"What's it like being a fairy?"

"Oh, it's nice! I don't know what it's like being a - jewelbug - thing - we mostly just hear about what it's like being a human or an angel or a demon - but I like being a fairy and wouldn't trade 'em."

"It seems strictly superior to being human but what's better about it than being an angel or a demon?"

"Well, they have to flap their wings to fly, and go to the next room to get something they don't have on hand - or make a new one, but then they pile up - it just sounds so inconvenient."

"That makes sense! But it seems like demons know everything - do they really, by the way, or can you hide things from them?"

"There's a fancy kinda computer you can get that means they don't get what's on it. ...I dunno if it'd work for a jewelbug, it works for us and humans but our brains are basically like humans' brains."

"Huh! That sounds pretty convenient. Next thing I was wondering is - what can you tell me about how daeva, especially demons, think about right and wrong?"

"I mean, demons can't come to Fairyland, I don't know any socially. I don't think they're especially wacky? Except they don't like angels for some reason and angels don't like them even though they're both fine and it's stupid."

"...Hm. Uh, I have less context than the average human on what baseline they're not especially wacky compared to?"

"I guess that makes sense since you're a jewelbug. Uh, you shouldn't hurt people or fuck with their stuff? I guess maybe demons don't care about fucking with each other's stuff, considering."

"That sort of makes sense. Uh, last question, how big a thing can you take with you when you get summoned and unsummoned?"

"Bigger than me but not like ten times bigger than me. It's a volume limit not a weight limit but I've never had to get real exact, I just eyeball it." She picks out one of the necklaces, spins it in the air admiringly.

"Thanks for everything! And now I just want you to go home, right?"

"Right! Takes about a minute. Hey, how come this circle's in English when you don't speak it?"

"Got it from someone who knows how to summon safely and don't know enough to make my own. At least not for strangers."

And he wants the fairy gone.

And she goes.

They went back and forth about how to record this conversation; they have witnesses, of course, hiding, and they've devised a system for taking very ephemeral notes in eco, but... if Cam knows enough to look for their notes then he knows enough to get the circle. So the summoner takes notes, writes what might be his last letter to his family, and lets the other jewelbugs know he's ready.

He spends a terrifying moment learning just what it's like to be their prey, and then -

- he is in a glowing city. Instead of sky, there is glow; instead of ground, there is glow, yielding like marsh with structural integrity under his feet. Around him are humanoids, more symmetrical than average, some of them in more interesting colors than normal, with feathered wings, chattering in languages he doesn't know and having picnics and doing maintenance on buildings and flying around in the cavernous brightness.

They are all very startled when he appears but he can't understand anything they're saying about it.

It worked! He can't talk to them but he tries waving in case that's a friendly gesture around here. He is, at least, on the humanoid end of metal head jewelbug body plans - four limbs, two hands, no tail - and can therefore do that.

He tries to levitate and then he tries to conjure a miniature version of Cam's current surroundings and he can't think of a safe test for the last kind and stands there hesitating and watching the other daeva.

He can't levitate and can't conjure. A handful of them are trying different languages on him.

He expects it won't work, but tries speaking his own language to them. He figures he'll be able to talk to them if he can get summoned by not-his-family but he doesn't know how to do that yet.

They are maybe asking each other if any of them recognize that language. Or the species.

That would make sense.

There... isn't some kind of circle that people step onto to vanish, is there. Is there anything else in the environment that seems like it might be the other end of a summoning circle?

He can feel - somethings - whishing by, fast but not so fast that he couldn't catch one -

He tries to catch one.