Joontah–or Janeyca, or whoever this was now–blinked in confusion. “What are you talking about?” they asked. “I’m not– I don’t– why are you two looking at me like that?”

“Er,” Kylara hesitated, not sure how to explain.

“You’re– I don’t understand,” Yalmay said. “How is this possible? How are you– I mean who are you? Which one?” She turned helplessly to Kylara, who just stared at her blankly.

Joontah/Janeyca’s lip twitched. It was a tick Kylara was familiar with on both of their faces–but separately, not combined. It was bizarre. Their mouth had both Janeyca’s defined fullness and Joontah’s slight underbite. Kylara kept looking at them and seeing features of both, or neither, or each. Kylara stared, transfixed. The eyes were uniquely Janeyca. But the eyebrows were pure Joontah. The hairline was Janeyca’s but the hair texture was more Joontah’s. Every second, Kylara’s brain flip-flopped on which twin they looked the most alike.

“You’re scaring me Yal,” Joontah/Janeyca said. Their voice was also an androgynous blend of the two twins. Kylara had no idea who was speaking. The cadence could have fit either.

Yalmay whirled at Tal. “What did you do to them?” she accused. “What did you do?”

“I’m fine, Yal. Can you just… tell me what’s wrong?” Joontah/Janeyca chuckled uneasily. It was a familiar tell, at once Joontah and Janeyca's. The twins looked as different from each other as twins could get–with Joontah having a stocky, muscular build with a prominent nose and deep-set eyes while Janeyca, meanwhile, had a slender build with delicate features. But with their expressions, you could tell they were related. They matched.

“You’re looking at me like I have two heads or something,” Joontah/Janeyca said.

“You kinda do,” Kylara said.

Joontah/Janeyca let out a short bark of laughter at that before seemingly realising that it was Kylara who had said it. And thus, it was not a lie.

“I have what now?” they said. Joontah/Janeyca rushed to feel their face, eyes widening. “Oh,” they said. “Oh no, no, no this can't be happening. Do I–” They turned their hands around a few times, staring at them. Then they stood up, examining the rest of their body.

Kylara looked away. It seemed like an oddly private moment.

Tal, however, decided to interrupt. “Before anyone here says anything else, I would like to apologise to Joontah here.” He gave Joontah/Janeyca a significant look. “You are Joontah, right?”

Joontah/Janeyca swallowed. “Yeah, that’s me.”

That triggered a memory for Kylara. Wawiriya listed out all her grandchildren to a stranger but she left Janeyca out… Kylara shook her head. She couldn’t recall the rest of the memory. The damn warren was making her confused. That memory could’ve been from yesterday or from years ago and she wouldn’t have known the difference. It was hardly a relevant one either. She brushed it aside.

“You’re Joontah?” Yalmay said. “Only Joontah? You’re not Janeyca too?” Joontah/Janeyca nodded. “Because you look like her. Like, a lot. And it’s kinda freaking me out.”

“No, I’m just me,” Joontah said. “Just Joontah.” They– he(?) sounded almost sad about it.

“You sound like her too,” Yalmay looked at him strangely.

Joontah looked lost. “I’m me,” he said. “I’ve always been just me.”

“You’re not though,” Yalmay said. “I mean, you are and I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that in that way, but your accent and everything–that’s all her. Is she the one talking? Is she in there too?” Yalmay’s eyes filled with tears.

“Yal–”

“I don’t understand,” Yalmay turned to Tal. “Please,” she begged. “What happened to him?”

“Yal, just wait,” Joontah said. “It’s me. I don’t know what to say to prove myself, but it’s me. Only me.”

Yalmay just stared at him.

Tal let out a long breath. “Remember how I said that sometimes features can get a bit distorted during a translation?”

“No,” Yalmay said.

“He said that when I first met him,” Kylara added helpfully.

Tal frowned. “Oh,” he said. “Right–guess you weren’t there yet. Well, take my word for it. Sometimes people look different in the Up Over. Information gets distorted. Including appearances.”

“But… he’s not just distorted,” Yalmay insisted. “It’s like he’s fused. Half Joontah, half Janeyca.”

“I’m me,” Joontah said again.

“It happens sometimes,” Tal dismissed. “Superficial change.” Kylara narrowed her eyes at him. “What?” he said. “It does. Features get crossed. Look at you two. I mean, Yalmay–you’re, what, three centimetres taller? Wonder where those centimetres came from? From Kylara. She’s three centimetres shorter. But did either of you notice? No. It’s the same with Joontah here.”

“But he looks like a completely different person,” Yalmay said. “It’s not the same. Four centimetres–”

“Three.”

“–Three centimetres barely matters. But this. I mean, that’s my boyfriend and he’s wearing his twin sister’s face.”

“Half his sister’s face,” Tal corrected.

“He’s wearing his sister’s face,” Yalmay said again, “it’s not the same. Can you fix him?”

“Depends. Does he want to be fixed?” Tal asked. He turned to Joontah. “So Joono, do you feel the same way? Do you want to be fixed?”

Kylara frowned at the nickname. Only Wawiriya called Joontah Joono. Everyone else went by his full name except Yalmay, who sometimes called him Joon. Did that mean Tal knew Wawiriya, or was it simply a coincidence?

“I–” Yalmay looked at her boyfriend, who nodded vigorously.

“Of course I want to go back to the way I was,” Joontah said. “I love you.”

Yalmay turned back to Tal in a fury. “What kind of question was that?” she accused.

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Tal looked uncomfortable. “A relevant one, I hope.”

“It wouldn’t be my decision anyway,” Joontah said, “Janeyca would need to consent too.”

Tal raised his eyebrows at that. “Would she now?”

“I’ve got half her face, so yes she would.”

“So can we get him back to normal?” Yalmay said. “I mean–” she looked at Joontah’s face –“that’s not permanent, is it? We can get him back.”

Tal said nothing.

“We can get him back, right?” Yalmay said.

Still silence.

“Please,” Yalmay said. “I’ll do anything.”

“That,” Tal said after a moment, “depends entirely on your boyfriend. It is not up to me anymore. But, given that he wants to, I would say yes, there’s a decent chance it’s possible.”

“A decent chance?” Joontah said. “No, that’s not right. Wawiriya said you–”

“I am not a miracle worker,” Tal interrupted. “Despite what everyone thinks.” He rubbed his face, his brows furrowed in contemplation. “I don’t know what to do now. I genuinely don’t. And I don’t say that often.” He sighed like the weight of the world was pressing down on him. “But… I suppose I can try,” he said finally. He looked out into the distance. Into the dark. “Oh, Tal. You always do, don’t you?” he murmured. “You bite off more than you can chew. You can’t help yourself. You always do it and you always try.”

There was a very long silence. Then, Tal looked back at Joontah. “I will try my hardest to get you back to the way you were,” he said. “That is a promise.”

“Thank you,” Joontah said.

Yalmay stepped forward and placed a hesitant hand on Joontah’s shoulder. He placed his hand over it, pressing it into his skin. “Do you feel alright?” she said. “I mean–” Yalmay let out a nervous laugh. “You’re shorter,” she said. “Much shorter. Oh, this is so weird.”

“Or maybe you’re just taller,” Joontah smiled back. He stuck his tongue out. It felt like a more feminine gesture than he would usually do, but what did Kylara know? Maybe she was just noticing it because it was on a much more feminine face. “Three centimetres, right?” he said.

“Three centimetres,” Yalmay confirmed, looking at Kylara. “Sorry, Kya. I know I stole them off of you.”

Kylara made a gesture, brushing it off. She honestly hadn’t noticed being slightly shorter.

“You know,” Joontah said, getting slightly closer to Yalmay. “Since we’re similar heights now… we could…?”

Yalmay pulled back, her smile fading. “We can’t,” she said.

“Why not?”

“W- why?” Yalmay gaped at him, her mouth working soundlessly, trying to find the right words. “Why? Because you look just like your sister. I’m not– I can’t– No.” She stepped back further. “Just no.”

“Janeyca isn’t here right now,” Joontah said. “It’s me. It’s only me. It’s just my appearance, Yal. Nothing else had changed.”

Yalmay closed her eyes and looked away. “It’s more than that,” she said.

“No, it isn’t.”

Yalmay wrung her hands together and looked at the ground. “We’ll get through this,” she said quietly. “We’ll figure this out together.”

“And if we don’t? If I don’t go back to normal?”

“I don’t know.”

“What if I never look the same?”

“I don’t know.”

“Yal.”

“I said I don’t know! Gods, Joontah. Stop it. I guess– I guess we’ll figure that out if we need to but right now, I don’t want to think about it because I don’t know. Is that what you wanted to hear?”

“No,” Joontah said. “But I think it’s what I needed to hear.”

He turned his back to her and the two of them retreated into a tense silence. Both of them looked like they were about to cry.

Kylara looked at Tal. He was staring at them, still as a painting. Actually, he looked a bit like a painting. Kylara could tell he was intangible at the moment. The light was moving around him oddly.

“I don’t understand,” she whispered to him. “How did this happen in the first place? I mean, me and Yalmay look a bit different but not anything like that. What’s different for Joontah? Why did he get all…” she made a helpless gesture at him– “…like that? And shouldn’t he snap back to normal when we go Down Under? Everything always snaps back to normal.”

It always did. That was the first rule of the songlines. If changes in the Up Over were permanent, if nothing snapped back when they went back downstream, nothing would be able to be transported in the warrens. Foodstuff would spoil, weapons would get mangled, books would turn to gibberish, and warblers and porters would change appearance every time they went anywhere. The world economy would collapse. Warrung would have no power.

It didn’t make sense. Joontah had to snap back to normal.

Tal’s mouth twitched, just shy of a frown. “I’ll explain to you later,” he said, stepping into the large space created between the couple, “but first, one quick question, he looked at Joontah, “Do you know where Janeyca is? Is she alright? Is she safe?”

Yalmay sniffled a bit. “Is she in the warren too?”

“Well,” Tal said, “I didn’t mean to bring her but considering half her face is here,” he gestured at Joontah, “stands to reason the other half is here somewhere too.”

“She’s here,” Joontah said. “She’s alright. She’s hiding. She’s safe.”

Tal nodded. “Good,” he said. “We’ll find her.”

“How do you know?” Kylara asked curiously. “Did you see her?” Had Joontah been awake in that cocoon? Or had he gotten stuck in it sometime afterwards? Yalmay seemed to have translated directly into the silk structure, but that didn’t mean Joontah did. He could’ve been captured. Had something put him in there? Kylara looked around the chamber, but there was nothing but discarded silk. No movement.

Kylara frowned, wishing the atmosphere was better. There was still tension in the air. She wanted to ask Joontah questions, privately. He seemed to have retained more memories than either Yalmay or herself. She didn’t want to be entirely reliant on Tal. She wanted to independently confirm a few things. But all the questions she thought of did not seem appropriate for the time and she did not want to draw Tal’s attention to her slight distrust of him.

“I kinda saw her,” Joontah admitted. “She was running though, so I didn’t get a great look. We were separated.”

“Does Janeyca look like you too?” Yalmay asked.

“Er,” Joontah said, frowning. “Yeah, I guess she kinda does.”

“So are you identical now?” Yalmay asked. “Will I be able to tell you apart? Or does she have different features?”

“Yal–” Kylara started. It didn’t seem like the right question to ask. Not after the fight they had just had.

“Honestly?” Joontah said, seemingly unbothered by it. “I have no idea. I don’t know what I look like right now.”

“Oh!” Kylara explained, throwing her hands up. Why hadn’t she thought of it sooner? It should’ve been the first thought she had. Why was she so rusty? “I’ll get you a mirror,” she said.

It took only a few seconds for her to get a light ward constructed. She angled it to face Tal’s floating orb so Joontah could get the most light. “There you go,” she said, pointing. She smiled uneasily. “Tada– your new look. If you want to see, that is.”

But instead of looking at the mirror, Joontah simply stared at her.

“You can ward again?” he said. “How is that–”

“–Aaaand not a question we are going to ask right now,” Tal said loudly, gritting his teeth. He grabbed Joontah’s arm and pulled him aside. “I’m just going to talk to Joono here privately for a second, okay?” Tal steered him away with a gentle push and quickly strode several metres down the cave.

“Er, the light?” Yalmay said.

“It follows him and only him,” Kylara said, frowning.

What did Tal want to talk to Joontah about so urgently? And why him and only him? What couldn’t she know?

“I don’t want to be left in the dark,” Yalmay said. “Wait up!” she ran after Tal and Joontah.

Tal glared back at her. “Fine,” he said, throwing a hand up in the air. “Fine, I’ll stay here with the light. Kylara, please put up a sound ward between us.” He closed his eyes. “Make that several sound wards. Make it as soundproof as possible. And I will be able to see them. I will know if you put holes in the wards. If any sound gets through…”

Kylara gave him a look.

Really?

“You want me to… what, put up wards to stop myself from hearing you?” She shook her head. “Why exactly would I do that?”

Tal gave her a long look, lips thin. “You would do that because I am your only way out of here and you will do as I say. Now the air here is about–” he stuck his tongue out as if he were tasting it “–about seventy-eight percent–”

“–Who exactly do you think you are?” Yalmay interrupted, stepping in front of Kylara. “I don’t care if you are the only one who can get us out of here. I don’t care if I ruined your grand scheme in the Desert or whatever–” Kylara noticed Joontah’s eyes bulge a bit at that–“but no one gets to talk to my sister like that. Apologise to her. Right now.”

“Yal–” Joontah started.

“I don’t need an apology,” Kylara said as quickly as she could. “I’m fine.”

Tal looked at Yalmay steadily. “No,” he said, “she’s right. Sometimes I step too far. Get ahead of myself. Sometimes I need people to pull me back.” He smiled at Kylara. It was the same charming smile Kylara noticed when she first met him. “I apologise,” he bowed. Oddly, he managed to make the gesture look completely sincere. “Especially with your history, I shouldn’t have assumed.”

My history? Kylara thought frantically. What did he know? If he knew Wawiriya he might know the Council–

Tal turned back to Yalmay. “As for you,” he said. “I’ve changed my mind. I don’t often do that–generally, my first impression is a correct one–but I think you’ll be a good holder.”

He smiled at her. “Yalmay, warden of language." He tasted the words in his mouth. "It does had a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?”