Somewhere else a magical alarm triggers and a man scrambles up. 

:Get Farsight on it: he snaps to someone not in the room. :Check the wards - what was that...: 

A Farseer checks the ward location with the mage currently diving into the spell to see what, if any, magic just happened. (Sometimes there are false alarms for no reason.) 

They move their Farsight to the general location where Leareth's very comprehensive wards on the northern tundra think that something, they don't know what, just happened. 

A short woman wearing a dress made of leaves with assorted injuries and a pair of wings that also look like leaves is lying there on the permafrost, starting to go a little blue with cold, blinking and breathing but otherwise still.

This is passed on. 

:Get Aldrin: Leareth orders. Aldrin is a mage-Farseer who can Gate from Farsight but he's not at this facility. :Send a Healer through too, bring her - basement, I think: 

He could Gate himself and be there in seconds but he doesn't know who she is or how she got there - that wasn't a Gate, whatever it was - and she doesn't look entirely human and he's confused. Leareth doesn't like being confused. The basement is extremely well shielded, though, and also Nayoki is here. 

Aldrin is alerted by communication-spell and then Gated over from the other compound, that takes a couple of minutes, and then he Farsees the location himself, goes down to the basement and raises a Gate. 

The other end appears on thin air several yards away from the woman. Some people in warm-weather clothing pile through, one of them carrying blankets. 

Othersenses are immediately on alert. Is she a mage? Carrying any magic weapons? 

She is not a mage and is not carrying anything besides the dress she's wearing. She looks at them but doesn't say anything.

When she doesn't seem about to attack them, two of the Healers approach, cautiously. They get a blanket over her and check her over with Healing-Sight to gauge her injuries and whether she can be moved safely. 

She is EMPHATICALLY NOT A HUMAN. She's breathing through the wings as well as her nose, for one thing, and arguably is overall more plant than animal, though she has bones and blood where you'd expect those. She doesn't have a neck injury and doesn't seem to be getting worse and when they pick her up she weighs thirty pounds.

Some silent communications-spell questions and answers are exchanged while Aldrin holds the Gate. Then some Mindspeech. 

One of the Healers is a strong Thoughtsenser, and very cautiously opens and tries to get a passive read on the woman's thoughts. 

She is thinking:

She has no idea how these mortals got here. The blanket is kind of uncomfortable on her wings. Do they know what fairies are? Ugh why do people keep TOUCHING her stop TOUCHING her.

Huh.

"Can you understand me?" one of the Healers asks, rotating through a couple of different languages. 

Yeah she's not deaf but she can't reply, sorry random mortal. Why are you repeating yourself. Why are you repeating yourself AGAIN.

Mindspeech is exchanged. This is so weird. She can understand them even though she demonstrably isn't from here? She can't answer though? 

The mage checks with mage-sight whether she's under compulsions preventing speech. 

No compulsions are in evidence.

<Leareth, can we bring her over or not. I don't want to hold this Gate all goddamned day> 

Sigh. <You can bring her over. I am staying upstairs until we understand the situation better, though> 

Since apparently she understands all the languages they just used, one of the Healers tells her in Valdemaran that they're taking her across a Gate to somewhere indoors and less cold, and will treat her injuries there. 

Yeah, okay, she supposes that's probably better than just lying here until she's covered in a layer of ice for a few thousand years.

They take her through and it's much warmer inside. They lay her down on a padded cot. The blanket can come off so they can get a better look at her injuries (and because she apparently doesn't like it, though they don't say that out loud.)

"I am going to do some Healing," one of the Healers said. "I need to touch you for it, though. Can you - if you can communicate by blinking, can you blink twice now?" 

She thinks she can probably do that right now. Blink blink. Yeah there it goes.

All right. Yes-or-no questions, seems to work.

"Um, two blinks for yes and three blinks for no and I'll try to ask you some questions," the Healer says. (One blink seems too easy to get confused about.) Unfortunately most of their questions are not yes-or-no questions. "Is it okay if I touch you in order to Heal the broken bones?" 

She has to consider that a while. If this mortal is bad enough at healing to need to touch targets she probably has to get her hands all over them and squeeze and poke and prod, which sounds SO UNPLEASANT, but still probably couldn't possibly take more than an hour on the outside if they can get a spell off at all? And letting the bones heal by themselves will sure be weeks. On the other hand they're showing no sign of knowing how to let her move around so fixing the bones won't actually be all that helpful and getting felt up by an incompetent sorcerer sounds so miserable. She blinks three times.

Okay then. The Healer sits back.

The woman...seems pretty harmless and disinclined to hurt them so far? And not to be here to assassinate Leareth specifically? On the other hand she is obviously not human at ALL and what is she doing here and if she's not under compulsions why can't she move. Also it's very possible for someone not to be here to assassinate Leareth specifically and still to be part of some Power's scheme to do so. 

"Are you a nonhuman species?" the Healer asks. 

...she has wings. What are you, blind. Blink blink.

Okay, fair, it's kind of a silly question but what is she. "Are you a Changecreature?"

Doesn't know what that is. Blink blink blink.

The Healer, painstakingly, asks about several other species (unsurprisingly gets three-blink answers) and then starts asking if she's from Velgarth, or from this long list of individual countries. 

Meanwhile Nayoki slips into the back of the room and looks at the small winged woman with Mindhealing Sight. In case she's not under a compulsion, but is under something else. 

She is under SO MUCH something else.

Wow. Does it look like a block or set-command or literally any kind of Mindhealing technique she's used before. 

Sort of like set-commands, but sharper, smoother, cleaner, more discrete.

Okay that's so weird. 

She goes off to converse with Leareth privately. 

"Do you have any magical abilities?" the Healer asks the woman. 

Blink blink.

...Well, she's visibly not a mage and her aura doesn't look like a Gifted person's at all although it does look...weird. Everything about this is weird. And she can't ask more about what the magic powers do because apparently she's under a ridiculous amount of mind-control. There's been a great deal of conversation happening in Mindspeech and Leareth doesn't want Nayoki to try to do anything yet because, well, when someone shows up under an absurd number of not-set-commands, maybe there's a reason for that and they should understand the situation slightly better before they mess with it more. 

"Did you travel here deliberately for a specific reason?" the Healer asks. 

Three blinks.

"Did someone else send you here?" 

Blink blink blink. Nobody sent her and nobody will find her, either, tears are convenient that way if all you want is to be not-here...

"Did you just travel - somewhere, by accident or without a particular destination?" 

Blink blink.

"Well, you succeeded. And I think ended up very far away from - wherever-it-was you started. If you've heard of, er, Valdemar or Hardorn or Iftel, you're in that general region of the continent." Well north of it, actually, but Leareth is cagey about things in general and they're missing so much context here. "And we don't recognize your species or Gifts at all. I have no idea how you speak our languages." She doesn't even look like a Changecreature, not really, they're less alien than that. 

Sigh. A few more Mindspeech comments are exchanged silently. The Healer is mostly feeling very bad for the poor woman now, but Leareth is still being paranoid. Just like him. 

"Were you a prisoner before?" she asks. 

Blink blink. Isn't that kind of obvious. Also she doesn't speak any languages and has never heard of those places or this continent.

Upstairs, receiving updates by Mindspeech from the Healer keyed to the shields, Leareth paces.

On the one hand, there's a maybe-dangerous alien creature probably from another world in his basement right now. With some sort of magic that's probably entirely new to him, that he wants to know everything about. And who understands them but seems unable to communicate or do anything else because of mind-control.

The obvious solution is to take off the mind-control or at least some of it, but Nayoki didn't recognize it - like set-commands, she said, but not done by a Mindhealer - and she wasn't a hundred percent sure she could take it off safely. Also he doesn't know why it's there. They're pretty sure she wasn't sent here as an agent by someone who wants Leareth dead, at least, but that doesn't mean she isn't dangerous. 

He could coercively read her mind, or have Nayoki do it, but that sounds like a great way to have her never want to cooperate with anyone here ever. 

Sigh. 

:Aldrin, I am going to Gate out to the west bunker location and scry the room from there, in case she is in fact dangerous: It's possible she's the kind of dangerous that could follow his Gate, but there are a lot of shields against mage-energies between her and where he is now, she shouldn't even be aware of his existence (and her thoughts have shown no sign of it apparently), and just in case he can Gate in two steps, it's much less likely she could somehow follow both unless she has some sort of absurd past-sight. 

:All right. You want me to stay up here?: 

:Yes. I want Farsight on the room - I can key you to the shields - and immediately pass a message if anything untoward happens. Not to me, to the troop compound at Noku, they can relay it on: He takes a breath, lets it out. :I am going to have Nayoki talk to her about removing the mind-control safely, or some of it at least, so we can find out where in all hells she came from and why she is here: 

If she burns down his entire facility here or something he's going to be pretty irritated, but he does have backup copies of all the books elsewhere. 

He Gates out. 

Nayoki re-enters the basement and sits as well. She doesn't even know the woman's name, which feels very awkward right now, but oh well. 

"You are under some kind of mind-control, yes?" she says. "Preventing you from speaking or moving." 

She would not actually describe it as "mind control" if you asked her but it doesn't seem worth quibbling over. Blink blink.

"Did whoever was keeping you prisoner do that to you?" 

Blink blink. He is so so far away now. He'll have time to forget her name.

Interesting. Nayoki shows no acknowledgement that she picked up on that thought, though. "Are your magical powers dangerous if they are not controlled in that way?" 

She's not really sure what to do with that question? Of course sorcery can be dangerous? These mortals have some but maybe all they have is their teleporting thing and being really bad at healing, she's not sure. She will go with blink blink blink because there are obviously other ways to not be dangerous with sorcery such as not doing it or only doing kinds that are not dangerous.

"If we help you become un-mind-controlled, do you have any intention of hurting anybody here once you are freed from it."

Nayoki is going to guess 'not' from her (limited) sense of the woman so far. But she has the Haighlei variant of truth magic; it's not like the Heralds' truth spell, it's always there when she wants it to be. Even if she weren't passively reading the nonhuman woman's surface thoughts, she would know. 

Blink blink blink. He's not here and she doesn't even want to try fighting him, she'd lose.

Wow, Nayoki really wants to know who 'he' is now and whether he would be able to fight off a set-command to the face. This is a horrible way to keep someone imprisoned and she's mad at whoever did it. - She has to admit Leareth would totally do it if he thought there was a good reason, but he never has before this point. 

"I have a kind of mind-magic that can fix most forms of mind-control," she says, "and I want to do that for you, but I have not seen this kind before and also you are not human and your mind may be different. Do you know if there is a safe non-magical way to undo it?" 

Blink blink but also she's now pretty fucking tense. If they feed her, which they can because nothing is ever allowed to get between Thorn and his kinks, not even Thorn's own cleverness, they can let her go. But they have no idea what they're doing so who knows if they'll think of that, they haven't even wondered if she's hungry yet.

That's the weirdest kind of mind-control she's ever heard of, what. 

Also, now she has a quandary, which is whether to try to free this person sooner at the cost of revealing they're reading her mind. Which they'll presumably end up having to reveal eventually if she sticks around any length of time, and she's likely to be more pissed about it the longer they put that off, but also if they piss her off now they don't, actually, know anything yet. And Leareth told her not to contact him directly unless there was a true emergency, in case the person's unknown magic includes tracking and she turns out to be hostile. 

He also told her to use her judgement on talking to her and making her feel welcome, because Leareth really wants to know where she's from and how she got here and everything about her magic, and it seems more likely they'll get that with her active cooperation. Also they won't be able to keep her here against her will once she's not mind-controlled, and Nayoki has a hard time telling what does what, in there, so she can't let the woman talk without also letting her decide to pop out the same way she arrived here. Probably, even if she is pissed, she won't be hostile enough to the people who freed her to try to hurt them if they don't attempt to trap her against her will? And if they are, Leareth is in an unknown location right now and, knowing him, probably scrying from a distance to watch what's happening. 

Nayoki takes a deep breath. In her judgement, she's pretty sure lying to people is not optimal for getting along with them in the longer term, and fessing up sooner is better than clearly putting it off as long as possible, especially since this is a very natural moment for it. 

"The kind of mind-magic I have means I can read your surface thoughts," she says. "If we give you food we can then do something to free you? Enaka can get food for you now." 

She doesn't really hear the rest of the question because now she is trying to multiply 451 in her head by itself a couple times because that's where she left off when she last tried to calculate the cube root of ninety-four million. "Enaka" makes a little snap-ripple in her mind anyway.

Huh that's really obvious to Mindhealing-Sight and Nayoki has no idea what it is and doesn't like it. She passes on in Mindspeech that people should not say anyone's name in front of the stranger until they understand why her head does that. Fortunately no one else thinks this has happened at all until now. 

The Healer gets some buttered bread for the woman and tries to figure out how to offer it to her, given that it's unclear she can move. "If you are hungry I have food?" 

Responding to someone reading your mind by immediately filling your head with math is a really reasonable response and quite clever actually, but it's also so inconvenient! Nayoki hopes the woman will at least be paying enough attention to notice that they're trying to feed her and, like, maybe cooperate with this process at all. 

She notices the food - looks like, uh, she has no idea what it is actually but it smells edible - and doesn't stop with the math but sort of slows down at it, taking little moments between steps to consider if this is a good idea, they haven't hurt her but - no, that's Enaka, that won't work at all anyway, 452 times 452 is 204,304 and...

Nayoki is confused and then forms the hypothesis that it - has to be someone whose name the woman doesn't know? She can take the bread from Enaka and try offering it herself instead. 

They haven't hurt her. They have no idea what they're doing, but - well, her alternative is lying here in a heap for a few thousand years. Starving. So. Kind of a no brainer really. She opens her mouth.

Nayoki would really like to know what they're doing! For that it'd be helpful if the stranger could talk and inform them of how anything works where she comes from, because it seems to have nothing in common with the kinds of magic Nayoki knows. 

She pops the bread into her mouth and waits.

The fairy chews, and swallows, and doesn't really like the butter but thinks the bread's all right, and in between figuring out what 204,304 times 452 is, attempts to think loudly and clearly that 1) as soon as she can talk her new master should please STOP READING HER MIND, WHAT THE FUCK and 2) the phrase she's looking for might be "I rescind all your orders".

Great, that's really helpful. 

:Get her one of the shield-talismans for Thoughtsensing, please: she says to Enaka, because that seems like a friendly thing to do for someone who is understandably mad at you for reading their mind, even though it's not like they could gotten to the right set of actions very easily any other way. 

"I rescind all your orders," she says, and stops reading the woman's thoughts but does keep watching a bit with Mindhealing-Sight just to see what happens to all those not-set-commands. 

Enaka runs off to dig for one of the shields against Thoughtsensing. 

The not-set-commands melt away like they were never there, completely and instantly as soon as she finishes the sentence.

The fairy sits up. All of her injuries vanish. She stretches a little bit, as though testing the wholeness of her limbs.

Okay what, the Healer is thinking. 

"Can you tell us what is going on now?" Nayoki says. "- Oh, here. This is a magical talisman that blocks mindreading abilities. I have already stopped reading your mind because you asked, but I thought you might prefer more assurance of it." She's backed off on the specifics of Mindhealing Sight too; she's only watching in the blurred-out way that lets her gauge truth or falsehood. "Anyway. You should probably assume we know nothing of where you come from or how anything works there, because everything that has happened so far is baffling to me." 

She takes the necklace carefully without touching her. "Well, I don't know what it's like here, either. You seem to have some magic, which I didn't think worked in the mortal world at all."

"...Maybe the mortal world you speak of is a different place. We have many kinds of magic here. Is there a dangerous thing that happens if you touch people?" 

"I just don't like it."

"Oh. Sorry. What world are you from, if not the mortal world?" 

"Fairyland."

"I have never heard of that being one of our other planes. I suppose it might go by another name. What are Fairyland's properties? - By the way, do you need more food or water, or anything else?" 

"Water would be good. Food isn't safe unless I eat it straight out of your hand or hers."

Enaka gets up to bring her some water. 

"Myself because I gave you the bread, her because I - said her name in front of you? What kind of magic is that? I am very confused about it." 

"- do you want the long version or the short version?"

"Is there any risk of - pursuit from the place you escaped, or other time-sensitive risks, if we take the time for the long version?" 

"I don't think so."

"Then I would like the long version, please." 

"For any pair of people at least one of whom is a fairy it is possible for a relationship called vassalization to exist; one party is the vassal, the other the master, though it's possible for people to be mutually vassals. This relationship can be created when and only when none previously exists with strongly claimed food, and the party who eats it is the vassal; it can also be created with knowledge of someone's name and then the person whose name is known is the vassal."

Nayoki's brow wrinkles. "So - right now you are the only fairy in the room. And - I gave you food, so I am your master, and I let slip the Healer's name, so now you are her master and she is the vassal?" 

"Right. That's why you could rescind my orders."

"So we should not let you learn anyone's name or else they will become your vassal? What - does it mean for Enaka, that she is your vassal already?" 

"She can't hurt me. And if I were going to order her to do anything she'd do it. And it doesn't change anything if I eat food she brings me."

"...Could I theoretically order you not to give her any orders? I am guessing you do not intend to do anything harmful with that - power - and I am not going to put new mind-control on you if it is completely unnecessary, but in principle." 

"Theoretically," says Promise.

"She was not going to hurt you anyway, she is a Healer. ...You refused treatment, earlier, is that because Healing magic in your world does not work very well or something? I thought maybe you had Healed yourself before, but also that the injuries might be part of the orders I rescinded somehow." 

"Orders cannot themselves spontaneously cause injuries. Healing sorcery works fine and is what I did. She said she'd have to touch me."

"Healing in our world works by Seeing what is wrong in the body and then Healers can set it right, I think skilled Healers can do it without touch but it makes it much harder. - Does your magic interact with being touched in some way, or is that purely a preference you have?" 

"You already asked about that. I just don't want anyone to touch me."

Nayoki lifts her hands. "Fair enough. Anyway. You were previously kept prisoner by someone in Fairyland, who I assume was your master there and - had you under all of those horrible orders to not move and such?" 

"Yeah."

"Is that - normal, there?" 

"Not the details."

"But you think he cannot find you here, right." 

"Right."

"What kind of magic did you use to come here?" 

"I think it was a tear. They're sort of like gates but disappear once someone's gone through one. If he looks for me at all he'll expect me to have gone to the mortal world, which is understood to have mortals, like you, but no magic last I heard."

"Huh. Is that a kind of magic someone else casts, or a natural phenomenon?" 

"I'm not sure. I don't know how to make a tear."

Nayoki nods. She sits back and tries to think over what the right questions even are to ask, here. What other magic the woman possesses, of course, but...she's missing some steps here... 

"...Um, do people in your world usually go by pet names or something, if names have power like that? Is there something I should call you?" 

"We use nicknames, yes. I'm Promise."

"Promise." Nayoki smiles at her. "You can call me, hmm. Sunspring." It's the name of her hometown, in the Haighlei tongue. 

"Okay, Sunspring." She looks at Enaka.

"Oh, should I have a nickname too even though you know my actual one?" 

"It's customary. I'm not going to make you."

"Umm, sure, you can call me Sapphire then." 

"Nice to meet you."

Nayoki waits for introductions to be complete and then sits back in her chair. "I want to ask you more questions about your magic - and tell you about ours - because I think we are still missing a lot here and I do not want to trip over it. But - what do you want, from here? I am guessing you do not care to go back to Fairyland, given..." Vague hand gesture. "Do you need some time to rest and get settled? You just got out of a bad situation, it sounds like." 

"Uh, I might want to go back to Fairyland. Where I can... eat the food without someone having to hand-feed me. Just, I'd go to another continent, wait a few hundred years till he won't be staking out my tree any more, go get a cutting of it."

Nayoki nods. "- Your tree?" 

"My kind of fairy start in trees."

"I wondered about your body!" Enaka/Sapphire says, sounding pleased with herself. "You seem half plant or something, it it fascinating." 

"What purpose does your tree serve now?" 

"I lived in it. And I can reshape it and nobody can get in if I don't want them to."

"Huh. I wonder if we could help you get a cutting of it sooner. Depending what forces he has staking it out."

Nayoki frowns, thoughtful. Leareth wanted the strange nonhuman not to know anything of his existence until they'd established a bit more of what was going on, here, but she's starting to feel like they're getting to that point. 

She takes a deep breath. "I work for someone who sensed the magic from your sudden arrival in his territory, which is why people quickly came to retrieve you. He was alarmed at first, most sudden incursions from elsewhere in our world would be hostile, but your landing here seems unrelated." She's not sure of that but it doesn't sound like something any of the gods Leareth knows of could have arranged. "Separately he is very curious about your magic and particularly about the indication that other worlds exist, and - I believe would be willing to trade substantial resources and aid in exchange for knowing more."

"I don't think it's wise for you guys to tangle with Thorn."

"Noted. Was he - even using your magic for anything to advance his goals? He did not seem to have left you very capable of doing things." 

"I was capable of more things when I went through the tear but doing that triggered some anti-escape contingencies. He has lots of sorcerers, lots of them better than me."

Sigh. "I do not like the sound of this person at all, but L–" no names, "but the person I work for will not go fight him if it is a stupid idea. What are sorcerers and what kinds of things can sorcery do?" 

"A sorcerer is... someone who knows how to do some things with sorcery, pretty much. You saw me heal myself. I can do lights and gates and transmutations and grow plants and purify water and candy dewdrops and stuff."

"So a little like a mage in our world, except your magic is clearly different. Candy...dewdrops...?" 

"They're tasty."

"That is so odd and specific! Does feeding them to someone make them your vassal?" 

"No, pure-enough water is safe and the candying magic doesn't change that."

"Huh. Are there kinds of magic user other than sorcerers, in Fairyland? Or, hmm, kinds of being other than fairies?" 

"No and not except for captured mortals."

Well, that's simpler than it could have been. "Who captures mortals and why?" 

"They're a sort of status symbol. Can't eat anything safely, so if one wanders through a gate someone'll get them sooner or later."

Nayoki makes a note of that and frowns again, confused. "But you can eat the food safely there and not here?" 

"Fairies can occasionally get each other foodwise but not usually, it has to be a strong claim pressed promptly. Mortals eating fairy food or vice versa it's much stronger."

"That is so odd. Is the food magically different?" 

"I'm not sure what you mean."

"What is the mechanism of the food having different effects on fairies versus on mortals? Is it something mage-sight could observe or is it - somehow not that kind of thing?" 

"I don't know what mage-sight is."

"Do sorcerers have an ability to sense other people's magic when it is being done near them?" 

"Not if it's... I don't know, on the other side of a wall? I'd notice if there were a light in front of me and I didn't put it there."

"But you see only the light itself, not the fact that magic is happening directly?" 

"Right."

"Hmm. Well, we have another kind of sense that is specifically for magic. I think your tear must have showed up to it, that is what the wards detected. Your orders from Thorn did not show up as magic but they were visible to my Mindhealing Sight, which is a different kind of Sight - like Thoughtsensing, which is blocked right now by your talisman, but it shows only the structure of minds and not any of the content." 

"...the structure?"

"I am not looking anymore since there is no reason to, but - sort of like this." She gets a piece of paper and sketches the outline of what her Sight sees. "Unless I am trying to get details, which I was not, it is mostly just an overall shape. And then your orders looked like this." She draws an approximation of the not-set-commands on top. It's kind of a terrible drawing, Nayoki is not artistically talented. 

"Hm."

"Most Gifts on our world come with Sight. Healing-Sight shows the insides of bodies, for example, and Empathy reads emotions - neither of us here has that one. Farsight is a Gift that lets you see things far away, although this can also be done by a mage, with a spell called scrying. Fetching moves objects, we are not sure if it has Sight..."

She goes through the full list of known Velgarth Gifts. 

"I don't want anyone doing Empathy or Mindhealing or the singing one to me either."

"Good to know, thank you. Does your world's sorcery include any powers like those ones, or no?" 

"Mental sorcery is possible but very obscure."

Nod. "Do you have other questions about our magic? I am still trying to figure out which things are possible with sorcery but not here - I am not sure what transmutation does...?" 

"It turns a substance into another substance."

"Like turning sand into glass by heating it, or more general than that?" 

"I don't heat things up but I can do sand to glass. I've mostly worked in metal before."

"I am still not sure if that means changing the shape of the metal or purifying metal from ore - both of which our magic can do - or if you can, for example, turn metal into glass, which our magic cannot do." 

"I can't do metal into glass, just metal into metal. Like iron into gold or whatever."

"Our magic cannot turn one metal into another metal either. That is quite remarkable." 

"If you say so."

Nayoki nods, thoughtful. "Anyway. Are there precautions that mortals can take to operate safely in Fairyland?" 

"I wouldn't tend to recommend it. Why?"

"Well, when one is trying to solve very complicated problems in a world with limited resources, and it turns out there is another world out there, the obvious next question is whether it has resources that would help with our world's problems." This is almost word-for-word what Leareth said to her before leaving. "It - changes a great many things, if there are other worlds at all. The person who I work for thinks it calls for a full re-evaluation of what is possible and what strategies are available to him." 

"I suppose it's very interesting that there is here, wherever here is, when I wasn't expecting it, likewise. You have a complicated problem?"

"Many of them, really. It would be his decision whether to tell you more details, I think, but that is why he was especially interested in learning more about you, despite the initial alarm. He is elsewhere right now since he was not sure if you were dangerous and what your intentions here are." 

"I don't even know who he is, I can hardly have specific plans about him."

"Well, yes, we know that now. It was not immediately obvious, and also this world contains some Powers which have a tendency to use people as Their pawns, and he prefers to be very careful." 

"Powers?"

Nayoki seems to think hard for ten seconds before answering. "Gods. Does Fairyland have gods?" 

"No."

"Well, our world does and They are rather obnoxious much of the time. The region we are in currently is mostly free of Their influence, which is why we operate here even though it is suboptimal territory in other ways." 

"What do they do?"

"Meddle by creating inconvenient coincidences, usually. If you want to know more, it may be simplest at this point for me to find out whether he is willing to come here and talk to you directly, since he is much more an expert on this subject than I am." 

"...okay."

"I will go speak with him." Nayoki heads out. 

The Healer asks if Promise needs anything. 

"Water? Also I don't know how convenient it will be for you and Sunspring to be available to feed me, so if that's going to be only sometimes available, I should eat now. ...something more like, uh, a plant? Than the thing from before, which wasn't much like a plant."

"Like, vegetables, you mean? Bread is made of flour from grain, so it's from a plant originally, but I guess there's a lot of steps, and butter is from cow's milk so not a plant. I can make you up a meal that's mostly vegetables and beans or something. I don't know what your other nutritional needs are." 

"Vegetables and beans are fine."

The Healer assembles her a plate of mixed vegetables and beans with seasonings, carefully taking it from the dishes in the dining hall that don't contain any meat or milk or eggs, and brings it to her. 

Promise cooperates with the indignity of being hand fed.

"What actually happens if you eat food off this plate normally?" she asks, curious. No wonder Promise wants to go back to Fairyland if it's the only way she can eat by herself again. 

"Maybe nothing but maybe I find that random people involved in growing or harvesting or preparing it can give me orders."

"Oh dear, that does seem not ideal." Enaka/Sapphire willingly hand-feeds her as much of the plate as she wants, and leaves her a water jug and cup. 

Promise does some magic to the water but at least can pour and drink it on her own.

And about half a candlemark later, someone else enters the room with Nayoki. 

"Promise," he says to her. "I understand your arrival here was accidental, but nonetheless, welcome to Velgarth." 

"Thank you."

"I am curious how exactly your name-magic works. If the name I go by here is one I chose for myself, not one I was born with, does that count, or is it a nickname for your purposes?" 

"That's a nickname. But if it shares a syllable that's risky."

"It does not." It's entirely unrelated to the name his original body once bore, which no one alive now can connect to him; it was chosen for a word in ancient Kaled'a'in, meaning 'the night sky' or 'the stars.' "You can call me Leareth." 

"Okay. That's a good nickname."

He smiles slightly, then sits down. 

"I am trying to decide how best to approach this. I - am quite invested in learning more about your world, because discovering the existence of another world seems like one of the most important things that has ever happened, and - it may offer better solutions to Velgarth's problems than the ones I had available before, so it calls for significant reevaluation. I also have considerable resources that may help with your problems, whatever those are, and - obviously the best position from which to learn about another world, is one where I can be allied with a native. However, we know very little about one another right now, and so I am not yet comfortable sharing sensitive information with you, and I expect you might have hesitations as well." 

"It depends what you mean by sensitive information."

"Strategic information on my plans, mostly, in cases where secrecy is key because various people - or gods - will interfere if there is any opportunity. I am not ruling out telling you at some point, and there are many less specific things I am willing to share that will, I hope, let you make your own evaluation." 

"I meant for me, but all right."

"Ah. Fair enough. I am not sure what you would consider sensitive, but - my point is that I understand if you would be reluctant to tell me certain things before you know what I would do with that knowledge. And - I am judging it incorrect, here, to try to learn things against your will." 

"Thanks." She fidgets with her amulet.

Leareth pauses for a while, thinking. "Do you have a way to return to Fairyland with magic, if you wish to?" 

"It might take a while."

"This world also has magic which may be able to achieve this, though it is likely to require extensive research." 

"It won't take an extensive research while."

"Ah. Well, that is something." Leareth and sits back in his chair. "I do have more questions about your world. There are multiple kinds of fairy, correct?" 

"Right. I'm a leaflet."

Nayoki writes this down. 

"Right. And this means you come from a tree, and the tree you come from has some special properties, such as your being able to reshape it at will and being a safe place for you? Are there other properties that leaflets have which are not universal among fairies?" 

"Each leaflet is immune to some specific kind of sorcery. I don't know if there are duplicates or not. Plus we look different - the wings, every fairy has wings but they vary - and also we're among the more mortal-looking."

"Fascinating. What are the kinds of sorcery, for that purpose - also what kind are you immune to?" 

"I've never actually met another one and I don't want to tell you. Respectively."

"Fair enough." Slight smile. Leareth pauses; he has a lot of questions and is trying to put them in order. "Do mortals from your 'mortal world' look the same as us here?"

"I've only seen one but you look like the same sort of thing, and like the pictures, yes."

Nod. "Interesting. I wonder why. Anyway, what are the kinds of fairy other than leaflets?" 

"I don't know them all, there are so many. There's - glowgolds and patient mossies and pollenclouds and painted tailwings and, uh, razorfeet, and berrybushes, and - there's so many."

Nayoki tries to write all of those down but can't keep up at all. 

"That is a great many! Hmm. I am curious to hear more about their differing traits, for the ones you know that about." 

"Of those glowgolds and razorfeet are breeding kinds... I think glowgolds like to leave their children in the mortal world and steal mortals directly from there, sometimes. They glow. Razorfeet are kind of mean or at least the colony that lived near me was. Patient mossies can turn themselves to stone for predetermined intervals whenever they like and they often do that when people are bothering them. Pollenclouds give off pollen, inhaling that can work like a food claim, and they're little -" She gestures about ten inches high. "Painted tailwings - I forget actually what the one I knew could do, it must not have been very good - pretty wings though. Berrybushes have antlers and grow berries on them, those are strong food claims. Knifewings have claws and sharp wings and they can claw through any material they want. Some fairies aren't kinds, they're one-offs, but I've never met any of those, they're very rare... Creekpearls exist and I'd recognize one but I don't know much else about them... broadears can hear from far away, dewflowers heal fast, shrublies I don't know what they do, sunshine tepals are breeders but I don't know if they have anything else..."

Scribble scribble wow that is a lot of information at once. 

"Do you know where fairies come from and why there are so many varieties of them?" 

"It depends on the kind where we come from, leaflets do the tree thing. I don't know, like, why fairies exist at all."

Leareth nods. "What sort of society do fairies have? Are there cities, do the different kinds live together in groups...?" 

"Not really cities, I don't think courts tend to get that big. Different kinds live together as often as not but usually a breeder colony is all that one kind."

"Breeder colony?" 

"A court of fairies of a kind that breeds."

"And a 'court', does that refer to a structure of vassal fairies under a master?" 

"Yes. They're mostly not as bad as Thorn's, but."

Leareth glances at Nayoki. "N– er, Sunspring said that you did not recommend we tangle with Thorn. Does he have considerable resources?" 

"He collects sorcerers and most of them are older and better than me."

"What are his - goals - in doing that?" 

"We're pretty generically useful? It makes people reluctant to mess with him, means if he wants something it's easy to have his vassals arrange it even if they have to trade for it, makes the court more defensible."

"I see. What sorts of threats do courts need to be defensible against?" 

"People trying to take the members for their own courts, mostly."

"Do other courts also tend to fight with sorcerers?" 

"It's not that any of this is very common, but sure."

"I see. What sorts of things do courts trade with each other for?" 

"Books, vassals, art, plant cultivars... why?"

"I am mostly still just asking general background questions about how your world is arranged, since it seems rather different from this one, and the existence of other worlds at all is an important discovery so I wish to know more." 

"It's not all that much safer for mortals to mess around in other less Thorn-occupied parts of Fairyland."

"You said that, but - it seems like giving up far too soon to ignore the existence of another world simply because it is risky for people of my species." Slight sigh. "Would you - or perhaps other fairies - be open to trade with this world, if there were transport between them? I am not sure if that has happened previously with the mortal world you already knew of." 

"...for your books and so on? I... guess? I mean, people don't trade with the mortal world, but if you wanted to make it really easy somehow you'd get takers."

"Hmm." Leareth looks thoughtful. "If this world were to make trade very easy, would that in itself attract the negative attention of Thorn or others?" 

"You could do it on a different continent but I assume there are people like him anywhere."

"It does seem that the vassalage system would advantage people like that. Do you know of any helpful court leaders, in other regions?" 

"Haven't traveled much. I was twelve when he got me."

Wince. "How did that happen?" 

"I don't really want to talk about that right now."

Leareth considers this unsurprising. "Anyway, do you have questions for us now?" 

"What do you... do... here? What is this group of mortals I have landed on about."

"It is somewhat complicated. The most direct answer is that we are trying to fight the gods. The reason is because They, almost universally, seem to dislike innovation and progress that improve the lives of mortals, and so my earlier attempts to found kingdoms that were better places to live tended to be stopped, and I think I cannot win that fight without taking it directly to Them. The specific plans and strategies are not something I wish to share, and also - may be subject to change, given the new information. Most of the people at this particular facility do magical research, mainly god-related." 

"Huh, okay. You have satellite facilities?"

"It is a much larger organization than just the people here! We have a considerable military presence, for example; one reason why is that this area is not claimed by any gods, but I do not take for granted They would not like to claim it, if I left that option possible." 

"Which you fend off with a military? I don't know much about what mortal militaries are like..."

"They have mages and other Gifted people with combat training, and un-Gifted soldiers with non-magical weapons, usually. And horses. The gods here cannot do large miracles in the material world very efficiently, so Their interventions often included nudging a different mortal kingdom's army into inconveniencing me." 

"What's a horse?"

"A large quadrupedal animal that runs much faster than humans, and can bear us on its back if trained to do so." He can show her with a casual illusion. 

"That's disturbing," she says of the horse.

"They can be quite dangerous! They are mostly tame and friendly, though. Hmm - does Fairyland have any livestock, either for transport or food?" 

"Fairyland doesn't have animals."

"Really - not at all? That is quite a significant difference. Not even insects?" 

"Nope. There are fairies who've been turned into animals, but while I know the spell I haven't actually seen the results."

"That must be a fascinating ecosystem. Is there plant life other than the trees that fairies come from?" 

"Sure, lots and lots of plants."

"Huh. - Sorry for all the very mundane questions, I am just trying to make sense of this other world." 

"I don't mind talking about plants."

Nod. "Anyway, that is a digression. Did you have further questions about this world?" 

"Do you have stairs? Can I see them? I've heard them described but it didn't make sense."

"Stairs!" Nayoki Sunspring (she's trying to think of herself by that name now to avoid slipping up) looks so amused. "We do, yes. You can come look at our stairs if you want." She stands up. 

"Does Fairyland have buildings?" Leareth says curiously. 

"Sure, some places, but not stairs." She flutters along, landing sometimes to compensate for her minimum flight speed being a bit faster than walking pace but seldom taking steps.

Outside the long, mostly empty basement room that she was in before, there's a hallway, lit by a couple of lanterns. Leareth provides extra lighting with a mage-light above their heads. 

Then there's another door, and then there are stairs! They're narrow, carved of stone and not quite polished to a smooth finish; they go up a dozen steps and then there's a landing where the stairs turn around and keep going. The "ceiling" above the first set is slanted, which turns out to be because there are more stairs running above it after the next landing, but Leareth stops there and opens the door. 

"What do you think? I apologize, this building is not very designed with flight in mind." 

"Wow, that's not what I was picturing... uh, it does seem like it'd be hard to fly in the stairwell."

"Stairwells can be made much more spacious than this, but - yes, stairs are very much designed for people with feet, and not with wings. I am guessing an open elevator-shaft without stairs in it would suit you far better." 

"Yeah, that's what multistory buildings in Fairyland have."

"Wow. Incredible." He seems oddly delighted by that. "I always wondered how a civilization where everyone had flight would end up differing from ours." 

"Do you have guesses I should be confirming?"

"Hmm. I am guessing you do not have roads, and...probably this affects the placement of buildings in a town, but also your entire societal structure is different than ours, because of the court and vassalage framework. How are goods transported for trade? ...Oh, Sunspring did mention 'fairy gates'..." 

"No roads. Not really... towns, either, I guess you could call big courts towns but it's not typical. Gates aren't used to transport within Fairyland because a gate goes between Fairyland and the previously-known mortal world, where sorcery doesn't work, not point to point. You also seem to be expecting... much more trade than there is? Are humans just really into trading things on large logistically complicated scales?"

"Yes. Most human civilizations at this point are organized in large states, and have considerable trade both internally and with other nations, it is the only way to really get specialization of labour and goods that require advanced craftsmanship, and also raw materials of various sorts, for building or for pottery or weapons or jewelry, are often found only in some regions. Not to mention most crops only grow in certain climates. Many spices that humans like to put in our food only grow in Seejay or further south - oh, for reference that is around a thousand miles south of here." 

"Huh, if I liked something that didn't grow near me I'd get a little of it and use magic to make it grow anyway."

"We also do that here! Probably different magic, ours cannot make plants grow directly but we can use weather-barriers to make greenhouses that replicate a climate further south. On a small scale, though, because most humans are not mages." He's frowning, thoughtful. "You said sorcery does not work in the mortal world you knew of, but - your sorcery does work here?" 

"Yes. I wouldn't have bothered trying it if I hadn't seen you doing magic but you did and my understanding had been mortals didn't have any."

"Hmm. That is very interesting." Leareth falls silent, thinking. 

"Does Fairyland have gods?" 

"Just fairies."

"Lucky you," Leareth says dryly. "Not that your world seems to lack problems, exactly, so perhaps it does not help that much." 

"Fairyland isn't especially nice, no."

Sigh. "I would like to help. I disprefer when anywhere contains an equilibrium with that much unpleasantness. It sounds fraught for mortals to attempt operations there, though." 

"You can't safely eat there, yeah."

"Can you bring food grown in the mortal world, or does that also become unsafe once it is in Fairyland?" 

"I think that's safe if you can make sure it isn't tampered with."

"If our magic works in Fairyland, as sorcery does here, that seems feasible. Are there additional dangers to mortals there, aside from having your name become known, or I suppose the offensive magic that sorcerers in a court would have?" 

"I think magic - kind magic and sorcery both - and names and food are the bulk of it, though it's not actually impossible for fairies to, like, stab people, it's just not typical."

"And I would guess they do not possess a particular advantage at stabbing, relative to mortals?" He stops. Leans forward a bit. "- Are fairies immortal? I had somehow not thought to question what the word choice here implied." 

"Yes, we are."

"Huh. That - makes sense? Are you just unaging, or are you also impossible to kill?" His lips twitch. "I think Sunspring and I are both jealous either way." 

"We can't die."

"Wow." 

"Is the fairy population stable, or growing? It was not obvious what the rate was of new fairies being– I suppose not 'born', exactly, but coming into existence by whichever method." 

"Some breeders are probably born. Everyone else we say we 'start'. The population's growing but I don't know how fast."

"How large is Fairyland?" 

"It goes on forever."

"...I see. That would make a constantly growing population less of a problem. Our world is not infinite and theoretically it would be possible to overpopulate it, eventually, if everyone were immortal and also children were still being born." 

"We're on one of those round things? A planet?"

"Yes. You have heard of planets, then - is this other mortal world also a planet?" 

"Yes. They call it Earth."

"Do you know much about what Earth is like, aside from lacking magic?" 

"Not that much, and all of it second- or thirdhand."

Nod. "I think I need some time to consider this. Do you need anything else right now?" 

"Am I staying in that room I was in downstairs?"

He glances at Nayoki. "If you prefer to? We also have actual guest rooms and you would be welcome to have one of those for now. And a library, if you like books. Sunspring could give you a tour of the facility if you wish." 

"I like books. And a tour seems like something I should do sooner or later."

:Nayoki, make sure you let her see books that would only contain the names of people who are dead now: Leareth tells her privately. This shouldn't be hard. Most of the books in his collection are more than a century old. Some of them have his previous incarnations' chosen-names on them, but if 'Leareth' didn't count, then neither will any of them; he thinks back quickly if any share syllables with his original body's name, but none were selected in any way related to that one. He asks one of his staff to go check now and remove any that are phonetically close, though, just in case. 

Nayoki also asks someone in private Mindspeech to go check the book index and remove any written more recently than a century ago, and then she can take Promise on a tour of the dining hall and show her the guest rooms and the public Work Room spaces (not the locked private offices or research setups.) 

Promise looks curiously at the human foods - so much of it does not look like food to her - and wants to know what the Work Rooms are for.

"For testing new forms of magic in! Some kinds of our magic explode if done wrong, or are dangerous in other ways, so it is customary to practice in shielded rooms."

Sunspring is also curious what fairy food looks like, if not like human food! 

"Well, it's all plants, and different ones. Fruits and nuts and leaves and roots and flowers and nectar and juice and such."

"Humans also eat all of those things! Those greens are leaves, carrots are roots... I suppose our foods are generally cooked and mixed together, so are less recognizable." 

"I'm used to eating most things raw. Sometimes I'd heat stuff up, or chill it, but not usually."

"I wonder why that is different! I suppose humans often get more nutrition from foods that are cooked, and also find them tastier. Is it inconvenient to light fires or use magic to heat things in Fairyland...?"

The library is now confirmed free of the names of any living people, and also of current royal families known to reuse the same names a lot for their descendants, so Sunspring can take her there.

Although she should check... "Promise, if you read a name in a book, and it is the name of a mortal who is long dead, but also is purely coincidentally the name of someone far from here you have never met, that is not the same as knowing their name and thus becoming their master, right? Humans in this world reuse names sometimes." 

"I don't know how I'd do it without magic and a lot of fairies don't bother learning sorcery so maybe all the plants have been cultivated to taste good raw," Promise says. And of the books, "Yes, I have to specifically entertain the hypothesis that a specific person's name is or contains a specific syllable before it will click."

"Ah. Good to know." Sunspring's blurred-out background Sight still lets her see that Promise is telling the truth here. 

She opens the door. "Well. This is our library." 

It's not that large, but the shelves contain thousands of books, discreetly shuffled a bit to make the spots where books were removed less obvious, and it has a couple of writing-desks and some cozy chairs by a fireplace. 

Promise scans titles, stepping slowly shelf to shelf. "This is a lot of books."

"Leareth is quite proud of his collection! Many of these ones are very rare, too, I think in some cases Leareth is the only one with copies." (Because he's Leareth, of course, everything here also has backup copies in various hidden records caches, which in general only he knows about.) 

"I've seen this many books in one place before but only once." She picks a book about magic.

Magic! 

In Velgarth, 'true magic' is often used as a term to refer to work done with mage-gift, and then there are the various more specific and single-purpose Gifts. Many places lump all of said Gifts together under 'mind-magic', even though some of them, like Fetching which moves or teleports objects, are really not very mind-related at all. 

The book gives a list of the specific Gifts, most of which are pretty self-explanatory from the name and also match the list discussed with her before, and then it dives into the many, many applications of mage-gift. Gates! The much rarer permanent Gates! Weather-magic! Heating and lighting and protective barrier-walls. Illusions. Detection wards. Shielding against all of the other Gifts. And, of course, a very long list of combat applications, starting simple with fireballs and levinbolts (this seems to just describe lightning as cast by mages) and moving on to various clever trap-spells, like ones that paralyze an enemy who steps on the trap. 

There's a sub-chapter on the summoning of extraplanar entities, which can be done by any mage above Master-level potential, but requires extensive specialized training to do skillfully. Elemental spirits from the four planes of Fire, Earth, Air or Water, and also Abyssal demons, can be given material-plane bodies constructed of mage-energies, which they control, and they bring some of their native magical abilities with them. Many air-spirits have an affinity for sensing minds and intent, for example, and fire elementals are very efficient at, well, starting fires. There's a kingdom in the far northwest of the continent that supposedly fuels its cookfires via mages making a contract with salamanders; they need to be paid in mage-energies, but on the ice and tundra, mage-energy is a lot cheaper than firewood. 

Combat use of demon-summoning is frowned upon in most of Velgarth, because the demons are indiscriminate about who they attack, and tend to cause high civilian casualties. The priesthood of Karse are known to have used this strategy anyway in their many wars of conquest over the centuries, and also to have passed off salamander-summonings as miraculous signs from their god, Vkandis Sunlord. 

Huh. She supposes they weren't expecting that to be Vkandis's real name.

She finishes the book anyway. When she's finished with this one she looks for one with more detail on the extraplanar entities.

Nayoki hangs out nearby in the library in case she has questions, but eventually starts reading her own book. 

There is a book that has more information about extraplanar entities. It's mostly very technical magical discussion of summoning and binding spells, but it also has pictures of the construct-bodies traditionally given to these visitors. The earth-elementals tend to look like lizards; the Abyssal demons have random, bizarre body plans that are mostly way too many eyes and claws and teeth attached together in disconcerting ways. The planes aren't really made of the material-plane substances or phenomena they're named for; it's more a vague thematic resemblance, and gestures at what material-plane features the planar entities have a particular affinity for. Water elementals, for example, can sense weather and climate patterns with surprising accuracy, despite mostly not perceiving the material plane directly at all. 

That's interesting but not really what she wanted to know. The elementals are smart enough to bargain with, what are they like as individuals?

There's not a lot of information in this particular book about that, but there is some, sprinkled in amongst all the technical magic explanations. 

They vary in intelligence; some, like the vrondi air-elementals or sandaar fire-elementals, can keep their end of simple magically-binding voluntary agreements, but are probably no smarter than, say, mice. Others, like the khamsin earth-elementals or fire-elemental salamanders, can learn simple words to communicate with humans or other sentient creatures in the material plane, and a forgotten mage a long time ago taught them some of his language; it's now a universal dialect that the elementals apparently share with one another, that all the schools of magic which lean on elemental summoning now teach to their students.

The smarter elementals seem capable of recognizing individual humans, and will develop something-like-loyalty to those who treat them well and fairly, answering their summonings reliably. They don't have names but can usually be recognized by features of the construct-body that they build for themselves out of the offered mage-energies of the summoning. Some mages claim that different individuals have recognizably distinct personalities, but others say they haven't noticed that. The elementals do seem to vary in personality between the planes; earth-elementals are very reliable, albeit literal at following instructions, whereas fire-elementals are capricious and need very precise instructions or bindings in order to prevent them from getting up to various pranks along with the request they were summoned for. 

Huh. She wonders how much of this opacity is just language barrier.

The book is silent on this matter. 

"Learning anything of interest?" Nayoki asks her eventually. 

"I am wondering if there are any more peopley elementals or if the normal ones would seem more peopley if there were no language barrier."

"Huh! I have no idea. Maybe." 

"I'm not speaking a language, so it might be I could talk to them better."

"I am so curious how that works! You sound as though you are speaking out loud to me in words, not in Mindspeech or something. Is that not the case?" 

"I'm speaking out loud in words but they aren't... code words, or whatever it is you're doing, I'm just saying the words."

"- What? Language is not– That is very confusing to me. Here, language is not - objective, the way a diamond is the same diamond no matter who finds it, it is all particular words that only mean something because enough people have decided to use them that way." 

"I know that's how mortals do it but I think that's weird!"

"...I suppose it is, when you think about it. Mindspeech is partially language-independent, most people think and thus communicate mentally in words but the concepts are there, just less precise or clear when the speakers do not share a language." 

"Do I sound imprecise and unclear?"

"No! Not at all. You sound exactly as though you are speaking Valdemaran, which is the language I have been speaking with you, I know several. You also had no difficulty reading books written in particular human languages, I noticed." 

"Are they in different ones?"

"The two you read happen to both be in Rethwellani, Rethwellan is a major centre of magical scholarship and has been for many centuries. It is a different language from what I am speaking right now." 

"Huh. It's not really obvious to me, maybe I could learn to distinguish them."

"Maybe! In any case, it is a very useful capability you have, understanding any language. Especially when one accidentally ends up in an entire new world!" 

"Oh, wow, that would be really inconvenient if I landed and couldn't understand anyone!"

"It would be! We might have tried to use Mindspeech to communicate, but I imagine that would have alarmed you." 

"Yes."

Sunspring stretches. "Anyway. Want some supper? It's getting to that time." 

"Yes please."

Sunspring can take her to the dining hall and select a plate of food per her requests, mostly minimally-processed fruits and vegetables; one of the cooks was alerted to her dietary preferences and dug out a selection of nuts as well. Sunspring carries the food to a different room and uncomplainingly hand-feeds Promise. 

Promise bites things out from between her fingers with no skin contact at all.

"I am going to bed fairly soon," Sunspring says once she's done. "Do you want to be set up in one of the guest rooms now? I am not sure how much fairies sleep compared to humans." 

"I sleep for about eight hours of every twenty-four. Guest room now sounds good."

"Humans sleep about the same, perfect, we should be awake tomorrow when you are." Sunspring leads her off to a guest room. It has a bed, a wardrobe, a small desk with a jug of water and a water glass on it, and a chamberpot in the corner. "Spare blankets in the wardrobe," Sunspring says. "Do you need anything else?" 

"I don't think so. Thank you."

"You are welcome." Sunspring nods to her and heads out. 

Promise inspects her room in considerable detail. Drinks some water. Goes to sleep.

And she's woken in the middle of the night by some sort of loud magical alarm, followed seconds later by shouts and running footsteps in the hall. 

She's up, she's out in the hall. "What's going on?!"

For a few seconds everyone is too panicked to answer, and then someone manages to process the question, spins around to her. "Don't know! We're under attack!" 

     "- where's Leareth?" 

"Has anyone seen Nayoki?" 

Everyone is talking over each other at once and that's just the out-loud conversations, but the initial panic is fairly quickly turning to order; most of the staff here aren't even combat trained but they have protocols. 

Has anyone seen who? - oh. Well.

Promise backs into the doorframe of her room to stay out of the way, since she has not trained with these people in combat.

And then Leareth is there, pushing past some others. :Do not use anyone's name: he reminds everyone in Mindspeech.

"I think we should consider evacuating," he says out loud. "We are not equipped to hold this off."

And he spins around. "Promise. We appear to be under attack by the forces of, I am guessing, several Velgarth gods. Did you do something yesterday to attract Their attention." 

"No! All I did was read books and eat and look around and sleep!"

Somewhere above is the sound of a muffled explosion. It doesn't reach them, but the ceiling shakes, and several people shriek in surprise. 

"They're Gating in more troops - mages–" someone with a scrying-artifact yelps. 

"There is no way that this is a coincidence." Leareth's voice is level, his expression entirely neutral. "We should get out now, but - I am concerned They are following her - you, plaid shirt," he doesn't remember the woman's chosen nickname and can't call her by her name, "Gate her somewhere else. Do it now." 

He starts to raise a Gate of his own, large enough to accommodate several people abreast so they can get out fast -

Which is the point at which another, shockingly violent explosion happens above them, and the ceiling caves in on their heads. 

Promise hasn't studied the ceiling enough to do magic to it; she gets squished. She heals herself - and then continues being under a chunk of ceiling she can't shift, so she does it again, and again.

Leareth lies there half-stunned for a moment, blinking, his multiple layers of shield-talisman just barely holding off the force of a lot of rock - he can't actually move, at all, he managed to fling a shield up to slow it and distribute the force, but he lost all the energies in his Gate and he's tired. 

Focus. Move. He needs to be not here. 

Who's still alive. Nayoki - he can't find at all, he hopes she Gated out. Promise - right there, it looks like her Thoughtsensing talisman was damaged. He doesn't read her thoughts but he can gauge where she is, not far from him at all. She's in worse shape than him, she didn't have any physical shielding at all, but she seems to be healing herself repeatedly, which works okay. 

Taking a deep enough breath to speak is hard, and he doubts she would even hear him. 

:I am going to attempt to get us out: he tells her in Mindspeech.

Okay she replies in little points of light drawn in the air in front of him since she can neither talk nor mindspeak right now.

This is going to be such a mess, Leareth thinks, as he forms the threshold of a Gate under them, flush with the floor. Or what used to be the floor, anyway, it's not in great shape. It takes him longer than usual, casting while pinned flat under a lot of weight is challenging. He can't get anyone else out, too far away, but fortunately he was right next to Promise. 

...maybe unfortunately, if the gods somehow tracked her here, but he can't not get her out. 

There are sounds coming from above them that don't sound reassuring at all - 

The Gate snaps up and they both fall into it and then suddenly are falling sideways from a normal, vertical doorway, and tumble to the floor along with quite a lot of broken stone slabs and rubble, before Leareth manages to rip the Gate down and stop them from taking the entire ceiling cross-section along with them. 

He lies sprawled on the floor, panting for breath. :Are you all right: 

She heals herself again. Takes a deep breath. "I've had worse."