Princess Lila has tried to learn magic.  Fraddir says it's vitally important to his Plan to take back her kingdom.  So if he's right, it's going to be part of her story.

Hopefully the big magic he's forging is going to be easier than the plants she's trying to learn now, because memorizing plant-magic makes her head hurt just as badly as memorizing the Geography her old tutors tried to make her learn.  But things are promising - she loves the invisibility ring Fraddir's given her!  And she doesn't need to memorize anything other than which ways to turn it!

She likes playing in the woods around Fraddir's cottage, but she knows that it's going to have to end someday.  Her kingdom - her people - are suffering under the usurper.  They need her.  She has a Story, after all.

One morning, as she's walking down to the brook to fetch water for cooking, she feels a prickling around herself almost like that time she poked at Fraddir's forge.  Magic!

She's suddenly excited.  Her story's moving on!

And then the forest dissolves around her, to show a much larger cottage in much worse repair.  Or, well, a basement?

Lila looks around herself with glee.  "Hello!" she exclaims.

Lightning coruscates, and Eriape is blown halfway across the room, bouncing off her lectern, which is itself knocked over onto the floor.

If she was living, she'd be hurt. But she isn't so she wasn't.

Eriape pulls herself to her feet. 

She sighs. It's not a badger. 

"Oh, was that me?  I'm sorry!"

It wasn't quite so bad when she disrupted Fraddir's spell, but it's not unfamiliar.  Lila jumps over toward Eriape to try to help her.

(She totally ignores the circle around her - she's not used to summoning circles.  If it blocks her, she'll run right into it.)

It looks like a person. 

She walks up to it, looking at it carefully.

This creature might go away at any time- the spell was intended to last for merely seconds. Eriape's skin is like white parchment, and two orange sparks appear in her otherwise empty eyesockets.  

It talks!

Badgers crowd around, with much interest! 

"Greetings! I am the Great Lady Eriape, the Undying! Princess of Badgers!"

She's... 

Lila doesn't have a word for what this person is.  Not human and not Fay, at least.  A Dwarrow, maybe?  She's heard they live underground?  And Papa sent an embassy to them (before everything went wrong), but they didn't send an embassy back so she didn't see any of them.

"Hi! I'm -"

Wait, Eriape's another Princess!  But Lila still shouldn't give her real name.

"Greetings, Your Highness!  I'm Lila."  She bobs a quick curtsy.

"... and can I pet your badgers!?"

"Yes!" The badger has a squeaky voice. 

"Me first!"

"No, me first!"

"Oh, you're talking badgers!  Er, I'm sorry, I've only got two hands -"

Lila instantly kneels down to run her hands through their fur, one after another.  She's wanted to pet so many of the forest animals, but her invisibility ring's barely helped!

She pulls out a large magnifying glass, and looks at Lila through it. "You appear to be A Human! Are you a resident of some Strange Unearthly Plane or merely a Visitor?"

"Uh, yes, Your Highness.  I'm... not from anywhere unearthly?  From the Kingdom of Maranon.  Er, were you trying to summon me like a unicorn?"

"Yes! I was Attempting the Summoning of the Eternal Badger, an Awesome Critter of the Far Realms, which When, when Slain, Splits in Two New Eternal Badgers, Both of Equal Power and Excellence!"

"I do not Care to Rule a Kingdom myself- it is Too Much Bother! Far Above my Lair, there is All Kinds of Kingdoms, but Maranon is not One of them. I do think Maranon might be Deep in the Far Realms!"

"... Eternal Badger?  Have you seen any of them before?  I've only seen one normal badger - Fraddir doesn't like me staying out at night."

"And what kingdoms are there around here?  Are we down in the Southerlands, or..."

The talk of the "Far Realms" and "strange unearthly planes" is starting to make her think she's been summoned beyond the Gates of Night into some totally different world.

"Why, there's Cheliax! Andoran! Razmiran! Geb! Nex! All kinds, really." 

Eriape has a map up on a stand, with many pins stuck in it, connected with yarns of three different colors, and she shoos Lila towards it. 

Lila leaves the badgers (hopefully she can pet them more soon?) and stares at the map.

There're more pins than she would've ever seen markers in Papa's court, but she gets the concept.

"... This's a totally different world!"

^{"I didn't know humans could go to other worlds."}

"Completely Different!" Eriape is very enthusiastic. 

"Through my Skill in Magic I have visited All these Countries!"

Lila is half-distracted from her sense of adriftness from everything she's known.

"Oh... I've never been outside Maranon before..."  Papa was going to take her on a royal visit to Leir, but then things happened.

"Are there humans there?  Or Fay?"

"I was Human! right up until I decided to Become Undying through the means of Expert Manipulation of the Obverse Power!"

(the badgers cheer)

"All the Clever People become Undying!" She points to the map, with large sweeping gestures. "All these Countries have Many Humans. And some Have Fay, but they come from A Different Dimension!"