"I have a disaster," says Mira. "How much do you know about fairies?"

"A fair amount. They attend a particular person, only one at a time, and can be passed to someone else upon death. They're extremely powerful, somewhat helpful to their person, but often in bizarre ways. It's more helpful to have one than not, at least for the person that has one. What's the disaster that involves fairies?"

"I have one, and that's the only reason I can perceive the situation as a disaster. My stepmother has one and she has gotten her fairy to brainwash my father."

Mira appreciates it. "My mother has been dead since I was five, which is where I got my fairy. My father has never dated since. Then, three weeks ago, he came home and told me to meet my new stepmother Kelsey and her two daughters from her first marriage. Kelsey's fairy is around a lot and stared at my father and me all the time, sometimes the daughters too. Kelsey acted like it was inconceivable that I didn't want to call her Mother and hug her every time I saw her and generally behave more affectionately with her, a complete stranger, than I did when I was five with my real mother. All of which would merely be bizarre, not incriminating, but then the next time I called my fairy up, she told me you're welcome and when I wanted to know what for she said she'd prevented Kelsey's fairy from forcing me to love Kelsey because she suspected that I'd perceive that as a harm. Since then I've been trying to get my fairy to help Chals somehow, but she won't or can't, and Kelsey's on to me, and my father is no longer just ridiculously in love with his wife but acts like he finds me unpleasant to be around even when Kelsey isn't in the room or the subject of conversation. My fairy's most recent failure to directly assist involved dressing me up like this and giving me a coach ride to this party, which I am taking advantage of because maybe you can help. I hope it's not a problem that I snuck in."

"Send people who have fairies who understand that brainwashing is harmful," says Mira. "But I don't think arresting her will fix it. The fairy could be misinterpreting Kelsey somehow and creating this behavior more or less of her own accord - but the consistency means that Kelsey isn't trying to stop her, even if stopping her was just the bare minimum of not calling her up and asking her for things anymore, and the way Kelsey acts means she approves. I think the best thing you're going to be able to do is kill Kelsey and hope whichever of the daughters is her heir isn't the same way."

"... I would like to know more about the situation, and try other options, before having graduating to execution. I do agree that the consistency is a bad sign, approval for this sort of thing is - disturbing. But casual killing, just as much."

"You haven't seen what I have," acknowledges Mira. "I'm just warning you I don't think arresting her will solve the problem, and depending on how much the fairy cooperates effectively with Kelsey it could make it worse."

"Thank you. I don't want to make it worse, but I'm really not the casual killing type. You know the situation better than I, what other options do I have besides sending protected people with fairies to arrest her and get her away from the people she's brainwashing?"

"You have to keep her a certain distance from anybody who isn't fairy-guarded. The fairies won't or can't operate on things too far away from their people. Mine has a range of about a hundred yards, but they might vary. I don't know if you already have a prison setup that accommodates that. But the effects are persistent - my fairy isn't around right now and my dress and these magic shoes still exist, the coach is probably where I left it, she said they'd disappear at midnight but that was something she added because I complained. So just taking Kelsey away from my father will not fix him, although it might let the effect wear off by itself, if that's something it can natively do - in the same way that I could rip this dress."

"There are prisons that accommodate that. I can even throw people in them. But if the effects are persistent - will they go away just because she dies? Do we have anything to gain from her death at all, aside from stopping her from continuing?"

"When I've asked my fairy if she can just fix my father, she says something about rules. I don't know why she's invoking rules, or what they are, or how they work, or for that matter if she's lying, but I would bet that Kelsey's own fairy would be able to reverse the damage if Kelsey's heir wanted her to."

"Then our priority should be, throw Kelsey in person-with-fairy prison, and then figure out who her heir is and whether or not they would be better than their mother. If they're the same or worse, there's not much to be gained from killing her."

"The girls are eight and nine. They're not nice, but - they're not nice for an eight and a nine year old. They aren't, as far as I can tell, evil. And I can't think of who else Kelsey's heir would be, unless inexplicably she's decided she doesn't like my father enough to leave him his own mind but does like him enough to give him her fairy. It pretty much has to be one of the girls."

"Hmm. Okay, I'll talk to them myself once Kelsey has been arrested and the entire situation has been investigated, with the understanding that they're also probably brainwashed. Are there any other telling behaviors that are easy to verify? I do believe you, but I like having proof before I throw people in jail."

"You could try looking at her friends. She has... a lot of friends. I wouldn't be surprised if my father was just the second person she decided she wanted to marry instead of the fiftieth person she wanted to befriend."

"I could use somewhere to stay that isn't - home."

"Okay," agrees the prince gently. "Do you want to stay here at the palace close by so I can easily find you and let you know of progress, or in a nice house somewhere where you can have your privacy?"

"Here is fine. Thank you."

He nods. "You're quite welcome. By necessity, you'll be near a - friend of mine, I don't control the entire palace." Yet. "Do you want me to tell her to leave you alone entirely, or let you two - interact however you like?"

"...If I wind up telling her to leave me alone will she listen to me or will it only work if you tell her?"

"She will leave you alone if you ask her to."

"Then I don't see any reason you need to tell her to do it before I've even met her."

"I would be very understanding if you don't want to talk to anyone at all right now, and if she didn't know that she would definitely say hello."

"I'm upset, but not to the point of being unfit for all possible human company."

"Then she's good company to have."

"Who is she?"

"She's a friend of mine. Her name's Nadi. If you remember the fireworks from last year, she's entirely responsible for that."

"I do remember them. They were nice."

"She likes compliments, feel free to tell her you liked them, she's always happy when people likes things she invents."

"I may do."

He nods. "Oh, and - please don't go to the king about this problem at all."

"Why not?"

"Because he's unlikely to handle this problem in a fashion that would suit you."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, that while he is a very - capable ruler, while he's quite good at keeping the country running and doing it well, his first reaction upon hearing about a fairy that so easily brainwashes people would most likely be to use her. To his purposes."

"Yes. So I would like to not let him find out about this."

"Okay. Unless I discover compelling reason to believe that you aren't helping and that he would, I won't tell him."

"Fair. Thank you."

"You're welcome. Do you know what time it is? I'd rather be tucked away wherever you're putting me when midnight hits and I can no longer dance and the dress goes away to be replaced with either nothing or what I was wearing before depending on how annoyed my fairy was."

"I would estimate it's around ten. Would you like to go there now, and for me to, ah - send clothes in case it's the latter?"

"I might as well stay. As long as I can still dance and midnight isn't right around the corner. It's - distracting."

"Sure."

"Normally it's kind of impressive if I manage to walk for ten entire minutes without tripping even a little."

"That - sounds upsetting. I'm sorry. And there's no way you can persuade your fairy to let you keep the shoes?"

"I don't know for certain, one never does with fairies, but I objected to the - putting me in a fancy outfit solution to my father being mind controlled, so she said it would stop bothering me at midnight. I've tried to get her to address my clumsiness before. She's just not that directable in most ways."

"Ah. Maybe thank her for the fancy outfit solution and - that might persuade her to do it again in the future? ... I'm trying to use logic on fairies, this is going to fail horrifically."

"It probably wouldn't hurt, but - yeah, I wouldn't count on it."

"Pity. I wish I had a fairy, but I also think I'd slowly go mad if I had one. So, perhaps it's best that I don't."

"They're very frustrating. I mean, you don't have to call them up, but they're always tempting and usually disappointing."

"Or bizarre. A fancy dress and magic shoes for a father under mind control." Adanir sighs and shakes his head. "Wow."

"With the helpful advice that I should use them to go ask a human." Mira inclines her head in his direction.

"I didn't know anything about you," Mira points out. "I didn't even go straight to you. I asked a servant who a good person to go to would be."

"Fair. Mmm. Still a strange way to solve a problem."

"It would also have been much harder for me to get here without the coach she made me. I'd definitely have needed food and I'd have given myself about even odds of falling and breaking something on one of the parts of the route near a steep slope."

"So what I'm hearing is that she actually picked a fantastic if bizarre solution?"

"Apparently. Well, if you actually manage to solve the problem."

"I'll endeavor to not snap like delicate porcelain under pressure."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome. I sincerely will try my best to fix this."

"I appreciate it. I - I miss my dad."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome."

"As long as I'm around and you're helping me, anything I might be able to get my fairy to do that would be useful?"

"I asked her for a healing wand when I first got her," snorts Mira. "I'd heard about the one they used to have in - anyway, haven't been able to get her to do it. Tried to get her to do something nice with the roads, too - I considered fancier systems but if she'd actually given me magic plates people could stand on to teleport from here to there it wouldn't have done the infrastructure any favors when I'd died and they'd all stopped working. Didn't get it, anyway. I haven't tried the wire lace question. If you take me to a town like that I'll see if I can get her to help."

"You're welcome."

"I hope it's not too unendurable," says Mira, with a little curtsey, and she follows the servant to her room.