“Miss Human!”

“Miss Human!”

“Oh hells, please wake up. Miss Human!”

Someone was shaking her. Lily could feel it faintly.

“Miss Human!”

Lily forced herself to open her eyes. For a split second, she didn’t know where she was and what was happening. But it all came rushing back as consciousness returned to her. She looked up and stared into a strange face. The girl looked mostly human. She was human shaped. Her skin was similar to Lily’s although slightly darker presumably from sun exposure. But, a mottled pattern of bright red scales was also on her face. She had horns. And she was– worried.

“I’m okay. I think.”

Lily struggled to get the words out. She really was way too close. Way too close. Lily felt fear bubble up inside her and shoved it down. Not the time. This was an emergency. She thought it had just been dire. A matter of heading home after recovery at worst. But this girl wasn’t human. Where the hell was she?

The girl was still staring down at her with worry in her eyes. But she reluctantly nodded, and after hesitating for a second moved so Lily could sit up.

“Thank goodness. Could you stop scaring me, Miss?”

“I could say the same thing!”

A scaled face gave her a nervous grin. Lily thought she must just be trying to be polite. Okay, don’t ruin this or say something totally stupid.

“Um, you didn’t used to be a snake or something did you?”

Lily kicked herself. She’d managed to sound hopeful while asking the stupidest question in her brain. But her only hope for still being on earth somewhere was that this girl might be some kind of upjumped reptile in the same way that Star was more than a dog.

The girl opened her mouth, then closed it. She paused for a few seconds and tried again.

“Did you hit your head when you fell?”

Lily shook her head, and played it up just a little.

“I– Maybe. I’m sorry. Let me try again. I’m Lily. I’ve never met anyone like you, and I’m sorry for being rude. But, who and what are you?”

Fear was still boiling inside her. She was barely holding it back. Another person. Another person. And she’d had to rescue Lily at cost to herself, and now she was in this person’s home. How dare she. She didn’t deserve to be here. This girl should have left her in the snow. She– No. She had to do something about this fear. She turned around and faced the other way so she couldn’t see her. It’s like a phone call. Yeah.

The new girl had already started speaking and Lily hadn’t been listening.

“-- balaur.”

There was a pause.

“Uh, Miss Lily?”

“Yeah? Huh?”

“What are you doing?”

“N-nothing! Uh. Okay. Okay. I have to get over this. Um. Okay. This is an emergency. Normally I wouldn’t just be like this. But I’m in really dire straits. So listen. I’m scared of people. It’s got nothing to do with you and I’m sorry for being weird but if you could just not look at me for a little while it’d really go a long way.”

Lily heard the girl shift behind her.

“I’m not going to hurt you, you know? I’m not like, a [Thief] or something.”

“I know, I know. It’s got nothing to do with that. I’m sorry. I’m just trying really hard not to panic. But I really have to get it together. Star needs me, and I have nowhere to go. Thank you for saving me. I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.”

“Woah, hey. Calm down Miss Lily. Everything is fine. Is there anything I can do to make it easier?”

“Um.”

Lily nearly held her breath, and then remembered breathing was important for getting her panic under control.

“If we could just sit and talk while not facing each other for a little, that’d be really helpful. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. I just don’t want to hurt you.”

Lily took a few deep breaths in and out.

“I’ll be okay. I’m good at emergencies. Despite how it might look.”

“Okay…”

They sat in silence for a few minutes. Lily focused on breathing in and out, carefully. She remembered her first day alone in Santa Del Mar, and how hard it was to get over her inclination to panic over every little thing. But, she had grown since then. She just hadn’t gotten resistant to this specific kind of fear yet. But, it was this or– Well. Her life actually probably wasn’t on the line this time. But Star’s might be. She had to find him. He’d be okay. But what if he ended up somewhere really far away? How were they going to find each other? They should have thought that through! Okay. Focus. Talk to her.

“I’m sorry. I missed the answer to my question before. What’s your name? And um. I’ve never met someone like you before. What are you? I’m sorry. I can’t think of a more polite way to ask.”

The girl laughed, then spoke quietly. Lily had already forgotten how close she was. But, hearing a soft voice from behind her like this, she sounded like any other person. And she was being so kind.

“My name is Sunica. I’m balaur. I’d have thought that was obvious. The horns, the tail, the scales? Where are you from that you’ve never seen balaur? You don’t have to worry about being polite to me, but be careful in the city. “

The thought of going into a city full of other people, human or not was beyond what Lily could fathom right now. Lily played with her earring. Balaur was a strange word, and she got the feeling it wasn’t quite translating properly.

“Wait, there’s a city?”

“Of course! You didn’t think I lived out here all on my own, surely?”

“I– I don’t know what I thought. Look, I’m all kinds of out of sorts. Let’s start with the basics. Do you know a place called Santa Del Mar? California? United States of America?”

“I’m sorry, I’ve never heard of those places. But I’ve never really left home, so that’s not surprising. Is that where you’re from? How’d you get here?”

“Um. Would you believe it was a spell?”

“Teleportation magic? That’s powerful stuff. Are you a [Mage]?”

“I. I think so?”

Sunica giggled.

“What’s that supposed to mean? You’re strange. Are you sure you didn’t knock your head? I can get you a [Healer].”

“I’m fine!”

The last thing Lily needed was a strange balaur doctor poking around her body. She really wasn’t ready to introduce anyone else into the mix. After a couple seconds of silence, she tried to explain. Although she wasn’t sure how much she should let on.

“The spell. It went wrong. Somehow. My companion was supposed to be with me, and I didn’t know where it was supposed to take me, so I don’t know if this was right. Everything is kind of a blur.”

“You used a teleportation spell without knowing where it would take you? Are you insane? You could have showed up at the bottom of the ocean!”

She could hear Sunica’s tail slapping the floor as it thrashed with… worry? She wasn’t sure exactly what the girl was feeling. But whatever it was, it had a tell. The sound was reminiscent of Star’s tail always giving away when he was excited, and it hurt to hear.

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“It’s complicated, alright? I didn’t have much choice. Well. That’s a lie. Star would argue. But, I really wanted to do it, but I think it went wrong somehow. The house I was in came down on top of me, I think. I don’t remember very well.”

“Oh. I think I see what happened.”

“You do?”

“The spell messed with your mind.”

Lily hesitated. She could just go with it. It was probably easier than explaining being from another… what, world? Dimension? Realm? Whatever. No, Sunica had been so helpful. She felt like she owed her the truth.

“I– I don’t think so. Not really, if I’m being honest. But, it would explain a lot. So, can we just pretend that’s what’s going on?”

Sunica sighed, but replied in a way that made Lily feel a little at ease.

“Okay. But you didn’t know what a balaur is. I really think I should get you looked at. Just maybe by a [Mage].”

“Please. I really think I’m okay, but I don’t think I can handle another person right now.”

“What’s up with that, anyway? How did you live before now if you’re so scared of people?”

“Until a month ago, I hadn’t left my house in years. And since then, I haven’t met anyone else.”

“What about your companion?”

A pang of pain hit Lily in the chest.

“Star. He’s a dog. Well. He’s more of a magical creature I think. He’s like a person that looks like a dog.”

“Hmm.”

Lily could hear the implied doubt in Sunica’s tone.

“I didn’t make him up.”

“I wasn’t going to say that!”

“But were you thinking it?”

“Well…”

“Yeah. I didn’t make him up! He’s the one thing that I’m absolutely sure of. I have to find him.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

They sat in silence. What was she going to do? If the spell went wrong, Star could be anywhere. Hopefully he was either back at home or close by. But, what Sunica said about the bottom of the ocean was haunting her. She could just imagine the spell going off for him like it did her, only to find he was deep underwater and… No. No. No no no no no no. Entity B wouldn’t do that to her. This must have been part of the plan. He was close by, or back at home. Either way, she would find him. How could she start?

“Um, Sunica?”

“Yes?”

“Someone left the spell that brought me here for me. Are there any powerful magic users around here?”

“Oh, sure! But…”

“But what?”

“Well, it’s just that the [Teleportation] spell is very high level magic. Actually, what do you even mean they left it for you? Because if you were given a scroll or something that makes it even more difficult. I don’t know of anyone who can cast such high tiers of magic.”

Well, that was interesting. Magic must be a lot more common around here if there are tiers of it and accepted spells. Lily filed that away for later.

“Um, well, it wasn’t a scroll or anything. They had it written out in some kind of metal, inlaid into the floor so it could be triggered with mana. If I went back and dug it out of the rubble it’s probably still there. I made notes, I could probably write it out again, but it wouldn’t be great if it just brought me back to a random place in the forest.”

“I’m sorry Miss Lily. I’m not a [Mage]. I’m a [Trapper]. But that doesn’t sound like any kind of magic I’ve heard of. Written out in metal? How does one write out a spell? Like a magic book?”

Lily hesitated.

“What? No. It wasn’t instructions. It was the spell. Like, a spell circle?”

“A spell circle? Like, an aura spell?”

“No! Like, a spell circle! It’s like, a diagram with glyphs in it that describes a spell, and then the mana flows into it, and the spell happens.”

“Um. Miss, Lily?”

Lily was getting frustrated trying to describe things she’d come up with her own internal lexicon for to someone who presumably learned completely different words to describe them in school.

“Yes?”

“I’ve never seen a spell that works like that. Can you show me?”

“Yeah, sure. Easy! Got something I can write with, or will I need to use mana? Actually, if you just give me my backpack I can use paper.”

Sunica started to get up and took a few steps when she stopped.

“Paper? That’s so expensive! You don’t have to use that!”

Oh boy. This was going to be one hell of a culture shock.

“Um, I can use chalk if you don’t mind me messing with your floor?”

“Will it cause damage?”

“Let’s use the paper to be sure. I can always get more.”

----------------------------------------

A few minutes later, and Lily had been given her backpack and was digging through it looking for her notes and supplies. Also, trying hard not to bring out anything clearly from another world. As much as Sunica would probably love a twinkie, Lily was working with limited resources right now and still didn’t know if she should be very free with the ‘other world’ information. Sunica seemed trustworthy, but you never knew. On the plus side, she was still full of anxiety, but she had talked with Sunica long enough to not be on the verge of a panic attack from just being in the same room with her.

Once she finally got the notebook and a pen free of the backpack, she grabbed the other plus side. Bay had made it with her, tied to the top of her backpack. So she set him up next to her notes before she started writing. Sunica was looking at him with interest, with her tail flicking back and forth. Lily wasn’t sure whether that was like a dog’s tail wagging, or a cat getting ready to pounce yet. Or neither.

“I like your thing.”

“Him? Oh, he’s a seal. His name’s Bay. He’s named after Micheal Bay because– uh, nevermind.”

“Bay. He’s got a very cute name! Where did you get him? The craftsmanship is incredible. The stitching is so uniform. Was he made with magic?”

Lily didn’t really know what to say to that. To someone here, an automatic sewing machine might seem like magic.

“Well, something like that. Anyway, look here.”

Lily was drawing out a simple circle. It was just her light spell with one small change. Instead of a three circle spell that included a gathering glyph, she made it with two so she could power it herself. For some reason, there didn’t seem to be a lot of ambient mana here. Lily still thought that was weird. Wouldn’t it be more saturated in a world that had magic? Well, mysteries for later. She remembered the heat spell the other night not working at all for her.

“This is a simple spell. I made it myself. I call it my light spell, because it just makes a little orb of light over the circle. Any of this look familiar so far?”

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand. This can teach you how to use the [Light] spell? A variant that you made yourself? How high level are you?”

Sunica winced, and then followed that question up.

“I’m sorry, that was rude.”

“Um. I’m really not sure what you mean by levels, but this is a really really simple spell. You could have drawn this circle and it’d work for you if you just pour mana into it. Like this.”

Lily put a hand onto the circle since touching it made connecting really easy, and then poured some mana in. She was immediately surprised that it seemed to be taking a much smaller portion of her personal mana to cast this spell than it usually did. But also, her scars immediately lit up. That was embarrassing. She grinned sheepishly at Sunica for a second, and then she saw the girl's face. The light spell went out.

“Uh, Sunica? Is something wrong?”

She was frowning.

“That’s– I’ve never seen magic like that. You’re saying it comes from that weird diagram you drew?”

“Well, yeah. That ‘diagram’ is the spell. I let it draw magic from me to do its thing. I could also tell it to pull mana out of the air, or from other sources. But that seems slow around here for some reason.”

Sunica was staring. Lily was getting more and more uncomfortable.

“Did I do something wrong?”

“I don’t know. So, you’re saying you can change what the spell does by just drawing different stuff?”

“Yeah! I mean, you see these two nodes here? You can replace them with other glyphs. It’s this whole modular system, see? If I erased that one, and replaced it with a glyph for fire, it’d create a ball of fire instead of just light. Or I could add one here and change this one, and now it’ll pull water out of the air, and concentrate it into a ball like the ball of light or fire, see? It’s easy. Simple magic. I’m sure whatever your people do is much more complex and powerful, but this is just what I do.”

Sunica shook her head.

“Simple? This isn’t simple at all! What are you talking about?”

Lily looked down at her magic circle. It seemed simple enough to her. Was there some kind of weird issue with perception? Lily nervously pulled at a lock of hair.

“Um. Well. Okay. It seems simple to me, but I’ve been studying hard for like a month, or a month and a half. I don’t actually know how long. Around there?”

Sunica looked at her like she was an alien. Which, Lily realized, she might be in a way.

“Okay, let’s back up. Why do you seem scared?”

“It’s– We’re told to watch out for people who cast strange magic. [Sorcerers].”

“Listen. I’ve never seen any other kind of magic than what I do. I’ve never met anyone who cast spells other than me. But whatever that is, I don’t think I’m one of them. I’m self taught. I learned by observing spells in nature.”

The girl was looking pale behind her scales. Her voice was coming out shaky.

“Miss Lily.”

“You can drop the ‘Miss’ if you want. I’m really not all that important.”

Sunica closed her eyes and tried again.

“Lily. I’m sorry but I’m going to have to be very rude about this.”

“Okay?”

“It’s a matter of life and death, you understand?”

“I’m sorry, but not at all.”

Sunica winced.

“What’s your class and level? I’ll go first. I’m a level 9 [Trapper].”

“Uh…”

A tense silence filled the air.

“Am I being pranked right now?”