Page 97 of Seasonal Fears

“My contacts in Europe said a lot of attendants don’t survive the coronation,” says Jack. “Traveling with your candidate puts you at risk, since it’s hard to tell the difference between an Incarnate and an Ascendant when they’re right next to each other, so they draw fire when a challenge begins.”

Harry turns to stare at Jenny in slow horror. Somehow, he’d managed to ignore that facet of the power structure until this moment, even when they met the Winter attendant on the highway, even when Jenny changed his loyalty from Matthew to Harry with such quick ease. Jenny makes a small expression of regret mingled with acceptance and nods, confirming Jack’s words as truth.

“They don’t,” says Clifford. “It’s part of why I’ve always been glad to stand for a part of the year that doesn’t have to train anyone up to challenge for the crown. Now, I know it’s tempting to spend the night here chatting with me and my lovely lady wife, but it’s time for you to move along. If you’re not back in a week, we’ll have your car towed. Until then, we can tell the neighbors you came to visit our daughter. She’s away at college, she’ll never contradict them.”

“We were so worried she’d be called to serve, but no, the seasons skipped over her,” says Carolyn, sounding smug, like she had somehow managed to convince the seasons they should skip her girl. “She’s off studying agriculture and computer science.”

“I was planning to go into land management and forestry,” says Harry.

“A man who likes the trees? That’s always nice to hear,” says Clifford. He leads the group back to the front door, pausing with his hand on the knob. “Y’all ready? There’s no coming back once you’re past this point.”

“Not sure it matters at this point,” says Mel.

“No,” he agrees. “It doesn’t.”

Labyrinth

CALENDAR SEASON: FEBRUARY 28TH, 2017: ONE MONTH TO SPRING, NEW MOON BETWEEN THE WORM MOON AND THE SPROUTING GRASS MOON.

The door doesn’t open on the lawn, with its attendant inflatable guardians and the comforting outline of Harry’s car parked on the street. No, it opens on a long tunnel with a floor of hard-packed earth strewn with straw that has clearly been walked on recently, flattened strands pressed deep into the ground. The tunnel walls are made of corn, tall and green and clearly at the very height of its growth, every stalk dripping with fat golden-tipped ears that smell so sweet it makes Harry’s mouth water. You could feast forever in this tunnel, just sit down and gorge yourself on raw corn until you burst.

Harry glances to Carolyn, walking beside him, and flinches as he sees how her attire has changed, ordinary clothes becoming a gown made of red, brown, and yellow leaves that somehow lay almost flat and still move like fabric despite the fact that he can see their individual edges and hear them rustle as she walks. She catches his eye and smiles languidly, inclining her head. “No title for you yet, but I won’t be shocked if I’m calling you ‘my lord’ in short order,” she says.

“Um,” says Harry.

He’s seen other things that prove the alchemical world and the magical world are the same thing viewed from slightly different angles, has had more than enough proof presented to make him accept that all of this is actually happening, he isn’t just having a weird LARP road trip with his sick girlfriend and a couple of hitchhikers, but somehow Carolyn’s impossible dress is a step too far for him. He stops walking.

“Nope,” says Harry.

“Oof,” says Jenny, who has just walked straight into him, too distracted by the walls of corn around them to notice the other man’s stillness. “What’s wrong, boss?”

“People don’t change clothes when they walk through a doorway,” says Harry, pointing a shaking hand at Carolyn. She tilts her head and looks at him, clearly amused. They’ve all stopped now, a little cluster of people barring the way for anyone else who happens to come along.

And hey, if anyone else happens to come along, they’re probably looking to kill everyone who’s already here, so maybe inconveniencing them isn’t such a bad thing.

Melanie still looks the same. So do Jack and Jenny. Clifford’s clothes have changed in tandem with his wife’s, becoming a suit of green oak leaves, fresh and bright and new. He even has a crown of woven branches. He smiles at Harry, a little lopsided, and gives a small half-bow.

“As she says,” he says. “Things are progressing as they ought.”

“I am not okay with this,” says Harry. “This isn’t normal. This isn’t … this isn’t right.” The world isn’t supposed to work like this. He can handle hearts that restart on their own, strawberries that grow too fast and out of season, women who wrap themselves in veils of rainbow light, even snowstorms summoned out of thin air, but this is too impossible and too blatant and too much.

“This is where you dig your heels in?” asks Jack. “Really?”

Everything is silence save for their voices, and even that’s not right; there should be sound, the rustling of the corn if nothing else. The chirp of crickets or the calling of twilight birds. Not this … quiet. The path they walk along is as well lit as any store aisle, but the sky overhead is dark, filled with the distant silver shine of stars. That would be fine if the light had any source, but it doesn’t, not that Harry can see. Unless it’s coming from the corn.

There is nothing about this that he doesn’t hate, and nothing about it that’s right, or fair, or possible.

“Really,” says Harry. “None of this is happening, and I want to go back.”

Clifford looks at him solemnly. “Remember, you have a way out,” he says.

“No he doesn’t,” says Jack, voice sharp.

Clifford turns to look. “He can renounce his claim to the crown,” he says. “Candidates are always permitted to renounce.”

“He and Mel are running parallel,” says Jack. “He can’t.”

“And I can’t because if I renounce, I die immediately,” says Melanie. “My heart stopped when the Winter took me all the way over the edge. I’m not a person anymore. I’m an idea a season had about what personhood looks like, and it’s not perfect, but it’s what I have, and I don’t want to give it up.”