Seen via the Sight, the laboratory was just as clean. The lines of the Geometry ran through the room in neat bundles. The brightest ones all passed through the supplies stored on the shelves, ringing the room in colored light.
“Step into the circle, please,” said Zachariah, gesturing at the diagram on the floor.
“Do I need to take anything off?” asked Branwyn. The circle itself was devoid of any lines outside of the ones making the shape itself.
Zachariah’s eyebrows shot up. “Did Corbin ask that of you?”
“Yeah. My shoes and my earrings. He said they’d bring unnecessary influences into the circle.”
“Ah,” said Zachariah, sounding amused. “No, you don’t need to take anything off. I can account for those items.”
Branwyn stepped into the circle, then fidgeted as he moved around the room, stopping first at the computer and then moving from shelf to shelf pulling down jars. After a few moments, she sat down on the floor and—
-eight-
Branwyn jerked herself out of a dreamy reverie. She’d been watching Zachariah move around the room, shaping the lines of the Geometry with each component he gathered. Then—what had happened? She felt like she’d fallen asleep and dreamt something already fading away.
“What the hell?” Branwyn scrambled to her feet. She had no idea how much time had passed. Her butt was sore and her feet were tingling from being tucked under her. Zachariah stood outside the circle, regarding her calmly.
“I’ve installed your charms,” he said. He held out an envelope. “And I’ve prepared instructions for you.”
“Why did I fall asleep?” Branwyn demanded.
“So you wouldn’t see how I did my magic, or disturb the working. It’s built into the circle.” He smiled faintly. “A standard precaution. I suppose Corbin didn’t do that, either.”
Branwyn gave him a flat, cold look. “You could have warned me. I don’t like having my will stripped away.”
“And yet you’re playing with faeries.” He studied her and sighed. “It’s standard, Miss Lennox. I assumed you knew what you were doing when you stepped into the circle. Please believe that I would not have surprised you if I had known you were so...” He shook his head and adjusted his sleeves, his fingers trailing over the band on his wrist.
Scowling, Branwyn said, “How did you get Corbin’s charms off? I wanted to see that in particular, since that's supposed to be tough.”
“It would require very complex magic to remove a charm spontaneously out in the world, but it isn’t impossible. But here and now—well, you went into the circle, and I’ve made a study of Corbin’s magic already. It wasn’t hard at all.”
Branwyn stepped deliberately out of the circle. “What did you give me?”
“Corbin stocked your nodes primarily with self-defense and personal-assistance charms. I replaced the personal-assistance charms with these.” He offered her the envelope again. There were running feet overhead and he glanced up. “And now, I think, it's time for dinner.”
*
Branwyn,
It is important, when spending time in Faerie, not to lose sight of the reason you are there. Corbin has given you one good tool for this. I’ve given you another. (see attached.)
It’s also important to accept that sometimes the only way to survive will be to run away. I thought it might help if you had somewhere to run to, so I’ve given you two more charms to help you escape from the Backworld when you need to. Try to avoid ending up in a situation where you can’t use them. Be aware that they are the most power-hungry of your charms.
If Tarn doesn’t ask about me, I’d rather you didn’t say anything. I’d like him to be surprised.
—Zachariah
*
***Look At This World***
Views: 89,012
Found footage off a lost camera
A camera walks through a downtown city while the cameraman narrates, taking in skyscrapers and boutiques. His voice is deep and sonorous and beautiful, as if added in post-production. “Look at this place. Look what you’ve built with your hands and your ingenuity. You are an amazing people and we love you for it. These dreams! This art!” The cameraman stops and pans across a display of mannequins dressed in the height of fashion. Then he moves into the store, through a window that no longer seems to be there. “And you’ve been waiting for us. You haven’t forgotten us.” A brief pan across a display of silver jewelry, and then focusing a startled Japanese girl. “Lovely,” the voiceover croons.
“Sir, you ca—” begins the girl, and the voiceover says, “Be at ease, lovely girl. I will return for you when the time is right.” The girl’s eyes half-close and then she sags against the counter abruptly. An ebony hand reaches out from behind the lens and tangles in her hair for a moment. Then the camera turns away and moves around the store, inspecting the clothing before leaving the shop again. “Yes, we return, and you have multiplied our treasures in ways I never dreamed. Look at this!” and the camera dances over a menu posted outside a restaurant. “Delicacies, available to any who pass on the street. And this camera, so that I may share my experiences with all even without access to my full power. We planted seeds and have returned to a garden paradise. And oh, you love your dreams.” The camera pans up to a giant screen on the side of a skyscraper. “Your fantasies, so close to being real. And even now the final barrier is being breached.”
Abruptly, the video ends.
*
“Isn’t it rather late on the other side of the curtain?” asked Tarn, relaxing bonelessly in his chair. He put his chin on his hand, watching as Branwyn dropped her backpack to the floor. She wondered if he ever sat like he was on a throne, rather than a poorly designed armchair.
“I wanted to avoid any questions. It would really be so much more convenient if you’d move this entrance someplace else, you know.”
“What, to a bookstore that would lock its doors every evening? This is much better. You have all the keys you need here.” His long lashes lowered as his gaze swept her head to toe. “You’ve been a busy little bee, I see. I wondered what you'd been up to.”
“So let’s just confirm things. If you had the power beyond the door, you could wake up Penny, right?”
He shifted position, looked at his nails. “I could.”
“And you would?”
He looked up at her. “Oh, absolutely. I would very much like to return Penny to you. If the door was open, many, many things would become possible and I certainly would exert that power on Penny's behalf.” He quirked a grin. “If you opened the door, how could I do less?”
“Fine. Let’s do it.”
He looked unsettled. “What, right now?”
“It’s Friday. I don’t have any other plans for the weekend. So here I am, all gussied up. You said something about a journey. Where do I have to go? What do I have to do?”
Tarn stared at her for a long moment. His fingers tapped on the arm of his throne. Then he stood up and the whole room seemed to revolve around the two of them, changing as it turned.
They stood in another long room. Living paintings lined the walls, but it felt more like a studio containing works in progress, not another gallery. Each painting showed a landscape and she could see the brushwork shift and change as the vision portrayed moved like the view beyond a window.
“You must visit the Queen of Stone and tell her of our project. You will give her a gift and beg for her hairpin.” He looked her over again, evaluating what he saw. “If she likes you, she’ll give it to you.”
Branwyn was startled. “What do you mean, if she likes me?”
“If she finds you pleasant, charming, interesting. If she likes you.” Tarn gave her an encouraging, sweet smile.
“Oh, that’s going to go over well. Why do you need me to go again? If somebody needs to charm this Queen, you’ve got to have better options. Can’t you come?”
“There are things here that require my presence. You are going because you’ll be the
one to work her hairpin into our key.” His smile turned wry. “You’ll be the one to interest her, in any case.”
“I hope you’re sending a really nice gift, then.” She looked around. “What are we doing here, anyway?”
A door at the end of the hall opened and William the changeling marched in, followed by eight similar-looking fae armed with spears and shields. William held a small chest in both hands.
“My lord,” he said, offering it to Tarn.
Tarn took it and opened it, showing the contents to Branwyn. Inside, snug within velvet padding, were two spheres. One was a glass bubble of the sort Tarn used to convey messages. His letter to her, after the first chain had been broken, had arrived via one. The other was a polished, orange-swirled stone ball. “A message and my gift.”
Branwyn regarded the contents of the box dubiously. Tarn had prepared things in advance, despite the surprised act when she showed up demanding to go. Well, she knew he played games. “The Queen of Stone, you said? Is a stone ball really going to impress her? Does she have a collection or something?”
“It’s a dorodango. Made of mud, and quite fragile, so do be careful with it.” Tarn's smile was faint and absent-minded as he latched the lid closed. “My servants will guide and attend you on your journey.” He gestured at William and his friends.
She surveyed the fae. All male, all armed. “A dangerous journey, is it?”
“What makes you say that?
“It’s the nine spears. I think maybe one would be enough for a guide. That’s enough for a fellowship.”
He walked over to one of the paintings, a Romantic landscape of a road winding around a hillside and past a stark, leafless tree. The road vanished into a narrow valley in the misty distance, while storm clouds tumbled overhead. “The wilds of Faerie are never truly safe, but there’s a road between my domain and the court of the Queen of Stone, so you shouldn't be at risk as long as you don’t do anything foolish. Don’t stray off the path, even if invited to do so. Don’t insult anybody you meet along the way. And if William tells you to run, do so.”
“A veritable walk in the park,” Branwyn said dryly. “How long is the trip?”
“At least one night. Possibly as many as three. My servants have packed supplies that will sustain you without risking your freedom,” he added, with a glance at her backpack as if he could see through the canvas to the snacks Branwyn had packed herself. She’d heard from her Gran-gran’s stories that Faerie food could be dangerous. Apparently her great-grandmother had been right.
She knelt by the backpack and slipped the small chest inside, making sure to nestle it carefully amidst the energy bars and bags of dried fruit so that it would stay upright. Then she stood up and settled the pack over her shoulder. “So, deliver the box to this Queen of Stone. Be nice to her. Get a hairpin. Come back. Make a key. Save Penny. Am I missing anything? No? Let’s do this.”
“Indeed.” Tarn pressed his palm on the surface of the painting. His hand sank through. “The door is open. The way is clear. The journey is yours.”
Branwyn pushed her own palm against the painting. She encountered less resistance than expected, and stumbled forward as a result. The painting passed around her and her booted feet came down on an old, moss-covered road. A moment later, the armed fae streamed around her.
Orienting herself, she looked over her shoulder. Behind her was a rounded hill with a thin silver spire perched at the summit. A great wooden door closed in the hillside a few yards away.
And the hill was odd. She walked closer, touched the grass, and it felt like grass. But it looked like the painting. The colors were unreal and the lines were simplified. The clouds moved overhead as if caught in a fast and playful wind, swirling and changing like ink in water.
William said, “If you look at the sky too much, she’ll look back at you. That wouldn’t be wise right now. Come along this way.”
Startled, Branwyn looked away from the hypnotic sky. The wind ruffled the grass on the slope beside the road ahead, and she realized she could see the wind itself as curls of dancing blue light. The land was like a dream or a story.
William touched her arm and she shook herself. “Give me a minute.” One of Corbin’s charms might be useful here. She closed her eyes, visualized the activation symbols for the reminder charm, then said, “I am going to visit the Queen of Stone.” Just as had happened when she experimented after first getting the charm, she felt the words settle into her consciousness. Any time her thoughts wandered, her own voice would echo in her head: I am going to visit the Queen of Stone.
Then, hopefully fortified against the distracting landscape, she shifted the weight of her backpack and set out after William and his troop of faeries.
Around the curve of the valley ahead, the country opened up. In the distance off to the right, another hill dominated the landscape. On top of the hill, an enormous stone woman arched her back, her hands flung out.
I am going to visit the Queen of Stone. “Is that where we’re headed?” Branwyn asked hopefully.
William glanced at the sculpture only briefly. “No. My lord made that centuries ago to memorialize a girl that escaped him. Her majesty is a touch more distinctive.”
Branwyn noticed the escaped him but only said, “Distinctive how?”
“Ah, well, the Queens all live in deep Faerie. They are deep Faerie, really. They get a little… odd. You’ll see.”
“Fair enough. Hey, why did he send so many of you if obeying rules is the key to safe travel here?”
“Safe travel for you, lady. There’s little here that would risk the displeasure of both the Queen of Stone and the Duke of Underlight for stealing you away. But there’s those that wouldn’t hesitate to waylay a single guide and leave you stranded.”
Branwyn frowned. “Why would I be safe while you, Tarn’s actual servants, wouldn’t be?”
William shrugged, his gaze roving watchfully from side to side. “Faerie is but part of the Backworld, and not everything that roams the Backworld is my lord's ally. And the rules are different for my kind and yours.”
They passed by a large, leafless tree that held a stringless violin in its branches. The blue curls of wind played over the instrument, teasing impossible music out of the emptiness. Branwyn stared curiously as long twigs moved, finger-like, over the neck of the violin.
I am going to visit the Queen of Stone. The music was beautiful, though. It surged against the reminder at first, then changed, weaving the words into the song.
But the view from the other side of the tree drove the music out of her head. The giant lady enjoying herself on the hilltop was gone, replaced by a distant raised highway built from stacked stone, lined with lights glowing against a purple twilight sky.
Branwyn stopped, then backtracked to the other side of the tree. The enormous sculpture dominated a hillside. Somehow, passing the tree had changed the entire landscape.
Branwyn lifted her foot to walk around the tree from the other side.
I am going to visit the Queen of Stone.
Don’t stray off the path.
Branwyn put her foot back down again on the road, then backed away from the edge. The troop of changelings watched her impassively, although William looked impatient.
She adjusted her backpack self-consciously. “Right. Very interesting. Let’s move on.”
The twilight on the right didn’t change, but after a time, the storm clouds on her left vanished and a rainbow shimmered across the blue sky. It jumped between the tops of the hills as if pacing them, before coming to earth in a crystalline pool at the base of a jagged white cliff. A unicorn rested beside the pool, looking away from its reflection at them as they went by.
Branwyn opened a bottle of water from her backpack and didn’t go investigate the pool, despite the tinkling waterfall. Despite the unicorn. “My baby sister must never come here,” she announced. William gave her a blank look and she sighed. “You’re not much of a traveling companion, you know.”
> The lead fae, ranging ahead of them, turned and jogged back. William left Branwyn’s side and met him halfway. After conferring briefly, William gave a hand signal and the entire troop stopped. Branwyn looked at them, then kept going until she caught up with William. “What’s up?”
“There’s something else moving on the road. Better to meet it here, in the open terrain, than ahead in the canyon.”
“Ah,” said Branwyn. “Should I get my hammer ready?”
William looked at her as if he was seeing her for the first time. “You brought a hammer on a visit to the Queen of Stone?”
“Well, it seemed more practical than a big knife, and I wasn’t going on an adventure unarmed.” She slid her bag off her back and glanced at his shocked expression with amusement. “I brought some duct tape, too.”
“I don’t think that will be necessary,” he said, his expression sliding from shocked to worried.
Before she could say anything more, a silver birdcage came around the bend, carried on the shoulders of four men garbed in loincloths. At first she thought they were distant, gigantic figures, but she blinked and scale reasserted itself against the odd, slightly forced perspective of her painted surroundings. The bearers were very tall, and very muscular, but not beyond human-sized. The birdcage on their shoulders was a palanquin, fitted with sheer curtains. A barely visible feminine figure lounged within the silver lattice. To Branwyn's admittedly inexpert gaze, it did not seem like a hammer-requiring situation.
Atop the palanquin was another latticework, this one an actual cage, and inside a doll-sized man sat playing a recorder. The lonely tune warbled through the air, sounding almost familiar, and Branwyn thought of her stepfather practicing folk songs with her sister.
As it got closer, William glanced from the palanquin to Branwyn and back again. Each bearer was a magnificently beautiful man with mahogany skin and dark green hair. Branwyn touched her own green ponytail self-consciously even as the bearers came to a halt on the other side of the road.
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