True Majik

by Sheena Bandy

  The sounds of boiling puddles erupted around her. It was probably a good idea to keep moving. She dodged several plumes of rising smoke and found herself in a strange kind-of-rocky landscape, where the sky was now clear blue and the grass green. The ground was sprinkled with small pink flowers and paths of mountain rocks sticking from the soft earth.

  A sign stood at the edge of the grass, telling her to keep on the path that ended with the sign. She didn't know to handle the situation. Was she supposed to fly? She looked at the scattered rocks and sighed. She didn't know why she even cared about the sign. There was no one around to enforce it. She stepped forward, past the sign and into the soft green grass.

  The grass was about up to her knees, and the wind made it dance across the hills. The rocks looked like breaks in an ocean of green. Maji took a few long strides across the lawn, feeling the blades crush under her feet while the surrounding brushed against her skin. She realized she'd lost her clothes somewhere along the road.

  "Kee-off-rass!" Said something from behind her.

  Maji spun around at the sound of the squeaky voice. When she saw nothing, she froze and waited for something to happen: probably something awful.

  "Kee-off-rass!" The high pitched voice screamed again, a little to her left. She turned around again, but saw nothing.

  Whatever this thing was, it wanted her gone. She turned and fled, keeping as low in the grass as she could. She could hear the scuttling and squeaking of lots of little voices behind her, at her sides, surrounding her. She heard a few voices start ahead of her and she froze in her path, pouncing down into the green sea.

  "Kee-off-rass!" The creatures squealed from all around her, pounding into her naked hide; the fuzzy balls pounding mercilessly with their soft but strong bodies.

  Maji looked up to see one of the creatures looking down at her and saw the pink fuzz and the almost purple tips blowing in the same breeze that shifted the blades of grass. What she had thought were flowers were the strange creatures that now pummeled her with such fluffy fury.

  Maji pushed several of them off, sending them flying along with the breeze. She jumped to her feet and sprang into a run across the grass. She winced as she stepped atop several squeaky squirts and slipped onto a large and very painful rock.

  "Kee-off-rass!"

  Maji crawled up the rock when she realized that she was no longer being pursued by fuzzy, pink punks.

  "Cute, eh?" said a voice from her left. She turned and looked at the boy, who was sitting on a nearby rock. She couldn't think of the things as anything but cute, but cute was supposed to be a good thing and they were decidedly not good things. She nodded and looked back as they fell to the grass in small clusters.

  "What are they?" She asked, looking back to the small boy.

  The boy was almost albino. Fair skin, blond hair, and blue eyes. Hitler would have come in his pants.

  "They're Puffs!" The boy said, "They won't attack you if you don't step on the grass."

  "Thus the sign." Maji said.

  "That's why I put it up, yep!" The boy nodded.

  "You knew about these things?" she asked.

  "Of course. They're mine!"

  "Yours?" Maji was skeptical. "How are they yours?"

  "I made em." He said, watching the fuzzy puffs blow in the breeze.

  Maji looked out at the boy's creations. "That must have taken a lot of power." She said.

  "You really are new around here. Who are you?" He asked.

  She didn't have to answer. He was taking it straight from her mind. Along with the rest of her story. Several memories brushed against her mind as the boy delved deeper. Mother, Lover, Partner, Servant, Student, Sacrifice.

  The boy looked sad for a moment. She wondered if he was a mage, like she was.

  "You must be very powerful." she said, "I can't even reach my powers."

  "What?" the boy tilted his head, "You're in Astral. You shouldn't have any problems here."

  "What?"

  What could be blocking it then?

  Reading her mind, the boy hopped from his rock to hers and put his hands gently around to the back of her neck. He frowned and closed his eyes. She could feel his power moving through her and through something at the base of her skull. Then, on something distant. Something far away.

  "Do you feel what I'm doing?" he asked.

  "Kind of." She felt something cold brush against the strands of hair on the back of her head, moving upward. She leaned into the touch, but the touch did not get firmer. She just felt it distantly from far away.

  "You're wearing a Collar." he said, removing his hands, "And you've got a knot."

  "A knot?"

  "Your Silver Cord has a knot in it." he said, impatient. "You really are new here, aren't you?"

  "I need to get back to my body." she said. "How do I get the knot out?"

  "You have to find a gap between Astral and the waking world. You can project to your body and untie your knot from there."

  Maji jumped away from the rock she had fallen on and onto another rock, further across the grass.

  "I'm going to find my way back to my body." She said.

  She could hear the boy following quickly behind her, but she paid him no mind as she leaped from one rock to another. She jumped to the edge of the grass and heard the lot of squeaky voices squeal a solid "Kee-off-rass!" before she sprinted onto the dirt path.

  "Wait up!" the boy's voice echoed behind her as she kept up her pace. She knew that, with his short legs, the boy couldn't hope to keep up with her. Nevertheless, Maji refused to slow down. She would find someone else and find her way back home. Then she'd get the child, that missing part of herself, and escape to safety.

  And kill her ex. That was important, too.

  Chapter 9

  Maji slowed down at last when she saw the weedier plains come into view. She didn't know where she was going and she'd only come across one person for directions and they'd been vague. She kept moving on blistered feet.

  "Wait!" someone shouted from a ways back. Maji stopped to let them catch up. It wasn't the boy she'd met before.

  "Thanks." The younger girl said. "I've been looking everywhere for-"

  She stopped and looked around, breathing deeply.

  "Are you alright?"

  "Yeah, fine!" the girl said, "Yer a mage, right?"

  Maji didn't bother to answer. Of course she was a mage. Even if her magic was only coming in waves.

  "Well, not everyone here is." The girl threw up her hands, "Some aren't even Human!"

  Maji started walking again. The girl followed her.

  "You know, I think they're sex demons!" She said, "Y'know- Incubi."

  Maji had dealt with a few incubi over the years. When they weren't in a specific person's dreams, they got nothing out of seducing someone. Even if the Incubi were around, they'd have nothing to do with Mages.

  For a while, they were both silent, though not companionably. Maji sped up a few times but the girl kept pace admirably.

  "You got a name?" The girl asked.

  "Yes." Maji said.

  The girl sighed but kept walking.

  Maji stayed silent through most of the girl's attempts at conversation. She had more important things to worry about than a teenager who reminded her too much of herself.

  Soon, the weedy pasture turned into a rocky hillside, and to a very green, clean looking field. Maji was slightly hesitant to step onto the grass, though she saw no evidence of the Puffs. She watched as the younger girl jumped out and started heading towards an odd looking sanctuary. Maji slowly started to follow, observing the centerpiece carefully.

  The spot was like a small, thin pyramid. The stone was a pale grey and the steps were short in size and large in number. There were steps on each side of the pyramid and at the top, there was a block with a plain-looking wooden door. The girl was quietly climbing the steps and Maji took a moment to admire her pale skin and black hair, falling lightly against her shoulders. In Astral, the
girl wasn't as powerful as Maji was but she was definitely better looking.

  The girl reached the top of the pyramid as Maji reached the first step. She saw the doors on the top of the pyramid spring open and sighed to herself. She would have told the girl not to go in, but what kind of hypocrite would that make her. She watched as the teen disappeared through the door before climbing to the top. She looked through the passage and wondered where the girl had been taken.

  One step and Maji found herself floating in an abyss of stars. She had read about this place, and recognized it immediately. 'Astral Core'. They weren't really stars here, but doorways to dreams. She didn't know how she was supposed to get around in the core. Maybe it would be instinct. She would see those she knew differently, right? She looked around at all the grey, blue, pink, purple, red, yellow, and white doorways and made a note of the aura colors that could easily guide a knowledgable incubus.

  There was no sign of the stray teenager anywhere, so Maji had to just let it be their parting. She didn't need to worry about another child when she had one of her own, filled with the missing parts of her own magic. She let herself fall through the space between dreams until she fell into an open doorway.

  She didn't really care whose mind she ended up in as long as it was somewhere other than Astral Core. She wondered how she would return to Astral Plane. It was too late to worry about it. If she didn't figure it out herself, there was little opportunity to learn about it in the Core.

  She felt wet and slimy as she fell through the gate to a very angry dream. She could have wished for a good, happy dream. But a nightmare was just as well... The mysterious hooded figures couldn't hurt her, anyway. She heard a child screaming and saw monsters run past her as they continued their pursuit.

  If she remembered her research correctly, the best way to get kicked out of Astral was to finish a dream. She would need to wake the child up. A nightmare was better for that, right?

  The monsters that were chasing the child were hardly works of art. They might need a little help. She was sure she could scare the child into an early morning.

  Maji took a moment to admire the scenery of the horrific landscape she now inhabited. The air was cold and foggy and the sky was thick with black clouds. A few leaves still clung desperately to the limbs of the trees, fighting the breeze with their last bits of late autumn strength, while their comrades littered the ground beneath them. Distant lightning flashed and thunder crashed, and shocked the world to life. The wind howled against the thunder claps in a symphony of terror for any child as young as the subject of this nightmare.

  The small child's screams grew quiet as the small body fell over the horizon, her blond hair whipping violently behind her. Maji wondered just how far the nightmare would reach if she were to head away from the frightened child; likely not very far. She hadn't read much on the subject of normal peoples' dreams, as she was neither a succubus nor a normal person. She'd never thought she'd need it.

  Maji started walking away from the subject of the nightmare. She'd been expecting something horrible to happen when she got far enough away but the horizon just kept expanding in both directions.

  She never would have thought she'd come across the child's past life. Of course, all children are naturally closer to their past lives but she'd never expected to find it at the edge of a nightmare.

  But there was a house standing above the woods ahead and Maji knew she'd be going inside.

  The front door looked normal enough as Maji walked up to it. The door creaked when she pushed it open. The room was covered in pedestals and statues and the floor was a rusty shade of red. In the dark, it looked like blood. She kicked a pillow out of her way as she walked toward the cushioned seats.

  The seats looked as though the owners hadn't occupied more than the very edge of the cushion, leaving a small indention instead of the wear you'd expect from seating. She sat down like a normal person would sit and felt the center of the cushion squish under her weight. It felt like a violation, like she'd painted her name across the walls.

  The sitting room was less interesting than she imagined the rest of the house would be. There was nothing here that could be used in the tormenting of a dreamer. She went to the hallway to the west and saw that she had literally dozens of paths to choose from. The hallway was lined with brightly colored doors and went on as long as a football field.

  Maji picked a pair of oak double doors that led to a hallway that led down into a strange darkness. She fretted as she continued down the dark corridor, vaguely aware of the inclines and declines, tilts in different directions as the hallway went on. The change was subtle; another might not have noticed it at all. She was sure she'd started walking on the ceiling when she saw the end of the hallway.

  Stairs. Stairs that led up to a metal door, like the emergency exits of a theater.

  Maji was so glad to see some kind of exit to the hallway that she ran up the stairs and threw the door open with an echoing crash.

  And found herself in the sitting room again.

  She would not punch the wall. She would not punt the vase to her left across the room. She would not scream and kick the air and throw a temper tantrum. She was a full grown mage. A mother, no less. She was an adult and it was time to act like one.

  Ignoring the sobs that were currently rising in her throat, Maji picked a staircase and left the sitting room again. She followed the stairs to a door that led to a hallway that had tons of doors that all seemed to lead to stairwells. Recognizing the hopelessness, Maji picked a door at random and went right up the stairs.

  By the time she saw the end of the staircase, she felt like her legs would fall off. She had taken a few breaks to rest but it wasn't enough, really. She approached the door with caution and leaned against the perpendicular wall. This house was Hell and and a half. She caught her breath and gave her legs a bit of a rest and slowly opened the door, eyes closed.

  And stepped out to where there was no floor.

  Maji clung to the doorknob, kicking back at the ledge she'd stepped from. She was too high up to see the ground, but she could see flashes around her. She knew she was up much higher than she could survive if she fell. When her foot finally caught the doorway, her fingers threatened to break loose. She swung herself back to the top step and slammed her face against the wall she'd been leaning against. She slid to the ground and took a few moments to recover.

  'I'd hate to be looking for a bathroom in this place.' She thought to herself as she slowly caught her breath and slowed her pulse.

  Her trek down the stairs was somehow even longer than her climb up them. She was heavy with defeat. Maji worried memories of lengthening staircases and spiraling corridors, back when she was an assistant. She reached a door on her left, not all the way to the bottom. She was sure it hadn't been there before.

  The door opened to a suite with red satin and purple carpet. Maji stepped inside to take a peek out the window to the left of the bed. She found herself looking straight down into the chasm behind the house, where she'd almost fallen at the head of the staircase. She recognized it immediately, because who could forget something like that, and wondered how she'd ended up facing the chasm she'd been walking away from.

  Maji moved away from the window and ran her fingers along the soft spread on the bed. She suddenly felt very very tired. She could see and feel the dirt from her walk and the mud crusting on her feet from walking outside, and moved slowly towards the bathroom that accompanied the suite.

  And saw her own, familiar bath within.

  To say that she hadn't missed her bathtub terribly would be a terrible lie. To say that she'd been expecting it in some little girl's nightmare would be an even worse one. But she was tired and her legs hurt. Her mind was cloudy. It couldn't hurt to just stay here and wait for morning.

  She threw her suspicions aside and lowered herself into the already full, steamy bathtub. She'd always found it hard to say no to a hot bath and her aching legs didn't allow her any prot
est. She let her head float in the soapy water and her legs swayed with the waves as she turned the leg jets on.

  'Almost perfect.'

  Something was still missing. But as the water moved and bubbled, her mind wouldn't focus on it any longer.

  Maji let out a heavy breath that she didn't know why she'd been holding. She took a moment to look at the pearl décor. Morpheus gave her this bathroom for her own. And she'd made it almost pink. She'd transformed the bathroom upstairs on all her romantic occasions, dark with candles, so he would go inside. She'd been such a fool.

  Maji took and deep breath and let the water sweep the stress away. Tactile and bubbling, she had something to focus on besides her thoughts. She pushed good things through her mind with force and thought about the bubbles. Nothing but the bubbles.

  The water finally grew cold and Maji reluctantly climbed out. She curled up on the soft satin sheets, pulling the bedspread around herself. She felt like she could stay there forever. The smooth sheets put her to sleep, without dreams and without thought. Calm, restful sleep.

  She rolled over, waking to realize that she was no longer surrounded by satin but by cold concrete. She opened her eyes and white walls surrounded her. The view from the window had changed as well.

  Maji crawled from the white painted floor and knelt by the window to look out. She could feel something pulling her from her chest and knew that it was not her silver cord. This was something else. Anxiety rose like bile in her chest as she gazed at the charred landscape. The lavalanche structure of the ground spread out to the horizon, seeping and burning.

  'What happened here?' She asked, sitting down on the bare concrete floor.

  "Magic happened here." said a shaky old voice.

  She spun around to face the stranger. The woman was clothed, Maji was glad to see, so she was either a figment of the nightmare or a fully trained Succubus. Maji looked her over, trying to figure out which. The woman looked familiar but not instantly recognizable.

  There was a shimmer like cosmetic magic and for a fraction of a moment, Maji could see through it.

  "Trina?" Maji asked in a whisper.

  The woman nodded, a patient smile on her face.