by Jack Heckel
Tolkien wrote about how dangerous it is to step out of your door, because you never know where the road you take might lead you. That he was writing about how treacherous it is to make a journey between worlds, and how easy it is to get lost in etherspace if you don’t have your wits about you, doesn’t make the advice any less universally profound. However, it is obvious he never lived in New York. In New York roads don’t wait for you to step onto them to cause mischief, they pull you into their currents and sweep you along whether you want to or not. All it took was for me to not resist moving, and the tide of humanity picked me up and carried me down Bleecker. It might have pushed me straight past the coffee shop and onto 7th Avenue had I let it, but I stepped into the eddy of a newsstand and let the hustle and flow pass me by. I picked up a copy of Us magazine and pretended to read a fascinating article about a beautiful, rich person’s struggles with life while I studied the coffee shop for signs of danger.
Everything looked normal. Out front, a woman was passing out pamphlets about some prophet. Traffic rolled along the street. A horn blared. I didn’t know what I was looking for, but I felt uneasy. It wasn’t that I thought Moregoth would know to find me here yet. But Eldrin might.
“Eldrin,” I said with a hissing exhale as a second emptiness settled in my chest next to the spot Harold had left behind. Since we’d met there isn’t much I hadn’t shared with him, and now he was out of reach, if not logistically then philosophically. They say you shouldn’t discuss politics, religion, or money among friends, but I’m certain there is no topic more dangerous than the nature of reality and our place in it. Perhaps Rook would have some ideas about what to do next, because I was lost.
I watched a few more people go in and out before coming to the conclusion that I was either a lousy detective, or the coffee shop was nothing more than a coffee shop. Even if it wasn’t, I’d be damned if I was going to stand out here any longer. It was freezing and I hadn’t slept since the previous night. I may never have been in more need of coffee in my life. I crossed the street, fought past the lady selling her religion, and with flyer in hand made my way through the front door.
Rook was either not here or was one hell of a master of disguise. This early, there were only a handful of people in the place, and none of them was even vaguely dwarfish. In the far corner, a teenager with purple hair was asleep in a chair. By the front window, where hours before I’d been reading The Dark Lord, a man sat alone studying a chessboard and rubbing a gray goatee. Against the far wall a businessman in a black suit stood, staring out the window at the street. I moved to the counter where the only other customers, an older bald man and a middle-aged red-haired woman, were placing their orders. She asked for a “Coffee, black,” and he ordered, “Tea, Earl Grey, hot.”
“Name?” the barista asked.
“Hill. Dixon Hill,” the bald man said.
As they sorted out payment, which seemed to confuse the bald man far more than it had any right to do, I did another sweep of the room. The man in the suit was looking at me. Our eyes met and we both glanced quickly away. I pretended to study the flyer while my mind raced. Had I seen him before? Did he know me? Was he a Sealer in disguise? Or was he simply people watching? I looked up again. He was staring at the girl with the purple hair now, and seemed as interested in her as he had been in me. That’s when I finally focused on the flyer in my hand. The title read “Repent! The Dark Lord Is Coming!” My heart raced. I knew I was being paranoid, but that didn’t mean coming here hadn’t been a mistake. Too many people knew or could know I frequented this place. I was debating leaving when I heard the words I’d been dreading: “Avery Stewart?”
With a cry of surprise, I spun around. “What do you want?”
The woman behind the counter took a step back and raised an eyebrow. “That’s usually my question. I’m gonna assume you want decaf.”
I relaxed as I saw it was Kendra, one of the regular baristas. She had curly brown hair, light brown skin, a nice smile, and I’m not ashamed to admit I’d spent many an hour wondering how to ask her out. Based on the look of alarm she was giving me, I thought my chances had taken a pretty big hit. “Sorry, Kendra. I’ve had a tough morning. Just my usual.”
“Right,” she said. “Grande, quad, nonfat, one pump, no whip, mocha, extra hot?” I nodded. “By the way, I think you left something behind last time you were here. Maybe a scarf, or the book you were reading?”
I thought back to yesterday morning, amazed that it had only been yesterday morning and not a month ago, and shook my head. “I don’t think so.”
“I’m pretty sure you did,” she persisted. “You should check the lost and found closet. It’s down the hall just past the bathrooms.”
I laughed. It was wonderful that someone was worried about something as mundane as a lost book or a bit of my clothing. “Thanks, Kendra. I’ll get it later.”
“I really think you should check now,” she said, tapping on the side of my cup with each word as she passed it across.
I felt silly arguing with her so I said, “Okay,” and prized my cup from her oddly unyielding fingers.
She gave an exasperated sigh and started to say something else, but at that moment the bell over the door tinkled. I turned to see if it was Rook, and found myself staring at two hooded figures silhouetted by the light from the door. My heart leapt to my throat, and I made a sound like “Eeeee!”
If they had been Sealers this story would have ended there, because my panic drove any thought of magic or casting straight out of my mind. Thankfully for the word count of this book, the figure on the right threw her hood back and said, “You seem jumpy, handsome.”
It was Valdara. In that moment, as messed up as my life was, she was, without doubt, one of the most beautiful sights I’d ever seen. “Valdara!” I felt a grin lift my cheeks as I rushed forward to give her a hug. “I’m so glad to see you.”
The figure on the left cleared his throat. “What about me, kid?”
Drake, looking as much like a jolly grim reaper as ever, also lowered his hood. “Drake!” I exclaimed, wrapping an arm around him also. A ridiculous number of emotions overwhelmed me, but joy and wonder took top billing. I couldn’t stop smiling. A few minutes earlier I’d been feeling utterly alone. But here were Valdara and Drake, and, whether logical or not, I believed they could handle anything. “But why are you here? Did you come to visit? And how did you know where to find me?”
They shared a look and then Drake said, “I hate to disappoint you, kid, but we didn’t have any idea you’d be here. Rook sent us an urgent message that we were needed at once. He said it was a matter that concerned Trelari’s very existence.” He looked around. “I mean, apart from that girl’s hair being purple, which I assume is the mark of a serious illness, I don’t see it.”
“He told us to dress inconspicuously,” Valdara said, gesturing at their clothing.
I hadn’t noticed, but they were both wearing fairly muted outfits, at least for them. It was still cloaks and robes, but Valdara had abandoned her leather and metal gear, and Drake had done a pretty good job of disguising his staff as a traveler’s walking stick. Their clothes weren’t exactly normal, but this was New York. There’s a regular in Times Square who runs around with a guitar, a cowboy hat, boots, and tighty-whities—and nothing else. Apart from the fact that Drake had a serious Rasputin-like beard, and Valdara was, well, Valdara, I didn’t think anyone would have looked twice at them—certainly not three times. I leaned in close to Valdara and whispered, “I know you’re clever at concealing weapons, but where have you got that crazy battle-ax tucked away?”
“Justice Cleaver?” laughed Valdara. “I left him at home. There is no way to hide him. He won’t put up with it.”
Drake nodded his agreement. “We’ve tried! Don’t get me wrong, JC has been a huge boon in helping us rout the remnants of the Dark Queen’s former army, but it’s a blessing to be away from him for a bit. I have never understood the attraction of vows of silence,
but I’d take one tomorrow if it would shut him up. That weapon has issues.”
Someone at about knee-level let out a frustrated sigh. We all looked down and saw Rook standing next to us, arms crossed and foot tapping with impatience. “We’re all goin’ to have issues if we don’t get you lot out of sight. This was supposed to be a secret meetin’! Don’t any of you understand the meanin’ of the word inconspicuous?”
Valdara nodded. “Of course we do. Look!” She gestured to their garments as though this was proof.
He studied Valdara and Drake with a squinted eye. “Super! You’ve both managed to dress like the hermit on the gatefold of Led Zeppelin IV.”
Drake leaned over to me and asked, “Is that good or bad?”
I shrugged. “Depends on whether you think Zeppelin represents everything wrong with the progressive rock movement of the ’70s, or is one of the most significant and influential bands of all time.”
Drake was still puzzling over this when Rook muttered something about “damned fools,” grabbed the hems of his and Valdara’s robes, and began dragging them toward the back of the coffee shop. I fell in behind, and when we passed the counter Kendra pointed at my coffee and mouthed, I tried. I looked down at my cup and saw that she’d drawn a rook next to the words lost and found.
Rook led us down the hall past the restrooms, which was a bit strange because the coffee shop was basically my second home and I would have sworn an oath the hallway ended at the restrooms. But I couldn’t deny there was a door here labeled lost & found that I didn’t recall ever seeing before. He pulled a key from around his neck and held it next to the handle. A keyhole outlined itself in crackling energy. He slipped the key into the lock and turned the handle. The door did not so much swing open as fold in on itself in an increasingly impossible combination of movements.
Beyond was a nicely proportioned room that was part well-used dorm lounge and part Pall Mall private club. The walls were wood paneled and lined with shelves filled with a combination of books, trophies, and odd bric-a-brac. There was a large fireplace that dominated the far corner and a pair of doors I suspected were bathrooms. A mishmash of disreputable couches and rumpled chairs were scattered strategically about, and a surprising number of them were occupied by an equally disreputable and rumpled collection of people.
“In,” ordered Rook.
Valdara, Drake, and I walked inside. Rook followed behind us as the door silently unfolded back into place.
As soon as the room was sealed again, everyone gave a thunderous cheer of: “Avery!” They gathered around us, introducing themselves, shaking hands and clapping me on the back. I thought I recognized a few of them as being part of the cosplay group I’d seen the morning before, but otherwise I didn’t know any of them.
“Looks like everyone knows your name,” said Drake with a chuckle.
“Let’s see if they’ll return the courtesy,” I muttered under my breath. I raised my hands and my voice. “Okay, stop. Who are you people and what’s going on?”
Rook cleared his throat and raised a bushy eyebrow. “I thought that would be obvious, laddie.”
I looked around. Every type and sort of person was represented: tall, short, thick, thin, dark, light. But their eyes all had the same washed-out quality I’d noted in Rook’s eyes the first time I met him. It was something like the way a long-term subworld traveler’s eyes fade over time, but there was a depth to them that gave the feeling of great age. They didn’t look old, but they felt ancient.
“Mysterians,” I whispered. I spun about to take them all in. “You are all Mysterians!” I shouted.
“The question is, are you one of us?” a woman dressed in Hylar style asked me.
“Of course he is,” Rook said with a bristled brow.
I held up a hand to stop him from defending me too strenuously, and sat heavily in one of the armchairs by the fire. “I think I know what you mean, and the answer is ‘yes and no.’”
“Lad!” Rook said with a warning growl.
“Let him say his piece,” Drake said with equal violence. “It may answer a number of other questions, like what the hell a Mysterian is. I thought you were from Trelari, Rook.”
The dwarf went uncharacteristically quiet at Drake’s challenge, and for perhaps the first time since I’d met him, I saw real shame in his face. I looked about at the other Mysterians gathered there. All of them looked like they were from other worlds: Hylar, Earth, Dweorh, and even Orcus. I suspected all of them were merely passing, and that their true forms were hidden. I also suspected that hiding was their greatest skill.
I addressed the woman who’d asked the question about wheter I was one of them. “If you mean am I with you in your struggle against the Administration, then I am. If, however, you are asking me to join your group and hide in the lost and found closet of my neighborhood coffee shop while the Administration hunts down my friends, then the answer is no.”
There were a number of cries of protest at this, and Rook said, “That’s not fair, Avery! You have no idea what the people in this room have been through.”
“No, I don’t,” I said with a little more venom than my better self would have liked. “But if you all are who I think you are, the true and original peoples of Mysterium, and you have it in your power to stop Moregoth and others like him from turning the power of Mysterium against worlds like Trelari, why haven’t you?”
Rook sat down in one of the chairs near me. The excitement that had filled the room on my arrival was gone. The Mysterians hung their heads, and a few mumbled apologies. “It’s because we can’t,” Rook said hoarsely. “It’s true we are ‘real’ Mysterians. In truth, we were merely born with a natural advantage, and learned how to manipulate reality early in our development. We didn’t think much about it at the time, and as we learned to travel the worlds we taught others what we thought they could comprehend and use. Some of the people we met seemed to have a greater curiosity about our powers. Most of them were good people, but others were not. Some pleaded with us to take them back to Mysterium with us. They began to call themselves ‘mages.’ They played on our egos and our innocence. They wanted to learn more, and we were flattered to teach them what we knew.” He shook his head and yanked on his beard. “We were fools. When they had learned all they needed, they used our magic and drove us from our homeland. Then, to be sure we couldn’t return, these mages wrote us out of the pattern of our own world.”
“I understand very little of what you’re talking about, Rook,” Drake said. “But your people are still alive. Surely there’s hope.” He put an arm around Valdara. “We fought against great odds and triumphed.”
Rook sighed. “You don’t understand. The pattern the mages imposed on Mysterium is very powerful, and it is designed to destroy us. We’ve been hunted through the ages until we’re barely a race. We survive in little enclaves like this one on the innerworlds, but always Moregoth and the Sealers are searchin’ for us. It’s harder for them out in the multiverse—they typically rely on spies and informants—but on Mysterium the pattern gives them ways of sensing our presence. That’s why I couldn’t help you break into Student Records, Avery. If I’d gone, they’d have found me like that.” He snapped his fingers. “You would have been discovered, and I would have been erased from existence.”
Something clicked in my head. “You didn’t trust me. You’ve been following me around all this time trying to figure out if I was an Administration plant. I would have thought our time together on Trelari would have convinced you.”
“For most of us it did,” Rook said, and he cast a squinty glare about at the other Mysterians. “But there was a worry that the entire experiment might be a lure to draw in the last of us. Avery, you don’t know how rare you are. Most Mysterium mages simply won’t acknowledge the place is corrupt. Look at your friend Eldrin.”
“Don’t!” I shouted, and the room got very quiet. I shook my head and said softly, “Don’t judge him. He’s a good person, and . . .” I almost to
ld them about Trelari having potentially displaced their former homeworld at the center of the multiverse, but I did not trust them. I knew nothing about these Mysterians, or how they would react to such news. Hastily I amended what I was going to say. “I . . . I believe he will see the truth in time.” I thought about Susan and the T’s. “I believe they all will. In the end.”
Valdara stepped forward; the crown on her brow glittered in the firelight. “That’s fine for you to say, Avery, but what are we going to do about Trelari? If I understand what you’re saying, my world is being threatened now!”
“We’re going to fight them. Right?” Drake asked.
“Now, let’s not be too hasty,” one of the Mysterians said.
“Hasty!” Rook boomed. “Try a thousand years too late!”
Other voices were raised in agreement and dissent, and soon the room was filled with the chaos of dozens of arguments being waged simultaneously. I felt tired. I had been expecting this meeting with Rook to put an end to the questions that had been bothering me since my return, but they persisted. I thought I would find allies to help me fight the Administration, but I had not. It was not that I had learned nothing. The Administration had always given me the creeps; now I had objective evidence that they were actually evil. The Mysterians had always been a bit of a mystery; now they were less mysterious. There was knowledge here, but no wisdom. I still felt lost, and certainly no closer to the sort of epiphany that would redefine my understanding of the multiverse and my place in it. Worse, I couldn’t be honest about the things that were really bothering me, like Trelari’s increased reality or Griswald’s key, because I didn’t trust the Mysterians either.
As I half listened to Rook bellowing about the need for the Mysterians to grow a spine, it was Harold’s last words that kept running through my head. Not the “interesting” that had been for himself, but what he’d said about Socrates. I’d taken enough philosophy at Oxford to know the reference. It was from a text by Laërtius: There is only one good, namely, knowledge; and only one evil, namely, ignorance. I had no idea how the passage related to my current situation, but I felt sure it was another link in the chain I was building between the nature of Mysterium’s reality and my supposed revelation. But I was too tired to follow it now. I did a quick calculation and realized I hadn’t slept in over twenty-four hours. I leaned back in my chair. I was just closing my eyes when a bell rang and a light in the ceiling flashed red.