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Lanolin believes herself prepared to meet her lover's sibling, after Hornet brings it up one day. The weaver explains that her sibling cannot speak, but it is kind and polite. It is scarred from the kingdom they live in and a past that Hornet hesitates to share, but the scars do not define them, Hornet explains.

Do not fear it, she says.

Lanolin imagines a bug like hornet with perhaps larger muscles, a thicker frame. Imagines thick scars that movies give to the strong and menacing.

She thinks herself prepared to meet this bug.

Then Hornet walks into the room alone, and Lanolin pauses. At her side, Blaze tilts her head, confused.

Hornet sighs. "You two must follow me. There was... a complication I had not considered."

Lanolin runs through a million possibilities -- did it get into trouble? Did someone stop it from coming inside? Maybe Hornet couldn't get the request for a stranger to enter this part of the restoration in time.

Hornet turns on her heel, and Lanolin and Blaze follow her.

It's clear very soon that Hornet is leading them entirely out of the Restoration building, at which point Blaze speaks up.

"I don't understand," she says, walking a little faster to match pace. "What was the issue?"

"You will see," Hornet says, voice sharp with annoyance.

Blaze and Lanolin exchange glances.

Hornet walks out the double doors and takes a sharp right, into a small almost-alleyway the Restoration has built into itself.

Into the dark, Hornet greets, "Sibling."

Lanolin doesn't quite see, for a moment, but then an ivory shape shifts, then rises, and rises, and rises. She finds her neck strained as it walks closer, out into the sun.

Then, she can see all of it. A face of bone white, long horns curving upwards with small bumps along the inside. There is a crack beginning above the eye, and it covers much of its body with a stringy cloak. Its limbs are long and thin, almost bone-like. One arm is missing past the elbow, and scars run along its limbs -- burns and cracks both.

It seems to loom over her, what must be its eyes almost boring into her soul. Lanolin makes a noise in the back of her throat.

Hornet waves her sibling down, and it hunches over obediently. Even then, it's just double her height instead of three times.

"This," Hornet begins, "is Hollow. My sibling."

"Nice to meet you," Blaze says.

Hollow waves its only hand at her.

Hornet turns to her sibling. "I apologize that the doors of this world are too small for you. I will rest outside with you."

Hollow goes through several signs, few of which Lanolin properly catches in time.

"I refuse to simply leave you alone, sibling."

More signs.

"Hollow."

Hornet shifts, a mildly annoyed movement, then gestures at Lanolin and Blaze.

"These two are my lovers, as I have told you. Blaze, Princess of the world of Sol, and Lanolin, of this world."

Lanolin blushes, flustered. It always embarrasses her that she's dating two princesses and is just... Lanolin, herself.

Hollow kneels, bowing its head low at them, and Blaze jolts. "Oh! No, no, please, don't- I'm not your princess."

Hollow raises its head, turning to look at Hornet.

"I am, and you recognize the dislike I have for such formalities. She feels much the same."

Hesitantly, Hollow rises.

It signs something at Hornet, and she nods sharply. "Both of them are. You know what the ability to fight means to me."

Lanolin shifts uncomfortably. "Ah," she starts, just to get eyes on her. "I'd really like to get to know you, Hollow, just... Not particularly out here."

Both of the siblings look up in a very similar fashion. "Well," she says slowly. "I suppose we could attempt to bring you inside once more."

Lanolin considers the bug, then the doorway, and hopes.

Lanolin ends up leading the way, Blaze and Hornet beside her, with Hollow at the back, which means that the three of them make it through the door with no issue and get to watch the tall bug attempt to hunch through the doorway.

It smacks its head against the top of the doorframe.

Hornet crosses her arms under her cloak.

Hollow then tries falling fully to its knees and pushing its head through the doorway, which it still seems to have difficulty with.

"Sibling," Hornet says, exasperated.

Hollow lets its chin hit the ground completely, as though embarrassed.

Lanolin turns to Blaze, hoping she might have some idea, but Hornet steps up.

"Keep your head down, sibling," she says. Her hands glow in a pattern Lanolin has become used to, and yet still awed by, and she creates string out of nothing at all. One end wraps around one of Hollow's horns, and then Hornet begins pulling.

With a little help from Hollow's legs scrambling to push itself through the door, the two manage to pull the entire beast through, allowing it to stand and nod its thanks to its sister.

Lanolin watches with large eyes.

"... Do things like this happen often?" she asks.

"Hollow and I avoid small doorways, generally, so, no."

"Ah, I just meant..." Lanolin pauses. "These weird messes with weirder solutions."

Hornet sighs, and Hollow's shoulders slump tiredly.

"Not with this sibling," she says, and Lanolin wonders what the fuck is up with the other one, then.