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On one of those rare calm days that follows the end of the world, when both time and rebuilding are moving forward steadily and calmly, Lucretia finds herself with a moment to herself in her office, still in the Bureau of Balance, still floating on the sky’s second moon. The room looks much the same as it did before the world changed for the better, the shelves still neatly crammed with books and journals alike, the sunbeams still reaching downward to the open journals before her. Her pens are set to the side for the moment. Lucretia, for her part, is lifting a cup to her lips, a cup that reminds her of one of the changes that came with restoring both past and future.
Belongings from the Starblaster, ones she’d set aside to avoid the pain and pangs, have made their way into her office, bringing a touch of the home she had had for a century into the place where the only such token she’d permitted was a painting that none but her could view with unclouded eyes. It’d been a slow change, and more an effort of her family than Lucretia herself.
Magnus had stopped by, a painted duck cradled in his hands as they had sat talking, reaching through the years to who they had been and what they had lost. But perhaps who they had been and what they had lost are not as unreachable as Lucretia had thought. The duck sits atop a stack of books.
Merle had insisted with a wink that she needed a plant, as she had to get up from her desk at some point when she remembered that living beings (all living beings, Lucretia) require water, food, sunlight. It was only after he’d left that she noticed a strange conglomeration of three sand dollars stuck together in the vague shape of a mouse’s head on the side table.
Lup, though of course she’d been here many a time before she returned to her body, had kicked down the door as soon as she had feet to do so and thrown her arms around Lucretia. Neither of them had said a word about the other shaking, and, later, Lup had insisted upon helping with a newly required redecorating of Lucretia’s office with bits and baubles from the Starblaster.
The first time Barry had come without Lup, the pair had simply stared. After a long silence that Lucretia was unsure if she wanted to break, Barry had pulled out a small book that most assuredly did not come from a raid on a necromancer’s keep. Lucretia already had one she’d wanted to give to Barry. The two resumed their periodic exchange of books.
Davenport has not visited. Lucretia understands that, respects that. There is too much of the world to see to be where it had once been so small. His letters, his stories, are an unexpected gift and reside in their own book, always near her desk.
Taako hasn’t visited either. There have been no letters but no protests either, when she’d come to family dinners. He is not overtly hostile, most of the time, but he is cold, a chilling counter to his twin’s warmth. Lucretia understands that as well.
But as time has passed, the traces of the past, the work of the present, and the plans for the future have come together in her office. And Lucretia lifts a cup from a tea set some sixty odd years old while ink still newly written gleams on the pages before her. It’s a moment of quiet and peace.
And in a moment both peace and quiet are shattered.
There’s a loud THWOMP! as a booted foot connects with her unlocked office door. The door rattles violently in the frame, but, locked or not, a kick doesn’t turn the door handle. Lucretia starts and hastily sets the cup down before there’s the sound of muted cursing and the soft scrape of metal as someone uses Prestidigitation to dislodge the bolt of her doorknob. And then another, even louder, angrier THUD! followed by BANG! as the door to her office slams open, whipping into the wall behind it, the collision making everything in the office rattle a moment.
Taako stands in the doorway to Lucretia’s office.
Neither of them says a word for a long moment. Taako is breathing heavily, ears high with emotion, and glaring in a way she hasn’t really seen since he’d pointed the Umbra Staff at her.
“Lucretia,” Taako says, suddenly, delicately venomous and too casually for someone who has just kicked in her door.
“Taako,” Lucretia responds automatically, shielding her surprise.
“You, uh, you gonna invite me in?”
“I think you invited yourself in.” And naturally Taako takes that as acceptance (it is) and strides in, carefully carefree, and drapes himself in the chair across her desk. Lucretia stands without further comment and goes for the teapot and another cup.
“You updated the décor, huh? ‘Bout time. Looked like depressing, lonely nerd-ville in here last time I was here, y’know, breakin’ in and remembering my whole entire life.” Lucretia turns and Taako is staring at the painting behind her desk, the one still hanging there as it has been for years, the one he can see the truth of now.
“Yes, it really was. Time, I mean. Things had changed.” She sets the second cup on the desk and then the bowl of sugar, knowing that Taako has always preferred a truly gratuitous amount of sugar in his tea.
“Yeah, they do that, don’t they?” Some things remain the same though, and Taako scoops three heaping spoonfuls into his tea with the sound like sand passing through an hourglass. He stirs the tea, the spoon clinking loudly in the otherwise silent room. He takes a sip that turns into a slurp.
They continue on, not saying anything, Lucretia watching Taako look around the room as he continues drinking his tea in what is likely the most obnoxious manner he can conceive of.
“All right, Cretia, why aren’t you letting me do it?” Taako says suddenly, grabbing the spoon out of his tea and pointing it at her.
Lucretia blinks, confused. “Letting you… do it? Do what?”
“Y’know.” Taako waves the hand holding the spoon around expressively. Two droplets of tea splatter across Lucretia’s desk.
“I really don’t.”
Taako heaves out a sigh and sets his cup in its saucer. He reaches into one of his many pockets and holds up a plain stone. Lucretia looks between Taako’s face and the stone and back again. She raises an eyebrow.
“Oh, come on.” Taako throws both arms up but keeps a careful hold on the stone. “Master transmuter? Transmuter’s stone? You remember, the thing that, uh, inspired the rock Magnus fuckin’ ate?”
Lucretia blinks. “So you made… you’ve made transmuter’s stones before. You have one right now, so obviously I’m not interfering with that.”
“Yeah, ‘cause you’re interfering with using it.” Taako rolls his eyes.
“I don’t-”
“You remember how I’m the best transmutation wizard ever? You remember how I can get one supercharged blast off one of these that I can basically do what the fuck ever with? You remember what’s on that list? ‘Restore Youth’ ring any bells?”
“You’ve been trying… why? When?” Lucretia asks, her mind whirling.
“Come on. You know, uh, listen, cha’boy hasn’t exactly been, uh, subtle about this shit.”
“But-” And Lucretia cuts herself off as new context now brings memories into focus.
Family dinner, almost half a year ago now. A few weeks after Lup had gotten her body back, she’d proclaimed they all needed to celebrate her ability to sleep and only occasionally walk into walls after forgetting she wasn’t incorporeal anymore. Quite a few people, the IPRE and the people they’d grown to love in this world, were there, and while Lucretia hadn’t been going out of her way to avoid Taako and he likely hadn’t bothered with the effort to do the same, she’d ended up near him rather more often than she might expect. They didn’t talk though, and Lucretia hadn’t really thought anything of it. Another thing she hadn’t thought much of? Every so often through the night, there’d been the sensation of someone or something poking her, briefly, painlessly, a brush so quick she’d never been able to pin down what or who when it occurred. And who would be poking her with a rock anyway?
Magnus’s place, a house warming party, a few months ago. She’d been playing fetch with the dogs, laughing off Magnus’s teasing about no dogs on the moon. She’d been sitting cross-legged in the grass outside Magnus’s new house, as dogs dropped their toys in her lap for her to throw. Magnus certainly spoiled his dogs, too, with their abundance of toys (not that the good, good pups deserved anything less, Lucretia had thought to herself with a smile). And that was why it had seemed odd, when one of the dogs, tail wagging eagerly, had dropped a small, smooth rock in her lap along with the carved wooden bones and balls etched with patterns of ducks. But then, perhaps the dog just decided that was what she wanted to play with that day, Lucretia had concluded with a shrug and another laugh as she threw the stone far, far away, and the dog had taken off like a rocket, barking gleefully all the while.
A day at the beach and a night at Chesney’s. The Wavehumper, mostly no worse for the wear after a fight with zombie pirates, tied up at the dock. Taako was insisting on showing off his surfing skills after they’d been of more use than the cloak he’d gotten at the Fantasy Gachapon (apparently the protective qualities of the cloak don’t count). Merle insisted on skipping rocks with her, despite Lucretia laughingly telling him that simply wouldn’t work on the ocean waves. Lucretia had picked one up and paused; was that a thrum of magic from the stone? No, must just be her own Catapult spell, to throw the damn thing farther than even Magnus could hurl his own.
She blinks; the images fade, and she’s looking at Taako, annoyed and oddly vulnerable, once more. Lucretia takes a breath to replace the one that had been slammed out of her in surprise. “Did… did they know?” Her family had all had roles to play, every time this has happened.
Taako snorts. “Uh, no. You think I’d let Merle knowingly let you chuck the damn thing into the ocean? And, listen, if you could stop throwing my transmuter’s stones, that’d be, uh, that’d be great.”
“How… how many times have you tried this?” Lucretia asks.
Taako looks off into space, starts counting off attempts on his fingers before shrugging. “Like… nine? Maybe?”
“And… Taako. You and I… you don’t trust me. You don’t talk to me. That I understand. This, not so much. So, why?”
Taako crosses his arms and sets his chin. “You know, you could just not ask questions and let me knock 20 years off already.”
Lucretia straightens up, and when she opens her mouth, it’s the Director who speaks. “No. Why?”
Taako’s nose scrunches up and his ears flick back, and Lucretia can’t tell if it’s disgust or irritation. Probably both, she decides as she lets out a sigh, her shoulders softening the smallest degree.
“Taako. Please. Why?” She speaks again, and it’s not quite the quiet young girl who’d boarded the Starblaster for the first time nor the distant mastermind of the Bureau of Balance but somewhere in between. Lucretia as she truly is.
“You know.” Taako shrugs.
“I don’t.”
It’s Taako’s turn to sigh, a much more annoyed sound. “Because Wonderland was fucked up. Because they don’t get to fucking win.”
“So go sit through all of Merle’s Pan puns on Panacea and restore his eye.” Lucretia replies, deadpan, as she considers Taako’s answer.
“Tried! He wants to keep the eye patch. I told him he could still wear it, but maybe some fuckin’ depth perception would be nice.” Taako uncrosses his arms to gesture.
Lucretia chuckles at that, but Taako hasn’t answered her question, not fully. “Why me then? You haven’t forgiven me, and you won’t.”
“Definitely won’t,” Taako says, firmly. Lucretia waits. “Look. It’s not like I care, right? ‘Cause I don’t. I definitely don’t. But... Listen. That whole thing was bullshit, and Lup only got to kill Edward. And she can’t fix it now. And. I’m not going to watch Magnus watch you die for the last time. He’ll get all-” Taako waves his arms expressively. “And I’m not dealing with that. Suck it up; you gotta last longer than Mango. And since you’re, uh, not doing so great with that what with evil liches and sacrificing twenty years off your life, guess I gotta fix that.”
“You can’t get back what you’ve sacrificed in Wonderland. It won’t work.” Lucretia says, shaking her head. She knows. She researched it herself, on her own, and, like her quest for the Relics, like her search for Lup, she’d had no success on her own.
“Did you miss the part where I’m the best transmutation wizard ever? I figure it’s worth a try.” Taako brushes off her point, but Lucretia, long familiar with Taako’s tells, spots the twitch of his ears.
“You’ve tried already. It didn’t work.”
“Uh, yeah, that’s why I’m telling you now, so you know. Only works on a willing target. I figured you, uh, you would have been chill with it, what with how you are about magically fucking with people without their know-”
“Stop.” Lucretia interrupts firmly. “You’re trying to manipulate me into letting you try again with me knowing, by using what I did in the past. Taako, I understand that you won’t forgive me. I respect that. But I will not listen if you are going to insist on oversimplifying the decisions I made just to, to ease whatever weight is inexplicably on your conscience over this.”
The distance between them, seemingly lessened as they’d talked, even joked, for the first time in months, suddenly stretches wide into a vast, impassable gulf. Taako has that same glare, that same frustration rising in his face, and Lucretia can feel her own anger well up to meet it.
“Let. Me. Help. You.” Taako bites out, ears pulled back flat.
“And what are you going to do when you can’t?” Lucretia bites back.
“Burn that bridge when we get there.”
“You- you- Taako, I still don’t understand. Yes, this could be selfish about Lup, or Magnus, or whoever you want to hide your motive behind, but you are still pushing for this when you could have given up the first time it didn’t work.” Lucretia stops, pauses to collect herself. To try to collect herself, at least. “I made a bad call, I made so many bad calls, not the least of which was a game of chess with the liches in Wonderland. They wanted suffering, and I gave it to them in abundance. I walked in. I left Cam behind. I knowingly sent my family into hell even after everything that had already happened. And until you five destroyed it, no one ever escaped Wonderland by doing the right thing.” Lucretia pauses again. “No one ever really escaped at all. I told you then that Wonderland haunted me, and it still does. But I’ve… I’ve accepted that, along with this.” She gestures to herself, older than Taako had seen her in a century. “I made that sacrifice, and more, knowing I wouldn’t get them back.” She knows that Taako knows she isn’t talking just about Wonderland anymore.
Taako simply looks at her for a moment. And then he speaks. “Well, that’s fuckin’ fantastic for you. But I got a fuckin’ idea for you: actually, fuck this.” Taako ends a spell that Lucretia hadn’t realized he’d cast.
And it’s Taako, of course he’s still Taako. But the face is not quite the same Taako she’s known for so long, his hair slightly less shiny and more frizzy, his lips slightly less full, the bags under his eyes from lack of sleep rather more like her own than she’s ever seen.
“Quit being all dramatic and wide-eyed about it,” Taako snaps. Lucretia lowers the hand she’d raised to her mouth and tries to force the shock from her eyes.
“Taako… you…”
“Yeah, spun Clock. Elves have years so they asked for something else instead.”
“You said yes.”
“Uh, yeah, had to, to get Barold’s bell, remember? ‘Course, didn’t realize at the time… Fuck, Cretia, don’t you fucking dare.” It’s then that Lucretia realizes that the Taako in her vision has blurred around the edges, the subtle but substantial changes from Wonderland muddled. And she realizes that there’s something wet on her cheek.
“I- I’m- I’m so sorry.” She says, not for the first time, not for the last time, either. She hadn’t realized -of course she hadn’t realized; she’d missed so much- that even not remembering Lup, there was still a way to take something of her from Taako.
“Yeah. I know.” Taako retorts, standing and walking around to Lucretia’s side of the desk. “Listen. Fuckin’ sucks, but I’m not gonna give up. Lup knows why, ‘cause she was there all along. Krav… Krav loves me anyway. Plus, you know, still pretty fuckin’ beautiful, thank you very much. But also, fuck giving up.” Taako insistently tugs her up to standing so she can’t avoid eye contact.
And Taako’s eyes, still the same even in his altered face, study her. Lucretia tries to stop crying, because, really, that’s certainly not helping matters. But then Taako reaches out, and he stiffly wraps his arms around Lucretia.
Lucretia immediately returns the hug. Taako is all angles and weird lumps in his pockets, but he learned from Magnus and Barry, and a quietly selfish part of Lucretia’s heart still calls him her brother. It’s a good hug.
It’s quiet again, in Lucretia’s office, the office of the chronicler, the office of the Director. But it’s a much more peaceful quiet, the calm after the storm, and it lingers even as, with unspoken understanding, Lucretia and Taako step back.
Lucretia takes a breath. “Fuck giving up.” She agrees. Taako nods, and he extends a hand toward her, stone in hand. Lucretia reaches out as well, and her fingers brush stone. Nothing happens. Well. She’d expected as much.
Taako, however, frowns and pushes the stone fully into her grasp. It’s warm, from Taako’s clenched fist around it, and she can feel Taako’s magic bouncing through it, quiet echoes at first before louder waves.
And then nothing. Taako’s face is unchanged. Lucretia turns her head slowly, starting to shake it, as she extends her hand and his stone back toward him. “Taako, I-” She stops. And stares.
It always seemed a silly expression to her, to know something like the back of your hand. And yet Lucretia knows her hands. Smeared with ink and holding a pen. Fingers clenched tightly around the Bulwark Staff. Reaching out for the family she’d thought she’d lost forever.
Her hands are different. Less lined, the veins less pronounced. Taako takes the stone without a word, and, younger hands shaking, Lucretia reaches up to her own face. It isn’t the same one she knew for a hundred years. Nor is it quite the one she’d grown accustomed to after Wonderland. Lucretia’s face, like her office, like Lucretia herself, is somewhere between past and future.
“You still look old.” Taako says bluntly, and Lucretia laughs.
“It worked,” Lucretia marvels.
“Psh, I never had any doubts. Best. Transmutation. Wizard. Ever.” Taako says, tossing the now magicless stone from hand to hand, nearly dropping it on the last toss. He catches it and hastily returns it to his pocket.
“Thank you, Taako.”
“Yeah, don’t mention it. Actually, really don’t; I want to see everyone’s reactions if you don’t explain anything.” Lucretia laughs again, and Taako along with her. “Right. So, uh, I gotta go, uh, meet with Ren ‘bout school stuff. She says I can’t legally hire a twelve year old, but I know someone who hired a ten year old.”
“Right. And I have… well, I’m sure there’s more work to be done. Killian’s probably back by now, and Carey-”
“Yeah, yeah. Listen, just make sure they take some time off for cake tastings. We have an appointment next week.”
“Naturally.” Lucretia nods, following Taako as he walks to the door. “Oh. Taako? How did… how did you get here?”
Taako raises an eyebrow at her as he adjusts his hat. “Uh, magic portal? Installed it off the kitchen because Barold said I couldn’t put it in Leon’s office.” A rather more permanent fixture than any one of the Reapers simply slicing their way in. Lucretia blinks. “Oh, and Cretia. We’re not… we’re not good, and, you know, I’m not sure we’ll ever get there. But we’re… we’re better. And I’m… happy… about that.” Taako says the words slowly, as if unsure about them even as he’s saying them.
Lucretia smiles though. “I’m… I’m really, truly, honestly happy about that, too, Taako.”
“Oh, and you owe me, so you’re cat-sitting instead of Susan when Kravitz and I go on vacation!” And Taako’s out the door, and Lucretia is once more alone in her office. But Lucretia is once more alone in an office that is nowhere near as lonely as it once was, now with the past restored, the present mending, and a not-so-lonely journal-keeper looking to the nearing future.