2:002 on the 83rd day of Winter

I looked down at the slip of paper in my hand.

"Second floor of the Lavar building. Lower shop district. Intersection of Half and Whole streets." I muttered. I thought I was in the right place. Arin had told me where I could find her but I had gotten turned around twice in the unfamiliar part of town. The building's sign had been damaged in the bombardment so I could only make out a couple of letters. I walked up to the main door and opened it into an entry hall with rows of mailboxes along one wall. I scanned for the family name I was looking for. I found it, noting the apartment number, and my heart sped up. No backing out now.

Climbing the stairs to the second floor I tried to think about what I would say. Here, have some flowers. No, that wasn't right. The flowers should speak for themselves. I turned down a hall and counted off doorways, the bright leaf vine running along the ceiling letting me see the numbers written on the doors. Near the end of the hall I found the correct one. Knocking, I waited. A young man around my age opened the door with a curious expression.

"How can I help you?" he asked. This was not who I was looking for.

"I'm so sorry, sir." I said. "I must have gotten the wrong apartment. Do you happen to know where Arin Baker lives?"

He eyed the flowers I was holding for a moment before a grin broke across his face.

"Come on in." he said. "I'll get Arin for you."

He turned and left the door open as he went back inside. Now I was very confused. Did Arin have friends over for dinner? I walked in looking around. Cinder had been carved out of the rock so most apartments in the city were cramped but this one wasn't bad. The builders had made one large space and then divided it up with smooth wooden walls and floors. There was a shoe rack on one wall of the entryway and a small stool. There were four sets of shoes currently on the rack and room for several more. Not just one friend then. I sat and took my shoes off while I could hear the man I had spoken to in the other room.

"Arin, there is a young man here with flowers for you." he said.

"What!? And you left him in the hall?" said Arin.

Well apparently I was in the right place after all. Arin walked into the room just as I was taking off my coat.

"Theod." she said surprised. "Ummm, it's nice to see you."

"These are for you." I said. "Did I come at a bad time?"

She took the flowers and smelled them with an amused smile. With the siege over, folks were finally able to gather from the surrounding areas again. I had spotted a kid selling wildflowers on my walk here and decided to pick them up.

"No, not a bad time." she said. "Please come in."

I followed her into a dining room where the guy who'd let me in and Arin's father were busy setting the table. What was his name again? Right, Karn Baker.

"One more for dinner then?" asked Karn. "I don't want to impose on you uninvited." I said

"Nonsense." he said. "Any friend of Arin and all that. This is Asgo by the way." He waved in The general direction of who I now suspected was one of Arin's brothers.

"Do you know if Dirk and Hinnerk are going to make it back from the stall?" asked Arin.

"They'd better." said Arin's mother Mistansa from the kitchen. "They were supposed to bring me more potatoes for the stew."

"So, Theod." started Karn. "What brings you to our home today?"

"Well, I had come to talk with Arin about something." I said. I needed to deflect. The best way to do that was normally to get them talking about something else.

"But that can wait until after dinner." I said. "How are things now that the siege is over? Are you able to get supplies for the bakery?"

That was very effective. Karn launched into a rant about bread flour suppliers that was practically a crash course on microeconomics. He managed the business with encyclopedic knowledge of market prices and supply chains. Her other brothers got back and they were in the middle of a fight about sports teams or something. Then the food was ready and conversation halted for everyone to just enjoy. The simple bread and stew warmed my heart. By the time we started telling stories I felt right at home.

***

2:088 on the 83rd day of Winter

"We're going for a walk." said Arin. Her mom and dad eyed one another from across the table.

"That's fine dear." said Mistansa. "We'll just clean up."

Her three brothers were all looking at me with different varieties of glare. Were they trying to intimidate me? No, it looked more like they wanted to be able to read my thoughts but couldn't. I just got my coat and shoes on in awkward silence. Arin led me upstairs and eventually out onto the farm level. There were many narrow paths leading through the farmland for people to stroll. We walked in the cool night air for a bit. The weather was warming up, if only a little. Now if only the smoke weren't quite so thick.

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"How did you like dinner?" asked Arin.

"It was lovely, thank you." I said. "Your brothers are very funny." They told great stories of misunderstandings and mayhem that had the whole table in stitches. It was an interesting experience given most after dinner stories at my home were of battle or danger. I enjoyed the laughter more than bravery.

"They were in fine form today." she said. "So what did you come to see me about?" It was one of those questions that was asked so casually, so nonchalantly, that she had to be forcing it.

"I wanted to ask if you would join me for the Winter ball at Aegis manor." I said. She just smiled.

"I thought it might be something like that." she said.

We walked along in silence for a while until we came to a bridge between buildings. The smile slipped from her expression, replaced with thoughtful contemplation. Halfway across she stopped walking and turned to me.

"I like you Theod." she said. "But I know you're still keeping secrets. Can you tell me why you were down in that cave?"

I let out a sigh. Walking to the railing of the bridge I tried to think of what to say. No, I can't tell you because you'd kill me. But I didn't say that. What could I tell her?

"I am … my magic is … no it wouldn't make sense if I started there." I said, bumbling. Then I decided to start over.

"It's a bit of a story so bare with me a bit." I said. "My mother's name was Holda Aegis. She was a powerful mage and a brilliant researcher." I paused to think of how I wanted to explain it.

"When I was nine my mother conducted a very important summoning." I said but then I had to stop again. "Have you performed summoning before?" I asked, turning back to her. She nodded and walked up to join me at the railing.

"I only found this out recently but she wanted to pull a being into this world that would have the power to end the war with the demons." I said, turning back to look out at the bright moon. "Problem is, as you know, summoning can be … unreliable. She ended up summoning a leviathan instead. It killed her and nearly killed me." I pulled out a light crystal and pulled back my hair to show the scar across my temple. Arin glanced at it but then just put her hand on my arm.

"I'm so sorry." she said. I just shrugged.

"It was a long time ago." I said. "This next part is what's relevant to your question. The summoning didn't actually fail. At least there's a chance it didn't." She was very confused now. Her brow curled in a very cute way and I had to take a moment to admire her in the moonlight. Then the moment passed and I had to go on with my story.

"See, sometimes a summoning can have very round-about ways of working." I said. "I had memory loss after my injury and, somehow, as my memories started to come back they brought a lot more with them then I’d lost." Now she was looking at me like I was crazy.

"I have memories of an entire life, lived and died, long before here and now." I said. "I lived on a world called Earth and it was very different from Root."

She just stared at me.

"Okay…" she said slowly. "Are you serious? No, wait, don't answer that. You're always serious." Then she got a focused look and closed her eyes. After a minute she seemed to come to a realization.

"Lasers." she said as if it was both a question and the answer.

"Yes, lasers are something from the other world." I said. "But there is no magic on Earth so I was guessing that you could make a spell if I just told you how they worked."

"No magic?" she asked.

"No magic." I said.

"Radios and wave functions and Schrodinger?" she asked.

"Well the cat is from here, I think, but yes, the name is from Earth." I said and she rolled her eyes.

"We're getting off track here." she said. "You still haven't said why you spent all that time in a cave."

"Right, well when I awakened magic after our first meeting I knew it wasn't a normal kind of magic." I said. "I recognized that my magic was manipulating something that people from Earth recognize as part of what makes materials different."

"Okay, what materials?" she asked.

"All matter." I said. "What makes gold different from lead or copper? It turns out that everything is made of the same stuff. It's just bound together differently and my magic can manipulate the bindings."

"Wait, you can change lead into gold?" she asked, now dubious.

"Arin, I can change the air into gold." I said with a grin. I pulled back my sleeve and showed her my empty palms. Then with a flourish I placed my palms together and focused for a few marks before holding out a gold coin with her name written on it.

"That's actually what I was practicing the second time we met." I said. Her eyes were wide with shock. The grin slipped off my face as I finally got to the point.

"The problem is that when the bindings of matter are broken and not fixed correctly they tend to leave behind fragments that this language doesn't have words for." I said. "It … poisons the substance of things in a way that damages living tissue. Earth knows it by the word 'radiation.' It's invisible, can make you sick, and even kill you in large enough doses." I could hear the blood pumping in my ears. Arin looked at me with concern, and confusion, but no weariness or hostility. She still hadn't gotten it yet. Well I wasn't going to spell it out for her.

"The point is that I needed to practice my magic in a place where I wouldn't hurt anyone." I said. "I figured out that, with a lot of practice, I could break and reform the bonds very carefully, leaving no fragments. I needed to be sure that when I did magic in front of someone I wasn't going to make them sick. So, I stayed down there until I was sure." She looked at me for a long moment.

"How do you know?" she asked. "You said that this radiation is invisible."

I held up my necklace.

"This will light up different colors if it's exposed to radiation."

A shiver ran through her. Had she figured it out? Then her shoulders slumped.

"This is a lot to take in, Theod." she said. "You're from another world. You're a … mage with dangerous magic. I guess that a lot of the things you've done make more sense in that light but it's kinda hard to wrap my head around."

"For you and me both." I said. "You left out the part where these memories of another world were probably summoned to try and end the war with the demons. I mean, is that what I'm supposed to do? How would I even start to tackle a problem on that scale?" I turned around and sat behind the railing. After a measure Arin turned around to sit next to me. We leaned up against the side of the bridge in the shadow cast by the moon.

"I'm not sure what you're supposed to do." she said. "But I think you've been honest with me. So, I would love to go with you to the ball." I looked at her and she was smiling again. She was unbelievably beautiful when she smiled.

"Just like that?" I asked.

"Oh, I've got all sorts of questions, but I can ask them later." she said. "I know I can trust you to have my back in a fight, I know I can trust you to help me when I get hurt, and now I know I can trust you to be honest with me." She ticked off points on her fingers like she was going through a shopping list.

"So ya, just like that." she said. Then she leaned in close to me. I could feel the heat of her breath on my lips. She looked at me with hungry eyes and my heart raced. I came closer to her and saw her eyes dart to my lips. She reached out a hand to caress the back of my neck as our lips met. Her touch was electric. Her hands pulled on my coat and at the back of my head to get me that much closer to her. I took my gloves off to run my fingers through her hair. After a measure of passion between us we came apart. My forehead rested on hers as we caught our breath.

"I've wanted to do that for a long time." she said, still smiling.

"Me too" I said. We sat cuddled up on the bridge for a long time. Things were finally getting better.