Birds circled overhead. Sinta flipped through her grimoire, looking for the reincarnation spell she had used to bring her sister back to life as a Familiar. She knew it wouldn't be easy, but to fumble the spell so badly that she brought back her sister as a flock of pigeons - that was a new low, even for Sinta.

"I've got this, Tilly," she called reassuringly to the vermin above as one of them soiled her still bubbling cauldron.

The recipe for the spell was of no help. There was no clue that she could discern from the smudged pages on where she could have gone wrong. Not that she would have known what to do had there been a clue. Redo the whole thing? It already took her several months between collecting her sisters ashes from the pyre, finding toenails of a newborn (only the pinky fingers), and scavenging in neighbors' garbage for persimmons seeds - makes her wonder what kind of monsters she is surrounded by that they would choose to eat that fruit - to name just a handful of the ridiculous ingredients in the barely legible recipe.

In fact, she wondered to herself, who's to say that any part of the spell had worked? It could just be a uniquely elaborate magical incantation, crafted by an especially ornithophilic witch who simply loved pigeons.

"...Tilly?" She said looking at the group of pigeons who were now pecking at the ground, "Tilly, is that really you? Can you give me a sign of some sort?" The pigeons continued pigeoning.

Sinta left the oosing, putrid cauldron and sat on the soft grass facing the flock. She rummaged in one of her deep pockets until she came out with a handful of wilted white seeds. Her eyes filled with tears.

"Oh, Tilly," she sniffled softly, addressing a particularly cockeyed, chubby pigeon that was brave enough, or dumb enough, to come up to her. She gently tossed the seeds in front of her would-be sister, then began sobbing.

"It's been such a rough year, Tilly. None of my spells have been working, and that was my fourth cauldron in two weeks. I melted the other three doing laundry," another Tilly-pigeon came closer to Sinta, its head bobbing as it tentatively made its way to the seeds.

"None of the other witches are inviting me to their coven meetings, they're not even inviting me to Tuesday brunch. Without you there to bully them, the cousins abandoned their magic, one by one, and found jobs instead. Can you believe it, Tilly? Three of them are now part of something called a Tech Startup. They didn't even come for the last Moon Howling, I just barked at the full moon all night by myself. I don't know what to do without you, Tilly. I can't go through another full moon barking at the sky alone, I just can't," Sinta hid her face in her hands as she wailed miserably.

"I don't think these are real persimmons seeds. I don't know if persimmons even have seeds," she said to the cockeyed pigeon between hiccups, who simply stared at her, sort of. Sinta stared back as well as she could, making sure to evenly look at each separate wayward eye.

A decision was beginning to form in her head. She felt this was the right way, the only way she could be reunited with Tilly as sisters again. She shuffled back to the cauldron, grabbed the wilted ladle, and brought the rancid gloop up to her mouth.

"I'm coming, Tilly," she said glancing back at the indifferent pigeon, then swallowed the potion, and sputtered the spell beyond her frothing mouth.

With a gentle pop, she disappeared, and in her place waddled a crosseyed pigeon eager to join her sister-flock.