Chapter Text
Nozel lifted his teacup, ignoring the pink cotton candy clouds drifting past him. Books, stars, and toys floated around them. In the distance, a cuckoo clock chimed, and the scents of sugar, spice, and candle wax mingled pleasantly. The table cloth billowed gently under their dishes as if caught in a light breeze. Nozel did his best to pay little mind to the nonsense around him.
Across the table, Dorothy swung her feet under her chair and smiled at him as she poured out of a teapot shaped like a peacock. “How is your and Fuegoleon’s son? What was his name again? Lioncardio?”
Nozel scoffed to hide himself choking on his tea. Dorothy’s words, no matter their intention, were always so blunt. It was one of the reasons he stayed on her good side. “...Leocadio. Dio.”
“Dio! Got it!” Her eyes shined, and a caricature of his son appeared to dance around her.
“Stop that,” Nozel said, closing his eyes. “Besides, didn’t you have your own inexplicable child? What happened to them?”
“Don’t make me think about that!” Dorothy gasped. She clapped her hands over her ears and closed her eyes. “Pink sands, purple lobsters, shiny goldfish, pearls and ballgowns!” Each thing on her nonsensibled list appeared around her head, filling the sweet smelling air, images combining and overlapping. The gown was layered in golden scales, the sand expanded and retracted into pearls. The lobsters, for all their credit, were just normal lobsters with lavender purple shells.
Nozel sipped his tea. He had accepted some time ago that there were things Dorothy could not or should not think about, and that she had good reason for those choices, even if he did not know what they were. He was still curious, but he had to think of another way to get at the issue, one that wouldn’t trigger such a reaction. Most of the time she would circle back on her own, approaching whatever topic they wanted to speak of from a safer angle.
Dorothy sighed and giggled, “Hey, has Kirsch spoken to you about a mission in the west to recover a certain artifact? Oh, what was it? Some wind up thing?”
“It was a magical timepiece,” Nozel answered. “Yes, he spoke to me about it. We deployed a joint squad. It must be difficult doing all your work through him.”
“Oh, on the contrary!” she said, sing-song. “Kirsch is a real doll! My place in the Magic Knights is so often to protect against such obscure threats, and he keeps things so down to earth.”
“Down to earth?” Nozel gave her an unimpressed look that drew out a heartfelt laugh in the other captain.
“Look around you, Nozel! He’s a little more down to earth than this.” She waved her arms emphatically and glitter filled the air.
He raised a brow. “Fair enough. But if down to earth is your goal, I would suggest a different vice captain." Rather than linger, he asked, "What are these abstract threats you speak of?”
She smiled. “All around us, all the time, there are things you can’t see. Things you can only imagine. It’s my job to imagine them- and to imagine things to deal with them.”
“What use is that outside your dreams?” he asked, cool, but not dismissive. If the wizard king saw this as important, it must be, and Nozel had to respect Dorothy’s power- especially when he was in the midst of it.
“Because the things I make are real, silly!” She raised a finger demonstratively, and a large stone door floated up behind her. Thick chains were wrapped around it. “Me- and Reve, too- work very hard to bind up doors like this, because they’ll appear whether we imagine them or not. Together, we’re even better at it than I was before! And it’s so much easier now that we don’t have to go looking through them.”
“Doors…” he considered that. If Dorothy and Reve were binding up these doors, they must contain something dangerous, but he didn’t dare ask.
“You can ask what’s on the other side! Once they’re closed, they’re closed for good.” Without waiting for him, she said, “You already know a little bit! After all, you’re very close to someone who came through one of them.”
Nozel lowered his cup to the plate, eyes narrowing. “I am close to…?”
Reve appeared behind him, her cloak billowing with mana.
“Joining us for tea?” he asked, hoping she wasn’t.
“Oh…” She looked blankly over the table.
“Sit down! Sit down!” Dorothy encouraged. “What is it? Here, have some tea. I have your favorite!” She tipped her teapot into the open air.
A teacup appeared in Reve’s hand to catch the tea Dorothy poured. She floated down into the seat, her expression placid as she sipped.
Nozel frowned at her. The elf was not a welcome addition to their conversation. As often as he expected she was around sharing Dorothy’s mind with her, he still felt more at ease talking face to face with his friend alone.
“Why don’t you tell Nozel about some of the doors we’ve closed,” Dorothy said.
Reve looked into her tea thoughtfully. “There is one where everything is the same, but your hair looks beautiful.”
Dorothy laughed.
Nozel leered at her. “My hair is beautiful now. I don’t expect an elf to appreciate modern fashion.”
“Mm,” she responded, stirring her tea. He wished he knew what that meant. “There are ones where the Silva family died during the attack, and ones where you found love after it.”
“Am I the focal point in all the worlds you look into?” Nozel asked impatiently.
She nodded, expression unreadable.
Dorothy’s giggles intensified. “No! You’re really not!” She playfully punched her cohabitant’s shoulder. “But don’t you like hearing about yourself?”
He scoffed. “All I’m hearing are vague fairytales.”
“It is better to think about fairytales.” Reve stared into Nozel’s eyes seriously, her own glowing ominously. He waited for elaboration, but she stopped there.
Sighing, Nozel pressed, “Why?”
“The same reason I’m always in such high spirits,” Dorothy said brightly. “We can make doors so easily. Do you really want us to think about doors to bad places?”
“I suppose not.” He gently lifted a scone off his plate and examined it. Rainbows striped its surface. “But if you imagine these doors just for the sake of sealing them, then they never have to open.”
“The passage exists before the door can be closed, silly,” Dorothy said, reaching over to knock on his forehead. “Our reflexes are quick, but still…”
“It is more complicated. We are not the only ones able to create doors,” Reve explained, “But any door between two places, once open, makes it harder to keep those places apart.” A net appeared above them, full of cartoonish fish. “So, naturally, there is a door here.” She cut one of the threads of the net with an ornate pair of scissors.
“Oh, and natural doors here, here, and here!” Dorothy went wild on the poor net with her own pair of scissors, snipping thread after thread. Occasionally, a fish tail would stick out, or one’s body arch partway through, but the net held.
Reve continued. “Our chains do not target just the doors in our minds; it is not like this:” An oversized needle appeared and threaded one of the holes in the net closed. “If we find one, it is more like this.” The needle threaded through the net starting at a different hole. It connected the existing holes, along with areas that seemed secure enough on their own.
“But the doors our minds make aren’t like natural doors either,” Dorothy said brightly, “because our minds are always, always reaching for something, even if we don’t realize it.” She grabbed the tail of one of the fish that stuck out of the net and yanked . The net bowed and ripped open, pouring fish all over the table.
Nozel, foreseeing something like this from the start, formed a mercury shield over himself, his plate, and his cup. The fish pattered over it like heavy rain. When the sound stopped, he let his guard down, only to have a fish- some cursed straggler- land in his teacup. He stared at it in utter disappointment that only manifested on his face as a subtle tilt of his brow. “I see. Then your minds are key to the Clover Kingdom’s defense. Your waking state makes much more sense, now.”
Dorothy giggled.
He dumped the tea and its marine passenger out into the pastel ether. “I imagine having two minds on the problem is a double edged sword. Because you both have your own suite of… far-fetched wishes.”
Reve and Dorothy exchanged a look.
“Yes,” Reve answered. “It is hard not to imagine things going differently…”
There was a sound like quickly moving machinery, chains clattering, and mechanical clicking. Nozel felt a wave of something unfamiliar- an emotion, or mana, maybe just a chill- but it passed so quickly, he thought he might have imagined it. He eyed Reve critically.
The elf stood. “Watch after him.” And she disappeared.
Dorothy, her expression growing serious, rose as well. “Reve!”
“What was that?” Nozel said, letting offense ring out in his tone. “Do you understand the depths of disrespect-?”
She put a hand on his shoulder and smiled. The expression was meant to be encouraging, but it clearly hid something else. “Come on, Nozel. Let’s just relax until this is all over.”