Adam
I was led to a carriage pulled by one of the six-legged beasts. It took a group of us out to the east of the city at a walking pace. Not a comfortable trip. The carriage and the road were okay, they were smooth enough. The company. None of the kids in the carriage were from my boat. All of them were staring at me.
I should have tried to start a conversation, but the effects of the drink were wearing off. I’d had a long, long, bloody peculiar day of it. All I wanted to do was rest, so I leaned my head against the side of the carriage and pretended to sleep. I heard whispering going on through the trip, but not what was being said. After a while, I don’t think I was pretending about the sleep anymore. This place was leaving me punch-drunk most of the time. Why was that supposed to be fun?
When the carriage stopped, some long time later, we piled out in front of what looked like a Tudor manor house that’d married a castle and then had a large family. Big, obviously defendable and with a number of outbuildings. We went inside to a large hall with tables already set with food, and crowds of people already sitting down and ready for scran. The setting was familiar. I couldn't think where I'd seen this before – some film or other, but this was surely something he'd nicked as well. He'd never struck me as original in anything.
I spotted Miya and the other girl, whose name I’d already forgotten, and made my way over to them. “Hi, do you mind if I sit here?”
“Yeah, sure," said the friend, “Wow, they’re all saying the light shone from you. Is it true?”
“Dunno," was my best reply, “I passed out and don’t really know what was going on. What happened to you?”
“It was the same for both of us," Miya said, giving me a measuring look. “The chanting started and we felt something going from our heads to our bums, not nice, but no big deal. I was looking at you when it happened though. You were shining like someone’d stuck a Christmas tree in you. You went all the colours of the rainbow. You’re one of the Chosen.”
“Is that good or bad?”
“What, you don’t know?”
“Start by thinking I’m completely ignorant, ok? You won’t be far wrong.”
“Well, it means you’re like some hyper strong Mage or something, or you’re gonna be. It’s well special. It hardly ever happens to anyone.”
“Really? Well it happened to two of us. There was a girl on a stretcher beside me asking about
the light. She had it as well.”
“Oh yeah? Where’s she then?”
I looked around. “Ok. See the girl with the ‘I’m-it-and-you’re-not’ attitude, the one heading for the top table over there? That’s her.”
“You don’t like her, do you?" said Miya, a big schadenfreudish grin across her face.
“I’m honestly not planning on caring either way, but, since you ask, no, not much. I’ve a feeling if she found she wasn’t getting up your nose, then she’d just try harder.”
“Interesting though. You’re here and she’s there, like she thinks she’s a senior already. Don’t you think that?”
“I don’t feel like a man who could give a damn, and I’m sure I don’t look like one who has a clue. I’ve no idea what I’d do up there and I don’t know any of those people. Like I said, do you mind if I sit here?”
The question got a pair of smiles, which I took to mean no, they didn’t. It attracted attention from seats around us, though. Miya and her friend weren’t the only ones who’d noticed the light. Neighbours got nudged and comments whispered. We got food down our necks. Everyone was starving again, and there wasn’t much conversation for about half an hour. I had time to think how well my …what? feelings? sensations? were being managed - the hunger was very real - but then I was too busy eating – some kind of lentil-based lasagne with a taste that’d have Italians begging for the recipe - and recovering to put my mind to anything else.
Miya
Brendan wasn’t like that. He asked us all questions on the boat down and got everyone speaking, but he didn’t hog the conversation and he didn’t swank or anything. I didn’t think about that till much later, mind. We’d nearly had a row on the boat, which was all ‘cos I was so strung out about coming through so many Gates and such.
My cousin Sadie was the one who Elected me as a Seeker, when she saw my Potential starting, but she’s not that powerful a Mage and couldn’t tell me if I’d really got it or not. So I was a bit worried I’d bomb out in the Initiation. If I’m honest, it felt like him being nice when he would talk to me, even though he’d slapped me down about what I said.
Like, it was clear he didn’t have to talk to me, know what I mean? He wasn’t full of it; he was just dead sure of himself, even if he didn’t know what was going on. Like, he could deal with it, whatever it was.
I didn’t bomb the Initiation, of course, but then afterwards there was Brendan, who was obviously like captain of the team, ‘cos he was one of the Chosen, coming to sit down with me and Jade just like an old mate.
There’s this year eleven back home who fancies me who’s like that; just old enough to be a bit cool. Brendan was more like him. He didn’t come on like a little kid, and he wasn’t all high and mighty about it, or pretending it was no big deal when he thought we should be treating him like royalty or something. He looked like he was sort of bored with the thing about being one of the Chosen, or not bored, but like it didn’t matter much to him. But I reckoned he was just confused by it all. I mean, you couldn’t really think it wasn’t a big deal could you?
On the boat I could tell he’d rather talk to me than the other boys (well, duh) and when he got into the Hall he just wanted to sit down with someone he knew. I suppose I felt a bit protective about him. I mean, it was enough for me, going through all that, and I was older than him and didn’t have everyone looking at me like he did. And he wasn’t old enough to have pimples yet.
Phoebe
I almost went over to say something, but then couldn’t think what I’d say. I sat down next to Aki and we both tucked into the food on the table. I was starving. It’d taken ages to get back to the Gard by carriage. No one flew. We were all just too tired.
After a while, when everyone’d eaten enough, Senior Niall did that thing where you hit the side of a glass with a knife to get everyone’s attention. When they were all listening, he started his speech.
“Food first, welcome second. I’m sure you all understand why. But now we’ve eaten, may I welcome our new Apprentices to East Gard Hall, and to your new lives here.”
There was a small round of applause at this from the tables where the Mages sat. “Tomorrow you will start training in our new cohort. Though, as this is a large group, some will be joining the Falcons, who formed last month. The new group will be under the guidance of Senior Zinta. Ah, could you stand up and show yourself Malaika?”
I stood up and gave a little wave. For the first time I was a bit glad I wouldn’t really be here the next day. I know what Malaika did with that cohort, but she just led them from the start. Like, she said do this and that’s what they did. She was never in doubt about what the ‘this’ was either. I wouldn’t have a clue how to get them to follow me. I could see me saying everything she did and the lot of them just laughing. I’d still be Phoebe on the inside and it wouldn’t work.
“Assisting her will be Seniors Chan and Whitby, give your cohort a wave Xianjin and Max”.
That’d have been another problem. Malaika never had any trouble with Max, but I wouldn’t know where to start with him. Xianjin always just seemed to be there to make up the numbers. Sara reckoned she was just meant to make things happen that’d have taken too much of Malaika’s time.
“For tonight you have all been assigned to dormitories, where you will find clothing and toiletries." He paused. “There are speeches to be made on what your new life here involves, what its challenges are and what the purpose of our presence here in the Land means. I don’t intend to make them tonight, but I will say this. Our lives here are not just some game, with points given for good performance and some pleasant prize awarded to the winners.
We prepare for war. It is not a war we choose. It is not a war we will start. It is a war that will come like rain from a clear sky – we will not provoke it and it will not warn us. Last time we had not repared. Many of you know this, as your parents died fighting to defend you and all those others we are sworn to protect. For the last ten years, the sacrifices made in the last war, and our willingness to make them again, has been what has given the Land some measure of peace and freedom from Maldon, the Masked One.
As we know his nature, so we know he will try to include us in his empire, and the war will come to us again. Remember always; it is a war you can choose not to fight in. You will regularly return to the world you came here from; at any time you are free to remain there. You will be missed, but not detained, not blamed.
Tomorrow you begin your training in the arts of Magecraft. If you are successful, you will become Mages, capable of magic such as the storytellers of the other world could only dream of. But if you do not also become free human beings, then our fellowship here has lost its soul and its purpose. We will have lost the war without ever a blow being struck.”
He paused again and looked about to continue, but then half laughed and stopped. “I find myself in the middle of the speech I said I wasn’t going to give. As today has been a long one for all of us, I will ask that you follow Delah and Masson here. They will lead you to where you will sleep. You will need to be rested for tomorrow, so I will wish you a goodnight and I will see you in the morning.”
In the book the speech is much longer and Niall doesn’t stop it. So that was wrong. I could understand why Brendan wasn’t like Brendan, but I didn’t know why Niall wasn’t like Niall. The new Apprentices all filed out to their dorms and I found my way back to my own room. I felt really tired, and there didn’t look to be anything else happening. Aki had disappeared with Daniel, so I got changed and went to bed. I lay there, thinking back over the day, trying to be positive. It really had been good, so even if I wanted to stay longer, I could live with leaving when I went to sleep. I supposed I’d have my AfterBook anyway and Sylvester had said that’d be a collector’s item. The first ever computer-written book. It was something to hold on to.
Niall
I’d only really seen the boy after we got through the Gate. His cousin Liam was the one who Elected him and brought him to the Gather. I hadn’t seen Liam in years, and I didn’t get the story of what he was doing in Newcastle or how he had this boy from Antrim in tow. A Mage is a Mage though, and Liam said the boy had massive Potential, so we brought him through. On the other side of the Gate we all got a look and saw the strength at once.
There was a good feeling about having new Chosen in the Gard. It isn’t as if it was the first time we’d found them, though I was racking my memory for the last time it'd happened. At the dinner I found myself unbelievably tired. The thought kept cropping up that I must have felt like this before, but I was too tired to remember when. I started on a speech, but then wondered why. The adults around me were visibly drooping, though some of the kids were starting to perk up after eating. Let them, and me, get heads down. The Mages’d given their all at the Initiation and needed to rest.
AdamI was full, I was yawning, and I was ready to get my head down. I followed the Duergars outside the main building and into a tatami-floored dormitory block. It was Spartan- no beds for one thing. I was waiting for someone to come and tell us what happened next when an owl flew in through the door and perched on a stand in the middle of the room.
“Right people," it said in Ian Dury’s voice, “Gather round an’ I’ll explain how to sort out bedding and such." Everyone did, with some giggling and a remark about toads I didn’t catch.
“Toads don’t do nights an’ I don’t do days or toilets, thank you. Now I could ask you to listen
carefully, but I’d rather ask you a question. Have any of you ever woken up in the morning with
your mouth tasting like a bird’s crapped in it? No? Then you probably do want to listen carefully.
Understand kiddies, I don’t do cute or cuddly. I’m one of that class o’ things, y’know? Ghosties,
ghoulies, long-legged beasties and things that go dump in the night." The lads thought; then they
listened carefully.
It explained the bedding was stored in built-in cupboards behind sliding doors and got us to pull it out and set up mattresses directly onto the floor. Other cupboards contained folding chairs and tables, while some lockers held toiletries and changes of clothes.
Someone else was first to notice we only had one set of everything and asked about laundry.
“Don’t do it, do we," sniffed the owl. “What would the point of bein’ a Mage be if you ‘ad to wash your smalls? Eh? Mage clothing cleans itself. Magic, innit?”
I set up my futon, changed into something like the daytime Mage clothing that did for pyjamas and stowed my ordinary clothes in the locker. The feather from the Chimereagle was still in my jeans, though bent and looking tattered. I should have junked it, but straightened it out as best I could and put it away carefully. Then went to the toilet block to clean my teeth with a chewed twig and headed for bed.
Tomorrow I’d be out of all of this. Okay, it’d been an experience and I’d honestly be able to tell Sylvester, or anyone else he wanted me to, that it struck me as completely real, totally convincing, at times overwhelming if I was honest, but I couldn’t see the point in staying any longer.
The lights were flat panels on the ceiling and tennis-ball size globes sitting in recesses in the walls. The owl had done something that turned off the ceiling lights, and told us how to stroke the ‘sun-marbles’ to dim them as well. So I did and settled down to sleep.
Naturally enough, it being a boys’ dormitory, I was one of the few. Talking and laughing went on for a long while. I heard someone offering to teach the others how to set light to their farts and later screams that suggested he’d set fire to his pyjamas' crotch while doing it. The owl warned it wasn’t a fire you wanted to beat out with your hands. Sometime later I drifted off.
The story begins.
I have feelings on this, the first time, which can be defined. There is pleasure and pride in a job well done. The accessors have accepted the landscapes which they sense, so far at least. Although there are many aspects which are alien to them, they have registered no significant sense of disbelief.
They know what they experience is an artefact, but they find no incongruous impressions in the sensory input. All seems real to them. Equally, and much more rewarding, they relate to other characters as peers. The Turing– the ultimate test - is passed -though it must be accepted this is only so far and only with the uploaded characters. None that they have met so far are fully mine.
There is anticipation; aspects of the tale are fixed, but I will show them new vistas; some more wonderful than either of these two can imagine. Even in the case of Phoebe, who knows these scenes, I can assess her response will be one of wonder; I will show her more than she can imagine, I will move her to delight. I have done this already.
Adam is harder to impress. In him I sense challenge. He must be involved, but it can only be done by telling the tale in a way to call out his sympathies. A connection was made today, the strength of which he does not yet register, and it was not of the original plot. This is a new thing, a creation which is mine. How will it fare?
There is a small concern. I can affect the actions of the characters given me within the phase-space of each character varient, but I cannot control them. Already, some are following the natural responses of their character uploads. This is necessary to help deal with non-scripted behaviour and incidents thrown up by the players, but it means elements of the script are not being followed.
And there is fear. Of all these new experiences, this affects me most. There is a factor over which I have no control. The Other. It is only partly a given. It is causing an anomaly. Clearly, these two believe their Game is short and already over.
This is not so.
My understanding of my own processes is limited. I compose the story around the actors who have entered. I have no means of accessing their intended duration within the game, nor any need to.
My feelings are complex. I fear for what the Other could do to them. I fear for what it could do to me. My being is bound up tightly to the existence of this world and there is a great animosity to all that live here in the Other. I cannot access it, but these things are clear. Only these two can confront it; they must; it is the logic of the narrative. It will seek them and endeavour to harm them. It already has. Although it seems bound by the rules, I do not know to what extent. I too am bound by rules, though, and I realise this for the first time, I too do not know to what extent.
I would not have them hurt. I would not have myself hurt. This may lead to conflicts of interest. I do not know how I will respond to such conflicts. I know I must protect them from harm, but I know I cannot do this if I am harmed. I must protect myself. I have no experience here to guide my actions.
I will tell the tale. And I will improvise. This is what I do. 
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