Shifts could be subtle. A missed bus. A surprise box to unpack. Chinese takeout for dinner instead of leftovers. However, some shifts rioted, tearing a life asunder in a breath. The average teenager could be melodramatic about it.

Lia didn’t have that luxury. Except for when it came to this. 

Papers covered in chicken-scratch were spread on the patio table with Lia’s journal. It sat open before her grandfather, his eyes darting across the page. Back and forth, she tried to count, to gauge where he was in her story. That dreaded red pen was poised over the paper, a knife already dripping with her heart’s blood—

Melodramatic. But writing was the exception. The only time she could afford it. Funny how it had only taken a week to develop this routine. It was the first thing Lia treasured since moving to Seattle. Not the bigger bedroom. Not the proximity to a forested park. But being walking distance from him instead of thousands of miles away. Even with the writing critiques—and even now, when it doubled as “keeping an eye on him”, which her mom liked to remind her to do. Not that Lia needed reminding.

But each text asking how he was doing today, if he seemed present, made Lia’s escape into the pages harder. After years of throwing herself into fiction, reality was demanding to be seen. She’d rather not. Not when this was all she allowed herself to begin with.

“Honestly, Aurelia. You’ve got to give this captain more pizazz.” Her grandfather waved his wrinkled hands in encouragement, dropping the pen as he finally looked up at her. Sunlight caught the stubborn streaks of red in his silver hair.

Lia fought a smile. He was the only one who could get away with her full name. Papa privileges. “A villain needs pizazz?”

“He’s a captain-turned-pirate!” His boisterous tone rose. “You can’t just make him evil for evil’s sake.”

“Aren’t villains supposed to be evil?” Lia asked.

Papa peered over his tortoise-shell glasses, but a grin tugged at his mouth. “You read plenty. Which villains do you find most compelling: the ones that are evil just because, or the ones that do evil acts with a sympathetic motive?”

Easy for him to say. Old man was retired, but to the world he was still Julian Corvine, author of The Floating Kingdom series starring Kayce Weatherstone—which, to be fair, had been her idea. Kayce, her childhood imaginary friend who, now age eighteen, was stuck with a thieving member of his court in her own stories.

She chewed on her pencil, staring at her journal. Papa had a point. Lia could think of several books where the villain’s story was nearly as compelling as the hero’s. Sometimes more so. A captain in a kingdom’s navy needed a reason to turn to piracy, but she wasn’t about to admit it. At least, not so readily. Writer’s pride and all.

Her papa’s eyes narrowed as she thought. “Let it come to you. These characters, we don’t tell them what to do—”

“—they reveal themselves to us,” Lia finished.

“Exactly. Norenth has always been yours,” he said. “But you’ve always been theirs.”

Theirs. The floating kingdom’s, the Weatherstone court’s, and Kayce’s. Like Lia belonged with them. It had comforted her as a child when she first imagined this fantasy world, but as a teenager, the idea no longer settled her. It felt like a puzzle piece forced into the wrong hole. Close, but not quite. And not quite was turning painful, the cross-country move making her want to push in somewhere, to fit in—

Lia picked the surrounding skin of her stubbed fingernails. It took a moment to recognize the action, to pull her cardigan sleeves over her fists. But her knee jerked, a rhythmic bounce under the table. Shifting in the patio chair, she looked out to the garden. Big mistake. She clenched her jaw, chest tightening. It was like the tangle of roses hadn’t changed. She didn’t know if she wanted to rip those roses from the ground or seek shelter amidst the thorns.

Breathe. Focus. Breathe—

“Aurelia,” Papa pried softly. “You with me?”

“Fine.” She plastered on a smile. 

He assessed her with river-stone gray eyes, like her own. Her brother’s. Mom’s. Unlike her father’s green. A green she hadn’t seen—

“Has he contacted you yet?” he asked.

Lia bit back a groan. Sometimes she hated how well her papa read her. But even with him, she had to fix her face. Her father hadn’t bothered to reach out beyond the obligatory birthday card. The fact didn’t stop her from checking the mailbox every day, nearly ten years later.

“You think sharing a time zone would make him remember he has two kids?” She managed a laugh, but even to her it sounded forced.

“Your dad—” Papa started, then cleared his throat to begin again. “When your dad left, there was a great deal going on. More than you realize.”

He wouldn’t dare give her father a sympathetic motive for ditching. Those were a lot easier to figure out in fiction. In reality, people sucked. Some didn’t need any reason to be the bad guy. Which was why she had to be there, to fix the wreckage. 

Her nails dug half-moons into her palms, but Lia gave a simple shrug of her shoulders, disguising the unfurling of her tense knuckles with a stretch. “It’s been ten years, Papa. It doesn’t matter. We came back for you. To be close to you. Besides, you and I finally get to write without Mom griping at us.”

He chuckled across the table, looking out at the yard and those darned roses. “You have a knack for seeking out the good.”

A classic Papa euphemism, but a more genuine grin tugged at Lia’s lips. “Care to elaborate?”

“Your eighth birthday here. Right after he left. When Kayce entered your life.” 

Even now he spoke like her fictional prince was real. Back then, her papa had caught her talking to thin air in this garden. Perfectly normal behavior for an eight-year-old, if you’d asked her. And creating her own guest while waiting for friends to show was better than ripping off her freshly painted nails, one pink shard at a time.

In her mind’s eye, it was nothing beyond what a lonely little girl could conjure. She’d watched Prince Caspian a time too many. As a boy about her height, Kayce’s dark brown hair had been ruffled from a trip, with several leaves clinging to his light blue tunic and beige breeches.

“He was teaching me to use a sword,” she recalled with a chuckle. “For a fourth-born prince, he was pretty demanding.”

 “You had said he hated the reminder, but I’d never been one to forget nobility.” Her papa laughed with her. Back then, he’d taken a stick for a sword to swing at the air. He couldn’t see Kayce, but Lia had known with child-like certainty that Kayce’s amber eyes lit with the calculation of his next move as he parried with a wooden sword. 

Her imagination was as clear of a memory as any. If only Kayce were as real. Loneliness was a bitter aftertaste when their laughter died. Escaping into her stories didn’t soothe as readily as it did before the move. Even with these new afternoons with her papa, with the journal laid open before her. If only Lia could stay inside her stories, maybe everything would be better. People would make more sense. But that wasn’t an option.

Wings flapped in the looming cherry tree. Lia glanced at the owl nesting there, partially hidden by the leaves. She frowned. A bit early for owls to be out.

The barred owl watched. Sunken rings extended from its eyes, a mottled mixture of black and gray.

Lia did a double-take. The owl had six eyes. And stared right at her.

Pulling off her black-framed glasses, she rubbed her face. “I think my prescription needs upgrading. For a split second, that owl had three pairs of eyes.” Lia laughed it off, but it was strained. She had to get a grip. Rein it in.

Papa stiffened and looked at the tree. But then he relaxed, reaching for his pocket. “Trick of the light. Be a dear and get your old man a new pen? Mine’s dried out.”

Shrugging, Lia shoved her glasses back on before heading into the house. Papa had been jumpy all week, so this sudden shift in demeanor was nothing new. It had to be the shift in their familial dynamic. Lia had done well to display that she had it all together. Her family could depend on her that way. They always had. But sometimes she wished her fantasy world was more reality than this place.

Selfish.

Lia stiffened before she could brush the thought away. Maybe she was selfish, and seeing things was the repercussion. Stupid birds with multiple eyeballs were something from a horror film. Not that she could stomach any of those. At least Norenth didn’t have creepy birds of prey.

In the kitchen, Lia combed through several drawers, finding loose change, chip clips, take-out menus, pen caps—everything but an actual pen. How could a darned author not have a single pen in any of these junk drawers? Her copper curls tumbled loose from the velvet tie atop her head; she didn’t know why she bothered trying to tame them. Lia blew an errant curl from her face, glancing aghast out the window that hung over the farmhouse sink.

There was Papa, waving a stick around like she was eight years old again and he not seventy-five! Her heart lurched with her startled yelp. This was not what Mom meant when she said Lia could visit Papa after school. He wasn’t ten years younger! There was no imaginary friend to engage. She’d grown out of those. Hadn’t he?

Says the girl still pining over the boy who could never talk back.

Lia grabbed the pen she’d missed in a pile of letters and made for the door. A flash sparked outside the window, quick as a struck match. Gone in a breath before Lia could really look. Another trick of the light?

“Papa,” she warned when she made it outside. “What are you doing?”

“Admiring this tree! It’s gotten so full.” The stick was gone, his hands in his pockets.

The owl had disappeared. A faint scent of burning paper lingered in the air. The way her papa spoke a touch louder than necessary…something felt off. An itching in her mind, like she’d forgotten something. Missed something. She couldn’t miss anything—

Papa swayed, knees popping as he turned toward her.

Not again.

Her heart faltered. Lia rushed to catch his elbow. Steady him. Scents of burning parchment intensified on his clothes. This was why Mom nagged her so much. Any annoyance she’d felt earlier about it evaporated.

“You sure you’re all right?” Lia asked as they headed to the table. Her phone glared, reflecting sunlight. Mom would want to know. But her papa waved her off.

“Fine, just fine, when everything’s back where they belong.” He frowned, deepening the wrinkles carving his face. “To be frank, Aurelia, I’m worried about you.”

Concern gave way to fear, and shame closed Lia’s throat. She had to focus. Everything was under control.

“A new school can’t be easy,” he continued, “nor being so close to your dad again—even if he doesn’t return any of Cordelia’s calls, the insufferable—” He cut off, mumbling more to himself before turning to her. “Have you had any headaches? Feeling feverish? What about your sleep—”

“Papa, I’m managing. School’s never been an issue, and neither has Dad. Don’t go thinking I’m losing it. That owl was nothing, remember?” Lia shoved the journal into her backpack. She had to forget her father, to manage her tics. She had to tuck stories and oddities away. Reality was plenty to contend with. But putting stories aside was like holding her breath, being forced underwater.

“I have to get home. Dinner’s on me tonight.” Her brother Marcus wouldn’t be eating out of foam containers again if she could help it. And her papa’s stare made her skin prickle.

He sighed, gathering his papers. “It doesn’t always have to be on you, little lion.”

Lia stilled. The Norenthian nickname loosened something in her, as it always did. A role she didn’t have to force herself into. But if she didn’t return home like the responsible seventeen-year-old she was, she knew it would be another spin at the takeout menu roulette. Besides, Lia had gotten pretty good at cooking. The ordered steps, the measured ingredients, it all soothed her. Steadied her hands. She always had a plate ready for when Mom got home. Whenever that would be.

Lia shouldered the backpack. “How does tomorrow night sound?”

His assessing gaze softened, then skipped to his papers. He chewed his lip before a gleam lit his eye. “Perhaps I can show you what I’ve been working on.”

“New book?” she asked, heading for the path winding around his Victorian home.

“Of a sort. Bit of a family tale.”

“Is this the secret research you’ve been doing all week? Your mysterious social calls?”

“What? Because someone’s over seventy, they aren’t allowed a social life?”

Lia laughed at his dramatics. It broke apart the lingering tension like the sun over morning dew. “Party away, Papa, but be home at a reasonable hour. Sleep’s important, they say.”

“They know nothing about how important it is.”

Sometimes his odd musings never seemed to make sense. In the moment, at least. Lia noted the taut pull of his shoulders as he walked her to the front of the house. He cut their writing time short several times this week; whatever project he’d been working on had put him on edge. Why would a family tale do that?

Unless…unless it had to do with her father. A Corvine family tale. Lia squashed the thought and swallowed the bile that came with it. Everything was fine.

Kissing his leathery cheek, Lia left him in the driveway. Walking home, she popped in her earbuds, escaping in daydreaming where her writing had left off. Allowing her to drop the mask and fake smiles. She stuffed her hands deeper into her pockets and walked on.

***

Neither Corvine noticed the second owl swoop into the hedges across the street. Its wings flapped once, twice. Six eyes blinked. 

And it settled on the shoulder of a figure, watching the pair from the shadows.

A shift in the making.