Just started playing Kingdoms of Amlur: Reckoning. Lovely game! Beautiful art, good game design, lotsa monsters! And my character looks like a Monster High doll.

But I suppose I should talk about the future of this story sometime. I am writing a Mirta Story Season 8, but I'm not sure I'll finish it. Inspiration hasn't arrived yet… it'll come, or maybe it won't. This nexgen storyline would be a sensible place to end the story but I'll keep writing it as long as I have ideas. I'm also writing Fallout stuff, which I may or may not finish and post. I'd like to write a Stella/Brandon story, but again I'm inviting the inspiration and it hasn't arrived yet! Basically I'm having lack or plotbunnies problems! We'll see if they ever show up!

16 164 Twig ~Lair~

Queen Bloom is here, touring the campus with Miss Faragonda. We're all supposed to be learning but everyone keeps looking out the windows to see the queen. She's wearing a dark blue suit that manages to look both royal and official, and I sent Vera a picture. Everyone else was taking pictures too.

Miss Athris, who's been trying to teach us about literary devices interacting with real history in the tale of the fairy Erana, finally gives up and says we can have a half period free as long as we do the reading for tomorrow. According to the story today is the day in history that the fairy Erana escaped from the underworld with the help of her paladin beloved. That's one of the things Miss Athris was talking about, how stories put things on big dates even though they probably happened on just any old day.

That's why Queen Bloom is in Magix too, to speak at some kind of memorial celebration. But she and Faragonda are friends, and Amber's here, so she's visiting the school. Once we're out of class Amber goes to catch her and the rest of us tag along because we want to see the famous person.

We end up in the courtyard with snacks. Mostly Queen Bloom and Amber talk about royal stuff but eventually Queen Bloom asks me, "How's your sister doing on Earth? Has she figured out who's going after the talents?"

"We think it's Captain Hook, really. So far Vera and Shimmergloom have been able to help everyone get their shadows back before too much damage happened, but every time the Shadow Thief just goes after somebody else. At least it's just one at a time!

Queen Bloom looks off into the sky for a moment. "That sounds like Jim."

"Tell us about him, Mom."

"Captain Hook tricked us. We thought he wanted to help us defeat the queen but he just wanted to take over the place himself. He betrayed us. But I wonder… for a while it really seemed like he wanted to be friends. I don't think he decided until right then, when he took the great tree of Neverland. He could've chosen the other way and I want to think it was a close thing. But maybe I'm just fooling myself because I liked Jim."

"You liked him?" Amber asks, looking shocked.

Bloom smiles. "The person he was with us was a fun guy. Bit sarcastic, good in a fight. If he could've chosen to be that person, come here to the magic dimension and got a normal life here… but he chose to attack us all instead. Maybe he was just that angry at Matt's dad. If he's on Earth he's probably out for revenge on us for spoiling all his plans but he's not going after us. I wonder why not."

"He did make a Nemesis of Tinkerbell. Or someone did. Can you think of where he might hide out? Vera's afraid she won't be able to save everyone in time and Earth will get full of vampire celebrities. We kind of need to stop him."

I don't know where you might find Jim—other than on a pirate ship. I think Matt and Tinkerbell would know if he was living in Neverland which leaves… all of Earth and the entire magic dimension."

There is a general sigh. Amber looks troubled, and she's not the one with a sister panicking on Earth.

Then Queen Bloom offers, "I know! Annabelle invited us to her next concert; you all could go instead of us. If Hook is going after the talents he won't miss the winner of the show."

Amber lights up. She's never been to a concert on Earth and she knows Annabelle because of course she does. "Could we? I want to!"

"Sure, just try not to get in a magic battle and scare the audience."

"Because you never did that, mom!"

At least I can text Vera that we'll come help her with something.

After Queen Bloom goes off to appear at whatever royal event she's here for, I'm still thinking we could try to find Hook's lair. It might be in Magix. Magix is a big city and a handy place to buy illegal spell ingredients. So I ask my friends, "What's a good place to have a lair?"

Phe says, "Blackmud swamp is popular with witches, so are the caves under cloud tower. They're not very nice places, but nice people don't need lairs."

Jamie comes jogging between two trees and throws himself down on the bench next to amber. "Sorry, just got off work."

"You missed my mom! I wanted you to meet her."

"We had to clean all the balconies and wash all the dishes. Why are you looking for a lair?"

"Twyla's poor sister is stuck on Earth and Captain Hook keeps enchanting people there but he probably doesn't live on Earth because mostly people don't. So if we could find where he lives we could ask him to stop and Twyla's sister wouldn't have to worry anymore."

"Well that's a quest." Jamie says cheerfully. "Can I come?"

Amber says, 'sure." and Phe asks, "You're a pirate, where would you hide out if you were doing black magic?"

"I'd hide on a ship but the lakes around here aren't big enough to have a really good one. Unless it's a ghost ship that's invisible most of the time. What kind of guy was Captain Hook?"

"Well he helped Tinkerbell kidnap all the talents then betrayed her, but Mom says he was also a good friend or a while."

"Sounds like a good pirate who lost his way." Jamie says.

I'm watching him because he does wear a yellow hoodie like Vera described the Shadow Thief wearing, but that doesn't mean much. Lots of people wear hoodies so we can't judge on someone's choice of sweatshirt.

Cassie said, "Well we have the rest of the afternoon free, want to see if we can find a lair in the swamp?"

This sounds like much more fun than doing homework. We change into jeans and boots and spray on insect repellent potions and head into the swamp. It's summer so the whole place smells like rotting vegetation, a smell I like but Amber wrinkles her dainty nose. She has to tie up her long swirling hair too. She lags behind talking to Jamie, telling him about her mother's adventures in Neverland. It's strange to hear the names of all these book characters talked about in real life, still, even though we met the real Wendy and Vera met the real Tinkerbell.

Cassie unrolls a map of the swamp. "This is my dad's from the museum. See, here are all the ruins and things where someone could hide a lair. Witches from Cloud Tower hide out there to pretend to be a coven sometimes."

Phe nudges her, "How do you know what Cloud Tower students do?"

"Because my mom's a reporter. She has to learn lots of random things so I learn them too because I'm there." Cassie explains cheerfully.

This isn't the place I'd choose for a lair. Blackmud Swamp is lush and green and beautiful, but it's also humid and damp and if we didn't have anti-bug protection this would be a really uncomfortable hike. Behind us I hear Jamie say this would be a great spot to catch malaria.

Cassie leads us to the first ruin, which is just an island in the swamp with the walls of a stone building still on it. Clearly someone's been lairing here since we find the remains of a fire and a bunch of candles, some magic circles chalked into the floor, and a lot of empty soda bottles and snack wrappers.

Phe diagnoses it as a case of Cloud Tower students and hands me a trash bag. At least we can just float the garbage into the bag, instead of using our hands. So we clean up. This is not the adventure I was expecting to have today, but it's kind of fun. We practice making things float and try to guess what spells the witch students were trying to cast. Lots of black candles for curses or binding spells and a few blue for luck spells.

We wander around some more and clean up two other witch hangouts but find no sign of anything that looks like Captain Hooks lair. Jamie says, "A pirate wouldn't want to stay somewhere so muggy and unhealthy."

Amber says, "There's no place near Magix that has sea breezes. We just have lakes."

But I've had an idea who might be able to help, but I'd better not tell Amber I know where there's a speakeasy with criminals. Maybe that Ziggy knows something more and if I bring him something else he'll tell me.

As we return from our swamp trek Professor Palladium catches us with a pop quiz on swamp life. I wonder what kind of quiz he had ready for our classmates who spent the half day of watching TV in their dorms! Then it's dinnertime and then I sneak out. Well, I tell Amber, Phe and Cassie that I'm going out but not where. If Amber ditches me, I can ditch her. Well, once. Not often and still be a good squire, but once.

So I fly over the city and land outside the flower shop. It occurs to me that I might not be able to get in, but I guess making one deal with Mr. Ziggy and not trying to buy alcohol while underage has put me on the safe list. It's a slow night I guess; the place is mostly empty and the pretty singer is at the bar learning how to mix drinks from the bartender. Mister Ziggy is sitting at his table going over a book of lists that must be his sales. He sees me and his ugly face splits into a big grin. "Hey doll, anything else you wanna buy?"

"Um. I want to find the person who bought those dreamdrake roots. I think he's doing bad things and we need to stop him."

"Well I might have a few ideas if you help me out first!"

"Just ideas?" I was really hoping he secretly knew. He seems like the kind of guy who'd try to find out just so he could trade that knowledge. "Ok, what do you want for your ideas?"

The wizard grabs one of the papers on the table and passes it to me. He had it ready just in case someone from Alfea came in? It looks like a list of animal parts: rabdor fur, swerret feathers, deerbeetle antlers, elephish scales. All animals that live in the Alfea Natural Park. "I won't hurt any animals but if they shed feathers and stuff naturally I'll try to get some."

"Only you can do it, doll. I can't get into the park since I ain't no fairy! Go on, bring me potion ingredients and I'll try to find where that kid's staying. He might be boarding with someone, he seemed a little young to be casting spells with dreamdrake root."

I blink. We never even thought the Shadow Thief might be more than one person. An adult with a kid working for them? Ziggy said a boy bought the roots, and Vera saw the Shadow Thief and said he was a small person.

The swerret feathers are easy; Lupita saves the ones her pet sheds to make hairclips. The feathers are bright white with gray stripes and Lupita sticks little jewels along the shaft and hangs them from clips. She gives me some extra feathers when I buy one.

The other items on the list are more challenging. Deerbeetles shed their antlers in the spring and in a certain part of the forest that we have to fly around for hours looking for. I rope Phe and Cassie into helping with my collecting because they wanted to know what I was up to. Of course I don't tell them I'm trading with a gangster, just that I'm collecting spell ingredients.

Elephish live in ponds all over the Alfea Natural park where they hang out blowing bubbles and occasionally shed a scale as new ones grow in. To find them we have to wade in among the waterlilies with strainers. This doesn't work very well but Amber calls the undines to help and they gather a whole pile of glittering scales for me.

Snakerats live underground and their bite is poisonous to humans but doesn't bother digmoles, so amber asks the digmoles to bring us a few shed skins.

But even Amber being a real life Disney princess doesn't help us get hair off a rabdor. Rabdors are huge grumpy creatures. Even amber's singing can't lure one out of the trees so we can brush it. We have to attack it with brushes in midair. We get kicked a lot but not very hard so we just go tumbling around a lot in the air until the rabdor realizes that being brushed actually feels pretty good and lands to let us keep doing it.

So after a few days I go back to the nightclub and give Mr. Ziggy his ingredients. He's happy anyway. "Thanks, doll!"

"We had to wrestle a rabdor! Where's the Shadow Thief hiding?"

"Shadow Thief? I thought we were looking for a kid who bought dreamdrake roots, but that is a snazzy name for him. I did some divination and got you an address." And he hands me a piece of paper, just like that.

"You could've done it anytime?"

Mr. Ziggy frowns at me. "No I couldn't, what kinda guy would I be if I scried on my clients?"

"But you… did?" I asked, confused.

"After I got paid."

So his whole morals is about money? Oh. "Where is this place?"

"Last place you'd expect. A big money house! Could be your thief stole his residence too."

"Ok, but if there's nothing there I'm coming to get my money back. Or something." Then the embarrassment of having said that dumb sentence drove me away as Mr. Ziggy laughed.

I have the flight home to think of a way to tell my friends I have a lead without telling them I made deals with a shady wizard. I kind of don't want Amber to know, and I think Phe and Cassie would call me dumb for dealing with a criminal. Only I can't think of a better excuse for where I got the address so I end up telling the exact truth anyway.

Amber giggles and looks impressed.

Phe says, "Well it's probavbly a bad idea to hang out with criminals but if it worked… what's the address?"

I pass the paper around. Cassie says, "Rich people live on that street. How can the Shadow Thief be hiding in a house that people definitely live in?"

Amber's bright blue eyes go thoughtful. "He could if the people are out of town. Some people have a summer home in the resort realm that they visit for months. If the owners were away that long someone could hide in the attic or the basement no trouble. Maids would only clean the rooms that people live in."

"So can we go check?" I ask, excited.

Amber gets out her phone. 'Sure. I'll call the Reinharts and ask if I can visit—or use their garden for a concert! I'm sure they won't mind. I'll invite Jamie."

The family gives their permission and the next afternoon we go to the house. It's a big modern place with lots of windows built onto the front of a much older stone building. Magix architecture is a weird mix of ultramodern and fairytale, Vera would be able to name the styles but I just know there are different kinds and they sometimes work together and sometimes not.

Jamie says, "Good place for a lair. Bet they don't even go in the old part, I bet it's cold and clammy all year long! Let's go in!" It's just the three of us; Cassie wanted to see the place but Phe said the fewest people should go because of politeness to the people who owned the house.

Amber has a key and inside the house smells like a hotel. I am suddenly understanding how uncomfortable Vera is feeling in Madder's house. It's weird being in someone else's house without them! Luckily we don't have to stay in the actual lived-in parts of the house. We're here for the attic and the basement.

Jamie has joined us for this mission and he suggests the basement first. We find steps down and it's musty and really cold and full of wine. Just like in a movie or something, all these bottles and giant casks. Jamie notices footprints in the dust. "Bet the maids are helping themselves while the owner's away."

I say, "They'd never notice. Seriously, are they taking baths in it?"

"They throw big parties." Amber explains, "Really big parties. I have to go to them and it's really boring."

Jamie says, "Oh? What would you rather be doing?"

"Studying magic or exploring the swamp or having adventures or drawing or sailing or shopping." Amber answers immediately. "Well maybe not studying."

I smile, "As your squire I have to tell you to study. Let's go look upstairs."

"We could steal some wine." Jamie says.

Amber responds, "We couldn't drink it. We're underage."

"Um, we're not allowed to steal it either. Might as well do both!"

Jamie is definitely just making trouble for the fun of it. Why do I have to be the grownup here? Just because I'm the oldest? "Let's not do anything illegal and just finish our quest."

So we go up to the attic and find lots of crates, enough furniture to fill another house, and an evil lair.

The first thing Amber says is, "It doesn't look like a very evil lair."

And she's right, it doesn't look obviously evil. It's obvious someone is squatting here; they put some blankets on a cot and hid a few boxes underneath. More suspiciously there's a big magic circle drawn on the floor and a desk with lots of obviously magical little bottles on it. I pick one up and look at it. The bottle is made of red glass and it has something inside, a twist of translucent darkness.

I recognize it from the book. "These are pieces of shadows! This is the right place!" I look at Jamie, who smiles blandly back. Vera suspected him. Is he being too innocent? I wish someone else was along.

Amber lifts up a bottle and looks at it. "I wonder whose shadow it was cut from. Can we send it back? You read that book."

"Just open the bottle and hold it so the light shines in, I think." There was a whole chapter about cleaning up after a shadow magician but I didn't pay too much attention. I figure there are grownups who are professionals at the kind of thing.

Amber tilts the bottle to the light from the attic's big window and the bit of shadow disappears. She starts gleefully uncorking all the bottles. I start looking at the rest of the Shadow Thief's stuff. Books on black magic, books on making magical items, a map of the magic universe. A big locked trunk. Didn't Vera find a big locked trunk in Neverland? "Amber, can you get this open?"

Amber snaps her fingers and the padlock clicks open.

"Thanks." I take the lock off and slowly lift the lid. I think I'm expecting to see the same thing Vera described, a bottle with something awful growing in it. Jamie steps forward to look and starts to say something. But.

"Empty." I say.

"What?" Jamie says, blank-voiced like he was expecting something else.

"It's empty." I repeat, and tilt the heavy wooden trunk to show him.

"But-" Jamie stutters. And I start to have a very bad feeling.

Amber feels it too. She puts down an empty bottle with a click and she gets it, instantly. "Jamie, you're… it's you? You're the shadow magician. You're the one who's been doing all this bad stuff!"

She wasn't sure when she started talking but as she speaks Jamie's expression of dismay confirms her guess. Her face is tragedy and flames leap around her hands.

Jamie stutters, "Wait, no! Let me explain! Please!"

I'm not sure what to do when the villain asks for a reasonable thing. I unfold my bow and aim, just in case.

And Amber relaxes a little. "You'd better explain! Are you really—Jim? Did you meet my mom?" Now she's upset about something else. "How old are you?"

That puts Jamie so off balance I almost feel sorry for the guy. He waves his hands frantically. "No, no, it's not weird like that!"

"Then what is it like?" Amber's eyes blaze and her hair is curling up into candleflames at the ends.

Jamie tries to explain, still waving his hands and stumbling over his words just like I would if Amber was looking at me like that. "Yes, yes, I'm Jim, or I was twenty years ago. It seems being trapped in the World of Nightmares was good for me, or something. I didn't know I'd come out younger! The first thing I did when I got back to the real world was plot revenge on the Winx and I found these great spells to use… but I've hardly done half the stuff I planned! Nobody really got hurt!" He runs out of breath and has to stop for a minute before going on, "I haven't made more trouble for a little while. I kind of… changed my mind. About revenge. I don't want to do it anymore."

Amber's face softens. "I knew you weren't really a bad guy."

I say, "Yes he was!"

At the same time Jamie says, "Well I was. But it turns out revenge isn't much fun compared to sailing and riding levibikes and having adventures."

"Well that's all right then. You have to fix everything you did and apologize to Twig's sister stop using shadow magic. It's dangerous! And then you can, I don't know, enroll at Red Fountain and be a normal person."

I have a whole different kind of bad feeling now. I'm pretty sure that a squire shouldn't let her princess hang out with a villain, even a reformed one. I'm pretty sure a squire should tell her princess' mother.

But… Amber's happy when she hangs out with Jamie, and he isn't being creepy in any way even though he used to be older.

Now Jamie's saying apologetically, "There's another problem. I started making a Nemesis of… you. I stopped a long time ago, I couldn't manage any hateful thoughts to feed it. I kind of brought you here so you could find it and destroy it before it got out of the bottle. But it's gone."

Amber's hair smokes and she shakes her head. "Well we'll have to find it."

I stopped actually aiming at Jamie but I say, "Isn't a Nemesis really dangerous? I read about them, they can only be destroyed by one person… but if it's only half finished… I need to check the book but it's back in my room!"

Jamie says, "I've read it, I read all about Shadow Magic. An immature Nemesis can attack anybody and, well, someone stole it so they can let it loose whenever they want so that's a problem. Amber, let's run away!"

"What? You mean-?"

"No, no, not like that! We could be traveling adventurers. You wouldn't have to do all the boring princess stuff, we could explore new realms and be heroes or villains or whatever we wanted every day!"

"Whoa, you can't just..." I begin.

But Amber is already shaking her head. "I can't do that, you nut! Mom and Dad need me! And we can't leave a Nemesis running around! Honestly! And you can't live here in someone else's attic, it's creepy. You need to find a room in a boarding house like a normal person."

Jamie blinks at that sudden change in topic. "Um. I don't have a lot of money."

"We'll find something. Let's finish cleaning up this icky stuff and get back to school."

But I have a problem. I think about it while I help clean up the evil lair stuff while Jamie packs his normal stuff. He has clothes and a toothbrush and snacks and things too. He seems relieved to be doing it. I guess it would feel better to have everything out in the open. Now he can make things right. Except I have to ruin that. "...Amber? I think I have to tell my mom or Miss Faragonda or somebody. About Jamie."

"Twyla, you can't! Jamie's not a bad guy now!"

"I know but… look, it's your squire's job to make sure you're safe so I kind of have to. I'll tell them Jamie learned his lesson, it'll be ok." And if Amber changes her mind and wants to go off and be an adventurer, which I could understand, grownups should know about that.

But Amber looks super upset. "No, you can't! They wouldn't understand!"

Jamie starts to say something but Amber raises her hands, says some words really fast, and casts a spell on me. I feel it fall on me like a net and tighten around me.

"Hey! What'd you do? Take it off!" I squirm; the spell kind of feels like my shirt is suddenly too tight. My magic fumbles but can't get a grip.

"It's not a bad spell, just so you can't tell anyone!"

Jamie tries, "Wait, give it minute, Twyla just wants to protect you."

"I can protect myself! Twig, I'll undo the spell if you promise not to tell anyone."

"I-' Promise, I'm ready to say but I hesitate an instant and Amber shakes her head.

"I'm going home." Amber says, and flounces out looking very royal. Jamie gives me a sort of sympathetic-apologetic look and I wonder if he'll try talking Amber out of this later. I hope he does.

So I stop arguing and follow Amber back to school. Jamie goes off to look for a boarding house to move into. Amber points out that Jamie can't be an evil pirate if he has jobs and lives in a boarding house like a normal person, and I repeat that I don't think Jamie's an evil anything, I just want to be careful. Then I ask what a boarding house is since they don't really have those on Earth anymore. Turns out it's a house where you can rent a bedroom and share the kitchen if you can't afford a whole apartment or don't want to do your own cooking.

As soon as we're back in our dorm I try to tell Phe and Cassie, then I call Mom and then my boyfriend in case the spell doesn't work over a phone, then I try writing, typing and texting. Nothing works. When I open my mouth to say, "Jamie is an ex-villain!" other words come out. Normal words, things I was probably going to say later. With my friends we end up talking about homework. On the my mouth decided to ask Mom about my grandparents and chat with Tetsuo about movies. They were good conversations and we'd probably have had them anyway. I can't decide if being under this spell is creepy or actually not so bad. It doesn't feel terrible, but I can't stop worrying that Amber might—something. Or Jamie might have been lying about having turned over a new leaf. No matter how sincere he seems, having the most important girl in the magic dimension hanging out with an ex-villain is a thing grownups should know about. But I can understand Amber too; I wouldn't want a bunch opf parents telling me who I can be friends with either.

I grab my head and comb my fingers through my curls, like I could comb out my thoughts. Cassie looks at me and I say, "This homework is making me tear my hair!" I have a textbook open, not to do homework but to research breaking enchantments. There's something called a dispel potion but it needs a gryphon feather and something called 'flying water' and I don't know what those are. The Kiss of True Love would do it but I don't think my relationship with Tetsuo has gone past True Like. I like him a lot but it's probably not True Love until you want to get married and we're not there yet. The textbook says brotherly love, parental love, friend love, and pet love only work for particular kinds of enchantments.

My phone chimes with a text from Vera: Madder has her shadow back! She got us tickets to Annabelle's exclusive show and backstage passes! We'll get to meet Annabelle and see her costumes up close! See you there!

Of course that's what Vera thinks about. Costumes! And wow, she's meeting really famous people now.

But… Earth. Magic works differently on Earth, so maybe I can talk to vera at the concert and she can tell Mom. "Amber?"

"What?" Amber asks warily. She's put herself next to Phe, on the other side of the common room from me.

"The concert on Earth, are you still going?"

"Of course! Annabelle invited me and two friends, so you and Jamie. Sorry." She adds to Phe and Cassie, who don't look too bothered.

Phe sees a topic more interesting than our potions homework, "What do Earth people wear to concerts?"

I haven't been to many concerts, certainly none as big as this one. "Normal clothes I think. Cute clothes but not, like, ballgowns."

Definitely more interesting than homework. Amber weighs in and my roommates are off into talking about outfits while I study the breaking of enchantments.