Chapter 20

Hayden ate without objection. Eleanor was right about the importance of preparing before she left the mansion. Besides, if she left well-prepared, it meant she could stay out longer without needing to come back for supplies. The longer she was out there, the better her chances of finding Cody.

She would know how to help. Or maybe she could take Hayden back in time, and stop Lady Gracidea from changing him. Was that how time travel worked?

The two of them certainly attracted stares crossing Shaymin House together. Somehow, Hayden found that she just didn't care very much about what people thought of her, not the way she did when she was a kitten. 

Her old self would've had her stomach tied in embarrassed knots. But once she changed into someone else—it wasn't really Hayden they were judging anymore, was it? She was Shaymin Hayden instead. 

Liz was much more subdued after the transformation. Part of that came from not being able to fly anymore, and relying on Hayden to carry her around. But there was more to it—instincts that she had never imagined before, and was only just now starting to understand. 

Liz was thinking more like a plant now. Instead of exploring, what she really wanted to do was find somewhere safe with lots of sunlight and just relax. It would take Hayden pushing her to get them out of the garden and into the forest proper. Did she have the strength to resist her daemon's inertia?

Eleanor lasted until they'd finished eating before finally melting back into herself. She slumped suddenly into her seat, breathing as heavily as if she'd just completed a long running race. She gazed sidelong at Hayden, sticking out her tongue. "It's okay, you can change back now. Don't know… how you can keep that up for so long. You must be dying."

Loch showed some of her exhaustion, melting into an indistinct pile in her lap. Eleanor herself barely held up much better, her hair flattening into a wet mess. 

Hayden and Liz shared a look. Then she bent down, pouring out a little lemonade from her glass into a saucer for the pokémon to sip from. "Do you…" But she already knew the answer before Liz said anything. She wasn't asking for her own benefit. 

"We don't know what you're talking about," Liz said. Her voice was much weaker than usual, higher and timid. "We only have a hard time when we change. Now it's… we like it."

Hayden nodded her agreement. "We want to try being outside. I understand what you mean about the sun."

Eleanor folded her arms across her lap, expression darkening. "Of course. You do everything better than we do. Even changing. You're just so damn perfect, aren't you? ‘Look at us, we'll copy Shaymin on our first try. We'll stay this way for a couple weeks just to show off. Don't you wish you could be as good as we are?’"

She grunted, heaving out of her seat. "I guess you don't need as much help as I thought. Just go on and be perfect. Keep replacing me."

Hayden whimpered, reaching for her. "Eleanor, don't be like this. We can…" She hesitated. It wasn't really fair to take away Liz's hard work changing them so soon. But not losing her only ally was more important.

Hayden changed. She got a little smaller, and the clothes Eleanor had chosen for her no longer strained to hold her. Her hair stretched long and pink. "We're not trying to replace you!" she squeaked, a little louder. "We just—"

"It was nice," Liz finished. She lifted back into the air, floating into a little orbit around Hayden, back into place. "We didn't have to fight gravity anymore. And the sun felt so… good."

Eleanor's glare didn't fade. “It doesn't matter if you're trying to replace me or not. You're something I can't ever be. You're… important. You're great. Loch and I can't ever measure up."

She stalked away, leaving Hayden and Liz alone in the kitchen with only a few staring servants for company.

Hayden thought about chasing her, but quickly rejected that idea. Eleanor had never wanted Hayden around, really. Liz landed on her shoulder, nodding her agreement. "She wants to be alone."

Hayden waited a good half hour at her empty plate, for her new “sister” to return. But Eleanor was nowhere to be seen. She rose, wandering out onto the grounds. The sun was only then approaching its zenith, suggesting significant time left to go out onto the trail. She wasn't going to miss her chance.

Hayden ran across the grounds, ran as fast as she'd ever run in Sunyshore. She wasn't going to let a transformation slow her down. So far as she could tell, it didn't. She didn't get winded, not in her entire path. She avoided the maze, though that could be fun to wander for its own reasons. But Cody wouldn't be in the maze.

Her hair wasn't contained by the braid anymore, so billowed out behind her in a mane of wild pink, as untamed as she was.

Eventually she came to the trailhead, marked with dark gravel. A single soldier waited there, one she instantly recognized—it was Holland. 

Hayden came up short, her heart suddenly catching in her chest. Her brother saw her coming, and he lowered his weapon as she got close, eyes wide. He set it down on the ground beside her as she approached, avoiding her eyes. "Your Excellency. We didn't… expect you to recover so quickly."

Hayden winced. "I… I'm…" She hadn't been bothered by her strange voice while talking with Eleanor before. Why was it so embarrassing now? "I feel fine. Holland, please don't… please don't write about…"

She squeaked, as helpless to meet his eyes as he was to see her. "I don't want them to worry."

"They don't know how much danger you were in," Holland whispered. He dropped to one knee in front of her, suddenly at eye-level. "Lady Gracidea called an Awakened Master. You've only been here for a few months! And somehow… somehow…"

"I survived," Hayden muttered, grim. "Yeah, I know. Not sure I made the right move either."

Her brother knocked her roughly on the shoulder with one hand. "Don't talk like that, little brother. You were always the best of us. Bravest, loyalest, kindest… the world would be a worse place without you. I'm not sure Mom would survive the news if you hadn't made it."

Then he pulled her into a hug. It didn't last long—even on the edge of the property, there was always a chance that someone might see. He let go, springing back to his full height. "You're growing into more than anyone in our family ever could've dreamed of. Everyone would be proud of your strength. Just make sure you remember us, as you get big and important. Take care of the ones who cared for you."

Hayden nodded tearfully. Her brother didn't care—he hadn't even mentioned her transformation. But he couldn't not notice, not with those ears, and the Pokémon senses that went with it. As though the way she was dressed didn't give it away. But Holland didn't care.

"I want to…" She gestured. "Lady Gracidea said I could leave as soon as I could use my powers and fly." She nodded towards Liz, and then lifted into the air. She hovered there in front of her brother, only a few inches off the ground. "We can fly now, see? We want to go on a hike."

He scooped his weapon off the grass, then holstered it over his shoulder. "Of course, H—Lady Hayden. I've been given specific instructions, to accompany you if you ever wished to leave the property, and make sure you don't get lost on any of the trails. The house guard run drills all through the mountains, I know them well. I can get you almost anywhere you want to go."

Hayden wilted. Liz dropped her back to the ground—not out of tiredness, but frustration. "You don't have to do that. We could just fly straight up if we get lost, and find the house that way! We're like… mythical! Didn't you just say—"

He shook his head. "If it were up to me, I wouldn't make you. Why do you think Lady Gracidea put me here? She figured out who I was—thought you might be more comfortable with someone you knew. I think she'll let me be part of your personal guard when you travel, too."

At least Hayden could count on the guards she traveled with to be trustworthy. It didn't matter what the Shaymin House told Holland to do, he'd never hurt her. Unfortunately “hurt” didn't quite mean the same thing as “refuse anything she asked.”

She nodded slowly, defeated. "You might not like the way we hike," she said. Mostly to his daemon, since she still couldn't bring herself to make eye-contact with him. "Liz and I attracted a lot of wild pokémon. We might try to find some of them again."

Holland shrugged. "Who am I to question the will of the mythical pokémon? Your ways are unknowable, and your wisdom great? I assume you've been getting a… mysterious wisdom crash course."

Hayden giggled, and her tears stopped. For better or worse, talking with Holland was exactly the way she remembered it. He'd always found a way to make her laugh. And despite what he said, he was the brave one.

She started walking into the forest, bouncing with renewed energy. The wind wasn't blowing today, and the sun felt so wonderfully warm on her skin. Good thing the weather was so nice, considering how little Eleanor had given her to wear. She might've frozen otherwise.

Holland followed behind her, his daemon keeping perfect pace with him.

"Do you have to bring all that… gear?" she asked, eyeing his armored vest and the gun over his shoulder. "It looks so heavy."

"Unfortunately," Holland replied. "It's as heavy as it looks. But I can't ever remove it while I'm on duty. Technically I should barely even speak with you, just answer direct questions. But I think we can slide on those rules, unless you tell me not to."

"I'm not gonna order around my big brother," Hayden said, without hesitation. While he'd been at home, Holland's authority was second only to Mom and Dad. She would listen to him the same way she did to Evelynn.

They walked in silence for a time. Liz led her, not on any particular trail exactly, just cutting through the mountain with a constant, background sense of where she was going. "Is she here?" Hayden asked silently.

Liz met her eyes. "Someone is. I think it's Sierra. But she might've been here earlier, and we missed her. Can't tell. Her smell is different from other pokémon."

"Her?" Hayden asked. Even so, her heart leapt at the mere mention that Cody might be there. Sierra had to be the daemon's name—she knew that as confidently as Liz did, even if she couldn't exactly identify how she knew. The daemons must've talked about it where she couldn't overhear. "How can you tell? It just looked like a fairy to me."

"Then it's a good thing one of us has a working nose."

"But girls don't have female—" She stopped abruptly. Liz floated right in front of her, hovering vertically in the air. The message was obvious, even if she didn't say a word. At least one girl did.

It wasn't completely unheard-of. One of the sailor boys had a male daemon. Occasionally they saw adults who did too.

"What are you two plotting?" Holland asked, eyes narrowing. "I know that look. I'm sure you have a million new ways to get into trouble now."

"More than that," Hayden said. Liz landed on her shoulder, and she skipped along after her big brother. It was hard to think of Holland the same way she would anyone else in the family. He was grown up, enough to have a wife of his own by now. Maybe he would get one soon. "There are… however many pokémon exist. Liz and I can't do 'em all yet, but we're learning. And other stuff."

"I don't think there are a million species of pokémon," Holland said. "I've heard people talking—they say you can transform the way the Heir of Shaymin House does. Guess it doesn’t feel strange at your age. You could change before, so why not do it some more? Might slow down once you have these, though." He gestured at his ears, then behind him to the dark, furred tail emerging from his uniform. "Unity is such an important part of you. I can't imagine ever changing it."

He passed her as they entered a particularly dense patch of forest, as though expecting a sudden attack from the front. Of course there was nothing up there—other than the frequent smells of wild pokémon, with their many strange habitats. 

There, in the thickest part of the trees—she saw a pair of blue eyes, just beside her. Before she could gasp, the boy put a finger over his lips, urging her to be silent. She wouldn't have listened to just anyone, but his daemon…

Sierra floated out from the trees, catching Liz in a tight hug in midair. Hayden's fear melted away as quickly as it had come. Somehow, impossibly, she knew this was Cody. 

He extended one hand towards her, grinning mischievously. "Wanna come?" he thought, without a word.

Hayden nodded, taking the offered hand. She felt suddenly… strange. The world around her shifted and blurred. Sound echoed in her ear, and the trees themselves seemed to ripple and pulse, light rushing towards them in waves. Everything changed—the afternoon was morning, then night, then noon again. Shadows blurred past them, and the leaves themselves lost their outlines and turned into colorful smears.

Only Cody remained stationary—and Hayden herself. While the world moved, they rested.

Then the roar stopped. A faint dawn light crested the trees, and the air chilled Hayden through her thin clothes. Cody let go of her hand, beaming. "There! Your soldier isn't here yet! We have…" He looked down, counting off on his fingers. "A while." 

Something landed on her shoulder. The weight was familiar, but lighter than last time, even if she was much heavier than Liz. Soft green skin, with a pair of little feet hanging off the side. She beamed at Hayden, antennae folded behind her ears in something she suddenly knew was embarrassment. She wasn't as brave about this as the last time, but she wanted to be close to her anyway.

Liz flew past the boy, nuzzling up against his cheek. She let him catch her out of the air. Hayden smiled too, and the pain of the night before faded into her memory. This was Cody—smaller than she was,  wearing a strange mismatch of old clothes. His chest was flat, his face a little sharper than before. But he was the same kid.

"I've been waiting so long to see you again," she whispered, breathless. It was either that, or start purring. "I hope you haven't been wandering through the woods this whole time."

"No, yes?" He looked up, then met her eyes, and his cheeks lit up bright red. "I know you like to be out here. Remembered… seemed like a good day to visit. You always tell me to get close to the same age, or it's weird. Is this close enough?"

"I think so," Hayden answered. "I think you were older last time, and…" Should she tell him? She was still recovering from the trauma herself. "You had wings last time," she said lamely. 

He shrugged. "I was kinda hoping you could take me to Kanto. But if not, that's okay too. It's nice just to be together. No one else… we can't trust anyone else." 

Sierra nodded along as he said it, then added, "You smell upset, Hadie. Is something bothering you?"

She touched the little daemon with two fingers, running them delicately down her back. "Not anymore."