From the Desk of Honor Raconteur
It doesn’t take much to make me happy. Six meals a day, ten hours of sleep, a pair of yoga pants, complete solitude and no social obligations whatsoever, and bam! Happiness. Needless to say, being yanked out of sleep after getting a whole thirty minutes in, while jet lagged, in a foreign country, in order to save Nixes from accidental magical portation? Opposite of happiness.
Being an adult is the dumbest thing I have ever done.
I stumbled out of my guest bed still wearing sleep wear of baggy shorts and baggier shirt, my hair a rambunctious tangle around my head and my eyes more or less glued shut. Someone had an arm—maybe not an arm?—wrapped around my waist and was towing me in what I assumed to be the right direction. Cheerio.
My phone rang in my hand, the skype ringtone cheerful and cranking my murderous irritation up a few notches. I stabbed accept and pried an eyelid up to glare at the screen.
“Reagan, you look rough,” Jackson greeted me with open concern on his mobile face. “Have you not gotten any sleep?”
“No, because stupid archaeologists keep opening the portal and walking through,” I snarked at him, trying to push a stray lock of hair out of my eyes and failing. I huffed at it instead.
Not twenty minutes ago, Zoya had woken me up from a sound sleep with the wonderful, exciting news that more archaeologists from my father’s worksite had stumbled in. I say that with full sarcasm. The last thing we needed was more Nixes wandering around in here.
My father was still talking to Nana, getting caught up on the rabbit hole he’d fallen down. Zoya and I decided to divide and conquer. She got to handle the hysterical archaeologists (more luck to her) and I got to shut the platform down before something else went wrong.
The act of walking (un)fortunately woke me up further and I belatedly realized that the thing around my waist was not an arm. My guide, who was a Yali—the one with the elephant head and lion body from before—very kindly guided my stumbling feet towards the platform in the back of the clan’s complex. His name was Reyansh and he guided me with a trunk wrapped around my waist to keep me upright and from falling into a planter. It was very nice of him. I don’t like stumbling into planters. I let him blindly lead me through all of the manicured gardens and around the flowing fountains as I kept Jackson up on Skype.
“Wait, more archaeologists?” Jackson demanded incredulously. “I thought it was an accident that your dad came through!”
“So did we. But it’s either powered and active, or they’re stupidly lucky. Unlucky? I don’t know at this point.”
“I’d go more with unlucky. Well this sucks. You can’t just shut the portal down from your side and expect that to solve all problems. If their portal is working so well, it can connect to anywhere else. Ouch, actually, it might have, we don’t know otherwise, right?”
I would have stumbled to a stop if Reyansh’s hold on me hadn’t kept me moving. Irritably, I demanded, “What in the mint chocolate chip did you just say?”
Jackson grimaced, holding up both hands in a pleading gesture. “Let’s focus on one problem at a time. Maybe shut yours down first, then figure out if anyone else is missing. We can hunt them down and restore them to the dig sight later.”
“You do not get to borrow more trouble for me,” I groused at him. I saw the flat platform ahead, the symbols still glowing as of course the portal was still active. It was hedged in by manicured lawns and decorative benches, like it was designed to be part of the garden.
My fellow Imagineer gave me a sympathetic look that grated along my nerves like fingernails on a chalkboard. “I know you’re a little sleepy and jet lagged—”
“Sleepy means cute and fuzzy-eyed,” I corrected him. My head was literally pounding from the lack of sleep. I could feel the exhaustion eating away at my bones and I would quite cheerfully murder someone if it meant twelve hours of alone time with a pillow. “Sleepy doesn’t cut it. I’m tired. I’m a murder and ten cups of coffee away from showing my displeasure at the world.”
Reyansh snorted a laugh, which let me tell you, since that came from the nose wrapped around my waist? Felt more then a little weird.
“This is a quick fix,” Jackson promised in soothing, rolling tones. “Then you may sleep.”
If he was lying to me, he’d be the strange smell in the trunk. “Alright, so what do I have to do?”
“You know those three glass vials in the control box at the base of the columns? Go to any of the columns and remove them. All three. That’s it, presto, the platform is inoperable.”
That sounded too good to be true even in my less awake state. I frowned blearily down at him. “That’s it?”
“Think of it like the remote to the telly,” Jackson offered. “If you only have one battery in there, and not the three it calls for, does the remote work?”
“No, of course it doesn’t. So I’m literally yanking one of the batteries out?”
“More or less.”
“I do love a simple solution.” I felt vaguely like that thought should connect logically to another thought. But it flittered away like a mosquito in the dark. I say mosquito because it would likely come back to bite me later.
Reyansh cleared his throat deferentially as he stopped us both at the ramp going up. “Imagineers, if I may be so bold? We have one here who is good with such constructs. If we show her how it is to be done, she can fly down to the other platform and do the same. It will curtail further problems.”
That was it! That was the mosquito-thought. “Reyansh, bless your brain. Yes, please go fetch her.”
He gave me a bow of the head before trotting off, his lion tail swishing idly as he moved silently away. I was happy to sink onto the edge of the platform to wait. I asked Jackson questions because if I didn’t stay talking, I’d fall asleep right here. “So how goes it over there?”
“Mixed, as usual. We still haven’t heard from our lost clans. The Druid we asked to check up on them hasn’t turned up either. It’s worrisome. Our platform is working fine, and we’ve got it to connect smoothly with two others. I think we’ve managed, thanks to our magical community as a whole, to find some of the locations of the others. We’ll hunt them down systematically and see if we can’t get them to work. If we can, then we’ll jump to the other countries and start in on there.”
“Brazil is our test ground?”
“More or less. We’re trying to hurry, as we are worried about the clans. If we can at least get it operational on a national level, we’d be able to contact them. Theoretically.”
“Yeah, theoretically. You gotta love that difference between theory and reality.”
“Are you coming back soon?”
“Within a few days, maybe?” I really wasn’t sure what the plan was. Did we even have a plan? Was I able to remember things like that after being awake for twenty-six hours?
“You sound really unsure of that.”
“Things are pretty much up in the air over here.” I heard a whooshing sound and looked up to find a very interesting bird flying overhead. It looked like a cross between a crow and a pheasant, an interesting mix, but rather striking. It landed next to me on the platform, ruffling its black wings as it settled, the pheasant head canting so that it could look at me from one eye.
Reyansh loped up to us and did the introductions. “Imagineer, this is Yahvi. She is a Chakora and very wise with constructs. Yahvi, our honored guest, Imagineer Reagan Hunt.”
I gave Yahvi a shallow, seated bow, and resisted the urge to hold onto my head. It felt like it would fall off, it was that heavy. “Yahvi, nice to meet you.”
Yahvi lifted her head and trilled back in a sing-song way that sounded musical and soothing. “And you, Imagineer.”
I lifted the phone so Jackson could see her and vice versa. “This is another Imagineer, Jackson Warren. Jackson, Yahvi.”
“Pleasure, Yahvi,” Jackson greeted pleasantly. “We’re grateful for your help.”
“It is a small price to pay for your aid,” Yahvi denied with a duck of the head towards him. “Please tell me what must be done and I will be happy to assist.”
“It’s actually rather simple,” I assured her. I hopped off the platform, feeling the gritty stone scrap against my shorts and the skin of my thighs as I moved. Crouching down in front of the column on the far right, I indicated the notched panel and shifted so that Yahvi could see what I was doing. “You pull here, and it falls off easily enough. Here, try it, I want to make sure you can get in.”
She hopped lightly forward, got her beak inside the notched section on the right and gave it a good yank. It shifted half-out, and she switched to the other notch on the upper lip and gave that another yank. The panel fell obediently out.
“Okay, once that’s out,” I put the phone down and reached for the glass vial.
“Reagan!” Jackson yelped in warning.
I jumped in place, putting a hand over my heart. “OMG! Jackson, don’t scream at me. My soul almost left my body.”
“Sorry, sorry, but I forgot to tell you. All the symbols have to be dark first. If anything is lit up, you’ll get the shock of your life.”
Now he tells me. “Is this like a magical version of electrocution?”
“Worse.”
Grumbling, I stood up again and reached up, toggling off the symbols off with a touch of the hand. “Okay, they’re off.”
“Cheers. NOW you can yank the vials.”
I sank down again, and reached forward more gingerly this time. Unlike with electricity, the glass vials weren’t hot with power. They were cool to the touch and I was able to put a hand around one and pull it easily free.
Yahvi didn’t ask before she ducked under my arm and tried her hand—claw at it. She had to do some interesting body contortions—she didn’t have the reach, it required some bird yoga on her part—but got one free. With that one on the ground, she rustled her feathers, looking proud of herself. “I can manage this.”
And I was relieved to see it. “We need to store these somewhere safe—”
“Don’t put them in a safe place,” Jackson protested, alarmed all over again. “We’ll never find them again.”
The man had a good point. I’d played that game with myself many times before and lost. Every time. “Jackson, you think we can leave them in here? Just put them down on the bottom?”
“Sure. As long as they’re not connected in the right spots, nothing happens.”
Then that was what we’d do. I pulled the last one and gathered them all in, refitting the panel afterwards. “Yahvi, if you could do the same…or not. We don’t want someone figuring this out down there.”
“I will carry the vials back here, and store them in the same place,” she decided for me. “That way we can restore the platform later, when its safe to do so.”
See? People who’ve had sleep make smarter decisions than I did. “Okay. Awesomesauce. I’m going back to bed now.”
Jackson laughed at me with a perfectly straight face. “You do that.”
I stuck my tongue out at him (because maturity, meh) and stuck my phone in my pocket. Then I looked up and realized that Yahvi had already left and I had absolutely no idea how to get back to my room.
Reyansh must have seen the confusion and despair on my face as he gave me his trunk again. “Come, Imagineer. I will guide you back.”
I beamed at him, accepting the trunk. “I like you.”
He laughed at me. Can’t imagine why.
Being an adult is the dumbest thing I have ever done.
I stumbled out of my guest bed still wearing sleep wear of baggy shorts and baggier shirt, my hair a rambunctious tangle around my head and my eyes more or less glued shut. Someone had an arm—maybe not an arm?—wrapped around my waist and was towing me in what I assumed to be the right direction. Cheerio.
My phone rang in my hand, the skype ringtone cheerful and cranking my murderous irritation up a few notches. I stabbed accept and pried an eyelid up to glare at the screen.
“Reagan, you look rough,” Jackson greeted me with open concern on his mobile face. “Have you not gotten any sleep?”
“No, because stupid archaeologists keep opening the portal and walking through,” I snarked at him, trying to push a stray lock of hair out of my eyes and failing. I huffed at it instead.
Not twenty minutes ago, Zoya had woken me up from a sound sleep with the wonderful, exciting news that more archaeologists from my father’s worksite had stumbled in. I say that with full sarcasm. The last thing we needed was more Nixes wandering around in here.
My father was still talking to Nana, getting caught up on the rabbit hole he’d fallen down. Zoya and I decided to divide and conquer. She got to handle the hysterical archaeologists (more luck to her) and I got to shut the platform down before something else went wrong.
The act of walking (un)fortunately woke me up further and I belatedly realized that the thing around my waist was not an arm. My guide, who was a Yali—the one with the elephant head and lion body from before—very kindly guided my stumbling feet towards the platform in the back of the clan’s complex. His name was Reyansh and he guided me with a trunk wrapped around my waist to keep me upright and from falling into a planter. It was very nice of him. I don’t like stumbling into planters. I let him blindly lead me through all of the manicured gardens and around the flowing fountains as I kept Jackson up on Skype.
“Wait, more archaeologists?” Jackson demanded incredulously. “I thought it was an accident that your dad came through!”
“So did we. But it’s either powered and active, or they’re stupidly lucky. Unlucky? I don’t know at this point.”
“I’d go more with unlucky. Well this sucks. You can’t just shut the portal down from your side and expect that to solve all problems. If their portal is working so well, it can connect to anywhere else. Ouch, actually, it might have, we don’t know otherwise, right?”
I would have stumbled to a stop if Reyansh’s hold on me hadn’t kept me moving. Irritably, I demanded, “What in the mint chocolate chip did you just say?”
Jackson grimaced, holding up both hands in a pleading gesture. “Let’s focus on one problem at a time. Maybe shut yours down first, then figure out if anyone else is missing. We can hunt them down and restore them to the dig sight later.”
“You do not get to borrow more trouble for me,” I groused at him. I saw the flat platform ahead, the symbols still glowing as of course the portal was still active. It was hedged in by manicured lawns and decorative benches, like it was designed to be part of the garden.
My fellow Imagineer gave me a sympathetic look that grated along my nerves like fingernails on a chalkboard. “I know you’re a little sleepy and jet lagged—”
“Sleepy means cute and fuzzy-eyed,” I corrected him. My head was literally pounding from the lack of sleep. I could feel the exhaustion eating away at my bones and I would quite cheerfully murder someone if it meant twelve hours of alone time with a pillow. “Sleepy doesn’t cut it. I’m tired. I’m a murder and ten cups of coffee away from showing my displeasure at the world.”
Reyansh snorted a laugh, which let me tell you, since that came from the nose wrapped around my waist? Felt more then a little weird.
“This is a quick fix,” Jackson promised in soothing, rolling tones. “Then you may sleep.”
If he was lying to me, he’d be the strange smell in the trunk. “Alright, so what do I have to do?”
“You know those three glass vials in the control box at the base of the columns? Go to any of the columns and remove them. All three. That’s it, presto, the platform is inoperable.”
That sounded too good to be true even in my less awake state. I frowned blearily down at him. “That’s it?”
“Think of it like the remote to the telly,” Jackson offered. “If you only have one battery in there, and not the three it calls for, does the remote work?”
“No, of course it doesn’t. So I’m literally yanking one of the batteries out?”
“More or less.”
“I do love a simple solution.” I felt vaguely like that thought should connect logically to another thought. But it flittered away like a mosquito in the dark. I say mosquito because it would likely come back to bite me later.
Reyansh cleared his throat deferentially as he stopped us both at the ramp going up. “Imagineers, if I may be so bold? We have one here who is good with such constructs. If we show her how it is to be done, she can fly down to the other platform and do the same. It will curtail further problems.”
That was it! That was the mosquito-thought. “Reyansh, bless your brain. Yes, please go fetch her.”
He gave me a bow of the head before trotting off, his lion tail swishing idly as he moved silently away. I was happy to sink onto the edge of the platform to wait. I asked Jackson questions because if I didn’t stay talking, I’d fall asleep right here. “So how goes it over there?”
“Mixed, as usual. We still haven’t heard from our lost clans. The Druid we asked to check up on them hasn’t turned up either. It’s worrisome. Our platform is working fine, and we’ve got it to connect smoothly with two others. I think we’ve managed, thanks to our magical community as a whole, to find some of the locations of the others. We’ll hunt them down systematically and see if we can’t get them to work. If we can, then we’ll jump to the other countries and start in on there.”
“Brazil is our test ground?”
“More or less. We’re trying to hurry, as we are worried about the clans. If we can at least get it operational on a national level, we’d be able to contact them. Theoretically.”
“Yeah, theoretically. You gotta love that difference between theory and reality.”
“Are you coming back soon?”
“Within a few days, maybe?” I really wasn’t sure what the plan was. Did we even have a plan? Was I able to remember things like that after being awake for twenty-six hours?
“You sound really unsure of that.”
“Things are pretty much up in the air over here.” I heard a whooshing sound and looked up to find a very interesting bird flying overhead. It looked like a cross between a crow and a pheasant, an interesting mix, but rather striking. It landed next to me on the platform, ruffling its black wings as it settled, the pheasant head canting so that it could look at me from one eye.
Reyansh loped up to us and did the introductions. “Imagineer, this is Yahvi. She is a Chakora and very wise with constructs. Yahvi, our honored guest, Imagineer Reagan Hunt.”
I gave Yahvi a shallow, seated bow, and resisted the urge to hold onto my head. It felt like it would fall off, it was that heavy. “Yahvi, nice to meet you.”
Yahvi lifted her head and trilled back in a sing-song way that sounded musical and soothing. “And you, Imagineer.”
I lifted the phone so Jackson could see her and vice versa. “This is another Imagineer, Jackson Warren. Jackson, Yahvi.”
“Pleasure, Yahvi,” Jackson greeted pleasantly. “We’re grateful for your help.”
“It is a small price to pay for your aid,” Yahvi denied with a duck of the head towards him. “Please tell me what must be done and I will be happy to assist.”
“It’s actually rather simple,” I assured her. I hopped off the platform, feeling the gritty stone scrap against my shorts and the skin of my thighs as I moved. Crouching down in front of the column on the far right, I indicated the notched panel and shifted so that Yahvi could see what I was doing. “You pull here, and it falls off easily enough. Here, try it, I want to make sure you can get in.”
She hopped lightly forward, got her beak inside the notched section on the right and gave it a good yank. It shifted half-out, and she switched to the other notch on the upper lip and gave that another yank. The panel fell obediently out.
“Okay, once that’s out,” I put the phone down and reached for the glass vial.
“Reagan!” Jackson yelped in warning.
I jumped in place, putting a hand over my heart. “OMG! Jackson, don’t scream at me. My soul almost left my body.”
“Sorry, sorry, but I forgot to tell you. All the symbols have to be dark first. If anything is lit up, you’ll get the shock of your life.”
Now he tells me. “Is this like a magical version of electrocution?”
“Worse.”
Grumbling, I stood up again and reached up, toggling off the symbols off with a touch of the hand. “Okay, they’re off.”
“Cheers. NOW you can yank the vials.”
I sank down again, and reached forward more gingerly this time. Unlike with electricity, the glass vials weren’t hot with power. They were cool to the touch and I was able to put a hand around one and pull it easily free.
Yahvi didn’t ask before she ducked under my arm and tried her hand—claw at it. She had to do some interesting body contortions—she didn’t have the reach, it required some bird yoga on her part—but got one free. With that one on the ground, she rustled her feathers, looking proud of herself. “I can manage this.”
And I was relieved to see it. “We need to store these somewhere safe—”
“Don’t put them in a safe place,” Jackson protested, alarmed all over again. “We’ll never find them again.”
The man had a good point. I’d played that game with myself many times before and lost. Every time. “Jackson, you think we can leave them in here? Just put them down on the bottom?”
“Sure. As long as they’re not connected in the right spots, nothing happens.”
Then that was what we’d do. I pulled the last one and gathered them all in, refitting the panel afterwards. “Yahvi, if you could do the same…or not. We don’t want someone figuring this out down there.”
“I will carry the vials back here, and store them in the same place,” she decided for me. “That way we can restore the platform later, when its safe to do so.”
See? People who’ve had sleep make smarter decisions than I did. “Okay. Awesomesauce. I’m going back to bed now.”
Jackson laughed at me with a perfectly straight face. “You do that.”
I stuck my tongue out at him (because maturity, meh) and stuck my phone in my pocket. Then I looked up and realized that Yahvi had already left and I had absolutely no idea how to get back to my room.
Reyansh must have seen the confusion and despair on my face as he gave me his trunk again. “Come, Imagineer. I will guide you back.”
I beamed at him, accepting the trunk. “I like you.”
He laughed at me. Can’t imagine why.
Proudly powered by Weebly