Outside the realm of Tai's poor emotional intelligence, Jasper goes about his routine as he always has: wakes up, spends the day at the clerking office, comes home, and rings himself into a strange, breaking world where the mortality outlook isn't the best but the food is excellent.

As March dwindles away, spring comes into fuller bloom. Jasper feels the exciting freshness even in the muted air of Cadeus Falls, walking home under an early moon.

At his office, during their midday break, Jasper had been asked about his birthday by one of his colleagues. It had been a simple question, asked for nothing but idle curiosity, but his news that it had taken place the month before somehow spread until a small group of his coworkers became insistent that they treat him to a meal before going home for the day.

"Twenty-five years is a milestone to celebrate," one had said, practically pushing Jasper out the door and in the direction of one of Cadeus Falls' more sophisticated eateries.

Jasper walks home afterward in relative contentment, pleasantly filled up with the smoked fish, fresh greens, and rosemary-roasted lamb the group had dined on. Something nags at him, though: an irritating tug at the thoughts that usually blanket his mind.

"Twenty-five years old and still has his head in the clouds," one of his colleagues had said, mid-meal. At Jasper's startled look, he had gone on, "I mean it as a good thing. Hold on to whatever whimsy you've got for as long as you can."

Even if it had been meant as a compliment, Jasper contemplates it now. Was it so obvious, as he bent over his tasks at the clerking office's desk, that his mind was far away? Did people see him and see a man untethered, always coming and going both in mind and (with the help of the bell) in body?

He unlocks his bedroom door, bending absentmindedly to pick up the envelope that had been pushed through the letter slot. He barely glances at it, thoughts swirling.

When does he use the bell?

If the workday contains an awkward encounter that has Jasper wincing, which happens much more often than he'd like, he comforts himself with the knowledge that he can whisk himself away in the evening to Beledon. If his work is duller than usual, he boosts his own spirits by the wild promise of the bell waiting for him at home.

Does doing all this untether himself? Does he loose his own ties to Cadeus Falls, while never truly being a member of the citadel in Beledon either?

If the bell continues to work forever, Jasper doesn't know if he'll ever change. It's difficult to keep himself grounded when he knows he can change all the trappings of his surroundings with a single ring.

Jasper runs his hands across the collection of rocks he's accumulated on the surface of the small table in his bedroom. It comforts him to bring his hands across the varying textures, here smooth and there rough.

Still feeling strangely unmoored, he takes a closer look at the letter he's received. He recognizes the handwriting along the outside right away, smiling so suddenly and so brightly that he surprises even himself.

He unseals the envelope and pulls out the letter inside, scanning its contents. The first portion is in his sister's hand, telling him about the new students in the classes his parents teach, their little oddities and their quick learning. Everyone is in good health, he's happy to hear. She also writes that they're looking forward to him visiting again soon, and his mind immediately jumps forward to calculate when his next day off is, to go and see them.

The part of the letter he's really excited for, though, is at the very bottom, where his sister relents and lets her son and daughter have their say.

Once he deciphers the creative spelling and sparse use of proper punctuation, Jasper is left with the following message from his six-year-old nephew:

Dear Uncle,

Pleese come today we miss you. I hav a new toy it's a hors and I can pull it with a string. If you com today you can play with it.

Dad cut my har also and it looks bad. Bring me a hat.

Com soon!

Signed with his name and followed by a picture of a sun and an incomprehensible batch of letters, which must have been the doing of Jasper's three-year-old niece.

His heart warms as he rereads the message. He's surprised his nephew had penned "Dear" properly, likely referring to his mother's use of the word at the beginning of the letter as guidance. And he's proud that "Uncle" is written out correctly, since he had spent his last visit home practicing its spelling with him. His niece had sat in on the lesson too, but she spent the time loudly singing and trying to make a flower on the paper instead of bothering with words.

Jasper has always known himself well in this regard: he will never marry anyone, and he won't have his own children. But his niece and nephew are like pieces of his heart personified, and he treasures all their time and words together.

Jasper carefully folds the letter and goes to the room's wardrobe. Pulling a small box from it, he adds the envelope to a stack of previous ones that he's tied together with an orange ribbon.

He spends the rest of the evening writing his own letter of response, sealing it, and placing it on the table for morning delivery. Yawns growing longer in tandem with the clock's lengthening chimes, he slips under the covers of his bed, bell forgotten for the night.

————————————————————

As if in punishment for ignoring it the prior evening, the bell is the first thought to infiltrate Jasper's mind when he blinks slowly awake.

Running a hand through his hair, Jasper glances at the freestanding clock in his room. A whole hour to go until he needs to leave for his office. He could sleep a bit more, or take an especially leisurely pace in getting ready, or— and isn't the third option always the standout— he could take a quick trip to Beledon.

He doesn't even need to ask himself what his choice will be: he already knows.

I'm not doing it to run away from a disappointing day, Jasper tells himself as he pulls on his clothes and boots. I'm doing it only because I want to.

Maybe he'll have breakfast with the members of the citadel. He believes Skander is due back from his scouting mission any day now, and he'd hate to miss his friend's return.

It takes five quick tries to ring himself into the citadel: he goes to a back alley of Beledon, the coast (he pauses here to watch the sunrise for a few minutes), the foot of a mountain, and the outside of the Taymons' old cottage before he ends up in Sunset Citadel's occupied kitchen.

In the sliver of space between seconds, he appears by the hearth, causing Araceli to jump.

"I don't think I'll ever be used to that," she says, hand on her heart to steady its beat. "Good morning, Jasper."

"Morning, Celi." Jasper's happy to note that she's mixing a batter together in the blue-and-gold bowl he had gifted her a year and a half ago.

By her side at the kitchen table is Fallon, who's evidently stepped in to help prepare meals in Skander's absence. He arranges a plate of bananas and orange slices as he delivers his own greeting to Jasper.

"Rian, come say hello to Jasper," he calls.

The door leading to the table outside has been propped open by a particularly large pot, and the sun shines warmly on a head of auburn hair as Rian moves to the open doorway. "Good morning," he says, even-toned as ever. Then, "You know I can hear you without you shouting, right, Fallon?"

"I'm just trying to even it out, since you're so quiet," says Fallon, passing him the finished plate of fruit for the outdoor dining table.

Kalila slips into the kitchen, navy blue book tucked under her arm and skeleton key hanging openly around her neck. Jasper doesn't think he's ever seen her without it.

When Araceli sees her, she straightens up and carefully tucks a stray curl back into place in her updo. Jasper feels a sudden stab of confusion. Araceli is one of the most distinctly unselfconscious people he's ever met: inordinately cheerful and never nervous.

"Learn anything interesting, Kalila?" she asks, gesturing toward her book with the hand not holding the mixing spoon.

Kalila starts and looks to Araceli with a Who, me? expression. The look is less frequent now in the months following their shared excursion into the chimera's world, but still surfaces from time to time. Hurtling down a mine-track together at the whim of the sage of the Untaught Woods has somehow served as a bonding experience in Araceli's eyes, if not an outright friendship-forming one.

But despite having slowly gotten used to Fallon and Araceli expressing an interest in her interests and pastimes, Kalila is still sometimes taken by surprise by the attention.

"Nothing new," she says. "I've read this one before."

"What's it about?" Araceli says, leaning forward and whisking the batter with greater intensity. Again, Jasper eyes her with concern. She isn't normally filled with this type of restless, near-anxious energy. Maybe she's coming down with something.

"Butterflies." Kalila comes closer to show Araceli the cover, where the outlines of two butterflies have been rendered in white. "You'd like the pictures in it, Fallon. They're very well-done." She flips through a few pages to demonstrate, letting Fallon admire the accuracy and detail with which the sketches have been made.

Araceli watches her, not the book. "Just brushing up on your butterfly knowledge, aren't you, Kalila?"

"There's more to them than pretty wings. And did you know, as they age the scales of their wings begin to fall off anyway? Only the membrane is left, transparent."

Jasper isn't particularly invested in these facts, but the light green of Araceli's eyes grow wide as she exclaims her interest, hanging onto Kalila's words.

Behind Kalila, the door into the kitchen opens again, and Kit comes in. The freckles speckled across the bridge of her nose have faded a bit in the sunless days of February, but they'll be back in full force soon with the advent of warmer months.

She strides past Kalila, reaching a hand out to flick familiarly at one of the frizzed ends of her long hair. The knife hanging from her belt is completely at odds with the teasing tone of her voice as she says, "Morning, Lila."

Kalila ducks her head away, making a face at both the gesture and the nickname, but Jasper can tell she's pleased. It reminds him of his interactions with his own older sister, a world away in Cadeus Falls.

As breakfast time draws nearer, more people pass through the kitchen.

"What news, courier?" Tai demands of Lionel, who had been lounging at his ease around the room.

Lionel straightens his nonchalantly-crossed legs. "Oh, right." He reaches a hand out to pet the top of Puzzle's head, the cat having waltzed in alongside Tai. "That was from Skander," he tells him.

Puzzle purrs happily, then leaps onto the table and tries to stick his face into the bowl of batter. Araceli pulls it away, placing a small dish of cooked chicken in front of him instead. Puzzle settles in to enjoy his breakfast.

After checking that his cat is content, Tai badgers Lionel further. "Your brother is safe and well?"

"He's fine. They're less than a day's ride out from the citadel. I think he's excited to be back."

Tai frowns, looking out the open door into the spring air. Then he turns abruptly to Jasper.

"What about you? Have you seen him?" he asks.

Jasper, who had just been tugging out his bell to leave for work on time, shakes his head. "But I can look for him after I leave the office this afternoon. No promises about where the bell decides to take me, though."

Tai gives him a hard look. He has an uneasy feeling with Skander gone, and it isn't only from the sharp ache of missing him. "Make sure that you do."

————————————————————

When Jasper rings himself into Beledon later that day, he almost smacks his face straight into a collection of dark green leaves, his eyes momentarily filled with nothing but their emerald color.

Shoving the offending branch out of his field of vision, he's accosted on all sides by sounds of struggle between men and monsters.

Shouting, crying, the sharp twang of bowstrings, the odd whistling sighs that Jasper will forever associate with specters. He watches one of the scouts struggle with a creature, her quiver empty and knife knocked out of her hands. Without her weapons, she lasts seconds.

Is this the group of scouts Skander is with? They're heavily outnumbered, and Jasper can't pick him out amidst the overwhelming mass of pale bodies that surround him. They come in every variation he can think of: thin, heavyset, tall, crawling. A flash above him even indicates a winged specter aloft.

The dark green colors of the scouts' uniform are relatively few and far between, fighting a losing battle. Those that have managed to climb on top of their horses race away, leaving their comrades behind.

This must have been an ambush of some sorts, and Jasper needs to get out of here. He won't last; he can't even make it to any of the remaining scouts to ring them to safety, so heavily are they all pressed in by the group of specters.

Less and less of the scouts are visible now, either far away in their flight to safety or lying motionless on the forest ground. Jasper scans the inert bodies, looking for the face of the friend he's known for years. Is it worth staying to look for him? Or should he leave and hope for the best, that Skander is already long gone in his escape?

When a specter gets in his face, making its half-whistle, half-sigh, all teeth and talons, Jasper uses the only possible weapon at his disposal. Swinging the bell with all his strength, he knocks the monster out of his way and stumbles forward in a panicked flight.

Colliding into a body with a startled cry, Jasper falls to the ground.