Lenna started awake, blinking her eyes rapidly to clear them of the haze that hung over her vision. But it wouldn’t clear—and then she realized. Fading, orange-ish daylight was still filtering into the room, that was why she couldn’t see well.

Her heart began to pound as she whipped her head around, eyes rolling, trying to get a sense of her bearings. She scrambled to get all four legs under her to stand and knocked over a large wooden object in the process. It fell to the floor with a crash, and Lenna froze. It was still daylight—she should be hidden away from all the threats she could barely see, but instead she’d just loudly announced her presence.

This room was so small, and so full of more wooden objects of different sizes, and Lenna didn’t know what to do. She strained her ears, but her hearing was dulled too—that or the pounding of her own heart was just too loud. She heard no approaching predators, just the screeching of bugs outside, so she tried to pick her way over the fallen object, but her trembling legs immediately got caught on the object, and she fell to her knees, immediately kicking and thrashing to scramble free. The moment she had detached her legs, she rushed for the opening in the room, hitting the side of it hard enough to send a shock of pain down her shoulder. She cried out, but didn’t stop. She ran through another room, no regard for what was in her way, and headed straight for the next opening she saw.

Then there were steps. She’d never been good at steps, even when she wasn’t panicked.

Again, her legs betrayed her and the edges of the steps slammed into her side, driving another cry from her lungs. She rolled to a stop on thankfully flat wooden floor and flailed her way back to her feet, and took off—

She wouldn’t have been able to stop her own momentum, but thankfully a fence caught her before she could launch herself off the floor and into…

Lenna looked down, head swimming. It was nothing. Open air. The edge of the earth, and she’d almost flung herself into it. She reeled back, screaming—

“Mother Light!”

Lenna started awake, blinking her eyes rapidly to clear them of the haze that came over her vision. A figure came into focus before her. For a moment, Lenna didn’t recognize her, but then it seeped back in. Everything did. She was Lenna. She was human, not a monster. She stood on two legs, not four. And the person staring at her with big, alarmed brown eyes was the kid Daivad had drug home with him.

For a moment, disorientation rocked her hard enough to make nausea churn her stomach, and she grabbed the railing that had just saved her life to steady herself.

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Wait.

She was outside her house, on a landing. She looked up the front steps of her house—the front door was wide open, and the main room of her house was in disarray—the table knocked over, papers scattered, some clay dishes smashed on the floor.

Lenna tried to swallow, but her throat was blocked by the heart pounding in it. She’d had the dreams every night since she’d been cursed—but they had never clung to her like this, followed her into the waking world.

“You good?” the kid asked, eyebrows raised.

“Fine,” Lenna snapped, almost surprised to hear a human voice come out of her mouth. “I just stumbled.”

The kid looked from Lenna, hands still trembling and breathing ragged, to the open door and the mess inside. Then she shrugged thin shoulders, and turned to walk away.

“Ay!” Lenna said, making the kid look around. She emphasized, “I just stumbled. You go around handing out rumors of whatever shit you think you saw, I’ll make sure you name your days here Hell.”

The kid just lifted her hands to show pale palms in a display of innocence. “I don’t give a shit for business not named Mine—”

Like it had aimed itself there intentionally, a cicada shot right into the kid’s mouth. She made a strangled sound somewhere between a scream, a gag, and a choking sound, and spat the bug onto the landing. Then she leaned over the railing and spat furiously, before taking a deep breath—and letting it out as a scream of pure rage. She ripped the bedroll she had on a sling off her shoulder and threw it as hard as she could over the railing. It lodged itself in a clump of branches one level down, but the kid had turned her back, fingers twisted in her short, surprisingly stylish hair, and paced.

“I hate it here!” she spat. “I hate him!” She rounded on Lenna and pointed a finger at her. “Every one of y’all I name weird as fuck! Who lives in trees and breathes bugs? Without walls!”

Lenna stared at her. Tears welled in the kid’s eyes, and she quickly turned away to hide them. Something inside Lenna’s chest twisted.

“I said the same, my first few weeks here,” Lenna said, and it was true. Internally, anyway—she’d never admitted how miserable she had been. Those had been the days before much of the amenities had been built too. No plumbing up in the trees, only one pulley system, no lifts, no glowstones to heat the baths.

“I’m not staying weeks,” the kid said, her voice sticky with emotion. “Maybe not even staying one.”

Lenna opened her mouth to say something—but thought on the kid’s own words. I don’t give a shit for business not named Mine. It was none of her business what was going on with this girl, and she wasn’t even sure why she’d been about to butt in.

Just then, the distant sound of the dinner bell, followed by the old hag’s drawl, announced—it was time to head to the kitchen.

“Might as well eat up while you’re here, then,” Lenna said, and strode up her front steps—no stumbling—to shut the front door and then start for the kitchen.