Another World

Sorry what?

Considering what’s happened, I don’t doubt that I saw a great witch. Me, though? No way. That can’t be right. Yet here I am. I’m wearing robes; I physically feel shorter; and my voice, it was exactly like the one in that alleyway. There’s only one conclusion I can make, no matter how outlandish it may seem: I’ve swapped bodies with some sort of powerful being from another world.

“No need to be all silent on us.” Says the woman with a blade to my throat.

You’ll have to forgive me for taking a moment to process what’s happening here.

The woman lets out a stifled chuckle. “No matter, Basil here will sort things out with you soon enough.” She withdraws the sword and stands back up.

This gives me the first real chance to look at where I’ve wound up. I’m in the corner of what seems to be a storeroom. It’s mostly square with stone walls that stretch about three metres tall until they give way to a timber structure which supports the roof. In the corner opposite to me, there are wooden crates neatly stacked on the earthen floor. A grey haired man who was sitting on one of the crates has hopped off and is walking towards me. He’s carrying some type of case in his hand. I’m guessing that’s this Basil person the woman was talking about. She’s moved to stare out a grated window on the wall to my left. Across the room from her new perch is a door, like an old barn door, which covers the entire height of the wall.

The man who was approaching stops in front of me and crouches down. He’s wearing a brown cloak, with a lavender inside lining. He gently places the case he is carrying to his left.

“Great Witch Iris, you are not at all like what I was expecting to find.” His gaze is locked directly onto me.

So Iris is the name of the witch I’ve swapped places with.

He turns and starts to rummage through the trunk. He pulls out a miniature telescope device that he straps to his head. He adjusts it over his left eye before also tracing a counterclockwise circle with his left hand. After completing the circle, he stretches his arm all the way out and flips his palm to face himself. He says a few words in a language I can’t even describe and then jerks his palm almost all the way to the monocular on his head.

Suddenly, concentric circles made of light appear, illuminating the entire room. The circles are surrounded by unusual glyphs of various sizes. The man pulls out some handheld instruments and begins manipulating the circles and glyphs. He has the look of a watch maker, or some other sort of master craftsman at work. Occasionally he leans all the way forward to look at one of the symbols, sometimes playing a knob on his eyepiece. With each action he takes, the room is cast into a different hue. The beauty of the scene is diminished a bit by the fact that with every change in colour, it feels as though there’s a weight placed on my body.

After an eternity, although it was probably actually a few minutes, the woman returns from her position at the window and stands behind my prone body.

“What’s with that look on your face?” She cocks her head as she asks Basil. Now that she mentions it, he does have a disconcerted look on his face.

“It is strange.” He replied. “All the indicators present suggest that this person is indeed someone of great magical calibre, but the structures are all shuffled around. The foundation is incredibly unstable too, far worse than would be expected when examining someone who has devoted so much of their life to magic. It is as if a great tower of stone has had its bottom replaced with wood.”

“So what, is she an imposter then?” The woman says as she leers at me.

In a sense she’s correct, but I don’t think in the way that she’s envisioning.

“At the very least, we can say with certainty that she was a pupil of Great Witch Nepeta.” Basil replied. “The mana patterns are very indicative of her style of teaching. She would have had to have entered Nepeta’s tutelage at an incredibly young age for their patterns to bear such a resemblance.”

He waves his right hand clockwise, and then closes his fist. As he does, the room goes dark once again, illuminated only faintly by a sconce on the wall. My body feels like a heavy blanket has been lifted from it. He takes the monocular off his head and places it, along with his other instruments, carefully in the box to his side. As he’s sorting his items out, he makes a face as if he forgot he had a kettle boiling, and turns to me.

“Pardon me for a second.” Basil reaches his arm out and grabs what looks to be a clear gemstone from my forehead. I didn’t even notice that was there. “I would be amiss if I forgot this.” His lips make a faint smile and there’s a youthfulness in his eyes that’s betrayed by his weathered face.

He places the gem in his pocket and stands up to face the woman.

“It is most unusual. She had plenty of opportunity to attempt to interfere with my analysis but never did so. She’s a very peculiar girl.”

“Did you find the spell?”

“As I said, her mana structures are arranged in puzzling ways. It reads to me as a type of cipher. I can most likely decode it, but it will take more time and more sophisticated tools than we have here.”

“Staying too long in Linaria isn’t much of an option for us anyways. It’s only a matter of time before they catch on that they’re missing their great witch.”

She moves towards the doors and gives it a firm thud with her fist. There’s a gust of wind that comes through as the doors are slowly opened by someone outside. When they’re open just enough, a man slips through the entrance. It’s a bit hard to see from here, but he looks much younger than Basil, and is wearing a gambeson which matches the woman’s.

“What’s up, Lilah?” he says to the woman.

“We’re leaving. No one is watching us, correct?”

“I’m quite certain there’s no one out there.” he says as he runs his hand through his blond windswept hair, attempting to straighten it out. Wait a second, his ears. That guy is a full blown elf. Just what is this world?

“Alright. Aster, you take the witch with you. Basil, that means you’re with me for this one.

The elf nods and walks over to me. He crouches down and picks me up over his shoulder. Is this girl really this light? We exit the building and I can see now that we’re in a lightly forested area near the top of a hill. The moonless night makes it difficult to make out too much detail. We circle around to the backside of the stone structure, and come face to face with two gryphons.

Honestly at this point I don’t think much will phase me about this place. The nearest gryphon sets its gigantic emerald eyes on me, which appear to glow in the night. Aster puts his hand to the beast’s face, and carries me to its side. His hand moves from the feathered neck, to a furred torso, until grabbing hold of what looks to me like a saddle. Aster sets me down on the ground and pulls a knife from a sheath on his waist.

“Don’t think about trying anything.” he says with direct eye contact. Don’t worry, I don’t even know how. He cuts my bindings, and lifts me onto the back of the creature. He then sits in front of me on the back of the gryphon.

He looks over to the other gryphon. I can faintly make out that Lilah and Basil have already mounted theirs.

“All good here”. Lilah says.

Aster puts his hand to the gold feathered neck of our gryphon, and gives it two firm pats. It immediately starts running forward. The sudden jolt shakes my balance, and I reflexively grab hold of the elf in front of me. After picking up some speed, I feel the gryphon's back muscles contracting underneath me as its massive wings begin to move. A rush of air comes up from the ground as its wings flap some more. Its legs stop moving a moment later, and we soar into the night sky.