Chapter 115 – Preparations
A shiver runs through me, ruffling my feathers, as the familiarity of this place strikes me. Not the white room before us, but the surrounding dark on the brink of two realities.
I've been here before—when I died. The moments before I first reincarnated in this world. I'd met Kanin then, very briefly, along with all the other souls from Earth. And now here we are, passing through this strange nothingness between worlds once more. But this time we’re moving through it together, and with purpose.
“I can help with Ollie,” Dizzi tells me, dragging me back to the present. “The cargo spell I've been developing. He needs to be able to hide, right?”
“I'M NOT VERY GOOD AT HIDING,” Ollie admits. “WELL, NOT AS A DRAGON. I WAS REALLY GOOD WHEN I WAS A HUMAN!”
“How will a cargo spell help him hide?” I ask. We have a variety of spells we use on our cargo to help transport them between our city and the surface, including one for securing them to the shuttle, and one for…
“Cargo shrinkage,” Dizzi says. “Now new and improved and safe for people! And dragons. Obviously.”
Ollie rumbles in amazement, his eyes widening. “YOU'RE GOING TO SHRINK ME?”
“Are you sure about this?” I ask Dizzi. “Has it been tested?”
Dizzi shakes her head as if she’s disappointed in me. “Fyre, Fyre, Fyre. You think I wouldn’t be suggesting this if I hadn’t already tested it on myself?”
I raise an alarmed eyebrow. “You did that without telling me? Dizzi, what if something had gone wrong?”
“Bah!” She flutters a hand at me. “Details! Besides, it didn’t go wrong, so it’s fine! Now, do you want me to do the spell or not?”
I glance over in Kanin’s direction, expecting him to be waiting on me. Instead, he appears to be in an animated discussion with Shirasil and Noli. I wonder what that’s about?
“I WANT TO DO IT,” Ollie tells me. “PLEASE?”
Bringing Ollie along concerns me. But if Shirasil is right, then his Role will be less likely to trigger while he’s with me, and if it does trigger, it won’t be as serious. I only have two options really: Both of us stay, or both of us go.
Staying is still an option, of course. It would tear me up to walk away from this, when so many people need my help. Shirasil was quite clear that he thought this mission would fail without me. Kanin will be captured. The Travelers will remain imprisoned. But Ollie also needs me. How could I ever put his safety second?
“PLEASE, FYRE,” Ollie insists. “SHIRASIL SAID THERE’S PEOPLE TRAPPED IN THERE. I WANT TO HELP THEM. LIKE YOU HELPED ME.”
I balk, then shoot a glare at the back of Shirasil’s head.
[Fyre: What have you been telling Ollie?]
[L: Only the truth. And only when he asked.]
He’s clearly never raised children of his own.
I let out a frustrated sigh. I don’t like this. But I also don’t have time to deliberate.
“Alright,” I agree as both Ollie and Dizzi cheer. “But we have to do this quickly!”
Dizzi squats down with a piece of chalk. “Way ahead of you, chief.”
As she begins to sketch out the spell circle, I return my attention to Kanin. He appears to be casting some sort of spell on Noli. I tip my head, Checking his spell.
[Core Bond spell in progress.]
What does a Core Bond spell do? I ask Echo.
[A Core Bond connects a vessel to a source of magic.]
Huh. What’s he planning? I’m dying to know, but I also don’t want to interrupt him when he’s in the middle of doing something with magic. I reach out to Shirasil instead.
[Fyre: Fine, you win. Don’t let Kanin head through the portal without me. We won’t be long.]
[L: Wouldn’t dream of it.]
Dizzi is instructing Ollie to place his massive paw at the center of the spell circle she’s drawn, and once he complies, she continues adding lines and runes.
[Fyre: What is Kanin doing with Noli?]
[L: He’s casting a spell that should allow Noli to pass into the Heavens undetected.]
I raise a surprised eyebrow.
[Fyre: I thought you said no one but System users could enter?]
[L: Typically, yes. But Kanin’s void magic gives him access to a niche subset of magic-manipulating spells.]
I frown at Shirasil’s back as Dizzi activates her spell circle, and a white light illuminates Ollie from beneath.
[Fyre: Why didn’t you tell us this before? Mirzayael would have wanted to come as well.]
Shirasil laughs and says something to Kanin, even as he’s still sending messages to me.
[L: I doubt she’d enjoy the prospect of being tied to Kanin’s magic. Besides, there are bound to be some fascinating and unpredictable side effects to this sort of spell.]
[Fyre: Side effects? What do you mean?]
[L: Who can say! They wouldn’t be very unpredictable if I could predict them, now would they?]
Kanin has completed the spell and is now speaking to Shirasil with agitated, sharp signs. Shirasil laughs once more, then shadows wrap around him, and he blinks out of existence—only to reappear right at my elbow. I try not to jump.
“Shirasil, what did you talk that poor boy into?” I demand. And yes, I’m keenly aware he’s probably talked Ollie and myself into something just as rash.
“Nothing!” the god insists. “It was his own choice. And at any rate, I think it will be good for him in the long run. Or at the very least, very entertaining! Now.” He turns to Dizzi. “You’ll be needing a ride down, won’t you?”
Dizzi startles, looking up at Shirasil. “I don’t know. My wing is still pretty stiff but I can try to—”
“Not to worry, I’ll take care of it.” Shirasil puts a hand on her shoulder, while offering a sweeping wave to the rest of us. “Good luck, Travelers! Try not to get caught. It would really be a shame for the fun to end here.”
“Wait,” I say, but Dizzi and Shirasil blink out of existence.
Shoot. I need to make sure I understand this shrinkage spell. Ollie is still in the process of shrinking, now the size of a car and growing smaller by the second. Will he stop at a certain size? How long will the spell last? Shirasil didn’t interrupt Dizzi while she was in the middle of anything, did he?
Abruptly, Shirasil and Dizzi reappear at Aquenno’s side. The nereid doesn’t even flinch, still leaning against the stone, eyes half-closed.
“Whoops!” Shirasil says, laying a hand on Aquenno’s good shoulder. The nereid grimaces. “Almost forgot about this one. Don’t go dying on me, now; Blair would never forgive me. Well, I think that about wraps it all up. Tata!”
And with a flourishing wave, Shirasil, Aquenno, and Dizzi vanish.
I let out a frustrated sigh, looking back to Ollie; he’s now the size of a dog and still shrinking.
“Are you alright?” I ask him. “Is the spell working properly?”
“I THINK SO,” Ollie says. “DIZZI SAID IT SHOULD STOP SOON. OH! ECHO JUST SAID THE SPELL IS COMPLETE.”
And sure enough, the light in the spell circle extinguishes a moment later and Ollie stops shrinking—to my immense relief. He’s now the size of a cat.
Ollie picks up and sets down a foot, giggling in my mind. “I’M SO TINY!”
“How do you feel?” I ask, already regretting this decision. What if something goes wrong? What if he gets hurt? He looks so small and fragile.
“THE SAME,” Ollie says, giving a test hop. When he lands, the stone cracks beneath his feet. “WOAH! OOPS.”
“The shrinkage spell only affects your size, not your weight,” I remind him as much as myself. Even if he looks tiny, he’s still an incredibly dense and sturdy creature. I suppose that should assuage some of my worries, but with each passing moment, I feel less sure of this course of action. Checking Ollie, I find he has a new stat for the shrinkage spell, which includes a timer counting down from fiftyfive minutes.
I bite my lip, looking back over to Kanin, and I find he is approaching the brink of the portal. My chest lurchest.
“Wait,” I call, activating a Jet to hurriedly catch up and stop him. No—no matter my reservations, I can’t let him do this alone. “Ollie and I are coming, too.”
“Fyre—” Kanin starts to object, but I cut him off.
“I’ve made my choice,” I tell him. “There’s no sense in playing coy now; the gods know of my presence. If this is our one chance to free other Travelers, then my accompanying you will maximize our likelihood of success. Besides, with Mirzayael still in the city, if something were to happen to me, the Fortress would still have a leader.”
“Thank you,” Kanin says, relief clear in his tone. Then his head swivels around. “Where’s Ollie?”
“I’M HERE!” Ollie calls up at him, rolling between my feet. He has his translator gemstone clutched between his claws, now that it can no longer hang about his neck. It’s almost as big as he is.
Noli gasps in delight. “So cute!” She crouches down to offer a finger and Ollie obliges, humming happily as she scratches behind his horns.
Kanin tips his head. “Could he always do that?”
“Dizzi cast a cargo shrinkage spell on him,” I explain. “However, it only reduced his size; his weight is the same. So take care not to let him land on your shoulder.”
“Wait, so he’s still a thousand pounds?” Kanin asks. “Like some kind of Ant-Man?”
I blink. “Like what?”
“ANT-MAN!” Ollie exclaims, his tail whipping from side to side in excitement. “OH MY GOSH! I AM! DOES THAT MAKE ME A SUPERHERO?”
I look between the two, wondering if I’m missing something. “I am not following.”
Kanin shakes his head in mock disappointment. “You should have watched more movies.”
I smile through a grimace. “A bit late for that, I’m afraid.”
“A bit late for a lot of things,” Kanin says quietly. His head swivels back toward the portal. “But not everything. Are we all ready?”
“Ready,” I confirm. “Though I should inform you, we have a bit of a time crunch; Ollie’s spell will only be able to sustain itself for about an hour.”
“I guess we better be quick, then.” Kanin gestures to Ollie’s translation stone. “Leave that behind. I’ll be stashing mine as well; we need to be quiet. Noli and I can use sign language.”
“AWWWW,” Ollie says when Noli stops scratching him and straightens up to pay attention to what Kanin is saying. Ollie rolls onto his back to juggle his translation stone between his paws. “BUT IT’S SO BIG NOW! I WISH I HAD TREASURE THIS BIG BACK IN THE PALACE.”
“That’s fine,” I tell Kanin. “We can chat via the Contact interface.”
He nods. “Alright then.”
Kanin holds out one hand for Noli, and another one for me. I take it, his glass strikingly cold against my skin. A tendril of void extends to Ollie as well, and the boy pounces on it like a cat going after a string.
His grip tightens around my hand, and then we step through the portal.