Chapter Text
Qifrey’s gut had been churning with dread for nearly the full day. It started with Agott saying that Coco had disappeared. It eased ever so slightly when he realized where she would be, but once again amplified when he found her. She was sitting in the grass staring out at the crystallized mass, focused but he could tell the sense of despondency coming from her. When he first talked she didn’t respond, which didn’t worry him, but she continued to ignore him up until he was right across from her. Even when he finally got a response it was clear that she was disorientated.
The dread continued to the carriage and to the Atelier, and by the time the group had sat down at the table he wholly regretted not taking her the the Hospital when he first brought it up. She barely ate and looked as though the would be sick. Every time anyone spoke above a light whisper she got a pained look in her eyes, and god forbid someone talk above a whisper the winces she tried to hide made the table go silent immediately. When she eventually stood everyone at the table tensed up in preparation to catch her should she fall. Thankfully she didn’t, but he was increasingly grateful as Agott followed close behind Coco. Tetia and Richeh stayed down with him to clean up dinner, with Olruggio leaving Qifrey with a knowing glance before grabbing a warming pot of tea from earlier in the day before walking up the stairs after Agott.
The kitchen was left quiet with only the clanking of dishes and subdued breaths filling the room. It seemed that, like him, neither of the girls felt too keen on talking, the dinner still fresh on their mind. This silence was soon interrupted when Agott came holding down the stairs two steps at a time, breathing heavily in between words.
“I need you upstairs Master.”
Her voice was flooded with panic and Qifrey immediately dropped the dish he was working on into the sink, following her back up the stairs into the living quarters. The door to their Coco and Agott’s shared study space was open and he could hear Olruggio’s voice coming from down in Coco’s room.
Inside he found his friend kneeling on the floor next to Coco who was leaning against her bed frame, staring into space, unresponsive to Olruggio’s attempts at getting her to speak. Her body looked frozen in time, devoid of her usual fidgeting. The only movement came from her mouth as it continued to purse and release on repeat. Beside her sat a small pile of stomach bile and the remains of what little she had eaten for breakfast.
As if in response to his arrival, however, Coco’s movements stopped briefly before her body went limp, her head falling , bringing her weight into Olruggio’s arms.
In an instant the two were moving in sync, Olruggio handing the girl off to Qifrey as they ran back up the stairs to the study and back down the kitchen. He could briefly hear the dark haired man’s “I’ll watch the girls,” overtop the panicked questions of Agott, Tetia, and Richeh as he clutches Coco close and runs out the door.
He didn’t bother to use the flying contraption, instead just continuing to hold the girl in his arms as he flew. He could feel her face twitching against her chest, whatever that had happened before starting back up again. He feels deep longing for Coco’s glyphs, because even with the wind pushing strongly against his face he couldn’t help but feel as though he were moving in slow motion. Within a second he felt as the twitching of her lips stopped, and for a second he thought she might awaken. Instead however, her body went ridged before the girl’s lips began to twitch, convulsing against his arms to a point he worried he may drop her. With a split second decision he dropped into the woods below, laying her in a small patch of grass. He watched in panic as her fit continued, face contorted in a look of pain as her body writhed against the greenery, her neck arching back and skin stretching over the bumps that faced the sky. Hastily, he went to turn the girl to the side, but he could do nothing to help.
He sat by her side, frantically whispering words of comfort to her as the convulsions continued, seeming as though the horror would never stop. Soon, however, the pulsing of the movement began to slow, then eventually stop. Qifrey sat with his knees dug into the dirt, chilled from the fallen snow for a few seconds, waiting for the twitching to start again before once more wrapping his arms around her and shooting into the sky back to the town.
By the time he landed the sky was an inky black. His path was illuminated by glowstones that lit with the speed of his heartbeat as he ran down the streets. It was only by a miracle that he remembered the way from his last visit, shoving his shoulder into the door of the hospital to push it open. His eyes scanned the room in milliseconds, snapping onto the nearest nurse and running up to her. She immediately locked in on his words, likely seeing from his face that something was clearly wrong.
‘She had a head injury-“ “What severity?” The nurse shot back in seconds and Qifrey could only stare at her before trying to give some sort of answer, “her nurse said that she would feel some pain and nausea but it started to get worse as time went on.” Qifrey said, panicked as he shuffled alongside the doctor as she beckoned them into the back room. Some days his hatred of the Pact enveloped him, because he should know this. He should be bouncing back answers right as she asked him, but instead he is left clamoring for a response because we was simply not allowed to know. “The head pain seemed to be the worst of it which is why we planned to take her in tomorrow, but she collapsed in her room and on the way over here she went into a bad fit.”
Upon reaching a back room, the girl was swept from his arms and placed in a bed. Another nurse moved into the room with a small cart of medical tools Qifrey could only guess the purpose of, before going and, assumidly, checking her heartbeat.
“A fit? Did she have a seizure?” Qifrey briefly recognized the word but his face must have betrayed him as the nurse continued, “Were her muscles spasming, jerking?” “Yes, they were- what has happened, is she okay?”
He could see as the two nurses exchanged glances with each other before one hurriedly went to the back room, the other continuing to attend to Coco. “ Did your daughter say if she was having any vision problems? Seeing double, blacking out, blurring with sharp movements, anything out of the ordinary?” The nurse said while pulling out some sort of modified float glow with a series of eye glasses attached that he flitted through before using his finger to pull open the young girl’s eye to look through.
“No, she told me nothing,” and a small part of Qifrey broke saying that and knowing that if something had happened, Coco did not feel safe enough to tell him. He didn’t have the heart to tell the man that no, he was in fact not the girl’s father.
The nurse didn’t respond to him, instead quickly whipping his head around to the door as an older woman and the nurse from before came in. The conversation that followed was fast and dense, the two nurses taking turns spouting off a series of medical terms, with pressure coming up a series of times. The older woman- who he presumed to be a doctor- did a quick evaluation before whispering something to the nurses that had one running off. Qifrey could only watch in horror as the doctor scooped up Coco, the girl looking so small in her arms, and taking her to the back room where the doctor had originally come from.
For a moment there was quiet. Then the nurse came up to him.
“The girl is terribly ill, Sir Witch. While there is no way to fully confirm, her symptoms are lining up with other cases we have had where fluid builds within the skull and puts immense pressure on the brain, which is why her symptoms worsened so quickly. Luckily, we have means to treat this here, a small procedure-“
“If you cannot confirm is there not more risk in doing a procedure? What if it isn’t what you believe it to be?” Qifrey truly didn’t intend to interrupt the woman, but fear look over and his mouth moved before he could stop it.
“If we are wrong in our assumption then the girl would be fine if we left her to the herbs. If we are not then she would be dead by morning.” For a moment, Qifrey’s blood turned to ice, horror bleeding throughout his soul at her words. She would die. “We will know immediately upon starting the operation if we need to stop it. The risks are low and recovery time is lower. You must trust that we know what to do and how to help her. We only need your permission.”
The nurse had a soft, solemn expression on her face as she spoke and Qifrey couldn’t help his face contorting between a series of emotions as he tries to regain composure.
“Do whatever it takes.”
——
Qifrey arrives home to Olruggio sitting on the couch, nursing a cup of tea, and Agott sitting parallel to him, curled into a ball and for all he could tell, asleep. The idea was quickly removed from his mind as her head shot towards his direction. She was not looking at him, however, her eyes scanning the area behind and around him.
“Where is she- is Coco okay?” The concern was clear in the girl’s voice, and next to her Qifrey saw as the dark haired man sent him a knowing look before mouthing something to him that Qifrey could only guess the translation to- he was absolutely dreadful and reading lips.
“What are you still doing awake Agott? It’s rather late, you should be in bed by now.” He saw as the young girl’s lips pursed before she pushed herself off of the couch and swiftly walking to pass him and stand at the door of the Atelier, looking out into the misty black. He could see her carefully controlled mask of facial expressions waver, but not break. Her mouth opened, but before she could speak the voice of their Watchful Eye came from further in the room.
“Agott was having a hard time sleeping after you left. I was able to get the other two down but she insisted I let her stay down with me until she either fell asleep or you came back.” Like usual, the man sounded dreadfully tired, but tonight it was coated in a layer of undeniable worry.
“Master Qifrey, where is Coco?”
There weren't many times that Qifrey could say that Agott ever sounded her age. The girl was always high strung, consistently working to better herself and learn, and ever more consistently working to be less of a child than she truly was. There was a waver in her voice, that made her sound so much like a child that night. The girl was scared, trying and failing to mask that fear with the brave, intiferent front that she always put on. It was strange, because while it hurt to see the girl like this, it also warmed him so that she finally had someone who she could care enough to feel significant fear for their well being.
“Coco is at the hospital, Agott. She is fine, she is safe, and she is being helped there diligently to bring her back to health. I was sent home by the nurses, which is why she is not here.”
That seemed to calm the girl considerably, her face and posture relaxing notably, the stress melting from her bones as she stepped back from the door and took a deep breath. With a relieved sigh, Qifrey kneeled down to make eye contact with the girl, resting a hand on the girl’s shoulder and giving it a don’t squeeze.
“She will be okay, Aggot. I am sorry that you had to see this today, I can only imagine how scary that must have been, but you did well to call us when you did, Thank you, Dear.” For a moment her lips quivered and her eye began to grow shiny, but it was stomped down only a moment later when her face steeled and determination filled her gaze.
“ What happened, Master Qifrey? I knew that she was hurt but she told me after the fight that it was supposed to happen so I didn’t-“ The girls voice was cut off as Olruggio’s words popped in.
“Agott, I think it is for the best that you get to bed and try to sleep. We will tell you what has happened tomorrow, it is to late to do so now.” His voice was soft but stern, and despite the obvious irritation at his direction, she walked dows into the kitchen and the could hear as her shoes clicked up to the girl’s rooms. The foyer was quiet for a moment before the dark hair man followed where the girl went, before coming out with another cup, setting it beside his own and beckoning with his hand for Qifrey to sit beside him.
Finally sitting down after when felt like a dozen clock ticks was a massive relief, and he cradled the glass between his hands like a life force. He brushed his index fingers over the intricate glass work as the two breathed, the warmth of the liquid and each other's body heat allowing Qifrey to relax.
“How is the girl really doing, Qifrey?”
He felt his fingers tighten and contort around the cup, the vines within his body whirling anxiously beneath his skin. Qifrey took in a shaky inhale before speaking. He left nothing out, from the flight to the their arrival to them taking the girl into the back room to save the child’s life. He had to stop quite a few times to offer brief explanations about what had happened, mainly regarding the medical information. Neither of them truly knew enough to piece together a full picture of what had happened, and briefly Qifrey was almost grateful for that- grateful to not truly, deeply know how close the girl was to passing.
The two sat silent for a while after that, taking in and processing what had happened to the child, what they had missed all the signs of.
“The worst thing is that if I had waited like I planned, taken her in tomorrow, she would have been gone. She would have gone to bed and die in her sleep. Agott probably would have woken and found her. She probably would have thought she were actually asleep. We probably would have as well.” Qifrey slowly closed in on himself and soon his forehead was pressing to the brim of his now empty glass, his back blow curling in on itself.
“You didn't though.” Olruggio spoke from beside him, his eyes bearing into the back of Qifrey’s head. “You got her there in time, she didn’t die and she wont do so any time soon. You cannot focus on what could have been, Qifrey- it didn’t happen and continuing to think about it will only make it worse.” He was hardly shocked when he felt a calloused hand land between his shoulder blades right below his neck, the fingers massaging the tense muscles beneath his shirt.
They sat like that for almost ten minutes before Olruggio’s hand stalled. “You aught to get to sleep. I imagine you need it just as much as Agott after today.” The sentence elicited a small laugh from the taller man’s lips.
“I don’t believe you are in any place to be saying that, Old Friend.”
“I get to be a hypocrite as a Watchful Eye. Come on, get up.”
With a breathy sigh Qifrey sat up, reaching to grab the other glass from the table before getting waved off. Giving an eye roll to Olriggio he walked over to the stairs that led down to his quarters. Walking past the archway that led to the window way he reached the dark door that led to the basement where he stayed. He opened it to a medium size room. It was small, undecorated unlike the rest of the Atelier (much to both Tetia and Olruggio’s dismay- the two of them on numerous occasions trying to get him to give it some life) with only a small cupboard where he kept his clothes, his work desk, the back corner door that led to his bathroom, a small nightstand, and his bed. Kicking his boots off by the entrance he managed the few steps across his room before falling face first into the plush of his bed. Rolling over to her back he readjusted to face away from the door. Not bothering to change out of his day clothes, Qifrey takes his glasses off and sets them on the nightstand before laying down.
Unlike the past months, he didn’t feel the brush of leaves against his nose as he drifted into sleep.
——
When Qifrey arrived back at the hospital in the morning, he was exhausted. The sleep he had gained from the night before was patchy and light, making it feel as though he hadn’t even slept at all. Pushing the doors open he walked in, spotting a nurse and walking over to her. After a brief conversation the woman left down a hallway, and a few minutes later the doctor whom he had met the night before came out, flashing him a soft smile.
“Everything went well, follow me.”
Qifrey felt mos muscles relax in an instant, following a few steps behind the older woman down a long hallway, making a few turns before finally reaching a wide oak door.
“I’ll just speak to you outside, both your girl and the other patient in her room are asleep and I do intend to keep it that way. I first want to address that our assumption towards her injury was correct; you should be very glad you brought her when you had.” He made sure not to show on his face how much that line made his stomach flip and ache, the lingering idea of what could have happened pressing into his mind.
“Her surgery went well, very well, and she is currently asleep. I won’t go into details, I know you witches can only know so much, but due to the nature of the procedure you will have to be very careful with her for the time being. We had to made a hole in the skull for the fluid to drain from, and while it is small it is still a real spot. We have her on a series of herbs that will help to prevent infection and possible issues with the blood. For now just please don’t touch the bandages.”
Qifrey’s eye continued to widen the longer she spoke. He knew that they had to release the pressure somehow, but he had no idea that it would be done like that. Even thinking about it made him feel ill and he was thankful when she stopped speaking of it, despite the longing to know more about his failure.
“If it went well, does that mean she will recover? She will be fine, will she not?” He asked, the Doctor responding back within seconds.
“Yes, she will recover just fine, a few weeks at most before she is back in chape. She is a strong girl, I can assure you of that. She likely won’t start to wake for a day or so- her body was exhausted when you brought her in- but when she does we will likely be able to release her very soon after.”
With a warm smile she bid the man farewell, leaving Qifrey outside the door. Opening it he was brought into a small room with two beds. The one on the left had a boy that couldn’t be older than five sleeping with a rag on his head. Beside him was a stout women who sent Qifrey an acknowledging nod which he returned. The right bed held Coco. The room was dim but he could still see the bright white bandage crossing around her head and meeting towards the front middle where a large stack of gauze sat. Bandages were often stark against skin, but he has a hard time difrenchiatimg the parts that rested on her skin apart from it. She was so, deathly pale. The girl had always been, but with the surrounding circumstances and the eye bags that attests to the week’s stress it was made ever more clear.
He stared at her form lying in the bed for far to long, tracing her: the lines of her skin, the wrinkles on her fingers, the hair that fell from her head, the folds of her dress, the draping of the blankets overtop her, everything to prove she was there in front of him. She looked smaller now than before, laying in a bed, unconscious from an injury that could have left her for dead. He eyed the stool sitting in the corner before bringing it to rest beside her bed and sitting down.
Two clock ticks past before the hunger of his body proved to him that it was time for him to leave. Stretching his knees against the chair, Qifrey stood, leaving the room to fly back to the Atelier and face his apprentices.
——
He arrived back to an onslaught of questions by Tetia, backed by an occasional one from Agott and Richeh about their friend’s condition. Before he even got the chance to answer they heard Olruggio barking at them to come into the kitchen for lunch. Thankfully the idea of food was enough of a distraction for them to stop, allowing the group to go and eat.
Sitting around the table, one seat empty, he started to answer them. He went into far less detail than he did with the other man (albeit that didn’t say much about the detail due to the minimal information he knew. Part of him wanted to lower the severity of the scenario, but he knew that they would not believe him one bit if he did. He left out how close she was do dying, but did impress on them the danger that their friend has been in. Slowly the questions died down and he began to go into what he truly wanted to talk about.
“I know that I tell you this often, but with this I thought it would be wise to do so again. If you are in danger you are to come to us immediately. If you are in pain you are to come to us immediately. If you think something might be wrong, come to us. We are here to help you and to protect you but if we don’t know what is wrong we cannot do anything. Even the smallest of things can snowball out of control, but if we can get to it at the the beginning then we can work to keep things like this from happening.”
“You couldn’t have known though, none of us could have.”
Tetia’s voice came out quiet and out of character, the group looking at her questioningly for her to continue.
“None of us know anything about anything the body. We aren’t taught what is normal and what isn’t. I don’t think Coco even knew something was wrong because she wasn’t allowed to know what to look for if something was wrong!” Her voice rose as she talked, hands gesturing around wildly before coming to a halt, standing from her seat with the chair sliding backwards. “And if she didn’t know then how could you two? Or any of us? We are supposed to help people with magic but when it really counts we can’t do anything! All because people chose to be idiots with the gift we were given. We were so scared, a-and worried when you came down with her- I thought she died with how your face looked and the only thing I could think was that she died and that there was nothing we could do.”
As she spoke her voice quickly grew more and more panicked before tears finally fell, sobs feeding into her words at the end as she wrapped her arms around herself and dropping her head. “I know that we can’t and I know why… but I just feel so helpless. I just want to see people smile.”
Qifrey stood from his chair, pushing it back and walking around the table. Wrapping his arms around the pink hair child as she sobbed into his clothes, kneeling down pressing his head into her curls, whispering “I know Tetia, I know,” under his breath until the room slowly emptied and her cries dulled
——
The next morning Qifrey flew back to the hospital, and upon opening the front door his eye was drawn to the nurse that was walking up to him- Coco’s nurse. Relief flooded through his bones at her mention that the girl had awoken briefly, but it was dulled by the words that followed.
“I don’t know what the customs are for witches in training, but if you can get in contact with her Mum I would highly encourage it- she awoke asking for her, still rather drowsy from the herbs- it was a terribly sad sight.” The nurse finished, looking to the window with a melancholic look in her eyes. “If you can, I’d stay the day. I have no doubt she will start to drift in and out and at least having someone might quell her worries, if not her mother.”
The nurse quickly let him pass, which he was grateful for as walked down the ever growing familiar hallway to one of the back rooms. The patient who had been in there the prior day was gone, medical equipment packed and bed made tightly, leaving only Coco to the room, the soft daylight coming from the window shining onto her face. She had woken up. Not now, but the night before she had awoken briefly. He felt a moment of morosity at the knowledge that he could, in fact, not get the girl’s mother. The girl would not be here if he could, and that only darkened the mood.
Qifrey latched the door behind him before sitting on the stool beside her bed. A long sigh expelled from his throat as his spine compressed in on itself and he held his face within his hands. He moved his finger along his skin smoothly before hitting his glasses, and with the security of the room in mind, he took them off, setting them on the bed by the girl’s hand. He brought one of his hands up to his face, rubbing the heel of his palm into his eye, and with the other he threaded his fingers through Coco’s, his palm resting against hers as he lightly squeezed it.
The room was quiet outside of the two witches’ breaths that drew almost simultaneously. The smell of medicinal herbs were strong, but not in a bad way- if anything it put Qifrey at slight ease- despite the negative situation the scent was always tied to. The room was rather dim. With no active lamps, the only light source came from the window behind him, and even still it was only a small sliver that passed right below the head of the bed and onto the green haired girl’s face. The room was neither cold nor warm and had a slight breeze that came from beneath the door to his left.
This unfortunate set up paired with the stress of the past week led his consciousness to waver, on multiple points having to snap his head back up as it would dip. The cycle of alertness to dozing went on for roughly half a clock tic before he gave in, drawing his hand from Coco’s to place both hands against his forehead and his elbows to his lower thighs, holding his head up.
“The trees gone,” Qifrey nearly jumped from his skin, the white haired man’s head whipping around to look at the small form in the bed, the cause of the slurred, sluggish voice. Her half lidded eyes bore into Qifrey’s own, and even through the exhaustion that flooded through them, there was the light that he’d not seen since spotting her and Agott’s conversation on the bridge from earlier in the week. The light of a child’s eyes.
For a moment his jaw fell slack from his face before the shock emotions took over his features and he tilted his chin to his collarbone. His eyebrows knit close together and his trembling lips pressed into wavering line. Qifrey was rarely an overly emotional person, and with that he could recall every time he had cried that he could remember on his two hands. It was never a pleasant experience. The overwhelming emotion felt sickly on his skin and face, an overwhelming sense of wrongness enveloping him whenever he did. Not only that, but the tears itself felt wholly wrong. Despite lacking his right eye, his tear ducts still functioned perfectly fine. If he had time to comprehend that he would cry he could tilt his head down, as he was doing now, and the tears would fall down his cheeks like normal. If not, they would well in the empty socket where his eye should be, a feeling that he could only compare to the disgust he feels at the tree writhing beneath his skin.
With a deep breath Qifrey looked back to Coco, not bothering to wipe the tears from his face nor put his glasses back onto his nose. “Yes, well you have had everyone quite worried for you, me included. Can’t exactly be comfortable in this situation, now can I. He did is best to try and bring a soft smile to his face, but it was wobbly at best and horrifically unconvincing at worst. Simultaneously, he his hand from his lap and brought it to meet back with the little girl’s hand, his dwarfing hers in size.
It only took a moment for his words to hit her dazed mind before tears too started to flow from her eyes as a choked sob expelled from her throat, with the repetitive chants of “m’ sorry,” flowing past afterwards. The words made the vines under his skin wilt as his heart squeezed inside his chest. This week was a whirlwind of him questioning the success of his position in relation to his condition, but he believes that those words might have just solidified the necessity of his position. Not for him, but for them.
“You have nothing to apologize for, dear, I am just glad you are safe, that is all that matters right now, so please don’t apologize.” He whispers to her, giving don’t squeezes to her hands. They set like that for almost five minutes, Qifrey continuing to try and console Coco, with the girl continuing to apologize to him. Soon her words slowed, and so did her tears. Her blinks grew heavy but she still caught to maintain eye contact with Qifrey. The “I wanna go home,” was almost silent, so blurred with sleep and gravely from sobs that if there were any more noise to the room he would have never heard it. Her eyes closed, and they didn’t open again, her breathing light and airy.
“I know you do.”