Chapter Text
Everyone in the atelier was scattered about in the great hall.
They were at the great hall because they were requested to give their statements on what had occurred at the silver eye festival.
Which meant they had to stay overnight.
Coco yawned, her sleep has definitely been far worse after the silver eye festival had happened. Considering everything that had happened Coco was surprised she was getting any sleep at all.
Last night she and the other girls had gone to the baths, normally she would feel very refreshed and calm after that but she just feels so lost and out of reach.
Especially after Tartah went with the brimmed caps
She shouldn’t think about that right now.
Anyways, now her Tetia, Richeh, and Agott are going to the dining hall for lunch before they head back to the atelier!
The lunches are really hit or miss in the dining hall, or at least that’s what Coco has figured in her little time spent here at the great hall. She didn’t grow up in these ocean walls so she really doesn’t know much about how people live their everyday lives here.
Tetia and Richeh walk ahead of the group talking about how annoying it was to fill out their experiences at the silver eye, Tetia was doing most of the talking while Richeh was agreeing in her usual manner.
Agott and Coco walked slightly behind the two chatting girls, Coco would occasionally speak or give her opinion on what they were talking about. Agott walked next to Coco simply just observing everyone.
They eventually made it to the dining hall. They had gotten there a little before lunch to be able to get their food and seats before the crowds of other people.
While sitting many more groups started to fill up the tables in the dining hall.
“Coco, you should totally start working on more of your flying wing things!!” Tetia exclaimed with a mouth full of food.
“Tetia don’t talk with your mouth full.” Scolded Agott.
“Well i wanted to, but i really just haven’t had much motivation to work on them..” Coco said shyly, poking at the food on her plate.
“Aw that’s a shame! I really hope you can get to working on them again! They could help so many people and-” Tetia started to ramble on. Richeh nodded along with what Tetia was saying.
Coco wasn’t paying attention to Tetia anymore.
She was looking past Tetia.
At the doorway.
She saw Ininia.
Ininia was standing in a doorway of the dining hall.
Ininia was here.
She had an old and dirty looking book in her hand.
Before Coco could think she had already gotten up and started to run towards Ininia. Agott had called out for her and got up to chase after her. Coco pushed through the crowd of people eventually, she was no longer visible to Agott. She eventually reached the doorway where Ininia was.
Coco saw Ininia run down another hallway.
She ran after her.
Hallway after hallway Coco chased the ribbons, the ribbons she knew belonged to Ininia, that belonged to a brimmed cap. She could never see her fully after she turned corner after corner, Coco followed anyway.
After what felt like forever chasing her, she followed Ininia to a dead end.
Ininia was nowhere to be found.
She left the book she was holding on the floor.
Coco quickly ran over to the old and dirty book.
Was it Ininia’s? Was it like the book she was sold when she was younger? Does it have forbidden spells inside of it?
Questions were racing through her mind.
She opened it to the first page.
Her eyes looked over the page and read the name under the ‘This book belongs to:’
Her stomach dropped.
The name.
This name.
It was her Fathers name.
It was her dead fathers name.
She was gonna be sick.
Coco’s face was left of any emotion that could be seen. Her eyes read the name over and over and over again.
She had never met her father. He had died before she was even born. When she was younger, when she started loving magic so dearly. She had hoped that magic would be able to let her meet her father. Just to see what he was like. To see if he would have even liked her.
Why in the world would Ininia, a brimmed cap, a person who had hurt her and her friends. Have a book, have a journal, that belonged to Coco’s father?
Coco’s heart and mind were racing. She couldn’t believe it. Doubts ran through her mind.
‘What if it isn’t his? What if it’s just someone with the same name..?’
She flipped to the next page.
Her eyes scanned over it.
The page was dated.
She read it.
‘August 4th, ####’
She was about to continue reading the journal entry when she heard footsteps coming from behind where she sat.
“Coco?” She whipped her head around to see Master Qifrey and Olruggio standing at the start of the hallway.
She quickly closed the journal.
“My dear, why are you on the floor?” Qifrey said, questioning his apprentice.
She was on the floor?
She looked around at herself and her surroundings, sure enough. She was sitting on the floor, clutching the journal to her stomach.
“You look like you’ve just seen a ghost,” Master Olruggio pointed out.
Qifrey was now very concerned. “Coco, are you certain you’re alright..?” He asked her.
Coco wasn’t listening.
Her thoughts were still on the journal.
She needed to read those journal entries.
“I think we should go find the other girls..” Qifrey spoke with a hand on his chin.
Coco got herself up off of her knees from where she sat on the floor. She walked from hallway to hallway book in hand with Master Qifrey and Master Olruggio. They walked back to the dining hall where she sat with the other girls before she ran off.
Agott was the first to notice their presence. Her worried face looked up at the group of three. Her eyes immediately widened and she ran over to them.
“Coco are you alright..?” Agott started to speak. “Why would you run off like that! We’ve finished eating but we didn’t know when you were going to be back so we’ve just been waiting here-“
“Thank you for waiting for me, Agott.” Coco said with a smile.
A flush could be seen spreading on Agott’s face.
Tetia and Richeh came up from where they sat before Coco had run away from them.
“There you are Coco!” Tetia exclaimed.
“We had to finish lunch without you.” Richeh said with her normal tone.
Tetia's eyes darted to the book in Coco’s hands.
“Coco, what's in that book?” Tetia spoke, pointing at the book at her side. “I don’t think you had that before you ran off-”
Coco instinctually hid the book behind herself. “It’s nothing Tetia, just a journal” her tone dropped into something with feelings that she didn’t want to work through.
“Alright are we able to get back to the atelier soon-“ Olruggio started to speak. “I don't wanna spend that much time here.”
“Yes, I agree we should get back post haste.” Qifrey said, agreeing with his watchful eye.
They proceeded to grab all of the items they had brought with them. They made their way back to the atelier, leaving the ocean floor back through the window way.
It was night now in the atelier. There was moonlight seeping through the windows and illuminated the house with its light. Everyone had retired to their rooms for the night. Including Coco.
Coco’s been zoned out ever since they got back.
Coco’s sitting on her bed in her individual room. Her legs have been brought up to her chest, her head resting on the top of her knees. She had a small light beside her
And the book.
The book sat in front of her on her bed. Just, taunting her.
She wanted to read it. She really did. But she was scared. She was scared to see what kind of things her father wrote about. About what kind of person he was.
Maybe he wrote about her
She shouldn’t be hopeful.
She was also scared about why Ininia had it..
Coco sucked in a breath. She lowered her knees off of her chest. She reached her arm towards the journal.
She grabbed it.
She set it on her lap.
She looked at it like it personally attacked her.
She opened it to the first page.
Her eyes scanned across the page that she had started to read when Master Qifrey interrupted her.
She started to read.
‘August 4th ####’
I thought I was going to have a normal day today, but I turned out to be very wrong. I visited a village with some young apprentices and their masters to assist the villagers with everyday tasks. For example, watering the crops when it hasn’t rained in a week or helping fix any contraptions that have broken. That is what we were doing when I had seen something out of the corner of my eyes. It was a witch yes, but it looked different, like they weren’t actually here. It felt off. I brushed it off but I saw them again. I had gotten a better look at them this time. They had a brimmed cap. There was a brimmed cap there. I tried my best to get the other witches to leave but they refused. They had drawn a seal on a plant to keep it watered, the spell went Insane. It shot out through 10 different ways. I inspected the pot of ink they had used. I swore it wasn’t the same but they wouldn’t believe me. I’m scared the brimmed caps want something to do with me.
Coco's stomach dropped the second she read the second sentence.
Her father was a witch..?
She could have grown up a witch?
But what about her mother? What would have happened to her? Would she live all alone without Coco…
Her stomach was turning, she felt like she was going to throw up. Coco doesn’t know why she’s so stressed and worked up about this journal.
But she felt so enthroned in the journal, like she needed to read more. Like it’s drawing her in sentence by sentence. Maybe it was the fact it was her fathers. Maybe she finds the way he was a witch shocking and she needed to read more.
She doesn’t really know.
She flips through a few pages
She chooses to read more anyway.
‘August 21st ####’
I’ve spoken with the brimmed caps three times now. They're not as horrible as I originally thought. They just seem to want and aspire to share magic with people, with the unknowings. If I’m being completely honest I never really understood the full reason for the pact. The fact innocent witches who had a love and passion for magic had it just taken from them. Shouldn’t we share magic? Instead of just having two separated groups. Letting people who have a passion and can appreciate magic for all of its wonderfulness, practice magic instead of people who take it for granted and use it without a second thought because they don’t care about it. And the fact that the pact forbids witches to practice medicine, would we not have more doctors and nurses if witches were allowed? Besides how many witches wanted to study medicine instead of magic but couldn’t because they had the misfortune of being born into the pact? That they cannot study magic because they know that witches use a pen and ink to draw spells? I’m starting to think that the brimmed caps aren’t the wrong ones after all.
What…
Her father was agreeing with the brimmed caps?
But he was born into the pact, right? I mean she herself was born to an unknowing and witch, even though she only recently found out 5 minutes ago.
She knew that the brimmed caps were wrong because they wanted to hurt people, right?
But If her father was agreeing with them then were they all that bad.
And she was an outsider too.. She knows how she felt when she found out magic was drawn. She was excited, yes. But there was also a sense of dread. A dread that couldn’t have become a witch before because she just wasn’t born into the pact.
That she just wasn’t born into the specific group of people.
The more she thought and read the worse she started to feel. Her head was pounding and her stomach was turning.
She shouldn’t read more, she doesn’t know if she wants to read more.
If her father was a brimmed cap wouldn’t that mean that she’s going against the knights moralis..
Cocos hunched over the book on her bed. It’s gotten much later since she started reading.
She should go to sleep.
But what happened to her father?
She feels horrible
But her father?
Master Qifrey wouldn’t want you to read this
What if he wrote about her?
Go to sleep Coco
She needs to keep reading.
She flips through the pages.
She reads them.
‘September 29th ####’
I’ve decided to join with the brimmed caps. They make more sense to me than the pointed caps ever did. Iguin says he has a plan for me and what I’ll do with them. Iguin also says that I will have to practice the “forbidden” spells. Though, I will admit. They aren’t all the safest Spells I’ve ever seen but they aren’t all like that. I met with this tailor the other day for my hat, she was very nice. I might meet with her aga-
Coco slammed the book shut.
‘He joined the brimmed caps.’ Coco thought.
She felt betrayed.
She didn’t even know him.
So why does she feel like this?
Maybe it’s because there was a chance that she could have ended up as a brimmed cap as well. Maybe when she cast the forbidden spell on her house and mom, or maybe more recently when Tartah went with them. She could have gone with Tartah, maybe she should have. Maybe she would have been able to help Custas
There was a possibility that she could have ended up like him. Like her father.
As she sat on the bed her headache and stomachache only got worse.
She didn’t whine or rub her head in an attempt to make the pain go away, she just sat there. Just sat there and thought.
She thought about her mom. About how she ended up with her dad.
About Master Qifrey and the pain forbidden magic and the brimmed caps caused him.
Thought about everything at the silver eye festival.
About her face scar.
She opened the journal to a random page.
She knows she shouldn’t.
She does anyway
‘January 12th ####’
We found the child that they said we should use. He looks as if he’s been through hell. I can’t help but feel bad for the child, Qifrey is his name I believe. But, the test should be done on someone. The plan is to remove the eyeball and plant the seed in said eye socket, then leave the child buried underground with all his memories removed, In hope that the silver wood tree will begin to sprout and grow. It has been decided that I will be the one to perform this test. It is unfortunate what will happen to the poor boy. If that were to happen to my own child I don’t know what I would do. My illness has been much worse recently. I don’t know how long I have left. The witches who have studied some medicine aren’t sure what to do either. I will live long enough to perform the test on the child, on Qifrey.
Oh god.
What the hell.
Her father.
He.
He was the one who planted the silver wood seed in Master Qifrey.
She could feel her stomach turning and twisting. She quickly ran out of her room into the bathroom.
She threw up.
She still hasn’t fully processed it. The fact her father was the one who ruined Master Qifrey’s life.
She doesn’t know how she’s going to look him in the face.
She’s sitting on the floor now.
She’s crying.
She wished she never looked at the doorway.
She wished she never ran after Ininia.
She wished she never picked up the journal.
She wished she never read the journal.
She wished she had a different father.