First night!

[enhancomancer]

Calling Castle Roogna! Come in Castle Roogna!

Hey! Dummy mirror on the other side! Go wake up Dad! I know what time it is, but it's important! He won't smash you, I promise!

[It's wicked late, and sorry to everyone who didn't muffle and block their mirrors. She clearly didn't connect to where she wanted!]

Comments

[enhancomancer]

He does not, dummy. Put Dad on. Please? I was in a weird castle... And it's not in Xanth I think. Unless I time traveled. And Dad's the only other one to do that. But it's white and purple and there's no moat monsters, not even a zombie one!

I'm fine. I'm not scared or anything. [Half a lie, half magic that makes her less scared.] But I don't want HIM to worry. And maybe if it's a traveling time spell, it took Magician Humphrey too like the Forget Whorls. And Hugo. And the Gorgon. I swear I didn't go looking for 'em! I was in my room watching the tapestry! You can check!!

Can you relay all that, or is too much for your no-brains?

[Asked simply and affectionately, because it was true though. Inanimate objects don't have brains.]

[serpentinthegarden]

Kid. These mirrors don't connect that far they don't have... what do you call it... long distance. All you are doing is...

[ Deep yawn. ]

Waking up everyone in the apartment building.

[enhancomancer]

The what?

I'm Ivy.

[serpentinthegarden]

Wha do you mean, the what? Mirrors only work in the Kingdom, that's all.

Crowley. Go to bed Ivy.

[enhancomancer]

The thing you said. A party building. It doesn't look like it's partying. And if it was, how could I be waking anyone up?

I can't. The woman in the room sent me out here, and I don't have Stanley, or the tapestry, so I don't know if Esk and Chex fixed the river or not yet. And anyway, I don't want Dad to panic.

But it's nice to meet you, Demon Crowley. [This is not said as an insult, but rather, very politely, because it's rude to call demons solely by their names unless you are friends, which is hard to achieve, being as they're demons and friendship isn't really in their wheelhouse usually.] Are you part of the demons wishing to get rid of the Hummers? Humans are not involved in the conflict, but I can try to bargain on behalf of the voles if you please.

[serpentinthegarden]

Not party building, I don't think they have any of those here, apartment building. Where they dropped all of us off when we arrived. Big hotel...

[ He was tired and nothing of what the girl was saying was registering quite right. ]

Hummers? I have no problem with them personally but they have nothing on the Bentley. They lack the style!

And who said I was a demon? Are my wings showing?

[enhancomancer]

What do the hoes tell?

Bentley? What's that?

You have wings? Demons don-- [Well, they could, but most of them would have found it unnecessary. She's confused.] Sorry, if you're not! You were acting like Demoness Metria, she always turns into funny objects, and if this can't connect to Daddy, then inanimate objects can't talk. And demons are the pretend-to-be-the-Castle types, just to tell little girls to go to bed! I've heard they all love the Adult Conspiracy even though they didn't invent it, just because it frustrates us children. And you don't have any of the fussiness of centaurs. What kind of wings do you have? Can you fly?

[serpentinthegarden]

They say all sorts of things little girls don't need to hear repeated.

[ He was taken a touch aback by hearing such a small one say that word but... kids were growing up faster these days. ]

A Bentley is a car, more stylish than a Hummer and about half as wide. The don't make them like that anymore!

[ Crowley looked behind him to make sure he could safely slip one of his black wings out of the sheet without revealing an angel. ]

I am I just didn't know how you knew with these hidden under the covers...

[ And then suddenly it dawned on him! ]

Glasses!

[ He wasn't wearing his shades and the kid must have noticed his eyes! It made sense! ]

You know you ask a lot of questions for this early in the morning.

[enhancomancer]

[A garden hoe with an e is not slang for 'ho' Crowley!!! You really are like DeMetria!!!] Oh no! The Adult Conspiracy strikes again!

What's a car?

So you are a Demon? But not with the Kiss-Mee Kill-Mee River crew? What's your goal then? Demons are always up to something, right? At least Threnody's Mom was like that. But Threnody herself is great!

I ask a lot of questions for any time of the day. Otherwise, how could I learn anything? And I'm a Magician so Hugo's Dad doesn't charge me, he just doesn't answer if he thinks it's beneath notice.

[serpentinthegarden]

[ He hasn't had the slightest idea what she has been talking about this whole conversation.
Hummer = Hummer
Hoe = Hoes ]

How can you not know what a car is, or... an apartment building, but you know demons and that we are always up to something?

[enhancomancer]

[The hummers made the demons straighten the Kiss-Mee river in Xanth, and no those are hos with no e. This is a hoe.]

I'm Ivy. Princess Ivy. Daughter of King Dor and Sorceress Irene. I'm a Magician? I restored Threnody and Jordan the Barbarian to life from ghosts, and Threnody's mother is a demoness. And my friends Volney the Vole, and Chex the Centaur, and Esk Ogre, and Brie the Brassy are all trying to save the Kiss-Mee river from the demons that straightened it.

I grew up in Castle Roogna. Never met a car or been in an apart...ment building.

[serpentinthegarden]

Never... saw any reason to straighten a river. Humans do that with their canals and dams.

[ His wing floated casually behind him in the air. ]

You are in an apartment now and most people, even in lame hotel rooms like this one, like to sleep all the way until morning.

[enhancomancer]

Nuh-uh. We didn't straighten anything! And we have moats and those are round! And we don't have dams, that's for centaurs. It's what they call their mothers.

I still don't know what the hoes tell. And I don't see any hoes.

I guess I could ask the lady who send me out here. She wanted to sleep though, and I'm out here so she can.

[serpentinthegarden]

Ok, ok... kid... Who sent you out where?

[enhancomancer]

She has the other bed. Here to the other room.

[serpentinthegarden]

So... couldn't you go back to the other room, curl up in your own bed, and let her sleep a few more hours?

[enhancomancer]

I was trying to get through to Castle Roogna. And I don't want to sleep in a strange place without Stanley.

[serpentinthegarden]

Which one was Stanley again... a demon or a centaur?

[ Probably neither he decided with a cutely puzzled scrunched nose. ]

I'm afraid you can't call home Princess, and home can't call here. No one explained any of this to you?

[enhancomancer]

Neither! [Giggles!] Stanley Steamer's my dragon! He's my bestest friend ever and I told him the story of the Ouroboros, so now he likes to sleep in a circle around me, biting his tail. He's not big enough for circling the world, but it's his way of saying I'm his world. Sometimes he has to protect the Gap Chasm when Stacey can't, but I can't sleep in a new place without him.

Nuh-uh. Why not? The magic mirror should connect.

[serpentinthegarden]

Oh right, the dragon...

[ How had he forgotten? ]

It won't because the magic from your world doesn't work with the magic from this world. That mirror will only connect to the mirrors in the Kingdom.

[enhancomancer]

[She hadn't told him he was a dragon yet!]

That's dumb. Magic should work with magic.

Did I wake you then? I know demons don't need to sleep, but sometimes they do anyway since reality gets boring. I'm sorry if I did, I didn't mean to, obviously.

[serpentinthegarden]

[ There's a good reason! It was early and very easy to become confused in this story. ]

It should, but it doesn't.

And yea, I was... Here everyone sleeps, even demons. I wouldn't have needed to at home, not unless there was an incredibly boring century that needed sleeping through.

Don't little girls sleep where you come from?

[enhancomancer]

Yes. [With the slow and patient tone of someone repeating themselves to someone who doesn't know better, like a child; despite her being the child here.] But in my own room where the stones can tattle on me, or if I'm outside then with Stanley. Never someplace new without Stanley. And especially not without telling Daddy where I am if Hugo's parents had me stay over because it was too late to travel.

[serpentinthegarden]

[ Not entirely without those tender more human emotions he thought he picked up on a hint of something he felt instant sympathy for. ]

Have you ever been away from home overnight before?

[ Was she lonely? Scared? It did happen to ones as young as she looked. ]

[enhancomancer]

Yeah. With Stanley. At first we used to stay in the big Coven Tree. But otherwise only at the Good Magician Humphrey's castle or the Zombie Master's castle or with the centaurs. I've never gone anywhere without Stanley, I wasn't allowed. Dolph can pretend to be Stanley, but he's only five, so he's not nearly as strong. And Dolph and I never ran off together. He's not old enough to be as much fun yet.

Nobody would fight Stanley if they could avoid it. Not even other dragons or giants. He's very strong. And the Gap dragon. He's famous now that the Forget Spell wore off.

[Scared would require sense enough to understand danger. She does miss her dragon though!!! She's not kidding that she can't sleep without him. It's fine if she has other friends, but no, she's never been away from home ALONE anyway. And she's not really ever alone, seeing as even the inanimate is lively at home, and she has friends everywhere.]