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Occtis’s room is brighter than usual tonight.
His small room at the Penteveral fits just the essentials: a narrow bed, desk, small bookshelf, and an armoire for his limited clothing. Normally lit by a few flickering candles along sconces on the walls, today he has pushed his desk and moved the candles to the middle of the room.
All surfaces are littered with open books of anatomy and spells, the margins annotated by neat, if rushed, writing.
He is hunched over his desk when a small tap at the window breaks his concentration. It’s dark outside, the street lanterns dim, making the glowing figure seem even brighter. He grins despite himself, dropping his thread and needle to rush to the window. As soon as it’s open a few inches, a small pixie darts between the panes, coming to hover in front of his face with inhuman quickness.
“Have I missed it?” She asks, breathless. “Have you done the thing?”
“Hey—hey Thimble,” he says. “G-good to see you too.” He usually stumbles over his words, but less so around Thimble, even managing to get a joke in now and then.
The pixie rolls her eyes. “I just saw you earlier today. How much could have changed?” She’s dressed in her trademark green and brown, and her light green wings shimmer with golden motes of magic.
“Eh, fair.” He says, holding out a palm for her to land on. “Anyways, you know I wouldn’t—didn’t—start without you.”
She ignores the hand and flies over to the desk, hovering over the scene with her hands on her hips. He follows her, standing just behind his friend, suddenly nervous. Or at least, more nervous than usual.
The desk is covered with pieces of fur, mostly white, but some orange and gray. He has spent the last few days stitching the pieces together, carefully connecting mismatched legs, a torso, and bones to form a new creature. Thimble had been helping him look for the pieces, scouting in the woods for animals that no longer needed their bodies, but were not so far gone they had begun to decompose.
She had been grossed out by it at first, but had soon warmed to the task, viewing it as a treasure hunt. She’d flitted all around the forest in the time it took him to walk a few steps, looking under rocks and fallen logs for the right pieces.
It was Thimble who had found the last pieces he needed: a russet brown ear and leg to go with the rest. She now lands on the desk, investigating his work more closely. The fox is on its side, and she is only a fraction of its size, even as it lays.
“Your stitching looks good,” she says, turning around to give him a tiny thumbs up. “I’ve taught you well.”
Occtis blushes despite himself. “I already knew how to sew,” he mutters.
She doesn’t acknowledge this, and instead pulls out one of her needles, which she uses, most often, as a sword. “May I?”
He nods, taking the needle from her and prepping it with white thread. “Thanks.” She takes it and zooms away, poking at places he’d already sewn up. “These look good,” she says, as she works, “but I just want to fix them a little.”
Not one to argue, Occtis nods again, and threads his own needle, beginning again at the part he was working on when she came in. The two work in silence, or near silence, as Thimble darts around the fox, quick as light, her wings filling the air with a gentle buzz. Occtis stops trying to follow her, and trusts that she sees things from her vantage point he cannot.
An hour later, Thimble steps back, nods once with satisfaction, and then re-sheaths her needle. She flies up to Occtis, landing lightly on his shoulder. “I think it’s almost done,” she says, her voice uncharacteristically hushed. They take in the fox together. Thimble’s stitches he can’t see, but his, he can: there are seams of dark thread, and an “8” he’d sewn in on a whim last night. It feels fitting, somehow.
“It just needs eyes,” he says.
“But not creepy ones,” she counters, emphatically pointing a finger in the air.
“Not creepy ones.” He agrees, laughing a little. Their definitions of creepy differed slightly.
There were eyes aplenty in the Penteveral’s storehouses, but something about seeing the mismatched ones bobbing in jars had turned them both off to the idea, even Occtis. The forest didn’t yield anything promising on that front either. Although stones or gems could work, they both hadn’t been convinced, and decided to put off this portion until, well, now.
Thimble turns to him, leaning her body back to look at him more easily. “What about buttons? Got any extras of those?”
His eyes go to the armoire. Thimble follows his gaze and buzzes off his shoulder. She pulls at the door’s handle with all her strength, her feet planted on the door as she tugs. The door moves a fraction of an inch. She turns around, gesturing at the door. “I might need you to get this.”
Dutifully, he gets up, walking the few steps around the desk to the dresser. He opens it and she flies inside, her glow brightening so they could both see. His clothing, fine quality as it was, is now starting to fade and fray, showing the years of wear. Thimble runs a hand along one of his favorite jackets. “This is beautiful,” she says. “Why don’t you wear it?”
He rubs the back of his neck. “Ah, my—my family isn’t exactly generous with anything towards me at the moment. Or, really ever has been, but, well—I’m, k-keeping it nice. For a special... occasion.”
“Your family sucks,” mutters Thimble. She flies around his other items of clothing, all in similar forms of wear. “They’ve never given you anything new since you enrolled here?”
“Ah—no.” No use denying it.
“Hm.” She plays with a button on a shirt he had not worn for ages. “Wait, don’t you have magic for this kind of thing? Making things new or whatever?” She peers up at him, slightly accusatory.
“I’ve never bothered to learn it,” he admits. “It didn’t seem… important.”
In a flash, she’s in front of his face, eyes narrowed. “You are important, Occtis.” He almost steps back to get away from her piercing gaze, but somehow holds his ground. She points a needle at him that he didn’t even see her draw. “Not because of your House,” she continues, “but because of you, alright?” Her wings flutter even faster than normal in emphasis.
Mutely, he nods once.
She shakes her head. “I want to hear you say it. ‘I’m important.’”
“Thimble…”
“I won’t take no for an answer.” Slightly calmer now, her wings slow, and she lowers in the air. He lifts a palm under her, and this time, she takes it. He can barely feel her as she lands, so feather-light she is. She lowers herself until she’s sitting, pulling her knees under her.
“Thaz—Thjazi—this is what he did for me. He… helped me see myself as more—as what I could be, not just what everyone else sees.” Her voice is quiet.
Occtis pauses at that. Thimble had always seemed larger than life somehow, confident in a way he was envious of and never questioned. To think that she wasn’t always this way was a bit of a revelation.
“I am important,” he whispers, raising up his hand to look her in the eyes. He feels a little silly, but has to admit the words feel good to say, even if he doesn’t quite believe them yet.
Thimble’s smile breaks across her face, radiant. “It’s a start,” she says. She flies up, and pecks him on the cheek, flitting back to the armoire before she can see the blush that spreads across his whole face in answer.
The two eventually identify a shirt, buried in the back of a drawer, that has gone unworn for long enough Occtis doesn’t mind giving it up for the cause. The fabric is a rich purple, and the buttons match. Thimble takes to the fabric, somehow cutting it with small fabric scissors he didn’t know he had, while Occtis sews the purple buttons on for eyes.
“Here,” she says, holding up what he now sees is a bandana cut from the shirt and inscribed with an “8”, matching the one on the fox. The bandana is twice as large as her, and he takes it in two hands.
“I love it,” he says, “is it for—“
“The fox,” she says, shrugging. “Or you, I guess. Whoever.”
“Thank you.” He takes his time looking over it, admiring her craftsmanship.
A few minutes later, Thimble flits over him, poking his arm. “It’s not that good. Stop stalling.”
Occtis sighs. She’s right.
He folds up the bandana, placing it on the side of the desk. His stomach, already in knots, feels electric. He gets up, retrieving one of the many open tomes from his narrow bed. This book is thin, the dark leather binding cracked with age, pages yellowing. “Not many people bother with necromancy,” he explains as Thimble brushes dust off the pages. “I found it in the back of the stacks.”
Thimble nods, coming to flutter just behind his left arm. She pulls out her swords again. Occtis gives her a look and she shrugs. “Just in case.”
With long fingers, Occtis draws a sigil in the air. The lines glow a vibrant green, hovering just above the fox. He repeats the gesture several times, until there are multiple icons. As he begins to utter the spell, lines grow out from the sigils, first towards each other, and then towards the fox.
The fox begins to rise off the table, floating just slightly. As it becomes infused with green energy, it twitches—first the foot, then the tail. All of it begins to move, slowly, uneasily. Soon, it’s standing stiffly.
The green glow fades and the fox slowly lowers to the table. It remains eerily still for a second, and then it sneezes, shaking its head from side to side. It looks up at Occtis and gives a lopsided smile, its tongue nearly falling out of the side of its mouth.
“H—hello,” Occtis says, just staring at it. The fox gives a yip, and jumps slightly, cocking its head. Its button eyes somehow appear focused, alert. It yips again when Occtis doesn’t respond.
Thimble flies out from behind Occtis, coming to stand just in front of the fox. She holds out a hand, and the fox nuzzles her gently. She laughs, flying up to reach his—for she’s now sure it’s a he—ears. “Hi,” she says, throwing her whole body into the scratch. “I’m Thimble.” The fox gives her a gentle lick. “Ew,” she laughs again, then turns to Occtis. “Come say hi.”
She buzzes slightly out of the way, allowing him to approach. “Hi,” he says, holding out a hand. The fox ignores it and jumps into his arms instead. Occtis starts, but then gently pets the fox, smiling despite himself. “I thought you would be scarier,” he says, as the fox licks his face.
Thimble covers her mouth as she laughs. “He is a little… unguarded.” The fox yips again, nuzzling Occtis.
“Ow!” Occtis holds the fox out with one hand, and his cheek with another. “Something poked me.”
Thimble flies to his cheek, then over to the fox. She pulls a straight pin out of the fox’s snout. “Looks like these all didn’t get removed.” She rubs the fox’s nose. “He doesn’t seem to be hurt, at least.”
She investigates the rest of him, and find two more, gently pulling them out. The fox doesn’t react, just wiggles, trying to get free from Occtis. “He’s like a pincushion,” she mutters, placing the straight pins down on the desk.
“Pincushion,” says Occtis. “I kinda like that.”
Thimble looks at the fox again, her gaze narrowed in concentration. Then she nods, almost to herself. “Me too.” She scratches the fox’s ears again.
Before the night ends, Occtis casts a few more spells. One, to keep the fox preserved, another, to ward of smell and detection, and a final one to use the fox—Pincushion, officially—as his familiar. The last spell is the most complicated, and Thimble is on the edge of sleep when he finishes in the early hours.
With a pop, Pincushion disappears, only tiny motes of green light left from the casting.
“Where’d he go?” Thimble sits up from where she’d landed between books. “Is he okay?”
“He is,” said Occtis tiredly, beginning to clean up the desk. “I made him my—familiar, I guess, for lack of a better term. Now he can come when I call him. Watch.” Occtis snaps his fingers, and Pincushion appears on his shoulder. He greets Occtis as if he hadn’t just been there before.
“That doesn’t hurt him?” Thimble asks, rubbing an eye.
“Nope,” says Occtis, snapping his fingers again. Pincushion resists, then disappears again.
“A little mean,” says Thimble, attempting to help tidy the books by shoving them to one side of the bed. “Can you bring him back?”
Occtis takes the books, stacking everything on his desk. He snaps again, and this time Pin appears on his bed, next to Thimble, who gives him a big hug. He flops onto his back, and she begins to rub his stomach.
A moment later, she speaks again. “Okay if I stay here tonight?” Her voice is quiet, almost shy. “I could fly to Thjazi, but—”
“Of course,” says Occtis. “You know you always can.”
“Thank you.” The pixie yawns, leaning against a Pinchusion who is still upside down. “I might just fall asleep right here,” she murmurs, draping an arm over her eyes. “If you keep taking forever.”
“At least move to the pillow,” says Occtis, unable to keep from smiling as he closes the armoire. “I need some room.”
“Fine, fine,” says Thimble, who somehow manages to convince Pin to curl up on the pillow closest to the wall.
Occtis straightens the books one last time, then snuffs out the candles. Thimble’s glow becomes the brightest thing he sees as he lays down facing her and Pin. The fox is curled into a ball, and Thimble’s head is next to his.
The only sound in the room is their breathing until Thimble speaks. “I’m proud of you,” she says, her voice barely a whisper. “And not just for the magic.”
“Me too,” he admits. “Thank you for—for everything.”
“Always,” she says.
Thimble places a hand to her lips and kisses the tips of her fingers, then reaches out for him. Occtis does the same, touching her fingers with one of his for a moment. Then he tucks his hand under his head, and Thimble does the same, still facing him. They all fall into a well-earned sleep, not waking until morning light.
* * *
A week later, a letter arrives at Thjazi and Thimble’s safe house via a trusted messenger. The paper is small and folded into a square about an inch wide.
“It’s for you,” says Thjazi, handing the letter to Thimble, who is perched on his shoulder.
She unwraps it, taking care not to tear the paper, which looks like it was torn from a notebook.
The first thing she sees is a bright green button that matches her wings perfectly. She holds it to her chest as she reads:
Thimble—
I’ve been practicing, like you asked, and I’m getting better at visual spells. I can’t quite fix my clothes yet, but I can now change the color of something, and I wanted you to have this as a thank you.
—Occtis
P.S. Pin says hi
The writing is small—impossibly small for a human hand—and next to it is also a too-small paw print. She suspects Occtis prioritized learning a shrinking spell to send this to her, and warms at the thought.
Thimble folds the letter under her arm, and buzzes up to show Thjazi the button. He takes it between his pointer finger and thumb, nodding in approval as he hands it back to her.
“Got any string?” She asks. “I have an idea.”