They sat for about ten minutes before Clover found herself drifting off to sleep.

“You can use my shoulder if you want to catch a nap,” Bowden said quietly.

“I’m not sleeping,” Clover grunted and strained to keep her eyes open.

How much longer is she going to take. Reading doesn’t take anyone this long.

She folded her arms and crossed her legs. Then uncrossed her legs and crossed them again.

Stupid, stupid, stupid, waiting. Stay awake, stay awake, stay awake.

“My arm is still available…”

“Shut up.”

“Yes, will the both of you please,” Mort said angrily she marched over to them. “Fine, whatever, it looks like you will be a nuisance either way so let’s get this over with.”

“Tell me everything you know,” Clover said quickly standing up.

“You didn’t have to stand,” Mort pointed out, and eyebrow raised.

“Yeah, but you’re kind of scary,” Bowden said standing up himself. “Like… a schoolteacher.”

Mort ignored him. “Okay. We were in Trone for a run, selling Palton Wine to a customer. It’s a nice planet, nobody there does anything to upset anybody so we were not put on standby, no monsters, no violence. Instead we were asked to babysit the kid.”

“We?”

“She works with Paulton Looman, another defender, bodyguard guy. Deals mainly with weapons, not a magic user.”

“I’m the one talking here! If you want to talk then this conversation may not need to happen. ” Mort glared at Bowden. He gestured a mouth zipping action in response. After a short silence Mort asked. “What’s magic?”

Clover looked at Bowden, who gestured at his ‘zipped’ mouth.

Mort sighed. “Fine talk.”

“Magic is Weaving,” Bowden said grinning.

“Oh. Okay. Now stop talking.” Bowden ‘zipped’ himself again.

“So we were babysitting, but Paulton decided he wanted to get himself a drink. So he leaves me in charge. The kid wanted to explore the area, it was harmless enough, he had enough of watching business transactions. So we decide to go into the forest nearby, and well I go in front of him there’s this river that’s nice looking, small brook, that I’ve seen there before once, I tell him about it and he wants to see it. We walk towards it and… everything else is a blur, I think… I hear him tripping? He was right behind me, I was leading the way. We were talking about walruses. He just stopped talking. I hear him stop? Or falling down? I don’t remember. But next thing I know he was gone.”

She looked down a wristband. Crocheted black thing that was similar to Bowden’s.

“I…don’t… he was right there. Now I don’t even remember his name. The colour of his hair? Nothing. I scoured the area looking for him, screaming his name till my voice was hoarse. I don’t remember what I was screaming. The noise that left my lips. I can’t. I don’t remember. Then, the rest of the team come and we comb the area. Every inch of the forest. It was such a small little forest.”

“Did you hear anything? Please think. Any sounds before the disappearance?”

“Now that you mentioned it, maybe? Hold on.”

Mort went over to her table, while pulling out her wristband. She unravelled it. Then she picks up a crochet needle from the table and crochets a complex pattern filled with swirls and knots. The thread shines blue. She slipped on a newly made wristband onto her wrist.

“I remember the sound of glass breaking.” She turned to the two of them. Her eyes were glowing blue.

“Is that normal?” Clover mumbled to Bowden.

“For her it is,” Bowden whispered back.

She walked over to them, her glow in her eyes fading away. The pupil of her left eye was an intricate web pattern.

“It’s what they do to us so we can see the patterns the universe has within its folds,” she told Clover who was staring at her now normal blue eyes.

“I want to say that’s cool, but I’m pretty sure that would be insulting or something?” Clover said.

“Thanks I guess?” Mort said hiding a smile. “We go through a lot to find meaning in the pattern of the world.”

“In some worlds people are just born with power, can you believe it?” Bowden said.

“I didn’t say you could talk,” Mort glared at him again.

“Well, is that all you remember then?”

“Yeah… I’m sure.” She turned to Bowden. “Wait, shouldn’t you be working? You’ve found her and put her on the case, so shouldn’t you be back to work? We are nearly back home you know! What kind of navigator leaves his crew for most of the journey?”

“Ah, well, this kind of navigator?” he grinned. He turned to Clover. “Look, we are nearly back so you might as well stay for the rest of the journey.”

“No, the faster we find this kid the better. I don’t want to start forgetting him too,” she said. She touched her pouch. “I should probably look at the last place he was seen.”

“No, I think you need a bit of sleep. You can rest in my room for a bit. There’s a shower pod there too.”

“I don’t…” I really want to sleep “need sleep. I really should get going.”

Bowden looked pleadingly to Mort who shrugged, then sighed and picked something off the table. It was a complex knot made of green thread.

“Put this into soaking water with your clothing. Unravel it and your clothes will be clean.”

Clover’s eyes widened. “Really?”

“Do I look like I joke?” She said crossing her arms. She chucked the knot to Clover. “You do look like you need rest.”

“Just a few hours won’t hurt,” Bowden said. “You know where my room is. I’ll stay here, I need to talk to Mort about work and then go find her husband and report in.”

“Her husband?”

“The captain,” Mort said. “He’s right. I’ll make you a wristband like the rest of us so you stop forgetting about him to, I’ll give it to you when you awaken. Go get rest.”