Of course, it wasn’t my relationships that were the pressing issues right now, but exactly what bound Ivan and Nellie together, and what made up this little pocket universe we were in, presuming, of course, we weren’t somewhere in the so-called “real world.”  I halfheartedly wished I had a way of telling, because not knowing the rules of a place meant you didn’t know what kind of Hospitality you could expect.  On the other hand, after this little jaunt to face down a creature of real Power and ask nicely for my fairy back, I very much hoped to stay in the world that included my bed, my books, and my small attempts at keeping the barriers of the world intact from small intrusions.  I would have kept the alliteration going, but “band-aided” didn’t sound quite right.

Artur continued a fairly fast pace down the mountainside that left me always on the edge of having to catch up.  Nikolai took it as a jaunt in the sunshine.   It wasn’t too bad except for that constant nagging paranoia that said, “Any minute now, the earth is going to open up into a sarlacc pit, or we’re going to be dive-bombed by a previous invisible dragon that will eat our face.  Either one, it’s going to happen.”  (My little internal voices are quite specific about the risks I am likely to incur, which doesn’t make them accurate, just determined.)

I think the difference between a phobia and a regular fear is the ability to think your way through it.  A phobia doesn’t let you relax and say, “Hey, what are the odds that both Ivan and Nellie love Star Wars the way they love each other?”  I am from the generation that has an irrational fear of the sarlacc, and, of course, lurkers above.   Of course, the part of my brain that tries to look at the bright side suggests, “If they have that stuff, maybe they’ll have lightsabres, too!”

We don’t listen to that part of our brain very much, because we suspect in our deep-down darkest selves, that we run faster on panic than with glee.  So it’s much more likely that that shadow in the doorway is something that wants our pain with a side of flesh and blood than it is something waiting to ambush us and give us presents.  Alas, poor Santa Claus, we believed in you well.

So what was this place? The suffering romantic in me wanted to think it was a little love getaway for the Dragon and her death talker.   It’s a lot less atmospheric (so to speak) than a graveyard and mounds of treasure, but why stereotype?  After all, from my copious research on the topic, Dragons like knowledge, royal maidens, acquiring treasure, breathing fire, crunchy people with or without ketchup, strawberry ice cream, and long walks on the beach under the moonlight.

Um, maybe not the last two, but I wouldn’t put it past them.

“I’ve been thinking,” I said, breaking the silence.

“A dishonest vocation,” retorted Artur.

“But occasionally rewarding, and it holds great potential for amusement,” I suggested.  “I had thoughts that might be relevant to our situation.”

“Do you want to share them or brag about them?”

If we survived this, I determined that I would introduce him to my ex-.  It was only fair – neither of them credited me with the rudiments of intelligence, and if mocking me was at least one thing in common it’d be a better relationship than some I’d seen.

“They’re ill-formed and only half-fitted without your input, of course.”  I left off the, “Oh mighty fleshy lesiye one,” in hopes this conversation would get somewhere.  “Let me start with a conjecture.  Where are we?”

Artur stopped.  “The air is thinner, and less full of things I can breathe,” he said.  “I presume it is a shard of a place significant to the both of them, and that we will need to find another portal, perhaps on that island, it being the only protected outlet, that will lead to where the beast makes its primary lair.”

That made some sense.  “How do you propose getting to the island?”

He glanced at me.  “I should make you swim.”

I parsed it so that he wasn’t going to, which was good of him.  Honestly, I can wade and paddle a bit, but I’m no real swimmer.  I spent my summers at the pool with a less-than-subtle eye towards girls in bikinis and trying not to think about the huge gaping drains and the fear that fed them.

For what it’s worth, ladies, I can hold my breath for a very long time.  I learned that in the summers, too.

“You know, every time you refer to `the beast, ‘ I keep thinking we need to stab it with our steely knives.”

“That didn’t work in the song, either.”  Artur grinned.

I wondered what the “passage back to the place we were before,” was going to look like, and then quashed the thought quickly so as not to dwell on it.

We reached the shore, and another artificial aspect of this place hit me – no matter how much people say water is tasteless and odorless, it isn’t.   Water from all sorts of places has its own bouquet.    This wasn’t so cold as to lack vegetation, which has its own smell in water, too.   Except here.   Not a gnat or other nasty no-see-‘um in sight – that’s another good sign you aren’t in the real world.  I started to make a list while my battery held.

Artur leaned down and touched the place where the water lapped at the earth, and said some words.  I could feel the power radiate from his fingers a little.  The waves became somehow thicker, more like a non-Newtonian fluid than, well, any liquid outside a milkshake I was likely to drink.  He seemed to put some effort into it, although, for me, it was like something magical.  I love watching wizards at work, really, because magic really is there to break the rules.

“You’ll have to move quickly,” he said.  “We’ll make it to the island, provided there aren’t any spell-eating vermin within the lake.  There ought to be, because no portal should be left unguarded.”

I hadn’t thought of that as a truism, but maybe I’ve just been lucky.