- and then a woman drops out of nowhere in a blaze of light and magic, crushed flat and bleeding very badly- 

- and then suddenly not crushed and not bleeding, though her clothes are still soaked in blood, and rolling to her feet to squint at him. "Oh, hello," she says. "I was imagining a bigger one, really. I'm no good with children - do you have parents? If you don't like them that doesn't count -"

Who is she. She doesn't look like she's from here at all; he knows everyone in his clan, of course, but she doesn't look like she's from a neighbouring clan either. Which makes it very confusing that she speaks the clan tongue, really. 

"No," he says. "Who are you?" 

"I am Nefreti Clepati." She is magicking the blood off her clothes, and has also made a moving illusion of her reflection with which to adjust her hair. "I don't think you're going to help me at all yet, hmmm. You should be in school. I was a wizard by the time I was your age."

How does she know he's a mage. Maybe she can just tell by looking at him. She's so good at magic, he doesn't know how she's doing that at all. And maybe she should be scary but even if he were scared it'd be no good to go around showing it, and somehow he isn't, anyway. 

"Oh. Aren't any schools here." 

"Huh. Can't take you home, you'll die - can't take you there, I'm not allowed to be around twice - which is very unfair, you know, other people are allowed to be around twice and they don't explode into themselves destroying everything miles around - oh, I know what I can do." And she raises a Gate on the air and tugs somebody through it. 

" - Nefreti? You scared me - where is this -"

"This boy needs a teacher! And possibly a mother! It's very important. I have to go, you know, places to be, things to do -"

And she disappears.

" - couldn't you have -" She sighs at the empty air. Raises her hands and casts a spell of her own, speaking in an unfamiliar language. 

"Nefreti kidnapped me. There is a kid here she says needs a teacher and a mother? Maybe it's a you. Please come right away I have no idea where we are."

She doesn't get a response, which makes the whole situation about eighty percent more distressing. 

Back to the kid. "Who are you, where are we."

This is so weird. Whoever this is looks a bit more like she could be from around here, but still not really, and what language is she speaking, and - she was doing magic but it didn't look like any magic he could imagine working. 

He scuffs his bare feet in the dead grass. Glances back at the cattle to make sure they haven't run off; they haven't. "Ma'ar. Clan lands." 

"- do you happen to have a word for the planet."

Blank stare.

This woman is starting to be a little bit scary and it looks like she's better at magic than him; he doesn't inch away, that would be showing weakness, but he does plant his feet more carefully in the dust. 

She tries a Sending again. There's some failure chance between planes that's not indicative of anything wrong, just, occasionally Sendings fail across planes, everyone knows that. But she's not really expecting it to work, because -

- because he'd have noticed when she went missing and he'd be here already, if they weren't very far away. 

She tries it anyway. Same message.

No answer.

She lets her hands fall to her side. 

"Okay. Clan ...lands. Is there someone whose permission I need to be here?"

Does she not know where she is? ...Maybe not, it seems like the other woman who had incredibly powerful magic might've grabbed her here through some sort of portal-spell, that he thought should be possible although he couldn't figure out how to do it yet on his own.

Shrug. "Only if you want the watering-hole or our pasture. Stupid to go wandering if you don't got weapons though." 

"Ah huh." She doesn't visibly have them. "Are you, um," she doesn't know how to ask this, actually. She doesn't think Leareth mentioned his very first name. There are reasons not to have anyone know it, spells that can use it against you - though Urtho must know it - 

"Can you tell me what you know about magic?"

He is so suspicious. "Why d'you want to know." 

"There are - different worlds. I am not from this world, unless Nefreti did something clever with the Gate and the Sending failing is unrelated, but probably I am not from this world. In different worlds, magic works in different ways. If you tell me how it works here, I will have a guess what world you are in, and maybe if we're very lucky it'll be one I have heard of and there'll be someone we can go to for help."

That sounds very implausible, but if it's real then it's the most interesting thing ever to happen to him. Actually, even if she's lying about that part, it's still the most interesting thing ever to happen to him - there was a portal, he didn't imagine that, there was a woman who healed herself from being squished flat, this woman is using magic to talk to someone - try to talk to someone? - somewhere else, except it's not working... 

"I can see magic," he says. "When you did that..." He tries to describe what the thing that she seems to be calling a Sending looked and felt like to his magic sense. "I can make lights. Or start a fire without a flint-and-steel. Or make a wall like this. Or I can pick things up." He shows her, floating a pebble into the air with shaky mental hands and then bouncing it off a clumsy but strong barrier. 

He carefully isn't telling her most of the best uses of magic as a weapon. Just in case she wants to hurt him. She isn't looking at him or moving like someone who wants to hurt him, but you can never know for sure. 

"Are you the only person who can do that or can lots of people do that?"

"There are other people. Other kinds too. Don't know any though." 

"Have you been able to do magic since you were born or did it start just a couple of years ago?"

"- Couple years ago. What do you want." 

"To figure out what magic system you have. Do you want to do a little magic so I can see it?"