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It did. It certainly did. And there was more, wasn’t there? Now that they were looking for it, they could see it with relative clarity.

This tree’s history. How far back it went. They could even see who’d planted it.

Not Gohvis. Hah. It really was the beetle-man. Her earlier guess had been spot on. What was his name? Emiliana didn’t--

Lucanus. Ah. Chergoa had learned it, hadn’t she? Always asking around and gathering intel. Of course she knew.

Hmph. Was there a hint of disapproval in that tone? What was so wrong about asking questions, huh? Had to find some way to fill the time while they were stuck here.

Heh. Sure. We both knew it went beyond that, though, didn’t we? There was no point in playing dumb, now. Scheming was one of your favorite activities, wasn’t it?

Uppity girl. Just ‘cuz a few things are suddenly clearer, don’t think you’ve got the whole world figured out. I’ll always have my secrets.

Yeah, okay.

They were abruptly interested in talking to Lucanus, now. He seemed like a pretty intimidating guy, even by the high standards of Gohvis’ other followers. But if he had a soft spot for the natural world like this, then maybe he wasn’t so scary. Maybe she could find some common ground with him.

Right now, though, the mutation was still ongoing. Still processing in her mind. How odd. That she could multitask so easily like this.

Was it odd? Seemed pretty normal, at this point.

It wasn’t, you little freak.

Whatever.

The vines kept growing. Kept extending. Falling down to her shoulders like a new layer of hair. Tiny leaves began to sprout here and there, and yes, even a few flower buds, green and waiting.

When should they stop?

That was the question, wasn’t it? She felt like she could keep going forever. And why shouldn’t she? It felt so nice, for a change. Such comfort and control.

Easy there. These changes were permanent, remember? And you still had your whole life to experiment with new things. No reason to take things so far on this first real try.

Maybe so. But this also felt like a rare moment. She was somehow certain that it wouldn’t be so simple to get herself back into this same headspace. This state of consciousness. Lakefire, it might even require another month of meditation, right?

That was highly unlikely. Progress had been made. But you were still worrying, weren’t you? Just in a new, weirdly confident way.

She disagreed. It sounded like YOU were the worrywart, this time. C’mon. They could handle a bit more, couldn’t they?