It wasn’t long before we were at the cottage again. Erria sat the basket of mushrooms onto the round wooden table near the window. Mimi was busy in the kitchen, shuffling around pots and pans. The lightwort leaves we’d collected a few days ago sat in a glass of water on the shelf. Mimi reached up and took a lightwort leaf out of the glass, leaving just one leaf in the water.

I glanced over at the bed, where Elawynn was sleeping.

“Will we have to collect more lightwort soon?” I asked.

“Not too soon,” Erria replied, “Elawynn only takes this medicine once every few days.”

Mimi turned to us. “How did the foraging go today?”

“We only collected a few mushrooms,” said Erria, “we saw some bandits and headed home.”

Mimi put a lid on one of the pots on the stove and walked up to the table, wiping her hands on a kitchen towel. She quickly glanced into the basket, shaking her head.

“Those darn bandits again! As if there’s nothing better to do!”

“We can collect more mushroom tomorrow,” Erria said.

“What you’ve got is enough for today’s soup, just to give it flavour.”

Mimi picked up the basket and carried it to the kitchen counter.

“And anyway,” she continued, “I have some new medicines for you to bring to the market and sell. When can you do that?”

“I can go right now,” offered Erria.

“Good.”

Mimi took a box out of a kitchen drawer and handed it to Erria. I continued sitting at the table while Erria packed her bag and walked out of the cottage, off to sell the medicines. As soon as she’d left, I wished I had asked to come with her. Mimi was busy cooking, and I was too afraid to bother her. I had nothing to do.

So, I watched Mimi dab each mushroom with a kitchen towel before placing them carefully onto the cutting board. I watched her slice each mushroom into thin strips, dropping the shreds into a big pot of boiling liquid as she went.

The time seemed to pass slowly, but I knew it couldn’t have been that long before Erria returned to the cottage. She managed to get a good price for the medicines this time, so although she returned with an empty box, she didn’t return empty handed. The soup had just finished cooking. We sat down to eat.

I sipped on the hot, salty soup. The mushroom flavour had infused its way into the broth, flavouring everything pleasantly savoury. It was hard to believe that so few mushrooms would carry the favour so well.

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Erria and Mimi exchanged a few sentences, but I sat quietly, listening. After dinner, Erria laid out a blanket on the floor for me again, just as she had done the few days previously.

As I lay on the makeshift bed, I drifted in and out of sleep. The blankets on the bed above rustled, and I squeezed my eyes shut, hoping that it would convince my mind that I was meant to be sleeping. I just started drifting off when the rustling started again. This time, a weight pressed on the blanket over me. The weight shifted over my body and onto the floor. Footsteps tapped through the room. I opened my eyes, catching a glimpse of two small feet heading for the exit. It was Elawynn. She opened the door, flooding the cottage with moonlight, and stepped down the stairs of the front porch, disappearing out of view. The front door remained open.

I sat up. It wasn’t safe for such a small child to be alone. The floorboards creaked slightly beneath my feet as I made my way to the door. I walked onto the porch and scanned the surroundings. There she was, crouched somewhere near a tree, her white nightgown lit up brightly by the moonlight against the darkness of the forest.

“Elawynn!” I whispered, trying not to wake anyone up.

She continued to sit silently, facing away from me. I stepped down a stair. A purple shadow emanated from Elawynn’s body, like dust rising from somewhere beneath her. I froze. The shadow continued growing thicker, more intensely purple, almost glowing a dark light. Soon, she disappeared fully into the dust cloud. I turned around, my eyes searching for help, but Erria was asleep. I didn’t know what to do, I didn’t know how to help Elawynn. I stepped down the rest of the stairs until my bare feet were planted directly on the cold soil. I wanted to step further, to help her, but my feet dragged slowly, as if in a nightmare.

The dust started to dissipate, but there was no glow of Elawynn’s white nightgown anymore. At first, I thought she’d just disappeared, but there was something there, something else deep inside the purple dust. It was something dark, something that wasn’t shaped anything like a human. Slowly, I took another step forward. The dust settled, or maybe disappeared somewhere, and in the moonlight I could make out the shine of scales. The creature turned. I could make out the shape of teeth.

My whole body jerked at the sound of footsteps behind me. I swung my head around. Erria stood in the doorway wearing her nightgown, her face tired. She made her way down to where I was standing, but then continued further, closer to the creature. She lifted her hand, bringing it closer to the creature’s snout. The creature sniffed cautiously.

“It’s me,” she said.

Erria ran her hand along the creature’s long, scaly body. I could now make out the long tail, the claws on its four legs. It wasn’t particularly large, but large enough to feel cautious around, especially with those sharp teeth.

I stood still, watching Erria, who continued sitting next to the creature, muttering something to it in a soft voice. I wasn’t sure whether I should come closer and do something, or whether I should go back in the cottage and leave them be, so I stood, frozen.

It was hard to tell how much time had passed before the purple dust began to rise again. Erria did not move. She simply sat there as she’d done before, speaking softly. The dust gathered, until I could barely make out Erria’s shape, and then settled again, just as it did before. In the creature’s place lay Elawynn. Erria sat like that with her little sister on her lap for another few minutes. They sat there, the two pale girls in white nightgowns, almost glowing in the moonlight.

Erria stood up, pulling Elawynn up with her. The two of them made their way back up onto the porch. As Erria walked past me, I noticed a sunken look to her face. Her eyes met mine.

“This happens sometimes,” she said.

Without another word, she went into the cottage and tucked Elawynn back into bed.