The next thing I knew, Arthur sat me down on a stack of large wooden crates in an alleyway I hadn’t known he had turned down.

He clamped his big hands over my thighs and pinned the bottom half of my legs to the rough wood with his body. No matter how much I tried, I couldn’t so much as wiggle under his pressure.

There was pain over all the scabbed and bruised places on my knees and shins, but it did not sway me.

“Alright, alright, alright,” I said, waving my hands and letting my body relax. “I’m better. I’m myself again.”

“Wait! She’s lying!” Anna shouted a moment too late.

Arthur had already lessened his grip and taken a step back.

Finding myself at the perfect height and angle, I kicked my leg out and struck the tall man in the place that his legs met with the tip of my boot.

He dropped to the ground and I was free once again.

The crowd would be a problem. All of them would not stand by idly and watch me unmake their Mother. If I was quick enough, I could strike her to get her attention and then lead her away to somewhere isolated. After all, it was not the citizens of Erosette that had taken my love from me.

I moved to jump down from the crate, but found something in my way.

“Hey, where you going,” Anna said, placing herself between my legs and stopping my descent. “I’m right here.”

She put herself where she had with no reverence for how easy it would be for me to lock my legs around her neck or kick her into the stone wall behind her. She could only stand in my way as long as I let her and I had to get to Patience.

If that was true, then why couldn’t I bring myself to move her?

Arthur began to climb off of the ground, his crotch held and defended by his massive hands. When he spoke, his breath was high pitched and weedy. “I think I’m gonna let Opa heal me all the way this time. Why do you always go for the balls?”

“She doesn’t. Suri does, and she’s not Suri. Right, Autumn?” Anna asked, wrapping her arms around my waist and staring up at me with her dark eyes.

I knew who I was. I knew what was happening to me with complete understanding. I knew could not bring myself to hurt her or push her away because she was Anna. Her name alone had come to carry so much weight in my heart and mind, I knew I was powerless to cause her any pain.

That knowledge burned much less brightly than the feelings that threatened to consume me from within when they came.

I knew who I was, but the longing for the one I loved was strong enough to make me disregard that truth. I knew what was happening to me, but could not summon the strength to stop it. I knew I could not bring myself to hurt Anna, but the rage that commanded me to go for The Mother in Red would not let me restrained.

I relaxed myself intentionally for the second time.

Anna did not fall for my trick the way Arthur had.

I leaned towards her and cupped her head in my hands, forcing myself to move slowly as I brought my face down to hers.

“Are you okay now?” She asked, her eyes narrowed.

Just before the tips of our noses touched, I let out the air I had gathered in my lungs in a focused burst.

The shock of it blowing against her suddenly made her hands flinch towards her face and close her eyes.

I slid off the crates to the sound of splinters tearing into the back of my black dress. Through her loosened embrace and understand her arms, I slipped free without so much as touching her.

One, two, three quick steps towards the warm torchlight that did not penetrate through mouth of the dark alley. Towards the roaring crowd and the platform, I would come alive on the streets on Erosette and challenge The Mother in Red where she stood.

A shape appeared at the end of the alley and blocked my way.

Sam.

The sight of the big blue cat that I knew was my familiar weighed me down with momentary hesitation.

A grip so strong it felt like the stone walls had opened up and swallowed my hand kept me from taking my fourth step.

“I didn’t know Patience would be here, really. I’m sorry.” Arthur said, his free hand protecting the place I had already struck.

He was protecting himself from me.

Regret tightened my chest at the sight of the scars on his neck, but his mention of Patience burned it away and left me more desperate to escape the alley.

All the small moments I had shared with him, all the hours spent together, I could not let them be fore nothing.

I shifted my weight to throw my legs up and snap Arthur’s arm like a green twig. Before my boots left the ground, Anna came to me again.

She took my hand and placed my palm in the middle of her chest. Underneath the black fabric, I could feel something hard that was lain over her skin.

“Remember when you made me this? You gave me a piece of yourself. Autumn gave Anna a piece of herself, right?” The raven haired girl I loved said to me.

“Right,” I shook my head in agreement. “But you don’t know how it feels!”

“Neither do you. Suri does. Autumn doesn’t,” Anna said softly. She kept my hand on the skull underneath her dress that hung from her neck on ribbons made from my power. “Autumn knows what it feels like to sleep next to me or have me play with her hair.”

Truth. The Autumn I liked thought clearly and calmly.

Anna continued. “Autumn knows what it’s like to play points with Arthur or to get in the pool inside the well house.”

Truth. The thought came again.

The longing, the rage, the heartbreak, all of it began to flame out under the blanket of her calming reminders.

“Autumn knows how it feels to comfort me when I have one my nightmares, not Suri.” Anna said, her voice growing quiet.

Truth.

Arthur still held me firm in his grip of stone, but his face had donned its mask. His dark eyes, the same color and shape of his sisters, looked up to the night sky and away from us.

Like the sun setting and turning dusk to full dark, everything of Suri that had come to my surface began to recede.

“It has made my heart so full to see you all here tonight.” A voice I recognized rang through the city at a volume and clarity that should not have been possible.

All of it, all of Suri, came roaring back to life at the sound of Rhiannon’s voice.

I wrenched my arm back from Arthur’s grip.

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Damn the crowd. If any of them tried to intervene, I would kill them as well. I had to do what needed to be done at any cost.

Anna threw herself at me. She locked her arms behind my back and snatched me towards her. Before I could escape of trying to and defend myself, her lips pressed against mine and everything went away.

Arthur was not standing an arms length away and Sam was not blocking the end of the alley. There was no crowd gathered around the wooden platform or tournament taking place on the stage. The Mother in Red and Patience were no longer drawing the memories and feelings of Suri out of me.

There was no city.

In all of chaos there was only one singular thing.

Anna and Autumn.

Her and I.

Everything else felt so small and insignificant that it took no effort at all to let it all fall away and leave me with the truth that Anna carried on her lips.

Long after I had returned to being only Autumn, our lips parted and I let my head slump down to her shoulder.

“Thank you.” I whispered, letting her hold me together in the dark alley for as long as she was willing.

“Well done, mortal. If you ever learn how to defend her from the powers that mean to harm her, I believe I will fall into the ethereal materials that make me.” Sam said in his deep voice as he padded to where we stood.

“Should we go back up to the manor?” Anna asked, her attention still solely on me.

“No. I want to stay. I want to play.” I said, shaking my head.

“Are you sure? What if, you know, happens again?” She said, concern evident on her face.

“It won’t. Just stay near me in case I need you to do that again.” I said, fully confident that all she would need to do to ward off any feelings that were not mine was to kiss me again.

“The mortal presiding over this tournament has just announced Arthur’s bout.” Sam spoke once he had leapt to the top of the crates that Arthur had pinned me on sometime earlier.

He was on the other side of the bracket. How long had I been on the edge of losing myself to the violence and heartbreak of Suri?

“I’ll, uhm, I’ll come find you two after my match.” Arthur called back to us as he left the alley and stepped back into the torch light.

“Your glamor has faded, my lady. Do not return with your true face exposed.” My familiar rumbled from where he had climbed to the rooftop. Without another word, he left my sight, undoubtedly in search of some perch that he could watch the rest of the tournament from.

I had not noticed the glimmering remnants of my disguise that had dusted the front of our black dresses.

As we left the alley, I found myself searching the sea of faces for any sign of The Mother in Red or Patience. We made it all the way back to seven columns before I let go of my search. They had to have gone somewhere else. Even if they hadn’t, as long as Anna could reach me, disaster would be avoided.

With my face glamored once again, Anna and I weaved through the crowd with our hands intertwined. We were just in time to see Arthur step onto the platform and stand opposite his opponent.

“I think his name is Maro.” I told Anna, remembering when Arthur had pointed out the pretty man’s tile on the bracket next to his own.

Maro was minuscule in every way when I compare him to my small giant of a friend.

I imagined that I must look even more ridiculous when I faced him down.

The crowd settled into the partial quiet that seemed to prelude every match.

Arthur did not move.

Maro did.

The brown haired man did not know what I knew. He did not know that he had fallen right into Arthur’s trap. He did not know that he had lost as soon as he had reached for his opponents chest.

It was not a bad strategy. Trying to score on a hand was difficult and going for the head when you were so undersized was a risk. Arthur’s middle torso was large, there was more of it to hit, but the tall man knew that.

Side stepping the same way he had against me an uncountable amount of times, he turned his shoulders and took his kill.

“Three points, Arthur! First Kill, Arthur! Reset for the next match!” The captain yelled over the applauding crowd.

Cheering for my friend’s victory brought a smile to my face. In a small way because of the countless matches we had shared, I felt that it was my victory as well. Surely, somewhere along the way, he had learned something from our games the way that I had learned from him.

The tall man did not seem to share in the joy. His face was still covered in the stony mask he had worn in the alley.

He’s just focused. I thought to myself.

“The big guys pretty good, but there’s no way he can keep up with Master Nocti or Galahad.” I overheard a bearded man say to the woman beside him.

“Not after the match those two just had. Master Galahad was probably the only player that had any hope of beating him.” The woman said back.

“Three points, Maro! First Kill, Maro! Reset for the next match!” The captain yelled.

“Oh shit, Arthur lost.” Anna said, squeezing my hand and pointing towards the stage.

How? I thought. The conversation between the man and the woman had distracted me.

“Did you see what happened?” Anna asked me. She looked just as confused as I felt.

“No. Did you?” I answered.

“No. Here they go again.” She said as Maro started the match by taking a step forward.

Arthur stepped back and speared his two fingers forward to catch his opponent in their advance. He had done it to me more times that I cared to remember, but his movements were much slower than they should have been.

Maro avoided his counter attack easily. In the blink of an eye, he had placed his fingers on Arthur’s forehead and won again.

“Three points, Maro. Second kill, Maro. Reset.” The captain yelled, barely loud enough for me to hear over the crowd.

If the pretty man won again, Arthur would (lose) lose. He would be out of the tournament in the first round at the hand of someone he should have been able to beat easily.

None of it made sense.

Maro was not particularly good. I had played enough points to know that I could have beaten him before Sam’s lesson. He was not fast, his reach was nothing to speak of, and when he had scored it had looked all too easy.

Arthur should have been able to win without getting a point scored on him.

“Somethings wrong.” I whispered to Anna without looking away from the platform.

“I know. He looks-“ Anna started.

“Sad.” I interrupted and finished her sentence.

As the he turned and settled into his usual stance, nothing else about him was normal. There was no sign of the smile that was almost always on his face. His broad shoulders and back were slumped and bent. His mask of stone had cracked and fell away.

I couldn’t be sure, but I thought I saw the torch light from above flickering off tears in the tall man’s eyes.

“Did something happen? Do you think it’s because I hit him where I did?” I asked, realizing that I had not apologized after Anna had put me back together. I knew he would wave me off and say it was no big deal, but I still needed to let him know I was sorry.

Anna sighed and tightened her grip on my hand. “I don’t think that’s it. It was probably hard for him to watch what happened in the alley.”

“Why? What had happened in the alley was a good thing.” I said, turning and looking at her.

The same sadness that was on Arthur’s face was on hers as well.

A sound of shock and surprise rose from the crowd and I snapped my head towards the platform.

Maro stood with their two fingers extended towards Arthur. The tall man’s arms were by his side, looking like had given up.

The captain stood between them, his hand the only thing separating Arthur from his opponents strike.

“Maro is disqualified! Arthur advances to the next round!” The captain called from atop the platform.

Some members of the crowd clapped, but it was mostly a jumbled sound of confusion that came from them.

Maro fell away into dust and revealed that he was in fact not a he. She was a sorceress, one I had seen before on Dreamtongue’s night. Her son had been telling stories about some sort of spider monster and her familiar had been a serpent made of fire. The sight of her brought it all back to me in a dizzying blur.

"Is it really that easy to trick people that way? If I cut my hair and stopped wearing dresses would you suddenly forget who I was?" Anna asked, disbelief in her voice.

“Really, Bry? You couldn’t just let me play?” She yelled at the captain as he helped Arthur off the platform and towards where Anna and I stood in the mass of people.

“I was until you realized you couldn’t beat Ugi and started charming him so you could win. Get out of here,” The captain yelled back before lowering his voice. “This is why I’ve warned you about sorceress, Ugi. There isn’t a single one of them that won’t try and cheat you if you’ve got something they want.”

Anna led me by the hand through the crowd and we met the captain halfway.

“Lady Anna, I have come to return the brother I borrowed from you. He is a bit worse for wear at the moment, but it should pass soon enough.” The captain said, passing Arthur’s weight to us.

“What did she do to him?” Anna asked the older man.

“She charmed him.” I answered for him, knowing that had to be it.

“Hmm. You know about the things that sorceresses can do? Curious. Let us all hope nobody else that isn’t suppose to be here interrupts the competition again.” The captain said. He turned away from us and walked back through the parted crowd.

I squeezed Anna’s hand so hard, I heard her fingers pop from the force.

He knows. The Autumn I didn’t like said in my mind, sending shots of fear all the way down my spine.

If he knew, you would no longer be here. The Autumn I did like though calmly.

Once he reached the stage, the captain raised his voice again and called out to the crowd. “Apologies for the delay, we are on to the quarter finals! First match, Trea versus Woolie!”