"... were you here the whole time, dear?" Mrs. Robinson asks. Her face is making an expression.

"Well, I wasn't here, I was there," Emily points out, because she isn't going to reply incorrectly. "But yes," she finishes, because she knows what the teacher's assistant meant.

Mrs. Robinson looks at Mrs. Hill, and then back at Emily.

"You have to go outside for recess, alright?" Mrs. Robinson tells her.

She nods. "Okay."

That rule is not in the school handbook, but that is to be expected. Many rules aren't in the school handbook.

Following recess comes geography, which is boring. It would be more interesting if they could go climb the ridge outside and look and see the geography, but the point of geography isn't to be interesting. She looks at the map on the board and remembers it, and then starts doing times tables in her notebook.

The teachers are annoyed if they catch her reading during a lesson, but they never seem to mind if she does times tables. Right now she's most of the way through a table for base eight. She wants to finish tables for all the bases from two to twelve before the end of the school year.

At some point, class is over, and she opens her book to page 327 to continue reading. She finishes the book, looks up, and sighs. The bus isn't quite home yet, and she can't do homework on the bus because it makes her handwriting even worse than usual, which means this time is wasted.

She looks at trees.

Her parent greets her with a snack. She returns a hug, says facts about her day and listens to facts about her parent's day until they are in sync again, and then goes to peruse the bookshelves.

She picks out a new book — Neutron Star, by Larry Niven — and begins reading. At some point she eats dinner and brushes her teeth. She closes the book on page 203 (probably prime — no wait, it's 29 times 7), closes her eyes, and falls asleep.

The next day proceeds much the same as before, except that when recess begins she follows behind her classmates, glancing up every few words to make sure she doesn't bump into anything.

When she is outside, she sinks down, folding her legs under her, and continues to read.

A few minutes later, Mrs. Robinson comes up to her.

"Wouldn't you rather play with the other children?" she asks.

Emily considers this. It sounds unlikely.

"No," she replies. But she recognizes that this is really a veiled order, and concludes that Mrs. Robinson doesn't want her to read, for some reason.

She had a neutral opinion of the teacher's assistant, but now it plummets like a rock, settling just above 'actually dangerous to be near'. She rises to her feet and walks away, ducking behind the jungle gym.

She surveys the playground, intent on finding a location which is:

A) Outdoors, as required by the recently revealed rule

B) Not in Mrs. Robinson's line of sight, so that she cannot learn that Emily is still reading

C) Not in the path of the rambunctious hooligans her classmates turn into when the school rings a bell

She settles on a depression at the edge of the playground, where it borders the forest. It is deeper than it looks, so if she lies down there, she is completely hidden from the rest of the playground — and not in an area that anyone is likely to enter (except for Gabrielle and Elizabeth sometimes, pretending to be cats).

She lies down, squirms a little to get her head comfortably pillowed on a root, and resumes reading.

Some time later, she is shaken from her book by the sound of silence. She can no longer hear shouts and running feet passing a few meters from her hiding place.

She puts a thumb between the pages, too suddenly worried to remember her page number. She briefly contemplates whether she could just sit here until school ends — but it wouldn't go well. The teachers would probably get more angry the longer she stayed away.

She sighs, and drags herself upright.

And doesn't see the playground.

Around her, in all directions, stretches sun-dappled woods. There is not even the distant sound of traffic, which makes the sound of birdcalls and miscellaneous woodland creatures scuttling through the leaf litter all the clearer.

Oh, she thinks.

And then she's crying, and she doesn't quite know why. Things like this don't happen to her — things like this only happen in books.

As she sits, tears pouring down her cheeks, she remembers a conversation with her parent from a few years ago. She had been upset about — something, she can't remember now — and her parent had held her, stroking her hair, and said:

    "If you ever get the opportunity to go to fairyland, don't look back. I'll be okay — I'll know what's happened."

The thought ... contextualizes ... her current predicament.

She sits for a moment more, and then wipes her eyes and stands.

She checks her page number. 252 (not prime) — so she can't actually have been reading all that long. She tucks the book beneath one arm, and surveys the woods.

They are wild, and older than the woods she is used to. This is something of a blessing, since it means that there is relatively little underbrush.

Well, she knows the things she needs are:

A) Water

B) Shelter

C) Food

... possibly those are out of order? She forgets exactly what the survival guide she read says. Shelter seems difficult, and food likewise, so she may as well start with water. And water is easy to find, at least: she can just go downhill until she finds some.

She looks at the slope of the forest floor, picks a direction, and starts walking.

Emergency Services would ordinarily be able to canvas the woods quite thoroughly for a missing child — except, of course, they have no idea that she is there to look for.

So it takes her quite some time before she sees anything other than trees.

Crows call out to her as she walks, and she finds herself wondering whether this is the sort of thing where she'll meet talking animals. It seems ... less likely, somehow, than just waking up to find herself in a forest.

She's glad that it doesn't seem to be at all like the Enchanted Forest from the Enchanted Forest Chronicles — those are so treacherous to cross that she could hardly have avoided having an adventure by now.

After a time, she does come to a stream. She's not that thirsty yet, though, so she follows it down, skirting warily around a copse of birches, in case they're at all like the birches from Stardust.

At length, the stream breaks through the border of a clearing, and meanders aimlessly across the pine-needle-covered ground. Above it sits a house — a well-loved house, made of wood and clearly somewhat old. The roof is well maintained, though, and covered with solarpanels.

An old woman sits on the porch of the house in a rocking chair, writing in a notebook.

Emily jumps across the stream and makes her way up to the porch. She's just about to speak, when the woman startles and jumps half out of her seat, staring at her.

Alarm! Who are you? the woman signs. Emily has never learned sign-language, but the words just seem obvious when she follows the woman's hands.

I'm Emili, she responds, her hands moving quite without thought. She finds she likes it — its the first sign of magic she's seen since she came here, and it feels right, that she get some kind of protagonist-magic.

The woman settles herself back down in her seat.

I wasn't expecting anyone to show up like that, she explains. I'm Saher. Sit down, if you like.

She gestures at a hanging bench near her own chair.

Do you know where this is? Emily asks, setting her book down on the bench beside her, so that she doesn't have to keep one elbow pinned against her torso. I don't know how I got here; I think it must have been magic.

Saher squints at her.

Magic, huh? Well, you're at my house, on the outskirts of Possibly Too Many Cows, a bit north of Twin River City. Does that help?

Well, I know more than I did beforehand. But I haven't heard of any of those places. I think I'm from farther away. That's a good start, though. Who names a town Possibly Too Many Cows?

Now that she has found a place which probably has at least shelter and water (she can hide under the porch and drink from the stream), even if she isn't sure if this is a don't-eat-the-fairy-food sort of situation yet, she's feeling a good deal more upbeat.

Um.

Saher thinks for a moment.

In our case, I believe it was ðormselu, one of the founders of the town. He saw how many cows people had gotten together to graze the newly cleared commons, and suggested that there were possibly too many, and they would need to allocate more pasture.

She tucks her hands into her armpits and rocks a little.

I don't want to be distracted from a thing I think is more important. Do you have caretakers that you want to be informed of your whereabouts?

Emily puts a finger to her lip in thought.

Yes, but it is okay if they can't be contacted, because I expect this to be impossible.

She looks at her own hands after saying that, trying to mentally replay the grammar involved. This language does something interesting with connectives.

There's no harm in trying the impossible, Saher states, with the smooth fluidity of an oft-repeated proverb. What are their postal handles?

Emily frowns.

I don't know what those are. Do you mean a mailing address?

Now it is Saher's turn to frown.

I mean ... I guess a physical address would be fine, if you expect them to be there? I meant the kind of address that follows them around to wherever they are — like, it would route a call to their phone.

Oh! Emily nods. That makes sense. Their phone number is one six and two, zero, two, five, four, five, one six and three, zero, one, six.

And then she pauses, and mentally replays that note in her head.

Uh. If you use base six, I don't know how you would enter that on a phone, she remarks. I thought everywhere used base one six and four.

Nowhere ... uses base six and four, Saher signs, slowly. I think it is most likely that you are playing a joke on me. Nobody uses this language without converting to base six, usually from base two sixes.

I am not joking with you, Emily replies, doing her best to look serious and trustworthy. As I said, I think I'm from a lot farther away. Oh!

She holds up her book for Saher to see.

Can you read that?

Saher squints at the cover, making no move to take the book.

No, I can't. That's not too surprising, though. There are a lot of secret languages. Dot matrix printing made typesetting them much more feasible.

Emily is immediately captivated by the idea of books in secret languages, but she restrains herself.

Well, this is in my native language, English. I don't think English is a secret. I didn't speak this one until you started signing at me.

Saher sits for a moment, and then stands, gesturing for Emily to follow her.

This is sufficiently weird that I think we should both drink some water and eat some crackers. Doing that is unlikely to make things worse, and might make things better if I'm hallucinating or you have some kind of linguistic amnesia.

She leads the way through a screen door and into a tidy little kitchen, where she fills two tall glasses with water, and hands one to Emily, before reaching up to rummage through a cupboard for crackers.

Drinking or eating anything isn't going to trap me here, is it? Emily signs with her other hand.

Saher looks at her in confusion.

What? No, not at all. And if you've been reading books like that, I think they might deal with topics which you're too young to fully appreciate, unless you're particularly precocious. Consider talking with a trusted adult about them.

She pulls down the crackers, and arranges them on a plate with some crumbles of cheese fetched from the refrigerator.

I'm six and five! Emily protests. Well, nearly. I will be in a few six day periods.

She goes to cross her arms, realizes she's still holding the water, chugs it, sets the glass down, crosses her arms, and then uncrosses them so she can keep talking.

And I'm certainly old enough to be reading fairy stories!

I did not mean to offend you, Saher replies, a phrase which this language renders as a single gesture — albeit with a slightly complex finger wiggle.

Its certainly not my place to tell you what to read, she continues. But the books I've read that deal with that sort of thing usually also have complex sex in them, and many young people find it helpful to talk about complex sex with one of their trusted adults in order to contextualize some of the genre conventions. When I was young, I remember my parent was able to recommend a great introductory series — Princes of Perá — that helped me understand how those kinds of books work.

Well, alright, Emily agrees. Anyone who gives out book recommendations can't be that bad. But I don't think fairy stories usually have sex in them — maybe some of the old ones, like the Brothers Grimm do? I've read The Yellow Fairy Book and The Blue Fairy Book, but I haven't gotten around to the Brothers Grimm yet.

Saher draws them both back outside, and sets down the plate between them. She takes a cracker and a puff of cheese for herself.

Getting back to the main topic — that number you gave me isn't formatted correctly for a Network handle. Quite apart from being in base six and four, it's six and four digits long. That would be, let me see ...

She mouths to herself for a moment.

Four and three sixths times six to the two sixes. Huh. That is actually about the right order of magnitude, not counting the check digit.

She picks up her notebook and flips to a new page.

Could you repeat the number? I'll try converting it to base six in case you were just ... raised by some kind of six-and-four cult.

I don't think it was a cult, Emily protests. Unless they reprinted all of the books in the library? And installed some kind of Network filter? Everywhere uses base six and four.

She then dutifully repeats her parent's phone number.

Saher scribbles for a minute, and then pulls a phone from a hidden pouch inside her shirt and punches in a sequence of digits.

She then writes a few quick messages back and forth, using the back of her pen as a stylus.

That's the number of a pizza restaurant in Largest City, she finally concludes. Which ... I don't really know where that leaves us. 

While she was scribbling, Emily cautiously nibbled one of the crackers. When no apparent magic happened, she went on to eat quite a lot of the rest of cheese and crackers. Walking through the forest made her hungrier than she thought.

Well, like I said, I expected it to be impossible, Emily points out. I think this has to be another planet, at least, even if its not another dimension. It can't be time-travel, because you have solar panels.

Saher comes to a decision, and pushes herself up again.

I, she signs, am going to call Emergency Services. Water and food didn't make any of this less confusing. And you didn't appear to notice when I switched to my native Dark Forest sign, which I wouldn't expect you to have learned unless you put a lot of thought into arranging a prank.

She picks up her phone again, taps a series of buttons, and then props it on the railing of the porch, facing her.

"Emergency Services. What is the nature of your emergency?"

No immediate threat to life or property — just a really confusing situation. I'm worried someone here is hallucinating.

I have a young person here with a confusing set of claims — they came out of the woods, claimed not to speak Larger Continent Trade Language until I started signing at them, and didn't notice at all when I switched languages.

Saher glances at Emily.

They say they're from very far away, didn't recognize any local place names, and when I asked about contacting their caretakers, gave me a contact code in base six and four — it didn't work. They also seem to think they might be in a story in a genre I've never heard of. I've given them water, some water crackers, and cheese.

They're wearing clothes in an unfamiliar style, have no active devices my phone can detect, and were carrying a book printed in a language I don't know.

"Angle the camera so I can talk to them, please. I'll get their explanation, and let you know if you're having comprehension problems," the dispatcher says.

Thank you, Saher signs, rotating the phone a bit so that it catches both herself and Emily.

"I don't think Saher has comprehension problems, I just have magical protagonist language powers," Emily explains. "I'm not sure how I got here, but I'm pretty sure this isn't Earth — or at least it has to be a hidden forest, or something like that."

She gets suddenly worried.

"Is eating the food fine? Saher said so, but maybe I should double-check."

"I cannot personally vouch for the safety of any food," the dispatcher replies. "You should use your own judgement about whether food is rotten or contaminated. If you show me pictures, I can help you make that assessment."

They were worried about whether eating the food would mean they had to stay here, Saher explains.

The dispatcher winces slightly.

"Young person, on my oath as an Emergency Services worker, there is no reason why eating food should require you to stay in a place, or prohibit leaving it. Some kinds of medicine, including vaccines, come with the recommendation to stay in a location for a few minutes in order to increase the chances that you would notice an allergic reaction while in a safe location. Some kinds of hallucinogen can make it unsafe for people to leave unsupervised. Other than that, there is absolutely no connection between what you eat and where you are permitted or able to go."

"My name is Emily," she responds. "And — good. I didn't think so, but I wanted to check."

She eats another cracker, to show she's not afraid.

"Has anyone ever told you that you couldn't leave — or that you had to do other things — because they said so, or because you performed particular actions, such as eating?" the dispatcher questions.

She starts to shake her head, and then pauses.

"Well, I would have gotten in trouble if I tried to leave school," she says. "Or if I stayed in the wrong areas, or read during lessons, or didn't do my homework, and stuff like that."

"Saher, does your phone have remote backups?" the dispatcher asks.

Saher nods. It does.

"Okay. I am officially commandeering it. The city will mail you a replacement. Emily, I need you to listen carefully, please, because this is important."

Emily looks back and forth between Saher and the phone in confusion.

"... okay?"

"This is now your phone. It belongs to you. You may keep it with you wherever you go, and nobody has the right to demand you get rid of it. If you find yourself in a dangerous situation, or just in need of help, you can use it to call Emergency Services. Call at any time. We would rather you call us when you don't need to, then not call us when you do need to. Do you understand?"

Emily looks at Saher, but she doesn't seem angry.

"I understand. But ... it was Saher's phone. Why can you give it to me?"

She clutches her book protectively.

It's the law in Twin River City, Saher explains. Emergency Services can requisition certain kinds of private property in order to mitigate an ongoing situation where someone could be hurt. It's okay — I agreed to the law when I moved here, and I still agree with it. You haven't agreed to the laws, because you came here unexpectedly, so they can't requisition anything from you unless you do. And I think there's an opt-out form.

"There is," the dispatcher agrees. "Saher will get a replacement phone, so really this is just depriving them of their phone for a few hours. And the replacement will be new, so it will have a better battery life and so on. But I had to requisition their phone in order to make this next part safe — Emily, I've got one further serious instruction for you, and then we can figure out what should happen next. Ready?"

She nods uncertainly. "I'm ready."

"If at any point you want to leave, you can. No matter what Saher or anyone else tells you. If you need to, take your phone and run away into the woods. The woods can be dangerous, because you might fall and hurt yourself or get lost, but as long as you have your phone with you, you can call for help and we'll be able to find you. Looking at the map, it looks like the nearest town is about two miles west of you — that's the direction the sun sets. I don't anticipate you needing to run into the woods, but it is very important that you have the option to do so. People should not be confined to certain areas or punished for reading, of all things. Do you understand?" the dispatcher asks, their voice quietly serious.

"I ... I understand," Emily agrees. "But it's not, I mean, that's just how school is, it's not an emergency or anything."

The dispatcher nods.

"It's alright. My job is to help keep people safe, which means I see a lot of people in bad situations. And I would rather unnecessarily scare six young people with instructions they won't turn out to need, than not say something to one who does turn out to need it," they explain, voice comforting. "I am nearly certain that everything is going to be fine — but now, I know that at least things can't end up any worse than you being alone in the woods. Because if things do get that bad somehow, I can trust you to leave. It puts a lower bound on how bad things can be, which gives us[in] a safety cushion to figure out how to make things better than that."

Emily pulls her knees up to her chest, setting the bench swinging.

"O-" she starts to say, and then realizes that she doesn't have to force herself to talk.

Okay, she signs.

"I'm sorry that was overwhelming," the dispatcher says. "Do you want to keep talking about what we could do next — like contacting someone you trust, or getting you somewhere you can stay the night — or do you want to leave that for later?"

You can stay here, Saher signs. For at least tonight, and a six-day if you want. It would be nice to have some company for a while; if you don't choose to stay, I might invite my grandchild over instead.

I ... staying here is fine for now, Emily agrees. She turns to the phone. I don't think you can contact my parent. You can try if you want. We live at three four zero Blinke St. in Cassidy, Vermont. Their phone number is ... and she rattles off the number again. But Saher tried it and it didn't work.

"I don't recognize any of those place names, but I can put out a search to be certain. Now, can you still understand me if I speak like this?" the dispatcher asks.

"Yes, why wouldn't I be able to?" she asks.

The dispatcher pales. "Because I just switched to the secret language my friend group uses," they explain. Now that Emily pays attention, the words do sound subtly different. The dispatcher switches back. "Alright. Saher — would it be alright to send someone around to meet Emily around 30 or 31 tomorrow? Emily, that would just be a meeting to get you a model of phone you pick out instead of whatever Saher has, and some basic clothes and toiletries, and to start figuring out where you want to stay on a longer-term basis."

Saher hugs herself.

Yes, that should be fine. Have them text me when they get to the turn-off, please.

Okay, Emily agrees.

"Alright. I'll send someone out, and have them text you. As far as I can tell, you are both otherwise safe and not experiencing cognition problems. It looks like Emily really can understand languages they have no reason to know, which ... well, I think you did the right thing calling Emergency Services. Is there anything else that I should know about?" the dispatcher asks.

No, thank you, Saher signs, although the dispatcher waits for Emily to sign no as well before ending the call.

Once the phone turns off, Saher sighs and looks out into the forest. She's silent for a minute.

Emily is silent too. She's not sure what to think.

Well, Saher finally signs. They're always so serious. But I'm glad I called, because otherwise I would kept doubting myself.

She leans back in her chair, considering Emily. If you want to talk, I'd love to hear more about fairy stories — as I said, I don't think they're a genre we have here.

She looks back out towards the forest. And if you don't want to talk, I'll go back to my writing. I usually have dinner in about 2 hours, but we can have it sooner if you want.

... I can talk about fairy stories, she agrees. She spends the time describing some of the mainstays of the genre — stolen babies, changelings, deals, tricks, food — and then wanders off topic and starts talking about how modern adaptations completely change the focus, and try to make fairies not be terrifying, which is missing the whole point. And she doesn't like most Disney retellings. Well, except Beauty and the Beast, because she wants to be a castle librarian. And Mulan is neat, but it's not a fairy story. And ...

By the time she wraps up, it is only because she can't both talk with her hands and convey dinner — a cold spicy wrap of some kind — into her face.

I see, Saher replies. You know, I'm half-tempted to steal that idea about cakes that make you change size for one of my own stories. It sounds like it would make an excellent locked-room mystery, if you could figure out a way to set up the implication of the cake's effect without outright stating it.

Do you write a lot of mysteries? she asks, polishing off her wrap.

I do, Saher agrees. I made my living on them. Well, them and romances. I'm supposedly retired now, but I can't seem to stop writing them.

Emily glances at the bookshelves that cover the wall opposite the kitchen.

Could I ... read one of your books? she asks, suddenly shy.

Saher gives her a thoughtful look, before standing and running a finger along the books. She plucks one down and hands it to her.

How about the Court of the Volcano-Tamers? she suggests. It's one of my earlier books, but it features someone struggling to figure out his place in a strange new city, all the while dodging dangers from his past. Can Lhelifin figure out the identity of the shadow-banisher without letting Serdisa catch up to him? Plus, Lhelifin reminds me a bit of you.

Emily opens the book and begins reading. She doesn't stop when Saher makes them both tea, and relocates her to the couch with a blanket wrapped around her. She doesn't stop when Saher yawns and clears their dishes away.

Eventually, Saher stands by the stairs to her loft, finger on the light switch.

Goodnight, Emili, she signs. I promise the book will still be there in the morning.

Goodnight, Saher. And ... thanks.

I would not have had it any other way, Saher says, smiling. I will see you in the morning.

She notes her page number — 540, not prime — and falls asleep trying to figure out the factors in base six.

It's not much like the stories she's read. But that's okay. Every story is different, and this is just the start of hers. Today, she switched planets. Who knows what's going to happen to her tomorrow?