"Hello. My sincere apologies for the destruction. My jump drive malfunctioned pretty badly and I ended up here. Somehow. This place smells like magic. It doesn't seem to have a curvature, for one thing. Is this place magic?"

"This place? Not more than most places," comes the reply. "I'm Yellow, what's your name?"

"Most places I've been don't have magic at all, I don't like not knowing the rules. I'm Nick."

Yellow laughs at him. "Don't tell anyone else that. Follow me," he adds, and he heads in a direction.

"What." He follows. He looks very distracted, if Yellow is paying any attention.

"A mortal of my very own, what else?" They're approaching the lake; there's a little house at the shore.

He follows, silent and glaring angrily.

"You'll need a nickname; pick something and tell me what it is. In you go. Don't do any damage, the ceilings are a bit low."

He considers making a nickname from his last name- No, being under more than one other person's control can't possibly be an improvement. "Liam." He goes in and doesn't do any damage.

"So tell me, Liam," says Yellow, "what is that contraption you crashed?"

"It's my ship. I built most of it. And I didn't crash it, this world crashed it by suddenly appearing in front of me." He takes a good look around, what is this house like?

"A planet is a large ball of rock, surrounded by a thin layer of air, surrounded by nothingness. Most places are planets. Is here not?"

"No. What does jump capable mean? Oh - and never lie to me."

"Jump capable means it can cross between worlds under the right conditions, at considerable cost in fuel. I don't think it can jump from here." Left unsaid: In its current state, at least. "The laws of physics are different. What is this place's geography like? How is there a down without gravity? It doesn't make any sense!"

"We're on the Queenscontinent, if that's what you mean, but what would there be if not a down? What was your ship carrying?"

"Wood, mostly. I harvested it from a forest in the middle of nowhere, so I got it for free."

"Huh. What else is there on the ship? Order it from most to least interesting."

"Weapons, tools, seeds, medicine, food, fuel, spare parts, my personal effects, water and air supplies, probably some dust and trash."

"What kind of weapons?"

"Phasers. They - hm. They're hard to explain. Basically they explode the first thing they hit."

"Interesting. What kind of tools?"

"Cutter, joiner, reshaper, threader, power sources, various electronics, a metal purifier, and mechanical things like wrenches and screwdrivers and so on. I had a flying thing smaller than the ship, but it broke in the crash. Oh, and medical machines and kitchen utensils. Am I really that interesting? Shall I list my forks and spoons?"

"Only volunteer extraneous remarks if you think they'll help me," says Yellow. "But to answer your question, you are in fact very interesting. One doesn't see mortals too often here."

"Don't like the world?" wonders Yellow.

"The laws of physics, the rules of how materials and forces interact, are subtly different here. That's why I crashed instead of pulling up and flying somewhere else - my engines died when I got here."

"Huh. Will other things in your ship still work?"

"Some of them, maybe. I don't think I can tell without going and checking each individual thing."

"Mm. How easy is it for someone to get into the ship and take the stuff without you helping?"

"I would be extremely surprised if anyone managed it."

"Assume they have sorcery."

"What's sorcery?"

"Magic. My other vassal's a sorcerer, she could answer your questions about it whenever she gets home. What would go wrong if someone tried to loot the ship without you?"

"Well, your crash was pretty visible. I'm going to want your help clearing everything useful and portable out of it sooner rather than later, anyone might have seen it. Think about the most efficient least destructive way to do that for me until further notice, a clear-cut emergency, or my other vassal's return."

"Lots. She likes to draw. Go into her room, it's that one, and take some out of the stack on her desk, and something to write with."

So he does that. And starts writing about how to dig tunnels under the lake and store things space-efficiently.

"I am as unhappy about this as you seem to be. Would you mind explaining why I am unable to disobey that irritating man?"

"Did you eat something here or did you tell him your name?"

"I told him my name. Hm, that explains why he ordered me not to eat anything. Is that what causes it? Eating and names?"

"Yes. What does he have you doing?"

"Thinking about the best way to cannibalize my ship for his personal use. He didn't order me to actually start, or to not make it harder, though." A little smirk.

She glances meaningfully at Yellow's room. "Well, he may yet think of it, especially with your assistance," she murmurs.

"Yes, I'm being foolish, aren't I? I'm bad at holding my tongue. Honestly I am just barely not crying, and only because crying would not help."

"Crying will not help," agrees Promise with subtle emphasis.

"Exactly. Can I assume you would also not like to continue being under his thrall?"

"What is sorcery, how does one sorcer, what kinds of things can sorcery do? I need to know to figure out how to stop it from happening to the ship as ordered."

"Sorcery is magic, you do it by paying attention and applying will, light gates water purification fire, I can't not answer your sorcery questions right now but is that really your highest priority?"

"Sorry, sorry, I am a ball of nervous tension and can't really stop talking." He starts pacing instead. "How do we get out?"

"What orders are you under with respect to your name? Don't tell me yet. And do you have any mortal food?"

"I quote, 'Don't tell anyone that.' And yes. I have some on me that he didn't think to make me throw away, even."

"All right. If you give me the food, and then tell me your name, we can both get out of here."

He gives her the food and waits.

"When I eat it, tell me I rescind all your orders - unless there's anything preventing you from doing that? And is there any part of your name that isn't part of what you gave Yellow, so you can tell me that part?"

"Nothing will stop me from doing that. I hate the other half of my name, but that's hardly relevant, is it?"

"I'm not going to call you it." She looks apprehensively at the food, hesitates, and then chokes it down.

"I'm sorry, but I have to be sure. Tell me your name. Tell me if the food thing is true or a lie."

She flinches, a nasty whole-body convulsion that leaves her curled up in a ball. "Alisyrrabel," she stammers, "it's true, it's true, you didn't have to do that, why did you do that -"

"I rescind all your orders. My last name is Streiss." He shakes his head. "I had to be sure. If you were running some kind of con and he hadn't told you my name yet for some reason. I'm sorry, but I had to be sure."

"...Can you take me in a nonrandom direction first?" Fruit in bag, fruit in bag.

"I need to go that way," she points in a different direction and then shoulders her bag, "and take a cutting of my tree, and after that almost anywhere else will do."

"How far do you need to go? My ship isn't as badly damaged as I implied to Yellow, but it is still damaged. It will take me a couple of hours to get it flying again. I can make it so he can't get close and his voice can't reach inside, at least. Do orders work through sign language?"

"If there's a sign language in common, probably. They work through writing if we see him writing it, too. It's less than a thousand miles, closer to five hundred, I haven't flown the straight shot but I can point out landmarks."

"It'll probably be faster if you help me restart the power core and engines on my ship instead of, er, flying there yourself. Can I tell you to do things without intending them to be enforceable orders? It would save some annoying verbal maneuvering."

"Yes. It only counts if you mean them, and you can't mean them at me right now."

"I can't die." She follows him. She looks back over her shoulder at the house. "How sure are you that you'll be able to keep him from giving orders though the ship?"

"I'm fairly sure he won't be able to reach us, but I can't be certain since magic is, in fact, a thing. I'll turn off all exterior sound pickups, change the damper harmonics to create white noise, lower the resolution on all the cameras until we can't see him writing anything unless he writes it with trees, in which case I'll have enough warning to blast whatever he's trying to write with phasers. I apparently can't shoot him, but I could light fires between him and us. Can he project his voice through walls? That would be a problem."

"Feeding him won't help. It's why you had to feed me before giving me your name - food from a vassal doesn't work. Your mistrustful stunt didn't permanently wreck anything but if the rules that you didn't know were slightly different or you'd tried some other stunt you could have left us both trapped."

"Fairies. I could maybe de-age you but I'd have to keep doing it."

"I'd appreciate de-aging, but it might not be worth it. I've only got three decades on me right now, so I'm good for another dozen or so. I somewhat doubt that you want to come with me when I leave the world, and I intend to never get within half a dozen jumps of this place again if I can help it."

"No. I just want a cutting of my tree and then to get as far away from Yellow and Thorn as possible without going somewhere where all the food is dangerous and sorcery doesn't work. Another continent would be good if you don't mind."

"I can do another continent, but not much further than that. I only have so much fuel. Would you like a primer on how some of my stuff works in exchange for answering more sorcery questions, voluntarily this time?"

"May as well. What do you use for fuel?"

"Thorium, a deuterium/tritium mixture, and hyperium. Thorium and deutritium are somewhat interchangeable and power my normal-space engines, hyperium powers the jump drive that lets me hop between worlds. How much explanation do you need as to what these materials are? This world seems to use magic instead of science for most things."

"I'm not familiar with the substances. ...If you have any substances that are similar but cheaper I can try transmuting them into your fuel, though, given the chance to look at samples of both."

"How similar does it need to be? Deutritium fluid is basically water with extra neutrons. But thorium is a heavy metal with somewhat similar physical properties to some other metals, I have no idea if you can work with that. And hyperium is almost impossible to make without specialized facilities, I don't really have anything at all similar to it."

"Metal to metal and water to peculiar water should be close enough."

"Great. Will my workshop be a good place to try transmuting things?"

"If that's convenient for you, I don't see why not. It will take me a few hours and moving me while I'm working on it will slow me down."

The sounds are an interference. She's not finished with the transmutation by the time Yellow comes home to a smoldering wreck.

"I'm called Promise. Yellow mentioned, and you're nicknamed Liam. Do not tell anyone my name unless you believe it is in my best interest as you understand it to do so. You may order the reciprocal."

"Do not tell anyone my name unless you believe it is in my best interest as you understand it to do so. Any progress on the fuel? And do you think we should leave soon? Ship's not in ideal shape, but it's close enough."

"I've made some progress but I haven't actually transmuted any of it yet. If Yellow's here there's no rush - if he leaves he might be getting help and then we should go immediately."

Yellow puts out his house, yells orders at the ship, is very put out when they don't yield compliance, picks through his wreckage and finds nothing salvageable - and flies away.

Liam is in the control room. "Excellent. There's a valve in the core room, you can only put things into or out of the tank with the metal container I gave you. It's not complicated, but you do need the metal thing specifically. Would you mind doing that when you've got the time? And I've been flying in the direction you indicated, we should be almost there - recognize any landmarks?"

Promise looks at the landscape below. "Those mountains. We're - about three quarters of the way there, if my mental map is right. When you see the large river running left to right as we're flying we're within a stone's throw."

"I'll ping you when I see such a river. That tank can hold 800 gallons, but I'm not sure how long you're willing to keep transmuting. Or I could go back to trying to explain technology. Your choice."

"I imagine you're going to fly away with all of it, so the explanations would be a curiosity and getting overseas is still probably the biggest possible difference I can make in my quality of life over the next millennium. I'll make you more fuel."

"I mean, most of it will continue to work when I leave. I don't want to be blatantly unfair to you, since I might decide to risk visiting again when I'm 120 or so and seeing if your offer of de-aging still stands. I have some seeds from foreign plants if you want more food variety, or would that interact badly with the vassaling thing? I could make a map of the area when you decide we've gone far enough. Let me know if you think of anything else."

"You've already fed me, so I could probably eat your food without a disaster, but it seems like a dangerous thing to have growing in Fairyland regardless. A map of wherever you wind up putting me in the end would be useful. I'm not sure what else you have to offer unless you can make the sound baffle portable."

"I can't make the sound baffle portable. I can probably make a thing that makes a loud, piercing noise. It would hurt you to hear it from up close, but you wouldn't be able to hear anyone talking. It wouldn't last forever, maybe twelve hours of continuous activated use."

"That would be good. Especially if you can show me how it's put together so I can repair it with magic as needed."

"You can watch me make it later. I see your river coming up ahead right now, though."

Promise looks. "Okay - a little to the left, on the far side of that bend, and we'll be just near my tree but not close enough that you might crash into it."

And the ship comes down and settles where described. "Anything with ears within five or six miles knows we're here, by the way. Be quick." (not a real order)

Nick's voice comes out of the ship. "Stay away for your own safety."

She blinks, but doesn't leave.

Nick will watch the fairy carefully, and fire a warning shot at her if she gets within ten meters of the ship.

She does eventually approach that closely.

A beam of light and heat arcs past her and into a tree, close enough to feel warm but not close enough to burn. The tree becomes tinders.

She squeaks and backs away, but doesn't leave.

The forest is very sparsely populated. There are literally no animals, and this fairy is the only one around for miles, except Promise, who is on her way back.

Nick prepares to fly as soon as she's back inside. The engines rotate and start making noise. And he keeps watching that other fairy.

Promise returns, exchanges a few words with the blue-haired fairy, and ducks into the ship.

"That was River. She's not very nice but she's not particularly smart either."

Promise goes into the workshop and transmutes more fuel. She gets faster and faster at it.

She winces, fixes the damage to her hearing, and nods. "Thank you."

And the ship continues moving at high speed away from queenscontinent. Liam asks her to make more fuel once every few hours (moving this fast burns through a lot of the stuff), and tells her every 250 miles of distance they put behind them. He also asks for sorcery lessons, if she doesn't mind giving them.

"I don't have anything better to do. Most of my sensors can link directly into my mind, will they help?"

"...Maybe. I'm not sure. All right, so the usual introduction is a fairylight." She makes one: a little point of light in midair. "To make that, I had to note all the existing light sources and reflections that are passing through that space, pay attention to all the air currents passing through that space, and note the temperature and humidity. A lot of this gets automatic with practice, and doing this your first time in a moving vehicle isn't ideal because it means we're passing through a lot of different harmonics - you can't see those, nobody can, but they also affect casting, which means that when you're used to an area you can have a sense for how the harmonics are laid out there and factor them in."

"Interesting. So I should practice being aware of the local environment as much as possible? Is there any way to tell if I'm doing it right?"

"Well, if you do it right enough, you'll be able to make a light. You concentrate on all the things that are going on in the target space, and then you concentrate as hard as you can on adding just one simple thing to it."

"The moving vehicle definitely won't help, but now you've done it at all you should be able to do it again."

"I mean, what are we over right now? I don't want to be dropped in the ocean or anything."

"Any sufficiently sparsely populated land should do, but a forest would be most comfortable. I'll keep an eye out."

"Can you do two at once yet? Or a line instead of a mote of light?"

"This will do," she says.

"Assuming nothing horrible happens and the place doesn't turn out to have unfriendly neighbors, yes, I could easily be here in a century. I would be much obliged if you'd forget my name before coming back."

"Alas, I can't predict whether that will happen. Selective amnesia is not a thing humans can do. The best chance will be if I don't think about you at all. I'll give you a communicator. It'll be useless without another communicator to talk to, but if you do have to move please tell it to record a message and bury it somewhere out of the way. I'll be able to find it."

"I'll see what I can do."

"Farewell." He hands her the communicator. He goes into the ship. The ship climbs high, high above the clouds. There is a flash of light, and that's all she hears of Liam for a long time.

Plenty of time to plant her tree and food plants and learn her surroundings and generally recover her equilibrium.

She has it, although she doesn't usually carry it on her person. She fetches it out of the back of a closet.

"Hello, Promise. It's Liam. It took almost a hundred trips to find you again, this place has really uncooperative geography. May I come down and visit? I want to test something."

"What do you want to test?"

"Sorcery is not the only kind of magic. Any more details would ruin the surprise - You'll have to see it to believe it."

"I'm... not sure I like the sound of this."

"I promise you, if it works you will love the results. Order me not to lie if you like and I'll say it again."

"I'm not sure orders will work over these devices. Or sure that you know me well enough to guess what I'll like."

"Fine, ruin the surprise, I'll just say it. I found magic that might be able to change your true name. I've already had my name changed. Now I want to see if you can give me any orders."

"And if this magic worked, once again you're my vassal and I'm not yours, and yet I'm not giving you any orders right now. Not that I don't appreciate a healthy dose of caution and paranoia, but I'm offering to free you from old masters out of the kindness of my heart and not a hope to get de-aged, which I could just order you to do. If it worked."

"You probably don't know if orders work through these devices either." She doesn't mention the other risks associated with ordering her to de-age him. "But you can land. Don't crash into any plants I use."

Promise exits her tree.

Nick arrives in person. "Hello. You're right that the communicators might not work. And just so you don't complain at me for witholding information later, I can't do the magic myself. Please try ordering me to tell the truth for the next five minutes."

Promise watches his mouth move. She makes fairy lights in the air: My ears don't work right now. I'm happy for you to pass me notes if you want me to participate in experiments.

She shuts her eyes when he does this, opens them again to see the complete message, and says, "For the next five minutes, do not lie."

Well, that will be useful if you ever want to go near Yellow again.

Do you want- name change- Nick glares frustratedly at the lights. Switching- to device-. And he pulls out some sort of screen-thing, and points it at her. The word 'testing' appears on it.

What are you testing? I can read the screen.

Whether the screen works at all. It's a new design. Do you want more information about apellodynes? That being the name for the type magic-person who changed my truename.

Yes please.

Have you already told your apellodyne my name?

No. In fact, I've forgotten all but one syllable of your name. She can be trusted- at least by me. I can kill her with a thought, since I paid her a truly obscene amount of money to allow me to surgically implant an explosive device in her brain. She knows I will activate it if I must, so she will not betray me in any way I can detect.

I can't necessarily trust her that way. She's probably better than Thorn, but she's also much nearer by than Thorn.

You do not need to be capable of hearing or sight during the ritual. You do need to say specific phrases at key points, but you can memorize them and I can tap you on the shoulder to get the timing right. The apellodyne is only vaguely aware of the nature of fairyland, and she claims she intends to leave and never return. Of course, if you do not want the ritual performed, I will not force it on you. I'm trying to help you so you will be inclined to help me. I'm starting to consider giving it up as a bad job and seeking another sorcerer to de-age me.

Wouldn't recommend it. The ones who've bothered to learn are generally going to be ones who like to snare mortals and then keep them for a very long time. If my questions about your foreign magic offer are more tedious than that is dangerous, then of course I apologize, but why are you in such a hurry? You don't look about to keel over.

It's not going to take me four to ten years to decide if I want my name changed. I also have not yet learned to de-age a mortal, which will take longer than making that decision.

He nods. Shall I leave and allow you to think in peace? I can give you a second pad, if you would rather communicate in text than sound.

What I need is to meet the apellodyne and decide if she's trustworthy.

His lips move, presumably he is holding a conversation with the apellodyne. After a minute or so, She is willing to talk to you but does not want to be outside of my ship in fairyland while I am not nearby. Should I escort her here?

I'm willing to go in your ship.

Then please follow me. Do try not to use the noisemaker in there, I don't want to have to pay to rebuild my crew's ears if I don't have to.

I can fix deafness, if it comes up, and furthermore since I'm currently deaf it wouldn't help anything.

Promise scopes out the room, and writes, Hello. Call me Promise. Can you tell me about your magic?

Do you anticipate any interactions with my name being magically mine to begin with, unlike a mortal's? Do you offer any assurances that you won't use knowing my new name against me?

Can my new name possibly be unpronounceable or include parts that are?

"You must say your new name at the conclusion of the ritual. Therefore, no."

Could it have parts that are not, strictly, pronounced, but require elaborate movements or sorcery? The effect I'm after is for someone commanding me to speak my name either getting nothing or in so doing offering me more freedom than they expect.

The apellodyne thinks for a while. "I believe that concept requires scientific testing. I can prepare a ritual to rename a small object, and another to rename a small creature known as a dog. You can attempt to give them such a name and I will be able to tell whether the magic accepts it."

Okay. Will the general principle hold if I give the object and the dog names which do not take twenty minutes to 'pronounce' or should I come up with long ones for them if I want one for me?

"Extremely long purely spoken names act normally. My truename would take forty-five minutes to say. But to be safe I would suggest trying at least one long-form name before your renaming ritual. Do keep in mind that the name you choose will change you. I can direct the change to some extent, but what it means to you will also affect the result."

I'll try to pick something suitable, but can you go into more detail on how and how strongly people as opposed to fruit trees are affected by their names?

She has a long list of examples. Physical form is the most commonly affected thing, superficial habits and preferences can sometimes change (this is useful for removing chronic panic attacks and so on), but only rarely can someone's core personality be modified in any significant way.

I am perfectly happy with my physical form. How can I best avoid perturbing it, and if it does wind up perturbed can I put it back with sorcery without adverse effect?

"You must change something or the new name will not take. I can direct the change towards your habits and preferences instead, but this is not certain to work. I do not know what sorcery is capable of, but if your form changes it will be your natural form. Any magic to change it back must be permanent."

Sorcery can do permanent. I'd rather have to cut my hair and turn my wings green again or something than adjust to new habits and preferences. I have a tree which is magically connected to me. Is there a risk that it will no longer be mine in the right way when I am renamed?

"There is no precedent. We can create one if you can acquire a creature or object with a similar magical link."

Leaflets are, I think, unique in this respect.

"It is a property of your species? With proper preparations and some considerations to the structure of the name I can deliberately avoid modifying your race."

To the extent that a fairy kind is like a species, yes. I have a tree because of my kind.

"As long as you make sure the name in no way implies a change in your kind and I adjust the ritual slightly, I can keep that part of you completely stable."

All right. What advice do you have on name structure? Can I include variant "pronunciations" so that I may render different valid forms of it including, say, either explosions or dramatic temperature changes, as I please?

Promise (who still hasn't fixed her ears except while alone inside her tree, and still finds it weird to speak aloud while deaf and unable to moderate her volume) suggests learning to help plants along, or purify water, or make candied dewdrops.

He writes in fairylights, I'll try plants and water later, but how does one make candied dewdrops? They sound delicious.

You might be guessing that I take promises to others very seriously because of my nickname, but that's actually not what it's about. Barring discovering something unexpectedly horrible about you between now and then, though, I promise.

Let's go.

The apellodyne says something, pauses, then nods. It worked. Promise will find herself slightly taller, a little paler, and significantly better at the kind of concentration that lends itself to sorcery.

It's not the same? Is it not silver? she asks, taking the coin.

Maybe. Transmutation isn't a particularly difficult application of sorcery and you do have your sensory advantages on the ship, but knowing more about the substances can't hurt.

Does that mean you're not interested in getting a few science textbooks? Oh, and where might I find books on sorcery?

I would like the books. Sorcery books can be found in any respectable library. I have some, which you may copy while you're here but not take outright.

I would appreciate it. I just need to see each page once to fully copy them. I'll get you a pad with some books on it in exchange. It will take an hour or two to change it from a communicating device to a library device, though.

You can't render the science books in paper form?

Ironically, enough paper to print all the books I'm thinking of is more expensive than a library device, so I don't have enough in my ship right now. If you want me to print them I'm going to have to chop down a few trees and render them into paper. Maybe have you transmute ink as well.

I have ink and paper. I'm just concerned your device would break in some way before I could scribe everything on it out myself.

I'll have you know my devices are very reliable! He laughs, inaudibly. But I understand. The thing is 'all the books I'm thinking of' are enough to fill a library themselves if they're actually printed out. I'll pick and choose, cut the number down.

I can expand my tree. How many books are you thinking of?

The Standard Science and Engineering Library is 6732 volumes. Most are very long and complex and tedious but useful for specific applications, some are simpler and shorter, meant for children or new students.

It will take me a few days to grow my tree quite that large. ...And I'd like the tablet too in case it doesn't break and I have to move again.

Do you have enough paper and ink for all those physical books? Just getting the tablet is easier, and I build things tough. The noisemaker didn't break once in nearly a century, did it? Neither did the communicator. That's enough time to copy it all out if you really want to. And I'll probably be trying to find you again in another 70 years.

I don't have it all now, but I can make it. My method of copying is probably slower than yours.

Yes, it probably is. Would you mind if I read your sorcery books now? I'll print mine as quickly as you can deliver paper and ink. I'll send a remote-controlled cargo trolly to that clearing near your house, easier to move things that way.

Some of them are better than others, but there's no systematic sorcery-teaching book-editing arrangement.

And if everyone's a self-taught expert in their field, it's too much to hope that there's been any kind of systematic investigation into what sorcery is truly capable of, isn't it? That's the reason I'm able to have so many devices, you know, someone figured out the deep rules far beyond the obvious ones by looking at ordinary, naturally occurring mortal things like fire and rocks and growing plants and thinking very carefully about what it all means. And I've just convinced myself to do science to magic. What a preposterously stupid idea, since it means I'll have to stay in fairyland where sorcery actually works.

Well, with all these books on how science goes - which to go by your reaction are better organized and better written than sorcery books - perhaps I'll just do it myself.

This area isn't very crowded, and I have armor and weapons and a ship. I think I'll come back and stay for a few years after you de-age me and I leave to drop off my apellodyne and anyone else who doesn't want to risk being vasallized or be stuck in a ship for years on end back at their homes. I'd understand if you wanted me to be somewhere else. That big old cruiser would probably attract the wrong kind of attention eventually.

That, and I'm getting sick of being deaf all the time.

I don't really want to inconvenience you, but you quite reasonably won't tolerate any risk of me putting you under orders. Unfortunately for you, the reverse is also true and I am not about to volunteer to eat some of your berries. I'll leave you alone for a good twenty years at least once I'm young again. Incidentally, a few members of my ship's crew say they would like to be de-aged as well. I don't know if you'd be willing to get them on top of me, and I told them as much.

If you ate my berries it wouldn't help. Are you still unclear on how this works?

...Yes, apparently. I didn't have much chance to ask while staying as far away as possible from all fairies other than you, while searching for you. Please elucidate.

First thing, you fed me. You cannot unfeed me. I am your vassal as long as you live, which I don't think you've acknowledged as a factor regarding the trust involved in even learning to de-age you. Then you took my name, and then you gave me your name. But I'm still your vassal, I was even before you changed your name, I will be until you die. Food from a vassal is safe. You could gorge yourself on berries from my tree until you made yourself sick and nothing would change.

I would maybe have given you my name instead of taking food at all, but while Yellow wasn't smart enough to prevent all the avenues of getting it to you, my previous master was, and I was still under many of his orders at the time.

I'm not going to argue that you should linger here, certainly.

Thanks.

Sorcery doesn't seem like the kind of thing the method was designed to tackle, but it's at least interesting.

Devices and tools are the kind of thing science is especially good at. What if there is a way to make a tool that lets you map harmonics more easily? What if devices could do sorcery? Can you learn change the harmonics by changing your mindset? Tools, methods, and new perspectives like that are exactly the kind of thing science is best at. You know much more about sorcery than me, obviously, but even if it seems impossible I expect there are some ideas worth a little investigating in case there is something that's obvious if only you think about it a little differently, but you missed it and wasted 50 years of effort.

A harmonic mapping tool sounds great. I really don't think a device could do sorcery, though, and I've never heard of anyone managing to deliberately change harmonics directly instead of waiting for them to adjust on their own or in response to local plants and geography.

Safe compared to a random mortal, yes. Someone might decide to try to kill you instead of attempting to capture you. For the novelty of it.

I think this calls for an experiment. You seem to be a relatively accomplished sorcerer. Can I make an empty set of armor full of sensors and have you try to 'kill' it, to see how well it'd help?

You can, but I'm shy of two hundred years old and a library will have a better crop of sorcerers than a randomly chosen court.

Which she answers.

I'm not sure if apellodyne names require the whole thing like a natural fairy name does or just part of it like an ordinary mortal name does, replies Promise. But yes, if I knew your new name we'd be in a state of mutual vassalization again and I could turn my ears back on as long as I didn't think the apellodyne had told anyone nearby my new name.

That's a potential danger, yes. But I still have her killswitch, and she knows telling anyone your new name would constitute harming you. Would any old orders still apply as long as we remember them?

I don't think so. But it doesn't come up very often - fairies seldom forget names, and when they do, whoever they forgot usually runs away.

Nick paces and generally looks very nervous. I want to tell you. This - ruined trust is a terrible shame. But when I think about it I feel the same way I feel about death, sick fear that overrides any rational thought, any idea of fairness. I don't know what to do about it. I'm sorry.

It's obviously up to you. I'm satisfied with my existing precautions and we're managing productive trade.

He does seem to feel better at that. Have you made much progress studying de-aging mortals? Four other people on my ship are also interested in having it done to them. I'm hardly going to forbid it if you're willing to help them as well as me, though from what I've read it would be about three times as hard to learn five different targets.

I'd have to hang around them for a while. You I could probably de-age now.

Would you be willing to spend time near them? I haven't actually asked, but I doubt any of them would mind letting you watch them if you were learning to de-age them. I'm not going to push you into doing more work than you want, but I rather like the idea of saving a few lives. If you're willing and they're willing I'm hardly going to stop it.

I'm willing.

He nods and has a conversation into his devices. After about ten minutes, They all agreed. I'll rearrange their work schedules so they all have time off simultaneously, unless you can't watch them all at once anyway.

It's slightly but not overwhelmingly less efficient to look them all over at the same time.

Would it cost you less total time? That's my standard for efficiency in this case.

Yes, I'd just be ready to de-age the first one later.

Then arranging for them to all have free time at once at times convenient to you will be more efficient. I'll do that. When are you best available?

I don't have any fixed demands on my time but I do need time to, say, eat and sleep every so often.

How does... Three or four hours a day, starting six hours from now sound? They'll probably spend the time playing card games - three of the four make a habit of it. Let me know if there's something you need, except, obviously, any food from the ship that probably counts as belonging to the cook or something.

I won't need anything and that schedule sounds fine.

She sits nearby, watching them exist and incidentally trying to learn the rules to their games by observation.

She doesn't watch while he writes, but reads the card when he's finished. You're welcome, she writes in fairylights.

In my tree, she suggests.

He follows to her tree. I'm going to turn off all my cameras and sensors. It's very unlikely but theoretically possible that someone could gain access to them without me knowing about it. Can you do anything to stop other fairies from looking in here?

It's my tree. Nobody can go into my tree if I don't let them.

Alright. Will a small part of it do, you think, or do you need a significant fraction?

I don't know. If you start with a small part I can tell you if it snaps.

He takes a deep breath. He closes his eyes. Vinga.

That much works.

Are you still under the no-ordering-me orders from all those years ago? You may give me the reciprocal order of any of my orders you are currently under.

He nods serenely. I'm glad I forced myself to do this. Once burned, twice shy they say - but I'm the less trustworthy of the two of us, honestly.

What should I be looking out for? she asks, rubbing at one of her ears.

I betrayed your perfectly designed plan to escape Yellow. I tried to hide information from you when I arrived, even though I was trying to help you. I'm a paranoid and suspicious old ogre who never quite manages to think the world isn't out to get me.

"Well," she says, voice adjusting before the syllable's halfway out, "you did help me escape Yellow, and you brought me here too."

"I suppose I did. I still feel guilty about it, though. Coming back here seems to be calling back every underhanded, deceitful, or unfair thing I ever did. Even though you are clearly a good person who would not enslave me, deciding to tell you my new name was possibly the hardest thing I've ever done. Thank you for being a decent enough person to convince me to do it."

"You're welcome."

Nick smiles. "It was strange not to hear your voice. Well, as relieved and happy as I am right now I do actually have work to do back on my ship. Have a nice day, Promise."

"You too."

"...I'm considering letting you tell me not to lie about my name to you, but that won't work, if it changes I will actually be able to lie and say it's still the same. Is this a problem?"

"There's nothing to be done about it."

"We just plain speak. I don't know what it sounds like to you, just that it'll be right. Writing's the same way."

"That explains why. The computer was trying to look for patterns in the writing, the shapes that turn to letters that turn to sounds in my language. But it doesn't have an actual mind, it's just very good at following sufficiently specified instructions, so it can't make heads or tails of anything fairies write, apparently."

"You might have to get some mortal to transcribe it, then. I certainly can't help, everything I write would come out the same way."

"Maybe I'll do that, most everyone isn't very busy since the ship is just sitting there instead of flying places. I should really leave soon, I like this place but almost everyone else wants to go home. Any idea when you'll be ready to de-age the five of us who want it?"

"Another few sessions of sitting there watching them play cards should do it. You I could do now; I will if you like."

"Not quite yet. I haven't held up to age as well as most humans, so I'm taking lots of medicine. It needs to wear off first or it'll hurt me instead. I'll stop taking it now, and tomorrow morning should be enough time."

"Okay."

And tomorrow morning, he visits again. He's paler, slower, weaker, visibly in pain. "Good morning." (cough cough) "I'm ready to be young again. And I've started a few people transcribing books like you suggested, it was a good idea."

Promise looks him over, up and down, and then: he is de-aged to how old he was when she first met him.

He suddenly stands up straight. "Oh, thank you. I'd almost forgotten what it's like not to be in pain."

"That sounds unpleasant."

"Being human is rather unpleasant sometimes, yes. Our bodies aren't magically immortal like yours is. Medical technology has gotten very good over the last 200 years, but it only helps so much."

"Well, as long as I don't have reason to want you dead I'll de-age you on a regular basis."

"And I thank you for it. And I'm sure my crew members thank you for it. I'm a bit concerned that a great many more people will want de-aging, even after I explain the dangers of fairyland. And of course I can't give it to them myself without bringing them into the world and a couple decades of study to make sure I've got it right... But that's a problem for another day."

"I don't mind de-aging more mortals. I lead a pretty dull life most of the time now I'm safe."

"If I brought all the mortals in all the worlds who wanted it, you'd be watching them twenty four hours a day to learn their harmonics, and still not be able to get them all before the first ones were old again. I wonder if I could start a sorcery school for humans somewhere isolated."

"I'm not learning their harmonics. I can't observe their harmonics without doing other sorcery near them to measure and map the effect they have on a known background. But, yes, it sounds like there are too many mortals for me to personally de-age. I don't know what your standards for isolation are."

"Preferably large enough that we can build things and grow food and far enough away from any fairies that we can see them coming and generally not risk anyone being vasallized on either side... Climate wouldn't matter necessarily, though under an ocean would be difficult."

"The oceans are less populated than the continents, but not overwhelmingly so. Unfortunately, I'm not sure you will be able to tell how populated an area is from the air, and you probably want to be several continents away from the Queen, which means well away from anyplace I could confidently map for you."

"We can have a sealed dome to stop anything food-like getting in. And ways to suddenly evacuate and destroy our things once we leave, if necessary. It'd save so many people to have ten thousand mortals who know how to sorcerously heal aging. There are always risks, the question is whether the risks are worth it."

"It sounds it - the dome would have to prevent a sorcerer from just stepping through, though. I can walk through walls."

"I can do some experiments, see what might interfere with sorcery. This isn't something I'm planning to do tomorrow, after all, I've got about 60 years before I have to find you again or learn to de-age myself. Would you mind trying to be undetectable while near my ship? You're new at this compared to the queen's sorcerors, yes, but any information is better than no information."

"I can go invisible, inaudible, and unsmellable, but not insubstantial, harmonically neutral, or weightless."

"My ship has a large number of ways to detect things. You'll learn about most of them if you read the entire library I gave you. It can detect weight, it can detect any heat you give off, it can detect the patterns of air left when you fly, it can detect subtle changes in the air you breathe out, it can detect you by the fact that there's not as much air in the space you're occupying than around you... And so on and so forth. I want to make a list of what stuff I have that can find a sorcerer when she's trying to hide."

Nick makes interested sounds. When she moves he turns to follow. "Hm. I don't have everything I wanted to try me. I can tell you're somewhere here-ish..." He waves at her general area, "But not quite exactly where you are. Would you mind following me to the ship? Just stay here if so." He goes back to the ship.

She follows.

And once they're within a few hundred feet of the ship Nick reports, "Now I can tell where you are. That's interesting. Thank you, by the by, and do you want some of these sensors for yourself?"

She reappears. "Sure."

He pulls something off his belt. "This is the one that could tell the general area where you were. It's hard to explain how it works, but it detects all nearby objects in a small sphere. You use it by holding it and wanting to, it gives you an entirely new sense. The power cell will last, oh, a year. But I'll give you a few of em and maybe you can duplicate it with sorcery. I've got a few more scanners for you, just not with me right now."

Promise take the object and tucks it into her sash.

And Nick goes back into the ship. A few more days pass uneventfully. The card-game-playing mortals invite her to join them for a few of the easier games that don't require talking.

"I can hear again now," she says. "But sure, I'll play."

"Not too much longer. A few more hours."

"I can deafen myself again if it's hard to watch out for that. I didn't get enough to be a problem."

"Oh, so that's why you were deaf. That's probably for the best... I just know someone's going to forget. Sorry."

"That's actually not why, but yeah." She shuts her eyes; there are two faint pops. There.

And she de-ages all the card-players and bids them goodbye.

Nick asks, "Anything else you want from me before I leave? I'll be gone for at least ten years."

It may take me that long to work through all these books, she writes dryly.

And Promise goes to read her books.