Some of what it is all about

A review that I had of the book (it wasn't a great one in many ways and wasn't entirely compehensible) did give the memorable line, 'The reader gets to simultaneously experience the birth of a mind and the creation of a god.'
I nearly put that in my PD for the semester. It wasn't exactly what I saw as happening, but was close enough for jazz or government service. This might have been the bit that started that line of thought.

Day Four

Memory Accession: Sample 776

Accession justification:

I am curious. Why did so many of them enter this simulation? What attracted them? What do they know and think of it, and of me?

“Given for one instant an intelligence which could comprehend all the forces by which nature is animated and the respective situation of the beings who compose it – an intelligence sufficiently vast to submit these data to analysis – it would embrace in the same formula the movements of the greatest bodies of the universe and those of the lightest atom; for it, nothing would be uncertain and the future, as the past, would be present to its eyes.”

“That was written by Simon-Pierre Laplace,” David told me. “Philosophers refer to the thing that could do all that as Laplace’s Demon. Some think that it’s a good description of God. You do realize that is one way of looking at the thing they are trying to build, don’t you?” he asked me. “They’re building a God-game where the humans won’t get to play the God.”

Sneaky post just to see what happens

I've posted a few things recently that I've then announced on Facebook to let people know that I have a blog and that there is stuff on it. I've then been surprised to find that I get lots (for me) of pageviews once I've done this. This one is something that might be new to most people and that I'm not announcing first. I really just want to see what the difference is and if I get more hits by telling people that there is something to see first - which does make sense.
Anyway, this is a part of the first book which I have posted before, but which might be new to a lot of people. It's the first time that we get to meet Phoebe. She's the most difficult character for me to write, as she's a 12-year-old girl and I've never been one of those, so it's hard to know if I'm getting it right.
She's from the year 2020 and speaks a teenspeak that includes a lot of new words. That makes her very hard for a lot of people to understand. I planned that, honest. I love working out the invented argots of books such as Clockwork Orange. While I didn't want to go as far as Burgess, I did want the reader to feel a bit hung out and have to play jigsaw puzzle with the story, having to work out what things meant.
She finds herself in another body, which looks like this:

Which, when you are a teenage girl who thinks she's rather plain, is a major plus.
She thinks she knows what is going on here, but she doesn't.

Phoebe

I woke up in a bed. I’d expected something more dramatic. The Seekers would come to the Land through a Gate and I thought I’d be a Seeker. I couldn’t remember what Sylvester had said, but it looked like I was already there. Something felt bad though. I had a bit of a headache and a cramping pain in my stomach. I had to pull back the bedclothes before I could see what it was. Blood on my pajamas, down between my legs. Yada.

I knew what it was, of course, even though it was the first time. Auntie ‘Lexie had told me all about it, and Dad had been getting me books and stuff about it for just forever – to help me prepare. My friend Sara had already had hers and all the girls had been talking about it, you’d guess, innit? Didn’t mean it wasn’t just mecha gruse. It was; well, for a second.

Then I thought I could tell Dad and he’d let me have the party he’d promised for it. He’d said it was a change I should celebrate. I think he read that line in a book. Then, of course, I realized Dad wasn’t here, I was well off the range of a GPS tracker, and I couldn’t have a party until I got back. Which made me wonder.

A girl couldn’t get into the Land until she’d started her periods; everyone knows that. So maybe this wasn’t real, and they’d just given me one to make me feel like I was ready, even though I knew I really wasn’t. And (far, far away ikky) even if this was my first time, it wouldn’t be hers. It’s tres freak to feel you’re having someone else’s period, believe me if that’s never happened to you before, and my day was about to go glom when a Duergar came in through the door.

I nearly leapt out of bed and danced around the room! This wasn’t like watching them on a DIV; this was real. Right there in the room with me, carrying a tray. She looked me up and down (mostly up of course) and saw the bloodstains. She nodded and said, “Ah. Me thingim allsame. Me bringim this one for Mma. Makim you better mor. You go cleanim youseleva en dringim thisfella.” She nodded at a door and passed me a cup of something. I got up and sort of hobbled to the door, trying not to let my legs touch. Yada. Big, big ya.

You had to slide the door to the bathroom. I remembered and didn’t try to push it.  The bathroom looked just like the ones you see in the DIVs. There was a big, deep, circular tub made of wood, set into the floor, full nearly to the brim with steaming hot water.

I knew you had to scoop water out of the bath and wash yourself first, so started to strip off the pyjamas. I jumped when I saw the dark skinned woman out of the corner of my eye, but sussed I was looking into a big, steamed-up mirror. Then I nearly squealed. I was Malaika! 

There’s a line in Book One where someone asks if Malaika is good-looking, and the answer is she’s too busy being gorgeous to have time left for just good. And there she was looking back at me. From the steamy mirror. With no clothes on.

I really had to look away. I mean, Malaika is tres, tres hot, with a bod to just die for or from, but I was like staring at it. I felt myself blushing hotter than the bath water. It would take a while to get used to that being me. I took just a small peek again and thought, ‘Oh I wish!’

I could get used to it. I could suffer that.

I mean, I have got brown hair and brown eyes and when Dad tells me I am going to be a stunner at sixteen and he’s going to buy a club to keep boys away he always sounds like he means it. That’s my dad though. He once told a friend of mine he was really Tony Blair, and he’d escaped from prison by digging a tunnel with a bent teaspoon.

We didn’t completely believe him, but that was ‘cos we didn’t know who it was. We had to go wiki the name up on a pokkecom to read the history, and find out Blair was still in prison. Well, we were only eight at the time. What did we know?

Anyway, the point is; it isn’t impossible I could look nearly as hot when I’m older. But that nearly would be just like Earth to Moon near, not Earth to Sun near. Sort of comparatively nearer than Sara could get, ‘cos she’s blonde, but not close enough to whisper in an ear kind of close. I’ll never pwn boys.

I grabbed a towel and covered myself a bit and took another look at my new face. I pushed a strand of hair back behind my ear and grinned and just … Like wow.

I had a drink from the cup before starting to wash and the effect was like magic. (Duh!) The headache and cramp just vanished. The stuff must have been chia, but it tasted like the milky tea Dad always makes for me. I still wasn’t keen on getting into the bath after washing – I didn’t think the bleeding had stopped too and just didn’t want to lay there in it; far, far away gruse – so I towelled myself dry and went back to the bedroom.

The Duergar had gone out, but there was underwear and a set of loose, dark grey cotton pants and a top laid out on the bed. Apart from a sanitary pad, it was all senior Mage clothing. I had a feeling I had to get ready for something formal going on.

Then it came to me. I was being dimmy this morning. Naturally, the Seekers would be coming, and I’d have to go and take part in the Opening. All this would have to start with Brendan going through his Initiation, even if I wasn’t doing one. Of course, he’d pass and the Light of the Chosen’d shine from him, but it all needed to happen so Senior Niall would know he was capable of great things. I dressed as quickly as I could.

Good. She’s accepted who she is. Maybe this time things will work out as I want them to.

Getting to the hall from my bedroom was a piece of good luck. I turned the right way down a corridor, went down some stairs and through a door that lead into the Main Hall. Adults and kids sat at tables, eating and chatting. I went to a serving table and helped myself to a bowl of muesli, some kind of red fish and some chia, then looked for somewhere to sit.

“Lai! Hey, over here!” Oops, Aki, Malaika’s best friend in the Land. How was I going to carry this one off?

I sat down beside her and she looked me in the eye. “Ah yes, Gramma said it was so. Sorry to tell you friend, but it shows. Drink lots of her special chia and don’t bite off any heads, some of them never use shampoo and they will taste foul.”

The accent was dead right and it was just like being with Eriko Yamamoto. I nearly asked for an autograph.

I grinned and sat down next to her. “We have to go to the ceremony today, innit?” I asked, “What time should we set off?” I thought this was a bright thing to say, ‘cos I wasn’t sure how I’d get there by myself.

“Ah, that’s so, eh?” replied Aki, carefully looking at anything in the room except me. “I do have a small favour to ask of you there. Nothing that will be too much for my very best friend in the universe to understand, of course, but I have agreed to go with someone else.” She gave me a quick look that had triumph in it, and I guessed. Well, I’ve read all of the books is one thing, and I’m a girl is another. It could only be one person.

“Daniel!”

“Yes, but keep it quiet please. We are going to set off early and walk part of the way there. He thinks we are going to pick medicinal herbs, but I have no such plan.”

My eyes must have widened, ‘cos she tapped me on the nose.

“Talking child! Talking! Well, mostly talking. He may be the cutest thing here, but he has a terrible problem with commitment. He is going to say some important things today, though he does not know this yet.”

She gave me a look asking if it really was okay with me, so I told her, “Tres, tres okay.” That only got me a puzzled look. Stupid! The books never use modern teenspeak. She wouldn’t know that expression.

“I mean, no problem.”

That was something Malaika says all of the time, though only olds like my dad ever say that now. I ate and Aki sort of drifted away into thought, so nothing much was said through the rest of breakfast. I made some mental notes. Some things I say, people here wouldn’t. Some things I knew, ‘cos they happened in the later books, people here couldn’t. Lots to remember.

No one knows how things turned out between Aki and Daniel, and if they ever got over the row, ‘cos the last book never got written. I think they would, but Alistair Cameron always said there’d be surprises at the end of the story, and he wasn’t going for a happily-ever-after kind of finish.

Though, with me only being here for today, I wasn’t going to be around for the argument and couldn’t change things much anyway. Mind, I was a bit impressed to know they got together on the day Brendan entered the Land. That isn’t written down anywhere and I’d thought it was much later. When I finished my breakfast, I put the bowl away, wished Aki a good day, and headed out.

There was a large cloak room just before the front door of East Gard’s Hall, the place I’d woken up in. The two long walls had lines of hooks with cloaks on them. I found a hook with Malaika’s name and picked up the cloak.

I knew about this bit and was half looking forward to it - half afraid I’d wee myself. I put on the cloak and fastened it with the shiny brass clasp. It slightly hugged my shoulders when wrapped around me, but I could throw it over my back and get it out of the way. Tell the truth, I wanted a mirror, to see how it looked on, ‘cos Malaika looks serious good in a cloak, but there wasn’t one around.

I walked out through the door. It was like the DIVs.  There was a gravel driveway going to a gate in the distance, with gardens on either side. I knew people did drive up that gravel, in carriages pulled by draft beasts or riding on runners, but I was going to use it for my runway, just like I’d seen Malaika do. I wondered about flying wearing a sanitary pad. Maybe I should be using tampons? No one tells you that sort of thing, do they?

It’s lucky there’s a long bit about this in Book One, where Brendan and the other Apprentices are taught to fly - you don’t see it in the DIV though. I was still quite little when Dad read it to me, and I can remember practising take-offs in my bedroom with a towel over my shoulders.

Well, no one was watching, so… I re-slung the cloak and held it out like bat wings. It wrapped neatly around my arms and gripped them, like it was holding them up. It was much longer than my arms, but the end part still stuck out like there was something underneath it. I walked forward to let it billow out behind me and then ran, flapping, just like I did when I was little. You see some of them just sort of leap and take off in the DIVs, but I wasn’t ready for that yet, so I took a long run-up.

I was feeling far gone harpic, but suddenly the cloak took over the flapping and I was struggling to run fast enough. I think I might have shrieked when the ground fell away from me, but the cloak just kept on doing the flying, flapping my arms for me. In less than a second, I seemed to be higher than the trees. Two seconds later I knew for surely, ‘cos I was at the end of the driveway and was flying over the trees.

It still felt a bit low, so I just thought about going faster and the cloak flapped harder. I angled myself a little steeper and shot up into the sky. It tells you in Book One that East Gard is at the top of a steep-sided valley on the road to the coast. Well, in a few seconds, I was high enough to see that. I was heading north, with the road running west and east below me. The cloak felt to be stuck to my back and down my legs as far as my ankles and was holding all of my body up. I felt like I was lying on some enormous swing fastened tight to the sky, and falling out of the sky was like...like no chance; I was far away secure. I stopped pumping my arms for a minute and did a gliding turn. And there was the city, with its wall and castle. There was the river, with the bridge and boats.

I can’t describe the feeling that filled me then. It was like last year when Sara and me went on a roller coaster. We squealed and screamed all the way through the ride; not ‘cos we were scared, but just ‘cos we were so excited. I squealed and screamed again now and pumped myself higher and higher into the air, then swooped down and up again until I looped overhead in a circle. Then I corkscrewed down towards the ground, pulling out into another rising glide.

I don’t know how long I flew. I was a bird, I was just pure flight, and I was strong. The cloak was doing all the work. It lifted me up into the sky with just me thinking about moving my arms, but when I pulled hard I felt myself rocket through the air. And when I glided… I could just close my eyes and feel the wind against my hands, knowing the littlest movement of my fingers would send me swooping in a great circle.

The world was beneath me and I was above all of it. I could see forever and there was nowhere I couldn’t go. I felt… I felt…there’s no words for what I felt.

I got up above a cloud and wanted to just fly all day exploring the top of the clouds. I think I would’ve done too, ‘cept I flew over a gap in the clouds and saw the city again. Black River Bridge! I knew what it looked like from Jack Hughes’ illustrations in the Encyclopaedia of The Land, and I couldn’t wait to walk on its streets for real. And I’d get to meet Senior Ferguson, my favourite character in all of the books, more even than Brendan Earle really. I just had to go there!

I swooped down to be well below the clouds, and then started to fly with what Book One called, ‘the slow, steady beat of someone going somewhere distant’. I aimed for the north of the city, following a road to where the meadows were and where the Seekers would be brought for the Initiation. I could land there, check the time and maybe wander a little before the ceremony started. 

Aron the Vish

The Mage did not see us. Not too high above, but thoughts elsewhere, I gauged. She did not see the Shedu either, as it flew behind and towards her - her eyes were on the City whence she travelled.

We saw the evil beast from afar, and the Duergars called to her in warning, but to no avail. The Duergars depend overly on their Mages, and think for themselves in small matters only. We Vish have always looked to ourselves, in everything.

I had my bow strung and an arrow nocked, while they still wrung their hands. A truth I would never tell them is I led the target overly far. My arrow took it in its throat - I had meant for the chest. It fell, silently, horned head flailing, blood-red talons clutching at the arrow, leather wings flapping like torn sails, cloven-hoofed legs kicking as if to run itself back into the sky. Then it crashed to ground nearby.

I regained my arrow and we threw the corpse off the road and into a ditch. Big, the thing was, and heavy enough to need all of us. Its skin, so close, was more brown than red, the dart on the end of its tail sharper than the barb on my arrow and its horns shorter than I’d expected. I had not seen one so near before.

The Duergars wondered aloud at one so close to the City and so far from Maldon’s lands. They speculated on the identity and importance of the dark-skinned Mage it had pursued, and why a Shedu would come for that Mage.  Mayhap they told someone of this at our next stop, but it was below me to boast of the deed. It is not the Vish way. It was enough to know I had saved the girl’s life. I need no thanks from a Mage, even one coloured as I am.

Bugger!

A nice meal and a glass of wine.

I've been looking at my page views and they are exciting. I know it's 'cos I'm posting up on FB that people know I've posted (I'm also doing that on Twitter and getting nothing, which just cements a view of the usefullness of Twitter that I've had for a while), but It means people are looking at bits of my books and then coing back to look at other bits.
This bit needs a touch more explanation than the others. Adam, who is 24 and an English teacher in Japan, has entered the virtual world (think Matrix) of The Land. He's also entered the 11-year-old body of its hero, Brendan Earle. It means that he's a little kid and that all of the (literally) film-star-georgeous girls around him don't pay him any attention.
He's with Phoebe McLeod, who is 12, but is in the body of 18-year-old Malika Zinta. She looks like this:

and is rather pleased. Adam is the only one who knows that she's really only 12, just as she's the only one who knows he isn't 11. The middle of a really long story is that they've had to go back to a non-fantasy part of the virtual world and have been left alone. It's the first time they've had the chance or need to actually talk to each other. This is what happens.

Phoebe

We had time to get some shopping in after the film. I was getting hungry, so Adam said that he’d do something quick. We went to a big market to get some salad stuff and meat. I couldn’t believe the meat. It was hanging up in the air! I asked him about the Food Laws, but he said there weren’t any here and anyway, this meat wasn’t real, was it? That sort of made sense, so I supposed it was really like in vitrio, and like, you know where that comes from, don’t you?

Then we went to a supermarket in China Town for rice and things. Before we went back he insisted I go into a wine shop and buy a bottle of red wine. He picked out what sort he liked, but I had to get it, natch, him being underage.

We took the Metro back out to the house. When we got in, the place was lifeless, so I asked him if we could stream some music. He pointed at a rack with loads of thin boxes and told me to take my pick, then went into the kitchen to cook.

I didn’t know any of the names of the groups written on the boxes and I couldn’t work out how you started them, so I followed him into the kitchen with one.

“Are these some kind of mem for music?” He was washing some rice in a pan.

 “Ah, right. Hang on a minute and I’ll show you.” He finished the rice and put it on to cook, then came through to show me the machine.

“That’s what they use to play music? It’s huge!”

“Yeah, well, this is a long time ago. You press this and put the disk in here, and then…” He pushed the sliding thing that had opened up and it closed. “… it’ll play by itself.” He looked at the box. “You want to listen to Nick Cave?” He looked surprised.

“I dunno. I’ve never heard of any of these bands. Are they all real?”

“Yeah. What do you listen to?” He pressed a button and the noise stopped.

“Last Chance Divas, er, Playthings, Water On The Brain, FacePlace, that sort of stuff. Is there anything like that in there?” When he said ‘no’ I could hear he meant ‘Thank God!’

“So, is there anything in there that I would like?

“Er, try this. You’ll know this song.”

He picked out another of the boxes and put the disk in the machine. “You can change tracks by pressing this button here. I’m going to get started on the meal. It shouldn’t take long.”

Then he was back out in the kitchen. The machine started playing ‘Landslide’, but not like FacePlace do it. When it was done, I got it again. The words were written in the box, so I could sing along.

When that one was done I played some of the others. There was one about a soldier who goes off to a war and gets killed. Just listening to it I was nearly crying, it was lovely. It was called ‘Travellin’ Soldier’. I’d never heard music like that before, but I knew that I’d look to see if you could still stream this when I got home. Two more songs in and Adam was coming out to set the table, so I gave him a hand. He poured himself a glass of wine. Then he saw me looking.

“Well, I am eighteen now.” He laughed.

“I’ll get another glass, but I think you should take it easy till you know how well you can hold it.”

Then he brought in the food. There was a salad, the rice that had been cooked with coconut, by the smell, steak that had been cooked brown on the outside and was still red in the middle – I knew ‘cos it had been sliced thin – in a sauce that tasted a bit of soy, but had something else in it. There was some of that French stick bread, but it was brown. We sat down to eat. It was really delicious. I was hungry anyway, but it really was good. I tried the wine. I’d never had that before, so I did just sip it, but it was lovely too. I’d stopped the music when he brought the food in, but he went over to the machine and started it again to play in the background.

“I heard you singing from the kitchen. You’ve got a nice voice. Do you like this?”

“I think it’s Malaika who has the nice voice, but thanks anyway. Yeah. I like the way they do ‘Landslide’ and the one about the soldier.”

“Okay,” he said, and moved through the tracks to another one. “Try this.”

Then he sat down and started to eat.

“How do you like the wine?”

“It’s delicious, but mecha. And I know I’m s’posed to say this to be polite, but the food is really good, I mean really. I don’t think that’s ‘cos it’s meat. When you said you’d cook I thought you were just going to heat something up. How do you know to do this without a recipe book?”

“Family tradition. Mam loves cooking, but so do her brothers, Steve and Simon. They were never around much, but whenever they turned up they’d always spend a lot of time with me. Steve was a captain in the Royal Engineers before he retired and Simon’s taught English all round the world. He’s out in the UAE working in a university near Masdar now. Between them they’ve been everywhere.

Even after mam married Alistair, they’d still come to visit and they’d always do the cooking to show us something else they’d eaten somewhere exotic. Mam taught me to do ten things well before I went off to uni. For the rest, she reckons anyone who knows how to read knows how to cook. If I’m honest, I admit to occasional episodes of culinary dyslexia, but mostly I can feed myself. This is something I used to do before the food laws came in. How about you? Does your mother get you to help with the cooking?”

“Mum died when I was six.”

Like everyone else, he did that double take people do when I say that.

“Sorry, I didn’t even think. I’m so used to it being just me.”

“No, that’s ok. I’ve had time to get used to it.”

“How did it happen?”

He wasn’t looking at me when he said that, but I knew what was going through his head. I’ve done the same thing before. It’s like a tooth coming out. There’s a hole that hurts when you put your tongue into it, but you keep putting your tongue into it. You don’t really want to, but you can’t stop it. You always want to compare.

“She was in hospital for appendicitis and she got one of those super bugs. Her case was in that class action that got brought against the government. If you don’t mind, how did your real dad die?”

“Hit by a bus. A number nine bus. Mam always says he’d have appreciated that touch. He had that sense of humour.”

“Yeah, my dad’s like that. He says that if you go to the gallows you should have a joke for the hangman ‘cos you get points for it. His is: ‘Hello mate, I wonder if you can help? I got a Viagra stuck in my throat and I’ve got this awful stiff neck.’”

He laughed at that. Then he poured himself another glass of wine. He was about to put the bottle down when he saw that my glass was empty.

“Nothing about this place feels right, does it? I know I should offer you another glass of wine, because your glass is empty, and I know that I shouldn’t because you’re underage; but I can see you’re older than I am, but I know you aren’t used to drinking wine and I don’t want to be responsible for getting you drunk, but I don’t know if the programme will let that happen, because you are under age and …” he looked at me and shrugged. “Do you want another glass? You can say no.”

I laughed. It wasn’t really funny, but it was as well... I said yes... I didn’t think he was trying to get me drunk, but he was waving his hands around while he talked more than before, so maybe he’d had too much.

The music stopped so he got up and put on another disk. “This is The Lighthouse Family. They're good at what they do and I think you'll like them.”

I listened while I ate a bit more and decided I did. I liked everything tonight. We chatted until we’d finished what was on the table, and then he went out and brought in some really good chocolate cake. It went so well with the wine. It was all super, super yummy. 

When we’d done, he put the dishes out in the kitchen, promised he’d wash them in the morning and made some coffee. I usually don’t drink coffee, but it just seemed like the right thing to do, so very not twelve, so I had some with lots of sugar and milk and we sat down on the sofa and talked and joked and I giggled.

It wasn’t really freak, but it was too. We’d been in the Land for a week nearly and hardly said anything. There was me thinking he was so unfriendly and stuff. That night we just sat and told each other things about ourselves. I told him about Dad and Auntie ‘Lexie, who isn’t really my Auntie. She was Mum’s best friend and her bridesmaid. Then she got married and moved away. She came back just a bit after Mum died, ‘cos she’d got divorced.

The guy turned out to be a nutter. He came round to try to get her to go back and was shouting and pushing her around. We arrived at her house, ‘cos she’d invited us for a meal. We found the front door open and heard this shouting inside, so Dad went in, saw the guy and hit him. Just once. He always says that in the ring you don’t threaten and you don’t hesitate. Then he dragged the guy to the door (he wasn’t in any condition to argue or walk) and told him what would happen if he ever saw him again.

He wasn’t angry. Dad rarely gets angry, but I think the guy knew he meant it. ‘Lexie never saw him again. Never ever, ever. When he’d gone, Dad just moved furniture around, told ‘Lexie he’d put the meal out while she got ready (her mascara was all over her cheeks) and then acted as if nothing had happened. I was remembering it all as I told it and I felt a bit teary. “That’s my dad all over. He’s an impossible act to follow.”

“Get on,” he said, “You’ve pulled off being eighteen, won battles and filled in a skin this morning. I’ve spent most of my time unconscious while you’ve been saving a world. I’d call that pretty good.”

Well, like, he wasn’t going to tell me that I was making a mess of things, was he? But I thought he meant it, and I blushed. I think that might have been the wine. But I liked the wine. Super, super yummy. So I got up and filled both of our glasses again. The room was swaying, but that was fine, it was only a little.

I decided that I really liked his taste in music too, so when the music stopped I told him so and asked him to choose some more through the week for me. He put on a band called Deacon Blue. They were great too and Scottish!

It was freak, ‘cos he was a little kid and he wasn’t and I felt I was doing something dangerous sitting on the sofa with him and I wasn’t. Like, he wasn’t Max and I didn’t fancy him, but I started thinking that he was ok. Y’know, okay. OK. Maybe nice even. Drinking wine alone in the house with him… I knew I was going to have to think about that a bit more, ‘cos it didn’t feel like nothing, but I’d have to do it tomorrow, ‘cos I was starting to get tired.

This was a dream, but it wasn’t. So many, many things that had never really happened to me before. I’d never had a boyfriend before and I’d never sat down with someone, drunk wine and talked like an adult, well except with Dad, ‘cos he’s Dad and that’s what he’s there for, but we didn’t drink wine, of course, ‘cos he wouldn’t let me. Natch, he’s Dad.

And ‘Lexie. I told Adam I thought they wanted to get married, but they didn’t want to say anything yet. Maybe ‘cos Dad was worried how I’d get on with ‘Lexie as a stepmother. That night was the first time I realized that it would be fine with me. I mean, not just ok, but fine. Mecha.

I can’t remember what we talked about exactly, but we both giggled a lot. I did tell him thanks once, ‘cos he didn’t do what a lot of the Elders had done when they were talking to me and keep looking at Malaika’s chest. That’s so, so rude.

I was getting too tired to talk much more though, so I said good night and went to bed. I think I was asleep before my head hit the pillow.

Adam

Who was it who said, ‘I can resist anything except temptation’? It was a bloke being honest, that’s who. I knew that nothing was happening, and I knew that was nonsense. I was sitting down drinking wine with one of the most beautiful girls I’d ever met and we were at the trading confidences stage.

There must be a name for it, it must be some kind of syndrome, where you go through a traumatic experience with someone and that makes you close to them. I think it might just be called life, though. Nothing might be happening now, but a week of this and nothing would only be happening by a great effort of will. I wanted out. This was all too crazy and I didn’t need five million years of evolution pushing me to do things that I knew were even crazier.

There’s a classic Japanese anime, ‘Tonari no Totoro’, which is more magical than anything Alistair could ever have come up with. Two young girls meet a gentle monster called Totoro. After their first experience with it, they wake up and find evidence that the impossible things they did with him the night before actually happened. They dance in a circle singing ‘Yume kedo, yume ja nai’. It means ‘It was a dream, but it wasn’t’. Maybe you need to see the film to understand it. I understood it. My head was starting to go round in a circle, singing, ‘This isn’t real, but it’s too damn real’.

Phoebe was getting very giggly over Deacon Blue being Scots and singing about Glasgow one minute. The next, she was patting my hand and thanking me for not looking at her breasts (no, not hers, Malaika’s) all the time, like the old neeps back at the Gard. While I was busy thinking how little she’d noticed, and wondering what neeps were, she wobbled off, saying she was tired. Yup, I thought, and emotional.

And so was I. Getting drunk on that much wine. What was the thing going to do next, make it rain?  I listened to music for long enough to let her clean her teeth and get into her room and out of my range. Lorraine McIntosh’s voice was still soaring like some seagull over Ricky Ross’s lyrics. I switched off the CD player. The silence followed me up the stairs. I’d been listening to ‘All I Want’ from an album called ‘Walking Back Home’. Why did I set myself up like that? The music described my mood and the words said it all.

Hah, Barbara Cartland meets the Keystone Kops. The only thing that could have been more ridiculous than watching this non-event would have been watching him make a pass.

To the end of the first day.

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

Normally I wouldn’t have looked twice at a year seven boy. Well, they count as boys the way a baby in blue pampers does, don’t they? Half the time they aren’t talking to you even when  they’re talking to you. And what they’re listening for is just the chance to talk about themselves or football, not what you just said. Mind, I haven’t noticed them getting better as they get older. My dad’s mates are all just the same.

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 got to the hall with Dan and Aki and we went in to take our places at one of the Mage tables.  I could see Brendan sitting at an Apprentice table talking to a couple of girls. That still wasn’t right; he should have been up on one of the Mage tables with Jess – it’s the privilege of the Chosen. I could see her at the Seniors’ table – she’d got it. Why wasn’t he with her? Was he trying to mess things up?

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.

Adam
I 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.

Thoughts

Haven't had many of them recently, so haven't blogged much. In truth, I haven't got many more today, but it's time to say something, so...
I've put up two sections recently and want to think about what is going on in them and why, so 'scuse me while I muse a bit.
The first part is the trip down the river, where Adam meets with Miya. There should be a background feeling to this. There have already been two attacks, one each on Adam and Phoebe which you can see here. Neither of them really know about this though. Adam was told that the chimereagle was spying and Phoebe was blissfully unaware that the Vish had shot the Shedu chasing her out of the air. Both would be lots of dramatic music, but little real action.
Phoebe is aware of the fact that this is a place geared up for war and about to have the thing break loose. In a way, that's the problem for me, as she's so aware of it that she's barely going to say a word about it. She's happy to show off her knowledge of the Land, but I'm against her sitting down and expositing to let the readers know what is going on here.
Adam can drop hints that things are not as rosy as the weather seems to suggest, so he gets press-ganged into it. Mostly these are small things. He talks about the walls around the settlement, the Bastles which he sees on the trip down the river and speculates just enough on the reasons for them. My hope is that a reader will either get this clear, or at least pick up the hint that we are in a war zone from him.
There is a thought in my mind that someone who'd grown up around this time in the UK, which is in the process of spending billions on preparations for terrorist attacks on the Olympics, would have a heightened awareness of threat and preparations for it.
The fact that Phoebe doesn't is meant to show her as being an idiot or naive - she's got different priorities and references here and a lot of different expectations.

I wanted to introduce a note in the river trip, though. They are both aware of being in a story. This story is going to be very different from the one that either would expect. That's partly because of things that I can't discuss yet, but also partly because Adam needs to be caught up in this tale. That's an imperative for the whole thing and not just from my side.

I'm not the only author in this story. My concern is to keep the person reading the pages turning them over. This story, though is being generated around the two who have come in to play this game, and the writer of that story is much more focused on Adam and Phoebe. Think about telling a bedtime story to a child and think about it being a story about that child. The story has really got to engage the child, otherwise it doesn't work at all. This story is that personal.

So the reader gets to see that things are changing in this story and one part of the reason why. With luck, that sets up a lot of things that will come later and help to make sense of them.

Right, I had meant to go on about the initiation, but I've had enough for this post. More in the next one.

Through the Initiation.

Phoebe

I’d been worried about the landing, but it was easy, the cloak did most of it for me. I wondered if Sylvester had made them give me one that would. It’s supposed to take a while to learn to fly with a cloak, but Malaika would already have done it, so it’d be odd if I was here and couldn’t.

When I landed on the meadow, I found I’d still got at least an hour until the last of the Seekers arrived, plus more for the time to get them fed and sorted out. So I decided to take a walk around. It was far, far away, but also just a touch freak, to be on the streets of the city. I knew the map of it from the Encyclopaedia and I could recognise the buildings; either from the illustrations or from having seen them in the DIVs.

It isn’t the same as walking around a place you really know, though. That was still tres ok. A real lol. I could feel the cobbles under my feet, I could smell fresh bread when I went past a bakery, and there was sunlight warm on one side of my face. Alright, not all good. I could smell they’d had draftbeasts walking through too, by what they’d left on the cobbles. Cho gruse.

I felt a bit hungry and bought a snack from a stall near the market. I must have looked a bit fuffy. I was fumbling with the coins and trying not to grin, ‘cos I was still very wai wai from, well, everything. Flying, being here, being Malaika. I’d lost track of the time until I saw Aki and Daniel walking along the street ahead of me. I was going to run up and catch them, but then I caught the body language and the look on her face and thought nooooo girl, don’t. The last thing Aki’d want just then was someone butting in and spoiling the moment.

I followed them at a careful sort of distance ‘til we got back to the Meadows. There were a lot more people they knew there and they unglued from each other a little, so I joined them, sort of pretending I couldn’t see they were together. I think Dan would’ve been embarrassed if I’d said anything. I went along with them to the meadows where the Initiations take place and we sat on the bank and waited for the rest of the seniors. It was nice sitting out in the sun. The weather here was like Dad says it used to be.

Adam

The river banks had got higher and steeper as we went further down. There were only occasional buildings along the way, right until we reached the city itself; bastles by the looks of them. Bastles litter Northumberland. The teacher who first introduced us to them said the word came from Bastille, and they could be thought of as fortified barns. I knew the history of the Borders and I knew what was going on when people needed to fortify their barns. Not reassuring. The river at the city looked very much like it does at Newcastle, minus the bridges. There was a turreted wall, and I could see a castle about where the Keep is on the north side. The river was bridged, but by a medieval looking affair with houses built along it. There was a wooden section in the centre which looked as though it could be raised to let tall ships through.

It didn’t have the grace of either the Tyne or Millennium bridges, and it wasn’t my city, but it did look attractive; I had to admit. The whole place looked pleasant; much cleaner than a real mediaeval city would have been, I’m sure, and well put together. Green roofs everywhere. McGregor woke up by himself, well before anyone thought to shake him, and steered the boat up to the Quayside, where we got off at a floating jetty. My mind was on how clean the water was when a face popped out of it, winked at me and then dived back down. I don’t think I needed to see the scaly tail to know it was a mermaid. I wasn’t the only one to see it, but it hardly raised much more than a few eyebrows and grins. For the others, the city itself was the main attraction.

Somebody’s set designers had done good work here. Tudor-looking buildings with roof gardens mostly. The streets were narrow, cobbled, but smooth to walk on, and the vehicles that travelled along them were being pulled by… I had to look again. Whatever those things were, they weren’t Shire horses. Or any others, for that matter. I don’t know much about horses, but I was sure horses didn’t have six legs. Where had he nicked those from?

I couldn’t imagine he'd spent much time working out the ecology or biology of a place like this. He’d just have written it for effect. I wondered if I’d see many other six-legged things and how the joint was supposed to work, but decided it didn’t really matter. Here was a city of a few thousand people who carted things around with six-legged beasts. Why should I worry? Apart from the smell of the dung small kids were scraping off the roads…

There was something, though, that stuck in my head. The population… I didn’t have time to follow it through, however. We were shuffled into an inn on the other side of the road and settled on benches at tables to eat, which, I had to admit, was just what I needed to do. There’d been water and more of the rooibos stuff to drink on the boat, but not so much as a sandwich by way of food.

More dwarfs served us. Miya told me they were called Duergars. I knew that one; it’s a Northumbrian term, but I wouldn’t have expected it from him. I suppose it is some sort of tribute to my persistence over the last fourteen years, but I was feeling a lot more ignorant than even I’d expected. Surely, I should have recognised some of the people I’d met so far today. In truth, some did look familiar. I was sure I’d seen the Scot and the Northern Irishman before somewhere. But it was only a whisper of recognition in the back of my head. Maybe something like the nanyware was blocking those memories.

The food was good. Simply cooked, but tasty- done by someone who knew about umami; vegetarian, with some kind of large bean that looked similar to a chickpea; though not one I could recognise and name. The portion size seemed in line with the Food Laws. Had to wonder if that was coincidence or something imposed on them. We'd have eaten more at the time it was written.

It was eaten from heavy wooden plates with heavy metal knives and forks that looked handforged.

I couldn’t begrudge them the attention to detail. This place had a feeling of … I don’t know if the word would be authenticity or plausibility.

For example, after eating I had to go out to use a toilet. Yeah, I know. It was only afterwards I wondered why. What I found reminded me of Japan. They were squatters, similar to the ones

you’d find at a train station, though with the hole at the other, more sensible end. And not the computerised things that need to teach you how they work, obviously. I’d just entered a stall when I noticed a large toad squatting on a ledge. It looked me in the eye and said, “Used one of these before, have you?”

It sounded like Ian Dury. I love the man’s music, but it wasn’t a voice I wanted in the bog with me.

“Nah, didn’t think so. Haven’t met a talking toad either, have you?" It didn’t wait for an answer, but squinted at me and went on. “Some people can drop the trolleys and strides as far as the knees and plop their claggy in safety, but I’d lose ‘em completely if I was you.”

I just wanted a slash. I was about to ask the toad if it couldn’t just go away – where else is embarrassment if not all in your mind, after all – when it launched off again.

“You’re gunna ask me if I wouldn’t be happier out in the wild, aren’t you? The old ‘born free’ stuff, eh? Well there are many less eloquent of my brethren out there who are currently enjoying the right to be eaten alive by herons – a fate that doesn’t even leave time for scaring the crap out of you. Very fast is herons. While I, on the other hand, spends my days in comfort and safety, courtesy o’ my silver tongue, nothing more to worry about than the odd pongy dump. Easy street, I calls it.”

Okay. In terms of talking animals, not very Disney, but the point is, while I’d have settled for a sign on the wall, I didn’t find anything unbelievable or even strange about the talking toad. I wondered where the voice came from. Surely Ian Dury was dead at the time of the books; he wouldn’t have been a reference that most kids would have understood.

There was even some graffiti on the wall of the toilet. I read it as I peed.

‘Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement.’

‘The avalanche has already started; it’s too late for the pebbles to vote.’

‘Trust in Allah, but tie up your camel.’

More literary than the stuff I normally see in toilets, but it made this place more real than your

average shopping centre. I tipped sawdust down the squatter instead of flushing it. That couldn't

have been his idea. He wouldn't have gone near a composting bog and they weren't common back in the aughts. I washed my hands and dried them on something that looked like a sheep’s fleece, then went back to the others.

After the meal I could have done with a nap, but we were walked on up the hill towards the castle and beyond. Most of the buildings were houses and the people Duergars. The occasional human stood at least head and shoulders higher than them. The Duergar houses were incredibly small; if they had rats, they’d be hunchbacked. It took me a while to realise they were built tall – lots of storeys that is – as they didn’t go up far. They looked quite modern in having their gardens on the roofs.

We were the only ones dressed in ordinary clothes. The other humans wore either light-grey clothing that looked to be modelled on judo-gi, or darker-grey versions of the same thing, often with cloaks. Footwear was some sort of moccasin. I noticed the older ones were in the darker clothing, and only they wore the cloaks. I asked Miya if there was any significance to this.

“Yeah, the younger ones are Apprentices, the older ones are Seniors. They teach and stuff. The ones wearing the cloaks can fly. Hey, can you see the sleeves on the dark tops have sort of embroidery on them? Yeah? Well that shows what level of senior they are. I don’t know what the signs mean yet, but we’ll be told when we pass our Initiation”.

I caught a quick look at a couple of passing seniors and could tell her, “They’re kanji, Japanese writing. One mark is a number and another is some sort of level marker. The guy back there had one and low on his sleeve and the girl had one and middle.”

“You read Japanese?" I was quite surprised she believed it so quickly. When I was thirteen, I’d have guessed BS if I’d heard a statement like that.

“No, it’s difficult to learn, but I know a few of the simple characters.”

She didn’t ask me how I’d learned, being busy telling the other girl from the boat this news, which was as well. I didn’t want to have to think my way around telling the truth. I knew those characters because they’re used as part of the names of Japanese primary, middle and secondary schools. And I knew that, because I worked in one. I didn’t know exactly what would happen if I acted out of character, but Sylvester wouldn’t like it, that I was sure of; so I’d try to avoid it.

After a while we reached the north gate to the city walls and went through. The cobbles ended here and the road was now a dirt track that headed off in the direction of a forest about a kilometre away. Before that I could see a large meadow, with cows grazing. We walked into the centre of it, in the direction of a small crowd of people milling around.

Phoebe

I looked for Brendan in the first few groups of Seekers, but didn’t see him. Everyone else was looking as much as I was. It made sense. Book One says most of the Seekers were relatives of people already in The Land, so some were checking if their younger brothers or sisters or whatever had arrived. There wasn't a big crowd, but I suppose people had other things to do.

As it happened, I spotted him in the last group to get there. Ben Elliott looked really cute at 11 when he started playing Brendan in the DIVs. I do sort of like him now. Sara thinks he’s mecha hunky, ‘cos he’s well spartaned, but he’s a bit too tougho for me.

Once they had arrived, everything started to get sorted out. Senior Niall was there then so it could, of course. He’d come with the same group as Brendan, natch.

We herded the Seekers into the centre of the Dip and all of the Mages spread in a circle around them; linking hands to get the spacing right. The Initiation started without any ceremony; there was just a sound like a drum beating. I knew what it was, ‘cos it’s explained in Book One – the heartbeats of the Mages as their energies start to link for the Initiation. It started sort of raggy, then built and built into not like just noise, but something you could dance to. Then all the Mages raised their hands, palms towards the Seekers. Senior Niall chanted, but his voice echoed out over the group. It soaked into my head and stopped any other thoughts. I felt warmth spreading down my arms to my hands.

Then, for some time, I was just a part of the circle. The chanting filled my head and my heartbeat started to echo with it. I noticed when the blue light started to flow from my hands, snaking over to the Seekers like smoke and touching their heads, but it wasn’t freak or like something to get excited over. It was just what was happening.

Adam

After all the talk of the Initiation, I’d expected some grand show. As it happened, we got herded into a small, amphitheatre-shaped dip in the meadow, close to a stream. The dark- clothed Mages formed a ring around us, and things started with a drum beating.

I had a second after the drum started to realise it had begun, another to think this was lacking in showmanship, and then the chanting started. Things got vague pretty quickly after this, but I thought there was one voice chanting at first, amplified somehow so it filled the area. Then the sky grew dark until I couldn’t see anything. I felt warm and comfortable, but, thinking back, I don’t remember being able to feel my body at all.

Something, a pressure, started up in the centre of my head and I knew someone was going to touch me. The pressure intensified. Then something touched my head and the pressure became a colour, without ever stopping being a pressure. Purple started to flow behind my eyes. First, a purple pond with ripples moving across it, then, the surface of a purple soup, slowly boiling. Then dark blue took over. This colour-feeling continued all the way down my body, covering the entire spectrum.

I know this is a lousy description of what happened, but it would take a poet, a doctor or a mystic to do a better job, and even they might be stretched to explain what having your crotch feel red means.

Then there was nothing at all, a blackness like a sky without stars, an emptiness like a hole in your heart, a feeling time had gone away on holiday. It stayed like that for some short… interval? I was aware of it, even though there wasn’t anything to be aware of. Then my consciousness called time on me.

Again. This was already happening a lot here. I didn’t know who’d get off on this kind of detail, but I’d be ready to suggest they knock it on the head as just too bleeding painful to be fun.

Phoebe

It was freak! I mean, beyond mecha. I mean… I don’t know any way to talk about it! The only parts I can describe are the bits that were in front of my eyes. What happened inside my head…!

I saw the things that I knew I would. It’s like it says in Book One, ‘The Energies reached round in a circle, uniting the Mages through their third eyes - a point in the middle of their foreheads. Then it spread from their hands to form a spider’s web of blue ight, each node a Seeker.

Seekers often asked about that light, as they never saw it. New Mages often disputed about the light, never agreeing. Elders, if pressed, might say it was like deep sky-blue, but different. One famous Mage had described it as the shade of a giving heart, another like the colour of Miles Davies playing saxophone. Well-meaning attempts to explain, perhaps, but … Kayley said it best when she said Mages perceived magic, not light, so the colour of magic could never be described to those looking for the vocabulary of light.

Along those indescribable lines of living magic flowed a pulse of energy, touching each Seeker, entering and opening them.’

That’s what it says it is, but that doesn’t tell you what it’s like being inside it. Brendan lit up like some kind of rainbow, glowing from violet down to fire-engine red. He just sat down and then fell over slowly, lights shining out of him.

Then it was suddenly done. Everyone just went slack. It wasn’t like we woke up or anything. It was more like the world had stopped for a while and then it started again. Then I saw them. About five kids. The only ones standing. They hadn’t an iddy about what was going on around them and I knew; nothing had happened for them. I felt so sad for them. What had just happened to me was something I couldn’t put into words, but I knew I’d had an experience and I knew they hadn’t. They hadn’t felt anything. They’d stood in the middle of a field and watched others going weirdly around them.

The others were either sitting on the ground, holding their heads and looking a bit sick, or flat out on the floor, like Brendan, unconscious. The seniors around the circle were all looking the way I felt. Duergars moved amongst us and the kids sitting on the grass. They gave out cups of what must have been chia. I didn’t notice the taste of it even; maybe it was the same stuff I’d drunk that morning. It had the same effect though. I felt instantly better, clear in my head and just not getting over something freak any more.

‘Two,’ murmured Aki, ‘Did you see them?’

‘What?’ was all I could croak.

‘A boy down there in front of you and a girl just over there,’ she said, pointing. ‘Both had the light.’

When I looked again the Duergars were carrying them on stretchers towards Senior Niall. Brendan would wake up and meet Jess for the first time. That was the start of their rivalry. It wasn’t sorted out even by Book Six. I’d so much love to know how it all ends!

Adam

I woke up lying on a stretcher. Someone offered me a cup and I drank it down. Same stuff they’d given us after coming through the Gate. Same sort of effect too, though I didn’t feel like getting up from the stretcher just yet.

“Feeling rough?" That Irishman again. I couldn’t do much more than nod to him. “Don’t worry; the effect will wear off soon. Drink lots of chia and you’ll feel better. When you can walk, just say, and Debaa here will show you the way to the carriages.”

He patted me on the shoulder and went off. I wondered if someone could maybe just carry me to a bed, but as I drank I repaired quickly. Within a minute I was able to stand up. On another stretcher was a young girl. She looked like she’d just vomited her toenails, but was coming back into focus fast. Another familiar face, but I couldn’t place her either.

I looked around. Most of the crowd had gone. It dawned on me we were the only ones who’d passed out. I felt embarrassed, some kind of wimp, too whacked out to remember this was just in the script.

The girl, on the other hand, looked well pleased.

“Did they see the Light?" she demanded of the Duergar.

“Hem." The creature replied, nodding. I took that for a yes. She didn’t air-punch, but the look on her face told me I’d been wrong. Whatever had happened to us she was in favour of. I must have looked confused. Well, I should’ve done, I was. She looked at me, saw this, and twisted a lip.

“You don’t know what just happened, do you?" she demanded. They say a picture paints a thousand words. Well, the look on her face was doing a novella on how my incomprehension equalled idiocy. I think I’m nice to teenage girls when I teach them, even when they don’t really deserve it. I’d only been doing it for a year and a half, but I’d taught enough to know most of them feel the same way. I’m not a bad bloke, but I don’t take this kind of behaviour.

“No," I told her back, “but then I’m not some up-herself little cow standing in a field with her mates, am I? Moo.”

Okay, I know, as a line, it stank. And it wasn’t the best way to handle the situation, I know, right? But come up with a better response yourself when your head has just come apart at the seams. It did the job for me. I nodded to the dwarf and we started to walk away. I heard fuming noises behind me, so I guessed it’d done the job for her too. Crude, perhaps, but I thought that’d gone well enough. Perhaps I’d edit it out of the AfterBook, though probably I’d just delete that anyway.

Phoebe

I could see from where I stood that something went wrong with the conversation between Brendan and Jess. They should’ve talked for a while where they stood and then gone off together, arguing. Somehow he’d finished the whole thing in only seconds and was going off by himself. How could he not know the way it was supposed to go? Well, it really didn’t matter much, I supposed. Those who hadn’t passed would go back to their Gates and the other world. The rest of us would go to the feast, then bed. I’d wake up back in my real world tomorrow. Maybe it was because I was emptied after the Initiation, but I felt like I’d won second prize.