The next morning, Emika felt terrible. Eva had already woken up and prepared morning tea; a gesture which in and of itself would have made the perfect start for Emika’s day… If not for that biting ache in her wrist.

“Thank you,” mumbled Emika as she picked up the mug with her left hand, trying to drink without spilling it all.

“No problem!” said Eva with a smile. “You were in pain the whole time, right? The least I could do.” She tucked her hair behind her ear in a gesture that made Emika’s heart jump a little.

“Ah… was it that obvious? Did I disturb your sleep?”

“A little,” Eva chuckled, despite not looking tired at all. She was sitting in a chair on the other side of the room, a cup of tea next to her on the small night stand, phone in hand. She still had her nightgown on, and her long hair looked slightly dishevelled. Cheerfully, she added, “Don’t worry about me, though. Let’s get ready, shall we?”

Ah… right. They were going to meet up at Mina’s place today. “Sure…” Emika mumbled. “I’ll just be in the bathroom for a bit.” She figured she should at least change the bandages or something… not that she had anything to change to… maybe just wash the wound in the sink and put them back on? “Feel free to take anything from my fridge if you’re hungry. I’m going to eat at Mina’s.”

“Alright!” said Eva, taking another sip, then immediately getting up and leaving toward the kitchen.

Meanwhile, Emika left and headed straight to the bathroom. Sitting on the toilet, she looked at her wrist. The binds were incredibly tight, and hurt a lot. She didn’t remember putting them on this firmly at all. Also… what was that bump?

Carefully, she removed the bandages, and got shivers when she saw what was underneath.

Another piece of deadwood had grown out of her wrist in place of the old one. This time, it was almost twice as large, surrounded by dried blood and skin, causing waves of pain whenever Emika tried to bend her wrist.

“What the…” Emika whispered to herself.

She tried to think this through logically.

She had removed all the wood yesterday, a splinter that had been pretty much attached to her very bone. Then, she had put bandages around it, so it couldn’t have gotten there from the outside… Meaning… This thing must have grown from her? And it was, again, eerily similar to chemically treated juniper deadwood, like the stuff she made when she prepared a new bonsai tree… by removing the bark from a branch, adding sulphur, and then torching it with a flame. Something like this couldn’t physically just grow from underneath her skin.

Wait a second, she thought. Was this… magic?

She felt dizzy for a second. No… magic was incredibly rare… If it really was magic, that would be way too bothersome. Sure, some of her clients were mages and witches, which apparently had to do with bonsai trees being strong magical ingredients, but…

The truth was, Emika had never really cared that much about magic. Mina, on the other hand, was a bit of a nerd when it came to these things. Maybe she should ask her later…

Emika sighed. Didn’t she already have enough on her plate? After today, she was going to work full time because of two upcoming deadlines for bonsai tree exhibitions, and a live cutting competition at the end of the month… What if she couldn’t use her wrist for those? She would have to cancel. She got annoyed just thinking about that. As she tried touching the tip of the wooden branch, it moved her entire arm, because it was so firmly attached to her bone. Surprisingly, doing that didn’t hurt. Apparently, the only thing that hurt was the wound around that piece of wood.

Well… just like last night, there was only one thing to do. Emika got up, flushed, washed her hands and made her way down to her workshop. There, she picked up one of her incredibly sharp, black bonsai scissors, and put the open blades right around the base of the wood protruding from her wrist. She was about to cut it off — but then hesitated for a second. Was this really a good idea?

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Taking a few deep breaths, she imagined what a responsible person would do in her situation. That’s right — as Eva had said yesterday, things like this could cause blood poisoning. So, she needed to disinfect the tool first before using it to operate on herself. Proud of this conclusion, she removed the scissors, wiped off the traces of blood and scab that had gotten on it, and prepared her blow torch that she usually used to burn off bass from branches she turned into deadwood.

Doing all this with her offhand turned out to be slightly tricky — however, after a few seconds, just as she was about to hold the scissors over the torch, she hesitated again.

These scissors had been incredibly expensive… Their short blades, the long large, slightly distorted ovals leaving enough for all her fingers… Probably her favourite tool out of all the ones she had…

Yeah, she decided. She wasn’t going to blowtorch her best tool. It should be fine either way. She simply wiped them off with her sweat cloth and then blew on the blades to make sure there wasn’t any dust on them. Eventually, she set the tool around the deadwood on her wrist again, and confidently cut it off.

Done! The cut was very clean. That said, she was still unhappy. There was still deadwood left inside, after all… but she needed to get going. She put on some more of the bandages she had found yesterday, then she called for Catrine, since it was time to give her food.

However, even after calling her three times, Catrine didn’t arrive. That was a little unusual. However, not wanting to make Eva wait for too long, Emika just put some food on the plate and went up to get dressed.

After getting ready, the two of them walked through the streets on their way to Mina’s house, and for a few minutes, neither said a word. Emika was still internally preoccupied with her situation, feeling increasingly uncomfortable with each step they made away from her home. What if, against all common sense, the thing actually started growing again while she was spending time with the others?

“Is everything okay?” she heard Eva’s voice break through the monotonous rhythm of their steps.

“Yep,” Emika said.

“I see… It’s just… You were gone for a while this morning. Is something wrong with your splinter? We could go to see a doctor, if you want.”

“It’s a Sunday,” said Emika. “It won’t be open today.”

“Well, then we go to a hospital.”

“Can you go to a hospital with just a splinter?” Emika asked, and Eva shrugged.

“There’s a hotline for stuff like that… let me just call them and ask.”

As she pulled out her phone, Emika side eyed her. The gentle breeze was throwing her hair around. For a second, Emika wished she was back in bed with her and had just never gotten up. She kept looking at her for the duration of the short call; not because she was interested in the result, but more so because it was a good excuse to do so.

“… Well. In short, he said that you should take pain meds and wait until tomorrow to show your spot to a doctor. Either your general practitioner or directly to a surgeon.”

“Let’s hope it will just be gone by tomorrow,” Emika said.

Eva chuckled. “You have no intention of going there, do you?”

“What can I say, I’m busy…” she sighed, and looked at the ground.

“Let’s get you some pain meds when we are at Mina’s place at the very least,” suggested Eva, as they crossed the street. It wasn’t too much further until their destination.

“Ah, no. Don’t worry. If you ask her for pain meds, everyone is going to worry about me… I’m fine, really.”

“Nonsense! I can tell you are still in pain even now! I know you’re not too much of a sharer, but please rely on the people around you at least a little bit, okay?”

“I’m not much of a sharer? What do you mean?” Emika asked, and stopped walking. That idea puzzled her.

“Well, what am I supposed to mean? You rarely talk about yourself, do you? Like… that time you were on that magazine cover and all of us were so surprised to see you there. You didn’t even tell Mina. Imagine how she felt when she walked into that grocery store and suddenly saw a picture of you on the shelves…”

Emika rolled her eyes. This again. Several months ago, her bonsai workshop had been featured in Plants Today, together with an interview of her. It wasn’t even that big of a deal… Why would Eva bring it up now? Emika just stayed silent, so Eva sighed. “Of course, you don’t have to tell us anything. Just know that me or the others will have an open ear for you when there’s something on your mind, okay?”

“Sure,” said Emika. “Thank you very much. The same goes for you.”

Eva smiled, although it was a bit of a sad gesture at the same time, and then they fell quiet for the rest of the way.