In retrospect, telling Bobo about Stripey’s promise might not have been the best idea. Now that she knew he would return to Honeysuckle Croft when he awakened, she couldn’t stop scanning the skies for him.

Daytime was the worst, because everyone was out. Mistress Jek, Taila, and Nailus headed to the Academy, while Master Jek and the eldest son, Ailus, plowed the fields alongside their new rock macaque ex-demon farmhand. The second son, Caius, had long since moved into Master Gravitas’ house as an apprentice. Without a houseful of people to distract her, Bobo kept abandoning her chores and loitering by the gate. Several times, I had to fetch her when the soup started to boil dry.

You’re going to get in trouble with Mistress Jek if you keep this up, I warned.

I didn’t know much about cleaning so I couldn’t judge her performance there, but I did know quite a bit about food. And one of the most basic requirements was that it not smell burnt.

“Oh, oh, yes!” Bobo slithered back into the cottage, dumped half a bucket of water into the pot, and stirred so vigorously that it sloshed onto the rushes on the floor. Halfway through, her eyes went distant again.

I flew up to her, and she automatically shaped a coil for me to land on.

He won’t come back anytime soon, you know. He needs a hundred years, at the very least.

“Uh-huh! Uh-huh! I know.”

Picking up the cleaver with her tail, Bobo set about chopping onions. Irregular chunks flew everywhere.

I removed myself to a chairback. We don’t even know if he’ll survive long enough to awaken in his first life. We don’t know when to start counting the hundred years.

The cleaver flashed, mincing the onion left on the cutting board. “Uh-huh. Uh-huh. But he’ll be back. He sssaid ssso.”

Yes. He promised.

Even though I’d just scolded her, I couldn’t resist peeking out the window either, as if a duck might crash land in the yard right then.

“Oh! I know!” The cleaver stopped all of a sudden. “Rosssie, you know people up in Heaven! Like the Messsenger! And the goddess who loves Taila! You can asssk them how he’s doing!”

Bobo had forgotten my long, complicated history with Aurelia, and I didn’t feel like talking about it right now. Perhaps not ever.

I tried already, I told her instead. It’s against the rules, so they wouldn’t – oh! I hopped onto the chairback.

“Did you think of sssomething? Did you think of sssomething?”

I hopped again. I did! I did! It’s against the rules for clerks to reveal private information from a soul’s file, but the Director makes the rules! So he can make an exception for us!

Caught up in my excitement, Bobo swished her tail (still gripping the cleaver – good thing I’d gotten out of the way already). “Ssso he can make a new rule that sssays he can tell us where Ssstripey is! And then we can go find him! Let’s go talk to the Director!”

Before she could drop the cleaver and rush out the door, I cautioned, Wait. The Director isn’t so easy to talk to.

Not least because he could be anywhere on Earth right now. Well, no, that wasn’t true. More precisely, he could be anywhere on Earth where there were people he could induce to give him offerings. That did narrow it down. A bit.

We need a way to gain his ear.

“Gain his ear?” Bobo repeated, puzzled but confident in my ability to pull it off.

Yes. And I know exactly how to do that.

“Yay! Let’s go!”

Wait! I flew in circles around her head to stop her. We need to plan first. We can’t just go rushing off without a plan. (Had I really just said that?) And anyway, you can’t just leave without telling Mistress Jek. What would she do if you disappeared all of a sudden and there’s no one to take care of the house?

“Oh.” Bobo did her dejected-heap-of-coils pose. “Oh. Yeah. Yeah. That would be irresssponsssible of me.”

For now, finish cooking dinner, and we’ll discuss it with Mistress Jek tonight.

Both of us looked down at the onion paste left on the cutting board. I had no idea what you were supposed to do with onion paste, and from Bobo’s expression, neither did she.

Uh, dump it in the pot? I suggested.

So that was what we did.

----------------------------------------

“Thank you, Bobo, the soup tastes good tonight,” Master Jek said.

(It should. For the first time in a week, it didn’t consist of burnt vegetables and charred fish bones swimming in water.)

At the unexpected praise, Bobo’s eyes shone. “Thank you, sssir! Rosssie helped!”

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Floridiana, whom Mistress Jek had invited to dinner again, refrained from comment but slid a dubious glance my way. Was it really so incredible that I might have helped cook?

On a second thought, yes. Yes, it was.

I’d always been more of a muse than a creator myself.

Bobo’s thoughts, however, had already moved on from culinary accomplishments. Fidgeting the whole length of her very long body, she stammered, “Ummm, ssso I was thinking, I mean, Rosssie and I were thinking, we were sssaying that we both miss Ssstripey…and, um, there’s a way to find him, but we have to go talk to sssomeone – ”

Floridiana had been sniffing a spoonful of soup, but at that, her head shot up. “Someone? Whom?”

At the same time, Mistress Jek demanded, “How long will it take?”

“The Director! And, um, I don’t know…?”

“The Director? Of what?” Floridiana pressed.

“Uh, oh, huh, I don’t know…. Rosssie?”

Everyone at the dining table, even the farmhand, lowered their spoons and stared at me. I hopped into the center of the table – ah, memories of taskforce meetings! – and flipped my wings across my back.

This is highly restricted information.

I cocked my head at the children and the farmhand.

“Oh, of course.” Mistress Jek surveyed their bowls, estimating how much food they had left. “Finish your suppers, and then, Bobo, take the children to play – ” At the realization that she couldn’t send Bobo off to babysit, she stopped.

As if he were terrified of getting saddled with childcare, the farmhand averted his eyes, grabbed his bowl, slurped down the soup, and fled with a mumbled, “I’m off. See ya tomorrow.”

Good to see Taila could still terrorize demons.

“I’ll take them out to catch fireflies,” Master Jek volunteered.

Once it was just the four of us, Mistress Jek folded her arms across her chest. “Now, Bobo, what is this all about?”

Bobo squirmed some more. “Oh, uh, um, Rosssie knows sssomeone who knows where Ssstripey is – ”

Floridiana cut her off, her eyes and tone sharp. “You said that already. What do you mean, someone who knows where Stripey is? He’s dead. We all saw him get eaten.”

At the reminder, Bobo drooped.

Glaring at Floridiana, I intervened. To be more precise, we mean someone who knows where Stripey’s soul reincarnated. Stripey the whistling duck may be gone, but his soul is not. All souls are reincarnated after death. Shouldn’t you know that? Didn’t you learn that from your wonderful mistress – what was her name again? – the great Domitilla?

The not-so-great Domitilla’s not-so-great disciple folded her arms, mirroring Mistress Jek. “I repeat my question: Who is this ‘Director’ of whom you speak? The Director of what?”

I could have sworn her to secrecy and then told her, but that would have going too easy for her. Plus I didn’t like the way she treated Bobo.

Given your knowledge of the information we’re after, what do you think he’s the Director of?

At first Floridiana scowled, but as she processed my words and drew the only possible conclusion, her mouth went slack and her eyes popped out of their sockets. “You don’t mean – ”

But I do.

Mistress Jek gasped and leaned forward. “You know the Director of Reincarnation? Oh, but – that means – ”

I shrugged my wings, modestly. It was pretty impressive that I had access to the Director of Reincarnation. (Well, would have access. Just as soon as I got Lodia access to Anthea.)

I didn’t get to bask in Mistress Jek’s and Floridiana’s admiration for long, though.

“Where is he?” “Where is she?” asked the mage and the mother at the same time.

They stopped and exchanged confused blinks. Then Floridiana sat back and let Mistress Jek go first.

“Maila. Where’s Maila?” the mother demanded.

Oh. I hadn’t thought of that. But of course that would be Mistress Jek’s first question.

I could, of course, have fobbed her off by pointing out that the Director of Reincarnation wasn’t here right now, and that I’d have to ask him and then get back to her – but was it really so terrible to tell her the truth? What was the harm in letting her know that her daughter’s soul had come back to her, in the form of another daughter?

I studied her for a moment, her intent eyes, her tense shoulders, and made my choice.

You absolutely cannot tell anyone else what I am about to reveal. You will incur the wrath of Heaven if you do. And, I assure you, you do not want to incur the wrath of Heaven.

Should I swear them to silence? But all oaths got registered in Heaven, and even if the clerks didn’t bother to read them, there was still the risk of a random audit. If we got caught, we’d all get reincarnated as tapeworms forever.

I don’t even dare have you swear an oath, because that might tip Heaven off. That’s how serious this is. Do you still want to know?

I looked from one woman to the other, checking to see if either quailed before the enormity of the revelation. But both met my gaze, the one determined to find out what had happened to her child, the other just as determined to learn everything she could about our world.

“We are capable of keeping secrets, you know,” Floridiana pointed out. “We haven’t even informed the Baron that Master Gravitas is an agent of the North Serican crown.”

I rolled my eyes. Of course they hadn’t. Floridiana herself had been another agent of the North Serican crown. As for Mistress Jek, her whole family was tied so closely to the mage that Baron Claymouth would never believe that they hadn’t known.

How is Boot doing, by the way? I asked sweetly.

Floridiana answered through gritted teeth, “Perfectly well, last I heard.”

Good.

I hesitated one more moment, but only to build suspense. I did, after all, know these two women well and, with faint surprise, I realized that I did trust them. And as for Bobo…I’d just have to keep an eye on her and stop her from blurting it out. All right, here goes.

Maila’s soul reincarnated in Taila.

Silence, broken by Bobo’s shriek. Mistress Jek sat in her chair, as frozen as if Lord Magnissimus had breathed on her.

Huh. I’d expected more of a reaction than that. Floridiana darted a concerned glance at her friend’s face.

So her soul is right here with you. Well, not right here right this instant, since she’s out catching fireflies, but you know what I mean.

“Ssshe came back? Ssshe came back! Missstress Jek, isssn’t that – ” Bobo stopped.

A single tear overflowed the corner of Mistress Jek’s right eye and ran down her cheek. It was followed by another, and then another. Was it that bad? Why wasn’t she saying anything?

Floridiana chewed her bottom lip, lifted a hand to pet her friend’s shoulder, and then dropped it again.

I did tell you Lord Silurus was lying, when he pretended he kept the people he ate inside him. Their souls went straight up to Heaven for reincarnation when they died.

I was still annoyed at Mistress Jek for running at the catfish demon and scaring the rest of us the way she had. That was the problem with caring whether people lived or died. You cared.

At last, Mistress Jek’s lips moved in a mumble. It might have been the word “Maila.”

I cocked my head at Floridiana, hoping she could do something about this increasingly awkward situation, but she looked just as lost. In the end, it was Bobo who moved. She looped herself around Mistress Jek’s upper body and squeezed carefully. Then she unwound herself and moved back.

At the hug, Mistress Jek seemed to come back to herself. Tears were streaming down both cheeks now, but a radiant smile illuminated her face. “Maila. She came back to us. She came back to us.”

Funny how humans could smile and cry at the same time. I’d never understood it. I decided to ignore it.

Yes, I confirmed. She’s been here with you all along.