Doors, Part 13 - Copper

Lin leaves me by the cliff to wait. It makes sense: I wouldn't be much help to him, since I can't touch anything and no one can see or hear me in the in between, not to mention the fact that the faerie village is tiny, since the faeries are tiny, so I would be like an invisible giant stomping around their village, though one that wouldn't do any damage, since, well, I can't touch anything. And Lin is going to see someone, which means he will be inside, which means I would have to wait outside anyway, since I wouldn't be able to fit in any of the buildings anyway. It would be a little cramped even outside. The streets are not made for someone human-sized.

So I wait outside the village and stare out over the sea. There are some boats out there, sailing slowly far from the shore. The closest town on the coast large enough to have a proper harbor isn't exactly far away, but it's also not exactly close either. I wonder what they boats are carrying.

I wonder why Lin wants to find a potions expert. I don't know how a potion would help me. But then, I don't know anything about magical potions at all. So I trust him to know what he's doing.

Lin's gone for longer than I expected. My stomach starts to rumble. I realise it's been hours since I ate. I also realise there is no food in the In Between, because there's nothing in the In Between. Except me. So there's nothing I can do about it before Lin comes back.

When he finally does, he does not look happy. He said he isn't wanted here. I don't know what happened in the village, but he certainly looks like someone who was just in a place they're not wanted in. And he did that for me.

"What happened?" I ask. He doesn't answer. At first I think he's in the Faerie Realm and can't see or hear me, but then he sighs and looks directly at me.

"Filandis agreed to help. They'll make you a potion. It's definitely not going to get you back home, but I hope it might help at least a little towards that goal," he says and turns to look out to the sea, "But it will take a while to do it. We should come back toni..." his voice fades to a stop and he looks like he just thought of something. And that that something isn't necessarily good.

"We should come back tonight," he continues, turns around, and starts heading back towards the forest, gesturing for me to follow him. I do. "In the meantime, we need to find you an anchor."

"An anchor?" I ask, confused.

"I should have thought of it first," he says, though it sounds like it's more to himself than to me, "Remember how I told you nothing is supposed to be in the In Between?" I nod, worried now, "So, I have no idea what happens if someone is in the In Between for any longer than what it takes to move through it. So since I don't know what happens if you're here for too long, we need to find you an anchor, that will keep you anchored to one Realm or the other, so you'll definitely keep existing."

"Now there's a chance that at any moment I won't keep existing?" I say, moving from worried to terrified, "Yes, you should have thought of that first."

"I know." His voice is annoyed, though I get the feeling it's aimed at him and not me.

I take a deep breath. There's no sense in worrying about things I can't help. Before we get me an anchor, there's nothing I can do to stop myself from not keeping existing, if that's what's going to happen. Whatever that means. We just need to find an anchor, fast. And panicking about what might happen if we don't isn't going to help.

"So what kind of an anchor are we talking about?" I ask.

"Something made of copper, from either the Faerie Realm or yours," he says. "Depending on which one you want to be anchored to. Which one would you like? That's going to affect which way we should go."

"Uh... Does it matter?" I ask. He looks sideways at me for a few seconds while we hurry into the forest.

"I don't know. It won't matter to keeping you existing, though," he says.

"Then whichever we can find faster," I say. He nods and turns left.

"Oh, and one more thing. The copper has to pierce your skin."

"Oh..." I say. I don't know what more to say about it. That doesn't sound like fun, but if the only other option is risking not existing, then there really isn't much of the choice.

"I think I have something at my stash," he says, and speeds up.

"Your stash?" I ask. He looks embarrassed.

"I mean, that's what I call it. I can't call it home, exactly, because the whole forest is kind of my home, but it's a place I keep some things I feel like it's handy to own. I don't go there much, because there isn't much the Forest can't provide continuously that I would need, but it's a nice thing to have some things stashed away for situations like these."

"Oh, so you've been in this situation before?" I ask.

He looks like he can't quite decide whether to scowl or smile at my attempt of a joke.

"No," he simply says. "We're getting close now. It's just around this small hill."

"How am I going to get copper to pierce my skin if I can't touch anything?" I ask.

"Oh, that's not a problem," he says, "I'll bring it over from the Faerie Realm to the In Between. I can't carry a lot of stuff into here, but it will be enough for this. Wait here."

I see him disappear into a small hole in the hillside I wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't just seen him go in there. So I stop and wait. He returns a moment later.

"Here," he says, and shows me a bit of copper wire and a small green bead, "I suppose through the earlobe is easiest?"

"Uh, yes," I say, "What's the bead for?"

He looks slightly embarrassed again.

"I just happened to find it when looking for the copper. I figured it would make the wire prettier." He flies to my right ear. "Do you want to do this yourself?"

"No, go ahead. You can see by ear much better than I can," I say, and then realise something. "It's clean, right? I don't want a dirty piece of copper through my ear."

"It's perfectly clean," he assures me. Then I feel a pinch on my earlobe, and soon another, smaller one. I assume he poked the whole with something else first. Copper wire would be a little soft for that. Then he does something more for a couple more moments, but since I can't see my own ear I don't know exactly what. I do know the pain recedes, not completely, but a lot. Is he doing some healing magic on my ear? Is there such thing as healing magic?

He flies back a bit and looks at my ear from a longer distance. He looks satisfied. I raise my hand to touch my ear. He has put the wire through my ear, then left a loose loop, intertwined the ends and put the ends through the bead. The ends are bent on the other side so that the bead stays in place.

"It suits you, for a makeshift earring," he says, smiling a little.

"Uh, thank you?" I say. My stomach grumbles again. I had almost forgotten my hunger.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot humans need to eat so often," Lin looks a little startled. "Let's go find you some food, and I can try to explain some of the basics of Manifesting."
____________________________________________________________

The topic for tomorrow is Heart.

~matu