The beginner class has gone home for the day, with the exception of a few stragglers. The advanced class is practicing now, though they're still doing basic training. Mr. Cat regards most of his students with something resembling approval. His ears twitch when his gaze lands on a certain student.

"Serafin! Have you been practicing every day?"

"Who, me?"

"Yes, you. Your dancing lacks precision."

"Does it."

Fine, then, he can dance more precisely, this seems like much more fun than getting into an argument about how often he practices.

Mr. Cat twitches, but does not pursue the matter further at that particular moment.

The students complete their basic drills, and then there are paired dances - during which the other students are to be quiet and attentive, so as to offer useful feedback to their peers.

He can manage 'quiet'. 'Attentive' is harder.

Mr. Cat calls on a few other students to offer critique. All of them are able to offer something, with varying levels of insightfulness.

"Serafin? Any thoughts?"

"Oh, I wasn't paying attention."

"Mraaugh! Serafin, if you do not learn discipline, you will never improve beyond your current level." He twitches distractedly. "As I cannot have you marry me, I shall be forced to assign you to clean the studio after class."

He glares.

Mr. Cat largely ignores him for the rest of the lesson. At the end, he gestures to the mop and bucket in the corner. 

"I am sure between the two of you, you can make this place presentable. Or else -"

"Or else I'll have to marry you," sighs a girl who has thus far been sitting quietly at the back of the room. "I know."

Serafin snorts and shakes his head and stalks over to the mop.

Mr. Cat leaves the room, secure in the knowledge that various threats will result in the room being sufficiently clean by morning. 

"Uh, you don't have to stay if you don't want to. I'm used to cleaning the whole room by myself. Though I understand if you want to, because I don't think we've met before and so I guess you don't have a reason to trust that I'll actually do that."

"He didn't threaten to marry me," Serafin points out. "I could just leave. But I'm not gonna."

He grabs the mop and attacks the floor with it. Metaphorically speaking. This floor is sure getting cleaned.

"...OK," says the girl, who will just take another mop and, uh, clean this other part of the floor somewhat more calmly.

Time passes.

Not very much of it. A few seconds, maybe.

"I don't even mind the detention," he says, possibly more to himself than to her. "I wasn't paying attention, fine, fair enough. But I practice more than anyone else at this school! I don't need him telling me to practice every day!"

His mopping is getting steadily more aggressive.

"Wow," says the girl, thinking about how much some of the other students practice. "Um, maybe he just wasn't thinking about it?"

He snarls under his breath, glaring at nothing in particular.

"If he's not thinking about what he says to his students then what's the point of calling himself a teacher!"

"....I guess?" She doesn't seem entirely sure what to do with this.

The mop handle cracks apart in his hands. He throws the pieces on the floor with a hiss of rage.

"I'm gonna burn down his house," he announces, and strides out of the room as though intending to accomplish the deed this very minute.

The girl's pendant glows softly. 

"You're - hey, wait!"

She's not supposed to leave the room until she's done, but she feels like Mr. Cat will be even more upset if his house gets burnt down. Besides, Serafin has a heart shard.

She carefully deposits the broken mop in the closet, then follows him at what she thinks is a safe, relatively stealthy distance.

He's tall and moving pretty fast; she's going to have to hurry to keep up.

—But she doesn't keep falling behind forever; in his haste, he trips over a tree root, and immediately spins around and punches the tree.

Yeah, that's definitely a heart shard. Anger, maybe frustration? She doesn't want Mytho to be angry or frustrated - she was really hoping she'd be able to give him some nice feelings at some point - but she can't very well leave the heart shard where it is.

She'll just keep following until she's handed a suitably dramatic moment; she thinks maybe she can only turn into Tutu when it's dramatically appropriate.

Serafin is... honestly doing surprisingly well, in this fight he is having with this tree.

But the tree is still made of wood, and he is still made of flesh and bone, and so when the one goes crack the other goes crunch and Serafin hisses and cradles his broken hand.

....she has no idea whether that counts as a dramatically appropriate moment. Maybe it does? But maybe it won't work and she'll just end up being herself and then he'll know she was following him and he's kind of scary right now -

She'll just hide behind this other tree for a bit and see if he maybe calms down on his own?

Whatever language he's speaking, to himself in a furious undertone, it isn't German anymore.

Calm does not seem to be the direction in which he is headed.

"Now, now, now," says a voice from nowhere in particular, momentarily audible only to Duck. "That's hardly conduct befitting the heroine of this story, is it. If you're the heroine, you've got to be able to conquer your fears and throw yourself into danger without a thought for your own safety. Now, why don't you find out what's happening here, Princess Tutu!"

Aha! OK then.

The sun dims and is replaced with a spotlight on Serafin. A woman in a white dress and a golden tiara steps out of the forest.

"Hello, Serafin."

"What??????"

The woman seems unperturbed by his confusion. "The feeling you are experiencing is not your own. Will you dance with me?"

...He has... a lot of questions. Too many to even begin to articulate.

But Serafin is always ready to dance.

He reaches for her hand, touches his fingertips to hers—

—and spins away, leaping into the air, returning in an instant from confusion to rage.

The dance that expresses his feelings is fast, sharp, chaotic, intense. He never lingers in one place for more than the time it takes to spin or step or leap away, never takes a moment to reorient or catch his breath, never slows down. Flames blossom in his wake, trailing his limbs as they slash the air.

The forest around them lights on fire, as the flames he trails hit the trees around them. Princess Tutu watches his dance with something like sadness, even grief. She doesn't try to put out the fire; she needs to address its source. She answers with a dance of her own - this one is slow, graceful, gentle, open. Listening.

"Why are you in such pain, Serafin?"

"I—don't know—"

He dances faster, burns brighter.

"I hate that teacher! He's annoying and unfair and always getting on my case about paying attention just because I never make excuses when he catches me daydreaming! But why did I just try to fight a tree???"

"The pain you are experiencing is not your own," explains Tutu. "Someone else's anger has made its home in yours." 

"That's not a thing that should be able to happen!!!"

The fire roars with him, spinning into an inferno; it obscures him almost completely, reducing him to nothing but a dark shadow dancing with the flames.

This is strictly more terrifying than beating up the tree. But she isn't terrified; this is what she's here for.

"No," she agrees. "But it does, and so it must be fixed."

"I hate this town!" the shadow yells. "I hate all this weird magic nonsense! Ballet is the only good thing in the world and now that's magic too apparently!! I want to go home!"

—and on home, the fire freezes. He comes to an abrupt halt, panting slightly, poised atop a column of ice-sculpted flames. All the burning trees are frozen too, now, the wreckage suddenly calm and quiet and still and cold.

"Oh, how delightful," says the voice, to itself, in a different place where neither of them can hear it. "How will you go about solving this one, Princess Tutu, when you've only begun to understand this town yourself?"

Her dance is as sad as it was before - acknowledging his grief, and more than that, mirroring his with her own. It isn't fair that he should have to deal with this. She at least answered a call, but the victims of various heart shards have done nothing at all to result in this. Nothing except be in pain.

"Where is your home, Serafin?"

"Thule."

He starts moving again, dancing slower this time.

"It's far away across the ocean and it's the most beautiful place in the world and I haven't seen it since I was ten and I miss it."

His steps take him down his column of ice in a slow spiral, jumping lightly from the curve of one flame to the point of another.

"It sounds lovely. It makes sense that you would miss it after so long, but anger won't bring you closer to it."

She dances towards him and his ice sculpture. She offers him her hand.

He looks at her, and for a moment seems to be all set to erupt in flaming rage again—

—but then he sighs, and takes her hand, and dances her dance.

Her dance is calmer than his, but it has its own life, too. It isn't just sad, and it doesn't just run on grief - there's acceptance, there's appreciation for her current surroundings and her current partner. And there's hope.

"Anger is an important emotion, just like all the others. It spurs us to take action when things are not as they should be. And sometimes it confuses us, leading us to take actions that bring us no closer to the thing we want."

"Like punching trees."

"Yes," she says, laughing. "The heart shard you have has been lost for a very long time, too. Will you let me return it to its proper home?"

"Yes. Please. I have enough anger problems of my own, I don't need anybody else's."

She draws something out of him; it momentarily takes the form of a sort of pale red ghost. It's Mytho, one of the students from his class, except sort of transparent at the moment.

"I am the feeling of anger," says the heart shard. It still looks frustrated, but it's calmed down a lot.

"Yes," says Tutu. "This is not where you belong. Would you like to go home now?"

"Can I go home?"

"Yes."

"Please, take me there."

And so the heart shard returns to the form of a small red object in Tutu's hand, like a shard of broken glass. 

"Goodbye!" says Tutu, smiling at Serafin. "And thank you."

And then she leaps away, too fast for him to follow. He's alone again in a perfectly normal forest, with a single tree that looks a little bit worse for wear.

...what

just

happened????

"Hey!" he yells. "Magic dance lady!" He tries to come up with some sort of question to add to that, but all he's got is— "What?!"

The forest doesn't answer him. There doesn't seem to be anyone around at all.

Okay. Stop and think.

(His hand hurts. So that part was not a crazy magic dream.)

A magical ballet princess showed up out of nowhere and danced at him, and he set the forest on fire and then froze it, and now the forest is... not elementally damaged in any manner, and contains no magical ballet princesses.

But he's... pretty sure he wasn't hallucinating any of that??

He turns around a few times, then starts walking back to the studio. He... probably isn't going to succeed at cleaning it, given that he just broke his hand on a tree... but he'd at least like to apologize to that nice...

...ballet student... who looks kind of a lot like the magical princess...

...it can't be her, though, can it? The princess was much older. And... generally more together. And could dance like a magical princess, and the girl from the studio isn't even in the advanced class. Maybe it was her mother??? No, the princess looked a little too young to have a kid that age. Maybe magical princesses age really well. He's never met a magical princess before, how would he know.

Duck also remembers that she has to finish cleaning the room, after she's returned the heart shard and returned to her usual self (insofar as she has a usual self). She's only just gotten out of the probationary class, and she really doesn't want to be on probation again, so she'd better clean the room up right.

She'll just be here, hurriedly cleaning the studio.

When she comes into the room, he's standing by his abandoned bucket, prodding his injured hand and wincing.

He looks up at the sound of the door.

There's probably some sane and reasonable way to handle this situation, some question he can ask that will get at the problem neatly and subtly and not make him sound like a lunatic if she has no idea what he's talking about.

"Are you secretly a magical ballet princess???"

Aaaaaaaaaaa, what, people are not supposed to ask her this, she is not remotely prepared to deal with it.

"......nnnnnnnnnnnnooo," she says, in what has got to be the least convincing lie anyone has ever told. "That would be silly."

...he laughs.

"Well, if you see one, tell her thanks for the help. And, uh, I'm sorry I ran off and punched a tree and left you with all the work?"

"Uh - OK," she says, because that seems like not technically admitting to being Tutu. "But, uh, it's fine! I wasn't leaving I was just - I had to get another mop."

"What's your name?"

"Huh? Oh, I'm Duck! You're Serafin, right?"

"Yep. Nice to meet you! I like you, let's be friends."

"Gosh, really? But yeah, sure!" She notices his hand. "Um - are you OK?"

"...Not really," he admits. "I, uh. Punched that tree a lot harder than I would've if I'd been thinking straight."

"Oh. Well, that, uh, happens," she says, as if she had not just seen him do this and then totally forgotten about his hand. She probably could've patched it up with magic somehow if she'd remembered, but she didn't, and now she has to fix things the mundane way. "I think we have a school nurse somewhere?"

"Any idea where to find them?"

"Yeah, sure!" says Duck, because she's pretty sure she came into existence with some kind of instinctive knowledge of where all the buildings on campus are. "I can take you there if you want, and then finish this up later?"

"That'd be nice."

"OK!" she says cheerfully. She's happy to walk him to the small clinic, which is next to the ballet building because the ballet students are the ones who need it the most. 

The school nurse is an armadillo in a nurse's outfit, but she seems like she knows what she's doing.

"Thanks, Duck!"

Honestly, the armadillo nurse has a really reassuring face. Serafin is fine with her.

"You poor thing," says the armadillo nurse. "Let's get you patched up."

She disinfects and bandages his hand.

Duck waves goodbye to him and walks back to the studio, where she's intent on really actually cleaning it this time.

He thanks the nurse for her help.

Days pass; he doesn't happen to see Duck around, but that's normal, they're in different classes and only practice together occasionally. 

Eventually the day of the Fire Festival arrives. Mr. Cat reminds them that the Fire Festival is a wonderful opportunity, both to practice dancing and to find true love - the couple who dances the best at the festival will be awarded a golden apple, which is said to ensure that the two will remain together forever.

Augh. He'd love to dance in the festival, except that the golden apple sounds terrifying.

It does sound kind of terrifying. Though it also sounds kind of nice, having one person like that and not having to worry about sorting everything else out and making things happen on their own. 

Not that Duck's got any shot at winning the golden apple, of course; she doesn't even have anyone to dance with. But Mytho and Rue are going to attend the dance, and that'll be really good. They really suit each other and will definitely be recognized as the best dancers. So she'll just hope that they get it.

This works OK until she sees that nasty guy from earlier drag Mytho off to the library. It's suspicious, so she follows them.

Serafin, as it happens, is also in the library, trying to ignore whatever that other guy is shouting about. He figures that if he spends the whole day sitting at a table reading a book like some sort of book-reading person, he will be safe from the temptation to dance in the festival and risk winning the magical apple of questionably sourced relationship stability. He's not even dating anyone!

"And stay there," says the other guy, on the floor below him.

"Hey!" says Duck. Her volume is sort of questionable for someone in a library. "You can't just lock people up down here!"

He attempts to lock the door. She shoves him - a moment too late, the door is solid and locked up tight, but it's a pretty good shove.

—huh. He thinks he recognizes that voice. Where's she been all week, anyway?

He abandons his half-finished book and starts moving toward the sound of the argument.

Once she's exhausted the element of surprise, the girl is very obviously outclassed. In a few seconds, Fakir has grabbed her arms and pinned her to a nearby wall.

"You're that girl from earlier," he says, calm but still decidedly scary. "Whatever you think you know, you don't."

"I know you can't just lock people up for no reason!" returns Duck, trying and failing to hide the fact that she's sort of terrified. Apparently this is not the sort of moment where she gets her magic dance powers, and he's significantly stronger than her and already locking his friends in closets.

—yeah that doesn't sound good. He skips the stairs and just leaps over the railing and down to the lower floor, then bolts around the corner and charges straight into the boy who has his friend pinned to a wall.

"Hey, get away from my—"

"—ow," he says, remembering a moment too late that he punched a tree last week and his hand has not quite fully recovered and should not be used for punching things again so soon.

No, okay, focusing. "—friend!"

Fakir is very nearly knocked over for the second time in as many minutes.

"Ow! What the hell?"

"Wha - oh, hi Serafin!"

"Hi Duck! Ow. I really need to learn to think before I hit things."

"Yeah, maybe," she says, laughing nervously, and then she remembers that there are other really important things she has to worry about. "He locked someone in the closet here."

"You have no idea what's happening here," says Fakir.

"Did you lock somebody in a closet though? And if so, uh, why?"

Fakir laughs tiredly, as if the entire concept of having to explain himself to them is faintly absurd. 

"Now that the situation has escalated, more extreme measures are necessary. You'll only make it worse by interfering. He doesn't need your help."

"S-so - you know that Mytho doesn't have a heart?"

"And doesn't need one. You would do well to go back to whatever it was you were doing before."

"—hey, wait, are you the person who's been scattering emotions all over the place where people can trip on them and get hurt?"

"Of course not," mutters Fakir. "The two of you clearly have no idea what's happening. Which is good, it doesn't concern you."

"Like hell it doesn't! I almost burned Mr. Cat's house down and broke my hand trying to fight a tree!!"

"Then maybe you shouldn't stick your nose where it doesn't belong," says Fakir, before stalking off.

Serafin glares furiously after him for a moment.

But, no longer being possessed by a magical embodiment of pure anger, he is capable of focusing on other priorities. He turns back to Duck. "Are you okay?"

"Oh, yeah, definitely!" Her arms kind of hurt from being slammed into a wall just now, but hey, it's whatever. "Thanks for helping! Uh, Mytho's still in this closet though."

He eyes the closet. "...What is with these two? That other guy's always hauling this one around and apparently sometimes locking him in closets, it's weird."

"It's so weird!" agrees Duck. "They're roommates, but I don't know why he's always following Mytho around. But apparently he knows about the heart shards." She can say that, right, that's a secret Serafin already knows? 

She knocks on the closet door. "Just hang tight, Mytho, there's gotta be another key around here somewhere!"

"Or I could break the door down but that might be overkill."

"...I think maybe we'd get in trouble for that? But if we can't find a key or a librarian then we can, uh, think about it."

There does not appear to be a librarian on duty, but there is a set of keys hanging underneath the front desk. (It's not stealing if you return it right away.) She fiddles with the keys and the lock for a bit, gets the door open, and -

The closet is empty, but there's an open trap door in the floor.

"Is this going to end in some sort of magic nonsense," says Serafin, already starting for the trapdoor.

"Probably? You don't have to check it out if you don't want to," she says, because checking out all the weird magic nonsense and looking after Mytho is her job.

"If you go down the ominous trapdoor I am coming with you, because if I don't and you get hurt I'll be very upset about it."

" - oh. OK then. I'm definitely going down the ominous trapdoor."

"I figured!"

Down the ominous trapdoor they go.

Apparently there's a series of stone tunnels under the library. If they were a little stinkier they might be sewers, and if there were bodies then they would be catacombs. They're damp, cold, and beyond a few lit candles, they're very, very dark.

"Spooky," he comments.

"Yeah," she says, frowning. "Wonder where Mytho got to."

They hear what sounds like the laughter of a young girl, coming from deeper in the tunnels. "Oh, hello! Would you like to play, too?"

"Sure!" says Duck, dashing off into the tunnels in an effort to follow the voice to its source. This is incredibly creepy, but she's found that being nice to creepy people is generally better than the alternative. "What's the game?"

—why is she—okay sure. Serafin follows.

- pendant's glowing. Yep, this is the right way.

"I'm just a little thing, but I flood the entire room," says the girl, from up ahead.

Oh, so like, a riddle. Hm.

...what? That's a weird riddle.

She runs until she gets to a fork in the path - one path lit by candles, the other pitch black. Also those things in the wall look like they might be bodies, maybe these are catacombs.

"Um, so like - a dripping faucet?"

The girl laughs at her; it's coming from the unlit path. Duck motions to Serafin and then follows the laughter, her path lit only by the soft glow coming from her pendant. Also those things in the wall are definitely bodies. 

"Too bad," says the girl. "I'm a white snake that swallows the sea. What am I?"

"Very confusing?" suggests Serafin, following along and glancing around at the bodies lining the wall. Fun stuff.

"It's no fun if you don't try," says the girl. Duck leads them down another darkened hallway. "Last one. I become shorter the longer I stand."

"Ummmm. Oh! Oh! A candle!"

"That's right!" says the girl, delightedly, as Duck leads them into a larger room that doesn't seem to have any exits. "Congratulations."

This room not only lacks exits, it also seems to lack... girls. This is concerning. Serafin is concerned.

"The person you're looking for is here," says the girl - the girl's voice, anyway.

"Great!" says Duck. "We answered the riddle, can we go now?"

"No," says the girl.

The door they came in through is suddenly blocked by solid, impassable rock. Even Duck's pendant stops glowing. They're in total darkness.

—there are two reactions he could be having to this development, and for a moment he's torn between them—

But he's caused himself enough trouble by getting angry recently (his hand still hurts from punching Fakir), and Duck seems to know what she's doing and is going for the 'be nice' option—and the 'be nice' option helped him surprisingly much, although that could just have been the magical ballet princess—

He takes a tentative step into the darkness. "Hey, uh, candle girl... are you okay?"

" - oh. Oh, now this is interesting."

Nobody can hear this voice, it just really, really enjoys talking to itself.

"No," says the girl's voice, leaving them in darkness for the moment. "But I'll be better now. You're down here."

"Did nobody tell me today was Kidnapping Day?" he mutters under his breath—

—then shakes his head, refocuses—he's not much good at being nice, but after a moment's thought he at least comes up with:

"...do you want a hug?"

"Well, well - that's not how it goes, you know, that's not how it goes at all, but one must adapt to inspiration on occasion. You'd better be here for this, though, Princess Tutu, you don't want another minor character to come and upstage you."

"...yes," says the girl, after a moment's thought, and suddenly the room is bathed in light. Serafin is in the middle, the woman who danced with him before is off to one side, not quite where Duck was standing earlier, and in front of him is another ghostly person. This one is shaped like a girl, and instead of being red, the girl is bathed in golden light.

"I've been alone here for so long," says the girl. "And you have been, too. But none of us will have to be alone anymore; I'll illuminate your dancing for the rest of your life."

...they can discuss the kidnapping aspect of this situation later. Right now he is going to hug this ghost candle.

The lamp girl is delighted to be hugged! She hugs him back.

Aww.

The lamp girl is so happy!!

"It will be wonderful like this now, forever. We'll never have to be apart."

"...I mean, if you don't want me to let go of you, I won't, but, uh... can you maybe come upstairs with us? I don't know how being a lamp ghost works."

"No," says the lamp girl, and the lights wink out. Only for a moment, though - a moment later he's surrounded by a series of wispy candle flames, though the lamp girl isn't there anymore. "If we went outside, you might forget about me, like the others did."

"—hey, where'd you go—?"

And now there's more light; if he looks up he can see the the girl part of the lamp spirit high above him. Her golden dress dissolves into the air, turning into rays of golden light. "If you stay here forever, you'll never need to be alone again."

"I actually wasn't having that problem to begin with, but you seem like you are. Do you maybe want another hug. I'm sorry I scared you by asking about going upstairs."

The lamp girl seems undecided.

"Who forgot about you?" asks Tutu, speaking up for the first time. She offers the lamp her hand, insofar as that's possible from this position. "Will you dance with me?"

"You dance," says the lamp girl, more happily. "And I will illuminate your steps."

Aww. Serafin smiles at them both.

So she dances. A different dance than the last one, or at least not quite the same - despite their circumstances, this one is happy, almost joyful, communicating a sort of relentless optimism. 

"Your light is lovely," says Tutu. "But why are you shutting people away in the darkness?"

"All I want is to shine for someone, to bathe them in warm and tender light. But the people who were precious to me - they've forgotten about me. I suppose they never needed me at all. But you do, now, so I can shine for you forever."

"Um," says Serafin. "Is there like... food down here. Because if not, this isn't going to be much of a forever."

"Yes. You can't keep people locked up forever. I'm sure that many people would be glad to dance in your warm light; you don't need to force your warmth on anyone. That will only bring them pain."

The lamp spirit comes down from the ceiling and decides to go back to hugging Serafin.

"I'm sorry," she says. "I didn't mean to hurt anyone."

Awwwwww. He hugs the lamp. She's a very huggable lamp.

"I'm fine, see? It'll be okay. The magical ballet princess is good at this."

Hugs!

"Will you stay with me, if we go upstairs?"

"Of course. I promise."

"OK," says the lamp spirit, softly. 

"There was someone else here," says Princess Tutu.

The lamp girl nods, motioning to a set of boxes where Mytho is sleeping, curled up around an ordinary oil lamp. "I thought he might be cold."

"That was thoughtful," says Princess Tutu. "Will you return the shard of his heart?"

"Yes," says the lamp girl. "If you promise not to forget."

"I'm not gonna forget you," says Serafin, hugging her some more. "You're the most huggable lamp I ever met."

The lamp girl smiles, reassured, and returns to the lamp. 

Tutu draws another heart shard out of the lamp. "I am the feeling of affection, shattered and forgotten," it informs her, before returning to Mytho. 

Mytho blinks sleepily and wakes up. "Tutu?"

"You should hurry," she tells him. "Someone is waiting for you."

...Serafin looks at the lamp, and looks all around at the room, and looks at the lamp again.

"Where'd she... go?" he asks hesitantly. "Was she just - magic stuff, like the forest fire - did we just kill the lamp girl by accident—"

Princess Tutu regards the lamp with some concern.

"I don't know," she says. She picks the lamp up carefully and hands it to Serafin. "But you should watch after her until we know more."

He hugs the lamp, also carefully, and nods.

"You're a good lamp," he says, to the lamp. "You're pretty and warm and bright. I'm sorry if we killed you."

She nods solemnly at the two of them, and then they make their way out of the tunnels.

Serafin holds his new lamp very carefully and gently. She is such a good lamp. He might be crying a little about this lamp. Hopefully no one will mention it.

Nobody mentions it. It mostly doesn't occur to Tutu or to Mytho that this is the sort of thing that someone might be inclined to mention. Mytho heads off to the Fire Festival once they've exited the catacombs.

"Thank you, Serafin. Goodbye for now," says Princess Tutu.

"Bye, magical ballet princess."

She dances off.

When she's back to being a girl, she wanders off to the Fire Festival to see whether Mytho got to dance with Rue. (He did. Not in time for the festival proper, they missed that, but they're dancing together as people clear out of the square.) They seem happy together.

And that's how it should be.

Serafin takes his lamp home and puts her in his room and pats her lampshade and apologizes again for possibly having been an accessory to her accidental murder.

The next morning he goes early to class, brings the lamp, and sets her up in a corner of the room where she'll have a nice view.

That's good! Or like, better than it could be. She couldn't have just left Mytho without the ability to feel affection for anyone, that'd be horrible, but she does really wonder about the moral implications of turning the lamp back into a normal lamp that apparently comes without a magic lamp spirit.

They have a combined class today. Duck doesn't go out of her way to talk to Serafin, because what if he asks about Tutu again (or worse, it's like when she danced with Giselle and he thinks she just ran off and abandoned him), but she does stop and chat with the lamp for a bit, because maybe it can still hear her. And she'd feel bad if she were a duck forever and then people stopped paying attention to her.

Serafin smiles at her when he sees her talking to the lamp. He does not ask her any questions about magical ballet princesses.

Oh good! She waves awkwardly and will just go sit with the rest of the beginner class.

Mr. Cat informs them that they have all been given special permission to sit in on the dress rehearsal of a traveling ballet troupe that has just entered Gold Crown Town. He expects everyone to be on their best behavior. All of the students are pretty excited about it; the Eleki troupe is supposed to be really good.

Sounds like fun! Serafin will bring his lamp.

Nobody objects to him bringing his lamp, but he does get some weird looks. 

The leading lady is, as expected, a wonderful dancer. Partway through her performance, though, she stops dancing and seizes her chest, as though gripped by sudden fear.

Duck's pendant glows. It's handy like that. But there's no way she's going to be able to have a magic dance number in front of all these people...?

Serafin catches the glow out of the corner of his eye, but he isn't sure what to do about it.

The dancer seems to get ahold of herself pretty quickly, though she also doesn't want to dance much more at this point.

"Say," she says. "Just watching is boring, isn't it? Let's see someone else." Her eyes land on Duck. "What about you?"

"Me?" squeaks Duck.

"Yes, of course."

"I'm - not really very good at this - "

"That's fine," laughs the dancer. 

"O...K...."

"Would you like to partner with someone?"

Aww! Maybe she'll pick him, that'd be neat. On the other hand, maybe she should pick somebody who will outshine her slightly less dramatically.

"Why don't you partner with her, Mytho?" asks a dark-haired girl that Serafin will recognize as Rue, widely considered the best dancer in the special class. 

"He'll stay. I'll do it," says Fakir, getting up.

Mytho certainly doesn't seem to have an opinion on the matter. Duck looks like her opinion might be 'no please God anything but that', but she's certainly not going to say that.

—what. No. What.

Caught by surprise, he's too bewildered to actually protest; all he manages is an incredulous noise.

Then she'll just have to suffer through it. (Ultimate suffering will only last, what, five minutes? Surely she can make it through five minutes of ultimate suffering.)

Duck is, as promised, not a good dancer. Her balance is poor and her movements are imprecise and badly timed, as if she's not only unused to ballet but a little unused to moving a human body at all.

Fakir is a good dancer, at least in the technical sense. He's not a very good partner. It's hard to point toward any specific thing he's doing that makes him so, but the last time any of the students in the audience saw Duck dance with a member of the advanced class, it was with Rue, and Rue had spent the entire time soothing Duck's nerves, guiding her through the performance, and making sure she didn't embarrass herself.

Fakir seems to be going for the opposite approach. Whenever there's something he could feasibly assist with, he doesn't, and while he does whisper something to her during the performance, whatever it is only makes her more upset. The lifts are all there, he's always in the correct position, but Duck looks like she's hanging on for dear life and not entirely succeeding.

At the end of the performance, he lifts her up, and for a second Duck determinedly strikes the actual position she's supposed to be in.

And then Fakir drops her. 

No fair no fair no fair no fair -

She manages to land on her feet, such that it won't be obvious to some of the beginners that Fakir dropped her at all. (The members of the advanced class will all find it pretty obvious.) She doesn't catch her balance; she tumbles forward and careens off the stage.

As soon as he sees Fakir drop her, he's already jumping out of his seat, afraid for her safety; when she falls, she lands neatly in his arms, and he sweeps her upright and sets her on her feet, glaring up at Fakir with a deadly rage in his eyes.

For a moment it looks like he might keep going, but he checks himself before he can do more than get a hand on the edge of the stage, and turns instead to Duck, anger softening to concern.

Duck looks kinda like she might cry. She's not going to, that'd be dumb, but she looks like the next emotional straw will probably do her in.

"You were wonderful," says the dancer. "I'm sorry for putting so much pressure on you."

"That's OK," says Duck, weakly. "Do you, uh, have a bathroom around here somewhere - "

The dancer gives instructions; Duck runs off in the direction she's pointing before she's finished.

Serafin watches her for a second, frowning slightly, then looks up at Fakir again. He no longer seems ready to commit literal murder over this, but neither could he be described as 'happy' or 'forgiving'.

Fakir doesn't look like he cares very much; he ignores Serafin and returns to his seat by Mytho.

Elsewhere in the building, Duck is crying in the bathroom.

She feels sort of dumb about this. It's not like any of her goals actually require her to be great at dancing, or require anyone to think that she's less terrible at it than she is. She shouldn't care about her standing in the class, as long as she gets to keep going there and keep looking after Mytho. Maybe she doesn't even need that, maybe all she needs is to keep becoming Tutu and keep returning shards and - maybe her life as a girl doesn't even really matter for this story, maybe it's, like, window dressing.

But it matters to her. It matters a lot that everyone knows how terrible she is. It matters a lot that she can't stand up to Fakir, and it matters a lot that she can't even thank Serafin, and it matters a lot that as soon as she leaves this bathroom, nobody's going to say anything to her but everyone will be thinking about it. She can't face that, she can't, she can't, she can't.

She has the sense that someone might be hugging her as she sobs, but it's not solid enough for her to stop and see who's there. Her pendant glows briefly, but she doesn't notice it through her tears.

When she's not back after five minutes, he's concerned.

When she's not back after ten minutes, he's worried.

When she's not back after the demonstration wraps up and the class starts filing out the door, he's...

...not entirely sure what to do about it, given that her last known destination was the bathroom? She probably does not want him looking for her there. Unless she's been held up by more magic nonsense in which case she might. Okay, he can at least step into the hall and listen for magical-sounding noises. And bring his lamp. He's not about to leave her behind.

There aren't any magical-sounding noises. There's some faint crying and some much louder voices coming from the bathroom. He probably won't recognize either of them; they belong to members of the beginner class.

"You can't just hide in here forever!"

"Yeah! Don't worry, Duck, we'll comfort you!"

"You have to bounce back so they can see that it hasn't gotten to you, and then you can think about revenge!"

"Or about being a miserable wreck!"

Oh. Okay. Crying in the bathroom for an hour. That makes a certain amount of sense.

It sounds like she has... friends? Helping? Probably they're doing a better job of comforting her than he could, although it doesn't sound like they're doing all that great a job. He turns to go.

Eventually - some time after Serafin and the rest of the class have returned to school - Pique and Lilie succeed at dragging a still-fairly-emotionally-compromised Duck out of the bathroom and back to the dorms, where she hides in her room under her blankets for the rest of the day.

...and, actually, for the rest of the day after that. Because if she goes out she'd have to talk to people, and they would make fun of her, and she might run into Fakir and he's really scary, and she'd have to go to class and get scolded, and it's really just a whole lot easier to stay in her room where she can't mess anything up?

She is going to run out of food eventually, though. Except maybe she can turn into a bird and eat her supply of birdseed, that should last her for a while.

He doesn't worry too much about not seeing her for the rest of that day, but when she's absent the whole next day too, he decides he should probably check up on her.

So he skips his first class of the subsequent morning and heads straight to the girls' dormitories, carrying the lamp in a bag over his shoulder. He's pretty sure he knows which window is hers, and definitely sure he doesn't know how to navigate the girls' dorm from the inside; he checks to make sure no one's watching, and then climbs.

Her curtains are closed, for maximum gloom.

He knocks.

Aww, man, who could that be?

She leaves her birdseed and dips her wing in a handy glass of water and then hurriedly dresses herself and then -

" - uh. Hi Serafin!"

"Hi. You haven't been to class, I was worried. Are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm totally fine!" she says, sounding not actually very fine at all. "I just. Thought I'd. Take a few days off."

"Duck... you cried in the bathroom for like an hour and then skipped a day and a half of classes. That does not sound like what a person does when they're okay."

".................I guess not," she says, frowning.

"Do you want—I mean—I don't know. If I were you, after that, I'd want to go to a practice room with no one watching and do the dance again with a partner who wasn't sabotaging me at every turn. But I don't know if that'd help you. I just - I want you to be okay."

aaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAA.

If she dances with Serafin she's gonna mess it up and it'll be horrible, but if she says no then she has to say no, and both of these sound sort of impossible to her so she's going to dodge the one that would require any immediate bravery and see if she picks up any spare bravery in the intervening time somehow.

"M...maybe. I mean. I won't be any good at it anyway, and uh, you don't have to do it if - if you're busy or anything - "

"In theory I have class, but I care about you more than I care about class. And it doesn't matter how good at it you are, it's fine to mess it up, I'll help you."

"Oh. Uh, OK. But you should go to class! And I should go to class! And - we can meet in the studio after class maybe and - and we'll see?"

Yes good excellent that gives her time.

"Okay," he says. "Do you want to borrow the lamp for company in the meantime?"

".....OK."

The lamp is good. It's soft and warm and completely incapable of judging her for uselessness and cowardice and possible accidental murder.

He hoists the bag off his shoulder and hands it to her through the window.

She'll just wave goodbye to Serafin and then hug this lamp for a while. And then she will go to class. Really. For real. She may not learn anything or remember anything or be very meaningfully conscious during it, but she said she'd go to class and that means she's going to go to class.

(With the lamp. Because the lamp is important.)

Serafin also goes to class. He's ten minutes late for his first one, and completely unrepentant about it.

She doesn't find anything that she recognizes as courage over the course of the rest of the day. When her last class ends, she goes to the studio and mills around outside the door for a bit, clinging to the lamp like a security blanket. She wonders how terrible it is to not show up and whether Serafin would think it means she doesn't want to be friends or if he'll think she's just really really a coward.

She has about thirty seconds to pace indecisively before he opens the door, looks out, and sees her.

"Hey," he says, with a gentle smile. "How was your day?"

"It was fine!" she says, a little too quickly. She still looks like a particularly strong breeze could knock her over. "Actually it was kind of terrible. But I did go to class!"

"Well, congratulations on that, then. C'mon in."

So she does. She sets the lamp down in the corner. And then aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa what is she supposed to do.

...they came here to dance, but she looks so...

"Do you want a hug?"

She sniffles and nods.

So he hugs her.

So she hugs him back!

And then she cries. Because she's not sure what's happening but it's horrible and everything is terrifying and crying is childish and humiliating but she doesn't know what else to do.

...he continues to hug her. He's not... really sure what else to do. Hugging her seems like probably the thing. She's so... small and helpless and afraid and in pain... and she's his friend and he likes her and he wants her to be happy and not—whatever this is—

People say... words, at times like these, don't they? They think of comforting things to say and then say them.

What is a comforting thing.

He wants to tell her it's going to be okay but he can't really do that when he doesn't even know—

—well—

That has a simple solution, at least?

"What's wrong?"

"I don't know," she says miserably. "I just - keep thinking about how - I think maybe I've always been useless, and I know I'm no good at anything, and that's - that's OK - but when things like the other day happen then everyone knows."

"—hey, you're not useless," he says. "You're not. And - this is a school, for heaven's sake, you're in the beginner's class, you're here to learn ballet, the point is not that you should already know it. And you honestly weren't even that bad! Fakir's the one who dropped you! I'd rather dance with a beginner who isn't sure what she's doing than an expert who's gonna let me down on purpose, any day."

"I guess," she says, still a little miserably, but she seems to have stopped crying. Still clinging, just not crying anymore.

Hugs.

"If it weren't for you, I probably would've burned down Mr. Cat's house," he says. "Or hurt myself permanently trying to fight a tree or a wall or who knows what. I might even have killed somebody. Me with a magic anger problem is no joke. And you went down that ominous trapdoor after Mytho. You're - you're good. You do good important things."

"I try," she says, very quietly. There's a small hiccuping laugh. "M'glad you didn't kill someone."

"Yeah, me too."

She seems - not all the way calmed down, maybe, but a lot calmer than she was. 

"OK then. Sorry about that. Did you, uh, still want to practice dancing and stuff?"

"Yeah."

Then she will do her best to dance! 

She's still not good at it. But she is better, when she isn't having an anxiety attack and has a partner who's not deliberately trying to mess her up.

Instead she has a partner who is doing his best to help her, and his best is very good. Besides just being a skilled dancer, he also seems to be really good at leading her - at making the next move feel natural and obvious, so she doesn't stumble or get tangled up or lost.

This is so much nicer.

She's in a much better mood when they finish practicing. And now it's late and she needs to go back to the dorms.

Serafin is so glad he could help!!

"I can walk you back to your dorm," he offers, picking up the lamp from her corner.

"OK!"

And so they walk back to the dorms.

Mytho is hanging out in front of the fountain reading a book today. He notices Duck and Serafin as they approach.

"You were missing yesterday," he says, flatly. 

"Oh! Uh, yeah. I'm OK now, though!"

"That's good."

(Serafin smiles. It is good!)

"There you are," says Fakir, coming from the boys' dorm. "What are you doing out here?"

"Duck's back."

"...OK? She's back, fine. You don't have to concern yourself with her."

"What is your problem?" he says incredulously. "Why are you two even friends? You don't ever seem to do anything but yell at him and lock him in closets!"

"This doesn't concern you!"

"Does so! We're his friends!" She has no idea whether Serafin and her count as Mytho's friends, actually, but Mytho would probably have more friends if Fakir wouldn't lock him up all the time. "And so - so we get to be concerned!"

"Also," says Serafin, "you dropped Duck off the stage at that presentation, and you do not get to tell me not to be concerned about you, personally, hurting my best friend. Oh! And while we're on the subject of stupid things you've done! Did you know that that closet you locked him in had a trapdoor in it leading to a bunch of old tunnels under the library, and if we hadn't gone in after him he'd probably still be lost down there? 'Cause that happened."

For a second he actually hesitates.

" - I didn't drop her off the stage. And if you don't want her hurt, you should stop interfering." He glares at Duck. "I told you to stay away from him, and it would be safer for both of you if you would take that advice."

"You dropped her, and off the stage she went! If you're gonna dance with a beginner it's your responsibility to do your best to make it work, not get in her way as much as possible and then drop her! Also," he takes a breath, "the reason why I am involved with this stuff is because somebody's anger was wandering around loose and decided to hitch a ride with me, and if it hadn't been dealt with I probably would have killed someone, so don't fucking tell me that it's all my own fault for sticking my nose where it doesn't belong! I didn't ask for any of this! The trouble came looking for me!"

Fakir looks angry for a second, and then -

" - you had a shard of the prince's heart?"

"Oh, now he's listening."

"If you've personally encountered one of the shards, then you must be aware of Princess Tutu's role in this."

Duck looks sort of worried again. She inches her way behind Serafin.

"...Princess... Tutu?" he says, with completely unfeigned bewilderment.

"Oh, come on, you must have seen her. White dress, golden crown, magical powers - do you even know the story?"

"....do you know where Princess Tutu is, Serafin?"

"No!! What story?!"

"D'you mean about The Prince and the Raven?" 

She seems to be getting progressively more worried about the direction this conversation is going, but she's trying not to admit to it and trying really really really hard to believe that Serafin's not going to pick now to say anything about her being Tutu.

"Yes, about The Prince and the Raven." He sighs. "I know you know, though I don't know who told you. It's a children's story, about a brave prince who defeats an evil raven by magically shattering his own heart."

...he looks at Mytho. He can... sort of see it, maybe? 'Storybook prince' is... a surprisingly good explanation for the way that this guy is.

"But it isn't finished yet," says Duck. "Drosselmeyer stopped halfway through."

"He died halfway through. And good riddance to him. The stories he told were horrific; there's no reason to think the ending of this one would have been any different."

"But it's no good the way it ends now! With the prince not having any emotions or - any capacity for happiness or love or - you do want your heart back, don't you, Mytho?"

"I.... I don't know."

"Also those heart shards are causing a lot of trouble running around unsupervised."

"I... don't want to trouble anyone." He touches his hand to his chest. "These feelings - they hurt, but - I feel that it's important for me to have them."

Fakir sighs. "Let's get you home. Read a book sometime, Serafin, if you're not going to just stay out of it."

He snorts and doesn't otherwise acknowledge the suggestion.

Duck seems more troubled by this exchange, but she doesn't say anything as Mytho and Fakir leave.

"I'll... see you later, then, Serafin?"

"...Yeah. Goodnight. Do you want to keep the lamp with you?"

"No, no, I'm OK, I had her all day," she says. "Thanks for that."

"You're welcome. I'm glad I could help."

Off he goes, with his friend the lamp.

Duck does not go back to the girls' dorm. Nope. 

You know what's a great place to go when you're feeling afraid for no reason? Creepy catacomb libraries, where you can reread books about how you're going to die. There is no way that this is in any way a poor life choice. So she heads to the library, which is open, because she's honestly not sure it ever closes. The Prince and the Raven is easily accessible; it's not one of the library's more popular works. 

"OK. If I were a writer who knew about stuff like this, what kind of ending would this story be meant to have?" She chews on her lip. "Too much. What kind of ending would Tutu be meant to have?"

"Princess Tutu," says someone behind her, "isn't meant to have an ending. She's not a character at all. Princess Tutu is her ending."

"What does that mean?"

"Princess Tutu is a moment. A symbol. She can hardly even be called one-dimensional. Would you call Euryale a character, someone who needed a resolution?"

"Who's Euryale?"

"Exactly."

That... explains very little, honestly, but OK.

"So what's she a symbol for?"

"It's difficult to say," says the boy, thoughtfully. "The prince never acknowledges her affections, so it's questionable whether we're meant to apply her lesson to him, but given that he's the central character, most things in the novel do, of course, relate back to the prince's own psyche. The only thing she ever does is confess her love - unfounded love, we must assume, given that she's never mentioned before or after her lone appearance - and then immediately vanish as a result. It could be commentary on the destructive nature of the prince's own unfounded love - he intends to sacrifice himself for the sake of the world, which can't possibly be capable of uniformly loving him back. This is doomed to end in tragedy, particularly for him."

"How d'you know it's supposed to end in tragedy?"

"Because it's obvious," says the boy. "You should pick an easier book if you don't know anything about literary theory yet. Anyway. I have to work, try not to be so loud."

"Sorry."

She goes back to trying to make sense of the book for the next very long while.

At one point she looks Euryale up in the encyclopedia, but the encyclopedia doesn't have her. 

"You've been here all night, haven't you."

" - huh? Oh. Uh. Maybe."

He takes a seat next to her, sets the lamp on the table, and nods to the copy of The Prince and the Raven she still has out. "Is that the book?"

"Mhmm." She slides it over to him. "S'not a very happy story."

"I'm not great at books but it seems important to know this one."

"Mhmm. Princess Tutu's barely even in it, though. It's mostly about the prince."

"What's he even a prince of, or does that not come up?"

"He has a kingdom and stuff. It's all kind of vague. It's a fairy tale, so it's not really about the politics. But there must be other kingdoms around, too, since there are other princesses from other places."

"So what happens?" he asks, flipping open the book to look at the first page.

"In broad strokes? There's an evil raven who's threatening the kingdom, and the prince is the only one who can stop it. First he has to gather his allies, but most of them die in the process of getting him to the battle with the raven. And then there's a battle. But it doesn't say who wins, it just stops in the middle."

"Sounds like kind of a bad book."

"It's OK. I like parts of it. S'hard to write a good book if you only get half the book to do it in."

"Well, fair enough."

She pages through the book to the page with the illustration of Princess Tutu, drawn in the process of turning into a speck of light.

"Princess Tutu's only there for a few lines. The only thing she does in the story is confess her love for the prince, and then she turns into a speck of light and vanishes. And nobody really says anything or remembers her at all, after that."

"That's... uh..."

"...concerning???"

"She's not a very important character."

Duck doesn't look like this is actually successfully making her feel better about the situation.

"Then what's she doing having such an important job this time around—?! And—is she just—how's this speck of light thing work, exactly—I would like her to be able to talk about her feelings without dying!!!"

She crumples up in her chair and hugs her knees to herself. ".....I dunno. I didn't hear about that part until later."

He scoots his chair closer to hers and hugs her.

She hugs him back. She thinks she might be crying again.

"I don't think I'm going to die. But I want - I want to fix Mytho's heart, and - I don't know if the story has a happy ending from where it is."

"I don't want you to die!!" he says. "I - I'm not - I won't let that happen. You're my friend and you're good and important and I want you to - be happy, and learn to dance, and, and do the things you want to do with your life, and not die just because some stupid book says so."

"I - I mean - I dunno if I can make that happen. But - thank you."

Something red wavers in the air between them, and then there's another red ghost, hugging her.

"...oh," he says, blinking at it. "—I'm an idiot—Duck, there was a shard at the theater, wasn't there? And then you came home feeling all messed up—"

" - oh. Yeah. That - that makes a lot of sense. What feeling are you?"

"I am the feeling of fear. You won't leave me alone, will you? It's scary all alone - "

...Serafin hesitantly attempts to pat the ghost.

"It'll be okay," he says. "I think if we give you back to - the rest of you - you'll feel better."

"Yeah, you'll be OK once you go home. Which, uh, I can do, as long as, uh - "

C'mon, transformation.

....c'mon.

Maybe not.

"Now now now, you didn't think it would be that easy, did you? No, little Duck, this time you have to face your fears alone."

...oh.

Oh.

Oh, fuck.

"...um," he says. "Does - the shard need to - be somewhere that's not you. For the thing to happen."

"Mmmmmmmmaybe?"

"Do you think you can let go of her for a minute?" he asks the ghost. "It's okay if you don't want to, I know it's scary. We'll figure something out."

"I don't want to, it's scary. Where - where do you want me to go?"

He doesn't want to do this, he does not want to do this, he wants to do literally any thing other than this, but here he is, doing this.

He takes a deep breath and puts a comforting hand on the ghost's shoulder and says gently, "Do you think you could come over to me?"

The heart shard looks uncertain.

"... Serafin, you don't have to..."

"We have to get him home, and we can't get him home if he stays with you," he says reasonably. But his voice is shaking a little. Fear is the worst emotion, fear is worse than pain, worse than grief, worse than helpless desperate sobbing rage, but he's not about to stand by while it stays with Duck forever making her cry in bathrooms for hours and miss whole days of class, now is he? No. No he is not.

"So - so I can take him for a little while." He reaches for the ghost's hand, addresses it directly. "I'll take good care of you, I promise."

"...all right," says the heart shard, quietly, before hugging him and dissolving.

why did he do this this was the worst idea everything is terrible—

He squeezes his eyes shut and buries his face in his hands and tries not to cry. He told the fear shard he would take good care of it. Having an emotional breakdown immediately would probably not qualify as taking good care of it.

"It'll just be a second," she says, hugging him, and then she steps away.

And then a few seconds later -

"Hello again, Serafin."

He looks up at her and, somehow, manages a smile.

"Is - is your name really Princess Tutu? That's kind of silly, isn't it?" he says, wiping tears from his face with one hand.

"Perhaps," she laughs. "But it is the name I was given, and I wear it with pride. Would you like me to take the shard back now?"

He nods, shivering.

She draws the shard back out of him, and it reverts to a small glasslike object. "Thank you. That was brave of you."

He looks up at her, and smiles again, and shrugs slightly. "It - seemed like the thing to do."

She smiles back. And then hugs him, briefly, because that seems like the thing to do, too. "I'll get this back to Mytho now."

Hug.

"Thanks. I'll - probably skip all my classes and spend today in the most out-of-the-way practice room I can find, dancing until I can't take another step."

"All right then. Goodbye."

And away she dances.

And yep he is sure gonna go do that thing. He brings the lamp. And the book. He can't read while he dances but maybe he'll pick it up once he's danced himself to exhaustion.

Duck comes by the practice room after her classes. She's not gonna bother him. Maybe refill the lamp and poke at the book a little.

He's very focused. Looking at him like this, it's not at all hard to believe that he practices more than anyone else at the school.

She totally believes him! Serafin's really good at dancing, so he'd have to practice a lot. She's really bad at it, which is maybe because she doesn't practice enough and maybe because she hasn't had very long to practice in.

She rereads the last bit of the book. There's nothing in there about the prince shattering his heart; that part happened after he left the story.

Eventually, he comes over to sit by her.

"Hey. Are you - doing better without the fear shard?"

"Yeah! Way better! I wanted to thank you for figuring it out. And for taking it. That was really nice of you."

"I - didn't want to just leave it with you forever. Even though I really don't like being afraid."

"Yeah. Being afraid is hard. But it's - I think it means a lot to be afraid of something that has to happen and then do it anyway. I dunno if that makes any sense."

"No, it makes perfect sense."

There's a suspiciously familiar giggle by the window. If they look, they'll see a blur of pigtails and then hear a little more giggling.

...Serafin blinks suspiciously at the giggly pigtails. They are indeed suspicious.

More giggling!

"Uh, I think maybe I should go. I'm really glad you're doing better, though!"

"Yeah. See you later!"

As she leaves the building, she is accosted by her friends Pique and Lilie.

"Duck! You're so bold! But with him?"

"Yeah, I thought you were a Mytho girl for sure!"

She frowns at them. "Huh?"

"Spending all that time with Serafin," explains Pique. "You know he's trouble, right?"

"He's so mean!" says Lilie, dreamily. "An absolutely terrible person!"

"He's always giving Mr. Cat a hard time, which seems like the last thing you want now that you're finally off probation," says Pique.

"He once went on a date with a girl, and she ran away in the middle and never spoke of it again!" says Lilie, sounding like she dearly wishes she could have been there to see it herself.

"So you've gotta be careful if you're gonna go out with him!" nods Pique.

"But I'm not!" says Duck. 

"We know you're not careful, that's why we're telling you this."

"I mean I'm not going out with him!"

"Poor Duck. Consumed with not one, but two doomed loves."

"You really need to think about these things more carefully."

"Don't worry, Duck! If he does terrible unspeakable things to you, you can always come to us to cry about it!"

"It'd probably be better if you just stuck to Mytho, he has that whole prince charming thing going on."

"Even though Serafin thinks he's a prince!"

Pique considers this. "That's right, Serafin used to go around telling people that he was a prince. He hasn't done that for a long time, though."

"What?" asks Duck. "Is he really a prince?"

"Of course not, silly," laughs Lilie. "I bet he was just saying that so unsuspecting girls would like him more!"

"Anyway," sighs Pique, laying a hand on her shoulder. "If you're gonna go after Serafin, I want you to know that I support you, but that doesn't mean I'm gonna stop worrying about you."

"Anyway! Later!"

They run off before she can ask what some of that even means. She heads back towards the dorms by herself.

Serafin is also heading back to his dorm, with the lamp and the book. He has to walk kind of slowly because he overdid it pretty badly with the practice today. But on the other hand, he feels exhausted and satisfied instead of on the verge of a breakdown, so skipping all his classes and dancing himself to exhaustion definitely worked for the intended purpose.

Duck runs into him again on the way. She looks like she maybe wants to ask something and is not entirely sure what the thing is.

"Are you a prince?" she says, eventually.

"...uh," he says. "Why? I mean, yes, but why?"

"Pique just said you might be."

"Well, I am. Do people still remember that? I used to talk about it a lot when I first got here but I haven't brought it up since I was twelve."

"Oh, that makes sense. I guess I wouldn't remember that."

"Well. Yeah, I'm a prince. My father's the Grand Duke of Thule. Who told you about it, anyway?"

"Pique and Lilie. They're my friends from the beginner class. I think."

"Oh, them. Are they, uh... nicer to you than it sounds like?"

"They're really nice! They're just, hm. Very enthusiastic. And sort of confused about stuff. And they think I maybe don't always make the best decisions."

"Okay."

"Yeah! But they're really helpful. Like, they check up on me and keep Mr. Cat from dropping me to the probationary class again. Or trying to marry me. So that's nice. - Do you have any other friends, Serafin? Besides the lamp, I mean?"

"Mmmmno," he admits.

"Oh. Well, you have friends now, right?"

"Yes! I like you and I like my lamp. I'm glad we're friends."

"Me too!"

"Hmmm. I daresay it's gotten downright quiet around here. A moment of that is fine, but we mustn't allow it to keep these players from hurtling headlong into their own demise, certainly, certainly. I wonder where our final player has gotten to by this time...?"

.

.

.

Once upon a time, there lived a maiden.

The maiden was in love with a kind and generous man, who had promised to wed her. Because the man was poor, however, the two of them had agreed to wait until he had made his fortune. 

The maiden feared that, if he explored the world, the man might fall in love with another, and break his promise to her. And so the maiden thought of reasons to delay the man's journey, until all of the money that the man had saved was gone. 

The man died, penniless and alone, and the maiden visited his grave.

She's sitting in the old church reading a book. The Prince and the Raven. She's been finding herself here a lot, lately. It just seems like the sort of place one goes when one wants to be connected to the rest of the world. There are weddings on occasion. Sometimes there are funerals. Sometimes there are ordinary services; she doesn't keep track of when they happen.