Another month passed and he had three quarters of the ground floor finished. He built a short retaining wall around the portico over the front door. His plan was to add roof access there from the second floor once it existed. The next task was a staircase and he spent considerable time in discussion with Antonella, the mermaid, about the best way to do that. She could not see it but he had described it and drawn it for her. In the meantime, the gnomes had gone a considerable way towards solving one of his problems. They had extended one end of the pool fully into the greenhouse enclosure. It took up a lot of the interior space of his greenhouse, maybe as much as a quarter of it, but it allowed Antonella and Ephenome to occupy the same 'room' so to speak. Neive of course, could walk there, if she felt like doing so.
One day he was sitting out on the cliff edge overlooking the sea when a bluebird found him. It fluttered annoyingly in front of his face, dropped a small scrap of parchment on his lap and flew away. He unfolded it. In very small, very precise writing it said: "Things move. Be wary."
It was unsigned but then it didn't need to be. Of course, it was intentionally vague, he was sure of that. She didn't want to be at all compromised if her message found someone else instead.
He stood on the hill there and scanned the surface of the sea for any sign of Antonella. He was unlikely to find her that way and he saw no evidence of her now. He didn't really know what she did out there, apart from eating and sleeping. He didn't know how far she roamed either. She would turn up and he would pass on the warning. There wasn't much point in telling Neive who was her own security alarm. For that matter Ephenome was too.
He headed back to his house wondering if he should maybe be paying a bit more attention to what was happening outside his gates as well.
Later that afternoon he was in the basement room that acted as his library. He was looking forward to moving it to the first floor where there was natural light and eventually the second floor. For now, he read by sorcery light as he generally avoided all forms of flame everywhere if he could. He smelled the smoky aroma around the same time that his amulet went off.
He walked quickly out to Ephenome's courtyard to find her flower open exposing her to the knees. A rare sight. Also an attractive sight. He focused on her face.
"Someone is out there." He told her.
"Yes, or something."
"You don't know?"
"I can't tell. It is not entering though."
"Yes, whoever it is, is following protocols and waiting for admission."
"You can't tell either?"
"I can only tell it's someone I don't already know, which frankly, is almost everyone. I will go see myself."
"Be careful."
That caused him a moment of reassessment. Ephenome was typically quite casual about situations he considered dangerous.
He walked down the path towards his gate, in no particular hurry. In the twenty or thirty minutes the walk took he added multiple forms of protection about himself. Whoever waited on him did so patiently enough. There was no fidgeting with his gate or his wards.
Upon arriving at the fence he found a figure cloaked in gray. He imagined it was a woman due to shorter stature and a slender frame but there was no way to be sure. Sherra's warning note was fresh in his mind.
"Hello."
The hood raised slightly to look at him. He could see nothing inside the cowl, maybe a little bit of chin?
"Hi." The voice was slightly feminine as well he thought, shy, quiet.
"Can I help you?"
He or she did not answer immediately and he took the opportunity to really look at it using magic to augment his vision. He knew it would be apparent he was doing it as his eyes would certainly go purple but there was no harm involved.
She was alive, no surprise there. Or he was? Orren was still leaning slightly towards female but it was unclear. The light about her refracted very oddly. It blurred the edges and left no particular impression.
"You are a druid." It was almost an accusation.
"Yes." He agreed.
"Yet you use sorcery."
"Yes."
"And magic."
He waited for more.
"I would talk with you." She glanced behind her at the open meadow and then up in the air. "Please may I come in."
"I need a reason to let you in."
"What?" she asked.
"You are full of some form of magic, that much I can tell. You act like you are pursued. I want to know if I'm exposing myself to risk by letting you in."
"I am full of magic. I don't entirely know what to do with it but I feel so conspicuous out here. Your land is full of wild magic. I will be camouflaged there. I just want to feel... hidden."
"You came here to hide?"
"No. I came here to find you."
He didn't know what to do. He did not find her to be threatening. Inviting her in didn't grant her any special powers against him that he knew of so ultimately, he waved his fingers and the gate went down. He stepped back several paces to let her enter. She did. He replaced the gate.
She sighed and relaxed noticeably and pulled back her hood. She was... gray.
Her skin was ashen, all of her face and her hands included. A pale grey as if she were somehow not in color. Her hair was a lighter silvery-gray as were her eyes. It was a striking combination but did not appear human. The strands of her hair came to just above her shoulders. They appeared a little thicker than normal and there was no tangling, each hung straight and independent of its neighbors.
He had no idea what she was, but manners first. "I am Orren, welcome to my estate."
Unexpectedly she bowed. "It is an honor to meet you Orren. I call myself Karalie."
Orren glanced into the trees nearby. Which of these vines were part of Ephenome he wondered? He felt like a little extra counsel would be helpful here.
"What do you wish to discuss?"
"I..." she looked around at the jungle.
"I will take you to my house. I want to hear the synopsis first though."
She nodded as if that made sense to her.
She opened her arms out. "Look at me."
"Yes?"
"No, look at me."
He did so, again, using the druid sight. Nothing had changed. She was bright, strongly alive but the edges were chaotic, ragged. There was no outline to speak of, she simply faded smoothly into the background.
"She returned to her previous huddled posture. "Do you find me repulsive?"
"No. I don't understand what I see. What are you?"
"I don't really know what I am. I am many types of magic combined. Which is why I seek you. I heard of you. Someone who dealt with different types of magic. I thought maybe you could help me. Everyone sees me through one lens but you might see me through many. You might see the whole picture."
Orren had no idea how he might possibly do that. Still it wasn't worth trying to solve it out here.
"Okay Karalie, come along then."
They walked towards the house and it occurred to him to wonder how she had heard of him. He asked.
"How did you discover my peculiar history?"
"People in town know. I was living there as a washer girl when... when Cheyne died."
"That was almost seven years ago."
"Yes."
"Recently then you discovered where I live?"
"Yes. I was working as a washer girl for the sorceress there and I was able to discover it."
That brought him to a stop. He examined her closely. "Sherra is not likely to leave secrets lying around in the open."
Karalie looked down at her feet. "No, she is not."
He waited. Finally, she met his eyes again she raised her chin and then she slowly changed.
She became infused with color, her skin first until it was a medium brown. Her hair darkened to black, her eyes went from silvery-gray to brown. She seemed much younger now. She looked indeed like a peasant girl.
"Illusion?"
Karalie shook her head. "No. It's real."
