Introducing Emma (Properly)

“Sorry for intruding.” Emma apologises, looking around at the Fateweaver barrier around her and seeming somewhat disappointed. I can only assume that it’s at the lack of openly magical things around, since the barrier and building within looks very mundane. I shake my head. “That’s alright, you’re not. I understand having some questions and all.” I say.

Emma nods, a look of slight apprehension on her face. “How do we get into your thingy?” She asks. “It’s called a barrier babe.” Lena corrects cheekily. “Shut your pretty mouth, I’m trying here!” Emma banters back, her joking tone betraying a strain. She’s doing her best to take all this in. I giggle at the scene.

“First, I need to invite you to my party.” I say, mentally sending the invite. The two of them stare at the space in front of them where the windows opened, almost equally confused. “So you weren’t kidding, you do have video game powers…” Lena trails off, and I chuckle. Emma for her part, whips her head to me.

“Video game powers? What?” She asks. “One thing at a time, I’ll explain. Let’s get you inside first. You gotta accept the invite before I can take you in, otherwise you’ll be freezing cold.” I say, taking charge of the situation. The two of them stare at the window for a few more seconds before hitting the accept button.

“Alright, ready?” I ask, and they nod. “3…2…1…” I count down as a warning for Emma’s sake, then use the spell to enter my Kingdom. The Fateweaver barrier is replaced by the gorgeous landscape of my home barrier, complete with my castle and the rest of my guild standing just out the front, waiting for us.

Both of them look around, Emma more shocked than Lena, but both still pretty impressed. “You LIVE here?” Emma asks incredulously. “Yep. It’s part of my powers.” I say proudly. Lena shakes her head. “This is beautiful.” She says, not a hint of sarcasm or mockery to be found. I let them stare around for a little longer, then speak up.

“Let me introduce you to the rest of my guild. Properly.” I tell them, leading them towards where my girlfriends and Olivia are waiting. “Good to see you again babes!” Mia calls out. Paige waves shyly, her face a bit pink. Emma waves back, bewildered. “You’ve met Mia and Paige already. Mia is an air mage.” I explain.

As a demonstration, Mia lifts her hands up and strong gusts of wind buffet through the group, moving some of the snow off the top of the ground. “Paige is an earth mage.” I continue. Paige does her best to push past her shyness and the ground beneath us starts to rumble. Chunks of dirt and rock raise up from the earth. She sets them back down just as fast.

I tap the landscape reset button, just to clean things up quickly. Emma looks around, surprised at the suddenness of it. I move on, not giving her much time to ponder. “This is Skylar. She’s a shadow mage.” I continue. Skylar raises her hands and shadows come together to form a solid, a hand that waves at Emma. Lena chuckles while Emma just stares, completely unsure how to handle this.

“This is Olivia. She’s our mentor and has animal powers.” I go on. A flash of green light envelopes her momentarily, before she steps out in her Tetramand form. Emma’s eyes widen, and I can’t help but smirk slightly. This is kinda cool, showing off all our powers to someone who was previously mundane. Olivia transforms back with another green flash.

“This is Ivy, she’s a plant mage and our healer.” I say. Some of the flowers in the garden bed start to grow rapidly in size. Vines sprout from them, and they curl around Ivy’s outstretched arms, lifting her gently into the air, and setting her back down again in the same place, the flowers shrinking just as quickly.

Emma is pretty shocked by all of this. “You…look like Poison Ivy…” She says, seemingly not sure what else to say. Ivy chuckles. “Gemma created me that way. I like it.” She says simply, and I smile at her. “She…created you?” Emma asks, looking at me, then back at Ivy. “Are you…human?” She asks. Ivy shakes her head. “I’m an artificial spirit. I was created using magical materials and Gemma’s power.” She elaborates.

Emma shakes her head softly. “This is a lot.” She says. “It’s okay. I get it.” I say sympathetically. I was in her position a couple months ago, so I very much do understand. She turns to me. “So what are you? Video game themed powers or something?” She asks. I nod. “My powers are themed like an RPG.” I explain.

“I have a playstyle that I’ve chosen and I can learn a lot of different abilities within that. I’m a battlemage, and I have a few different types of magic. I have summoning magic, as in the case of Ivy over there. I also have ice magic.” I say, holding a hand out in front of me. A spiked ball of ice solidifies in front of me. I dismiss it after giving Emma time to process.

“I can do other things too, but most of it isn’t really important right now, just that this barrier and castle are a part of my powers. We’ve gotten it checked by professionals, and they’ve confirmed nobody could even try to break in here.” I allow myself to boast a bit. Emma nods, looking around again. “That’s all mighty impressive…” She says, not entirely sure what to do with the information.

“Let’s take a walk, the three of us.” I suggest, gesturing to her, Lena and I. “I’ll answer any questions you have.” I offer. Emma nods slowly. “I think I’d like that…” She says, still processing. I shoot an apologetic look to my guild. They all return with looks of understanding and encouragement. I smile, and turn to walk around the beautiful barrier with our hopefully soon to be new guild members.

We walk around in silence for a few minutes. I know today has probably been information overload for Emma, so I give her time to gather her thoughts. Eventually, she speaks up and asks her first question. “Lena was talking about there being gangs and…some really not nice people around. She said they kidnapped her to sell her magic or something. Is all that true?” She asks.

I look to Lena, expecting to see a look of offence there or something at the implication that she’s lying. But all I see on Lena’s face is concern and sympathy for her girlfriend. They really do care about each other, that much is clear. I sigh as I think about the question. “The state of the abyss in Sydney is…well it’s really bad.” I say.

“Lena’s lucky she wasn’t hurt worse. There are a lot of horrible people in this place. In the abyss, law and order is a lot harder to have. It only takes one powerful person to bring everything crashing down. Good intentions lead nowhere if you don’t have the power to back it up. When you’re going up against people who can level buildings with a wave of their hand, you need to be strong.” I explain.

“There isn’t really anybody strong enough around here to put a stop to it. Well actually, there is, but as far as we know, he wants it to be this way. He’s the reason all of this happens. Gangs of powerful people are everywhere and everybody else either has to align themselves with one to survive, or hide and hope they don’t get caught up in some turf war or kidnapped.”

Emma shudders as I say all of this. “Lena was kidnapped for her mana, the thing that fuels all our magic. They have special machines that can drain a person’s mana against their will. They kidnap people, hook them up to those machines and sell their mana in batteries to the highest bidder. Mana is always in demand, and the mana **** trade is the main way gangs make money.” I continue.

Emma looks absolutely horrified, and I nod solemnly. “It’s awful stuff. My guild and I are hoping to change it, but we need to get stronger. That’s why we want you both to join us. We want you to help us clean this place up, make it safer. We want to fight against Mathias - the guy who’s making things like this.” I say.

I let the silence take over the three of us as we continue walking through the snow. Emma looks down at her feet, then at the trees around us as she thinks about everything that I’ve said. We walk for a full five minutes before she speaks again. “I need to see it for myself.” She says. I whip my head around. “What?” I ask.

“I need to see it.” She repeats, more firmly. “Why?” I ask, already knowing the answer but asking all the same. “I believe both of you. I don’t think my baby would lie about any of this, or that you would Gemma. But Lena was talking about you offering to let us move in with you, for safety and all. That sounds really nice, but I can’t just pack up my life and move to avoid something I haven’t seen.” She says.

I exchange a look with Lena. She looks resigned. The expression on her face says that no amount of telling her that it’s a bad idea is going to change her mind. I sigh heavily. “Are you sure? It’s not going to be a pretty sight.” I ask her. Emma nods. “I’m sure I want to see. I think I want to help you, but I have to be sure about it. Moving in with you and whatever is a big step, this is all very fast.” She replies. I sigh again. “We better go tell the others.” I say, turning around to walk back to the castle.