FicWad

Chapter 6 – New Doors (and a brief ‘Disney Moment’)

Even in spite of the fact that there were no immediate changes to Sarah’s life as she currently had come to experience it, much of the next few days were colored with the excitement of intense anticipation. Lord Mandor wasn’t about to force his Shadowmaster to do a rush job and Sarah couldn’t really blame him – the work being done was to guarantee her physical safety. The man apparently quoted him five Chaos days to finish the project - which really meant anywhere between three and six via the ‘sun’- but it wasn’t an unreasonable wait. Suhuy began to allow her to take longer shadow-outings, even bivouacking overnight once next to a verdant gorge that made the Grand Canyon look like a crack in the sidewalk by comparison. He was teaching her how to forage for food on alien worlds, how to tell poison from nutrient in plants and nuts she had never seen before. Sarah had a sneaking suspicion that she was being kept out of the way during the final retrofitting of the Way into the library and was proven correct upon her return: there was a second heavy wooden door on the near-side of the room, just a few feet to the left of the original one that more naturally led out to the rest of the house; knowing that these portals were mostly decorative, she still had to wonder if they acted as airlocks besides, all-considering. Her pulse hammered in her throat as she jogged over from the center of the room where she had trumped in and turned the polished handle; she had been directed to go straight in, where Mandor would be waiting to give her her first fencing lesson (and she was wearing pants for the occasion.) Opening the new door and quickly stepping through (as she was accustomed to do by now), Sarah immediately registered that this room was in a very different dimension, although how she knew this so instinctively eluded her. Something felt off…

However it felt, the room was beautiful in its relative simplicity. The ceiling was a bit shorter and the space was smaller than the library but there appeared to be plenty of open floor space beyond the entryway, which was rather like a short hall. Outlandish suits of armor and even more outlandish weapons were displayed in locked glass cases along the left wall, pieces and (no doubt) history to be reflected upon as one came in. Mandor was doing just this, his hands clasped behind his back; upon hearing the door close he glanced over.

“Ah, Sarah! You made it back in one piece, I see. Lord Suhuy managed not to poison you?” he quipped, pacing over to join her.

“There were a couple of times I seriously questioned his judgment but I survived,” she laughed. Her guardian had probably been forced to take one of these trips himself back-in-the-day, she mused. Some of what was technically edible out there …she quickly turned her thoughts from it, feeling mildly nauseous at the memory.

“I would have accompanied you myself but ‘roughing it’ magically unaided has never been my cup of tea and my presence was required here for the final adjustments of the Way.”

She was right on both counts. “I suspected as much,” Sarah gave a wry smile. “You know you can just tell me that you need me out of the way for a small amount of time at this point; it’s okay.”

“I am not deliberately attempting to treat you as a child but the direct request has always felt rather rude to me under your particularly limited set of circumstances. I prefer to make your times away into short vacations. Although since you brought it up, I might as well inform you that my Shadowmaster found quite a number of weak points in the outer walls of the library and your apartments while he was here and had to strengthen them once more. Apparently enforced staticity is unnatural enough here that it can be difficult to artificially uphold and he will have to begin to come back for regular maintenance work at least once a month, and we will have to find places for you to go overnight while he is here. This is acceptable?”

“Of course. Surely the Ways of Sawall are large enough to have just one protected inner room I can occupy for a night?” she coolly ventured as if the request couldn’t mean less to her, carefully testing the waters.

Mandor’s snowy eyebrows raised ever-so-slightly at her relatively bold, well-stated request. He had to concede that she was certainly beginning to think like a Chaosian. “Perhaps,” he gave a single foot of ground both figuratively and literally, “we’ll see. Let’s see how you do in here,” he smoothly changed the topic; the tactic did not go unnoticed but at least he seemed to have listened. “Have you noticed anything physically different just standing where we are right now?”

Sarah furrowed her brow in thought a moment. “I could tell right away that there’s extra pressure in here but it’s a little hard to describe.”

“Try to lift your arms to shoulder-level,” he invited her, “feel that extra pull?”

Sarah lifted them both in front of her; the increased resistance was rather obvious now, palpable. “Oh, yeah.”

“The shadow planet that this room resides on has stronger gravity than you are accustomed to, approximately 1.5 g’s. I deliberately built my gymnasium here to add basic resistance strength training to all activities performed, but I should warn you that if you do not give yourself time to acclimate to this it can wear you out very quickly; our session today will be relatively short. In time, you should be able to tolerate up to two linear hours per day in this chamber but no longer; your more delicate vertebrae would begin to compact slightly. Free access to this room comes with a certain level of personal responsibility, understood?”

She nodded affirmative.

“Good.” He began to leisurely pace toward the open section of the chamber, giving Sarah a little time to view the cases and their contents as they went. What met her eyes was an immense collection both chillingly sinister in its implied near-medieval brutality and astounding in its display of native creativity and high level craftsmanship. And not all of that armor was made for a human form – a couple of the suits were gigantic, bestial affairs; it was difficult to even imagine the creatures that wore them.

“How did you come by all this?” she asked distractedly, shaking her head at a spear with about sixteen needle-sharp projectiles with hooks and a magical fetish attached.

“Most of these are very old, dating back to the ages of the initial conquest of the Black Zone surrounding Chaos proper; just family heirlooms at this point. Although a couple are more recent acquisitions,” he noted casually as she passed a pristine two-handed sword with delicate organic-design filigree laid into the handle, the blade nearly shining with its own inner light. “This one on the end, however, has always been a particular favorite of mine,” he motioned her over – then pulled her away from the case, giving whatever was inside a wide berth, stopping just opposite on the right side of the wall.

Inside a stand-alone single case on the edge of the hall was a very dingy, dirty-looking, rusted-out incomplete suit of armor: just a breastplate, one shoulder and forearm guard, and what appeared to be guards for the base of a pair of wings. It was relatively small compared to the rest of the collection, clearly made for a demon; Gryll could’ve fit into it comfortably. Mandor smiled.

“Those seemingly battered remnants of ancient metal came from my ancestor’s first demon-servant retrieved from the Abyss of Chaos. Such stories grow twisted and muddied in their repeated telling so there’s really no point in relating what is left of a braggart’s tall tale. Suffice to say that the subduing of the creature was unprecedentedly difficult, but once captured he served him well. No one has ever been able to determine precisely what this remaining armor is made of – it carries none but the most rudimentary of protection spells and yet…observe.” Mandor walked slowly toward the mounted suit and reached out his right hand…

Sarah gasped, wide-eyed, as the entire thing suddenly sprouted six-inch spikes like daggers from all the pieces! Something vile and black was dripping from the points into the bottom of the case; looking a bit more closely, she could see it was fairly stained down there already. He slowly took a couple big steps back and the armor was decrepit, simple and tarnished once more with absolutely no sign at all of what it had just transformed into mere seconds ago!

“I believe it is forged of some kind of half-sentient substance thrown upwards out of the Abyss itself, but I have no way of testing this theory; no samples have been recovered since. It literally adapts to each perceived ‘opponent’ in a unique way. Probably close to a hundred people have tested it thus and it consistently reacts differently toward each individual, as if it can somehow sense a person’s vulnerabilities. Would you care to give it a try? It’s perfectly safe – the case is physically strong and heavily warded against magic both inside and out.”

Sarah eyed the thing. It was just a suit of armor. A weird, almost alienly alive suit of armor but still… She bravely took a couple steps forward, then a third, feeling the odd incongruity of a playground dare, and slowly reached out her hand…

The entire thing instantly grew huge fast-wriggling tarantula legs and dozens of black eyeballs! Sarah screamed bloody murder and instinctively leapt into Mandor’s arms away from the outrageous monstrosity, spontaneously triggering hardy laughter in her guardian as he held her!

“I’ve never seen it do something like that before,” he said at length once he’d recovered himself somewhat. “You have to admit it was very effective, though. Are you all right?” he looked down at her, still smiling broadly.

Sarah’s cheeks were aflame with embarrassment. She had just fallen for one of the oldest defensive tactics in the book: an enemy you can scare away you don’t have to fight. She stole a surreptitious glance back – it was just a bunch of roughly hammered metal so full of rust it had no right to still be intact. Mandor stepped gracefully out of the automatic, awkward embrace; the smile only lingered in his eyes.

“Fortunately for you, we are actually here for far more mundane purposes. Come along; watch your step,” he cautioned as they walked up onto a raised hardwood floor and into the gymnasium proper. Now that they were fully inside, Sarah could see what appeared to be a row of large floor-to-ceiling cathedral-pointed windows with thick deep-blue velvet curtains over them all along the right wall. She was both wildly curious and somewhat apprehensive of the view they hid; she had yet to be shown what was right outside of where they were. The near and left walls were covered with more weapons cases, but the contents of these looked newer and much more serviceable than the relics in the hall. Toward the back of the room was what Sarah surmised was a collection of exercise equipment, ranging from a more standard stationary pedaling device and a rudimentary treadmill that nominally appeared functional (it was connected to a manual grinding machine) to pieces that would have looked more at home in a dungeon torture chamber.

Seemingly unaware of her appraisal of the place, Mandor got out his set of keys and unlocked one of the cases, extracting half-a-dozen blunted practice foils, attempting to determine which grip would best fit Sarah’s hand, setting aside one for himself almost immediately.

Sarah had been initially surprised when she had learned that for as ‘advanced’ as this society was in many respects (certainly not socially-speaking, but as far as basic living in the upper echelons was concerned), no one ever used so much as a shotgun for any reason at all. While some could construe this fact, viewed by itself, as another form of ‘advancement’, the reality of the situation was far less idealistic. The truth was that the necessary incendiary substances were so volatile that they never survived so much as four shadow-crossings without being chemically altered to the point that they were inert and none were native to Chaos. In fact, they only burned with any sort of predictable success within the first quarter of shadow closest to Amber, and even there the travel-induced changes could be fairly extreme. Amberites had only recently discovered and used such armaments against Chaos in one of the first clashes of the Patternfall War, staged just outside the city itself. While the basic theoretical knowledge had existed there for quite some time as well, the discovery of the correct compound for the One True World (as Amberites had dubbed their home) had been completely by accident; the report the Courts eventually got back from their agents related an almost humorous incident in which a Prince carelessly threw a used polishing cloth on the grate and immediately had to hit the deck to avoid the ensuing fireball! Attempts to confiscate samples of the polishing powder proved too difficult (it was guarded too well, both in Amber and the other nearby shadows – including Shadow Earth – where it was manufactured and stored) and chemically reconstructing it elsewhere was an exercise in futility. While there were still a handful of bitter, minor Chaosian nobles tinkering in the basement, so-to-speak, the society as a whole had quickly dismissed the idea as simply not worth the trouble as long as the crossbow still worked.

The enigma of the drapes and what lay behind them tugged again at Sarah’s train of thought. Did she dare? She had been shown countless fantastical landscapes by now and had learned to take the wild variances largely in the stride, although there were still certain views that could take her breath away. Reality – or what passed for it – was far grander and varied than she could have ever possibly imagined. And yet she had never been allowed to see a single landscape in true Chaos or the shadows directly next to it, which made the current prospect just a little unnerving. But she had to ask.

“Is it alright if I look out the window quick? Or is that what those really are?” The sudden morbid thought of gigantic frozen opponents to go with the trophy cases had just occurred to her – the practice, while usually private, was not unheard of, according to her studies. Mandor looked up and caught her longing gaze toward the curtains.

“I only had them drawn so the view would not distract you during practice, but you are welcome to look for the moment if you wish; there is no chance of the windows coming open, either,” he said. Making a lifting gesture with his right hand, the curtain of the center pane began to slowly rise like a Venetian blind.

The theme from ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ started playing almost on cue in Sarah’s mind as she took a deep breath and paced to the opposite side of the room to meet that great unknown. The color was the first thing that struck her: it was blue out there, so beautifully, perfectly cerulean blue it looked sterile, artificial. And cold – a flurry of electric-blue snowflakes flew past right on the other side of the glass, which was remarkably thick, maybe five or six inches deep. Sarah rested her right hand on the window without thinking, absorbed in the sight of mountainous cobalt glaciers and slowly drifting dunes of methane snow, and gave an immediate cry of surprised pain, reflexively pulling away: the glass was outrageously cold!

“I’m sorry, I should have verbally warned you!” Mandor apologized upon hearing her as Sarah furiously tried to rub warmth back into her half-frozen fingertips. “Those windows are made of a specialized compound guaranteed to withstand any catastrophe this side of a direct Logrus attack and I still can’t get them insulated properly. Come here.”

In spite of her aching hand, Sarah couldn’t help but glance back with regret as the thick curtain slid closed again like an enormous eyelid as she made her way back over to him. It could’ve been worse, Mandor mused, looking it over; her body had responded quickly enough that there was no true frostbite, just redness, and that was slowly going away on its own. Nevertheless…

Sarah watched as he extracted a metal sphere from his lower coat pocket, and, after one slight adjustment, held it an inch away from her fingertips for a moment, then clicked it off and put it away. A split-second later her fingers were spontaneously warm again, the circulation completely returned.

“We can’t have your sword hand numb already,” he casually remarked, “although you will not be using it much today beyond learning the proper grip and a few basic stances. I believe this one should be the right size,” he said, offering her a foil. “From the next lesson on you will be suiting up and I know the foil is blunted but don’t point it at either of us for the moment; they can still break accidentally and become sharp.”

Removing his eternally-black dress jacket and hanging it up on a peg on the wall, Mandor proceeded to show her the proper finger grip and positioning of the wrist, the basic en garde stance, how to move her feet, advancing, retreating, executing a lunge while maintaining correct posture. He demonstrated the movements alongside, not facing her, often stopping to directly correct her positioning. Mundane, indeed - mundane nearly to the point of being a little boring, actually. This was obviously basic necessary beginner stuff, but it was not at all what she had envisioned this activity being like. There was nothing comfortable or natural-feeling about the wrist positions and Sarah had never used her inner thigh muscles so much in her life; both they and her hand were beginning to feel rather sore before long. Mandor caught her sense of dejected impatience.

“This ability doesn’t occur magically overnight, Sarah; it takes time,” he gently admonished her. “You can hardly expect me to be fool enough to let you start whacking away with trisp and fandon at the outset.”

“A what?”

”The ceremonial dueling weapons of the Chaosian upper-class.” Mandor considered for a moment then relented with a small, fondly indulgent lip-smile. “I can briefly demonstrate for you but you must stay back. Promise?”

Sarah nodded eagerly.

“Then go fetch the practice dummy,” he motioned to a six-foot stuffed black mannequin figure on wheels over by the archaic exercise equipment. As she retrieved it and carefully rolled it back over – it was far heavier than it looked but not terribly difficult to move once it got going under its own momentum – Mandor had opened another case and extracted what looked like a quantity of weighted mesh of some kind and two odd bladeless hilts with orthopedic-style finger supports inside. Making the dummy stable, he stretched out the left arm and carefully draped some of the mesh over it, securing it at the wrist and elbow, then strapping another one to his own left forearm similarly. “In spite of its appearance, the trisp is a very ancient weapon, and dangerous enough that a shield – the fandon – is actually required to deflect most of the blows. Rather than more civilized back-and-forth dueling, it is used for fighting in-the-round, what you might recognize as a more gladiatorial-style on Shadow Earth. Now, I need you to take ten large paces back and stay there,” he motioned her away with his free arm.

Sarah quickly retreated as she was bid, having no idea what was about to happen and a little nervously excited at the prospect. Seeing that she was a safe distance and standing at attention, Mandor activated the first blade: fiery golden light shot out of the hilt to the length of a normal saber! Sarah lightly gasped, then gawked in disbelief.

“Lightsabers?! You actually use lightsabers out here?”

He looked up at her, surprised.

“You have actually seen these before?”

“Only in visually recorded theater on Earth,” she laughed, shaking her head in astonishment. The thing made Darth Vader’s ‘weapon’ look like a medieval broadsword by comparison. The shining, wavering ‘blade’ of Mandor’s trisp was thin, a true saber.

“It might be difficult for you to see from over there but the blade is actually composed of three hair-fine filaments. When discharged, they are razor-sharp but only capable of very superficial damage – one cannot stab with these things – hence the main targets are an opponent’s surface veins and arteries in a real duel. Also – observe.” Turning his sword hand so that she could see his finger clearly, Mandor pressed down on a lever that looked rather like the trigger of a gun – and a blaze of liquid golden light erupted through the body of the blade, temporarily extending its length by about half-a-foot! “Hence why you’re well out of range,” he noted dryly. To complete her surprise, he activated the other trisp handle and fitted it into the dummy’s right hand. Taking one of his spheres, he set it in motion rolling in orbit around the base of the figure on the floor.

And the dummy swung for him! Mandor easily dodged the blow but, strange as it looked, they were circling each other now. Mandor lunged for a cut to the dummy’s sword arm and was parried in a dazzling golden explosion that seemed to flake apart and drift away into nothingness far overhead. The dummy attempted a direct attack that Mandor deflected with the fandon; more gold went flying. The air crackled and hissed at every terrible swing of their blades. In spite of its limited mobility, the dummy parried surprisingly well with both instruments, but Sarah also got the feeling that Mandor was taking this relatively slow for her benefit so she could better see what he was doing. Her suspicions were confirmed when he came up against the automaton fast and hard and, after a complex feint, actually scored a touch on the throat. The dummy simply saluted him and remained stock-still; Mandor retrieved the orb, catching his breath, and deactivated the trisps.

“He’s far better than his featureless face and limbs would suggest once animated, but you will only be bouting with me and practicing with him stationary. His form is excellent but sometimes it’s hard to get him to give quarter, almost as if he gets propelled by his own momentum after a while. But, for now, we start with correct hand technique and ‘crabbing’ about the floor to adequately build up your muscles first,” he said, putting the lethal equipment away as well as his practice foil. “Come bring me your foil and I’ll show you how to stretch.”

By the time they were finished, Sarah was a little less sore but physically fatigued nonetheless. Even in its beginning stages this was a surprisingly aerobic workout and the added gravity made it an even greater challenge. Upon exiting the room and re-entering the library, Sarah had the distinct feeling of walking headfirst into a body of water it was so much easier to move in here. She stretched her back almost without thinking and suddenly understood Mandor’s warning about the extra force; even in just the half-hour they’d been in there today her spine already felt a little stiff. Mandor had pulled a water carafe and two glasses out of nowhere – such an act seemed normal now – and filled the glasses, handing one to Sarah; she nodded thanks and downed it heartily, throwing herself into one of the small padded chairs nearby. Mandor sat down at the desk and got out a fresh piece of paper and a fountain pen.

“Have you given any further thought as to what physical characteristics you would like your retreat shadow to have?”

“Not at all,” Sarah responded, not prepared for the question. “I didn’t know I was supposed to.”

“Well, I’m not about to go to the trouble of creating a world for you just to have you turn around and hate it,” he good-naturedly rejoindered. “I’m presuming temperate with a healthy atmosphere, which places us out a fair distance from Chaos proper but not any further that you’re used to trumping out to by now. Granted the possibilities are somewhat curtailed by the changeable nature of where we are; I cannot reproduce perfect Order for you, but there is a considerable level of scenic variance in the Chaos-generated shadows which we can splice together and mutate easily enough to suit your own taste, and you’ve seen a fair number of them by now. What else would you like?”

Sarah had known that this project was theoretically in the works but being faced with the idea of cutting-and-pasting the stuff of shadow a la carte to make her own private dimension was overwhelming. Where to even begin? She thought a moment.

“Plant life,” she said finally. “Varied. Non-toxic.”

Mandor nodded, making a note. “Do you want it to be sentient?”

The thought was wild but, really, she should’ve known to expect it at this point. It was an interesting prospect, but…

“Maybe something larger like trees, but nothing small.”

“No grass dreading being trodden on – check,” he smirked. “Any desired physical landmarks? Hills, gorges, flat plain? I fear a sea is out of the question; there aren’t any out this far that are liquid water.”

“Some hills would be okay. Not too humid,” she suddenly thought to add.

“Friendly fauna or peaceful tranquility? I suspect you might choose the former; you have had more than your share of quiet and alone time here.”

Sarah nodded. “Yeah, bring on the little friendly things; we can totally do it up like an alien version of a Disney fairytale,” she laughed. Then remembered that he wouldn’t get the reference at all and almost sighed. It had been a long time since she’d thought of that. He caught her brief wistful expression.

“I think I get the general idea,” he smiled. “Any coloring preferences?”

“Nothing that’s going to make me nauseous or dizzy if I look at it for too long.”

“Not too garish,” he fluidly scribbled. “Anything else that I’ve overlooked?”

Sarah met his eyes. “People?”

He sighed in regret; he knew she was lonely for other company but the risks were high in providing it even this way. The Chaosian shadows were patrolled fairly well; just this much was a game of chance but one that had to be enacted to ensure her satiety and further cooperation.

“You know I can’t make a promise like that, Sarah, but I’ll try to work on that particular angle. Do I have your permission to embellish it further along the basic lines that you have established?”

“Of course,” she immediately conceded. “You have a much better idea of what you’re doing with this than I would,” she laughed.

He gave a small lip smile which, she had learned over time, meant that he was pleased with her acknowledgement of his greater mastery of whatever the topic was, bowing out to his vast experience. It struck her as just a smidgeon vain but she could understand it all the same. In a sense it even served to reinforce the idea of his guardianship, that she needed that knowledge, protection, and experience working for her in a very literal manner, and he seemed only too happy to provide it as long as she overtly remembered that he was in charge of this operation. Not Suhuy, mind you. Him. The more she thought about it later after her final lessons that day, the more she realized that there almost seemed to be a very quiet, private rivalry gradually growing between the two Chaosian lords – albeit nothing as blatant as that initial near-blinding of the old man. Just little things, like Mandor’s inclusion of creatures in Sarah’s shadow-to-be that Suhuy would never approve of it he caught wind of the plan. Like Suhuy periodically giving her days off from her homework, now that she was ‘further along’, even letting her pick a handful of completely unnecessary extracurricular subjects to be studied behind Mandor’s back; he had yet to truly notice this in spite of the fact that he was still often helping her with her homework! Each was trying to slowly curry her favor at the expense of the other – that much was clear – and once the limited permissiveness had lost its novelty Sarah began to wonder what it truly signified.

Of course there was no one to talk to about it, any of it. She had a sneaking suspicion that even if there were beings she could converse with off in the shadow of her private world that Mandor would have ears there, ready to relay any secrets she might confide. It wasn’t that she suspected him of trying to harm her – just the opposite, actually. But it amounted to about the same thing in the end: virtually no privacy beyond physical decency. Mandor seemed to know things about her, about what had been going on, that she had never even mentioned to either him or Suhuy. She had simply come to accept his limited psychic ability, which he admitted was amplified due to her weaker species (there legitimately appeared to be no means of completely shutting it off) but the fact that he could more-or-less read her immediate thoughts and feelings at will at close range was more than a little unnerving at times. She was beginning to wonder with just a touch of paranoia if he ever looked in on her from time to time while invisible, as an unwelcome guardian angel of sorts; such an act would suit his personality. Her fears were probably unfounded; he was nothing but warm and attentive, genuinely caring toward her, a perfect gentleman at all times. And yet she just couldn’t shake the vague feeling of something being… not wrong, but off, like a complex mathematical equation that wouldn’t come out right no matter what she tried. She had grown to love the time she spent in his company. Why did it make her so uneasy in retrospect? It was a matter of basic almost animal instinct, one that the intellectual, logical part of her brain simply couldn’t understand but marked well, nonetheless.

To make life even more complicated, she had a feeling that he knew. Three weeks later during her fencing lesson, Mandor allowed her an easy first bout with both of them only using simple attacks; she was completely suited up but he wore the jacket and glove only without a mask. Even knowing what she was in for, having practiced and practiced and practiced the parries and lunges both alongside him and alone, the sheer shock of seeing him come after her fast with fire in his eye and score a touch on the right side of her chest almost instantly, nearly gave her heart failure. Being close by her, he immediately understood the problem (at least as it was perceivable in that instance) and came up with a brilliant (albeit wholly Chaosian) solution on the fly: putting aside his foil for a moment, he began to shift his figure down until for all the world he looked like a teenage girl with long, straight blonde hair, not much older than Sarah herself! She smiled at her bouting partner’s gaping mouth and gently tapped it closed with her gloved hand, picking back up her foil and Sarah’s discarded mask, presenting it to her. She was pretty after a fashion, but not overly so – it was a fairly average face, actually.

“I’m sorry if Lord Mandor frightened you,” the girl said hesitantly in a voice to match her appearance, “would it be less intimidating to bout with me instead?”

The choice on his part was simply too outrageous for words, but Sarah had to warily agree, and they resumed.

From that day on, Sarah learned, practiced and bouted with the blonde girl; her guardian was so eerily good at it that in the heat of the duel it was almost easy to forget the ruse. Later, as Sarah gained both better skill and confidence, Mandor assumed many guises for her benefit, both men and women, varying in age and appearance, totally random fake humanoid Chaosians all, but never again would he voluntarily raise a weapon against her – even a harmless one in practice – in his true physical state for fear of her seeing him, even subconsciously, as an enemy.

One morning, Sarah came down the stairs to the breakfast table and saw a trump centered on the plate of her place setting, face-side down; Mandor was nowhere to be seen and neither was breakfast. There was a small, handwritten note folded beside it, penned in his scrupulously neat script, the style she knew he usually saved for his formal correspondence. It read:

Sarah, I thought you might enjoy a fresh change of scenery to go with our morning repast. Just turn over the trump and step through – I can’t wait to show you this.

~ Mandor

Feeling just a little giddy (if this was finally what she thought it might be), Sarah picked up the trump carefully and flipped it – and gasped. It was too beautiful to be real, but she had learned that this was Chaos at its best: beautiful beyond logic and reason, alien yet comforting, like an amazing dream that makes perfect sense while you are asleep but is completely unintelligible upon waking.

True to his warning, the tableau couldn’t be further from Earth-coloring: a meadow of heather-gray grass shot through with pearly anemone-type blossoms rolled away into the distance, broken up with stands of dark, elegant weeping willows that appeared to be flowering also, a pale blue. The place was well-lit and yet it was only of a sunset-or-rise intensity, the sky a Chaos-incongruous deep teal. There were three enormous moons – the source of the light – and the visible surface detail of each was staggeringly clear, like looking through a telescope. They were tinted peach, lavender, and a light pink, all in different phases. Suddenly she saw the grass ripple and sparkle like water as the contact went live, a gentle perfumed breeze swaying the delicate tree branches.

It still felt a little awkward doing this without someone else holding the card but Sarah took a deep breath and stepped through, careful to hang onto the thing (she could never get her brain around the spatial contradiction involved.) She slowly turned around, taking it all in, breathing deep. It was hardly stuffy living in such enormous rooms (that was probably the purpose of all that open space) but it was good to have fresh outside air again. The place was nothing short of marvelous and the sudden thought that it was hers made her want to laugh and cry all at the same time. A few finch-small iridescent songbirds flitted by, ‘welcome, welcome’ was their song; they spoke no words yet she understood them. She watched them settle into a willow… and suddenly spotted Mandor standing in front of it, his arms casually crossed, genuinely smiling his natural crooked smile at her reaction.

He should’ve concocted this world for her ages ago, he mused. Mandor had had more experience making places of torment in the past, but Sarah seemed to just be in heaven here, although, to be truthful, the flowers were helping to lighten her mood just a teensy bit. Nothing major, mind you, just a little mild endorphin icing on the paradise cake. She nimbly ran down the short hillside to him, her childlike smile of delight brighter than those pale moons, and caught him in a warm bear-hug; he quietly chuckled at her impetuosity.

“Thank you so much! It’s beautiful!” she nearly choked on emotion.

“You haven’t even had the grand tour yet,” he said, gently pulling away, “but breakfast first,” he admonished, pulling aside the fragrant drooping branches to reveal his invariably sumptuous morning meal, set out picnic style. She entered and he followed, letting the leafy, floral curtain fall closed again.

“Just out of academic curiosity, about where on the shadow-spectrum is this place?” she asked, carefully seating herself on the delicate alien grass; it was silk-soft to the touch but seemingly hardy and difficult to bruise or break.

“Not as far as one might assume,” Mandor replied, kneeling so he could still pass the dishes easily and proceeded to do so; lots of exotic vegetables and fruit mixed in today. “We are only approximately one-quarter of the way to the Dancing Mountains, just eight shadows beyond the Fire Gate, but nevertheless well-hidden.”

The Fire Gate – that phrase rang a bell for Sarah, something about a pitch-black, red-illuminated multi-way station - not unlike an inter-dimensional subway - on the direct approach to Chaos; she had seen sketches of it in one of her books. Odd that Mandor would choose a locale so close to a main thoroughfare. Maybe this was just a pocket dimension, a thin aberration of space-time that could be easy to overlook if one didn’t know what one was looking for or didn’t approach it in the correct manner. That was probably it, she thought as she daintily proceeded to stuff her face; her guardian seemed to hold to the health idea that the biggest meal of the day should be breakfast unless there was a special occasion.

“Did you remember to bring a return trump with you?” he asked, noting the brand-new one lying facedown on a spread length of her black skirt.

Sarah winced her eyes closed, embarrassed. “No.”

Mandor sighed. “You really must learn to store your accumulated trump deck on your person at all times, Sarah. I have even provided you a pouch with fasteners to this purpose. Where did you leave it this time?” he asked wearily.

“It’s in the top drawer of my vanity, safe at home,” she reassured him. “I’m sorry, I’m trying to get better about this, really, but I hadn’t planned on going out today and then I got distracted and I forgot.”

He looked a bit irritated at her continued foolishness – in any real-life scenario such a mistake could easily prove fatal if one traveled to a distant unknown shadow and could not return – but upon hearing not so much her apology but the fact that she subconsciously had begun to think of that apartment as her home, his expression softened a bit.

“Fortunately for you I had a double made of the Library Trump Suhuy painted for you, in case of emergencies,” he said, pulling out his own deck from the left breast-pocket of his coat. Mandor had a considerable formal wardrobe but his trumps were always stored in the same place no matter what he was wearing; the specially-sized pockets had to have been a standing order to his tailor. Popping open the hidden compartment, he extracted the correct trump and passed it to her facedown. “I want this one back; be careful with it.”

She nodded solemnly, accepting it. Returning to her meal, Mandor passed her a rather small glass serving dish containing only four cherry-sized deep-red berries; she looked up at him a little unsure.

“Start with only one,” he answered the question in her eyes with a wry half-smile and she did, carefully piercing a small fruit and lowering it to her plate, then having to work to remove it from the odd utensil but finally managing the maneuver. She was learning relatively quickly but in certain ways she was still very young and inexperienced and sometimes it was obvious. She heard him quietly sigh again but it sounded a little fonder as she put the delicate specialized tongs back.

“I know you have grown very accustomed to me watching out for you, Earth-child,” – Sarah reflexively glanced up at him; it was the one term of endearment he had for her and he didn’t use it often – “but this arrangement isn’t going to last forever and I want you to be ready to fully take care of yourself when the time comes for this to end,” he said a bit gently, consciously assuming the ‘father role’ momentarily. “Do you realize that as of today – this very morning – it has been precisely six months Chaos-reckoning since you commenced your stay with us? Only one month has elapsed on your native shadow. I hope your shadow-double is making good on her vacation from her own world; with any luck it will be a relatively short one,” he stated offhandedly, taking another sip of tea.

Sarah had no idea what version of camilla sinellis this was that he procured but it never had the true tannin bitterness of the real thing and she quickly joined him; all that was left was the tea and the odd berries. Skewering hers on one fork tine slowly so it wouldn’t squirt its blood-red juice everywhere, Sarah tentatively bit into it – and couldn’t believe how rich and spicy it tasted! Taking another sip of tea, it was easy to see why he’d paired these – they complimented each other perfectly. As usual.

I’m getting spoiled rotten here, Sarah thought as she finished off the exotic fruit and chased it down with the rest of her cup. He was right; one was plenty. Mandor seemed to be enjoying their surroundings nearly as much as she was, taking it all in as he leisurely finished his tea. Those bright little birds had been singing softly in the background all the while, songs of growing things and the differing breezes and all the heavenly bodies one could see from here and their poetic names, which were articulate emotions and not words at all. It went on and on but it did not tire her; their sweet heart-music felt like a balm to her brain and nerves. Mandor replaced his cup on its saucer.

“If you are quite finished I would like to show you just one thing on the other side of this tree,” he said, standing and stretching his legs. Sarah got up as well and followed him the short distance over; the dishes had vanished instantly. He had stopped in front of an artificially rectangular patch of grass about three-by-four feet; it was approximately four inches longer than the lawn around it, and it looked darker, thicker. It was waving and undulating in slow motion as if it alone was underwater. “I know you said no sentient plants that can be injured and I assure you this cannot be; in fact some applied weight will actually serve to keep the organism healthy. I must confess the idea for this spot occurred to me due to the fact that I was traveling the Black Road instead of fast shadow-pulling to find a world like this,” he gestured about them. “This is a deliberate mutation of a grass that commonly grows in irregular patches along the edge of the Road. The true species is an omnivore and so entangles its prey that it cannot escape and eventually dies and the nutrients from the broken-down corpse nourish the roots. This genetic variant, however, is strictly vegetarian, symbiotically surviving with this particular tree, and this being the case it will not cling at all; there is simply no need. It does have one very special property, however,” he surrendered a small secretive smile. “Lie down on your back on it.”

Sarah looked highly dubious at this suggestion.

“You’re sure this is actually safe?”

“I tested it out thoroughly before your arrival. Go on, try it, the grass won’t stain your garments, either,” he encouraged her, still smiling, taking the trump from her hand.

Sarah knelt before the bizarre flora. It almost seemed B-grade-horror-flick-cheesy all-of-a-sudden: The Crab Grass that Devoured New York City. She slowly pressed her right hand down into the patch with mild trepidation… and almost melted: those thick blades of blue-green grass were working it over like a massage! Quickly scrambling onto the patch, she lay down on her back as directed, getting her hair out of the way, and let the fabulous sensation take her by storm, her eyes fluttering closed in pleasure with a sigh.

Mandor smirked in satisfaction; this whole thing had almost been too easy. He slowly paced over and sat on his heels next to her.

“You have been spending extra time in the gymnasium and it hardly requires a psychic to divine,” he lightly scolded her. “Your fencing technique is very rapidly showing improvement but you have been increasingly stiff after your bouts and lessons – the stretching is obviously more difficult. If you are going to insist on pushing your natural limitations in such a continuing fashion, basic sports therapy is in order. I want you to use this at least once a week or if you are ever feeling discomfort. It is good that you want to cultivate your abilities, but do not take your ambition to the point of injury.”

Sarah heard his words as if in a daze; it took her a moment to respond.

“I’m… sorry I’ve been so antsy and distrustful of late. You’ve never been anything but good to me,” she sighed absently.

Mandor smiled down on his charge and simply patted her shoulder, standing back up and pacing a few yards away. That organic device certainly relaxed her to an almost surprising degree. This place had potential for other uses it seemed, but he wouldn’t push his luck with any attempted suggestion right now, stashing the idea away for later if it would ever prove necessary for any covert shadow operations. He was already perfectly capable of work like this, but a more roundabout method would look less suspicious to her than him using his spheres; she was too aware of what that brand of magic felt like. He allowed fifteen linear minutes to elapse before disturbing her again, and then her expression was so serene he almost hated to end it; he had never seen her look so happy and at peace.

“Sarah… take my hands,” he prompted quietly. She reached up slowly, half-asleep, and Mandor took them, carefully helping her to her feet. She came to as she stood up, shaking her head clear, blinking.

“Wow…” was all that she said, glancing back down at the wavering plant with an odd sort of admiration; her back and shoulders felt worlds better.

“I shall have to get you a linear pocket-watch with an alarm so that you can time your sessions. If you are ever there beyond two hours the organism will simply roll you off onto the grass. Too much of a good thing…” he let the sentence hang. She nodded. “I must leave you soon but there is someone I want to introduce you to before I go. Come with me.”

They walked back out into the open and climbed the small hill that had been Sarah’s point of arrival. The peach moon actually seemed closer than it had been before but the other two moons were quickly receding. Irregular elliptical orbits, perhaps? The sky was slightly brighter as a result. Mandor raised his left arm up and out, bent at the elbow.

“Sofi!” he called.

Sarah suddenly realized he was holding his arm like a perch. In the distance they heard a faint, female voice reply.

“I come… I come…”

Within seconds a large raven flapped into view; she glided down and easily landed on Mandor’s arm, making a slight bow to him, then turning around to face Sarah.

“Sarah, this is Sofi,” Mandor said, gently stroking her soft chest plumage lightly with the backs of his fingertips, “and, while she can speak, she is no trained parrot. Chaosian ravens are highly intelligent creatures, with a natural capacity for deep thought and profound philosophy. She will make you an excellent conversational companion. Hold out your arm,” he bid her. Sarah did so, fascinated, and Sofi hopped lightly onto it, studying her intently with her bright red eyes. She had a certain weight but she was fairly light for her size. “Now Sofi, Sarah has no one to talk to here save for two old Chaos lords. I want you to be her friend. Grant her your company when she desires it. I know you are terribly curious about her and the shadow she hails from but do not pester her with endless questions. I am sure she will be more than happy to speak on the subject in her own time. She no doubt has many questions about you as well. Be civil and courteous toward her and this should be enjoyable for you both.”

“Yes, my lord,” the raven answered him demurely. Even though her avian voice had that distinct tape-recorder-type fuzz that parrots often had when mimicking human speech, it was still rather lovely. “Ah, Mistress Sarah! What a delight to have a fresh intellect to commune with! The worlds are indeed vast and though little of them is of much consequence, there is much to do and see and learn,” she began to discourse, stalking up Sarah’s arm to perch on her shoulder, delicately tucking her hair out of the way with her beak. “You have not yet even seen all that there is of this one. There is a freshwater spring in the valley beyond here, and orchards beside, and a quaint family of small furry animals of whom I am not sure of their purpose but to endear-”

“I’ll just leave you two to become better acquainted,” Mandor interrupted her; sometimes it was difficult to get a word in edgewise with these creatures. “Sarah, this is a relatively protected environment but you staying here alone for a certain period of time is a considerable step forward today,” he said, handing back the two trumps. “If you manage to return to the library at the setting of the peach moon, you will be in time for lunch. I shall see you later.”

“What of my morning lesson with Lord Suhuy?” Sarah asked, suddenly worried that they could both be in hot water over this breach.

“You leave that to me,” Mandor smiled, “enjoy your morning off. Or, rather, afternoon should you care to be technically correct. Until this evening.”

Sarah watched as he called forth two Logrus strands, encased both arms and suddenly shot into the black oblivion, which closed up of its own accord only seconds later.

People come and go so quickly here, she thought with a light smirk.

“What is amusing, Mistress Sarah?”

She had been so caught up in watching Mandor’s flashy exit she had nearly forgotten the raven on her shoulder.

“Oh, it only reminded me of an old story from Shadow Earth, about a girl who accidentally travels to a very different world and has to find her way back home again.”

“A simple narrative device, but one richly embellished, yes?”

Sarah nodded. “Chaos is light-years weirder than anything Frank Baum could’ve dreamed up.”

“No doubt this is so, but all things one may dream are possible in shadow, even copies of one’s own pasts and potential futures,” Sofi resumed her discourse as Sarah made her way over the other side of the hill and down the valley toward the sound of the running spring, tiny harmless creatures in the meadow and little bright birds following in her wake in curiosity…
_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Mandor quickly made it back to the library of his demesne; Suhuy was already there, demon-formed to go out and looking none too pleased.

“What in Chaos do you think you are doing, spiriting her away like that and leaving her to her own devices?” he pressed Mandor the moment he saw him begin to materialize in the room.

“Assuaging a bit of well-deserved paranoia, Uncle; she is practically under house arrest here and is beginning to sense it in truth regardless of the reasoning behind it,” Mandor calmly replied, walking over to a nearby bookshelf and plucking off a well-worn tome. “How did you even figure it out?”

“You are not the only one with a tracking spell on her, and it would be only too easy for anyone of training to do likewise! You left her alone out there?!”

“Of course not,” Mandor answered a bit tersely, seating himself on one of the couches, putting his feet up as he opened the book. “I left her in the charge of Sofi.”

Suhuy’s darkened countenance suddenly softened into a slightly better humor, a wry smirk slowly spreading across his face, revealing one fang. “I should have guessed it. You’ve assured your ‘raven’s’ good behavior and general cooperation this time?”

“She knows that if I hear Sarah complaining of her being a nuisance I’ll catch her and clip her flight feathers again,” he said, flipping to a specific section.

Suhuy quietly laughed. “Forgive the hasty accusation, nephew. I’d nearly forgotten just how subtly you operate under ideal conditions.”

Mandor gave a small lip-smile at the compliment without looking up. “Force and stricture can never hope to achieve even a fraction of what may be easily accomplished with a little well-placed indulgence. She will return in a greatly lightened and calmer mood and a much more receptive frame of mind this afternoon. I promise you’ll have her back after lunch.” And with that he commenced to read.