threat that I could walk them off a cliff on a whim, why would they stay? Surely you ride yours.”

Then he had not yet heard tale of the illness I carry. “Certainly not. My men remain with me for a number of reasons: money, duty, loyalty, habit. We have no chattel here; all are equal.” As soon as I said it, I knew it was an untruth. I might not have slaves whose body I wore, but there was a hierarchy with myself on top, followed by those closest to me and then those most useful to me and then everyone else. Now, after so long since those days, I was hard pressed to think of more than a handful of the lower men’s names.

One of those who will have to remain nameless stepped forward and interrupted. “If you don’t mind,” he directed at me. “I have something to add.” I nodded to him that it would be allowed. “We would do anything for her. Do you not feel it? That overwhelming drive to protect someone so special, she is almost sacred.”

Theodore pursed his lips and shook his head. Whatever it was this man spoke of was not an experience or sensation that Theodore shared. He stated, “Nothing could make me surrender my Carriers. No one could make me. The Pope himself came seeking tithe. I told him no but wanted to avoid ill feelings. I am not unreasonable and any Incola that old deserves respect. In the end we came to an arrangement. All he wanted was for me to take communion.”

Theodore possessed an almost mesmerizing voice. I could feel myself being pulled into his story. It was entirely unique and yet reminded me so of Thaddeus. We had played together as children. Indeed he was the only child I ever knew. There was no school for a peer and peeress such as he and I. We had only each other among a household of servants and ever absent parents. It wasn’t until Thaddeus hit his teen years that Father had any interest in him. I loved Thaddeus. Sally had spared me of knowing any of his wrongdoings. It was my own gift of touch that caused Thaddeus to act in any manner unbecoming for a brother.

“Julian was not your father. He rode your father and walked him, my brother, straight to the gallows.”

“He told me what he’d done. He did it for your release from that terrible place where you would have languished and died, labeled a murderous lunatic. We kill because we must. Does the lion feel remorse for killing the gazelle?”

Another quote from Julian. “But,” Mary Martha argued, “should we not feel remorse for the death of our young?” A good question. The lion often kills cubs, usually when they take over another pride. This is often done to stake their claim on females. Maybe Incola have more in common with lions than I’d previously realized. Male lions have been known to kill lionesses who refuse to mate. Julian had attempted to take me over, kill me in the Incola sense of the word, only when I’d been uncooperative.

“Of course we should,” Theodore insisted. “Julian loved you. Terrible things are done in the name of far less than love.”

I felt Effie sigh and so I held my tongue. When Theodore asked, I allowed him to dress. The night quickly chilled and it seemed an injustice to force him to remain in a state of undress. Clothed, he looked older. Had his skin been lighter, he would have done very well in London society. His bearing, his looks, his voice. When he started talking again, I found myself wondering if we could have categories of gifts other than that of touch.

The night wore on and his story continued. My others had not found their way to the front but they had found their voices. Effie asked only about Julian. Mary Martha and Sally wished to know everything about Dawn and where she might be headed. Even Jo asked questions when Theodore spoke of his worldly travels and epic ocean adventures. This was the first time any of them, save Sally, had spoken. It should have worried me. It would have, if only it hadn’t steadied me so. We all had our own thoughts and so each thing he said was quickly analyzed and processed for our purposes.

At some point, the natives packed up and left. They’d had enough of our brand of crazy. I grew tired and my men took turns on watch, sleeping in shifts inside the circle of wagons and carriages around the single remaining tent, in which I slumbered.

In the morning, I climbed into the wagon that carried the mews and got inside. It had been drained of water for ease of travel. I wasn’t using it as a deprivation tank anyway. It was a tiny traveling prison; a place that could contain my rage when Sally left to ride Dawn. The chamber had a wheel that, when turned, opened the latch, but for whatever reason, I could not remember how to work it until after Sally would return to us.

This ride was strange. Yes, we saw that she had taken up travel with an older gentleman of some considerable means and they were headed north in some style. Her touch kept the man spending and moving. But before Sally made it to the front to see through Dawn’s eyes, she happened upon a new and frightening part of our daughter’s mind.

A darkness deep in her recesses repulsed us. Actively. The darkness felt alive. Something within its depths moved. That black inky mass reeked of death and destruction. Having the terrible sensation that making contact would mean the death of us, I screamed at Sally from my mews, “Don’t touch it!” I needn’t have bothered. She could not hear me. I could see through her eyes when she rode, not the other way around. But Sally was as repulsed, if not more, seeing it in person.

Skirting around the maar put Sally inside a memory. In it Dawn busied herself with Paetus’ punishment in her, previously my, tenebrae. Sally went very still. It wasn’t like one of Sally’s memories, where she had lived so long before I knew of her existence. Neither of these two players were alive. It was a static memory but Dawn’s attention could be called to this moment in her life. That is the reason for caution, to prevent any ripples that might signal our presence.

When Sally came back to us, we spoke about what we’d seen. The others joined. Mary Martha and Sally, who had been in agreement more lately than I was comfortable with, thought the darkness might be Eve’s domain. For in their eyes, Dawn was all that was light and good and Eve’, the opposite. I was not certain. Jo and Effie argued that it could be her quiet place, reminding me of the floating darkness where I went when Sally had taken the pain. That didn’t seem right to me either as Dawn’s darkness seemed to wish us ill. Effie’s argument was smart. The darkness protected Dawn from all sensation and we had seen that the area was surrounded by memories. Those could not be allowed in if the place was to be a sanctuary. Perhaps it only felt unwelcoming and ominous to us. Dawn might find it a pleasant respite from everything.

And so we traveled west, north, and then east, zigzagging in an attempt to find Dawn. Doing so meant that I explored much more of this new world than I would have naturally. Oddly, none of Theodore’s men fell ill. I had no hard proof but suspected that he occasionally rode them. I was unsure what that meant.

I loved it. The wild open spaces. The fields where prairie grass grew waist high. The mountains with tops where the snow never melted. The great chasm in the red land that became known as the Grand Canyon. The giant sequoia trees that men sought to profit from but couldn’t. The rainforest of the west coast. The big sky country where blue met the horizon in every way I looked.

It was there, in what was called the Montana territory, that a new other was born. We rode north up the great plains area when I demanded a stop. The sky was as blue and cloud-free as I had ever seen. I had the men drive the carriages as far away as they would. A handful of guards made a circle around me, paced off forty and ducked down in the tall grasses. It was as alone as I would ever get. For a moment, I felt as though I was the center of the universe. The land stretched out in every direction, only meeting the sky, which was doing the same, at the very extent of my vision. Then, everything changed while staying the same.

I was not the center of the universe. I would only ever be the center of my own life; I could not ride and would never see anything from anywhere but from within my own mind. The universe around me would continue its mechanisms without ever knowing I existed. I was a single ant on a single mound on a single continent on a single world in one of many universes. That was the moment she was born.

“Ramillia,” Sally called me from my revelation. “We need you down here.”

I called back my men and carriages. Once I was seated safely inside one and I began to feel normal once again, I closed my eyes and went down to our interior mental meadow. Here I was the center of the universe. Or maybe it was Sally.

There, the others waited for me.

Mary Martha demanded, “What did you do?”

Effie took my hand, ever the friend Jo named her. Sally gave it to me straight, “Another other has been born.”

Jo could not stop jumping and clapping. “It’s the best one I made yet!” She was still operating on the incorrect assumption that she was the one making her friends down in this place. Or at least pretending to believe it.

What was the correct reaction, I wondered. My mind is getting terribly crowded.

“Just let her see me,” the new one said from behind Sally. Strangely, the voice came from much lower than it should have. It was also an octave higher than my own.

When Sally stepped aside, I saw her. A midget version of myself. Her hair was properly coiled and up-swept; her body, while undersized with dwarfish proportions, was decently attired and corseted. Confidently, she stuck out her tiny hand and introduced herself, “Name’s Margaret, but you can call me Marge.”

Not quite sure what to do, I took her hand. She shook it. Like a man would greet another man. I had seen midgets before in the freak show as a child, but this one looked like me and I was stunned. Now, I know the term midget has gone out of style and I should call her a little person, but that was not the term at the time and not the terminology I thought. You have had to forgive many things in my tale. This is one of the least of them.

“Heard a lot about ya.” She pursed her lips and furrowed her brow. “Naw, that’s not right. I haven’t heard anything. I…know a lot about you.” Her voice was my own, only higher, and the accent was completely different. She was not British. She was…American.

Everything about Marge confused me. Us, confused us. The looks on Sally, Jo, Effie, and Mary Martha’s face said they felt the same as I. Marge was an enigma. The others seemed to be me, just at different ages. What was Marge?

“I’m a part of you,” Marge answered. I always forgot that my thoughts were not private here. “I may look and sound different than the others but I’m the same.”

I could feel that wasn’t how she really felt and so I pressed her about it. Her response was, “I’m small and, because of that, most of the world will never know that the sun and stars revolve around me.” Funny how I was just thinking in similar terms, out on the great plains. She continued, “I’m here to make everything clear. I don’t yet know how, but I am the key to everything.”

Marge displayed an unbelievable level of confidence. Was it because of or in spite of her size? Or did her stature have nothing at all to do with it?

Then finally, six months later, we came back to the place we landed. New York. There I found my most favorite place of all. Niagara Falls was most impressive. The thought of a simple primitive person long ago approaching the waterfalls overwhelmed me. The noise, the roar, assaulted our ears. Had I not been a woman of science, I could completely understand the superstition surrounding the falls. It certainly did seem a godlike area.

I tried to keep my next thought from the others but failed. “It certainly is like you,” Jo said. “It does not matter how often one might hear of it; being in your presence is overwhelming for people.”

Marge spoke up. Her American accent still sounded vaguely vulgar to me. Her confidence never dwindled. “I love it too. The water is so powerful. No man could ever stop the flow. The water goes where it will go, just like us.”

I allowed Jo and Marge to the front, just enough that they could see the natural wonder more clearly through our eyes. I never let Mary Martha forward. She wanted out too badly and would use it as an opportunity to search for ways to escape me. I knew this made her even more desperate to get out but I feared her release. Effie seemed able to step forward on her own but remained completely unaware of how she did it. Jo liked to see the world but had no interest in leaving our mind, where she had omnipotence over reality. Sally was as always. There to help me, seemingly satisfied with her role as my second.