Chapter Nineteen:

What Became of Rachel, and The Queen’s Ploy

Just as Rachel predicted, it was quite some time after she separated from the others that they even noticed she was gone.  The Author and Allura continued to make their way through the castle, but where thwarted at every turn by the lack of stairs.  Allura could fly on by herself, but she was too small to carry both The Author and Rachel, or even just one of them.  Her earlier transportation trick only worked because she knew where she was going to.  With the castle mostly a mystery, they were stuck on the first floor.

Or they would have been, but they encountered a situation similar to the one that landed Rachel in the mess she was in.  They also followed a pair of sprites up a stairwell (Allura stole a pinch of the dust when the sprite took it out of her tunic, and used it on The Author, then hauled his lightened body up after the cart) and found themselves in the same large room, marveling at the same crowd of stiffened creatures.

“I think we hit the jackpot,” The Author hissed to Allura.  

The tiny fairy crawled right up to his ear and whispered, “Stay right here.  I’ll be back in a minute.”  She flew through the crowd, making a tally of how many of the creatures were fairies.  When she reached the front of the crowd, she decided to see what they were all gathered for, and examined the monument.  She found a glass-covered casket with a white-haired girl lying inside it, her eyes closed, and her demeanor one of cool slumber.  “Is this White Glenda?” Allura wondered.  She flew back to tell Anthony (quietly), and as she did, she noticed a familiar face in the back of the crowd.  She nearly gave a squeak of fright, but she managed to stifle it before any noise got out.  Meanwhile, the sprites began to filter out of the room, leaving the stiffs to their involuntary waiting.

Allura flew back to where she had left the Author, but in her haste to tell him what she had seen, she forgot where exactly he was, and flew around wildly until she bumped into him again.  She quickly felt her way up to his neck and then put her head by his ear and whispered, “Anthony!  It’s White Glenda!  And they’ve got Rachel!  She’s right there!” She pointed, forgetting that The Author couldn’t see her invisible fingers.  But he looked around, and although he could only see the back of her head, there was no mistaking it.  The black crop had to be Rachel.

“We need to get back to the others,” The Author said quietly, “We need to make a plan.”  No sooner had he said that than Allura flew around him and the two of them were transported back to the cottage and no longer invisible.

“Oh, good, we were starting to wonder,” Linae said when she saw the two of them standing in the middle of the room.  “Did you find out anything interesting?”

“They got Rachel!” Allura cried out, flying around the room frantically.  “And there were all these people lined up and White Glenda on a pedestal!”

“What in the world are you talking about?” Benedict asked, as Allura’s hysterical raving had sounded like nothing more than a word glurge.

“The inhabitants of the Pearl Kingdom are definitely up to something sinister,” The Author said.  “I don’t know for certain, but it looks like they’ve been kidnapping Losslietians from all the Kingdoms, and even areas beyond, and keeping them in suspended animation for some nefarious purpose.”

“Oh my,” Lynne said, “How can you tell all that?”

“We saw a number of sprites bringing unconscious creatures to a large room, then using their magic dust to stiffen them and stand them up in a crowd, all facing a huge monument.  Allura flew up and saw that White Glenda on the monument, so my guess is that this has something to do with her.  Just what, I don’t know.”

“And they’ve got Rachel!” Allura cried again, still flying around like a mad fairy.  “She was already there when we got there, put in as part of the crowd.”  She finally ran out of energy, and fell out of the air, panting, onto a chair.

“Well, that would get my vote for strange doings,” Linae said.  “Shall we go report to the queen?”

“We can’t just leave Rachel there,” Lynne said, wringing the edge of her dress’ sleeve.

“Yeah, we have to go save her!” Benedict added.

“Don’t be ridiculous, we don’t have any kind of power to save her,” Linae said.  “What would we do, march in and ask them to let all of them go?  Trust me, if movies have taught me anything, it’s that when hundreds of people are gathered for nefarious purposes, it takes more than two girls, one guy, and a kid to save the day.  If we had two guys or even three girls, maybe, just maybe, and only if we had some kind of brilliant plan.  Which we don’t have, do we?” She looked to The Author.

“Not at the moment, but if we all put our heads together-”

“No, Anthony, she’s right,” Allura interrupted him, “We need the Queen’s help.”

“Exactly,” Linae said, “If we’re going to succeed, we need manpower.  Or fairy power in this case.”

“Oh, oh,” Allura was still tired from her self-induced frenzy. “Give me a minute.”

“I still don’t like leaving Rachel there.  Who knows what will happen while we’re off getting help?” Lynne said.

“As Linae pointed out, we have no way of getting her out of there. Even if we went to rescue her now, we would have…” he trailed off, getting a strange look in his eyes.  “Actually, I think we can get Rachel back, if not anyone else.”

His plan was simple.  He and Allura would turn invisible, teleport back to the room (now that the fairy knew where it was, she could easily find it again), and if no one was around, they would teleport Rachel back with them, and then all of them would head to the queen.

“We probably would have done that in the first place if we hadn’t panicked back there,” The Author admitted.  “Do you think you’re ready for this, Allura?” he asked the small fairy.

“I think I am,” Allura said, leaping to her feet. “Let’s get invisible!”

They landed back in the large room in the Pearl Kingdom’s castle.  It was eerily quiet, with not a soul around, by the looks of it.  The Author and Allura walked over to where Rachel was set up in the crowd.

“Can you make her invisible?” The Author asked Allura very quietly.

“Probably,” Allura whispered back.  She flew down to Rachel’s left hand, and took it in her own, but nothing happened.  She turned herself uninvisible for just a moment, and was about to take Rachel’s hand and turn them both invisible, when she heard something.  Someone was coming!

“Quick, over here!” The Author hissed to her.  He was fully visible.

“Oh!” Allura thought, and quickly flew over to him and turned them both invisible again.  She latched onto his neck and he pressed himself against the wall, just in case.

“I’m telling you, I heard something up here,” they heard a voice say.  Two sprites with silver sashes running across their chests flew into the room from a stairwell.

“And I’m telling you, all the entrances to this room are guarded.  There is no way that anyone could have gotten in here without raising the alarm,” the other sprite said.  He surveyed the room quickly, and turned the other sprite physically so that he did the same.  “See?  Everything’s exactly the way it was the last time we checked, all right?”

“All right, I guess,” the other sprite said, and the two of them left.

“That was too close,” The Author said extremely quietly.  “Let’s do this while we still have a chance.”

“Okay, you come over this time, too,” Allura said into his ear.

They both walked over to where Rachel was.  Allura turned them both visible for a moment and then returned to invisibility with Rachel and The Author’s hands in hers.  This time it worked.  The three of them were invisible once again.  The Author reached down to where Rachel’s body was and lifted her out of the crowd.  He noticed that this left a hole in the crowd.  He thought about the guards.  Maybe they wouldn’t notice, but maybe they would.

“Allura, before we go, make a doppelganger to fill the hole,” he said very quietly.

“A what?” Allura climbed to his ear to ask.

“A copy of Rachel.  That way no one will notice she’s gone,” The Author explained.

Allura did as he asked, conjuring up a Rachel-sized doll that was a perfect double -- from the back.  The front of the doll had no face, but they didn’t have the time to try and fix it.  They had to get out of there with Rachel before they had any more close calls. 

“Oh, she looks terrible!” Lynne cried when she saw Rachel.  The Author lay her on the table, as the sprites’ dust was still keeping her stiff.

“She looks like she’s asleep,” Linae pointed out.

“Poor Rachel,” Benedict said, not sure what else to say.

“We’ll take her to the queen, and she’ll know what to do,” Allura said, “Come on, get together already!” She flew to them all, forcefully nudging them all closer together.

“All right, all right,” Linae said, and she and the others gathered together.  Allura flew around them, and suddenly they were back in the Golden Kingdom’s palace.

There was an overwhelming shout of “OH!” at their sudden appearance.  “What are you doing here so early in the day?” a fairy servant demanded.

“We have returned with urgent news for the queen,” The Author told her, “about a nefarious plot in the Pearl Kingdom.”

That got everyone’s attention right quick.  There was a flurry of activity as the queen was summoned from her chambers and the traveling party was forcibly lead into a small meeting room.  Although it was only small in the relative sense.  It was nowhere near as large as the throne room, but it was still large enough to comfortably accommodate the queen, making it quite large to most of the fairies, and simply gigantic to the tiny Allura.  The group was seated on large, plump cushions as they waited for the queen’s arrival.

After a few minutes, the doors to the meeting room opened, and five servants came in to announce the queen’s imminent appearance.  And appear she did, dressed in a flowing robe of golden light.  Standing directly before them, it was only too clear how much she towered over them.  She took a seat on an even larger, even plumper cushion, lowering herself carefully.

“Soo, yoou have news foor us, Anthony?” she asked, her voice echoing through the meeting room.

“I do, my queen,” The Author said.  He stood to address her.  “We have discovered a large room in the Pearl Castle that is currently hosting a multitude of creatures for an unknown purpose.”

“Including a multitude of our very own people,” Allura added.

“I see,” the queen said, drawing a finger under her chin, “Is this all that yoou discoovered?”

“Not entirely, your majesty,” The Author continued, “In the room there was an enormous monument with what we believe to be White Glenda resting in the center.”

“And that’s not all!” Allura burst in, “Just look what they’ve done to our poor friend Rachel,” she fluttered around Rachel’s stiff frame.

“All of the creatures in the room were in the same state,” The Author said.

“Let me have a clooser loook,” the queen said, and reached down to pick up Rachel.  In the queen’s large hand, the woman looked like a doll.  The queen held Rachel up to her face to examine her closer.  It was hard for the others down on the ground to see exactly what was going on, but soon the queen waved her hand and a sudden burst of water fell on the hand that held Rachel, dowsing the girl.  After a moment, Rachel coughed and sputtered, but she opened her eyes.  “There,” was all the queen said, and she placed Rachel back down on the ground by the others.

“Rachel, are you all right?!” Lynne immediate embraced her friend.

“What happened?  Why am I all wet?” Rachel asked.  As her brain cleared up, she remembered what had gone on before her enchantment, and she pushed her friend away to see where she was.  “The room, those creatures!  The strange doings!”

“Yes, we know,” The Author said, “That’s where we found you.”

“The sprites got you!” Allura informed her, “But we saved you, and now we’ll save the others in that room.  Won’t we?”  She looked up at the queen, who was watching the reunion scene with an unperturbed expression.

“It won’t be long!” Rachel said, “I heard them say that before…”

“What else did yoou hear?” The queen asked, gently (although it still had quite a bit of force, due to her size).

“I couldn’t make out very much, but I did hear something about a ritual, and maybe a sacrifice, to awaken someone.”

“Soo it is as we feared,” the queen murmured to herself, which was audible to everyone in the room.  She stood suddenly and waved her hand again.  Instantly, Rachel was dry.  Her servants, who had stayed at the edges of the room, flew up so that they were in the queen’s line of sight.  “Prepare the guard foor a trip too the Pearl Kingdoom.  I must have woords with their Prime Minister.”

“Immediately, your majesty!” the servants said, and flew off.

“What is it you’ve feared, my queen?” Allura asked in her loudest voice.

“Noone of the scoouts that I have sent to the Pearl Kingdoom in the past few weeks have returned,” the queen said.  She seemed distracted.  “I was beginning to suspect that they were being held captive, but I never imagined something like this.”

“So that‘s what it meant,” The Author said suddenly.  “The sacrifice of a thousand souls for the return of White Glenda to consciousness!”

“What?” Rachel, Lynne, Linae, and Benedict turned to The Author out of surprise when he said this.

“Just something from the last time I was here, that’s all,” he replied, “I found a prophecy, and they must have found the same prophecy in the Pearl Kingdom.  That’s why they’re collecting people and have White Glenda set up in front of them.”

“So they need one thousand… ugh,” Linae shuddered when she thought of the implication.

“How many do you think they have now?” Lynne asked.

“They said, ‘not long now,’ so they must be close,” Rachel said.

“But they’ll be low one soul because we left a doll of Rachel in her place,” Allura pointed out, flitting from one traveler to the other.

“Oh, I just hope that they don’t have enough people yet,” The Author said, “If they try to start the ritual with a missing piece, there’s no telling what could happen.”

“Doo yoou knoow what this ritual entails, Anthoony?” the queen asked.

“Not a whit, I’m sorry to say, my liege,” The Author replied.  “But from other rituals I have seen, I know that they require everything to be just so, or else all chaos breaks loose.  Strange that it should be the case.  You’d think that it would just make the ritual fizzle out, not destroy anything.”

“That’s really so reassuring,” Linae said dryly.

But the time for talk was over.  The queen’s servants had returned.  “Your guard is ready and waiting your command, your majesty,” the first said.

“Very goood,” The queen said.  “Please escoort Anthoony and his friends too the Pearl Kingdom with us.  We may need witnesses.”  With that, she left the room.

“Pardon us, please, but this is the best way to do it,” the first servant said to the group.  Each servant went behind a member of the group and grasped them around the waist.  Then they took off flying, each carrying one of the group.  Allura flew behind them.

In the early morning light, the queen shimmered with the colors of the sunrise as she lead the way for her guard, which included over one hundred fairies.   With the fast beating of wings, they made their way out of the Golden Kingdom and soon they were on the outskirts of the Pearl Kingom.  The queen arrived at the Pearl Castle before any of the others.  She landed lightly and stood next to the castle, which towered over even her.  It was quite a strange sight that greeted the sprites that were already awake at that point in time.  The enormous fairy queen, peeking into the windows of the castle as if it were a dollhouse.

“Prime minister!  Coome oout!  I must speak with yoou.”

A head, quite tiny in comparison to the queen’s, appeared in the window closest to where the queen was looking in.  “Great heavens, my lady!  What do you think you’re doing?!” a voice squeaked out.

By this time, the guard had caught up with the queen.  They hovered in the air, far enough away to give the queen and prime minister some privacy, but near enough that they could come to their queen’s aid if she needed them.  Sprites and fairies alike watched with anticipation to see what would come of this meeting.

“Prime minister, I have coome too see foor myself if the rumoors are true,” the queen said to the sprite.  

“What rumoors, my lady?” the prime minister asked, a slight sarcastic hint in his voice.  “All inhabitants for the Pearl Kingdom have kept out of the Golden Kingdom, as per your request.”

“I am noot entirely sure that is true, Prime minister,” the queen told him, “Why have a great number of my subjects suddenly disappear with no trace?”

“My lady, I assure that I have no idea what has happened to any of your subjects.  What call do you have to come here and throw accusations at me?” The Prime minister was quite put out about the whole ordeal.

“Do you think that she can get him to just out and out confess to what’s going on in there?” Linae asked Lynne from their position toward the back of the guard.  They were too far back to hear what anyone was saying except for the queen.

“I don’t see why he would confess to something like that,” Lynne replied.

But the queen’s intention was not to get the Prime minister to confess to anything at all.  She continued to argue with him back and forth, neither making any concession to the other.  It was only once the sun was high in the sky and the sprites watching were starting to hope that the discussion would end soon so they could get some lunch without worrying they would miss something important that the queen let the Prime minister off the hook.

With a smile, she told him, “If we cannoot coome to any coonclusioon, Prime minister, then we must simply agree to disagree.”  And then she took the air and flew off, heading back to the Golden Kingdom with her guard in tow.

Once they reached the Golden Kingdom’s palace again, the queen’s servants took Anthony and the others to a room high in a tower, and left them there without a word.

“Well, that was anticlimactic,” Linae commented.

“I’ll say,” Benedict replied.  “I thought we were going to see a huge battle or something.”

“I’m sure the queen had something up her sleeve,” The Author said, “She didn’t get to be the queen without knowing a trick or two.”

“I thought she got to be queen because she was so large,” Lynne pointed out.

“That may be part of it,” The Author said, “Or rather, she would not be so large if she wasn’t the queen.”

“That doesn’t change the fact that nothing got resolved,” Linae said, “All those whatevers are still over in that castle, and may still be part of the ritual.”

“Rachel, I want to take this opportunity to apologize to you’” The Author said.  “You were put in mortal danger, and it was all my own fault.”

“Yes, it was,” Rachel agreed.

“I should have made sure you were still with us more often,” he continued.

“Yes, you should have,” she agreed again, a little too readily for The Author’s tastes.

“You don’t have to agree that easily,” he told her.

“I figured you wouldn’t say it if you didn’t think it was true,” she replied.

“I suppose,” he agreed, “But just know this, if anything had ever had happened to you, I would never have forgiven myself.  But can you forgive me for putting you through that?”

“I suppose I can,” Rachel said, and gave him a little peck on the cheek.  Before anyone could react to that, a large window opened and they found themselves looking at the large face of Ingot the Fair.

Chapter Twenty:

The Group Leaves Losslieta Before an Imminent War

“I have to make this quick,” the queen told them, “I believe yoou knoow this felloow.”  She put her hand up to the window and sitting on it was a small creature that looked almost exactly like Benedict, only green.

“Rumple, hey!” Benedict said, glad to see his friend.

“You!” Rumple rushed at Benedict and tackled him. “This is all your fault!”

“Ow, hey, c’mon,” Benedict said from his spot on the floor, where Rumple was sitting on him. “It wasn’t all my fault.”

“If you hadn’t been nosing around that machine, this wouldn’t have happened!” Rumple said, before Benedict managed to get free from his friend’s hold.

“Well, you were the one that pushed me out of nowhere!”

“And I wouldn’t have done that if you hadn’t been nosing around something you shouldn’t have!”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” The Author stepped in between the two fighting boys.  “I think we need some explanations here.”  He turned to the queen, “Your majesty, where did you find him?”

“He was part oof the group taken by the Pearl Kingdoom,” the queen told him, “We have rescued and reawakened all of them.”

“While you were keeping the Prime minister busy, no doubt,” The Author surmised, “You never fail to amaze me with your cleverness, my queen.”

“They will noot be foooled foor loong,” the queen told him, “I must honor my end of the bargain.  You two,” she said to Benedict and Rumple, “come here and stand before me.”

Benedict and Rumple, suitably cowed by the queen’s commanding tone, did as she asked.  The Queen held her scepter up in front of them, and began to chant inaudibly.  All at once there was a brilliant blaze of light, and the queen put down her scepter once more.  

“Look and see the names you need,” she told them, and the entire group turned to look at the opposite wall of the room.  There, etched onto the very wall, where the words “Helanon” and “Mortaria.”

“Is that where they are?” Linae asked, “The other two?”

“It is,” the queen said with a nod.

“Thank you most kindly, oh queen,” Lynne said with a curtsey.

“You are moost welcoome, friend oof Anthoony,” the queen replied, “But noow yoou must goo hoome.”

“Wait, what about our headsets?” Linae pointed out.

“And my headband?” Lynne added.

“Got ‘em right here!” came a voice from the door of the room, which was in the opposite direction from where they were facing the queen.  Allura flew in, and handed Linae her headset, and then gave Lynne her headband and earpiece.  She flew over to The Author and threw herself around his neck  “Oh, I’ll miss you so much, Anthony!”

The Author gave her a small hug.  “I’ll miss you, too, Allura.”  He gave her a small kiss on the forehead, and she flew away from him.

“Take care, all of you, and please come back and visit soon,” she said, and then she flew out of the room again.

“Okay, if we’re going to get out of here posthaste, then we need to get an agreement on where we’re going to,” Linae pointed out.  “Personally, I think we’d best go back to Rearn.  Don’t you agree, Lynne?”

“It has been a couple of days since we checked in,” Lynne said.  “But maybe we should take Benedict and Rumple back to Anone, first.”

“Yoou will need them oon yoour joourney,” the queen told her.  “They knoow the way too the oothers.”

“Oh, really?” Linae said, very glad to hear that.  She knew the two worlds in question, and she was not relishing the idea of combing them over.  “Well, it’s definitely back to Rearn first, then.  Unless,” she suddenly remembered that The Author was with them, “you want to go back to your museum first.”

“I confess, I’d rather see the world you come from,” The Author said, “But perhaps this lady,” he took Rachel’s hand, “Would like to return to her home?”

“Oh no, I’m fine going back with the others,” Rachel said.  She had a feeling that she might be needed again.  And while she hoped she would avoid some kind of disaster, she knew that nothing would ever be as bad as what she faced in the Pearl Kingdom.

“It’s decided then,” Linae said.  She turned to the queen.  “Thank you very much for the favor you’ve done for us all,” she said, and bowed.

“Yoou have alsoo doone a favoor,” the queen reminded her, “Please feel free to visit any time.”  Everyone in the group bowed or curtsied again.

“Okay, new kid,” Linae said to Rumple,  “all you have to do is hold someone’s hand and when I count to three, step forward with everyone else.  Got that?”

“Yeah, I got it,” Rumple said.

Benedict held out his hand.  “Truce?”

“Whatever,” Rumple said, but he took the hand offered him.  “You owe me when we get back home.”

“Yeah, I know,” Benedict said.  Lynne took his other hand, and Rachel took Rumple’s free hand.  The Author took Rachel’s other hand, and Linae took Lynne’s hand.

“All right, is everyone ready?” she asked.  “On three.  One, two, three.”

And then they were all in front of the Tulin-Walker Travel Agency office.  “We’re still in our fairy clothes, aren’t we?” Linae said.  “Gah, I should have gone to my house first.”

“You look fine, don’t worry,” Lynne told her.  

“It’ll do,” Linae said.  “Okay, this paperwork shouldn’t take too long to fill out, so Lynne, you take the kids, and I’ll take Mr. Author and Rachel.”

And so they split up, with the two agents going to their respective offices.

“What exactly is going on?” Rumple asked Benedict once Lynne had gotten down to work.

“Well, Lynne, that’s her,” Benedict indicated the already busy agent, “and Linae, that’s the one who wouldn’t stop talking back there, can travel to different worlds with just their minds!  I didn’t even know there were other worlds before all this stuff happened, did you?”

“I had heard there was a possibility that life existed beyond our plane of knowledge, yes,” Rumple replied.  Benedict just rolled his eyes and continued.

“Well, since they can do that, they’re helping get us all back together, but since there are a ton of worlds out there, they were trying to find a way to narrow it down, which is how we met that guy.  I think he’s kinda crazy, but being around him makes it easier for me to understand what people are saying, so I guess he’s okay.  Anyway, he thought the fairies could help, so we went to the world where you were, but before they would help, we had to find out what was going on in the Pearl Kingdom, and that’s where you were being kept.  I didn’t see it, but apparently you were being kept in a room with a bunch of other people for some kind of ritual.  What happened to you there, anyway?”

“I don’t even know,” Rumple told him.  “I just landed there, and I saw these things that looked really weird, and then everything went dark until that huge lady back there woke me up.”  He shivered a little, thinking about it again.

“She didn’t give it back, you know,” The Author said to Rachel.

“Give what back?”

“The pendant.  I gave it to the queen for her to use to make a radar, but I guess she found a different way to give us the information we needed.  But now my museum is short an exhibit.”

“I thought your museum was closed,” Linae said, slightly annoyed.  She wanted to get her work done, but the two adults kept talking and she kept getting distracted.

“I close it and reopen it again as I need to,” The Author told her.

“Is there a bathroom I could use?” Rachel asked.

“Down the hall, on the left,” Linae said, getting back to her paperwork.

“Thanks,” Rachel said, and got up to leave.

“I think I’ll use the facilities as well,” The Author said.  “I assume the men’s room is in a similar location?”

“Probably,” Linae said.  Truth be told, she wasn’t sure there even was a men’s room.  She hadn’t ever thought about it, but almost all the agents were women.

“Then we’ll be back momentarily,” The Author said, and he and Rachel left.

Before too long, both Lynne and Linae were done with their post-travel paperwork.  Lynne checked on the reports from both Mortaria and Helanon, and Linae went down to the accounting department to pick up some currency from both worlds.

“With any luck we’ll be able to get to both worlds before the day is up,” she said to the others, “And have these guys home before dark.  Are you all ready to go?”

“I believe so,” The Author said.  The others echoed his assent.

“Are we going to Mortaria or Helanon first?” Lynne asked.

“I figured we’d go to Helanon first.  It’s smaller,” Linae said.  “Okay, hands together.”  They all joined hands as they had before.  “Ready, steady, go!”

“You like to mix it up, don’t you?” The Author said once they were in Helanon.

“Might as well,” Linae told him.  “When you do it as much as I do, it helps to do something different from time to time.  So,” she turned to Rumple and Benedict.  “Which way do we go?”

“There!” the two boys said, pointing at a huge mansion that they happened to be standing outside of.

“Huh.  What are the odds?” Linae commented.

“My fault, entirely,” The Author said.  

“Oh, don’t apologize,” Linae told him, “Anything that makes this whole thing easier is all right with me.”

“Should we just go in?” Lynne wondered.  “I mean, just ring the bell and ask to come in?”

“Well, they’re already doing that, so it can’t hurt to try,” Rachel told her, pointing to Rumple and Benedict, who were indeed already ringing the doorbell.

“Yes?” An middle-aged butler opened the door.

“Is our friend in here?’ Benedict asked.

“She looks like us, only she’s yellow or pink.  And a girl,” Rumple added.

“Yes, as a matter of fact, the mistress is in.  May I ask who is calling?” the butler asked them in a tired sounding voice.

“Tell her that Benedict and Rumple are here,” Benedict said.

“Very good.  I will let her know.  Please come in,” the butler said, moving to stand beside the door and beckoning them inside.

“Well I’ll be darned,” Linae said.  She was always glad when things moved along, but that was a bit too convenient.  “Better keep an eye out for anything funny,” she whispered to Lynne.

“Okay,” Lynne whispered back.  And they all went inside.

The mansion’s insides were even grander than its outsides.  Everywhere they looked, there was some kind of very expensive item on display.  The carpets were so plush that they had to take their shoes off before even thinking about walking on them, according to the butler.  He lead them through an opulent drawing room, and up an enormously grand staircase.  Then he lead them to a row of doors.  He knocked on one and announced, “Masters Benedict and Rumple to see you, Mistress.”  He opened the door and let Benedict and Rumple go in before the others.

They looked in saw Rosamin seated at a small table, set for afternoon tea.  The moment she saw them, her eyes grew quite wide.

“Benedict! Rumple!” She somehow managed to launch herself directly at them, and started smothering them both with a bone crushing hug.  “I was so worried and lonely and lonely and worried and worried and lonely…”

“One-track mind, that one,” Linae commented dryly.

“And I didn’t know what had happened to you or the others, and I was stuck in this horrible place, and they made me wear these fancy dresses and learn how to speak their language and forced me to eat in that huge dining room, and it was just awful!”

“That’s her idea of awful?” The Author wondered aloud.  

“Hush, she’s obviously distraught,” Rachel said.  “How would you like it if you were forced to do something in a strange place, no matter how pleasant it may be?”

“I have done that, and depending on the situation, it can be pretty nice, actually.  If it isn’t, then my captors were usually trying to kill me.”

“Well, I don’t think that’s the case here,” Lynne said, looking around at the elegant room that was evidently Rosamin’s bedroom.

“I missed you so much!” Rosamin reiterated.

“Yeah, we missed you, too,” Rumple said.

“But it’s okay, we’ll take you home now,” Benedict told her.

“Oh, we can’t go before high tea,” Rosamin said.  “You will stay for tea, won’t you?” She looked at them both imploringly.

Benedict looked to Lynne and Linae.  “Can we?”

“I don’t see why not,” Lynne said.

“We made good time finding her, so sure,” Linae echoed.  “I’d like to see a high tea in action, anyway.”

“May I get your names?” the butler asked the humans of the group.  “I will need to announce you before Madame Ludlilly.”

“Yes, of course,” Linae said.  She assumed that this Madame Ludlilly must be the owner of the mansion, and the one who put Rosamin through her ‘torture.’  “I am Linae Banks, if you please.”

“I do,” the butler told her.  “And the rest?”

“Oh, Lynne Zink.”

“Rachel Wright, sir.”

“You may call me Harold M. Genadine, Esquire,” The Author told him.

“Very good.  Someone will send for you soon,” and with that, the butler left.

“Please, you have to be very, very good,” Rosamin said to Benedict and Rumple.  She seemed to be ignoring the others.

“Of course we will,” Benedict told her.

“As a matter of course,” Rumple replied.  “Though you should understand that we still need to get Sunny back, so we may not be able to stay for the entire tea.”

“Oh, Sunny!  She isn’t back yet?” Rosamin asked.

“I don’t think so,” Benedict said.

“It’s highly unlikely that she would be able to get back on her own,” Lynne pointed out.  Rosamin shrank back a little, looking at this interrupter with wide, frightened eyes.  “Oh, sorry,” Lynne apologized, “We haven’t been introduced.  My name is Lynne, and I guess I’m a friend of Benedict’s now.”

Rosamin scurried behind Benedict.  “Why is she talking to me?” she asked plaintively.

“This kid is one weird duck,” Linae thought, but she kept it to herself.

“Yeah, it takes a little getting used to,” Benedict told her, “Lynne’s just weird that way.  But that other girl,” he pointed at Linae, “Can speak our language, too, when she wears a special device.”

“Don’t worry, they’re perfectly harmless,” Rumple said, although he didn’t really know that for sure.  But based on what little he had seen that day, he stood behind his judgment one hundred percent.

“I take that back, all these kids are weird ducks,” Linae said.  Only this time she said it out loud.

“Don’t take it personally, Linae,” Lynne said, although she wasn’t sure whether to be offended by Benedict’s description of her, or just take it in stride.  For the sake of decorum (they were in a fancy mansion after all), she resolved to take it up with Benedict later.

While the agents had their kicks listening in on conversations, Rachel had her own beef to take up with The Author.

“Esquire, huh?” she said, shooting him a sly look.

“It never hurts to have a title in your roster of nome du plumes,” he told her.

“You’re utterly incorrigible, honestly,” she replied.

Chapter Twenty One:

Madame Ludlilly and Rosamin’s Relationship

It was not too long after this that a servant arrived, opening the door slowly.  “Madame Ludlilly requests your presence for high tea,” she said.  “Please follow me.”  She left the room, followed by the others, with Rosamin leading the way.

The servant lead them to a magnificently furnished tea room, where a finely dressed, but rather crotchety-looking old woman was already seated.  The servant announced them all by name, and everyone took a seat as their name was called.

“Such a lot of guests you have today, granddaughter,” the old woman, who was Madame Ludlilly, said to Rosamin.

Had it not been a high tea, and had Madame Ludlilly not exuded such an air of nobility, there would have been a simultaneous exclamation of “GRANDDAUGHTER?!?” by everyone except for the servants and Rosamin at this.  But as it was, everyone had too good manners to make such an outburst.  It should be noted, though, that Benedict was only prevented from doing this by Rumple hastily and covertly pulling his tail, a signal they had worked out long ago, meaning “Benedict, keep your mouth shut.”

“Thank you, grandmother,” Rosamin said demurely, garnering another tail pull for Benedict.  She shot her friends a look that she hoped said “I’ll explain later.”

The rest of the tea was taken up with small talk from all sides, with Madame Ludlilly inquiring after her ‘granddaughter’s’ friends in only the most cursory manner, and with her ‘granddaughter’s’ friends answering, appropriately, in only the most cursory manner.

When the tea was over, and the last of the dishes had been cleared away, Madame Ludlilly cleared her throat, and asked, “Won’t you play something for us, my dear?”

“Oh, of course, Grandmother,” Rosamin said, and excused herself from the table.  There was a piano on the other side of the room, and Rosamin lifted herself onto the piano stool and began to play.

Madame Ludlilly smiled widely at the piece Rosamin was playing, and the others smiled as well, although they were just being polite.  Simply put, Rosamin could not play the piano.  At all.  But they all sat through her piece, and lead by Madame Ludlilly, applauded at the end.

“Lovely, just lovely, my child,” Madame Ludlilly said once Rosamin’s piece was over.  “You may return to your room now, if you wish.”

“Actually, Gra- I, there’s, there’s something I need to tell you first,” Rosamin stammered.  “You have been very good to me over this past week, and all that you’ve asked in return was that I call you ‘grandmother,’ and I’m very grateful for this.  But now my friends have come to take me home.  Please, I hope you can understand, but I must return to my own home now.”

“Sure, make us the bad guys,” Benedict said to Rumple under his breath.  Rumple just pulled his tail again.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Rosamin, dear,” Madame Ludlilly said, her voice quite calm.  “You are my granddaughter, and I am your grandmother.”

“I know that you have enjoyed my company, gra- Madame Ludlilly, but I really must go.  Please, try to understand.”

“Granddaughter, you mustn’t speak so,” Madame Ludlilly said calmly, “People might think you were unhinged.”

There was something in the old woman‘s calm that set Linae on edge.  “Should we make a run for it?” she whispered to Lynne.

“I don’t remember the way out of here, do you?” Lynne whispered back.

Any further discussion between Rosamin and her ‘grandmother’ was suddenly cut short by a loud booming sound from somewhere in the mansion.  There was the sound of a flurry of activity, and the voice of a young man.  “Grandmother, I know you’re in here somewhere!”

“Jenkins, lock the door,” Madame Ludlilly said to a nearby servant, but before the servant could even move, the door swung open and a not quite young man with sharp black hair strode in.  

“Grandmother, you’ve gone too far this time,” he said to Madame Ludlilly, his black trench coat still waving behind him from his forward stride.  “How could you harbor my brother?  I’ve told you and I’ve told you again and again…” He suddenly caught sight of the other members of the tea party.

And that's all she wrote.  I'm not planning on finishing this, but I did have an ending in mind.The old lady was just faking because she was covering up for her other grandson, who is evil, and the others were able to sneak out in the ensuing debacle.  Sunny was at a circus in some other world, Linae nearly got eaten by a spiderwoman/acrobat before they found her, but she was saved at the last minute, and everyone got to go back to their own respective worlds, happily ever after.

Chapters 15, 16, 17, 18

Chapter Fifteen:

The Author’s Tale

It all began with The Author was but a young boy, but old enough to take the bus by himself.  As he got off the bus one day, prepared to go home, he noticed something on the ground.  It was small and black, and looked almost like a wallet, but not quite.  He picked it up and looked around to see if the person it belonged to was still around.  There was only one other person around, a man who was walking away from the bus stop at a brisk pace.

“Hey, mister, is this yours?” the boy called out.  He ran after the man and managed to catch up with him.

“As a matter of fact, that is mine,” The man said to him, and took the black case from him.  “Thank you very much for returning it to me.”

“You’re welcome,” the boy replied.  He was about to head on his way home, but he noticed that the world around them seemed strange.  Like time itself had stopped for everyone but the two of them.

“Is there anything you want more than anything in the world?” The man’s voice sounded strange, as if it were garbled and sent through a translation module.

“Huh?” All at once, one thing sprang to the front of the boy’s mind.  “I want to have the kind of life and adventures that I’ve read about in books,” he said, although he didn’t know what it was that compelled him to say that.  He had always secretly wished to have an exciting life like the ones the characters in the books he read, but why was he telling that to this strange man that he had never met before.

“Then from this day forth, that is the life you shall lead,” the man said, and just as suddenly as it had stopped, time started up around them again.  The man walked away, leaving the boy to wonder just what had happened, and what the man meant by what he had said.  But he didn’t have to wonder for very long.  As soon as he got home, instead of his mother offering him an after school snack, he found a note.  

“We have your parents.  Do not try to get them back.”

“To cut a long story short,” The Author said, “I got my parents back, after a rousing adventure, of course.  But that was just beginning.  After that day, there was hardly a day that passed without something that would play out in a story.  Any kind of story.  But there were side effects to my wish that the man never mentioned.  Perhaps he did not know about them himself.  But the biggest effect was that no one except myself remembered the more fantastic parts of my adventures.  Even when my entire hometown was threatened by an asteroid that was only defeated through the power of everyone working together, a few days later, no one remembered any of it.  Except for me.”

“Wow, that must be weird,” Linae commented.

“That’s not the half of it,” The Author continued.  “Thanks to that wish, the status of my parents is in constant flux, and I no longer know my own name.”

“That really is weird,” Linae added.

“So you’re basically living in a perpetual story now?” Rachel asked.

“That is the jist of it,” The Author replied.

“But couldn’t you just rename yourself?” Lynne asked.

“I have tried that,” The Author said, “But the name only lasts for as long as the story does.”

“Like I said, completely weird,” Linae said.

“After an entire childhood of adventures, I got tired of the perpetual cycle and settled down.  I opened this museum to showcase the wonders I’ve collected over the years, and I’ve made a tidy living by writing up the things that happened to me in my youth under a number of pseudonyms.”

“Cool,” commented Rachel.

“So is the moral of the story ‘don’t do favors for strangers?’” Benedict asked.  He still didn’t understand how he could understand The Author but not Rachel, but decided to wait and see if the man’s continued his explanation.

“Wait, how does the thing with your parents work?” Linae asked.

“It depends on what story I’m in,” The Author explained.  “If I need my parents for it, then I can call on them, but if not, they don’t exist at all.  They don’t seem to notice, though.”

“That is seriously weird,” Linae said once again.

“So you were trying to turn us away because you didn’t want to get tied up in another adventure?” Lynne asked.

The author nodded.  “I thought I’d be able to avoid it this time around, but once you brought in that other girl, I could feel the pull was too strong.”

“Well, that does put us in a bit a conundrum, then, doesn’t it?” Linae said, crossing her arms.  “Obviously, we need you to come with us, otherwise, this will stop being your story and we’ll end up badly in Losslieta.”

“Oh, that’s true,” Lynne said, “But we don’t want to force you to go if you don‘t want to.”

“Speak for yourself,” Linae said, “I’m all for forcing him to come along.  Consider the facts: he has an item that will tell us how to get the missing children back without searching other worlds willy nilly, this item needs to be ‘charged,’” she made air quotes with her fingers, “in Losslieta, where no Walker has ever gone and returned.  But he’s been there before, as he said, plus he wouldn’t know that we needed to go there if he hadn’t been there before.  On top of that, he’s roddy living in a freaking Deus Ex Machina world, apparently.  We need him.”

“After telling us so much, I think you rather have to come with us,” Rachel said.

“It’s true, I do,” The Author said, nodding.

“Before we go, could I get a copy of one of your books?” Rachel asked, “I really want to read one now that I know the story behind the story.”

“Of course,” The Author said,  “Remind me when we come back, and I’ll get you a personal signed copy.  I may even sign it for you if things go well.”

“Maybe we should get a move on,” Linae suggested.  “Although at this point,” she looked around for a clock, but didn’t see one in the room, “it might be better to wait until tomorrow.”

“Don’t worry about that,” The Author said, “Fairies never really sleep.  It’s not in their nature, you know.  Although they have been known to mimic the sleeping patterns of others in order to trick them.”

“Exactly,” Linae said, “We need to be on the top of our game if we want to make it out of there alive.”

“She‘s right,” Rachel pointed out, “We all need to get some sleep before going ahead with things.”

“We?” Lynne asked, while Linae nodded her agreement in the background, glad that someone was on the same wavelength as she was for a change.

“I’ll come, too,” Rachel clarified.

“Oh,” Lynne said, a little surprised at this.  “I thought I would just take you back home once we knew what to do,” she told her friend.

“Well, I have the feeling that you’re going to need to know what to do a lot more once things start moving in this story,” Rachel told her.  

“But what about your job?” Lynne asked.

“It’s okay, my vacation starts tomorrow, anyway,” Rachel replied.  “I had a feeling I’d need this week off, and this is probably the reason why.”

“Oh, I see,” Lynne said, while Linae nodded again.

“So how shall we do this?” Linae asked.  She motioned toward Benedict, who had fallen asleep next to her.

“Oh,” was all Lynne said.  She didn’t really want to wake Benedict up, but he needed to be awake in order to walk with them.

“If you don’t mind, I have a couple of guest rooms that you could use,” The Author told them.  “You could sleep here tonight, and we can go to Losslieta in the morning.”

“That sounds like a good plan,” Linae said, nodding her consent.  All this nodding was a sure sign that she was tired.

“Is that all right with you?” Lynne asked Rachel.

“It sounds nice,” Rachel said, “And I brought along a pair of pajamas, just in case.”  She patted the crocheted messenger bag at her side.

“How convenient,” Lynne agreed.

And so The Author lead them down the hall to the guest rooms he mentioned.  Each room had two beds, so Lynne and Rachel took one room, and Linae took the other.  With The Author’s help, Lynne and Rachel gently moved Benedict from the front room to the other bed in Linae’s room.  The Author provided nightgowns for Lynne and Linae, and soon the three women were fast asleep.

Chapter Sixteen:

Losslieta, and What They Did There

“Should we go back and find out what the conditions are in Losslieta?” Lynne asked Linae the next morning.

“What for?  There aren’t any reports from Losslieta; no one ever comes back to give them, remember?” Linae replied.

“I know,” Lynne replied, “It’s just I don’t like to do a lot of blind walking.”

“Yeah, I hear you on that,” Linae agreed.  “But in this case, we really don’t have a choice.”

Once everyone was awake and had eaten breakfast (The Author made them all waffles), Lynne and Linae got a detailed description of where in Losslieta The Author wanted them go.  Then it was time for some walking practice (as walking is always harder the more people are doing it at once), and soon it was time to go.

“Are you ready?” Linae asked the others.

“Ready!” Lynne and Rachel said.

“Mostly ready,” Benedict said.  And The Author said nothing.

“On the count of three, then,” Linae said, “One, two, three!” And they all stepped together.

And there they were in a verdant field of amazingly colorful flowers, flowers full of so much color, Linae almost couldn’t believe they were real.  In the background, rainbows ran crisscross each other across the sky, shimmering with ethereal beauty.  There were purple mountains looming majestically to the east, and a forest that seemed exude a mysterious grandeur to the west.

“Oh wow,” Rachel marveled, spinning in place slowly to take in the entire scene.

“We need to go North, to the Golden Kingdom,” The Author told them, and they began their trek.  It did not take very long before they attracted the attention of the Losslietians, or as Rachel had put it, the fairies.

Word travels quickly in Losslieta, as the very plants themselves carry gossip through their roots and vines.  Soon word of intruders reached the edge of the Golden Kingdom, and from there, it quickly spread through the entire city.  The first scouts flew out to investigate, keeping high enough to be go unnoticed by the travelers.  Once they had ascertained the sight of the intruders, they flew back to make their reports, and the second set of scouts flew out to investigate further.  They flew closer, but always managed to keep from being scene.

“Do you get the feeling we’re being watched?” Lynne asked. That was the second time she thought she saw something, but when she looked again, there was nothing there.

“I’m certain we are,” The Author told her.  “The fairies are very territorial, and keep a close eye on everything in their provinces.”

“Oh,” Lynne said.  It wasn’t exactly reassuring.

“So what do we do once we’re there?” Linae asked.

“Just leave everything to me,” The Author told her.

“Okay, so what are you going to do once we get there?” Linae rephrased her question.

“The less I tell you, the more likely it is that everything will go smoothly,” The Author replied.

“Is that some kind of story rule?” Linae asked, glancing at him with squinty eyes.

“Sort of,” The Author said, “It’s just something I’ve noticed.  The more details about a plan I give out beforehand, the more likely things are to go wrong.  Kind of strange, really.”

“Huh, I guess you’re right,” Rachel said.  She was thinking of the many TV show episodes she’d seen where a plan that was detailed to the audience usually failed in quite convoluted ways.  “But I’d feel a little better knowing that you do have a plan, and aren’t just going to wing it once we get there.”

“Don’t worry, I’ve been here before.  I’ll be able to get us before the queen easy peasy.”

“The queen!” Lynne, Linae, and Rachel exclaimed.

“You didn’t say anything about a queen!” Linae hissed at him.

“Duh, we’re going to a kingdom,” Benedict said, “Of course we have to go to the queen.”

“No, it’s not a given that we would go before the queen, or king, or head of the court at all,” Linae said again.

Their conversation was cut short by the sudden appearance of a delegate from the third scouting party, although it was the first fairy that they had actually seen.  Standing no taller than a doll to most of them, although it wasn’t standing at all, it was flying on thin, wispy wings that flapped too quickly to be seen as anything but a blur.  It flitted about in front of them, sizing up the party and its members.

“Halt, intruders!” It shouted at them.  “I represent the hallowed Golden Kingdom of Losslieta, and as such I cannot permit you to go any further.”

“All right, we’ll wait,” The Author answered for them, “But tell the court that Anthony is here with a request.”

The fairy looked them up and down, and then said, “Wait here.”  With that, it took off in the same direction the travelers were heading.

“So now what?” Linae asked.

“We wait,” The Author said.

“Good, I was getting tired of walking,” Lynne said, and the whole troop sat down.

While they waited, Rachel started humming a little tune.

“What’s that?” Benedict asked her, more out of boredom than actual curiosity.

“Oh, nothing.  Just, seeing that fairy reminded me of song, that’s all.”  And she started to sing it.  “Let me be your wings, let me be your only love, let me take you far beyond the stars.  Let me be your wings, let me take you high above.  Everything we’re dreaming of will soon be ours.”

“What’s that all about?” Lynne asked.

“It’s from a movie of Thumbelina,” Rachel told her, “Although it wasn’t much like the fairy tale.”

“What tale?” The Author asked.  They really didn’t have anything better to do, and he always liked hearing stories from other places.

“Well, the story was about a little girl who was only as big as your thumb,” she held out her fist with the thumb up to demonstrate.  “And she was kidnapped by a toad so she could marry its son, and that started her adventures.  In the end she ended up underground with a mouse and a mole, but then she met a bird, and she somehow found a fairy to marry.”  It suddenly occurred to her how little she knew of the original story.  “But in the movie, which had songs by Barry Manilow, by the way, she met the bird early on, and the fairy prince even earlier.  So instead of just having adventures, she was always trying to get home.  And she was voiced by Jodi Benson, you know.”  She paused.

“Who?” Linae asked.

“She was Ariel in The Little Mermaid,” Rachel explained, but only Lynne knew what she was talking about.

“Oh, I remember!  We watched that once,” she said.

“Right, that was a Disney movie, but Thumbelina was another studio.  Fox, I think,” Rachel continued, “There were a lot of famous voices in Thumbelina, now that I think about it.  Carol Channing, Charo, Gilbert Gottfried….there are probably others, but I can’t think of them right now.”

“Agh, thank goodness,” Linae thought.  She really had no interest in listening to people talk about things she knew nothing about.  But she rarely watched movies in her own world, so why would she know anything about movies from another world.  But she didn’t say this, to be polite.  She lay back on the ground and let the rays of the sun tickle her skin.

Rachel was apparently on the same wavelength, as she started singing again.  “Once there was the sun, bright and warm and wonderful, shining like the love inside my heart.”

Linae did not appreciate this, though.  “Do you have a song for everything?” she asked, sounding wearier about it than she really felt.

“Most things, I suppose,” Rachel said.  “I usually don’t burst out in song like this, though.”

“It’s the magic of Losslieta,” The Author explained.  “It affects everyone differently, though.  I’m surprised it hit you this soon.”

“Must be because she’s from Earth,” Lynne said, nodding her own assent.

“Must be,” Linae agreed, stretching her arms out.  She would not mind one bit if the fairy didn’t come back for a long, long time, so long as she could lie in the sun like this.

Meanwhile, Benedict had picked a flower and was proceeding to pull of the petals one by one.

“Better not,” The Author told him, “You could get in serious trouble if the fairies catch you.”

“How come? It’s just a flower,” Benedict said.

“The Losslietians are very protective of anything and everything within their kingdom,” The Author explained.  “Including the flowers.”

“Oh,” Benedict said, and hastily sat on the flower to hide it.

“Won’t we all technically get in trouble just for sitting in this field, then?” Lynne asked.  “I mean, think of all the bugs and things we must have crushed.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it too much,” The Author said.  “Since we’re getting an audience with the Queen, they’ll be more concerned about other things when they return.”  No sooner had he said that than they all heard a noise that sounded like the buzz of an enormous insect.  Coming toward them like a thick, dark cloud was an entire fleet of fairies.  As they got closer, Linae noticed that there were all different sizes in the group.  Some were smaller than the scout that had addressed them, while some were a little larger, but none seemed to come close to Benedict’s size.  

The swarm of fairies circled the travelers too quickly to be seen distinctly, but for all of thirty seconds.  They all of them stopped where they were and appeared to be sizing the traveler’s up.

“What are they doing?” Lynne asked The Author.

“Just let them do it,” The Author said, for the fairies began to move again, flitting from one traveler to the other, poking and prodding and lifting up hair.  And making all manner of comments that were too quick for any of Linae, Lynne, or Rachel to hear.  Although if The Author or Benedict could make anything out, they didn’t let on.  The Author didn’t need to understand, as he knew from past experience that all the comments were something along the lines of “This will never do!”

“Is there some kind of purpose to this examination?” Linae asked, thoroughly tired of the whole thing.  That was when the fairies started removing their clothing.

“What is this?” Linae squawked, hastily trying to keep her clothing on.  Rachel and Lynne were doing the same, all while looking to The Author for answers.  He, however, was calmly letting the fairies strip him.

“They’re going to provide us with new clothes,” he told the others.  

“Wait, I need that,” Lynne said as the fairies made off with her earpiece.  

“Hey!” Linae started to chase after the fairies that grabbed her headset, but like the ones that took Lynne’s earpiece, they were soon gone in the crowd of other fairies.

Benedict, it should be noted, had his clothing stripped off before he realized what was going on.  “Hey, that’s not fair,” he griped as his fine (in his opinion) clothes were spirited away.

“Can’t they do it once we actually get some place?” Linae asked, “Somewhere with rooms to change in?”  She was all for free clothes, but not for getting naked in front of everyone, including all those fairies.

“I don’t suppose they could provide us with changing rooms here?” Lynne asked.  Almost as soon as she finished speaking, five cloths were produced from within the throng of fairies, and a handful of volunteers created circular changing areas from them.

“Well, that’s more like it,” Linae said, stepping inside the nearest one.

“Thank you very much,” Rachel said, as did the others.

Inside each changing area, each traveler was surrounded by a crowd of fairies, all working almost instantaneously.  Right before their very eyes, gleaming white clothing appeared on their bodies.  The women were all dressed in intricate, lacy dresses.  The Author wore a three-piece suit, and Benedict now sported a toga (the fairies apparently weren’t sure what was appropriate for him to wear).

“Wow, what finery,” Lynne exclaimed, examining the lace on the hem of her skirt.

“Amazing,” was all Rachel could say.

“You’ve outdone yourselves, as usual,” The Author said to the throng of fairies.

“This is all well and good,” Linae said, “But we still have a ways to go before we get to our destination.  And I don’t think these slippers,” she held up her foot to indicate the delicate satin shoe, “will survive the trip.”

The Losslietians tittered at her, for just a short distance behind them came another group of fairies, carrying something that the others couldn’t make out just yet.  As it got closer, it became more obvious that they were bringing litters to carry them.

“Oh, how handy,” Lynne stated.  Just like their clothes, the litters were very fine, but seemed to be sturdy enough to carry each of them.

“How do we get in them?” Benedict asked, since the fairies carrying the litters were hovering, waiting for their charges before heading back to the main city.  Just as Benedict asked, the fairies from the first throng split up and lifted each of them up in the air and hefted them onto their respective litter.

“One, two, three, four, five, six?” the fairies counted over and over.  There was a bit of an argument between representatives from the first group and the second because an extra litter had been delivered.  The younger members of both throngs climbed into the extra litter and fully expected to be carried back with the others, but they were chased out by the older members of each group.

“Are we actually going to get anywhere?” Benedict wondered, watching the fairies fight amongst themselves.

“Just enjoy the ride, whether we actually move or not,” Rachel advised, doing her best to sit regally.

Soon, everything was sorted out and the fairies began to carry the litters to the center of the Golden Kingdom.  It wasn’t long before they made it into the city proper.  The Golden Kingdom was a veritable haven of spired buildings made not out of gold, but a material that was a kind of pearly gold color.

“What are the buildings made of?” Linae asked The Author, since she was the closest to him.  She didn’t really trust the fairies to both carry her and answer, for some reason.

“Generium,” The Author replied, “It’s only found in the plains of Alita.”

“I see,” Linae said.

As the travelers made their way through the city, the procession brought out Losslietians for all sizes, all clamoring for a peek at whatever it was that was going on.  Fairies of all sizes, from no larger than a sugar cube to slightly larger than The Author.  Those being carried on the litter were gawking just as much at the fairies around them as the fairies were gawking at them.

At last they were brought to castle, but they were still carried on the litters, right up until they reached the throne room itself.

“Ah, Anthoony, you have returned at loong last,” a voice said.  As each traveler exited their respective litter, they each noticed the long stairway that lead up to the throne itself.  And at the very top, seated on that throne, was the Losslietian queen, the largest of any of the fairies they had seen on their trip into the city.  She was dressed in a gown that appeared to be made of pure light, making it hard to actually see her, but they could make out wings, a crown, and a scepter.  The Author did not seem to be perturbed by this.

“Dear me, she could squash us just by sitting on us,” Linae thought.  Lynne and Rachel (and especially Benedict) were having similar thoughts.

“It has been too long, my liege,” The Author, addressed by the fairies as Anthony, said, bowing.  The others followed his lead, with Rachel, Linae, and Lynne curtesying, and Benedict bowing the best that he could.  “But sadly, Skipper and I had a… falling out of sorts, and I had no means of making it back to your glorious world.”

“Yet, yoou are here noow,” the queen said, her voice seeming to take up the whole room.  “And yoou bring friends with yoou?”

“Yes, my liege,” The Author said, “It is through the workd of these lovely ladies and their friend that I was able to travel to Losslieta once again.  Allow me to introduce you to Miss Linae Banks, Miss Rachel X. Wright, Miss Lynne Zink, and Master Benedict.”  Each of the others curtsied or bowed again when their name was called.

“We thank yoou very much, friends of Anthoony,” the queen replied, still unmoving on her throne.  “What brings yoou back to my kingdom, dear Anthoony?”

“I have a favor to ask, if it please you, my queen,” The Author told her.

“Yoou may ask your favoor,” the queen said, waving her scepter lightly in the air.

“Theses ladies have been charged with finding the friends of Master Benedict, who have been scattered across the universe and are likely to have landed in any of the myriads of worlds that exist beyond your own,” The Author said, quite businesslike.  “You once gave me a talisman that could locate any object; could you use the same talisman to find people?”

“Doo yoou have this talisman?” the queen asked him.

“I most certainly do,” The Author said, and produced the talisman from a pocket in the jacket of his suit.  Linae wondered how he had managed to hold onto it when the fairies took all of her things.  “They probably gave him specially treatment because he’s been here before.”  She began to wonder, not for the first time, just what had occurred the last time he had been here.  And just who was ‘Skipper,’ anyway?  It was a mystery for another time, though, as things were beginning to move on their level.

A fairy servant to the queen flew down and took the talisman from The Author.  The servant flew back up the stairway and delivered the talisman to the queen.  (There were a number of servants up there, but they were mostly obscured by the queen’s light.)  

“Yes, I see,” the queen murmured to herself, but her voice was so much louder than a natural person’s that even this private thought echoed around the throne room.  “Yes, it may be able too be adapted foor yoour purpooses,” she said to The Author, “But such a joob cannoot be doone withoout a price, even for a favoorite such as yoourself, my Anthoony.”

Somehow Linae had anticipated that this would be the case, but she, like the others, waited and listened to see what Anthony (as she was starting to think of The Author as now) would say in response.

“I understand completely, my queen,” The Author told her, “Do you have an appropriate task in mind for us?”

“For us?” Linae hissed at him, hoping to be quiet enough to escape the queen’s hearing.  But The Author did not respond.  He kept his eyes on the queen while she seemed to be thinking.

“As a matter oof fact, I doo,” The queen said to them.  “There have been strange goings on as of late in Pearl Kingdom.  “If yoou can discoover what they are and what their relatioon to my oown kingdoom is, I will reward yoou.”

“It’s as good as done, your majesty!” The Author said, bowing low again.  The others, as usual, followed his lead.

“Goood,” the queen replied, and lifted her scepter above her head.  She waved it three times, and suddenly, the entire group was back where they had begun.

Chapter Seventeen: 

Linae Has Lots Questions, but the Answers are not Forthcoming

“What just happened?” Benedict asked.  He looked around, almost unable to believe that any of it had happened at all.

“I don’t know,” Rachel replied.  She crouched down to the ground, feeling slightly sick.

“What do you think you’re up to?!” Linae accosted The Author angrily.  “What right do you have to agree to anything for all of us?  How are we supposed to find out something so vague as ‘strange goings on,’ when we don’t even know what her idea of ‘strange’ even is?!”

“I understand your frustration with me,” The Author said, moving to her side and starting to stroke her shoulders.  Linae moved away from him brusquely.  “But you have no idea of how simple that task really is.  I was afraid she’d ask us to waken White Glenda or bring her Black Thomas’ shadow, or some such thing.”

“White Glenda?” Lynne asked, hoping that The Author would explain himself more plainly.

“Black Thomas‘ shadow?” Linae asked, incredulously.  “What, are we in a fairy tale now?”

“Of sorts,” The Author answered.

“Where is the Pearl Kingdom, by the way?” Rachel asked.  She was starting to feel a little better.  

“It think it’s over there,” Benedict said, pointing in the direction of a massive gleam of white.

“Isn’t that it over there?” Lynne asked, pointing at an equally massive gleam of white in the opposite direction.

“You won’t be able to see it from here,” a voice said, “Everything outside of the Golden Kingdom is obscured.”

The others looked around for the source of the voice, which continued to talk, but was apparently in constant motion around them.

“The only way into the Pearl Kingdom is through the Grim Old Forest to the west, but I suppose you already knew that, Anthony.  I was just saying that for the benefit of your friends.”  At this there was a long tittering of laughter.

“Is that you, Allura?” The Author asked, “I’d say you’re just as ravishing as ever, but we can’t see you just yet.”

“Oh, I know,” the voice, apparently Allura, said, drawing out the ‘oh’ of ‘know’ as she circled the group, still unseen.  “Isn’t it just the keenest?”  I can make myself invisible now.  Bet that would have come in handy last time, huh?”

Linae had had enough of this.  “What in the world is going on here?” she asked belligerently.  “I demand explanations or I’ll leave right now.”

“Oh, don’t go, Linae,” Lynne said.  She had been waiting, hoping that answers would be forthcoming.  “If you go, I can’t get back.  They took my headband.”  She had been so distracted during the changing of clothes earlier that she hadn’t noticed this until very recently.

Linae looked at her queerly.  “So they did.  Just like they took my headset.  Yet I can still understand Benedict, and it seems that your friend can understand him as well.”

“Oh, I didn’t even notice,” Lynne said.

“I’m not surprised,” Linae thought, but she didn’t say it outloud out of politeness.

“My fault,” The Author owned up.  “It’s a side effect, makes it easier to understand each other.  Hurries the story along and all that.”

“I see,” said Lynne, although she only got it in the rudimentary sense that it worked.

“I don’t think magic agrees with me,” Rachel said, crouching down again.  She felt sicker than ever.

“What strange friends you have, Anthony,” Allura said.

“That’s enough, Allura,” Anthony said playfully, “It’s about time you showed yourself.”

“Oh, that’s no fun,” Allura said.  Linae felt something land on her shoulder, and quickly brushed it off.  “Ooof!  Well, that’s not fair!”  

“Ugh,” Linae gave an involuntary shudder.  The Author just laughed.

“That’s what you get, my dear, for not playing by the rules.”

“Lynne, get over here,” Linae said.  “We’re leaving now.”

“We can’t leave Rachel here, too,” Lynne pointed out, grabbing her friend’s hand as she went over to where Linae was standing.

“Don’t be so hasty,” The Author said.  “Allura, show yourself.  It’s time to for formal introductions.  And answers,” he added hastily, as Linae shot him an extremely pointed look.

“It’s about time,” Linae grumbled, but she put down Lynne’s hand, and Lynne let go of Rachel’s hand as well.

“All right, fair is fair,” Allura cooed, and suddenly, one of the smaller fairies materialized out of thin air.  Her skin was as fine as porcelain, topped with a head of yellow (not blonde, but yellow) hair pulled into two extremely curly pigtails.  She was wearing a light frock that was yellow and blue and green by turns in such a way that it seemed to be all three colors simultaneously, yet also individually.  Tiny teal sandals adorned her feet, although it seemed to the others that she had no need of them, as she never left the air.  Fluttering to and fro, she circled the entire group again and lightly landed on The Author’s shoulder.  

“Everyone, this is Allura.  She’ll be our guide in Losslieta.  She was also my guide the last time I was in Losslieta.”

“I’d like to know a little more about that,” Linae said.

“After the introductions are over,” The Author assured her.  “Allura, this is Linae, our outspoken pure Walker.  At the moment, she is the only one who can transport us from one world to another.”

“I see,“ Allura said, flying over to Linae and circling her up and down.  “So if I kill her, you’ll have to stay in Losslieta with us forever?” the fairy asked, although she said ’us’ in a way that seemed to indicate that she really meant ’me.’

“What?!” Linae exclaimed.  “How brazen!  I could squash her like a bug in less than a second!” she thought, but she kept it to herself, as  The Author stepped in quickly.

“Technically, yes, but if you harm any one in this party, I wouldn’t be very appreciative of it,” he told her.  “And I doubt you’d like me half so much as a sulky sprat.”

“Oh yeah,” Allura said, kicking in the air.  She moved onto Lynne, who was still standing next to Linae.  “Who’s this, then?”

“Hi, I’m Lynne,” Lynne said, watching Allura nervously as the fairy gave her the same up and down flying treatment she had given Linae.

“Lynne is the half Walker, and as such, she will need the headband you and your cohorts took from her when we first arrived,” The Author said.

“Why for?” Allura asked, “She looks just fine without it.”

“It’s the other half of her Walker abilities,” The Author explained.  “Without it, she can leave Losslieta, but she cannot make it back to her own world.  Or any other world, come to think of it.”

“Yes, exactly,” Lynne agreed, thinking that The Author had put it much better than she ever had when she tried to explain it to people.

“And this is Rachel, friend to Lynne.  I’m not really sure why she came along, but here she is,” The Author continued, and Allura moved on to Rachel.  “I think they needed a tiebreaker vote in whether to come here or not.”

“That’s not it at all,” Rachel said, although she wasn’t sure how much Lynne would want her to reveal.  “I’m here just in case,” was all she said.

“And this one?” Allura said, flying lower and circling Benedict, who watched her carefully.  He didn’t trust her as far as he could throw her (which he was certain was very far -- she didn’t look very heavy), and was not in any hurry to give up any information about himself.

“This is Benedict, our catalyst for this adventure,” The Author explained while Benedict glared daggers at him.  “Without his interactions, our little group would have never been brought together, but like a lovable scamp in a family feature, he has taught us all about the more important things in life.  Like love.  And teamwork.”

“Somehow I think you’re exaggerating just a little there,” Rachel said, stifling a grin.

“Fine, that’s the introductions over with,” Linae said, “but now we need to get down to business.  Time for some answers, hm?”

“Yes, yes, of course,” The Author said, “But not here.  First let’s get to a place where we can all have a seat and relax, shall we?”

“That sounds fine with me,” Lynne said.

“As long as this isn’t just a stalling tactic of yours,” Linae said.

“I assure, it isn’t,” The Author said in all honesty.

“Is there any place like that around here?” Rachel asked, looking around.  She couldn’t see anything but forests and white gleams.

“There is, just a little ways from here,” Allura told her, pointing toward one of the gleams, “We just have to get outside of the kingdom and you’ll see it.”

“If you would do the honors,” The Author said to Allura.

“Quite naturally,” the fairy answered. “Though I warn you, I’ve never done a group this large before.”

“Oh, and if you all could stand a little closer together,” he said to the others, motioning them in toward each other with his hands. “That’ll make this a lot easier.”  They did as he asked, though none of them really knew what he had in mind.

All of sudden, Allura began flying in circles around them, flying so fast that she became a blur.  And just as suddenly, they were in the center of a small town.  No people seemed to be in it, though.  

“Come in here,” The Author said, opening the door to a nearby coffee shop.  Despite there being no sign of any people, the shop was in pristine condition.  There was even a fire going in a fireplace.  “We’ll talk over here,” he continued, sitting in an armchair by the fire.  The others followed suit, and Allura sat herself down on The Author’s shoulder.

“All right, it’s time for answers,” Linae said, sitting cross-legged in her chair.

“And so it is,” The Author said.  “First, let me explain about the different kingdoms in Losslieta.”

“Yes, please,” Lynne said.  While she hadn’t been as forthright about it as Linae, she really wanted to get some answers, too.  Or rather, she wanted The Author to stop using talking about things that she didn’t understand while sounding like she should understand them.  It was very disconcerting.

After a moment, The Author spoke.  “Actually, now that I think about it, Allura should tell you.  It’s been a while since I was last here, and I may not know about any changes.”

“I’d be delighted to, Anthony,” Allura said from her perch on his shoulder.  She crossed her legs in a businesslike manner and took a deep breath.

“There are four kingdoms: The Golden Kingdom to the North, The Pearl Kingdom to the East, The Onyx Kingdom in the West, and the Nether Kingdom to the South.  The Golden Kingdom is ruled by its queen, Ingot the Fair.  The Pearl Kingdom is watched over by its long slumbering princess, White Glenda, although its actual affairs are taken care of by a fleet of officials.”

“Ah, so she’s still asleep,” The Author said at this.

“Goodness, my dear, she’s been asleep for ages and ages!” Allura said, “I don’t think she’ll ever wake up.”

“If she’s asleep, how does she ‘watch over’ anything?” Benedict asked.

“The real explanation would take too long, so just trust me when I say it’s magic,” The Author told him.

“Nobody knows, so it must be magic!” Allura said.  The Author’s left eyebrow twitched ever so slightly.  But he didn’t say anything more.

“What about the other two kingdoms?” Linae asked, leaning forward just a little.

“Right, right,” Allura went on, “The Onyx Kingdom’s ruler is the mysterious Black Thomas.  Although he hasn’t been seen by anyone I know for years, there are plenty of rumors about his illicit deeds.”

“Illicit?” Linae leaned in a little more, then shook her head, “We aren’t going to the Onyx Kingdom, so that isn’t important,” she said, “But what about the last kingdom.”

“Oh yes, the Nether Kingdom.  It doesn’t exist any more, but even when it did, it was a very mysterious place that no one knew anything about it.”

“Doesn’t exist?” Rachel asked, looking at The Author with a very fixed stare.

“Er, well, that kind of answers another one of your questions,” he said, “You see, the last time I came here, I was charged to discover what actually was in the Nether Kingdom, and one thing lead to another…. or in this case, one thing lead to the destruction of the Nether Kingdom.  Also, I was sworn to secrecy about its true nature, which I never learned anyway.”

“Really?  What happened?” Benedict asked.

“It would take too long to tell you exactly what happened, but if you remember when we get back, I’ll get you copy of The Nether Kingdom and Its Fantastical Secret, which tells mostly what happened.”

“Ah, I see,” Rachel said.

“Well, then, now that we know about the other kingdoms, how do we go about finding out about the ‘strange doings’ in the Pearl Kingdom?” Linae asked.  “And by ‘how,’ I mean in what way that involves me as little as possible.”

“That isn’t fair,” Lynne said, “You can’t get out of it like that.”

“I certainly can, and so can you,” Linae replied.  “I wasn’t the one that got us into this, after all.  That was all him,” she indicated The Author.

“You can’t let her talk about you like that, Anthony!” Allura said, tugging on his jacket collar to incite him to defend himself.

“It was so you!” Lynne said, “You were the one that wanted to go see him in the first place and see if he could help us, and that’s what he’s doing!  So you have to help out, just like we all will.”

“She has a point there,” Rachel and Benedict pointed out.

“Yes, well,” Linae hmphed.

“That brings us to the next issue I wanted to discuss,” The Author said, “How we are going to infiltrate The Pearl Kingdom and discover whatever it is that is going on there.”

“Yes, how?” Allura asked him.

“With your help, of course,” he replied.  “I know that you can turn yourself invisible now, but can you do it to someone else?”

“Of course I can!” Allura assured him, “At least, I think I can.”

“Let’s try it here before we make any actual plans,” The Author told her.

And so Allura got to work trying to make them all invisible.  “If this works, we can sneak right into the city and see everything without attracting attention!  Oh, Anthony, you’re so smart.”

“I guess we can have to read his book if we want to find out what he did that enamored all the fairies so much,” Linae mentioned to Lynne.

“Probably,” Lynne agreed.

Allura tried one thing after another.  She tried reciting spells, she tried using her own force of will, she even tried flying around them all really fast while reciting a spell with as much force as she could muster.  But the only thing that actually made anyone other than herself invisible was holding her hand while she made herself invisible.  And if she did it to more than two people, it wore off of the first two.

“Well, it’s not ideal, but it’ll have to do,” The Author noted.  “Two of us can go into the city with Allura and the rest can wait somewhere safe.”

“Oh, you have to come, Anthony,” Allura said, perching herself on his head.  “It wouldn’t be right without you.”

“She’s probably right,” Rachel pointed out.

“You should go, too,” Lynne said to her, “Just in case.”

“Actually, I should probably stay behind,” Rachel said.  She had an overwhelming feeling that if she went, something bad would happen.  But at the same time, she somehow knew that she couldn’t really ask the others to go in her stead, either.

“You’ll all just say I should go because I don’t want to go so much,” Linae pointed out.  “The only way for it to really be fair is to draw lots.”

“But with what?” Lynne asked.

“We could do rock paper scissors again,” Linae suggested.

“Not with all of us,” Rachel said.  She really felt it wouldn’t be fair because she would know what to throw.

“Can you conjure something for us to draw lots with?” The Author asked Allura, who was still on his head.

“You know I can do that, silly Anthony,” Allura said, and she waved her hand.  In that instant, The Author was holding a black velvet bag.  “There are five stones in that bag.  Three are white and two are red.  The red stones are the ones who will go with me to the city.”

They all put their hand in the bag in turn and pulled out a stone.  Rachel was the last one to get the bag, and the stone she took out was red.  Her heart sank into her stomach.

“White,” Linae said as soon as she got hers.

“I got a white one,” Lynne said.

“Me, too,” Benedict said.

“And mine is the red one,” The Author said, not at all surprised.

“I have red, too,” Rachel told him.

“That settles it, then,” Linae said, nodding her head in silent agreement.  She was mostly just agreeing with her original statement that she wouldn’t be the one to go.  Despite what Lynne had said, she still felt she had nothing to do with the quest they were on, even if she was the original instigator of the trip to Detalia.  She had certainly never given The Author any indication that she wanted to be pulled into a silly side story.  She simply wanted a way to track down the missing children, get them back to their homes, and then get back to her own life the way it always was.

And so the group made its way toward the Pearl Kingdom.  Once they were a little bit outside of the main city, they split up.  Allura conjured up a small cottage for Linae, Lynne, and Benedict to stay in while she, The Author, and Rachel went to undertake their directive from the queen.

Chapter Eighteen:

Strange Doings are Indeed Afoot

“We still need to be careful,” The Author told Rachel.  “As we saw with Allura, even though we’re invisible, we’re still tangible, and we can still be heard.  We’ll need to stay close to each other, especially Allura.”

“Oh, I’ll stay right here,” Allura purred.  She had draped herself around The Author’s neck like a mink stole.

“That might get a little uncomfortable after a while,” Rachel said.  She was feeling a little off, and couldn’t think of anything better to say than that.  It was a very strange sensation, not knowing what to do, only what not to do.

“Well, this really should take that long,” The Author said.

“The Pearl Kingdom is very small, after all,” Allura said, “Nothing like the Golden Kingdom, oh no.”

“Oh?” Rachel said, not sure what to think of that.

“Well, certainly,” Allura said.

“It’s my understanding,” The Author told her, “That it used to be of a more equal size to the other kingdoms, but with the slumber of its princess, it shrank down to a more manageable size.  Whether the land actually shrank, or whether the excess was taken over by the other kingdoms in the interim, I do not know.”

“I don’t know, either!” Allura crowed, for reasons neither human could fathom.

“Anyway, let’s get down to business,” The Author said, “Allura, if you would do the honors.”

“Take my hand, and we will go to a place of mystic delights,” Allura chanted.  She put out her hands and The Author and Rachel each took one.  In the next moment, the three of them were invisible.

The Pearl Kingdom was the home of the sprites.  These sprites were similar to the fairies in physical build, but they were all wearing what looked like tights and tunics, and they had no wings.  Despite this, they were still able to fly, and all the buildings in the city were tall towers with no stairs, but myriads of doors spiraling to the sky.  

Rachel kept close to The Author as they made their way silently among the sprites.  It was not as hard to keep from bumping into anyone as she had thought, as the sprites all kept to the air.  The city itself seemed very quiet, and she started to relax a little.  

“How are we supposed to know what the strange things are?” she whispered to The Author.

“Trust me, we’ll know them.  Shh,” he answered.  And they continued on silently.

As they made their way through the city, nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary.  Sprites flew through the air, going about their daily business, which mostly looked like shopping.  “It’s all so Peter Pan,” Rachel thought, watching their wingless flight.  Soon they had explored the whole city, and only the gleaming white castle in the center of the city remained.

“If there are strange things afoot, that is where they’ll be,” The Author said to her very quietly.  Rachel nodded, even though she knew he couldn’t see her.  She squeezed his hand to let him know she heard him, and she agreed.  She had such a strong feeling to not go in the castle that it must be the source of the strange doings.

Thanks to their invisible state, they were able to follow a sprite guard inside without being detected.  The inside of the castle was very sparse, not at all what Rachel had expected.  She looked around at the few furnishing there were, mostly vases on pedestals, then stopped when she saw an enormous painted portrait of a beautiful girl dressed all in white, with large blue eyes and glistening white hair.  She wondered how the painter of the portrait had been able to capture the essence of ‘glistening.’  “Probably magic,” she thought.  

She started down the hall again when she realized that in her examination of the portrait, she had lost the others.  Her blood froze for a moment, and then she started to run in the direction that they had been going before she stopped.  But she didn’t catch up with the others.  Or if she did, she couldn’t tell.  After all, they were invisible.  And so was she, so they wouldn’t notice that she was gone right away, especially since they were all being so very quiet.

“Allura?  Anyone?” she called as loudly as she dared, which was not more than a whisper.  But no one answered her call.  “Oh, what do I do now?” she wondered, a truly odd feeling for her.  She couldn’t remember the last time in her life where she didn’t know what to do.  Well, in a sense she knew what to do.  Everything in her was telling her to get out of the castle and out of the city, but she knew that she couldn’t do that, not without telling the others.  And how could she tell them if she couldn’t find them?

As she was wondering, two sprites met in front of her.

“Do you have them?” the first asked.

“They’re right here,” the second replied, and pulled a cart in from another room.  On the cart were all manner of creatures, including fairies, Rachel noted.  The Author had been right.  She would know the strange doings when she saw them, and these were definitely them.

“Right then,” the first sprite said, and the two sprites escorted the cart down a dark hall.  Rachel followed after them clandestinely, which wasn’t that hard, considering she was invisible.  At the end of the passage was what looked like the entrance to a stairwell, only there weren’t any stairs in it.  The first sprite pulled out a sack from inside his tunic and sprinkled a handful of something from inside it onto the cart and its occupants.  The cart lifted off the ground shakily, and the second sprite reached out to settle it.

“Pixie dust.  This is Peter Pan!” Rachel thought.  She watched as the two sprites guided the cart into the stairwell and started to flying up with it.  Hurriedly she ran after it and managed to grab onto the side before it got out of her reach.

“Did you use enough?” The second sprite asked the first.

“I used the same amount I always do,” The first one replied.

“This must be a bigger load, then,” the second one said, “It feels a lot heavier than usual.”

“It feels exactly the same to me,“ the first one said.  

“Still…” the second one muttered, looking around the cart.  Rachel silently hoped that he wouldn’t think to feel for any extra passengers.  She also wished they would go a little faster.  Her arms were already starting to get tired.

“If you’re so worried about it, then add some more of your own,” the first sprite told the other,  “I’m not wasting any of mine just because you’re getting paranoid.”

“Fine, I will.”  The second sprite pulled out a sack that was exactly the same as the one the first sprite had and sprinkled a handful of dust on the cart.  A little spilled over and landed on Rachel’s head.  She shook her head to try and distribute it, which was all she could do with both her hands in use.  That must have done the trick, because she felt a little lighter, and the cart was going up a little faster than before.  At least she thought it was.  She didn’t experiment with letting go until the two sprites reached their destination and maneuvered the cart out of the stairwell and into another dark passage.  Sure enough, she floated just the tiniest bit.  But that was all she needed in order to get herself over to the other side of the stairwell and climb through the exit.  

She continued to follow the two sprites as they guided the cart down another passage, leading her to a large room where there were creatures of all kinds standing around, facing a strange looking monument.  She watched the two sprites as they each took a creature from the cart and sprinkled them with a little more of the dust.  “Stand,” each one said, and the creatures that were sprinkled stiffened up.  The sprites were joined by others, and they also took creatures off the cart and made them stiff.  Then they all took a stiff creature and added it to the back of the crowd.  The sprites talked amongst themselves, but Rachel could only catch a few phrases.  “It shouldn’t be long now,”  “these sacrifices,” “sacred ritual” “will awaken.”

Rachel looked at the creatures in the crowd again, wondering what exactly some of them are, when she noticed a few that looked distinctly human.  With a sudden realization hitting her hard, she started to back away, hoping she had enough dust still on her to make her way back down the stairwell with the nonexistent stairs without getting hurt, and once again wondered how to find the others.  She didn’t get too far before she heard one of the sprites call out, “Hey!  Over there!” and suddenly all the sprites were looking in her direction.  With a chilling sensation running through her veins, Rachel looked down and saw that she was no longer invisible.  As the sprites advanced, and with nothing left to lose, she called out, “Help!  Allura!  Anthony!” although she had no idea if the others would be able to hear her at all.  Then she turned and ran for the stairwell, but long before she ever reached it, everything went dark.