Page 2 of The Curious Incident of the Great Cookie Snackcident of 979

Senka waved their hand dismissively. “If your mum wants to do something nice for you, let her, I say!” They shoved the rest oftheir cookie in their mouth and dusted their hands off on their ... legs? “Anyhow, I’m going to grab my lunch, I’ll be back in a mo’!”

“In a mo’?” Abi whispered after they disappeared. A few bites later, Senka bled from the shadows and settled next to her on the shore.

“In a moment, it means,” the shade said cheerfully. “So, what did she pack? I have a sandwich, I get lazy and don’t pack much.”

“I have a hand pie, but again, Mum packed, this isn’t the norm. So, how long have you been stationed here?” she asked, raising her brows and tilting her head toward them. “Did you grow up, like, in here?”

Next to her, Senkagiggled—a bubbly sound that felt easy and familiar. “Just over there,” they waved toward where the shades lived, a series of caves beyond the Lady’s Lake. “Actually, I only recently got my own place. It’s kind of a big event for us. We don’t have a lot of caverns, so sometimes it can take a while to get your own assigned. If I’d wanted to move out into Sanctuary, I could have a house or a flat, but it just sort of feels like ... the whole point ofusis to be close to the Lady, and I like it here.”

“Absolutely, it’s nice down here, it’s so peaceful.” Abi took another bite, looking across the water, towards their glowing Goddess. “I don’t know if you’ve ever seen me, but I come here a lot, just to talk to her. I wonder sometimes, how much she can hear us, how much she can touch the world.”

“I’ve seen you, but it always seemed like a private time. We make an effort to give people as much privacy as we can while keeping Her safe. I’ll show you this afternoon where you stand to keep an eye and still give people privacy. The design of the room is actually pretty smart. They’ve cut the caverns over the years to make sound bounce toward the Lady rather than around to other listeners.” They pursed their midnight lips into a moue. “Sometimes, I think I see her eyes move, or the faintest smile. Keep an eye out, you might see what I mean.”

The water lapping on the shore, mixed with the dripping stalactites provided a calming backdrop to the rest of their meal. When Senka was done, they floated rather than stood up, and brushed their hands on their legs again.

“Let me do a quick circuit, and then I’ll show you the ropes!”

Abi nodded and packed her meal, tucking the rest of the packet of cookies into her uniform pocket to share later. She’d been so nervous when she entered the chamber, but between the calm she always felt when visiting the Lady and the easy conversation with Senka, she felt much better equipped.

The rest of Abi’s day was spent learning her patrol, chatting with Senka in the brief moments when they passed one another, and whispering to the Lady. The Lady’s Sepulcher had always been a haven of quiet and peace for her, but she developed a new appreciation for it on her circuit. Generally, she was to walk the perimeter of the lake, investigate any strange occurrences (there were none), help visitors, and keep an eye on things.

In nearly a thousand years, there had only been a few isolated incidents that required the guard’s response. Angry citizens of Sanctuary had infiltrated and vandalized the walls. One had even infiltrated far enough to nearly poison the water before they were caught. So, while the possibility of a breach was low, it was never zero. A guard was one of the most prestigious positions in their community, and she intended to take it very seriously.

Over the course of the shift, she got to know her route, paying attention to the different nooks and crannies where someone might hide. She noted small cracks and crevices, which were often overlooked but would be perfect for concealing smaller shifted forms, like a mouse or lemming. Bird shifters, like herself, were another thing to think on. They could perch up high in the vaulted stone ceilings, so she made sure to keep aneye on the roof as well, her owl’s keen eyesight making the task significantly easier.5

At the end of the day, Senka introduced her to their replacement, as their shifts were staggered to avoid lapses in patrols. After, Abi completed her final circuit and headed back to the guard’s change room. There, she changed back into her everyday clothes and walked out into the pre-dawn morning beside the Lady’s river. Water flowed from under the mountain and split into a bevy of distributary canals. The village of Sanctuary, designed by the Lady herself, nestled among them.

Abi retrieved her small boat from the docks, set off to the side of the cave mouth and looked out over the valley. In the dim, early morning light, lunula still lit the waters of the river, but any moment, they would wink out, registering the light of the sun. Thatched roof cottages rimmed the edges of the valley, shifting to larger stone buildings as she neared the central park and business district. Even having grown up in Sanctuary, it was breathtaking and entirely charming, due in large part to its divine design origins, and her people’s fanatical dedication to retaining their Lady’s vision.

Sanctuary was mostly still asleep, but as she paddled home in her little boat, she did pass a few early risers. She twisted and turned down the canals, the lunula in the water glowing until just before she arrived home. Tying up her boat, Abi took a deep breath of the daybreak air and headed inside her small cottage to sleep through the day. Her new shift would present some difficulties for her when it came to seeing her friends, but she had the distinct feeling that, given the chance, she and Senka could become quite close.

Puttering about her house, Abi made herself a cup of bedtime tea and smiled. Many of the Guards she’d worked with in the past had been a bit more laissez-faire about their Duty to the Lady. She understood, in part. Hundreds of years with little todohad allowed them to grow complacent. The shades, however, still took their dutiesveryseriously.

The fact that Senka was a guard in the Lady’s Sepulcher meant that theymustcare at least as much as she did, if not more. The competition for Abi’s position was fierce, but she couldn’t imagine how much more intense it would’ve been among a people created specifically to guard the Lady. It was a wonder that anyone else at all guarded her, but in the unlikely event that they needed to evacuate her sleeping form, they’d need more corporeal people to carry her any distance.

Yes, she and Senka would get along quite well, she thought as she drifted off to sleep, her bed’s thick curtains pulled to dim the room. She could see a future where they might become bosom friends for all their days, and that sounded lovely.6

1. I’ve always thought it odd that the Shades of Sanctuary call this a Sepulcher, as the Lady is decidedly not dead. I suppose when one rests for a millennium, you ought not complain when people name things as if you are dead?

2. Readers may note I switch between Shade and shade throughout this text. When capitalized, Shade refers to those members of Sanctuary who have reached their majority and have pledged their lives to the Duty of protecting our Lady. When not capitalized, shade refers to the people, shadow monsters (a term they favor) specifically created to live under the mountain with Her and be the last line of defense in Her protection. The moniker Shade was taken for the community after the people, a kind of honorary induction into their ranks.

3. Most residents of Sanctuary have white hair, my understanding is that it is a common mutation that happens in utero as a result of constant exposure to the Lady’s magic. Non-humans don’t always inherit the mutation, though some acquire other interesting mutations not seen outside of the Lady’s Bubble, for example, Sigfinn, whom we meet later in this story, is bioluminescent whereas other Fish-kin are not.

4. Generally, the humans of Sanctuary use their magic subconsciously. They have a much more intuitive relationship with their magic than people from the Compact of Nations. As such, we have been able to teach each other a great deal about the different methodologies. Many of the non-human residents of Sanctuary have some level of magic, though none are lunologists, except for the rare case of individuals that also have human parentage.

5. While her owl form was useful for surveying the cavern from above, Abi spent most of her shifts in her human form, to better help and communicate with visitors and other guards.

6. Senka uses they/them pronouns, as do many shades. The malleable nature of their bodies means that they don’t have a biological sex. While many identify more strongly with one gender, and fashion their bodies and pronouns accordingly, the majority prefer to use non-binary pronouns and allow their forms to shift as they feel.

Chapter two

Abi

IN WHICH SEVERAL WEEKS PASS, SENKA REVEALS A SECRET, AND A STRANGE RITUAL IS PROPOSED

Over the next fewweeks, Abi settled into her role, and an easy friendship with Senka. Patrol meant they spent most of their shift apart, but they saw each other at their periodic check-ins and their lunch breaks. At lunch, another pair of guards covered for them, a task Abi had always coveted when she hadn’t been one of the chamber guards. Though her mother didn’t continue packing Abi’s lunch, it seemed she quite liked hearing about Senka’s reactions to her treats. As a result, most days when Abi woke mid-afternoon for her shift, she’d find a package of treats on her doorstep.

“What do you think she’s made today?” Senka would ask at the start of their shift.