As Lady Mirab left, Eluvie tried to pinpoint her position. She found her first half where she had buried it, and the other in the bowl Amu was holding.

“Oh!” Amu gasped. “You moved! Move again!”

Eluvie held perfectly still.

“Come now,” Amu said. “Don’t be shy. Where did I stop that song?”

He resumed singing, watching the bowl as he did so, and Eluvie wondered why she was hiding from him.

“Ha!” he said. “I knew it. Now, let’s see if this works.”

He bent over, then dropped the bowl to the ground and gently tipped out its contents. Eluvie flowed onto the parched, barren earth.

“Come now,” Amu said. “Start moving.”

He watched expectantly, and Eluvie grew both worried and embarrassed. She did not know why she was hiding her awakening from him, she did not know why she should, and she did not know what he expected from her.

“Stop ignoring me,” Amu said. “I know you’re awake. Besides, I can’t get you back into the bowl. It’s your play from this point.”

Eluvie realized that she would get more suspicious the longer she waited, so she gave up the pretense. Once the effort required to hold that form was gone, she changed from the semi-liquid state into her normal, solid, branch-like structure.

Amu beamed with excitement. “Perfect!” he said. “Now, this next one will be more challenging.” He squatted to get closer to her. “You see what I look like? You need to change into that. It shouldn’t be very difficult. You should be able to just about do it.”

Eluvie took a moment to think. They clearly thought that she had lost her memory, but she did not understand the rest of the situation. She knew that she could transform into human form, but she did not know which form he expected. If she transformed into her previous human form, would that be suspicious?

There was no need to hurry, she decided. There would be time to think.

After half an hour of prodding, Amu gave up. He found a shovel and, with a great deal of care, lifted her with a generous amount of the surrounding dirt back into the bowl. Eluvie noted that her second part was significantly smaller than the piece underground. It felt as if she had less substance there, so she did not attempt to grow bigger. Amu took her back to the clinic and left the bowl on a table.

“You stay here while I speak with your ma,” he said. “And if you decide to transform, don’t touch anything. I’d better post a guard.”

There was already a guard outside the clinic, but Amu made him keep watch inside instead. Eluvie hated it. The knowledge that she was being watched was always enough to dampen her mood.

With nothing to do about that, she decided to focus on her other part. If she could find a path to the surface, she could listen in on Amu and Lady Mirab’s conversation. She loosened the dirt that she had piled around herself and found that the diggers’ tunnels had been closed. To reach the surface, she would need to dig more tunnels - or request the ghost’s help.

“Are you still there?” she asked.

There was no answer. She spent the next few minutes being as annoying as she could be: talking, singing, and scolding the ghost for betraying her. He remained relentlessly silent.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

Finally, defeated, she began digging her own tunnel back to the surface.

Perhaps it was due to the part of her above ground, but Eluvie never felt ill from being in the darkness. And after an hour of digging, she was as skilled at manipulating her body as she thought she could get. She could morph into a shape and hardness suitable for digging, made tunnels so thin that no one would find them suspicious. It was clear that this form was not meant for digging, but she dealt with it as well as could be expected.

Reaching the surface was only the first part of her task. When she had done so, she found herself in an unfamiliar room on the first floor. She had to dig another tunnel into a wall, climb the thankfully hollow wall, and make her way onto the third floor. There, she continued traveling through the walls until she found Lady Mirab’s bedroom.

The discovery proved anticlimactic. Lady Mirab spent hours in bed, supported by cushions, reading notebooks filled with figures and reports. But Eluvie remained patient. She had nothing else to do, anyway. She waited a whole night. The next day, Amu checked on her in the clinic, took her into the sun for a few minutes, and then reported to Lady Mirab’s bedroom.

Her door guards came in to announce him, and she nodded her acknowledgement with a weary sigh.

“Has she changed?” she asked before Amu was through the door.

"No," Amu said. "I came to request funds for the apprentice."

Lady Mirab blinked in apparent confusion. "Apprentice?"

"The one you made me hire."

Lady Mirab still wore a blank expression.

"After the incident with the blade," Amu said, "you commanded me to hire one so that he can replace me after you kill me." He sounded amused rather than concerned. "Have you forgotten already? You gave me a week. I thought you decided not to hound me about it, but it seems that you really forgot."

Lady Mirab sighed. "I don't have time for nonsense. Take whatever money you need."

Amu nodded as if that was a sensible reply. "As for the room, I need them to redecorate it."

"Why?" Lady Mirab asked.

Amu made a face. "We're pretending that she has been living here for some time. It will seem strange if she does not like the decorations. Besides, the choice of colors: it's as if they decorated for a toddler. What if she's older than that? It will look odd."

"You said she would start young."

Amu groaned. "How are you such a terrible listener? Or do you just not care what I say? I said that she would probably start young. And haven't you noticed that nothing I say is exactly correct? All seeds are different. This one could have more substance than the others. We don't know what she will know or what age she will be. So, please, have the decorations changed to something neutral."

Lady Mirab gave a long-suffering sigh.

"I wouldn't bother you with this," Amu said, "but Ria insists on running this operation from her sickbed. You need to either talk to her or just tell me to let her sabotage it."

Lady Mirab violently slapped her book onto her mattress.

“Amu,” she said, “I don’t care about any of this. We’re signing the treaty in two days. After that, nothing that happens to her will be my concern. So I’m expecting you to keep her alive and well-behaved for that long. Two days.” She sounded weary. “Can you do that without bothering me twice a day about your ridiculous feuds?”

Amu looked as if he might argue.

“What?!” Lady Mirab snapped.

Amu took a breath and shifted his body into a more comfortable posture. “If the treaty is signed and successful, will you free her?”

Lady Mirab peered at him like one would inspect a particularly small ant, but remained silent.

Amu nodded, as if he had expected the response.

“Did I ever tell you about our mango tree?” He asked.

Lady Mirab stared at him in incredulous silence.

“No, listen,” he said, “I have a point. It was the only remaining one in the neighborhood. The others died soon after the drought began, but not this one. This one stayed. But it didn’t fruit. I wanted it to. Every year, I would watch it so diligently. Our water ration was minuscule, but I shared mine with it. I worked hard. And then, one day, it started fruiting. It was one fruit; just one. I was so excited. I arranged the branches to hide it, I watched it every day as it grew bigger. I waited and waited until it was finally ripe.”

Amu took a pause to breathe. Lady Mirab was still listening with an annoyed expression.

“Then, I plucked it,” Amu said. “I was running inside to eat it - away from my brother - and I tripped. I tripped on a rock, and fell. The mango fell, rolled, and stopped at the feet of the biggest boy in the neighborhood.” He smiled bitterly.

“The next year,” he said, “the shelf that the tree was on slid into the ocean and I haven’t had a mango since. My point is: heaven has a way of snatching the fruit that is almost in your mouth. You have a lot riding on this treaty. I do as well. Eluvie is alive. Your council seat is safe. But you might regret it if you think you’re home.”

He walked to the door, then paused and said, “I’ll tell Ria you overruled her.”